Branch Davidians, People's Temple, Heaven's Gate, Al-Qaida...

I stumbled upon the first story about the Branch Davidians this morning and thought it would be good to look back and remind ourselves how easily someone can morph a religion into an evil entity.

Compare this to the Jones group in Guyana, Heaven's Gate group, and now to the Extremists of Islam today and it appears to me they have alot in common, the key is the forced brainwashing that conditions the followers and closes their minds to the "truth".

The differences are evident as well, all the other groups had to concentrate its followers in a tight core to maintain control while the radical islamists obviously maintain little control over the group as a whole.

While we are battling these terrorists I hope that there is someone studying how Al-Qaida and associated terror networks became so powerful and how they were able to grow their network without having to maintain a "chokehold" on their followers.

I know with the variety of opiniions we have here on the board maybe we can toss this around and come up with some answers.....

Branch Davidians Article
Heaven's Gate
People's Temple
People's Temple2
Heaven's Gate2
Branch Davidians 2

While I understand there are conspiracies about these groups, I would like to try and focus on the groups themselves (origin, practices, members etc.) and leave the conspiracies to other threads.

I am fairly new to this site and really enjoy the wide variety of opinions and thinking that goes on. I can't help but think if the followers of these types of
groups only had the chance to see a site like this that they would have had a chance to "Deny Ignorance".

An open mind sees in 3D, takes in info from all available sources, analyzes this info, then makes a personal decision based upon this info.

A closed mind sees in 1D, and will only see info which already confirms what this mind already has been taught. I believe that the followers of these types of groups fall into the one dimension category.

I apologize for the rambling, LOL, but the main purpose of this thread is to try and identify HOW the Islamist Terrorists are able to maintain a cohesive group with little central control. How do they instill there beliefs so strongly in their members that even exposure in an open society, (like the US), does not result in the members leaving the group.

Originally posted by JacKatMtn
While I understand there are conspiracies about these groups, I would like to try and focus on the groups themselves (origin, practices, members etc.) and leave the conspiracies to other threads.

the main purpose of this thread is to try and identify HOW the Islamist Terrorists are able to maintain a cohesive group with little central control. How do they instill there beliefs so strongly in their members that even exposure in an open society, (like the US), does not result in the members leaving the group.

I have no problem with your article but if we're not concentrating on religious conspiracy, lets take it over to war on terror and see what they think about it.

Its really a no brainer how they do it. In an open society, tis even easier to maintain such cohesion with members. Why?

Because openess is emptiness. Look how even in our open society, how many people gravitate towards small, narrow, tight knit groups. Its a modern day tribalism. Humans instinctively have the desire to belong and form extremely tight knit small, exclusive groups. Family is the basis for this. When society is open and braod, there nothing, no markers, to indentify with someone or something. people get lost. They have no purpose. This is why most people have no desire to join with huge numbers of others in some great love fest. Once a small idea gets too big, many people leave it to find another tightly knit clan group of thier own.

People like exclusion because it makes them feel special. Elite. Different from the mainstream humanity. Religion often fills some of this gap, being part of a small group of people with similar beliefs.

But take it to another level, and feed off the desire of people to really break away from the mainstream and join an even eliter, more :enlightened group, and thus, you have cults. And terrorist cells.

Because people naturally tend to offer loyalty to others who promise them exclusion, identity, to be apart from the crowd. Some, this desire is taken to the extreme. Cults often feed off the extreme alienation and disgust many people have from the mass, nameless, one world humanity cultures, and want to form thier own tribes. They desire exclusion, idenity, ect, and small cults give them this.

Terrorist cells offer a religious bent, offer thier members promises of great rewards in the after life, and eternal aknowldgement of such "martyrs". Terrorists become heros. They become different from even other Muslims or christians, whatever religion they follow, and become a clan of thier own within the larger clan.

Originally posted by Skadi_the_Evil_Elf
Terrorist cells offer a religious bent, offer thier members promises of great rewards in the after life, and eternal acknowledgement of such "martyrs". Terrorists become heros. They become different from even other Muslims or christians, whatever religion they follow, and become a clan of thier own within the larger clan.

I agree with most of your analysis that it is a feeling of belonging to a group which brings most of them together, but there has got to be something more that Al Qaeda has been doing to be able to maintain there unity despite being spread over the world.

How does Al-Qaeda brainwash there followers to the point that being exposed to all varieties of cultures, people, etc. has absolutely no effect on their "programming" so to speak.

I think it goes way beyond the promises of virgins in heaven and martyr status, but exactly what is the question..

I found this article which goes into the Cult theory of Al-Qaeda

There are striking parallels between cults and what we have discovered since the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon about al-Qaida and the Taliban of Afghanistan. In both types of groups, the processes of recruitment, group dynamics, thought reform, and resulting personality changes are very similar.

wellspringretreat.org...

Or just a little way out there?

I see them as more like the SS compared to all Nazi's rather than like the Koresh group relative to Christianity. They have a heavier medium to sustain them. The can move in that sea of Muslim Brotherhood (I would also add extreme Wahabbism) and share the support of many Muslims worldwide. The Al Qa'eda group are certainly the killer whales in that sea but the fervor, the support, the acceptance by the Muslim Brotherhood sustains them and sustains their cells (packs?) wherever they operate in the world.

The Muslim Brotherhood, in turn, can be likened to the Nazi Party relative to Germans as a whole in the years leading up to WW II. They are supported by rich Muslims and feared by the general Muslim populace worldwide. They are the soup from which the Al Qa'eda's spring.

Membership in the Brotherhood garners a certain respect. You are the elite - much, much better than other Muslims. You have a mission, a purpose and you're part of something larger than yourself. You're also actually participating in changing the world as we know it. Can life get much better than that?

Oh yes, an enemy. The appearance of a religious state in a once Muslim land within just 20 years of the Brotherhood's creation probably helped their recruiting numbers exponentially. Nothing like an enemy to bring a people together.

So is Al Qe'ada far out? Not as far out as you'd think. Just check into Wahabbism. Is the Muslim Brotherhood a cult? If they are, their scope is beyond what my perception of a cult had been...kind of like the day I remember reading about this (visualize "mushroom" and then follow the link) - www.exn.ca...