The Game of Incrementalism

[skyrider]

In the busy cycles of life and living, one rarely sees the incrementalism of bondage and servitude. Only by thoughtful consideration and peeling back the layers of doctrine, philosophy, social engineering, etc. can one grasp the direction of being led astray. After all, who would "willingly" relinquish their individuality and freedom over to another's control?

I would venture to say that most took pfal to learn scripture and enhance one's living situation, no? Whether that was to increase meaning to life or follow the dictates of a loving God.....it was fairly clear-cut? I mean, really, who would have expected to incrementally fall beholden to twi for the rest of your life?

The Game of Incrementalism is found in.......religion, politics, business, etc.

To fall prey to this "game" in one's youth is fairly common....BUT to stay in those trenches a lifetime is quite something else. Has the general populace lost their critical thinking skills to discern when they're being "played?"

Stepping back.....one can easily see how wierwille's status CHANGED thru the years as the incrementalism, the indoctrination, crept in unawares. From "Teacher".....to "Man of God".....to "Father in the Word"....followers were incrementally seduced to pay homage to this idolatry. Gee, do people go to the Fountain of Living Waters and pray at the altar of wierwille?

Have the "prophets" in twi sounded the alarm of this idolatry????? Have the trustees/directors cited the scriptures of worshipping idols and denounced this practice that twi embraces? Have the ex-leaders, the offshoot leaders, issued stern warnings to their people of this wierwille-worship?

To me, one of the things I learned in twi was WHAT IT IS NOT!

With Christ as mediator.....twi is NOT my mediator.

With Scripture to study.....twi is NOT the agent of truth.

With Christian love.........twi is NOT the arbitrator of "true fellowship."

I suppose......people, like sheep, will always be led astray. When will some learn the lessons of the scriptures to BEWARE?

How many ways is this lesson taught?

Leaven

Seduce

False Prophets

False Teachers

Wolves in Sheeps' Clothing

Last week, I read where an Amish guy bilked millions from amish investors, the amish community. Just like the Hirschfeld scandal in twi, people are deceived by "sincerity." It happens, has happened, and will probably keep happening. Where is the discernment to separate the good from evil?

Wierwille played the game of incrementalism well. I believe that he knew exactly what he was doing when he started twi, and later the corps program. Consistently, throughout his "ministry".....wierwille implants the seeds of commitment and obedience. YET, wierwille LEFT his church, his denomination, to strike out from "the suppression of not having answers." And, in the end, wierwille demanded totalitarian rule.....yep, the end justifies the means of deceptive incrementalism.

Incrementalism, of course.

That's The Way deception works!

[waysider]

We were taught to ignore any sort of logical evaluation. (Session 7/PFAL)

[skyrider]

We were taught to ignore any sort of logical evaluation. (Session 7/PFAL)

Well, of course.

That's how deception works. If you don't distract and subvert the truth, how are you going to lead them to your little corner of the world?

[Ham]

every day is a winding what..

No Jack, or what Queen, can take this hand,

[Broken Arrow]

Has the general populace lost their critical thinking skills to discern when they're being "played?"

Yes, the general populace has lost, or is losing, their critical thinking skills. There are people everywhere who are hanging onto empty or false promises. It's rather sad

[waysider]

You can see them on facebook, reciting entire sections of the PFAL class, or its collaterals, encouraging others to resist the "temptation" to consider alternative viewpoints.

Then, again, maybe it's themselves they are encouraging.....like re-fortifying self-delusion.

Edited September 19, 2011 by waysider

[waysider]

Renewed mind + Likemindedness = Delusion prophylaxis.

(Incremental preventive maintenance)

Edited September 19, 2011 by waysider

[frank123lol]

After years of not thinking for themselves,what do you expect?

[skyrider]

Renewed mind + Likemindedness = Delusion prophylaxis.

(Incremental preventive maintenance)

According to scripture, renewing one's mind is a process.

Twi taught "The Renewed Mind" as a destination.

[waysider]

According to scripture, renewing one's mind is a process.

Twi taught "The Renewed Mind" as a destination.

Sorry.

I should have clarified that I was using the term as it was practiced in TWI.

(ie: "Make your mind think only what we tell it to think.")

[skyrider]

The coerced mind is the key to power.....twi's power.

[skyrider]

Wierwille played the game of incrementalism well. I believe that he knew exactly what he was doing when he started twi, and later the corps program. Consistently, throughout his "ministry".....wierwille implants the seeds of commitment and obedience. YET, wierwille LEFT his church, his denomination, to strike out from "the suppression of not having answers." And, in the end, wierwille demanded totalitarian rule.....yep, the end justifies the means of deceptive incrementalism.

Think about it.....wierwille LEFT his church to search for more truth.

Well.......after two decades of twi-cliches, classes, and dogma, it was time for me to get off the merry-go-round. Twi no longer held my interests. In fact, more and more questions were arising about their "research".....and, it was apparent that twi was suppressing all things beyond twi.

Remember hearing that wierwille's church had stricken his name from the church history registry? Wierwille fumed over this.....and yet, twi BECAME that which they themselves despised. The mark/avoid policy came front-n-center when corps and clergy left twi's fold. Yep. Twi was just another denomination.

Looking back.....the foundational/int/adv classes were INCREMENTAL steppingstones towards the cult house. And, once you graduated from the advanced class, you were IN. You were special and treated "special"......not unconditional, but conditional. As long as you obeyed their dogma, you could take you advanced class nametag and stroll thru the house.

Same with the corps program.....it was INCREMENTALISM. We started the inrez training with a month of pfal indoctrination, again. Behind the scenes, the disciplining was the REAL programming that was sought. Jump when they say "jump!" In house, peer pressure, sleep deprivation, privacy deprivation, and coercion were the real levers of persuasion and indoctrination. By Christmas, they racheted up the "we are your true family."

For some.....the indoctrination will last a lifetime.

Therefore, I am not surprised that facebook shows slivers of this cult element. Many of these people will go to their graves....staking their belief system on twi's doctrines. Wierwille went to his graves "wishing" he had lived by another set of standards.

Tell me again.....why we should live by wierwille-cliches, when even he wished he'd lived differently.

[jkboehme]

"...Behind the scenes, the disciplining was the REAL programming that was sought. Jump when they say "jump!" In house, peer pressure, sleep deprivation, privacy deprivation, and coercion were the real levers of persuasion and indoctrination..."

*************************************************************************************************

I think in many if not most instances the initial foible was not a general lack of critical thinking, but that most of us were experiencing some transient vulnerability that allowed us to be sucked into TWI when our critical guard was down. Examples: death of a loved one, ending of a relationship, going off to college, loss of a job, divorce, etc., etc.

Then the big 'hook' was a strategically implemented destabilization of our worldview with replacement by the semi-resonable concepts {neoplatonic, hermetic, kabbalistic, etc., straight off VPW's own AC 'junk table'} that inhabit the intro level class. Then modeling, peer pressure, & any of numerous ways to covertly influence one's thinking were utilized.

[waysider]

I can remember thinking to myself one day, when I was in FellowLaborers, "How the hell did I end up here??"

I'm not sure if that makes sense. It wasn't like waking up from a coma or any such thing. It was more like when you look into the mirror and ruefully wonder, "Who is that old guy looking back at me?" I think that was the day I started to question whether my decisions and actions and behavior were really my own or if they had been prescribed for me.

And, yet, I stayed...."Gotta renew the old mind and snuff out those old-man thoughts. You'll be a better man for it.", I told myself..... <_<

Edited September 20, 2011 by waysider

[Human without the bean]

The coerced mind is the key to power.....twi's power.

Looking back on it now we weren't allowed to have a mind or anything that resembled critical thinking. Any thought of any kind other than those that twi planted were corrected, like edited film, cut from our thought processes and then replaced, spliced back in with twi's brainwashed bulls#it. How naive I was.

[chockfull]

I would totally agree with this. Incrementalism. The way you really see this is by noting all the things that are asked of certain members in private. This is like Proverbs talks about in Proverbs 6 about the person who winks with their eyes, speaks with feet, teaches with their fingers - and how they sow discord.

Now in TWI, they teach that this verse is about the "seed of the serpent" men and women. How perfect. What a great disguise for nobody ever considering that is how they operate.

In the advanced circles, the elite of the elite, the pharisees of the pharisees, this is how it works. VPW, LCM, Rosalie whispers to a Cabinet member, a Region leader pre-prepares a Limb or Branch coordinator, then when in the presence of the person they have prepared in their hearts libel, slander, and false testimony against, a little wink is all it takes. A point of the finger, a pre-arranged signal, and people on queue attack with their libelous accusations. And people are demolished - sent away, kicked out, blackballed, labeled as 'possessed', shunned. I've seen this so many times.

Now in a normal Christian type of interaction and fellowship, you would never be able to convince someone to do this kind of thing. So how do they do it? Incrementalism. Teachings about commitment, step by step. The more committed you are, the more you want to be part of that 'inner circle'. The more you would justify to get there or stay there. It's a lust for power that drives it. Take PFAL, or the FNC, and you aren't even aware of this. However, as you advance, the programs stack up. Advanced class? Sell your house - get rid of your mortgage, become a nomad for the Way. Become trained. WOW / Way Disciple - now you're introduced to the more elite - you were willing to give up everything for a year and move wherever they told you. Corps? Same but even more - now you have people evaluate where you are every year and can tell you to leave or move. Clergy? You take a salt covenant with the leader to be bound to their will. Any misstep will have dire consequences.

I was discussing this with a psychologist over a meal once. He said that incrementalism presents choices in very small changes. Then you wonder how you got so far offline from normal. Every choice is not a choice between a scale of zero being the norm and minus 250 being your current choice. That would raise too many alarms. Its the choice between zero and minus 5. Then so on and so forth. And finally minus 245 to 250 is the choice faced. Not too different from where you are at. And spread out over time, the normal alarms in a person's conscience are bypassed.

Classic conditioning. Pavlov's dog. It's the tool of the cults. Behavior control. Control in general is the paramount thing. If you control the environment you control the person.

[OldSkool]

In the advanced circles, the elite of the elite, the pharisees of the pharisees, this is how it works. VPW, LCM, Rosalie whispers to a Cabinet member, a Region leader pre-prepares a Limb or Branch coordinator, then when in the presence of the person they have prepared in their hearts libel, slander, and false testimony against, a little wink is all it takes. A point of the finger, a pre-arranged signal, and people on queue attack with their libelous accusations. And people are demolished - sent away, kicked out, blackballed, labeled as 'possessed', shunned. I've seen this so many times.

This is EXACTLY how it works. Talk about exposing the belly of the beast.

[skyrider]

I would totally agree with this. Incrementalism. The way you really see this is by noting all the things that are asked of certain members in private. This is like Proverbs talks about in Proverbs 6 about the person who winks with their eyes, speaks with feet, teaches with their fingers - and how they sow discord.

Now in TWI, they teach that this verse is about the "seed of the serpent" men and women. How perfect. What a great disguise for nobody ever considering that is how they operate.

In the advanced circles, the elite of the elite, the pharisees of the pharisees, this is how it works. VPW, LCM, Rosalie whispers to a Cabinet member, a Region leader pre-prepares a Limb or Branch coordinator, then when in the presence of the person they have prepared in their hearts libel, slander, and false testimony against, a little wink is all it takes. A point of the finger, a pre-arranged signal, and people on queue attack with their libelous accusations. And people are demolished - sent away, kicked out, blackballed, labeled as 'possessed', shunned. I've seen this so many times.

Now in a normal Christian type of interaction and fellowship, you would never be able to convince someone to do this kind of thing. So how do they do it? Incrementalism. Teachings about commitment, step by step. The more committed you are, the more you want to be part of that 'inner circle'. The more you would justify to get there or stay there. It's a lust for power that drives it. Take PFAL, or the FNC, and you aren't even aware of this. However, as you advance, the programs stack up. Advanced class? Sell your house - get rid of your mortgage, become a nomad for the Way. Become trained. WOW / Way Disciple - now you're introduced to the more elite - you were willing to give up everything for a year and move wherever they told you. Corps? Same but even more - now you have people evaluate where you are every year and can tell you to leave or move. Clergy? You take a salt covenant with the leader to be bound to their will. Any misstep will have dire consequences.

I was discussing this with a psychologist over a meal once. He said that incrementalism presents choices in very small changes. Then you wonder how you got so far offline from normal. Every choice is not a choice between a scale of zero being the norm and minus 250 being your current choice. That would raise too many alarms. Its the choice between zero and minus 5. Then so on and so forth. And finally minus 245 to 250 is the choice faced. Not too different from where you are at. And spread out over time, the normal alarms in a person's conscience are bypassed.

Classic conditioning. Pavlov's dog. It's the tool of the cults. Behavior control. Control in general is the paramount thing. If you control the environment you control the person.

Nice post.

[Broken Arrow]

I would totally agree with this. Incrementalism. The way you really see this is by noting all the things that are asked of certain members in private. This is like Proverbs talks about in Proverbs 6 about the person who winks with their eyes, speaks with feet, teaches with their fingers - and how they sow discord.

Now in TWI, they teach that this verse is about the "seed of the serpent" men and women. How perfect. What a great disguise for nobody ever considering that is how they operate.

In the advanced circles, the elite of the elite, the pharisees of the pharisees, this is how it works. VPW, LCM, Rosalie whispers to a Cabinet member, a Region leader pre-prepares a Limb or Branch coordinator, then when in the presence of the person they have prepared in their hearts libel, slander, and false testimony against, a little wink is all it takes. A point of the finger, a pre-arranged signal, and people on queue attack with their libelous accusations. And people are demolished - sent away, kicked out, blackballed, labeled as 'possessed', shunned. I've seen this so many times.

Now in a normal Christian type of interaction and fellowship, you would never be able to convince someone to do this kind of thing. So how do they do it? Incrementalism. Teachings about commitment, step by step. The more committed you are, the more you want to be part of that 'inner circle'. The more you would justify to get there or stay there. It's a lust for power that drives it. Take PFAL, or the FNC, and you aren't even aware of this. However, as you advance, the programs stack up. Advanced class? Sell your house - get rid of your mortgage, become a nomad for the Way. Become trained. WOW / Way Disciple - now you're introduced to the more elite - you were willing to give up everything for a year and move wherever they told you. Corps? Same but even more - now you have people evaluate where you are every year and can tell you to leave or move. Clergy? You take a salt covenant with the leader to be bound to their will. Any misstep will have dire consequences.

I was discussing this with a psychologist over a meal once. He said that incrementalism presents choices in very small changes. Then you wonder how you got so far offline from normal. Every choice is not a choice between a scale of zero being the norm and minus 250 being your current choice. That would raise too many alarms. Its the choice between zero and minus 5. Then so on and so forth. And finally minus 245 to 250 is the choice faced. Not too different from where you are at. And spread out over time, the normal alarms in a person's conscience are bypassed.

Classic conditioning. Pavlov's dog. It's the tool of the cults. Behavior control. Control in general is the paramount thing. If you control the environment you control the person.

The mafia works the same way. It starts by being paid well by "the boss" for doing little favors for the boss when you're around 10-years-old or younger. By adulthood you're a hit man, i.e. murdering people for "the boss" and not even caring.

[Broken Arrow]

I would totally agree with this. Incrementalism. The way you really see this is by noting all the things that are asked of certain members in private. This is like Proverbs talks about in Proverbs 6 about the person who winks with their eyes, speaks with feet, teaches with their fingers - and how they sow discord.

Now in TWI, they teach that this verse is about the "seed of the serpent" men and women. How perfect. What a great disguise for nobody ever considering that is how they operate.

In the advanced circles, the elite of the elite, the pharisees of the pharisees, this is how it works. VPW, LCM, Rosalie whispers to a Cabinet member, a Region leader pre-prepares a Limb or Branch coordinator, then when in the presence of the person they have prepared in their hearts libel, slander, and false testimony against, a little wink is all it takes. A point of the finger, a pre-arranged signal, and people on queue attack with their libelous accusations. And people are demolished - sent away, kicked out, blackballed, labeled as 'possessed', shunned. I've seen this so many times.

Now in a normal Christian type of interaction and fellowship, you would never be able to convince someone to do this kind of thing. So how do they do it? Incrementalism. Teachings about commitment, step by step. The more committed you are, the more you want to be part of that 'inner circle'. The more you would justify to get there or stay there. It's a lust for power that drives it. Take PFAL, or the FNC, and you aren't even aware of this. However, as you advance, the programs stack up. Advanced class? Sell your house - get rid of your mortgage, become a nomad for the Way. Become trained. WOW / Way Disciple - now you're introduced to the more elite - you were willing to give up everything for a year and move wherever they told you. Corps? Same but even more - now you have people evaluate where you are every year and can tell you to leave or move. Clergy? You take a salt covenant with the leader to be bound to their will. Any misstep will have dire consequences.

I was discussing this with a psychologist over a meal once. He said that incrementalism presents choices in very small changes. Then you wonder how you got so far offline from normal. Every choice is not a choice between a scale of zero being the norm and minus 250 being your current choice. That would raise too many alarms. Its the choice between zero and minus 5. Then so on and so forth. And finally minus 245 to 250 is the choice faced. Not too different from where you are at. And spread out over time, the normal alarms in a person's conscience are bypassed.

Classic conditioning. Pavlov's dog. It's the tool of the cults. Behavior control. Control in general is the paramount thing. If you control the environment you control the person.

The mafia works the same way. It starts by being paid well by "the boss" for doing little favors for the boss when you're around 10-years-old or younger. By adulthood you're a hit man, i.e. murdering people for "the boss" and not even caring.

[Broken Arrow]

I would totally agree with this. Incrementalism. The way you really see this is by noting all the things that are asked of certain members in private. This is like Proverbs talks about in Proverbs 6 about the person who winks with their eyes, speaks with feet, teaches with their fingers - and how they sow discord.

Now in TWI, they teach that this verse is about the "seed of the serpent" men and women. How perfect. What a great disguise for nobody ever considering that is how they operate.

In the advanced circles, the elite of the elite, the pharisees of the pharisees, this is how it works. VPW, LCM, Rosalie whispers to a Cabinet member, a Region leader pre-prepares a Limb or Branch coordinator, then when in the presence of the person they have prepared in their hearts libel, slander, and false testimony against, a little wink is all it takes. A point of the finger, a pre-arranged signal, and people on queue attack with their libelous accusations. And people are demolished - sent away, kicked out, blackballed, labeled as 'possessed', shunned. I've seen this so many times.

Now in a normal Christian type of interaction and fellowship, you would never be able to convince someone to do this kind of thing. So how do they do it? Incrementalism. Teachings about commitment, step by step. The more committed you are, the more you want to be part of that 'inner circle'. The more you would justify to get there or stay there. It's a lust for power that drives it. Take PFAL, or the FNC, and you aren't even aware of this. However, as you advance, the programs stack up. Advanced class? Sell your house - get rid of your mortgage, become a nomad for the Way. Become trained. WOW / Way Disciple - now you're introduced to the more elite - you were willing to give up everything for a year and move wherever they told you. Corps? Same but even more - now you have people evaluate where you are every year and can tell you to leave or move. Clergy? You take a salt covenant with the leader to be bound to their will. Any misstep will have dire consequences.

I was discussing this with a psychologist over a meal once. He said that incrementalism presents choices in very small changes. Then you wonder how you got so far offline from normal. Every choice is not a choice between a scale of zero being the norm and minus 250 being your current choice. That would raise too many alarms. Its the choice between zero and minus 5. Then so on and so forth. And finally minus 245 to 250 is the choice faced. Not too different from where you are at. And spread out over time, the normal alarms in a person's conscience are bypassed.

Classic conditioning. Pavlov's dog. It's the tool of the cults. Behavior control. Control in general is the paramount thing. If you control the environment you control the person.

The mafia works the same way. It starts by being paid well by "the boss" for doing little favors for the boss when you're around 10-years-old or younger. By adulthood you're a hit man, i.e. murdering people for "the boss" and not even caring.

[johniam]

quote: Therefore, I am not surprised that facebook shows slivers of this cult element. Many of these people will go to their graves....staking their belief system on twi's doctrines.

At least now you acknowledge that there are more people than just me who still value what VP taught. If something isn't broken, no need to "fix" it. VP was just a man; God's word stands forever.

[chockfull]

At least now you acknowledge that there are more people than just me who still value what VP taught. If something isn't broken, no need to "fix" it. VP was just a man; God's word stands forever.

If you truly believe that, then there should be absolutely no challenge in transferring that value to the people VP plagiarized the stuff from in the first place. For instance, do you own a copy of JE Stiles book? I do. My first read through that I was just interested in learning what the guy who led VP into SIT was into. Realizing that without even doing any direct comparisons that RHST was at least 70% plagiarized from that book was shocking. I didn't want to believe it. I kept looking at publication dates sure that it was JE doing the plagiarizing. Eventually the facts proved out. Then I went back to read the account of VP writing that book in "The Way Living in Love", where he describes checking into a hotel and writing most of it over 2 weeks on a diet of grapes, with all of the scriptures memorized. How gullible was I?

[OldSkool]

Then I went back to read the account of VP writing that book in "The Way Living in Love", where he describes checking into a hotel and writing most of it over 2 weeks on a diet of grapes, with all of the scriptures memorized. How gullible was I?

Interesting that they have pulled TWLIL from the shelves long ago. I guess some of his claims are too outrageous? Of course the standard line in my time in-residence was the one about taking over 3,000 books to the city dump. I had never heard the grapes line until reading here on GSC. The man was full of it.

[JavaJane]

Is Drambuie made from grapes?

:)