The Faith Column
Every week a different believer gives the inside track on their religion or philosophy.
The social impact of cult groups
- Posted by Allen Tate Wood
- 02 July 2008
Allen Tate Wood argues that destructive cult groups are exerting unjust control over their members - and using loopholes in contemporary law to do it.
The impact of cult groups on society and the influence they exercise cannot and should not be underestimated. For anecdotal proof of this assertion, I refer the reader to a famous picture of former President Ronald Regan holding up a copy of the Washington Times circa 1982. The quote below the boldly claims, “This is the only newspaper I read”.
The Washington Times, however, was the brainchild of Sun Myung Moon. Had Regan taken the time to do more than the crossword puzzle and paid attention to more than just the cartoons, he might have discovered that Sun Myung Moon, a Korean industrialist and self-proclaimed saviour of the world, had spoken at length of his plans to end democracy in the United States. Ironically, Mr. Moon has been one of the chief supporters of Ronald Regan, George Bush and George W. Bush.
The Thirteenth Amendment put a formal end to slavery in the United States and its territories. In the last quarter century, however, many groups in the United States, i.e. paramilitary organizations, destructive cults, gangs, and criminal organizations have used the mantle of religion and along with it the protections and guarantees of the First Amendment in a deliberate strategy designed to defraud the innocent, the unwary, and the unsophisticated out of the protections guaranteed by the Thirteenth Amendment.
These same malefactors, in carrying out the mandates of their ends-justifies-the-means philosophy, have perverted the intent of the First Amendment by using it as a shield against criminal prosecution .The smoke-screen diversion is always the same: a battle cry against “religious persecution.” Neither the Constitution nor the Bill of Rights grants immunity from prosecution to religious leaders or groups who violate the laws of the land. On the contrary, fraud laws, banking and currency laws, as well as immigration and naturalization laws all work together to indirectly promote involuntary servitude, a type of slavery that serves as the lifeblood of many destructive cults.
Increasingly sophisticated technology of influence and persuasion is falling into the hands of destructive cult leaders, pyramid sales organizations, gang members and criminal organizations. To make matters worse, the social and economic conditions all over the world have people looking for easy answers, which leaves them vulnerable to the quick-fix philosophy espoused by cults and other groups. The denial attending this wide spread social phenomenon is baffling, heartrending and frightening .
The justice department’s failure to prosecute monolithic pseudo religious organizations, which continue to operate with impunity, only contributes to the growing cynicism of the youth culture, which increasingly sees government simply as the handmaiden of wealth and power.
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