15-year-old stabs hypnotherapist mother 111 times

[Amelia]

Stop it right now. No more he said, she said. What I said vs what you said. IT"S ALL OFF TOPIC!

[Gail]

I just caught up with this now...

From the information I see here, I have no idea whether the mother actually used hypnotism on the boy or whether he got his ideas on his own or was into something else on the side apart from her influence

I don't know if anyone is saying that hypnotism is not dangerous and should not be warned against...

What I see is that people are not willing to put hypnotism as the cause in this particular case without more information

I would be interested in discussing the subject of hypnotism more. Certainly EGW did write against the dangers of it. Mind control and the modern use of hypnotism or the power of suggestion could come into play

Many years ago, I was in a group therapy session where certain relaxation techniques were used. I found that one of those techniques made me very uncomfortable and I consciously fought against the exercise, afterward requesting to be removed from the program. The staff complied, but ever since it made me wonder...

[Ron Lambert]

Gail, I read about a study many years ago where the sales resistance of people was evaluated before and after undergoing hypnosis for the first time, and the study concluded that after a person has been hypnotized, his general sales resistance declines, and continues to decline with additional hypnosis sessions. This seems to indicate that once you surrender your will to the power of someone else's suggestion, you become more suggestible. I have read where hypnotists claim that after a person has been sucessfully hypnotized, the person is much easier to "put under" the next time.

Yet if you took a survey, you would probably find that nearly 99% of the general population think that hypnosis is harmless, fascinating, and often helpful in retrieving lost or only dimly remembered memories. Hypnosis used to be used commonly to help witnesses to a crime remember more clearly details of what they witnessed, and sometimes even retrieve buried memories of things like being abused as a child. This has recently been questioned though, because it has been shown that many such memories are false ones that were actually implanted by the hypnotist, often without the hypnotist being aware he was causing the subject to "remember" false memories through a carelessly used power of suggestion.

I think your caution was wise. I am persuaded that under no circumstances should we ever surrender our minds to the control of another person.

But the phenomenon may go beyond even that. What about television, and movies? Or even reading novels that depict a world view in haromony with the low moral standards that prevail today? Are there various levels of hypnosis, so that we can be unconsciously programmed by something we only read or watch on TV, without actually going into an obvious trance? Of course, many people watching TV seem to be in a light trance at times.

That reminds me of a cartoon someone just emailed me. The husband and wife are sitting together in the living room, facing the same direction, and the husband says: "Just so you know....I never want to live in a vegetative state, depenent on some machine....If that ever happens, just pull the plug." The wife says "OK." Then in the last frame, the husband protests, "Hey!" while his wife unplugs the TV they had been watching.

[cricket]

My apologies, Ron.

I get offended easily when it appears to me that others are talking about people without all the facts. I did assume that you were implying that this boy, indeed, suffered under his mother's hypnotic powers.

You used this article to spark a thread on hypnosis. Unfortunately, the question asked initially was about the boy and his mother....not just about hypnosis in general.

Had it been about hypnosis, I wouldn't likely have misinterpreted your posts.

Again, I apologize for reading into your posts something that you had not intended.

I apologize three times for for not responding to your three correctional posts. Somehow, they slipped by me.