Posted by Yardena on August 26, 1999, at 18:16:12
In reply to Re: Anybody ever attend the "Landmark Forum"?, posted by claudeah on August 26, 1999, at 17:55:10
I personally would not recommend going. I have read studies that were written by "undercover" researchers and they found that Landmark and other such groups use a lot of brainwashing techniques. It involves a lot of social stress and peer pressure. People who agree with the leader are praised and people who disagree are booed down. Physical appearance and the ability to sell are the main criteria for choosing the leaders. They usually have no training as mental health professionals. They wear people's resistance to independent thinking down, albeit not as rapidly or "violently" as in the original EST, which kept people from eating, sleeping and going to the bathroom. It is more of the social pressure that has been shown in zillions of social psych experiments in which people are intimidated from thinking independently. After you do a seminar, you are then hooked in to sell for them, ie, get more people to come. It is essentially a psychological pyramid scheme, using manipulative tactics. Your ability to sell is linked with approval and confirmation of success. If you do not recruit new people, you are shamed as having not succeeded in your own self discovery process, etc. etc.
BE VERY CAREFUL!!!!!
Personally I think it would be a total waste of money.
poster:Yardena
thread:10674
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/19990829/msgs/10698.html