Understanding Religious Trauma Syndrome: It’s Time to Recognize It

[Warren Stupidity]

I'm really struggling and am desperate never to go back to the religion I was raised in, but I no longer want to live in fear or depression. It seems that I am walking through the jungle alone with my machete; no one to share my crazy and sometimes scary thoughts with.

After years of depression, anxiety, anger, and finally a week in a psychiatric hospital a year ago, I am now trying to pick up the pieces and put them together into something that makes sense. I'm confused. My whole identity is a shredded, tangled mess. I am in utter turmoil.

These comments are not unusual for people suffering with Religious Trauma Syndrome, or RTS. Religious trauma? Isn’t religion supposed to be helpful, or at least benign? In the case of fundamentalist beliefs, people expect that choosing to leave a childhood faith is like giving up Santa Claus – a little sad but basically a matter of growing up.

But religious indoctrination can be hugely damaging, and making the break from an authoritarian kind of religion can definitely be traumatic. It involves a complete upheaval of a person’s construction of reality, including the self, other people, life, the future, everything. People unfamiliar with it, including therapists, have trouble appreciating the sheer terror it can create and the recovery needed.

http://www.babcp.com/Review/RTS-Its-Time-to-Recognize-it.aspx

[guillaumeb]

1. Not RTS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

More psychobabble from and for the crowd that cannot admit that religion could ever have a positive outcome.

Many in the same crowd often insists that every outcome of religious belief must be a bad one.

How about the trauma suffered by the millions of Russians who lost family members due to the actions of well know atheist Joseph Stalin? What of their suffering?

And what about that other condition, Patriotic Trauma Syndrome? PTS is suffered by many who blindly accept the myth that the US is an exceptional nation filled with exceptional people. 300 plus years of Slavery in all its forms, nuclear genocide of the Japanese civilians in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and many other horrors have traumatized many generations of innocents.

[Warren Stupidity]

2. interesting reaction

[Warpy]

7. Fascinating.

You seem to be suggesting we ignore the very real and deep trauma suffered by people born into extremist religious cults just because there are other forms of trauma in the world.\

How every odd. You seem to excuse the worst abuse of children and adults just because the excuse for abusing them is god.

Better rethink that.

People in pain need compassion and help, no matter where the pain is from.

[guillaumeb]

9. My post suggested nothing of the sort.

People suffer from trauma that arises from many different situations. But some here, note my emphasis on some, use stories like this as an excuse/reason to attack religions and religious belief.

I would never excuse physical or psychological abuse in any situation.

How do you feel about my comments about PTS? Has patriotism, or chauvinism not caused much physical and psychological suffering?

[rug]

12. She's trying to rebrand Complex Trauma.

Here's a source with no ax to grind.

http://www.nctsn.org/trauma-types/complex-trauma

[skepticscott]

13. Demonstrate your claims of

"Ever", "Many", "often" and "every"

We'll wait.

And while you're at it, convince us that the millions of Russians who suffered under Stalin blamed atheism. There should be millions of quotes attesting to that, right?

[guillaumeb]

14. What I wrote is somewhat hyperbolic, but I have read many posts at DU

condemning religion as the source of much evil. Anyone who follows the religion group is aware of the posts.

I offered a suggestion for a PTS illness in much the same vein as the RTS article.

Whether the millions of Russians who suffered under Stalin linked the suffering to his atheism is irrelevant. If Christians who do bad things can be condemned by people who link Christianity and the act of believing to the bad acts of some believers, I will do the same in reverse to an atheist who did bad things.

[skepticscott]

15. So by "somewhat hyperbolic"

you mean "untrue". Gotcha.

And obviously you can't distinguish between acts perpetrated by religious people and motivated by their religion and acts committed by people who just happened to be atheists, but whose atheism had nothing whatsoever to do with why they did what they did. Stalin had dark hair too, as did Mao, Hitler and Pol Pot. Are you blaming their brown hair or condemning brown haired people in general because of what they did? Because that would be as rational as what you're trying to do with atheism.

[rug]

16. Broadbrushing is a very dishonest tactic, wouldn't you agree?

[guillaumeb]

18. And you are certain that all the aforementioned mass murderers

were NOT motivated by their atheism? Why this certainty? Did you base your feeling on what you wish to be true or can you point out your sources that can prove that atheism had nothing to do with mass murder?

[skepticscott]

20. Nice try, but you're flailing

The burden is on you to produce evidence to support your claim, not on me to disprove it to a mathematical certainty. Nothing is true by default.

These are prominent figures from recent history, who have been researched and written about extensively. There are abundant accounts of what they said and did during their lives. If you can't produce ANY direct evidence from ALL of that to back up the notion that they were motivated to do what they did by atheism, then your claim is pretty much untenable.

Seriously? These are old, tired arguments that have been debunked over and over. Only people with a desperate and irrational need to bash atheism and atheists still resort to them.

[guillaumeb]

22. I feel no need to bash atheism or atheists.

It is unfortunate that many in this forum feel the need to post articles like this that purport to show how faith leads to all types of irrational and intolerant behavior.

[rug]

23. It's a Syndrome.

[guillaumeb]

24. Is denial a prominent behavior in those who suffer from this syndrome? eom

[rug]

25. I'll await the reception of my thesis In Britain before responding.

[skepticscott]

26. Apparently, you do need to

Or you wouldn't have posted things like this:

How about the trauma suffered by the millions of Russians who lost family members due to the actions of well know atheist Joseph Stalin? (followed up by your laughably false claim in post 19: I did NOT mention Stalin.)

Or this:

And you are certain that all the aforementioned mass murderers were NOT motivated by their atheism? Why this certainty? Did you base your feeling on what you wish to be true or can you point out your sources that can prove that atheism had nothing to do with mass murder?

And is it also unfortunate that so many people on this site feel the need to post articles that purport to show how conservatism leads to all kinds of irrational and intolerant behavior? Really?

If it disturbs you that there are so many well documented instances of religion and "faith" doing exactly that, and more appearing every day, too bad. That's just the way religion is.

And now, I think we're done here. I see no reason to spend more time responding to you.

[guillaumeb]

28. For the people who are reading my responses,

my "syndrome" was meant as a parody of the RTS that was the subject of the original post.

[Act_of_Reparation]

29. I get that. And your parody fails. Hard.

First, I'm going to say this, just to get it out of the way: I think "religious trauma syndrome" is a load of bunkum. The DSM is a tool for diagnosing mental illness, not a guide for treating it. There already exists a number of accepted diagnoses that encapsulate the suggested criteria for RTS, and the author does a pretty poor job differentiating RTS from them.
Now, onto you.

Your parody fails because it is an inappropriate analogy. "RTS" describes trauma caused by religion, not religious people. If you wanted to draw a parallel between "RTS" and atheism, you would have to demonstrate how holding the core beliefs of atheism causes psychological harm.

It's alright. We'll wait.

[guillaumeb]

33. Your thesis is flawed.

I cannot demonstrate how holding ANY PARTICULAR beliefs must lead to ANY PARTICULAR actions.

There are people who kill and commit other acts of violence in the name of religion.
There are churchgoing people who commit acts of violence without invoking their religion.
There are atheists who commit acts of violence and denounce religion. Such as Stalin, and Mao Tse-Tung, and Pol Pot.
There are atheists who commit acts of violence and say nothing about religion.

When people claim to be traumatized by religion, I believe it is safe to say that each case is different. A person who is sexually abused by a clergy member, while undoubtedly traumatized, cannot claim to be traumatized by religious belief.

The people who committed suicide in Guinea followed the teachings of Jim Jones. Were they traumatized by religion, or by following a lunatic?

When we see the examples of certain older males marrying (sometimes multiple) child brides in Utah, are these females traumatized by the Mormon religion, or by pedophiles?

Sometimes violent and abusive people claim that they are religiously inspired, or claim scriptural interpretation. Some are undoubtedly serious in that they truly believe that a deity has required or sanctioned their violence. But it would be ridiculous to claim that the act of believing in a religion makes one more prone to violence or intolerance.

My parody was directed against the custom here of trying to frame religion as the motivator for much of the violence in the world. I feel that this post falls in that grouping. My PTS was an example of how ANY belief system can be shown to provoke violent behavior.

[trotsky]

38. Do you believe in hell? n/t

[guillaumeb]

40. Hell is other people.

Or so said Jean-Paul Sartre.

I prefer the comment from Mme. de Stael: to know all is to forgive all.

And you?

[trotsky]

43. So, do you believe in hell?

Or more to the point, do you believe in a place of eternal torture or separation from god?

[skepticscott]

44. How bizarre is it

that when asked for their opinion on a simple issue, this poster feels compelled to give someone else's opinion, instead of their own?

[trotsky]

45. Bizarre at first, but after you see that same reaction over and over...

you understand why it's offered. The person doing so generally isn't comfortable defending their own position.

[guillaumeb]

46. The Mme. de Stael reference WAS my answer.

But to be quite explicit, no. An all knowing creator would understand that finite beings are not error free.

When Jesus was asked by his disciples how many times they should forgive he replied, 7 times 70, a contemporary idiom for "without number".

And you? Do you believe in an afterlife?

[trotsky]

47. Please allow me to continue my point.

So you don't personally believe in hell, but you are aware that multiple major world religions and sects therein teach of a place like hell, correct?

Hell being, of course, a "place" where souls are tormented for eternity. May or may not involve real fire, etc. But it's a quite unpleasant place where souls suffer.

Do you accept that statement? (That many religions teach of such a thing?)

[guillaumeb]

48. Some religions have taught that "hell" is a specific place.

Some do not. And some that DID teach that "hell" referred to a specific location have changed that belief from eternal suffering to some sort of waiting period before entrance into "heaven".

(I will await your response to my question, assuming that you are aiming/targeting for a specific point.)

[trotsky]

49. Have taught, and continue to teach.

Correct? They haven't all softened their beliefs. There are mainstream religions TODAY that teach about hell being a place of eternal torture. True or false?

Please just answer "true" or "false." I'm trying to see if you have a grasp of what religious people actually believe.

[guillaumeb]

50. We might very well agree on many things

relative to what certain people believe in any grouping. But that says nothing about the belief system and much about the particular believers.

This discussion, and many like it, can never "prove" anything because in any belief system with a million believers, there will be a million distinctive believers, each with a distinctive, individual belief.

The Westboro Baptist Church attracts a particular, thankfully miniscule, subset of Christian believers. But the church members are not the official spokespeople for all who believe in the message of Jesus Christ.

It would be the same if anyone insisted that ALL US citizens are similar in beliefs.

If it is your intent to demonstrate that some people are intolerant, you have no need to try. We can agree that there are many intolerant people living on the world. Some believe in a deity, some do not.

[trotsky]

51. Does it "prove" anything about the RCC to refer to its very own catechism?

http://www.vatican.va/archive/ccc_css/archive/catechism/p123a12.htm#IV

Look, major religions teach about hell as a real place where souls are not just punished, but tormented for eternity.

Do you accept that? Yes or no.

On edit: To get rid of this straw man you keep dragging out, I am not now saying, nor have I *ever* said that all believers, even within a specific religion, are monolithic in their beliefs. Just for Koresh's sake can you acknowledge that YES, some people are brought up being told that hell is as described above??? And that they're not just in fringe or extreme religions?

[guillaumeb]

54. Some religions teach about "hell". Some people believe in the existence of "hell".

For some it is a place, for others a condition. We are in agreement on this point.

The RCC catechism has changed (dare I say evolved?) since the 5th Century Council of Nicea.

[trotsky]

56. THANK YOU FOR FINALLY ANSWERING. Sort of. But I'll take what I can get.

Talk about pulling teeth.

So now, do you think it is beneficial or harmful to a child to teach them about a place of eternal torture - burning, unquenchable flames - that they could end up in if they don't follow the rules?

[guillaumeb]

58. I would not do it myself.

But I was raised a Catholic, and went through 17 years of Catholic education. My first 12 years of primary and secondary were counterbalanced by 5 years of a Jesuit University.

Many RCC children were taught about hell as a place such as you describe. What percentage of them were traumatized by that? What percentage used the motivation of hell to rein in their actions?

[trotsky]

60. I have no idea of exact percentages, nor is that relevant to my point.

Is it harmful or beneficial to teach children that a place of eternal torture is real, and they could end up there?

[guillaumeb]

61. My answer was that it could be impossible to answer that question.

How does one balance the good vs. the bad in any belief system, and how does one assign blame for the bad to any one particular tenet of belief?

If a US citizen killed a number of fellow citizens, and that citizen was a person of faith who also was a military veteran, how is blame apportioned?

Does the military training have the greatest influence, or the religion of patriotism, or the religious beliefs?

Or could it be a combination, and if so, what tipped the scale in favor of violence?

[Act_of_Reparation]

39. Your reading comprehension is flawed.

I cannot demonstrate how holding ANY PARTICULAR beliefs must lead to ANY PARTICULAR actions.

There are people who kill and commit other acts of violence in the name of religion.
There are churchgoing people who commit acts of violence without invoking their religion.
There are atheists who commit acts of violence and denounce religion. Such as Stalin, and Mao Tse-Tung, and Pol Pot.
There are atheists who commit acts of violence and say nothing about religion.

When people claim to be traumatized by religion, I believe it is safe to say that each case is different. A person who is sexually abused by a clergy member, while undoubtedly traumatized, cannot claim to be traumatized by religious belief.

The people who committed suicide in Guinea followed the teachings of Jim Jones. Were they traumatized by religion, or by following a lunatic?

When we see the examples of certain older males marrying (sometimes multiple) child brides in Utah, are these females traumatized by the Mormon religion, or by pedophiles?

Sometimes violent and abusive people claim that they are religiously inspired, or claim scriptural interpretation. Some are undoubtedly serious in that they truly believe that a deity has required or sanctioned their violence. But it would be ridiculous to claim that the act of believing in a religion makes one more prone to violence or intolerance.

Wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong.

RTS isn't about people hurting people. It wouldn't apply to any of the hypothetical scenarios you just wasted your time providing.

It's about certain beliefs leading to pathology in the very people who hold or held them. An example would be, for instance, someone developing depression as a result of believing themselves inherently flawed and unworthy of a place at God's side; or a person developing such an intense fear of Hell that the thought of it still wakes them up at night years after they have abandoned religion.

Seriously, did you even read the OP? Because I am getting the distinct impression you didn't.

[guillaumeb]

41. And your own comprehension? Or should I write "condescension"?

When you wrote:
"Wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong.
It's about certain beliefs leading to pathology in the very people who hold or held them. An example would be, for instance, someone developing depression as a result of believing themselves inherently flawed and unworthy of a place at God's side; or a person developing such an intense fear of Hell that the thought of it still wakes them up at night years after they have abandoned religion."

If every person of faith developed these quite bizarre scenarios that you describe, I might be willing to concede that you have a point. Perhaps you can supply some statistics to back up your claim. What percentage of religious believers develop these types of pathological behaviors?


But using your system of logic, all gun ownership must be banned because some people commit suicide using a gun.

Also using your system of logic, all displays of patriotism must be banned because some people might use patriotic feelings to commit violent acts.

Some people are so desperate to discredit any forms of religious belief that they resort to the most ridiculous claims to justify their own intolerance. (This is not necessarily directed at any particular people in this thread.)

[Act_of_Reparation]

42. Keep digging that hole.

Perhaps you can supply some statistics to back up your claim. What percentage of religious believers develop these types of pathological behaviors?

Didn't I just tell you I thought RTS was bunkum?

Jesus Christ.

[mr blur]

17. Have fun, now. Mind how you go.

Points for mentioning Stalin. No Pol Pot? Hitler? Must try harder.

[guillaumeb]

19. I did not mention Stalin.

skepticscott did, and added Pol Pot and Hitler.

Does this mean that I lose the points?

[mr blur]

21. Really? So who is "well know atheist Joseph Stalin" you mention in #1?

Try again.

[skepticscott]

27. And people wonder

why threads go downhill in this group, and why so many posters are treated with scorn and derision.

[mr blur]

31. Indeed, and deservedly so. (nt)

[EvilAL]

32. lol..

must have been autocorrect.

[AtheistCrusader]

30. Why would you cite religious counter examples? You new at this?

American exceptional ism is firmly rooted in Americas religious cultural background. Divine providence and all that.

Stalin simply built a carbon copy of any run of the mill theocracy with The Party as a substitute for church and himself for God. Same song and dance.

Atheists don't ape religious institutions for the most part. Those that do are an outlier.

[guillaumeb]

34. All mass murderers are outliers. Jim Jones and Joseph Stalin are both outliers.

Any claim that the outliers of any group of believes reflect on a group belief system is flawed.

[AtheistCrusader]

35. I saw people complaining upthread of mistreatment by million+ member american churches.

What excuse do you offer for them?

[guillaumeb]

36. If a church organization or a corporation discriminates against a particular class

of people in hiring or providing services, claiming that the discrimination is a religiously motivated activity, is this not legal under the law? I am thinking specifically about Burwell v. Hobby Lobby (June 30, 2014).

Churches are allowed to use their own dogma as an excuse for discrimination based on certain factors. Churches can refuse to perform a marriage based on their dogma.

Churches can discriminate in hiring and firing. The First Amendment trumps Title VII of the Civil Rights Act.

Is this the mistreatment of which you complain? If so, what is your proposed legal remedy?

[wendylaroux]

52. Not attacking the good people

just the bad,but the bad are very very bad! They destroy lives,take lives.Don't get in such a snit.

[guillaumeb]

55. I will try to un-snit myself.

Is it like knitting, to un-snit?


There is a quote that I recently read:
"Religion makes good people better and bad people worse.”

― H. Richard Niebuhr

And that sentiment probably applies to any belief system.

[wendylaroux]

57. try to not let

others words upset you,love that quote!

Have a snit free weekend.

[guillaumeb]

59. And you. I also like the quote. eom

[rug]

3. Maybe she'll have better luck with this in the UK.

Winnell, a self-described former fundamentalist who coined the phrase, has been pushing this in the U.S. for years, without success, attempting to have it classified as a mental illness diagnosis.

[guillaumeb]

8. possibly in an attempt to profit from "treating" a "disorder" that she created?

Just asking.

[rug]

10. She's written a couple of books and built a practice on it.

She has her fans.

[goldent]

37. Yeah, sounds like a syndrome the tele-evangelists would use to solicit donations.

[edhopper]

4. It is about religion

so we should try not to criticize, better to ignore people in pain I guess.

[Warren Stupidity]

5. well there were bad atheists.

Plus she's had no luck in the USA where we certainly don't have any problem at all with religious fundamentalism.

[edhopper]

6. Sure

failing with a challenge to religion in the good 'ol secular USA means you don't have a good argument.

[rug]

11. Could be because her thesis hasn't gotten very good peer reviews.

Science!

[ChairmanAgnostic]

53. training kids in a religious setting is child abuse.

Especially when they are taught to be fearful of invisible, imaginary critters, taught that praying actually causes something to happen, and worse.