This is an 18 minute video. I'd like you all to watch it and write a brief reaction to what you learn (1 page typed). I won't grade it, just check that you did it for a HW grade.
The Doomsday Cult - Uganda
If you can't get to the video from this link, search "The Doomsday Cult - Uganda" on youtube. I can't embed the video because the producers haven't allowed that on youtube.
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16 comments:
thats crazy. i cant beleive that guy would murder so many of his own followers
hundreds of people died and not 1 person noticed. thats what shocked me the most
I am completely shocked about this. I can’t believe that thousands of people died and were buried without anyone noticing. How long had this been going on and how many large burial grounds did they find? I don’t see how people could join on for something like this and end up dead. In this case this appears to be mass murder not suicide. I just don’t see how there are no suspects. This all happened and the leaders got away with it. They even say in the video that they don’t understand the reasoning behind it because there was not much money in the community so what the reason for the death of all these innocent people?
well they mentioned somethnig about obtaining money for a car.. they said it may have been to move the people's bodies to a different location. i think the money was just for the leaders themselves because the country and the people there are poor. - this is in response to a statement makenzie made
i think it kind of shows how easily people can be blind and how we don't seem to notice things that are happening around us
Alex D's response - *The narrator opened by stating that Uganda was one of the poorest 24 countries in the world, a fact that likely correlates with the death cults. Since the residents have little to no money, they may seek the death cults as an opportunity for steady money. The same situation usually applies to poor inner-city dwellers as well. Maybe to stop the carnage, we should allow banks to invest in Ugandan businesses; of course, with our current economic status, that might not be possible. Perhaps we should try to overthrow the corrupt warlords?
*What would motivate someone to murder hundreds of innocent people? In war it could be forgiven, but in civilian life it is an incontrovertible sin.
That was an interesting point about it being okay to murder innocent people during war but not forgivable in civilian life.
I don't think innocent people being murdered is totally forgiven during war, but rather expected in a sick sort of way. As long as something is expected to happen, no matter how disturbing or scary it is, it seems to soften the blow. Not as though its tolerable, but just that its expected so theres no surprise and people dont see it is as horrible as it is.
It's hard for me to believe that this is true, but at the same time similar things have happened before, and no one has noticed.
Some of the images in this video are very disturbing. I think those people died from suicides were better off than those 150 some people murdered by their leaders, because they choose to die for what they believed in, rather than forced to die. It seems like it's easier to convince people in desperate conditions to join cults and to convince them to kill themselves, because they don't have a lot to live for. They also wanted to be a part of a group. The leader can then use their craves for a sense of belonging to convince them to do crazy things like killing themselves.
the things that bother me the most are that no one thought that it was strange when the high fences were put up and that no one noticed either people going in and never coming back out or dead bodies being brought to the sites, and at some point someone would have to notice the smell. How the leader of Uganda can sit back and allow things like this to occur in their country is beyond me and it is things like that, that make Uganda a country that is treated like a third-world country and with little respect. The reasons Uganda officials gave for not having a huge investigation were fishy because if findings of mass burial of murdered people isn't enough to spark one then i don't know what is.
This was a very shocking video. it is surprising how the leader of this cult could convince so many people to follow him when there were so many rules in place. It also seems to me that the government of Uganda most be corrupt because they did little once the mass graves were found. The police say they don't have enough money to do thorough investigation but they could definitely done more to find those responsible for these mass murders. I found it interesting that so many people were willing to join the cult even though they basically became slaves for the leaders. I can not imagine someone wanting to become enslaved, they must have been held against their will by the leaders. One thing I find disturbing is that it seems these followers did not fight back when they were all being killed. Maybe they did and there was no evidence but you would think if there were hundreds of people about to be killed then they would fight back unless they wanted to die.
Marianna's Response – The Doomsday Cult, Uganda
This video depicted the horrors of the mass murders in Uganda. My question is why would these people join the cults in which they were murdered? I understand that the cult publicized the idea that they were for the Restoration of the Ten Commandments, but I would assume that the people who were thinking of joining this group would understand what they were getting into. I mean, the people had to sell all of their possessions and give all the money in which they made from their possessions to the group, money which they would never see again. Were the people some what tricked into joining this cult? Although this instance was a huge tradjedy, I can’t help but think it was somewhat preventable.
Christine Schmidt
Uganda was asking for a cult, sad but true!
Although the massacre in Uganda was horrific, to me it seems inevitable. Uganda seemed to be almost a perfect place create and hide a cult. When I heard about the background of Uganda in the beginning of the video, I got the impression that it was small, quiet, and poverty stricken. The video mentioned how it entered an economic crisis and hasn’t made much progress since. That lead me to believe that people were becoming desperate and in most desperate situations people look to leaders for help. The leaders usually obtain some form of a stronghold over their followers. The followers then increase in number and are promised better lives and some religious gratification as well, in this case a promise of heaven. As the typical cult develops the leader or leaders start to get more hungry for power and money. The people begin to question the leader and soon receive punishment or death. Therefore, the massacre was inevitable due to the perfect conditions for a cult in Uganda.
EMILY ANDRY
I found this cult or sect or whatever to be sick. So many people burned in a church, supposedly on purpose and hundreds more murdered. At first blush, I didn’t understand why anyone would join the cult, because in doing so they gave up all their belongings and money and even soap and talking. Then the video made the point that the native people respected leaders, especially religious leaders, which makes sense. Most of these people, at least the ones joining the cult, are illiterate and uneducated and so it makes sense that they wouldn’t know what they were getting themselves into by becoming a member, handing themselves over body and mind and money. But just because it makes sense why they would join, it doesn’t mean their practices made sense or that it was okay that they all died and the leaders conveniently made it away safely.
So I sort of understand how people are enlisted into this cult, but I don’t understand why they would continue to belong once they found out the harsh living conditions, and hard labor. I suppose because they weren’t allowed to leave once they joined or they didn’t realize they could get out. The district official in the video did say that “ignorance is a very big disease, especially when it’s coupled with poverty.” With that in mind, it’s scary to think about, but very true. The people of Uganda didn’t know any better and they were ignorant and poor.
It all very frightening and hard to believe, especially that no one knew the extent to which the cults killed until it was too late and all the members were already dead and the leaders had safely fled.
I don’t believe for a second that people didn’t notice all this going on in their own backyards. They said there were fences to hide it, but still that doesn’t keep people from knowing things. If they really wanted to find something out, it’s not hard to do.
Some say that the reason all the members enlisted in the cult was for the money but “the district official has another opinion, ‘[he suspects] that there was a lot of pressure from the members [to join].” I think this district official fellow may be on to something. This idea of peer pressure combined with illiterate people who may not know any better and are just looking to survive provide the perfect reasons to join this cult, however extreme it may be. It was said in the video that, “Many of these illiterate people have a sacred respect for leaders in general, but especially for religious leaders.” I think the people of Uganda have a great respect for their elders and the leaders in the community and so with this instilled in their minds, it would be easy for them to follow a religious leader even when the cult became less about religion and more about rebellion, as they so often do.
Its terrifying to learn of this tragic incident in Uganda and even scarier to think that nothing was done to stop it and nothing can be done to investigate without the proper funding.
Maryclaire's response
Everything that I read about the cult in Uganda, like in the video, said the reason the leader killed all of those people was because they began to question his methods and his false prophesies. He took all of their money and their property, and they began to wonder where all of their money was spent. He said the world would end with the beginning of the millennium, and that did not end up happening so they began to wonder if he was a good leader. Whatever the causes were for the murders of these people, one question of mine remains: How did a few religious leaders kill hundreds of followers without any signs of struggle or without anyone hearing cries for help? This question makes the circumstances of this event all the more eerie to me.
MPH's response:
The tragedy which occurred in Uganda regarding the mass suicide is extremely gruesome and saddening. It is unbelievable that the leaders of the cult could influence that many people, and even more surprising that the leaders were able to hide all of the violent activity. I have a hard time believing that the man closest to the murders could not see what was happening because of the fence that was apparently set up, but the man could have also been killed if he had confronted the cult leaders.
I was confused regarding whether or not the Ugandans were murdered or participated in a mass suicide. I assume both acts of violence occurred, only adding to the horrors of the cult. The fact that the participants of the cult had to give the leaders their earnings adds speculation as to whether or not the murders/suicide related to money. Since Uganda is one of the top twenty poorest countries (at the time of the video) in the world, it is very possible that the overwhelming amount of deaths did involve an issue of accumulating money and maybe some cult members were abiding by the cult’s policies.
Other shocking facts from the video included how local Ugandans were assigned to dig up the dead bodies from the murders/mass suicide. The health risk involved with those Ugandan inhabitants could have infected some of the Ugandans, causing more of an issue on top of the deaths. One of the Ugandan officials did say the country had no time to wait for the government and had to rely on their own people for assistance, which does show the country’s loyalty and care for their homeland. The video is definitely disheartening, but hopefully the Ugandans have learned from this tragedy and I’m sure other countries are striving to rid their land of the dangers that can result from a cult.
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