One of the least discussed aspects of bullying and mobbing, and perhaps the most powerful and damaging, is the practice of shunning. Shunning is widely practiced among certain religions; the Jehovah's Witnesses, the Church of Scientology, even the otherwise forgiving Amish have made shunning a religious tenet to control the conduct of its members. Families routinely shun other family members, whether through disinheritance and outright withdrawal of any contact or support, or the deafening "silent treatment" that some spouses and parents engage in as a form of punishment for real or perceived offenses. People are shunned in their communities, their clubs and their schools. But perhaps shunning is most common in the workplace, when a worker is targeted for collective aggression and elimination, or "workplace mobbing."
When a person is marked for punishment or elimination by management, workers instinctively avoid being seen with that person for fear of their own status being tarnished in the workplace. But to targets of shunning, the near instantaneous isolation almost always comes as a shock, and the intensifying silence that encircles them is indeed deadly. The impact of shunning is so severe that those religions, organizations and families which routinely employ it do so because they know just how effective a form of social control the practice can be, debilitating even the strongest people once it commences.
When a person is shunned, it is because they have done something to displease someone, or are perceived as distinctly "different" from the group and are therefore an "unknown" force. Shunning is thus a feature of a broader spectrum of aggressive behaviors, including accusation, sabotage, investigation and other efforts to control or remove the person from the group. To shun a person consequently isolates them at the very point when they most need support. It further erodes their self-esteem and their ability to withstand attack. Moreover, when a worker is targeted for elimination, once they are shunned it becomes very difficult to defend their position as former supporters disappear, and even more difficult for them to find new work. And shunning is a particularly effective tactic to undermine a worker's legal claims, however legitimate, because it is very difficult to prove a negative. Shunning is a non-action -- to shun is to avoid, not to interact.
Yet for all its destructiveness, our society treats shunning as a virtue. In virtually all professional self-help books on how to succeed at work, a person is advised to avoid unpopular people, "trouble makers" or anyone else who is under attack at work. A good deal of the current anti-bullying rhetoric makes it a strategic and moral imperative to collectively shun anyone accused of bullying, a rather ironic tactic of workplace aggression. And self-help books promoting optimistic thinking commonly advise their readers to avoid "negative" or unpopular people. Indeed, human instinct itself suggests that stigma is contagious and it is better to be seen with those who are successful than those who are crashing from once revered heights of their profession or station, in many cases unjustifiably or unfairly.
I understand the motivation to avoid those whose own dilemma may prove stigmatizing or discomforting. Yet I remain troubled by the failure of our species to extend compassion to those who need it the most. The instinct to avoid those who are unpopular with leaders is well recognized in the animal kingdom -- chimps and wolves being among the most notable in tormenting their unpopular brethren when the alphas do so -- and humans share such survival instincts. But we differ from these animals by being blessed with the ability to give meaning to the events in our lives, and to intellectually discern complexity and nuance -- the very features of social aggression that lead to shunning. Our capacity to understand the complexity of social conflicts ought to suggest that whatever our human counterparts are suffering, chances are there is plenty of room for compassion -- and patience -- in how we approach them in their troubling times.
To survive as humans, we must rely on social support, and when we withdraw that support on the basis of unpopularity we might advance our own social survival, but we erode our own capacity for compassion and our own potential to be fully human and humane. Whether we shun someone professionally in the name of professionalism, in our religious institutions in the name of God, or in our own families in the name of pride, we lessen ourselves, our spirits and our humanity. Silence is not always golden, it is deadly when it extends to shunning, and once commenced, it is difficult to stop. But on individual levels it can stop, if each of us considers how and whom we shun. We rarely shun the most nefarious of leaders in our groups and organizations, but we routinely shun those who are powerless or losing power, however good-hearted but imperfect they may be. And when we do shun, we rarely call it by name, and virtually always shift the blame to the target as having brought it on themselves, regardless of their suffering. We justify shunning through gossip, revising our opinions of those we once respected and in many cases loved, and by diffusing our responsibility as we note others are doing the same.
The longer we shun a person, the harder it is to break the silence and make peace. But there is no better season by which we might do so than the holiday season. Should old acquaintances be forgotten, or might each of us consider those we have forgotten because, for whatever reason, we joined with others to avoid another person's pain? You may give no greater gift this season than to reach out and un-shun someone whose social isolation you have helped create, however unintentionally. At most, you risk rejection. At best, you help to heal a heart, at the very least, your own.
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Shunning is shunning and mobbing is mobbing, There are similarities but are not the same.
Many rules, ethics, morals, and policies are routinely broken such as smoking on the property or relationships among staff even the business code is bypassed in favor of a company profit. I will continue to contend that a person is on their way out for many reasons and often this is an ostreperous personality.
Mobbing usually is a response and usually an instantaneous response by a group to a situation Mobbing can be prolonged over quite a period of time depending on the broken social contract by the offending party. Ex. Rodney King and LA when the police were not found guilty.
Common understanding - socially - is guilt by association. In business it is still those with the gold rule. Unions were formed to combat such but have turned into bullies and social cliques which even spend the workers money backing political canidates and demand political unity or the union members are shunned?
Same goes for companies that had employees giving money to a "charity" that was shown later to be 80% administration cost of donations? People were blacklisted if they did not give?
Mobbing is a physical action and the negative form leads to physical harm of properity or person(s). Mobbing can be organized such as the shoplifting flash mobbing now going on.
'Heinz' Leyman does make a case for organized punishment of fellow employees and this is translated directly as mobbing.. I do not know what swedish word Heinz used it amy be any of three - samlas; attackera, anfalla.
It basically means a collective attack.
There is academic mobbing - in my opinion - if your position can not be defended in detail - it is time to withdraw and realign.
The point is that the shunning of cults is not the shunning of which you write. Workplace shunning or mobbing can drive a person from their job but does not and is not the same as those that have been shunned by a religious group. You are being told this in many different ways by many different people. Some are being very polite and complimentary willing to see the similarities between the two. The cults mentioned are deadly and there is no comparison to aspects of workplace shunning.
It is a fact that there are people that fail to adapt to a work situation for some reason. This is often seen and known to workers well before the owners or management of a company. This is often a cause for shunning in the workplace.
There are always - always - skeletons in the closet of the cults's leadership (and that includes those that run colleges). There are the equivalent of the student that wields power over others by being the teacher's pet in both cults and the workplace so too the equivilent of the physical bully and the social bully in cults and the workplace.
Yes there is bullying in religion, the workplace, the neighborhood, and so forth but Shunning is quite different. Shunning is an organized mental, emotional, and spiritual abuse of a person by a group of people. Shunning is not a mob action driven by an event or events or rage. Shunning is a diliberate and purposeful action to bend a person's will or keep people in line by fear of abandonment.
more work perhaps? research a book?
A person that belongs to a religion or a thought system such as the WatchTower Organization or Scientology is under a control that the author has not experienced. Shunning and being a social pariah or an outcast is quite different.
The motivations and the structures that these aspects of human social behaviors vary and can not be compared except to place a vague label and state a generality.
Shunning is performed by cults to pull a person back into the fold by shocking them using the awareness of loneliness outside of the group. Shunning also keeps current membership or followers from being influenced by those that have stepped outside of "group thought".
Many social groupings have cliques or sepratists. People that choose to be outside of the main body who often are proud to be a lone wolf are social sepratists whereas a person who has for any number of reasons brought on the distiction of social pariah are often the makers of their own situation. Not following group think of the boss or the company is a choice. Keep in mind that when a person takes a job they have made both a written and unwritten agreements to follow company policy and be paid a wage as a result acting as an agent for the company in their job capacity. Social pariahs in the workplace have broken any number of contracts and often long before people begin avoiding them.
Having been ganged up on yourself will make a person think it is common. Often it is a small group but powerful social subgroup that instigates the larger mass action.
Cults such as the WatchTower and the Scientologists practive shunning that is abandonment of members that do not agree with the leadership's tenants. Shunning as practiced by the WatchTower is a premeditated act of punishment and control. Shunning as practice by the WatchTower is evil.
Followers of the WatchTower, called Jehovah's Witnesses, do not celebrate Christmas and have no understanding of 'goodwill toward all', the spirit of love or forgiveness. The WatchTower teaches them that all people that are not part o the WatchTower organization are of the world under the influence of satan and the demons. Former JWs are called apostates labeled poisonous, mentally diseased, and are treated as they are dead. Members of the WatchTower completely cut off their children, mothers, fathers, brothers, sisters, friends, and so forth. There is no comparison Janice to a person that has become a workplace outcast and shunning by cults.
* Requiring a family to alienate or divorce a shunned member, forcing him to leave the home.
* Requiring a community to refuse to do business with a shunned member, depriving him of the means of life, forcing him to leave.
* Shunning members who did not join of their own will, or join without knowing the religion's requirements or the consequences of not meeting them.
* Shunning members with no opportunity to appeal.
* Shunning members who simply stop participating.
We who don't practice those, do not appreciated being lumped together with those who do. Considering that different religions practice differently and use different terms to indicate these practices, respectful discussion requires using the correct term for each religion's practice, such as Disfellowshipping among Jehovah's Witnesses or Mormons, Excommunication among Catholics, Cherem within Judaism, Meidung among Amish, Disconnection among Scientologists, etc.
How do you presume to dictate to those who already participate in your Season how they will observe it? How do you presume to dictate to the rest, that we must begin participating?
Without shunning, how will you dictate what Reason and Season to observe, and how? I don't know where you are, but in the USA, we have Freedom of Religion. Some faiths take our beliefs seriously; if you don't want
Shunning is "emotional blackmail"; a coldly enforced punishment by those who arrogantly believe that the shunned one "brought it upon themselves." Also, those who "punish" with shunning are often unwilling to consider the shunned one's circumstances which caused them to "fall from grace," or to "consider the evidence."
Sadly, the shunned one must often cope with those "in between" them and their shunners; being expected to "just take it"; often asked, "What's the big deal, anyway?"
The shunned one can rarely defend themselves to their shunners...they will not be listened to if they try, and are judged as "deserving of punishment" if they "just take it" in silence...
True shunning goes beyond simply "avoiding" someone; it's an act of cold and calculated cruelty that is often enforced by a group that puts the shunned one in a weaker position of being alone and on "the outside." Cave men did it; tribes did it; and high-control religions do it..
Shunning is used to control others; to "vilify" them; to "set apart" those no longer in favor with authority; to punish; to use as an "example" to control others. Shunning is one of the ugliest sides of humanity...
I for one, do not shun. I have never shunned anyone. Period. I never will. There is no need. If a person is dangerous to me then they will be in jail. When they get out, I can have a conversation with them if I want. Maybe they reformed or got saved. Who knows. But I will never have some MAN or ORGANIZATION come up to me and tell me I can't talk to someone.
I may not actively seek out company for a number of reasons, but if I run into someone I will probably talk to them even if I can't stand them or have a difference in values with them. They can't harm me in any way just by talking to me. If they have information to share, I will listen. If the info turns out to be false then, oh well.
Jehovah's Witness elders enter into a home, a family, like they did mine when I was growing up, and they will tell family members, like they told mine that we can't watch TV with my disfellowshipped sister because that was unnecessary association. That is SICK and disgusting.
The argument is not whether people can or cannot be members it is the treatment metered out to those that leave namely shunning. Shunning is an emotional control toll employed by the wt organisation. If I discover that the organisation belonged to the UN as an NGO , a fact concealed from the member of the organisation, and conscientiously leave due to this I am condemned as an apostate. BTW belonging to the library is a weak pathetic reason and far from justifies having anything to do with an organisation that JWs are taught is the expression of the Wild Beast, namely Satan. This did in fact happen. For discovering this duplicity of the organisation and leaving anyone can have their family and friends cut them off by decree, so sad. The shunning expected by the wt organisation is emotional abuse and it is ironic that 'lack of natural affection' is a sign of the last days according to Timothy.
The God Ron said “Never Defend, Always Attack”. He “thought” and then “Doctrine of Fair Game” came into being into this Sinful World to control it.
He saw that people got sick and he claimed to all mankind. “That all illness in greater or lesser degree and all foul-ups stem directly and only from a PTS condition”.
He saw that all real causes of illnesses and symptoms, had to be suppressed, hidden, erased from his Ronbots’ brains, so he needed a way to keep the fraud secret. So he claimed to his slaves that all the REAL CAUSES of illnesses in the world were only an illusion and a deception created by psychiatrists to dominate the world in mental health and MDs in physical health.
"So long as a physiological phenomenon remains the knowledge of a few and is denied to the many it can be utilized to control the many." LRH (from Journal of Scientology Issue 4-G from Oct. 1952)
The God Ron claims that 72 hours after being near a Suppressive Person you or your pet will get sick. He claims that all SPs restimulate and is the ONLY cause or source of ALL illnesses and accidents or foul-ups. But the cult also claims that ALL people that dislike and/or oppose Scientology are Suppressive Persons without exception.
THE RONBOT HUNTER
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
Jehovah's Witnesses have the highest turnover rate of any religion in the United States. Nearly two-thirds of those who become members will leave. There is something deeply wrong with an organization that claims to be Christian and breaks apart families, shunning even their own children. This form of shunning called “Disfellowshipping” is nothing more than psychological brutality meted out to keep the rank and file in line with fear and has led some to commit suicide. Jehovah’s Witnesses will only treat you with love and respect if you go along 100% with their distortions. If you persist in asking questions or challenging their doctrine, you are expelled, losing all friends and family members, never able to speak to them again, not even to say “hello.” Even minor children have been forced to leave home and live on the streets because they no longer agreed with the convoluted and highly extrapolated teachings of their faith.
this (lie) to the public and media.
You cannot leave without being shunned. If you are in for 3 generations like my family, you will loose all your friends and family in one single day! And you will be hated by those still in the organization. Anyone who does not accept the organization as the ONLY way to God is hated See WT Oct 1, 1993 page 19
. Disfellowshipping isn't to be found in the Bible. Even checking the scripture/word index in their own NWT JW Bible reveals this.
The Scriptures that they do twist/apply (not to say a greeting) have to do with shunning the ANTI-Christ
The nearest I can see to their Dfing practice it is the trial of Jesus.
The shunning practiced by Jehovah's Witnesses is a shame device cult control tactic and the entire family is cut-off.
-Danny Haszard (been there a disfellowshipped Jehovah's Witness)