Posted by alexandra_k on July 19, 2005, at 4:23:12
In reply to Satanism in America, posted by Racer on July 18, 2005, at 13:02:29
I have read some stuff...
Mostly in relation to DID.
There was a dramatic rise in the number of cases reported - especially in Bible belt areas.
They understandably took an interest
(possession)
Some bright spark suggested that satanic ritual abuse might just be a cause of the disorder.
Hypnotism...
The stories came rolling out...The police looked into the stories.
People who claimed that they were forced to sacrifice and eat younger siblings.
People who claimed that they were loaned to the cult to be ritually abused.One woman claimed that she was forced to kill and eat over 100 people I think it was.. Then... Over time... She realised that if that really happened to her then somebody in her very small town would have known / seen something. People would have gone missing. Something. She sued her therapist for encouraging her believe that these memories were accurate and if my memory serves me (;-)) his lisence to practice in the US was lifted.
(He set up shop in Australia and up went the number of reported cases over there...)
I have also read about it by Dennett. This is highly speculative (even for Dennett) but he thought that maybe people who claim to have been abducted by aliens might have been sexually abused and they are having funny distorted memories. That that is why people tend to report invasive 'operations'.
I dunno.
I dunno.I think it can be one of the dangers of thinking that 'abuse of objectively sickening severity' is required in order for people to justify their being f*cked up.
And the popular conception of memory (as being fixed and immutable and accurate) just lying there in the brain waiting to be remembered doesn't help much either.
poster:alexandra_k
thread:529539
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/books/20050501/msgs/530031.html