Thinking outside the group!

       Reading Irving Janis's Victims Of Groupthink was something that definitely felt very personal for me. I grew up being raised as a Jehovah's Witness and was heavily indoctrinated into the groupthink mentality. I had viewed this as a cult like mentality before reading this and still feel in many respects that it is however I can see more clearly how a "sheep like" quality of just going along with the majority can happen in any setting where people are coming together for whatever purpose.  

        I was taught from a very young age not to question any of the beliefs that were the basis of my family's religious beliefs. This was very difficult for me since what I was being asked to accept did not feel right for me. If I did not become baptized into the group of Jehovah's Witnesses by the time I was a teenager, I was going to be under suspicion. I had a choice, either I could go along with what my family and the church wanted or I would be shunned.

        I had put off the decision to become baptized until I was eighteen years old, which was way past time according to my family. I wasn't even living at home anymore and my lifestyle was definitely not in harmony with the values of Jehovah's Witnesses. The pressure to make a commitment to being a Jehovah's Witness was more than I could take. I was not ready to cut off ties with my family yet, particularly my mother and sister. If I did not show them that I was one of them I would no longer have a connection with the people that meant the most to me. So I did it, I got baptized as a Jehovah's Witness and everyone could breathe a sigh of relief.   

        Unfortunately the facade did not last very long. I could not pretend that I was truly a Jehovah's Witness and that this was the life I wanted to live. Instead of actually facing my family and telling them the truth I moved to Portland Oregon and began to explore who I was away from the influence of my family and their community of Jehovah's Witnesses. I would pretend that I was going to church and making friends in the Jehovah's Witness community in Portland. I hated lying to my family and knew that I had to stop being a hypocrite. The guilt that I felt was consuming every aspect of my life. I finally told the truth and excommunicated myself from the community of Jehovah's Witnesses. This went as I had expected which was not good. It has been over thirteen years since I have seen my mother and most of the rest of my family. As difficult as this has been at times being truthful and genuine with myself and everyone around me is definitely worth the pain involved.

        It amazes me to see just how powerful group mentality can be not just in my own life but in the world at large. We can go along with what other people are saying is right ignoring what I feel are very powerful natural instincts. We can inflict so much damage and still feel that what we are doing is o.k. because the group has agreed on what action should be taken. In his article Irving Janis states "Nietzsche went so far as to say that madness is the exception in individuals but the rule in groups" (Janis 32). Whether it's telling someone to cut off communication with their child or even something that feels positive such as making a decision to improve a societies well being, it is critical that we think for ourselves and ask question, even when it feels scary to do so.

missing eachother

       Reading different viewpoints on terrorism has been very enlightening for me. I hadn't really taken the time before to understand other points of view on why terrorist attacks happen. I just knew that I did not agree with what was being said by mainstream American media. Because of my lack of trust in what is being said by most newscast and a feeling of overwhelm, I have taken the approach of tuning out as much as possible. Catching some headlines from the news page on my computer or listening to public radio when I am in the car has been the extent of my news gathering.

       In his writing "The Clash of Civilizations" Samuel Huntington states "For the relevant future, there will be no universal civilizations, but instead a world of different civilizations, each of which will have to learn to coexist as Huntington says we need to educate ourselves about who these "other" people are. This knowing needs to be on deeper level than the biases and judgments that tend to have us making up our minds about someone before we have even found out their name.

       It is so easy to make up a story about someone and why they deserve to be judged in an unjust way when we don't know them as a human being. As long as we keep our distance and continue to believe
our story lines we can feel o.k. about the cruelty happening to those others. In saying this I realize that I need to do more to change this pattern in myself as well. Instead of shutting out information I may not want to hear, I need to learn more about peoples stories and remember we are all human beings doing what we feel is best.

response to Eve Ensler

       Besides what came up for me around feminism while hearing Eve Ensler speak my I was also questioning how I view my own security. I have been struggling with transportation issues getting to and from Naropa. On Thursday and Friday it is no problem for me to ride my bike to school.  I get out early enough from school on both of these days that I don't worry about riding in areas that are not well lit at night since this is not an issue. On Tuesdays however I don't get out of class until 9 pm. I didn't think too much of riding my bike at night until we received the e-mail about the robberies in the Goss/Grove area and also hearing my husbands concerns about me riding alone alone that late.

       I feel really torn between not wanting to make fear based decisions and being realistic about the possible consequences of my actions. It feels unfair to me that I have to worry about my safety while riding up into North Boulder while my husband does the same thing without worry. I don't want to be falling into a trap of buying into the fear and adjusting my actions based on this.  If there is a problem going on in our community where women feel that there safety is in question we should be doing something to change this. Taking action to improve our safety rather than changing our way of living to adjust to the threat seems like the best course to take.  Unfortunately, I am not sure how to go about doing this and at this point most likely be riding my bike on Tuesday nights.  Ate least for the time being.