Jen Kiaba
Thought Reform
"Thought Reform" 2019 from the #BurdensofaWhiteDressProject
From a young age "brainwashed" was a common word in my vocabulary. Though I didn't fully understand what the word meant, my parents would insist that we weren't brainwashed, and that anyone who said otherwise was a tool for Satan.
As I grew older, whenever I was struggling with church doctrine or in opposition to it, I was sent away to a church workshop to shunt me back onto the path. Though I didn't realize it then, they were essentially reeducation workshops. With their hours of lecture, physical punishments, and limited sleep schedules, they were intended to rewire our brains into submission.
The first time I was sent away I was eight. My parents put me on a bus full of strangers, and I was driven from Virginia to a camp in New York where I knew no one. We were kept up hours after my bedtime in a competition that involved a lot of screaming to show the spiritual world our unity. Though I snuck off to find a corner to sleep in, I was found, chastised and sent back to the games. Years later, in a leadership training, we were awoken at three in the morning with a dog whistle and ordered into a darkened parking lot to do jumping jacks so that we would learn "absolute obedience."
I would come back from these workshops with a strange floaty feeling, like I was invincible. "You're acting brainwashed," my sister would hiss at me, horrified by the change she witnesses. I didn't understand.
By the time I was 16 and had finished high school, we were expected to go away for a two year mission called Special Task Force where we lived in van, fundraising and witnessing for the church. Although all my friends had gone, I chose to stay because I felt that I was too young. When my friends would come back for the holy days, I could barely recognize them anymore. They seemed wholly altered, a strange light in their eyes and a smile plastered across tight features.
"This is what brainwashing looks like," I thought, understanding it for the first time.
--
I've been thinking about blogging my stories to accompany my photos and was wondering if this is something you'd be interested in reading.
Thought Reform
"Thought Reform" 2019 from the #BurdensofaWhiteDressProject
From a young age "brainwashed" was a common word in my vocabulary. Though I didn't fully understand what the word meant, my parents would insist that we weren't brainwashed, and that anyone who said otherwise was a tool for Satan.
As I grew older, whenever I was struggling with church doctrine or in opposition to it, I was sent away to a church workshop to shunt me back onto the path. Though I didn't realize it then, they were essentially reeducation workshops. With their hours of lecture, physical punishments, and limited sleep schedules, they were intended to rewire our brains into submission.
The first time I was sent away I was eight. My parents put me on a bus full of strangers, and I was driven from Virginia to a camp in New York where I knew no one. We were kept up hours after my bedtime in a competition that involved a lot of screaming to show the spiritual world our unity. Though I snuck off to find a corner to sleep in, I was found, chastised and sent back to the games. Years later, in a leadership training, we were awoken at three in the morning with a dog whistle and ordered into a darkened parking lot to do jumping jacks so that we would learn "absolute obedience."
I would come back from these workshops with a strange floaty feeling, like I was invincible. "You're acting brainwashed," my sister would hiss at me, horrified by the change she witnesses. I didn't understand.
By the time I was 16 and had finished high school, we were expected to go away for a two year mission called Special Task Force where we lived in van, fundraising and witnessing for the church. Although all my friends had gone, I chose to stay because I felt that I was too young. When my friends would come back for the holy days, I could barely recognize them anymore. They seemed wholly altered, a strange light in their eyes and a smile plastered across tight features.
"This is what brainwashing looks like," I thought, understanding it for the first time.
--
I've been thinking about blogging my stories to accompany my photos and was wondering if this is something you'd be interested in reading.