Ask Lemmy

A lot of churches are cults. The Jehovah's Witnesses put their religion before their own kids and kick them out if they want. They'll pass on a blood transfusion for their religion. So yeah, mind control is a real thing.

In a word: gullible. Full stop.

For the abrahamitic religions, I'd say that the problem is the age of their texts. Their metaphors and the societies they were created in are so outdated that in order to live by the texts, which have to be followed since they are the only cornerstone everything is built upon, you need specialists that are authority figures like priests who you have to trust as a laiman in order to learn what the texts meaning is. Because not everyone can devote themselves to theology.

Imo, because they expect God/Source/whatever to be a cosmic vending machine, without doing any internal work on themselves, or external work to make manifest the world they envision, with a large Side-Order of blame, shame, and guilt, scattered, smothered, and covered with greed, vengeance, and distraction (addictions included).

Their entire worldview depends on blindly believing things that don't make sense and are unverifiable

They are trained from a very young age to accept anything an authority tells them.

I think maybe you have it backwards people who are easily swayed/trusting of authority/gullible are going to be naturally drawn toward religion. Skeptics/those who don’t take things at face value are going to be naturally skeptical of it.

Religion doesn’t make you stupid but it’s very attractive to the sort

People with a highly metaphysical worldview are easier to deceive and manipulate because their normal logic barriers have already been broken down - ie, if you already believe that the earth and everything on it was created by an omnipotent superbeing in six days, it's not much of a further leap to believe that demons are making you horny.

There is also a selection bias at play here. I suspect that people who are more susceptible to manipulation are more likely to be religious.

I think you have it backwards, it's no wonder people who are easy to manipulate get drawn into religion.

South Park sang it best.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Hm3mDatFpNE

Joseph Smith was called a prophet (Dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb) He started the Mormon religion (Dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb). (Dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb) Joseph Smith was called a prophet-

(Dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb) Many people believed Joseph (Dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb) And that night he-ee saw an angel (Dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb)

(Dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb)

Joseph Smith was called a prophet (Dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb)

(Dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb)

He found the stones and golden plates (Dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb) Even though nobody else ever saw them (Dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb)

(Dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb)

(Dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb)

And that's how the Book of Mormon was written (Dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb) (Dumb dadumb dumb dumb dumb dumb) (Dumb dadumb dumb dumb dumb dumb) (Dahumb dahumb dumb dumb dumb dumb) (Dumb dumb dumb dumb duuumb, duuumb.)

Martin went home to his wife (Dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb) And showed her pages from the Book of Mormon (Dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb)

Lucy Harris smart smart smart (Smart smart smart smart smart)

Martin Harris dumb dadumb-

Lucy Harris smart smart smart Martin Harris dumb. So Martin went on back to Smith Said the pages had gone away Smith got mad and told Martin He needed to go pray (Dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb)

(Dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb)

Dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb.

Literally, because they're trained, usually from the age of children, to believe things without evidence. Their beliefs are based ENTIRELY on the conviction of other brainwashed ~~idiots~~ religious people, which can be very convincing as a small child who's otherwise completely and utterly dependant on the understanding of the adults around them.

This is from someone who grew up in a religion and thankfully realized other peoples' conviction is absolutely NOT a valid basis for understanding truth.

If you believe in a magic man in the sky and a talking snake, it's probably pretty easy to convince them of other things too.

Pretty simple. They are groomed from birth and often until death, to blindly trust the "leaders" of their community. At some point they develop critical thinking skills, but they are so deeply manipulated to trust the cult that they face an internal conflict: Break away from your core values, family, friends, community, comfort of purpose and greater value, etc. Or don't apply critical thinking to certain topics in your life.

Faced with what is essentially a social and moral death they ofteb choose the simpler option, just don't let logic into that part of their life.

Honestly, hard to balme them, I myself have faced similar issues in my life and sadly didn't always have to courage and strength to go with logic and instead kept with social norms that I know are wrong. To be fair, I think that 90% of people are blind to their own illogical (and often harmful) beliefs, but they easily identify it in others.

People are stupid. They can be made to believe any lie because either they want to believe it's true or because they are afraid it's true.

-Terry Goodkind, "Wizard's First Rule"

Hate to break it to you, it's not just religious people.

when you believe one outlandish thing, it's easy to be convinced of others. On top of that one of the main tools religions have is fear. Make people believe in some horrible fate, then convince them the only way to avoid that fate is through doing exactly as you say.

Yourlve got the cause and effect backwards there big shoots.

I don't know about across the pond, but to me that always seemed to be a loud minority of charismatic leaders gathering big flocks. Which the rest of The Church tries to distance itself from.

I think this isn't specifically tied to religion. It's just it's noticeable when it is. People are manipulated by governments and the media all of the time. It even happens in largely secular states as well.

You say evangelicals, but there's also the likes of Mormons, Seventh day Adventists (not really a big cult now as it used to be), Jehovah's Witnesses. There are Sunni extremists and Shia extremists in Islamic countries. China had weird cults as well such as the Falun Gong. But that also had an atheistic movement in the cultural revolution. Nazi Germany's movement was borderline pagan in nature.

Think about how scary and tough life is on your own. Think about everything bad that's happening, and realizing that no one is in control. This we are all aware of, but we choose to confront that. Christians at least (because it's who I grew up with so I just have the most experience) find comfort in their church. It gives them the feeling that there is someone in charge, that it's not all just chaos but there is a plan, and rules, and a defined right and wrong. (Again, ignoring all the things wrong with the church, just from my examples).

Believing allows them to not have to worry about the world. There's a plan. It's not chaos. It's safe. To me it's very natural why people choose it, it's honestly scary facing the chaotic real world we have, and I honestly don't think most people can handle it.

They were conditioned to growing up. Their parents taught them to, they saw how the ingroup and the outgroups work and settled on the ingroup. Not much more to it than that i'm afraid.

The same reason why people who believe in crystal-healing are easy to manipulate.

Because they have glaring gaps in their rational thinking ability

I think it's because religions, cults, sports teams or whatever have community. Community comes with shared identities and beliefs. Nobody wants to be outcasted or shunned. So you follow along. Your friends are there, your family is there ... they all believe the same thing.

I mean they believe there's a man in the sky that they don't see who controls everything. Then that big man speaks through the pastor and this pastor interprets this book for them to hear. Everything good or bad is part of some divine plan. Then the whole thing is wrapped around the idea of wholehearted faith.

All throughout history, religious leaders plant themselves as a way to control people and power over them. See Europe, Asia, Africa, the Americas.

Because they have been taught, from childhood, to just believe whatever the guy up front tells them to.

The bubble. I have a friend who ended up in a 'bubble' church. They get all their news from the church. TV channels: church. Cinema: church.

They have a STEM degree. They're not stupid, and yet they are.

It's why religions make such a BIG DEAL about "faith".

Faith is simply a commitment to believe things that otherwise contradict obvious reality (but which invariably work to some "leader's" advantage).

2 Corinthians 5:7

For we live by faith, not by sight.

The whole concept of faith implies believing something without proof. Not a long stretch to see how people might believe in other, non religious, things without evidence.

Most people are easy to manipulate, religious or not.

1. Why do you think fake news are a thing? People are willing to believe whatever will suit their narrative without actually doing the (real/hard) work of cross-referencing and checking said news (edit: aka, without using their brains). More importantly without ever daring criticize their own beliefs—aka the 'we're right/we're the good guys' vs the 'they're the wrong/the bad guys' type of discourses that seem to prevail in our (manipulative and manipulated) societies.
2. What could explain those almost instantaneous gathering of large crowds based on anger or fear? Most people are willing to use anything as a pretext to let their anger/fear free to express itself and wreck havoc (back to point 1)

People being religious just tells us the type of things they're more likely willing to believe in/act upon. But the gullibility is the same with or without religion (edit: and that is real major issue in everything that's going wrong nowadays), to me at least.

Why are most ~~religious~~ people so easy to manipulate?

Targeted Propaganda creates an online echo-chamber where everyone thinks that they're correct for obvious -to them- reasons (Selective reporting, lying by omission, no one reads the retraction etc.). Add to that the addictive and isolating nature of smart technology, the sense of community they find in their personal traits/hobbies/beliefs/interests and the fact that the rich are actively trying to destroy the middle and working class. That's how you get someone from group X, who believes they are wholly correct and smart enough to not be manipulated by media, asking why group Y is so easy to manipulate. It's not about characteristics of faith, or anything like that. It's the people at the top, telling you it's other members of your class dragging you down. Through the global media monopolies that they control. We're all part of it.

This does not only happen with religion. Also for example with some politicians, or nowadays 'influencers', etc.

It is the phenomenon that people do not like to think for themselves and decide for themselves.

Thinking and deciding and taking responsibility can be difficult. It may appear quite convenient when someone does it for you.

@return2ozma@lemmy.world

Greetings! Brazilian here.

First and foremost, Brazil has many religions beyond Christianity: we have Afro-Brazilian traditions such as Candomblé, Umbanda and Quimbanda, as well as numerous Brazilian indigenous traditions, as well as communities practicing Islam, Judaism, Buddhism, Bahá'í and Kardecism, as well as smaller communities practicing Wicca, Luciferianism and many New Religious Movements (such as "New Age").

There are also independent, personal religions, when people (like me) chose to believe in something on their own without any kind of congregation or membership. I'm myself someone who oscillates between religiosity and non-religiosity, between Apatheism (which is not Atheism, despite how both terms look similar) and a deeply-specific mix (syncretism) between Luciferianism, Lilitheism, Gnosticism, Crowley's Thelema and Hermeticism (to mention some of the religious frameworks from which my beliefs stemmed).

The whole Brazilian state was founded on the grounds of Christianity, so Christianity is deeply ingrained in the way our politics do politics.

However, despite Christianity being a tool of indoctrination since the colonization (indigenous people were compelled into Christianity), it's not what leads to indoctrination (and I say this as someone who has a "diametrically opposed belief" to theirs because, after all, I worship their "Persona Non Grata" Lucifer alongside Lilith). Rather, it's social compliance (as per Derren Brown's concepts and social experiments).

People are socially compelled by their family, friends, neighbors, coworkers, employers and others into going to a church and believing in whatever their "leader" (a Bishop, a "Pastor" or a "Father") says. Many Christians "read" the Bible through this "leader", because they fear that reading on their own would lead to defiance and excommunication (which would mean social ostracism for them). That's why they blindly follow, and that's why they're easily manipulated, and that's why politics gets to use their power within the churches to gain more power.

But this isn't something restricted to a specific political spectrum: all political spectra have their grips on Christianity, because, as I said, the entire country is built upon Christianity, so both the right-wing, the left-wing and the center-wing try to take advantage from it, because it holds the majority of Brazilian voters. If the majority of Brazilian voters were, for example, Kardecists, you could bet that politicians would try to twist The Spirits Book to their own whims. Similarly, if the majority of Brazilian voters were from Umbanda or Candomblé, politicians would allege that they're being guided by Orixás and this is why people should vote to them. So it's not the religion to blame (although Christianity itself is to blame by many things), it's simply whatever politicians can use to perpetuate their power and/or trying to be powerful.

I often wonder about this with regard to right wing Americans believing such ridiculous things. It's seem that what Trump supporters ultimately have in common is not one set of beliefs but a shared belief in things that make no sense: that all Democrats are paedophiles, that JFK wasn't really assassinated, that vaccines don't work, that climate change isn't real, that Donald Trump is anything but a foolish, evil corrupt man. What do these views have in common? They're fundamentally foolish things to believe.

The fact is that once you believe one patently absurd thing - for example, that an interventionist god exists - your thinking gets warped. When you then make this absurdity the centre of your worldview and your identity, your views on everything become warped. After a certain point, they seem to start believing things because they make no sense.

If a person believes God actually answers prayers, something there is no reason whatsoever to believe, they're primed to believe all kinds of other nonsense. This is exactly why many religious people have stopped believing in that kind of thing, and now take refuge in the idea of prayer as comfort or as asking for 'strength' rather than asking for anything specific (note that even this compromise requires them to ignore the plain meaning of the words of, e.g., the Lord's Prayer). Most people find it uncomfortable to believe in nonsense. For others, it becomes the point.

People in general are easily manipulated, and those who manipulate use the beliefs of the people they’re manipulating to do so.

Religion certainly is a something used for that, but it’s hardly the only one.