Lecture Topic:
Resources for Understanding Waco

Thomas Jefferson
on religious liberty

Resources for Understanding Waco

Soc 257

New Religious Movements

Lecture Outline

Part I:
The Adventist Tradition

Locating the Branch Davadians

The Millerites

Surviving Groups:

Advent:

Part II:
The Branch Davidians

The Houteff Era

The Roden Era

David Howell the handy man

Vernon Howell
cum
David Koresh

George Roden

The Koresh Era Begins

Koresh's teachings

Part III:
The Social Construction of News

What is news? Who decides?

What is news? Who decides?

What is news? Who decides?

Events (and ideas) are selected from a wide array of possibilities and shaped into a plausible story-line viz. the perspective of reporters and editors

Factors affecting the construction of news

Part IV:
The Social Construction
of Evil in Waco

Factors affecting the construction of evil in Waco







Two predominant themes of:
Armageddon in Waco

"…marginal religions and their members are accorded diminished human and social value, largely tied to disparaging stigmas and widespread stereotypes (brainwashed cultists") that recall some of the most vicious racial, ethnic, and religious prejudices of our nation's past...

Two predominant themes of:
Armageddon in Waco

"…minority religions are more likely to be victimized by extreme efforts of social control, most notably be government, but hastened and incited by selected interest groups."

Stuart A. Wright

Cops, News Copy and Public Opinion

Part V:
Post Siege Narratives and the Reconstruction of a Crisis Event

Standoff ends in flames

Before

After

The conquest

Attorney General Janet Reno
said they moved on the Davidians because:

Reports and hearings...