UPDATE::Teachers in Connecticut 'indoctrinated family's daughters into a cult' | Mail Online

UPDATE::  Avon School District Reaches Settlement In Alleged Cult Lawsuit

A settlement has been reached in a bizarre lawsuit that accused four Connecticut high school educators of "indoctrinating" three sisters into a religious cult that celebrates death and causing the siblings to suffer severe personality changes.

Court documents show the lawsuit filed nearly four years ago was reported settled after a conference led by a federal judge in New Haven on Thursday. Terms were not disclosed. The settlement must be approved by the local school board.

In my previous post concerning the Stern case I stated, "Cult like thinking and indoctrination doesn't necessarily equate to a strict "religious" setting,,,[t]he use of mind-control tactics and mental abuse to exploit and manipulate for personal gain can be seen outside the church as well."

According to the UK's Daily Mail Online, this case also exhibits that same characteristic:
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A couple have claimed that their three daughters were indoctrinated into a religious cult by their school teachers leaving them with suicidal thoughts and alienated from their loving family, according to a new lawsuit.

The couple, from Avon, Connecticut, filed the civil lawsuit in federal court on Monday against the Avon school district, three teachers and a guidance counselor at Avon High School and Wellesley College in Massachusetts.

The parents alleged that their older daughters, now aged 22 and 19, became 'reclusive, secretive and distant' after they began taking Spanish classes at Avon High.

The named defendants are Connecticut residents Tanya Mastoloni (also known as Tanya Romero), Rebecca Kessler; Laura Sullivan and California resident Christopher Esposito.

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The couple claimed that the teachers and counselor indoctrinated their daughters into a cult that promotes martyrdom and celebrates death.

The couple said their daughters became secretive, lost their good humor and empathy and began speaking a bizarre language. The girls are also unable to think critically or independently, the lawsuit claimed.

The parents noticed that their second daughter began to change in the same way as her older sister when she took classes with the same Spanish teacher, Tanya Mastoloni.

The teachers, along with a guidance counselor, encouraged the girl to join her older sister at Wellesley so they could all meet up there. The indoctrination by the teachers reportedly continued when two of the girls went to Wellesley College.

According to the 64-page lawsuit, the youngest daughter was also targeted to be indoctrinated into the same belief system, but she broke free. She has jointly filed the lawsuit with her parents.

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The parents claimed that the three women, along with Esposito, acted like a clique, favoring certain students over others. The lawsuit claimed that they socialized with students and shared inappropriate stories about boyfriends. Mastoloni would also pry about students' personal lives and offer to interpret their dreams.

Defendant Mastoloni veered from the Spanish curriculum and taught her students about spirituality, numerology, astrology, dreams and angels in her classes, the lawsuit claimed.

She asked students to write essays about what they believed happened to them when they died - but because the writing was in Spanish, people outside the class were unaware of the inappropriate subject matter.

According to the suit, Mastoloni told her class about her abusive upbringing, including stories of an alleged kidnapping and rape by her stepfather.

The parents' lawsuit alleges that the girls were up all night performing 'whirling dervish' dances at Wellesley College, following their personality changes

From Courthouse News service:

"All three girls experienced sudden and severe personality changes," the complaint states. "They became flat and distant, reclusive, secretive, and non-communicative. They lost their humor and their empathy. They began speaking in a bizarre new language. They became unable to think critically or independently. They became dependent on the school teachers and guidance counselor who had indoctrinated them, especially defendant Tanya Mastoloni."

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The Does say they sent their daughters to public school to receive a secular education. "The religious indoctrination had no secular purpose," the complaint states.

They claim that the "infringement of Jane's and John's fundamental right to parental autonomy was done without a compelling reason, and without due process of law."

The Does want Avon Public Schools held accountable for its failure to "properly supervise and control its employees, and for allowing its employees to engage in predatory religious indoctrination in school."

Teachers in Connecticut 'indoctrinated family's daughters into a cult' | Mail Online

Yazidi boy forced to join ISIS terror camp given sword to behead his MOTHER | Daily Mail Online

A Yazidi mother has told how her four-year-old son was taken from her to join an ISIS terror training camp where he was forced to learn passages from the Koran, Sharia Law and even given a sword and taught how to behead his own mother.

Bohar – not her real name - could do little but watch as her young son was handed a sword by their captors, who told him 'this is to kill your mother'.

Later, he revealed they were training him to chop people's heads off, shoot guns and hate his own people, at an age when most children around the world are just learning to read.

Her son was never forced to carry out the perverted act - but his mother is adamant if her son had stayed he would have been forced to kill for ISIS.

In an exclusive interview, Bohar, 35, told MailOnline: 'ISIS trained my son to learn the Koran, how to speak Arabic, how to pray and how to use a sword.’

Speaking from a refugee camp in Dohuk, northern Iraq, Bohar said: 'They told him that Yazidis are Kafir, Arabic for ‘non-believers’ and told him he had to fight them.

‘This one time the ISIS man gave him a sword and said this is to kill your mother.'

Bohar, her son Hamo, not his real name, and her three other children were captured by ISIS last August, just south-east of Sinjar Mountain.

Unable to flee, they were imprisoned with 2,000 other Yazidi, from where they were shunted between prisons in Tal-Afar and Badush in Mosul - as evil ISIS militants decided their fate.

'In Badush prison ISIS took my eldest daughter and my eldest son who is 12. They took them to Syria,' she said.

'Some friends [later] told me my daughter and son were taken to Raqqa, where I believe they still are,' she added. 

Yazidi boy forced to join ISIS terror camp given sword to behead his MOTHER | Daily Mail Online

Indoctrinated son 'troubled’ by mother’s religion is put into care - Telegraph

What strange case out of the UK,,,

A devout mother made a legally binding promise, backed up with the threat of criminal sanctions, never to talk to her son about her religion, take him to church or even say grace at meals in a doomed attempt to stop him being taken into care, amid claims that she was “indoctrinating” him, a judge has disclosed.

The seven-year-old boy, who cannot be named, has been placed with foster carers because of fears that his mother, a Jehovah’s Witness, was causing him emotional harm by “immersing” him in her beliefs.

The child, who teachers described as “troubled, angry and confused”, rejected his own father because he said he “could not be with people who didn’t believe in Jehovah”.

He appeared fixated with the idea that his father, who is separated from his mother but had shared parental responsibilities, would not be “going to Paradise” and told adults he “did not want to go to Daddy’s because he was not a Jehovah”.

Indoctrinated son 'troubled’ by mother’s religion is put into care - Telegraph

LiveLeak.com - Child Coercion at Memphis area church camp

This concerns the debacle surrounding the Rose of Sharon indoctrination video posted previously. There is a concerted effort on the part of the religionist to remove any evidence of this incident:

The next thing we knew, the legal threats started coming in,,, claiming everything from copyright violations to slander and defamation to child exploitation,,,[b]ecause we don’t have the time and money for lawyers, and because we have spent a lot of time and money over the last year building a page of over 100,000 fans for our Biblical literacy project – well, we caved. We are not proud to admit it, but we let the bullies win and removed the post. Within minutes, we were inundated with questions from fans, “What happened to the post? All of the shares disappeared too!”

One of those fans had the guts to set up a new page of their own, Stop Religious Child Abuse and shared the content there from the LiveLeak video and one of the image sites. So, we graciously linked to their post instead for a few hours. I say a ‘few hours’ because that is all it took for the content to be removed by Facebook’s (what I presume to be automated) system due to multiple reports of being “offensive”. (The irony of those who originally created and publicly shared the “offensive” content now reporting it was “offensive” was not lost on me.) Again, all of the public shares and re-shares were gone forever, fans growing weary of sharing the same content over and over again. Bullies win again.

This is the so-called religious freedom, the Reich hides behind. It is "Jesus Camp" part two!!
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CROWDSOURCING AGAINST CHILD ABUSE
The time has come. One of the fans over at Awkward Moments Children's Bible put together the following list of major media outlets in Memphis area. (The Rose of Sharon Church & Camp are in Burlison, just north of the city.)

As the church continues to force the removal of shares, re-posts and mirrors of content (and local authorities appear to be non-responsive) the only way this story won’t disappear forever is if we stand together and politely ask the local media to seriously consider reporting on a story that has gone viral (and silenced) online many times in the last week.

LINKS TO SHARE WITH MEDIA
VIDEO: http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=468_1405628081
PHOTO: http://bit.ly/1qPY2Ov
(Please, use your own words.)

If you are personally concerned for the well being of the children shown in the content shared by counselors from last week’s camp, please consider speaking up on their behalf.

"The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing." - Edmund Burke

= = = MEMPHIS MEDIA CONTACTS = = =
Memphis Action 5 News (NBC)
Report: desk@wmctv.com
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ActionNews5

WREG News - Channel - (CBS)
Report: http://wreg.com/contact/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/wreg3

Fox13 Memphis (FOX)
Report: news@myfoxmemphis.com
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/fox13news.myfoxmemphis

Local Memphis (ABC/CW)
Report: newsdesk@localmemphis.com
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/LocalMemphis

LiveLeak.com - Child Coercion at Memphis area church camp

This Is What Religious Indoctrination Looks Like, Courtesy of a Christian Summer Camp

In a previous post, I referenced the documentary Jesus Camp.  Although I do not believe there is a "direct" affiliation, the similarities are there.  For example, both "Kids On Fire School of Ministry" (since closed) and the Rose of Sharon Camp come out of or are influenced by the Pentecostal and the Charismatic movement.  Daily structure for activities and indoctrination are also almost identical.

What I find very creepy from a personal standpoint, minus the "spiritual gifts" emphasis, they are both similar to the Christian camp organization I was once affiliated with.  And that realization has just freaked me the fuck out,,,eeew!!

(A we side note:  I was raised in the Lutheran church - Missouri Synod, ie Catholic wannabees.  I am as close to a PK as one can get without actually being one as both my parental units have held the office of church president multiple times.  That alone placed me on a higher pedestal amongst my peers as my conduct "had to be" impeccable.  Trust me it wasn't!

I left the Lutheran church at 20 and was involved in the Charismatic movement for another 7 years before beginning my "de-conversion" that began with doctrinal issues but eventually evolved into more than "just" non-believe.)

What is so troublesome, especially considering my former role in such matters,

This is just manipulation by the adults. It’s not like speaking in tongues is a special God-given gift. It’s a trick that must be taught. I know atheists who once believed they could do it — and if they get themselves in the right mental state, they can start speaking in tongues again. It’s a neat little parlor trick with them.

But with these kids, it’s flat-out disturbing. It’s not like they know what they’re doing; they’re just being pressured into going along with the crowd.

It is for this reason I am so anti-hereditary religious indoctrination.

This Is What Religious Indoctrination Looks Like, Courtesy of a Christian Summer Camp

See also: 

 VIDEO – Child Coercion or Religious Freedom?

• A thorough breakdown of what has transpired concerning this horrid video went public,. The who, what, where, why, when ans how of it,,,  

Stop Religious Child Abuse

• A Facebook group created in response to the debacle mention above."We are here to use the power of social media to bring light to the most extreme religious traditions and practices that cause harm - especially to kids."

But What About Your Daughter | Leaving Your Religion

Years ago, when I was a youth pastor, I read an article in a youth ministry magazine that claimed 85% of all Christians accepted Christ before the age of eighteen. Based on these statistics, it encouraged youth workers to redouble their efforts to save youth and children. Once they went off to college or began exploring the world, the odds of young adults becoming religious were greatly diminished. Back then, I thought that outcome a tragedy.

When I was teaching religious doctrine to children, I never thought of it as indoctrination. As a religious person, I had the responsibility of raising them in the faith. While orthodox theology allowed for an age of accountability before which children weren’t morally responsible, every Christian parent was overjoyed when their son or daughter accepted Christ. The pressure was off. Their eternal destiny was assured.

Back then, if someone had suggested children weren’t developmentally capable of making an informed decision about religious belief, I would have missed the point. You indoctrinated children when they were most malleable, assuring their adherence to your religion’s beliefs and practices, because you loved them. This indoctrination, though inappropriate from a non-religious perspective, was the religious equivalent of a vaccination. You were protecting your children from ideas and experiences that might destroy them, from choices and actions that might damn them to hell. To do otherwise was irresponsible.

Now that I’m non-religious, I try to remember the religious motive. I remember the mother, who when I publicly abandoned a belief in hell, chastised me for threatening one of her tools for raising her children. She said, “Without the threat of hell, how do you expect me to raise a moral child?” This woman was not a negligent, abusive parent. Indeed, within her religious framework, she was an exemplary mother. Though she worried about hell, her primary concern was raising a moral child.

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Again, I try to remember my indoctrination. I was taught that without religious training moral development was problematic, if not impossible. This prejudice was difficult for me to abandon. Since my moral training happened within a religious context, it was hard to imagine raising children without that undergirding. What could possibly replace the Ten Commandments, the Sermon on the Mount, the Golden Rule and the parables of Jesus? This anxiety may explain why many parents, though they no longer have much interest in religion, often return to their childhood religious communities when they become parents. They don’t know where else to go.

But What About Your Daughter | Leaving Your Religion