Absurd Religious Cults - Students of light

"...what you are about to hear may include disturbing descriptions of sexual or physical abuse or may contain coarse language listener discretion is advised they called themselves the students of light we used to call him the veggies or the vegetarians the vegetarian Mafia extremely manipulative a secret and insular spiritual sect United by their common search for enlightenment forgive yourself for your suppressed anger forgive yourself for scattering your Consciousness you felt pure clear happy like drugs at the drugs it really was to some the students of light were a divinely inspired spiritual School whose founder a man named John Haynes possessed Supernatural knowledge and abilities what I felt coming from that man could not have come from a normal person never ever ever...here's Professor Loren Dawson sociologist at the University of Waterloo and an expert on new religious movements the Heyday of new religious movements and on public concern about them the so-called Great American Cults care which really spread all over the world primarily started in the States was definitely late 70s early 80s in responding to groups it mainly came into being at the end of the 60s and into the 70s and you know there seemed to be a sudden surge of hundreds if not thousands of groups at the time it was thought to be so urgent because it was that all this is something totally new and an affront to mainstream culture and if we don't immediately grab hold of us like a disease is going to take over our youth like Many religious groups of this period the students of Light have themselves been called a secretive cult with their leader John heinous accused of controlling and subjugating others in feeding his ego and lining his own pockets the story of the students of light will unfold over our coming episodes with much of it told Through The Eyes of former members who have agreed to share their you'll hear about why people chose to join the group in the first place I think we were all speakers really change the world to make a difference and about why many eventually became disillusioned and left you'll also hear about the group's Inception by its founder John heinous and how his leadership of the group evolved over the course of several decades I would say he changed quite a lot from being fairly humble sort of spiritual leader to being well learn it completely and yeah I think he turned into a bad man and you'll hear about some of the darker allegations that former members have leveled against John and the group allegations in from brainwashing and mind control and then of course we were told not to use our minds that our minds were destructive to sexual abuse he told her that it was for her spiritual growth pay extremely manipulative to the mistreatment of children sometimes it was a thing with the parents oh the parents aren't Towing the line will take your kid away or oh the kids acting up so yeah yeah we'll teach this family lesson join us as we take a deep dive into Toronto students of..." Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices