Very interesting, Brandon.

I've just come off the second session of Rebel Wisdom's Sensemaking 101. One of the participants, originally from Japan, spoke very movingly about the serious issue of social isolation in Japan, linked to the broader issue of extreme conformity, suppression of individualism, and scripted interactions.

Another participant suggested a similar dynamic exists in Korea, and is perhaps emerging in China.

Perhaps these could also be seen as resulting from attractors in socio-cultural evolution - arising from attractors related to the earlier value meme, creating extreme conformity. But perhaps there is also an effect of interacting attractors: perhaps a conformity-attractor and a modern-attractor generate unresolvable tensions that can only be dealt with via seriously dysfunctional behaviour - such as isolation (for 30 years, sometimes), for example.

Pure speculation, of course - but the idea of meme-driven attractors is very..... attractive.

If you go ahead with your Emerge debrief, I'd love to listen in. 

Thanks

Alex Goodall 

On Wed, 13 Oct 2021 at 22:04, Brandon Norgaard <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
CAUTION: This email originated from outside of JMU. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognize the sender and know the content is safe.

This is related to the notion of attractors in socio-cultural evolution.  If we take spiral dynamics and other similar theories of the stages of socio-cultural development, we can also recognize that there are attractors within each value meme that essentially put social pressure on people to take those values to the extreme.  This is how attractors work.  The modern value meme (I want to avoid referencing those silly colors often associated with these stages) has an attractor for more and more enterprise, material wealth, and competition that eventually leads to the global economy that we are now living in.  The postmodern value meme has an attractor that tends to lead to precisely the sort of cultish and brainwashing flatland wokeness described in this article, because avoiding the exploitation based on power dynamics is seen as paramount and thus everyone becomes suspect of perpetuating the old order of hyper-modernism. 

 

Some people are working to establish metamodern attractors that would out-compete the modern GameA rat race and also the postmodern ultra-woke cult of flatland.  I just got back home after attending the Emerge Gathering in Berlin over the weekend.  Many of the leading metamodern thinkers of our time were in attendance.  I was there to import these ideas into the USA so that we might be able to improve the social/political/economic situation here.  If anyone would like to have a discussion and debriefing about the Emerge Gathering, send me a message and maybe we could set up some time to talk.

 

Brandon Norgaard

 

From: theory of knowledge society discussion <[log in to unmask]> On Behalf Of Zachary Stein
Sent: Wednesday, October 13, 2021 7:25 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: TOK Open Letter

 

CAUTION: This email originated from outside of JMU. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognize the sender and know the content is safe.

Gregg, 

 

Thanks. Cult is exactly the right word. I have been talking lately with Steven Hassan, the leading cult expert in the US. We talk about Robert Lifton's work on how brainwashing happens... and relate it to current events. Below is the basic model, for those unaware of this work. 

--------

 

Lifton’s Eight Signs of Brainwashing

Robert Jay Lifton interviewed people who had been subject to brainwashing during the Maoist cultural revolution. His work distilling the structural properties of environments that result in undue influence was path breaking.

1. Milieu Control: Control of environment and communication within that environment. This includes not only monitoring and controlling what people communicate, but also when, and how, including attempts to control internal dialogue.

2. Mystical manipulation: The contrived engineering of experiences to stage seemingly spontaneous and supernatural events, such as synchronicities and mind reading. Everyone is manipulated by and for a higher power. 

3. Demand for Purity: Establishing impossible standards for performance, thereby creating an environment of guilt and shame. No matter how hard a person tries, they always fall short, feel bad, are punished, and must work harder.

4. The Cult of Confession: The destruction of personal boundaries, and the expectation that every thought, feeling, or action—past or present—that does not conform to the group’s rules be shared or confessed. The information is not forgotten or forgiven but used to exercise further control.

5. Sacred Science: The belief that the group’s dogma is absolutely scientifically and morally true, with no room for questioning alternative viewpoints.

6. Loading the Language: The use of vocabulary to construct member’s thinking into absolute, black-and-white, thought-terminating cliches understood only by insiders.

7. Doctrine over Person: The imposition of group beliefs over individual experience, conscience, and integrity.

8. Dispensing of Existence: The belief that people in the group have the right to exist and all ex-members and critics or dissidents do not.

 

 

 

On Wed, Oct 13, 2021 at 10:16 AM Henriques, Gregg - henriqgx <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

I stumbled across this today and thought it was worth reflecting on…

 

An open letter: why I'm leaving the cult of wokeness by Africa Brooke

https://ckarchive.com/b/d0ueh0h67mpd

 

Best,
Gregg

 

___________________________________________

Gregg Henriques, Ph.D.
Professor
Department of Graduate Psychology
216 Johnston Hall
MSC 7401
James Madison University
Harrisonburg, VA 22807
(540) 568-7857 (phone)
(540) 568-4747 (fax)


Be that which enhances dignity and well-being with integrity.

Check out the Unified Theory Of Knowledge homepage at:

https://www.unifiedtheoryofknowledge.org/

 

############################

To unsubscribe from the TOK-SOCIETY-L list: write to: mailto:[log in to unmask] or click the following link: http://listserv.jmu.edu/cgi-bin/wa?SUBED1=TOK-SOCIETY-L&A=1


 

--

Zachary Stein, Ed.D.

############################

To unsubscribe from the TOK-SOCIETY-L list: write to: mailto:[log in to unmask] or click the following link: http://listserv.jmu.edu/cgi-bin/wa?SUBED1=TOK-SOCIETY-L&A=1

############################

To unsubscribe from the TOK-SOCIETY-L list: write to: mailto:[log in to unmask] or click the following link: http://listserv.jmu.edu/cgi-bin/wa?SUBED1=TOK-SOCIETY-L&A=1

############################

To unsubscribe from the TOK-SOCIETY-L list: write to: mailto:[log in to unmask] or click the following link: http://listserv.jmu.edu/cgi-bin/wa?SUBED1=TOK-SOCIETY-L&A=1