Spiritual* Violence

[Linked]

More from "Finding Meaning in the Second Half of Life":

What a terrible dilemma facing a child! Please my parents and die within, or live my separate journey and lose their love. Such deformation of the child's unique journey is a kind of spiritual violence. And how many only come to realize this spiritual deformation of themselves years after the critical choices were made? Such demand for compliance cannot in the end be called love, because it is a harm of the deepest sort to those we profess to love.

This rings true with my experience growing up mormon. The church perverts the meaning of love to be "make everyone mormon", which pushes parents to do everything possible to make their kids mormon. By the time the kid realizes that mormonism is not True, nor is it for them, they are married to someone who is all in on mormonism and have 2 kids.

On the other hand, this is a tough thing when you get specific. Where is the line between important things you need to reinforce with your kids and spiritual violence? Is punishing my kids for hurting others spiritual violence? TBMs really think staying mormon is the most important thing in the universe, so in their worldview it is spiritual violence to NOT do everything in their power to push their kids toward lifelong belief and participation.

*spiritual in this book is not really religion-based, but more about the yearnings of the self or soul.

[alas]

Where is the line between important things you need to reinforce with your kids and spiritual violence? Is punishing my kids for hurting others spiritual violence? TBMs really think staying mormon is the most important thing in the universe, so in their worldview it is spiritual violence to NOT do everything in their power to push their kids toward lifelong belief and participation.

*spiritual in this book is not really religion-based, but more about the yearnings of the self or soul.

When my oldest was three, we had a neighbor with a little boy who was three. He was a brat. One day he bit my daughter hard enough to draw blood. She of course came home crying. A few minutes later, his mother who watched the whole thing, came over, with the poor kid two inches off the ground being held up by a twisted ear. She was yelling at him to apologize to my daughter.

That is spiritual violence in the name of teaching a kid to be kind to others. My daughter was traumatized a second time by the mother abusing her boy for biting, and I shudder what to think of the lesson the kid learned. Violence is fine if you have authority. Violence is fine if someone bigger than you does it. But the kid was happily (his one ear was probably longer) out playing before I got the bleeding stopped on my daughter’s arm. You can see why the child was a holy terror. My child would have been grounded to their bedroom with, if you can’t play nicely with other children, then you can’t play with other children.

There is a difference between teaching your child and forcing your child. Teaching would be to take them to church, talk about things at home, you know, teach them. Forcing them are the parents who promise the kid a new car if he goes on a mission. Threatening them you won’t pay for college if they don’t serve a mission. You should show your child what is good about something and then let them choose. But there would be few Mormon missionaries, because there is too little good that comes from serving a mission.

Spiritual violence are tactics that harm the child, so, of course physical violence, shunning, withdrawal of love, shaming. So, if you harm your child trying to make them do something you think is good, that isn’t love and it is probably not for the child’s well being, but for your own benefit. The parents who force the child to be Mormon are not doing it for the child’s good, but usually for their own selfish motives. The parents want the child to make the parents look like good parents, so they turn into horrible parents so things look good to the neighbors. Conditional love is harmful, so when parents withdraw their love, in an attempt to force the child into something, no matter if the parents justify it as good, then that s emotional abuse.

[wtfluff]

*spiritual in this book is not really religion-based, but more about the yearnings of the self or soul.

Does the book have an actual definition of *spiritual?

[deacon blues]

Spiritual abuse is sometimes called religious abuse. It happens when someone uses spiritual or religious beliefs to hurt, scare or control you. Spiritual abuse can be a form of domestic and family violence. From 1-800-Respect
This makes sense.

[Linked]

*spiritual in this book is not really religion-based, but more about the yearnings of the self or soul.

Does the book have an actual definition of *spiritual?

Hey Fluff, I've been thinking about this question once a day since you posted it, but I haven't yet got a good answer. I'm listening to the book so it's a chore to try to find the part of the book that the author might have defined spiritual.

I am now on a chapter where the author is condemning organized religions and rejection of spirituality. There is certainly room to do that, but I'm having a hard time finding any value in what this guy is selling. It's very "your truth" and "your god" kind of stuff which is anathema to me. The spirituality seems to be rooted in your self/soul; the being who sees through your eyes and acts with your body. Sorry I haven't got a better response!

Where is the line between important things you need to reinforce with your kids and spiritual violence? Is punishing my kids for hurting others spiritual violence? TBMs really think staying mormon is the most important thing in the universe, so in their worldview it is spiritual violence to NOT do everything in their power to push their kids toward lifelong belief and participation.

*spiritual in this book is not really religion-based, but more about the yearnings of the self or soul.

When my oldest was three, we had a neighbor with a little boy who was three. He was a brat. One day he bit my daughter hard enough to draw blood. She of course came home crying. A few minutes later, his mother who watched the whole thing, came over, with the poor kid two inches off the ground being held up by a twisted ear. She was yelling at him to apologize to my daughter.

That is spiritual violence in the name of teaching a kid to be kind to others. My daughter was traumatized a second time by the mother abusing her boy for biting, and I shudder what to think of the lesson the kid learned. Violence is fine if you have authority. Violence is fine if someone bigger than you does it. But the kid was happily (his one ear was probably longer) out playing before I got the bleeding stopped on my daughter’s arm. You can see why the child was a holy terror. My child would have been grounded to their bedroom with, if you can’t play nicely with other children, then you can’t play with other children.

There is a difference between teaching your child and forcing your child. Teaching would be to take them to church, talk about things at home, you know, teach them. Forcing them are the parents who promise the kid a new car if he goes on a mission. Threatening them you won’t pay for college if they don’t serve a mission. You should show your child what is good about something and then let them choose. But there would be few Mormon missionaries, because there is too little good that comes from serving a mission.

Spiritual violence are tactics that harm the child, so, of course physical violence, shunning, withdrawal of love, shaming. So, if you harm your child trying to make them do something you think is good, that isn’t love and it is probably not for the child’s well being, but for your own benefit. The parents who force the child to be Mormon are not doing it for the child’s good, but usually for their own selfish motives. The parents want the child to make the parents look like good parents, so they turn into horrible parents so things look good to the neighbors. Conditional love is harmful, so when parents withdraw their love, in an attempt to force the child into something, no matter if the parents justify it as good, then that s emotional abuse.

I've thought about this one a lot too, Alas. I like your definition of spiritual violence. It's not necessarily what you are teaching, but how you are teaching it. Beating your kids is physical violence. In my understanding of the author's definition, forcing a child into a worldview which conflicts with their "self" is spiritual violence. Maybe that could be simplified to just forcing a worldview on a child is spiritual violence.

[alas]

*spiritual in this book is not really religion-based, but more about the yearnings of the self or soul.

Does the book have an actual definition of *spiritual?

Hey Fluff, I've been thinking about this question once a day since you posted it, but I haven't yet got a good answer. I'm listening to the book so it's a chore to try to find the part of the book that the author might have defined spiritual.

I am now on a chapter where the author is condemning organized religions and rejection of spirituality. There is certainly room to do that, but I'm having a hard time finding any value in what this guy is selling. It's very "your truth" and "your god" kind of stuff which is anathema to me. The spirituality seems to be rooted in your self/soul; the being who sees through your eyes and acts with your body. Sorry I haven't got a better response!

Where is the line between important things you need to reinforce with your kids and spiritual violence? Is punishing my kids for hurting others spiritual violence? TBMs really think staying mormon is the most important thing in the universe, so in their worldview it is spiritual violence to NOT do everything in their power to push their kids toward lifelong belief and participation.

*spiritual in this book is not really religion-based, but more about the yearnings of the self or soul.

When my oldest was three, we had a neighbor with a little boy who was three. He was a brat. One day he bit my daughter hard enough to draw blood. She of course came home crying. A few minutes later, his mother who watched the whole thing, came over, with the poor kid two inches off the ground being held up by a twisted ear. She was yelling at him to apologize to my daughter.

That is spiritual violence in the name of teaching a kid to be kind to others. My daughter was traumatized a second time by the mother abusing her boy for biting, and I shudder what to think of the lesson the kid learned. Violence is fine if you have authority. Violence is fine if someone bigger than you does it. But the kid was happily (his one ear was probably longer) out playing before I got the bleeding stopped on my daughter’s arm. You can see why the child was a holy terror. My child would have been grounded to their bedroom with, if you can’t play nicely with other children, then you can’t play with other children.

There is a difference between teaching your child and forcing your child. Teaching would be to take them to church, talk about things at home, you know, teach them. Forcing them are the parents who promise the kid a new car if he goes on a mission. Threatening them you won’t pay for college if they don’t serve a mission. You should show your child what is good about something and then let them choose. But there would be few Mormon missionaries, because there is too little good that comes from serving a mission.

Spiritual violence are tactics that harm the child, so, of course physical violence, shunning, withdrawal of love, shaming. So, if you harm your child trying to make them do something you think is good, that isn’t love and it is probably not for the child’s well being, but for your own benefit. The parents who force the child to be Mormon are not doing it for the child’s good, but usually for their own selfish motives. The parents want the child to make the parents look like good parents, so they turn into horrible parents so things look good to the neighbors. Conditional love is harmful, so when parents withdraw their love, in an attempt to force the child into something, no matter if the parents justify it as good, then that s emotional abuse.

I've thought about this one a lot too, Alas. I like your definition of spiritual violence. It's not necessarily what you are teaching, but how you are teaching it. Beating your kids is physical violence. In my understanding of the author's definition, forcing a child into a worldview which conflicts with their "self" is spiritual violence. Maybe that could be simplified to just forcing a worldview on a child is spiritual violence.

Yes, it can be simplified even further. Forcing your thinking of any type onto another person is abusive. Because doing so overrides their lived experience. Gaslighting is one form of forcing your world view onto another. You tell them that their reality is not real. Say a child walks into the room, obviously upset and announces, “I hate daddy.” Well, mom thinks, we can’t have that, so she immediately tells the child that he does not hate his father. She just discounted her child’s feelings and experience. That is abuse when done repeatedly. Sure, “hate” is a strong word for what the kid is going to forget by tomorrow. But obviously the kid is angry, so acknowledge the real feeling. “It sounds like you are angry at Daddy. Tell me what happened.” This response recognized the child’s experience as real, where telling the kid that he doesn’t really hate his father basically tells the kid his feelings are wrong and bad.it doesn’t help resolve the feelings, just pretends they don’t exist. The parent is imposing her reality onto the child and saying the child’s reality is wrong. This teaches the child that their honest feeling are bad and so they learn to stuff their feelings down instead of deal with them in a healthy way.

Spiritual violence or emotional abuse or whatever one wants to call it is doing emotional harm and really, it is SO common among people who call themselves religious. In the name of doing God’s will, they use shame and guilt and deny people lived experience, deny their feelings, tell them their feelings are evil, tell them their likes are bad, any harm is spiritual violence.

So, same thing by telling the child that their feelings of attraction to someone are wrong, evil, “God doesn’t like you feeling that.” That forces the child to deny their natural feelings. Makes them feel crazy. Wanting to hit Johnny is evil. And that feels evil. So, that is a congruent thought when a parent teaches it is evil. Wanting to be close to Johnny does not feel evil, but people are telling me that feeling is evil, so I must be crazy to not feel like that is evil.

A gay person’s lived experience is that “love is good”. But then society tries to force them into “YOUR love is not good, it is icky.” Now as a straight person, I can understand the reaction that “that kind of love is icky.” Because to me it feels strange to try to consider loving someone female. It really feels strange, so of course I am going to imagine that my way of feeling is the right way and your way of feeling is strange and icky. But when I try to insist that someone else feels or SHOULD feel the same way I do, I deny their reality.

There are big ways you can deny someone else’s reality and little ways. But any denial of someone’s live experience is crazy making if repeated over and over.

So, let’s look at a common way. Some dude tells a blond joke, and the blond girl says, “that is not funny, it is mean.” And the dude says, “what’s wrong with you, can’t you take a joke?” Dude just insisted that his reality is important and hers is not important. Dude just crossed the line into being a sexist jerk, because he is insisting that his reality is real and hers is not. “Can’t you take a joke?” Is probably the most common abusive line there is.

When the older generation says to the younger generation, “that isn’t modest.” Or “that music is sexually suggestive.” Or “two piercing in your ear is not modest.” Or even “why can’t you put on a little lipstick. It isn’t that hard.” (All things the church authorities have said) they are imposing their generation’s style on the younger generation. It is just a way of saying “what I like is good and what you like is icky.” It is the same d*** thing. Whether is the “the music like like is good and the music you like is evil” or “the sex I like is good and the sex you like is evil.” It is all the same thing. It is saying “my reality matters more than your reality.”

To sum up what I am saying, any emotional abuse in the name of God is spiritual violence. It is using God as a club to beat someone and religious people live to use God as a club.

[Linked]

Yes, it can be simplified even further. Forcing your thinking of any type onto another person is abusive. Because doing so overrides their lived experience. Gaslighting is one form of forcing your world view onto another. You tell them that their reality is not real. Say a child walks into the room, obviously upset and announces, “I hate daddy.” Well, mom thinks, we can’t have that, so she immediately tells the child that he does not hate his father. She just discounted her child’s feelings and experience. That is abuse when done repeatedly. Sure, “hate” is a strong word for what the kid is going to forget by tomorrow. But obviously the kid is angry, so acknowledge the real feeling. “It sounds like you are angry at Daddy. Tell me what happened.” This response recognized the child’s experience as real, where telling the kid that he doesn’t really hate his father basically tells the kid his feelings are wrong and bad.it doesn’t help resolve the feelings, just pretends they don’t exist. The parent is imposing her reality onto the child and saying the child’s reality is wrong. This teaches the child that their honest feeling are bad and so they learn to stuff their feelings down instead of deal with them in a healthy way.

This got me choked up a little bit. This happens so much. And you can see the light go out of the kids eyes each time their reality is beaten out of them.

Thank you for sharing your wisdom Alas!