If I may offer some words to you, I would recommend that you ask some of your closest friends, who are the most open of your kin, these questions:

Imagine a world without choice, as if free will had never existed. That everyone followed one predestined purpose, that they were assigned by somone else, and never questioned or grew. A world without exploration, without invention, without curiosity. A cold, grey world of concrete and steel. A world like that existed, and its symbols were a hammer and sickle...

In reality, everyone is in control of their own world, their own human experience, and our collective experiences form humanity’s most cherished assets.

Could you be happy in a world without choice?

Is it right to deprive others of choice, only because they are different?

And the most important, in light of all of this:

How you ever destroyed someone’s choice, and been proud of it? If so, who told you it was okay, and why did you believe them?

Have you ever destroyed someone’s happiness, and been proud of it? If so, who told you it was okay, and why did you believe them?

My family is half-Romanian, and I know many firsthand stories of how Communism controls, "courtesy" of one of the most brutal bastard dictators in the Soviet bloc. Futu-ți Ceaușescu.

It begins when someone you trust (an actor, role model, news anchor, local leader etc.) convinces you they are right, and they care.

And then, they convince you someone is "too different to be one of us, the 'good guys'".

After that, they tell you that someone is "not capable of being good at all, because of who they are".

And then, before you know it, you are cold, that someone is subhuman in your eyes (because you were told "you're better than them, because you're good") and the only thing in your mind is...

"If I don't obey stop these people they will destroy my country and the people that command me that I love and all of my family and the State and my friends! I have to obey fight them!...I need to do the good thing and obey...I...its the right thing to do! I HAVE TO!..."

And you are lost. Those people become neighbor-reporters, abusers and at worse, killers and torturers. It feels so cold. It is truly like dying, to feel your free will be stolen without knowing it, to sacrifice your soul and not know how or why, just that its what "good" people do. To be truly convinced that evil is good, and good is evil. It is truly, truly terrifying.

u/Oldnormal, I am so so SO happy you've found us here, and I'm glad you are here. We'll help anyway we can. But please, don't stop trying to save your friends. As someone who knows what the End of the Left-Handed Path looks like, PLEASE don't give up. Save them. We're here for you.

If I may offer some words to you, I would recommend that you ask some of your closest friends, who are the most open of your kin, these questions:

Imagine a world without choice, as if free will had never existed. That everyone followed one predestined purpose, that they were assigned by somone else, and never questioned or grew. A world without exploration, without invention, without curiosity. A cold, grey world of concrete and steel. A world like that existed, and its symbols were a hammer and sickle...

In reality, everyone is in control of their own world, their own human experience, and our collective experiences form humanity’s most cherished assets.

Could you be happy in a world without choice?

Is it right to deprive others of choice, only because they are different?

And the most important, in light of all of this:

How you ever destroyed someone’s choice, and been proud of it? If so, who told you it was okay, and why did you believe them?

Have you ever destroyed someone’s happiness, and been proud of it? If so, who told you it was okay, and why did you believe them?

My family is half-Romanian, and I know many firsthand stories of how Communism controls, "courtesy" of one of the most brutal bastard dictators in the Soviet bloc. Futu-i Ceaușescu.

It begins when someone you trust (an actor, role model, news anchor, local leader etc.) convinces you they are right, and they care.

And then, they convince you someone is "too different to be one of us, the 'good guys'".

After that, they tell you that someone is "not capable of being good at all, because of who they are".

And then, before you know it, you are cold, that someone is subhuman in your eyes (because you were told "you're better than them, because you're good") and the only thing in your mind is...

"If I don't obey stop these people they will destroy my country and the people that command me that I love and all of my family and the State and my friends! I have to obey fight them!...I need to do the good thing and obey...I...its the right thing to do! I HAVE TO!..."

And you are lost. Those people become neighbor-reporters, abusers and at worse, killers and torturers. It feels so cold. It is truly like dying, to feel your free will be stolen without knowing it, to sacrifice your soul and not know how or why, just that its what "good" people do. To be truly convinced that evil is good, and good is evil. It is truly, truly terrifying.

u/Oldnormal, I am so so SO happy you've found us here, and I'm glad you are here. We'll help anyway we can. But please, don't stop trying to save your friends. As someone who knows what the End of the Left-Handed Path looks like, PLEASE don't give up. Save them. We're here for you.