2025-09-12 17:22 UTC
Replies (4)
-
@corbden@defcon.social 2025-09-12 18:51
Ok let's get into it. Cognitive dissonance/consonance theory originated when Leon Festinger when asked the question: "Why do core believers in doomsday cults double-down after doomsday never comes?" In his book, "When Prophecy Fails," he outlines the history of such sects (like the Anabaptists and Millerites), describes his theory about why it happens, and then infiltrates a doomsday UFO cult to watch events unfold and confirm his theory. He also performed famous experiments on college students where he tricked them into legitimately believing they'd enjoyed a meaningless, tedious task by paying them almost nothing to lie. The theory works like this: 🧵 #ReligiousTrauma #psychology #MAGA #cults #AbuseCulture
-
@marshray@infosec.exchange 2025-09-12 22:47
@corbden@defcon.social So they’re not “misusing the term ‘cognitive dissonance’”. They’re using it appropriately, but to make such a statement suggests to you they have a misunderstanding of the basic theory.
-
@cy@fedicy.us.to 2025-09-12 23:49
I really wonder (and am very suspicious of actually) why almost all mind control in any of the stories we ever tell each other is actually body control. The notion of a mind trapped in a puppetted body sure gives people the spooks, but it's not mind control. Mind control is where you do your master's bidding, thinking it was your idea, and that you're doing the right thing. Or at least twisting your mind to fear not doing what the controllers want. You come out of mind control feeling guilty, because you really did want to do all those awful things.
-
@Aurin_the_classtraitor@climatejustice.social 2025-09-24 16:48
@corbden@defcon.social "Mind control completely subverts the mind's natural process for righting itself in the face of disconfirming information." Yup. That's what it was like for me. With the actual cult I was born into as well as other ideologies that had their claws deep in me for over a decade (that cult members introduced me to). I look back at my beliefs and get dizzy with how self-contradictory they were! But I also remember how at the time I GENUINELY saw it as the other way around, that people debating me were contradicting themselves and I thought I had the correct, logical, and bigger picture view of things. Really I was just shifting goalposts and attacking straw puppets and fixating on whatever aspect fit my narrative while dismissing the rest... Classic manipulation tactics that I didn't want to be using and didn't believe I was using. Really scary to realise what was going on in my mind. But luckily the truth (along with empathy and connection) is one of my unshakable core values, so I eventually faced all that dissonance and toppled the entire house of cards. But I had to be physically far away from the abusers and ideology-slingers before I could do that, and have very patient support.