This was my response to a recent comment on another board regarding this movie and its disgusting, disturbing subject matter: Furthermore, this is the absolute WORST kind of child abuse. These adults should be in prison. You hit the nail on the head. I'm sure we're not the first on this board to consider religious indoctrination of children as a kind of abuse. But this goes beyond the pale. It's absolutely appalling. This is brainwashing. Of the very youngest children. It's a legal, sanctioned cult. I suspect many of these kids will have serious emotional and psychological issues when they become adults. The woman leading this thing is a full-on fruitcake. These parents are allowing an obviously mentally unstable woman to shape the entire future lives of their children. (And incidentally, it seems not only to be religious indoctrination, but political as well, ultra-conservatism as a life-style.) When I was a kid I went to several Christian Summer Camps, in the 70's. It was all Jesus, all the time, all the games and entertainment and social interaction was somehow related to and filtered thru Christ Our Lord. They would even take popular songs of the period and change the lyrics, these were the hymns we sung and the tunes we danced to. Part of one sticks in my mind to this day, it was The Carpenters "We've Only Just Begun" and the opening lyrics were "We've only just begun, To live our lives for Christ on Earth..." And so on. You get the picture. But this was mild, tame stuff compared to Jesus Camp. My upbringing was in a fairly normal, average southern Christian household and as a reasonable, rational adult my psyche still has trouble coping w/that ingrained religious belief. I can't imagine what these kids will have to go thru as adults. One can clearly see that these children are merely parroting what they have been taught by the "grownups" (I use that sarcastically, since these folks never really grow up). This is the nature of childhood. That's what kids do, no matter what you teach them. Can you imagine the peer pressure in that place if you dare to question the party-line? How are they different from the Hitler Youth, young teens who murdered innocents in the name of their Fuhrer because they believed in him? Or the skinheads and bigots who openly teach their children to hate other races and proudly boast about what they've done on Jerry Springer, their kids spouting racist dogma w/o any trace of a real or meaningful understanding of what they're actually saying and the despicable, intolerant lifestyle their promoting? If this was, er, what... "Quetzalcoatl Camp" instead of "Jesus Camp" it would be recognized for the cult it truly is and this woman would be a criminal and on the run, one of the FBI's most-wanted, like that recent psycho who was marrying teens several at at time. She's David Koresh w/o the guns; she's nuts, she's scary and dangerous and only more so because her madness is validated and sanctioned by our society. H
I know we have clashed in the past but what you write is exactly why i do what i do here: http://www.elitetrader.com/vb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=70716 I believe education, awareness and the ability for young people to question dogma in a logical way is the only way to win the battle over religious superstition.
I've only watched the trailer, but... all I can say is... fcking idiots. This is our answer to the radical madrassas. Wonderful.
I didn't see the movie, but if this woman falls anywhere short of drinking the blood of these campers, your condemnation of her is too strong. Frankly, your post sounds hysterical. Should I begin compiling a list of Non-Religious, insane monsters in society?
yeah, these kids would be much better off watching MTV, playing grand-theft auto, eating ritalin, and downloading pornography ...
They will be after treatment like this. I have experience in this area. I have an aunt who grew up in that area of the country. She belonged to a wacko church group call the nazarines. They treated their kids like that. Made them go up in front of the church and confess their sins to the congregation. It messed up her mind and she has been in and out of mental institutions for the last 30 years. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Church_of_the_Nazarene
Yeah, I have experience also. Growing up, my mother was hooked on a number of these traveling, evangelical, religious charalatans. Gave away tons of money and it was a major cause of my parents divorce. Like I said, I didn't see the movie, but the clip you linked to wasn't over-the-top. I think every kid should get a good dose of God-Fearing while growing up. Face it, the only place morality is even mentioned, let alone discussed in detail, is church. I'm not very religiuos at all, but I'm no relativist. There is Good, and there is Evil.
Well I guess that settles it. Why don't we just repeal the First Amendment and require parents to get approval of Social Services before subjecting their children to any religious instruction? Or maybe just ban religion all together?
By far the best solution. After that we can go to work on the misguided idea we have about the role of government.