Skeptic Project

Good article.

Prepare for the deluge of angry emails from Zeitgeisters shouting "the movies aren't the movement!" and "you haven't done a bit of research!"

Ah nice, enjoy the calm before the storm I suppose :).

Very good article a few spelling checks needed here and there which I came across, 'iss' instead of is somewhere on the page, but other than that fluid and makes a lot of the points us 'ex members' consider important.

Quote:I think it's all a shame, however, because getting all of those people together could have done something, could have lead to actual success in some way, but it's not even close [to] that.

The "to" is missing. This is where it talks about the future of TZM.

I'm sure they'll talk about how crazy I am and how awesome they are. I admit it, I "don't get it." I don't get how anyone could believe such stupidity. I'm sick of the emails, a link to the article will just be my reply from now on, I doubt many will add more to the discussion.

Your Amero back guarantee: I'll get emails, and you'll get replies, from people they did not read it.

Great stuff d00d! I'm going to get my content up soon, that I promised long ago. Some of the stuff is 5 hours away on my brothers computer (if it hasn't been deleted), but like other articles I need to get written, it's long overdue.

"This hasn't stopped members from discussing the transition to the Resource Based Economy, despite the fact they're discussing step 10,000 when they haven't even reached step 1 and don't seem to want to."

So true.

Damn, I feel stupid about spending so much time on this whole thing. I really need to get rid of this habit.

>> Its shown me that we are so much slaves to evolution, that so few of us can break those chains that cause us to act like apes. <<

I don't even think it's that, personality. I think it's just that so much blather is bought into in popular culture, that people are easily distorted by their view of how to do things.

Peter Joseph is not spiritually capable of leading a movement in the way he is attempting to do it (meaning, that the term 'inclusive in focus' doesn't enter his consideration) and I'm not saying that I am either. That's why I so strongly agree with Edward's suggestion of democratic leadership.

It helps us keep each other in check, you know?

> That's why I so strongly agree with Edward's suggestion of democratic leadership.
>
> It helps us keep each other in check, you know?

I'm for some kind of democracy, but its not to me what would be best.

I've worked in groups with democratic leadership, and often the person who ends up in charge only got there because they said what the people wanted to hear, rather than what the people needed to hear. (Eg. they promise everything for no work at all..)

Or because those voting decided that the person who was tallest, or best haircut should get the position..

I've seen dictators work well, but only when the dictator actually knows how to do the job..

Which reminds me of the free market..

eg. a business is a dictatorship, that if it does its job well, survives, if not, it fails..

My thinking is we need something like that, only less messy when it fails..

I notice a similar kind of problem with this organisation as well, though I'm not sure they see it, perhaps some of you might find it interesting:

http://www.eoslife.eu/index.php?option=com_kunena&Itemid=94&func=view&catid=19&id=13973#13973

As at least they are mostly open to far more debate about how to solve these kind of problems than TZM, even if they disagree there is a problem with their leadership!

(The question I ask myself is, even with all the lessons we have learn't from the TZM experience, can we prevent another group from going the exact same poor direction?)

Can I stop my own group going the same way I ask myself..

I guess they have a different definition of failing. lol

@ Ed indeed, I think what has happened as I was not around at the beginning of TZM but from what I hear from others it use to have a none structure element but eventually when idiots want hierarchal position their is a fight for power then after they get that power their is a fight to maintain and enforce that power and that's what's happening now, everybody has established their imaginary power being that Peter Merola, DarkDancer, VTV, Thunder etc...

Now they must maintain the power but their having a difficult time as they also have to live by the tenets of the venus project which is impossible for them to do so their in this massive confused state of idiocy. Now VTV being the idiot he is a sudo politician has influenced political tactics into the cult movement. VTV's lack of experience, education aka credentials, has not stopped this individuals from spouting his mouth and influencing people/the cult into his imaginary political thinking.

Once you see a bigger picture of the smaller picture it makes total sense. I for one begin to see a picture of a budding interest group. As interest groups start off as movements with good intentions at first they eventually turn into interest groups which if your not familiar with interest group that involves money and their more of a bureaucracy than you could ever get again something that goes against the tenets of the venus project. I'm just trying to highlight what they are doing has already been done before by thousands of interest groups and that of that cult turns into a cult interest group aka a bureaucracy that's when it will be done, that's when it will go into more familiar territory that's when it will accept societal norms and have the LEAST influence as possible while pretending to have a lot of influence. To some it up it's turning more and more into a type of cult interest group where because of idiots fighting for position of power and now trying to maintain their power and impose their value system onto other while creating a facade environment that pretends to be open, that pretends to follow venus project tennets yet they say the first two zeitcult videos are not the movement yet they still pass out the movement like their is no tomorrow.

This looks like a cult attempt at a bate a switch the oldest trick in the book, as bate in switch in this case being openness, venus project values and then when you get their one is subjected to seeing bannings, the people in power actually going back on their word, a dictorial controlling environment,and a lot of double talk aka they will say one thing but completely do another. I agree with the article as based on what I've seen and experienced from TZM/TVp I'd rather keep the current structure we have right now then see this Venus project actually implemented because I can't even imagine how bad it'll get if the Venus project were to be implemented based on what I already have seen from the Zeitgeist movement.

Just a FYI, I still think the zeitgeist movement is a cult; just because I say it's turning into a bureaucracy at that more into of a interest group it can still be a cult. Many religions operate in such a manner of the zeitgeist movement, their are hundreds of religious interest groups in america as of right now (use google). Just because I say it's turning into a interest group doesn't mean it's not a cult it's both now. Let me throw out a article called "The Effects of Religious Cults on the Health and Welfare of Their Converts" next will be excerpt Testimony from JOHN G. CLARK, JR., M.D. Thursday, November 4, 1977

"All of the groups that we are talking about have living leaders who are demonstrably wealthy. The beliefs of all these cults are absolutist and non-tolerant of other systems of beliefs. Their systems of governance are totalitarian. A requirement of membership is to obey absolutely without questioning. Their interest in the individual’s development within the cult towards some kind of satisfactory individual adult personality is by their doctrines, very low or nonexistent. "

"Most of the cults of concern consider themselves purely religious; some others appear to be more political. One of the most important of the common properties of such cults is the presence of a leader who, in one way or another, claims special powers or may even allow himself to be thought of as the Messiah. Such leaders do have special personal qualities, including a unique worldview and special willingness to effect drastic changes in the thinking and behavior of followers."

"It appears that the techniques utilized by these cults are very similar overall although each one uses its own peculiar style. It would appear obvious that all of these cults have worked out ways of gaining access to susceptible individuals in order to have served to any degree. Those who succumb to the enlisting efforts seem to be divided into two rather distinct groups. The first is composed of the "seekers" of whom we all know, popularly though incorrectly thought to constitute the entire population of susceptible people. They are schizophrenic, chronically so, or borderline personalities. It is quite clear that the existence of emotional or personality problems is a reason for becoming involved in the cults and that most mental health professionals consider only this reason at present. These inductees involve themselves in order to feel better because they are excessively uncomfortable with the outside world and themselves. Such motivated versions are "restitutive," in that the "seekers" are trying to restore themselves to some semblance of comfort in a fresh, though false, reality. We also see this attempt at restitution in the development of the so called secondary symptoms of schizophrenia and other forms of mental illness as the attempt at restitution of a troubled or damaged mind to put together a new, simplified mental world and style of reasoning in order to compensate for the terrible awareness (or near awareness) of personal vulnerability. Approximately 58% of inductees were found to be in this first group from my studies.
The remaining 42% of the examined sample, however, were not ill or damaged in the sense I have mentioned before. That is, they were found to be apparently normal, developing young people who were going through the usual crises of development on the way to becoming adults, who, for any of a number of reasons, had fallen into the trap laid by the cults and had been taken in. On examination they were strong growing students on the average who were facing the normal pains of separation from their families, the normal depressions therefrom, the new, clear slightly feverish view of the complexity of outer reality which is a part of early college life. I think of their joining the cult as being "adaptive;" that is, they are presented with certain problems by the social and physiological processes which are not in themselves as pathological as those involved in the "restitutive" conversions. In some ways it is this more healthy "adaptive" group that is most alarming to the observer."

"From a clinicians point of view the first or restitutive group under the influence of cult indoctrination and practices is very much at risk. In many ways it can be very easily shown from long experience within the mental health field how very much more damaged they may become by being given a thought disorder by a group that conforms to a prior tendency to this sort of thinking disability. Their chances of ever developing a good relationship to outer reality and becoming autonomous individuals must, perforce, diminish with the passage of time. I am reminded of the chronic schizophrenics of some years ago whose psychotic style of thinking became totally institutionalized when placed in the back wards of hospitals for such a long enough time that they ultimately could no longer think at all effectively. The healthier second group, though theoretically less totally vulnerable, is more easy to identify with; their problems may be especially revealing, as I will try to explain."

"These people tend to be from intact, idealistic, believing families with some religious background. Often they had not truly made any of the major shifts toward independence, and so, left home at the appropriate time believing they were ready for freedom. When this belief was seriously challenged in this brave new world by their first real set backs or by any real crisis they became covertly depressed, thus enhancing their susceptibility to the processes of conversion."

I'll stop their and link you guys to the article. I say a great artcle of course the TZm/TVP cult will say I and the doctor whose talking about what cults are, are in fact mentally ILL (link is below).

http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/The_Effects_of_Religious_Cults_on_the_Health_and_Welfare_of_Their_Converts</p>

Found some more information, a front organization as I defined TZm/TVP cults as being basically.

"Front organizations that appear to be independent voluntary associations or charitable organizations are called front groups. In the business world, front organizations such as front companies or shell corporations are used to shield the parent company from legal liability. In international relations, a puppet state is a state which acts as a front (or surrogate) for another state."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Front_organization

I found a nice way to link to this article in my most recent blog entry http://brentoneccles.com/2010/06/a-week-experiencing-changing-the-world/</p>

Which took hours to write. OH MY GOSH. It's 2AM and I'm not in bed! :( #firstworldproblem

>> Keep falling in line with the status quo, keep “volunteering” and donating that 10% tithe like a good little boy.

Why did he quote volunteering? I guess forums help more people than feeding them? This attempt to make me feel bad about actually helping someone and getting off my ass is just weird, and didn't work, it just makes them seem monstrous and stupid.

>> “holier than thou” attitude

I'm not the one claiming to be changing the world from an Internet forum, nor am I the one claiming that my way is the only way -- please tell me how that makes me "holier than thou."

http://thezeitgeistmovement.com/joomla/index.php?option=com_kunena&Itemid=99999&func=view&catid=231&id=267220

They have seen it