Healing from Emotional Anger and Relational Trauma

April 19th 2023 at 7:30 PM EDT

FamilyKind in partnership with Queens Long Island Community Services


INVITES YOU TO OUR VIRTUAL GROUP:
Healing from Emotional Anger and Relational Trauma

Take Heart and Regain Control over trauma from you emotions, anger or another

In this eight-week virtual group, we will distinguish between appropriate and inappropriate expressions of anger while exploring the hidden emotions behind the anger particularly in view of relational trauma. We will focus on healing with positive strategies and responses to deal more effectively with anger, extreme narcissism and gaslighting.

• When: Wednesday evenings starting April 19 – June 7, 2023
• Time: 7:30 – 8:45 pm EST. Certificate awarded upon completion of at least 7 sessions
• Where: On Zoom. You will receive the link upon registration.
• Cost: $80 for the entire 8 week session
• Scholarships are available based on financial need.
• Facilitator: Dr. Paul Engel, DHL, LCSW & QLICS staff
• Register

For more information, please call: 516-547-4318 or 718-461-6393

Workshop Description: In this eight-week virtual group, we will distinguish between appropriate and inappropriate expressions of anger while exploring the hidden emotions behind the anger particularly in view of relational trauma. We will focus on healing with positive strategies and responses to deal more effectively with anger, extreme narcissism and gaslighting.

Download our Flyer HERE.

Family Kind Website

ICSA Annual Conference: Cultic Gaslighting

ICSA Annual Conference: Cultic Gaslighting

William Goldberg; Saturday, June 25, 2022; 12:00 PM-12:50 PM

Gaslighting refers to attempts by cult leaders to manipulate their followers by creating an environment in which the cult members doubt their own thoughts, observations, interpretations, and memories. By proclaiming their victims' perceptions to be warped and their interpretations to be ignorant or wicked, the cult leaders systematically undermine the cult members' faith that they can trust themselves. The result of this emotional abuse is that the victims become apprehensive, child-like, and malleable.

In this presentation, the speaker will define the term gaslighting and will present examples of both obvious and non-obvious ways that gaslighting occurs in cults. The goal is for the manipulation to be recognized and discredited. The speaker will also explain the personality disorder that leads some individuals to become cult leaders and to take advantage of others. This personality disorder allows the cult leader to harm their victims without feeling guilt or remorse. Finally, the speaker will discuss strategies that can be utilized by victims of gaslighting to counter the effects of this manipulation.

• Conference Information
• Agenda
• Conference Registration

William Goldberg, LCSW, PsyA, is a clinical social worker and psychoanalyst with over forty years’ experience working with former cult members. He and his wife, Lorna, co-lead a support group for former cult members, which has been meeting for over forty years. It is the oldest group of its kind in the world. In 2007, Bill retired from the Rockland County, NY Department of Mental Health, where he directed several programs and clinics. He is presently an adjunct professor in the social work and social science departments of Dominican College and he is on the faculty of the Institute for Psychoanalytic Studies. Bill has published numerous articles in books and professional journals. Bill is a frequent speaker at ICSA conferences, and he and Lorna have been the recipients of the Authentic CAN Hall of Fame Award and the Leo J. Ryan Award. In 2010, Bill was the recipient of ICSA’s Lifetime Achievement Award. He is also co-editor of ICSA's Cult Recovery: A Clinician's Guide to Working With Former Members and Their Families, published in 2017. Email: bill@blgoldberg.com Phone: (201) 894-8515 Englewood, New Jersey.

#gaslighting #mentalhealth #socialwork

http://cultmediation.com/event/icsa-annual-conference-cultic-gaslighting/

ICSA Annual Conference: Roadmaps not Templates

ICSA Annual Conference: Roadmaps not Templates
Angel Garden
Saturday, June 25, 2022
11:00 AM-11:50 AM

“The hardest thing to believe is your own experience”, a statement ever more true when everything regularly now changes overnight. And when we know that the same people who own ‘the media’ are often also working with and for governments, it’s hard to know what to believe.

More localised or remotely connected authoritarian and controlling groups and influences are now all operating in this context as well, adding to general uncertainty, and to the pool of scared and docile targets experiencing coercive control in the family or other relationship, or even through a group joined for support in trying times.

On or offline, by nature coercive behaviour seeks conformity, suggesting uniformity, but really nobody is ‘one size fits all’. The propaganda may be the same, but how we’re affected depends on our tendencies, temperament and personal history. When we leave the controlling space, these are what we’re left with.

All bullying aims to make you do it to yourself. to hate and degrade yourself, ie to destroy all belief in your own experience and then police yourself in the bullied state, making it hard to reassert meaning out of what has happened.

The key to survival, for me, was to make documentary materials to analyse what had happened, contextualise it into the landscapes of the secondary wounding, of ostracism and cyberbullying and stalking through social media, and express what I found in images, papers, video.

In doing this I learned how documentation assists resistance to coercion and gaslighting, differences between documentation and publication, how both can both quickly change things around you and about threats to free-speech.

Seeking objective context for my experiences, the created objects were informative rather than personally reflective, more a road-map of what you might find, than a template for recovery.

Angel Garden: Researcher - Amazon Films

Angel Garden started her career as a successful stand-up comedian and actor. Her mediating skills and love for Ki Aikido led her to design highly praised community courses in assertiveness training. But her first love has always been filmmaking and journalism, which led her to create Amazon Films with her husband Steve Paris, through which they have made and released Yam, a full length comedy feature, “birth-trust”, documenting the first Holistic Birth Trust conference and many other environmental, and community shorts. On stumbling onto an extremely controlling group, the repercussions of this event allowed her to strengthen her investigative reporting and presenting skills. This gave birth to the acclaimed political satire show “Beehave”, which used the course of an education law change to lobby MPs in New Zealand. This then led to the creation of Amazon News Media, increasingly reporting on health, education, and community issues. Meanwhile Amazon Films is increasingly involved in projects focusing on the rights of children and young people. Angel is physically disabled and has three children. angelgarden@mac.com

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CultNEWS101 Articles: 2/11/2022 (Hillsong, Child Sexual Abuse, Australia, Legal, COVID-19, Maharishi U., Transcendental Meditation, Jehovah's Witnesses, Gaslighting)

Hillsong, Child Sexual Abuse, Australia, Legal, COVID-19, Maharishi U., Transcendental Meditation, Jehovah's Witnesses, Gaslighting 

RNS: Facing trial, Brian Houston steps aside as global senior pastor of Hillsong

"Brian Houston, co-founder of the Hillsong megachurch and media empire, announced that he is stepping aside as global senior pastor, telling worshippers via a pre-recorded video played during the Sunday morning service at Hillsong's Sydney, Australia, headquarters that he would be taking a leave of absence from the church until the end of this year.

Citing a decision by the Hillsong board and external legal counsel, Houston, standing with his wife and co-founder, Bobbie, said "best practice" dictates that he absent himself completely from church leadership as he faces trial for allegedly failing to report sexual abuse. The court proceedings, he said, are "likely to be drawn out and take up most of 2022."

"It's been an unexpected season, and we are thankful for you all and for the community we share," Houston said on the video streamed toward the end of the service. "I never get tired of the praise reports and miracles, especially those committing to Jesus."

Houston's leave of absence comes after more than a year of scandals that have rocked the church both in Australia and abroad and amid Houston's own legal troubles at home. Houston stepped down from the board of Hillsong in September.

"The result is that the Hillsong Global Board feel it is in my and the church's best interest for this to happen, so I have agreed to step aside from all ministry responsibilities until the end of the year," Houston said in the January 30 video announcement.

Houston, 67, was charged in August with concealing a serious indictable offense of another person. Police say his late father, Frank Houston, also a preacher, indecently assaulted a young male in 1970. Court documents allege Houston knew of his father's abuse as early as 1999 and "without reasonable excuse," failed to disclose that information to police."

ThreadReader: Mike Doughney

"Thread on the intersection among TM institutions, lifelong TM meditators, and COVID-19 virus denial and anti-vaccination."

Daily Independent: Jehovah's Witnesses continue ministry inside AZ prisons

"COVID-19 shut down access to most U.S. prisons including the Arizona State Prison Complex in Yuma where Shannon Gunderman volunteers with a group of Jehovah's Witness ministers.

Without warning, inmates were cut off from a robust Bible education program that included weekly Bible-based discourses, audience discussions, individual Bible studies and video presentations.

Within weeks, Jehovah's Witnesses pivoted their in-person ministry and activities around the country to virtual meetings and preaching through letters, telephone calls and videoconferencing."

Psychology Today: Surprising New Findings on Power and Gaslighting

People with low power or high power experience more Gaslighting.

" ... Gaslighting is a psychological control strategy used to manipulate a person's sense of reality and make them doubt their own perceptions, memories, and judgment.

In the gaslighter's world, only one person's perspective matters. More importantly, only one individual's perspective can matter: the gaslighter's. The victim's views, as if the ramblings of a crazy person, are dismissed as not worthy of serious consideration. The gaslighter wants the victim to truly accept the gaslighter's judgment. Why?

So that, being riddled with self-doubt, the victim of gaslighting does not take himself or herself seriously enough to voice an opinion. And instead relies completely on the gaslighter's judgment.

To be clear, gaslighters do not necessarily have the long-term goal of making their romantic partner think themselves ill or crazy. However, because gaslighters cannot tolerate being challenged or thought wrong, their partner having a mind of his or her own is experienced as a major threat, one that must be destroyed.

We now turn to the study by Samp and Graves. These authors define gaslighting in terms of dependence power, or the "capacity to influence derived from relational partners' reliance on one another." Gaslighting generates dependence power because the victim of gaslighting gradually depends more and more on the gaslighter—not just forQ approval (or love, money, and so forth) but to know what is real."

News, Education, Intervention, Recovery

CultEducationEvents.com

CultMediation.com   

Intervention101.com to help families and friends understand and effectively respond to the complexity of a loved one's cult involvement.

CultRecovery101.com assists group members and their families make the sometimes difficult transition from coercion to renewed individual choice.

CultNEWS101.com news, links, resources.

Facebook

Flipboard

Twitter

Instagram

Cults101.org resources about cults, cultic groups, abusive relationships, movements, religions, political organizations and related topics.

Selection of articles for CultNEWS101 does not mean that Patrick Ryan or Joseph Kelly agree with the content. We provide information from many points of view in order to promote dialogue.

Please forward articles that you think we should add to cultintervention@gmail.com.

Gaslighting in the C3 Evangelical Church ~ with EMILY PERRY

Talk Beliefs
August 13, 2021

"EMILY PERRY runs the @c3churchwatch account on Instagram, exposing abuses within the C3 Church.

Emily spent three years in C3 - most of it under "pastoral care" that was unwanted. It began while she was trying to alert the church pastors and get help when an abuser showed up at a church conference and was threatening towards her.

MARK from Talk Beliefs talks with Emily about the C3 church, its reach across the world, its constant demands for donations and hollow promises of care and sympathy."

CultNEWS101 Articles: 8/11/2021 (Cult Formation, Gaslighting, Baha'i, Iran, Religious Discrimination, Auroville, India)

Cult Formation, Gaslighting, Baha'i, Iran, Religious Discrimination, Auroville, India

The Harvard Mental Health Letter: Cult Formation (Robert J. Lifton)

" ... Cults represent one aspect of a worldwide epidemic of ideological totalism, or fundamentalism. They tend to be associated with a charismatic leader, thought reform, and exploitation of members. Among the methods of thought reform commonly used by cults are milieu control, mystical manipulation, the demand for purity, a cult of confession, sacred science, loading the language, doctrine over person, and dispensing of existence. The current historical context of dislocation from organizing symbolic structures, decaying belief systems concerning religion, authority, marriage, family, and death, and a "protean style" of continuous psychological experimentation with the self is conducive to the growth of cults. The use of coercion, as in certain forms of "deprogramming," to deal with the restrictions of individual liberty associated with cults is inconsistent with the civil rights tradition. Yet legal intervention may be indicated when specific laws are broken.

Two main concerns should inform our moral and psychological perspective on cults: the dangers of ideological totalism, or what I would also call fundamentalism; and the need to protect civil liberties."

Independent Ireland: Gaslighting: What is it, how to recognise it and how to protect yourself from it

"Gaslighting is a form of psychological manipulation in which the perpetrator makes the victim doubt their own memories, perceptions and behaviours. We talk to the experts about the warning signs and how to stand up to a gaslighter.

Calm down. You're so emotional. I never said that. That never happened. It's not a big deal. Stop imagining things. You're always twisting things. I would never have done that. Stop being so dramatic. You're over sensitive. I was just kidding. You're remembering it wrong. What's the matter with you? You're insane. You need help.

This is gaslighting. Mostly it happens in intimate relationships, but really it can happen anywhere — at work, in friendships, in politics. It's not a medical term, but a colloquialism referring to a form of psychological manipulation where over time the manipulated person begins to doubt their own memory, perception, even their reality.

It is a gradual process, which makes it difficult to detect if you're on the receiving end, and even more difficult to extricate yourself from, as it slowly but steadily erodes your sense of self, and of what's real. At its most malevolent, it's crazy making. Like narcissistic rage and coercive control, it is abuse without the black eyes; this is not to say, however, that the violence can progress from psychological to physical."

Iran News Wire: Iran: Bahai Woman Sentenced To 5 Years In Prison

" ... Unofficial sources say that there are more than 300,000 people following the Bahai Faith in Iran. However, the Constitution of the Islamic Republic of Iran only recognizes Islam, Christianity, Judaism, and Zoroastrianism and does not recognize Bahaism.

Since the 1979 Islamic Revolution in Iran, Iranian Bahais have been systematically persecuted as a matter of government policy. During the first decade of this persecution, more than 200 of Iran's Bahais were killed or executed. Hundreds more were tortured or imprisoned, and tens of thousands lost jobs, access to education, and other rights – all solely because of their religious belief.

The persecution of Iran's Bahais is still ongoing with dozens of Bahais languishing in prisons throughout Iran."

NY Times: The Promise and Tragedy of a Utopian Community, as Seen by One of Its Own

"Utopia's finest hour, Akash Kapur writes in "Better to Have Gone," is the very beginning, "when the dream remains unsullied." The phrase has the ring of preordainment: From the heights of a vision, there is nowhere to go but down.

As it does — viciously then tragically — in his memoir, which is also a group biography, the investigation of a mystery, a meditation on searching and faith, and an act of love. Kapur's main subject is Auroville, a 53-year-old intentional community in southern India where both he and his wife, Auralice, were raised, and where, in 1986, her mother and adoptive father died. The murky circumstances of their deaths shadow Kapur's marriage, all the more when he and Auralice move back to Auroville in 2004. There her parents' fates have been transmuted into a mix of legend, theory and gossip, even as their bodies lie in unmarked graves. Kapur decides (with his wife's help, though she is not credited as an author) to excavate the past. Knowledge, he hopes, might bring peace.

This is a haunting, heartbreaking story, deeply researched and lucidly told, with an almost painful emotional honesty — the use of present tense weaving a kind of trance. I kept wanting to read "Better to Have Gone" because I found it so gripping; I kept wanting not to read it because I found it so upsetting. The image that came to mind, again and again, was of human lives being dashed against the rocks of rigid belief.

News, Education, Intervention, Recovery

CultEducationEvents.com

CultMediation.com   

Intervention101.com to help families and friends understand and effectively respond to the complexity of a loved one's cult involvement.

CultRecovery101.com assists group members and their families make the sometimes difficult transition from coercion to renewed individual choice.

CultNEWS101.com news, links, resources.

Facebook

Flipboard

Twitter

Instagram

Cults101.org resources about cults, cultic groups, abusive relationships, movements, religions, political organizations and related topics.

Selection of articles for CultNEWS101 does not mean that Patrick Ryan or Joseph Kelly agree with the content. We provide information from many points of view in order to promote dialogue.

Please forward articles that you think we should add to cultintervention@gmail.com.

Gaslighting: What is it, how to recognise it and how to protect yourself from it

Gaslighting is a form of psychological manipulation in which the perpetrator makes the victim doubt their own memories, perceptions and behaviours. We talk to the experts about the warning signs and how to stand up to a gaslighter.

Suzanne Harrington
Independent.ie

August 4, 2021

Gaslighting is a form of psychological manipulation in which the perpetrator makes the victim doubt their own memories, perceptions and behaviours. We talk to the experts about the warning signs and how to stand up to a gaslighter.


Calm down. You’re so emotional. I never said that. That never happened. It’s not a big deal. Stop imagining things. You’re always twisting things. I would never have done that. Stop being so dramatic. You’re over sensitive. I was just kidding. You’re remembering it wrong. What’s the matter with you? You’re insane. You need help.

his is gaslighting. Mostly it happens in intimate relationships, but really it can happen anywhere — at work, in friendships, in politics. It’s not a medical term, but a colloquialism referring to a form of psychological manipulation where over time the manipulated person begins to doubt their own memory, perception, even their reality.

It is a gradual process, which makes it difficult to detect if you’re on the receiving end, and even more difficult to extricate yourself from, as it slowly but steadily erodes your sense of self, and of what’s real. At its most malevolent, it’s crazy making. Like narcissistic rage and coercive control, it is abuse without the black eyes; this is not to say, however, that the violence can progress from psychological to physical.

The term comes from the 1944 film Gaslight(originally a 1938 play by Patrick Hamilton), in which a vivacious young woman played by Ingrid Bergman is slowly driven mad by her new husband, who pretends to love her, but is really after her money. He continually dims the gaslights of their apartment, while telling her that she’s imagining things — that the light is at normal levels of brightness — which causes her to crumble from a confident and self-assured person to self doubting and anxious. Psychoanalyst Dr Robin Stern is co-founder of the Yale Centre For Emotional Intelligence, and has written headtopics.com

The Gaslight Effect. “In therapy sessions, I can hear successful lawyers and academics, who are confident in every aspect of their lives except their intimate relationships, where they say things like, ‘It’s my fault’,” she says. “For the most part, it’s women who are gaslighted, because we have been socialised to be pleasers, to fear being alone, and until relatively recently to be dependent on men financially and for social status. Women can get stuck. According to domestic abuse statistics, it takes a woman an average of seven attempts before she will leave an abusive relationship. More women end up in psychotherapy because more women get stuck in bad relationships.

Rationalising “When a woman is physically battered or verbally abused, it’s easy to say, ‘Yes, he did this’, but if she can’t put her finger on it (her anxiety, self doubt, unease) then the woman will often point the finger at herself. “One client was physically and verbally abused by her husband for arriving home a little late from work. She rationalised it by saying that she knew he had issues with lateness, that he would not have hit her or swore at her had she been on time, and so really it was her fault.

“Another client was friendly and outgoing, and smiled at people in the street. Her boyfriend would get furious if she smiled at anyone. In therapy, she said it was her fault. Home & Property Get the best home, property and gardening stories straight to your inbox every Saturday.

“Only when the suggestion arose that she look down at the pavement to avoid smiling at anyone did she realise how crazy her situation was. ”In her book, Gaslighting, psychotherapist Dr Stephanie Sarkis explains how someone on the receiving end will use cognitive dissonance to remain connected with the gaslighter, “whether it is a partner, sibling, parent, co-worker, or someone you helped elect”. 

This can manifest in three ways: we ignore the contradictory behaviour of the gaslighter; we fight against it; or we replace our beliefs and values with what the gaslighter tells us. She reminds us that we are not at fault for falling for a gaslighter — they are highly seductive people. “They’ll sweep you off your feet then drop you off a cliff,” she writes, adding that the most effective way to decrease a gaslighter’s influence on your life is to “get as far away as possible”.

Because gaslighters are so slippery and manipulative, your best bet is to cut off all contact. Easier said than done, especially if you’re in a long-term relationship with someone who gaslights you. There are broadly four levels of gaslighting: unconscious, being somewhat aware of it, intentional, and malicious. The effect on the gaslighted person tends to be disbelief, defence, and if it continues, self doubt, perhaps even depression.

“Gaslighting has several stages,” says Dr Stern. “Initially you think the other person is nuts, then you go into defend-or-deny mode, until you start to see yourself through the gaslighter’s eyes. This can erode your stability. I have never met anyone who remained robust when their reality is being eroded.”

But why do people do it? It’s not only women who experience gaslighting; men do too, in both straight and same-sex relationships, but because of how we are gender socialised, men are less likely to report abuse in their intimate relationships. So what prompts it? Dr Sarkis writes how many gaslighters have “narcissistic injury — a perceived threat to their self worth or self esteem”. 

A very public example of gaslighting was when Donald Trump told comedian John Oliver that he did not wish to appear on Oliver’s HBO show. Oliver responded saying he had never invited Trump on, but Trump was so insistent that he had been invited four times (he hadn’t) that Oliver began doubting his own memory, and had to check with colleagues to make sure he wasn’t mistaken. Imagine that kind of dynamic in an intimate relationship, day in, day out.

Read More It’s not me, it’s you! How to spot a narcissist “Nobody is born a gaslighter,” says Dr Stern. “It is not a personality trait. Aggressive, controlling people are more likely to become gaslighters — it’s a learned dynamic which requires two people.

“This is not to blame the target of gaslighting, of course. But it’s important to recognise our human ‘urge to merge’, our need for connection, validation, understanding, love.” It’s these basic needs which gaslighters seek to manipulate.To cultivate a robust gaslighting radar, Dr Stern says it’s important to tune into our own emotions. “Pay attention to what is going on inside you as well as outside you,” she says.

“For instance, if the conversation twists from asking your partner why they are always coming home late to you being told you’re paranoid or insecure rather than addressing your original question. Many women will allow the conversation to be sidetracked because we have been socialised to be accommodating.

“Pay attention to your own internal signs. Something doesn’t feel right. It could manifest as headaches, or withdrawing from other people. We have not been taught or encouraged to tune into our emotions. Being emotional has a bad reputation, but our emotions provide information which we need to listen to.”

Clinical psychologist Professor Eva Doherty says that it can be incredibly difficult to reverse out of a gaslighting relationship. “It’s so insidious,” she says. “Red flags may be noticed in hindsight, but they are hard to detect in the honeymoon period.”

Prof Doherty explains that often in relationships where gaslighting and other coercive behaviours are present, the person being manipulated may be unconsciously echoing and reliving dysfunctional or unresolved childhood relationships. Gut feelings“As the relationship progresses and things get worse, there will be an eroding of self-esteem, an inability to see reality, endlessly questioning yourself,” she says.

“If you have children, it will be even harder. By definition, you cannot see what is real, which makes it even harder to empower yourself to walk away. This difficulty is not to be underestimated. ”Like Dr Stern, Prof Doherty says that the way out is to listen to your gut feelings. “Often people are angry and fearful, which are healthy and protective emotions,” she says. “Our feelings are usually screaming at us — we need to listen to them, to tune into what they are trying to tell us.

“People get their self esteem back by listening to someone else validating their feelings. And they also have to relinquish control. They may think, if I just get the formula right, the relationship will work. The abuser will reinforce this: ‘I’m like this because you’re like that’.

“But abusers don’t change. Even when a couple have separated, the victim can still be wondering why the abuser is being so unreasonable or obstructive. There is often a continuing belief that the abuser will change. But they won’t. “The difficulty of leaving a relationship like this should not be underestimated, particularly if it has been going on for a long time. The person’s sense of reality has been tampered with.”

This means that people do not present to a therapist or counsellor saying that they are being gaslighted. Instead, they will turn up with other issues — anxiety, panic attacks, stress, low mood — often not realising the source. The job of the therapist or psychologist is to facilitate the person coming to realise where the source of these uncomfortable feelings lie.

“It can take ages,” adds Prof Doherty. “The person has to come to the realisation themselves.” However, no matter how far down the rabbit hole you have fallen, it is possible to restore your sense of self. “If you walk away second guessing your own actions, you’re still being gaslighted,” says Dr Stern.

“If you walk away calling out and naming what is happening to you, you are no longer being gaslighted.” Rather than listen to the other person’s words, listen to your own instincts — they’re there to protect you.

https://headtopics.com/ie/gaslighting-what-is-it-how-to-recognise-it-and-how-to-protect-yourself-from-it-21188697

CultNEWS101 Articles: 12/7-8/2019

Nithyananda, Jehovah's Witnesses, Legal, Exorcism, Proud Boys, Neo-nazi, Gaslighting

Republic World: Nithyananda Case: Republic TV Accesses Inside Details Of Gujarat Police Probe

"Republic TV has accessed inside details of the Gujarat police probe in the Nithyananda case. As per the sources, when the police had raided the Ahmedabad ashram, they had found out that at least two of these minors aged 8 to 10 years old had been crying and talking to the ashram officials pleading them to be sent back to their houses. However, they had been kept forcefully. While there were 39 people in the ashram, only half of them were adults. 63 items including many iPads were recovered and the forensic laboratory officials have been asked to find out about the correspondence between the ashram officials. As proxy servers were used by the allegedly kidnapped girls to post videos, their location is being ascertained.

One girl located in Ecuador

Several former devotees have shared the horror of what they have witnessed. Sources reveal that the children were locked in a room and told to beat each other. On one occasion, the children were told to beat to death a dog to teach them 'detachment'. Not only that, the police has reportedly come to the conclusion that such activities were going on in the locked classrooms of DPS school as well. According to the sources, one of the girls has been located in Ecuador. They have reportedly contacted their father via video calls. Furthermore, the police has learnt that the apartment used for illegally confining children is owned by a Vadodara based businessman. He allegedly had no clue about all this.  

Gujarat HC sets deadline

Janardana Sharma and his wife approached the Gujarat High Court on Monday stating that their two elder daughters, Lopamudra Janardhana Sharma (21) and Nandita (18) who were studying in Nithyananda's Yogini Sarvagyapeetham institution had refused to accompany them to their home. Their younger minor-aged daughters, who have been rescued by the couple, were allegedly kidnapped and kept in illegal confinement for more than two weeks. Subsequently, the Gujarat HC set a deadline of November 26 to present the two victims before the court."

The Californian: 'It took a while but we did it': Christie Piña's family gets justice for brutal rape, murder

"For almost 30 years, loved ones of Christie Sue Piña have awaited justice for the 14-year-old's rape and murder even as her killer hid in Mexico while raising a family there.

On Wednesday, Arsenio Pacheco Leyva, 57, was sentenced to life in prison for Christie's brutal death as her loved ones watched — and voiced their anguish and anger.

"I sincerely hope you live a long life rotting behind bars. I hope the misery eats you from the inside," Robert Michael "Mikey" Piña, Christie's younger brother, told Leyva at the hearing. "I'll see you in hell you monster."  

Leyva previously pleaded guilty to allegations he kidnapped Christie, raped and sodomized her and then stabbed her 23 times with a screwdriver.

Farmworkers found her body Feb. 8, 1990, in a Castroville artichoke field near the Leyva family bakery on Merritt Street several days after she disappeared. Authorities suspected Leyva but didn't have enough evidence to arrest him at the time.

He would later flee to Mexico, settle down and start a family after he was also accused of the attempted kidnapping of Jane Doe, then 13, in 1993.

Judge Carrie Panetta sentenced Leyva to life-in-prison Wednesday, noting that Christie's loved ones had packed three benches in Monterey County Superior Court.

She also ordered him to serve seven years and four months, to be carried out before the life-in-prison sentence, in the assault and attempted kidnapping of Jane Doe.

In letters to the court, Leyva's mother and brother described him as a devout Jehovah's Witness, a loving son, sibling, husband and father who helped others after growing up with an abusive father. They asked for clemency.

Panetta, however, sided with Deputy District Attorney Lana Nassoura.

"As Ms. Nassoura stated, Mr. Leyva is a predator," Panetta said.

Head Topics: Nine-year-old boy dies 'in sect exorcism using whips to drive out demons'

Nine-year-old boy dies 'in sect exorcism using whips to drive away demons'

"Members of the Disciples of Jesus Christ sect prayed by his body for two days after he died from the ordeal, seeking to "resurrect" him.

Both parents are among a number of sect members detained on suspicion of murder over the horrific case.

The child's mother was held in neighbouring Belarus and Russia is seeking her extradition, according to reports.

Dr Alexander Neveev, an expert on religious cults in Russia, said: "In this sect it was believed that sinfulness should be beaten out of children."

CTV News: Encyclopedia of hate: A look at the neo-Nazi militant movements with roots in Canada

"A recent data dump from the now-defunct neo-Nazi forum Iron March has led to the identification of hundreds of users engaging with extremist groups around the world.

Among them are approximately 88 Canadians who span provinces, age groups, and religious affiliations.

Iron March was founded in 2011 by Russian nationalist Alexander "Slavros" Mukhitdinov and was considered the birthplace of several modern fascist far-right neo-Nazi movements.

The website -- which contained explicit calls for terrorism, death and genocide of minorities -- shut down abruptly in late 2017 after several members and groups were tied to deadly violence around the world.

Unknown to most, these groups live in communities throughout the country and experts say some of the most violent have a long history in Canada. Here is a look at some of the key groups related to the Iron March leak:

One of the most pervasive groups to emerge from Iron March is Atomwaffen Division (AWD). Founded in Texas in 2015, #Atomwaffen is defined as "a series of terror cells that work toward civilizational collapse" by racism watchdog the Southern Poverty Law Centre (SPLC). Its members are described as believing in the use of violence or terrorism to accelerate what they see as inevitable social collapse.

The group has been tied to more than three murders in the U.S. and has been operating in Canada since 2016, according to Evan Balgord, executive director of the Canadian Anti-Hate Network (CAHN)."

National Domestic Violence Hotline: A Deeper Look Into Gaslighting

"... Gaslighting is when your emotions, words, and experiences are twisted and used against you, causing you to question your reality. This can be a very effective form of emotional abuse, 

because once an abusive partner has broken down your ability to trust your own perspective, you may be more vulnerable to the effects of abuse, making it more difficult to leave the abusive relationship."

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