Cult Hackers

Today on 'The Sunday Interview', we speak to Lloyd Evans, Ex Jehovah's Witness apostate, activist, advocate, author and filmmaker. Lloyd's YouTube channel is huge and is one of the places that ex Witnesses, currently doubting Witnesses and in fact  anybody just curious about about the Group go for information.

Lloyd describes how he left the group, his sense-making processes about himself and his beliefs upon leaving, his activism and his views on how society should treat high control groups like Jehovah's Witnesses.

Lloyd Evan's YouTube channel can be found here.

https://www.youtube.com/user/johncedars1929

Celine asks her dad to explore what it means to be a man and she explores her female gender. 

Questions based upon Heather Flowers @HTHRFLWRS

A fabulous interview, Ali is an author and podcaster. Ali talks about her life as a Jehovah's Witness, her secret passion for writing, why she enjoyed doing assignments in the Theocratic Ministry School and how she left, including the fears she experienced as she exited the High Control Group.

We explore with Ali the difficulties of leaving behind everything she knew, the pain of losing family connections as well as her realisation of the extent of the gendered and patriarchal organisation she has been a part of, and the effect this had had on her. She describes her struggle to believe in her ability, her decision to do a masters in creative writing and what led to her writing her book. 

Ali's book 'The Last Days' comes out in the Spring of 2022.

Ali's Website

https://www.alimillar.com/

The Bookseller featuring 'The Last Days'

https://www.thebookseller.com/news/ebury-picks-luminous-memoir-about-growing-part-and-leaving-jehovah-s-witnesses-1226737

Ali's Podcast along with Penny Wincer

https://www.pennywincerwrites.com/not-too-busy-to-write-podcast

As a Jehovah's Witness getting involved in making the world a better place is not encouraged. When you leave such a High Control Organization the opportunity to get involved can be exciting and a bit overwhelming. We discuss activism in all its forms.

A very special episode today as we interview Alex Millar, world renowned artist. Alex was raised as a Jehovah's Witness and was an elder before leaving, going through a very difficult period until he discovered his real calling.

Warning: During our discussion there is mention of suicidal thoughts.

Alex talks frankly, and with plenty of humour about his life as a Jehovah's Witness child, growing up and then the crisis that led him out of the organisation. He is now a respected artist and shares his philosophy on life. This was such a privilege and a rare opportunity to talk to such a singular talent. We hope you enjoy is as much as we did.

One of the most common ways of describing a cult is that it has a charismatic leader, but just what does that mean. Charisma has been studied or decades in organizational psychology so Stephen and Celine explore some of the research and discuss whether it's a good or a bad thing. 

References

Bass, B. M., & Steidlmeier, P. (1999). Ethics, character, and authentic transformational leadership behavior. The leadership quarterly, 10(2), 181-217.

Shamir, B., House, R. J., & Arthur, M. B. (1993). The motivational effects of charismatic leadership: A self-concept based theory. Organization science, 4(4), 577-594.

Moving forward with Charisma

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/323705542_Moving_psychology_forward_-_With_charisma

High Control Organisations often take a very specific political stance. Jehovah's Witness are taught that Christians must be politically neutral, which means not voting - not even having an opinion about issues that affect you, such as how much tax you should pay or what the laws should be. Upon leaving it feels wonderful to be able to make your own decisions. Today we look at just a few political questions through the use of the Eight Values Questionnaire (see link below) - it's not a serious political exploration but it got us thinking and hopefully you'll enjoy it.

Links

Eight values quiz

https://8values.github.io/

Mormon Stories Podcast with John Dehlin

https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/mormon-stories-lds/id312094772

Today We take a very deep dive into Festinger, Riecken & Schacter's seminal work "When Prophecy Fails". This episode is packed with crazy stuff; exploration of the 1800's Millerite movement (to later inspire Jehovah's Witnesses and others), automatic writing, UFO cults, dianetics practitioners, flood prophecies, flying saucers, Atlantis with a bit of 'The Justified Ancients of Mu Mu' thrown in for good measure. Not to mention Venusian footprint interpretation.

The idea of cognitive dissonance and its affect on followers facing disconfirmation of the end of the world has become well known, but the research has some real problems as well as some moments of comedy gold. 

To help follow the characters in the story you can download a table here (or from copy and paste the link below). 

https://3e3480ad-2b0d-4112-8174-0fdd614840ec.filesusr.com/ugd/4c85e9_f1e86bb90c5f40b6a627de8751849978.pdf

How does it go when a Jehovah's Witness child explains to a teacher why he is not comfortable reading a book with foul language? Spoiler alert! Not well!

Riley is an ex Jehovah's Witness and activist. He talks about his experience leaving the organisation, the changes he has seen in himself and the excitement of being able to make decisions about politics. He talks about the people who were there for him and his newly found passion for martial arts.

Riley's YouTube Channel

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCTJ2YmTMxtqdhYpdrVtwWGQ