cult recovery 101

Logic-Tight Compartments: How our modular brains lead us to deny and distort evidence

michaelshermer.com
Michael Shermer
How our modular brains lead us to deny and distort evidence
January 1, 2013
IF YOU HAVE PONDERED how intelligent and educated people can, in the face of overwhelming contradictory evidence, believe that that evolution is a myth, that global warming is a hoax, that vaccines cause autism and asthma, that 9/11 was orchestrated by the Bush administration, conjecture no more. The explanation is in what I call logic-tight compartments—modules in the brain analogous to watertight compartments in a ship.
The concept of compartmentalized brain functions acting either in concert or in conflict has been a core idea of evolutionary psychology since the early 1990s. According to University of Pennsylvania evolutionary psychologist Robert Kurzban in Why Everyone (Else) Is a Hypocrite (Princeton University Press, 2010), the brain evolved as a modular, multitasking problem-solving organ—a Swiss Army knife of practical tools in the old metaphor or an app-loaded iPhone in Kurzban’s upgrade. There is no unified “self” that generates internally consistent and seamlessly coherent beliefs devoid of conflict. Instead we are a collection of distinct but interacting modules often at odds with one another. The module that leads us to crave sweet and fatty foods in the short term is in conflict with the module that monitors our body image and health in the long term. The module for cooperation is in conflict with the one for competition, as are the modules for altruism and avarice or the modules for truth telling and lying.
Compartmentalization is also at work when new scientific theories conflict with older and more naive beliefs. In the 2012 paper “Scientific Knowledge Suppresses but Does Not Supplant Earlier Intuitions” in the journal Cognition, Occidental College psychologists Andrew Shtulman and Joshua Valcarcel found that subjects more quickly verified the validity of scientific statements when those statements agreed with their prior naive beliefs. Contradictory scientific statements were processed more slowly and less accurately, suggesting that “naive theories survive the acquisition of a mutually incompatible scientific theory, coexisting with that theory for many years to follow.”
Cognitive dissonance may also be at work in the compartmentalization of beliefs. In the 2010 article “When in Doubt, Shout!” in Psychological Science, Northwestern University researchers David Gal and Derek Rucker found that when subjects’ closely held beliefs were shaken, they “engaged in more advocacy of their beliefs … than did people whose confidence was not undermined.” Further, they concluded that enthusiastic evangelists of a belief may in fact be “boiling over with doubt,” and thus their persistent proselytizing may be a signal that the belief warrants skepticism.
In addition, our logic-tight compartments are influenced by our moral emotions, which lead us to bend and distort data and evidence through a process called motivated reasoning. The module housing our religious preferences, for example, motivates believers to seek and find facts that support, say, a biblical model of a young earth in which the overwhelming evidence of an old earth must be denied. The module containing our political predilections, if they are, say, of a conservative bent, may motivate procapitalists to believe that any attempt to curtail industrial pollution by way of the threat of global warming must be a liberal hoax.
What can be done to break down the walls separating our logic-tight compartments? In the 2012 paper “Misinformation and Its Correction: Continued Influence and Successful Debiasing” in Psychological Science in the Public Interest, University of Western Australia psychologist Stephan Lewandowsky and his colleagues suggest these strategies: “Consider what gaps in people’s mental event models are created by debunking and fill them using an alternative explanation…. To avoid making people more familiar with misinformation…, emphasize the facts you wish to communicate rather than the myth. Provide an explicit warning before mentioning a myth, to ensure that people are cognitively on guard and less likely to be influenced by the misinformation…. Consider whether your content may be threatening to the worldview and values of your audience. If so, you risk a worldview backfire effect.”
Debunking by itself is not enough. We must replace bad bunk with sound science.

Aspects of Recovery

          Recovery from cults is a multifaceted process; initially it is the separation from the group, group practices, and meetings that bound us to the group. Therapy  helps address the emotional aspects of group involvement – feelings of betrayal, abuse and vulnerability to recruitment. It helps to develop and understanding of how the group’s doctrine was used to manipulate and encourage commitment.


          Our focus in this article is the development of an intellectual understanding of the characteristics of cultic groups – how they differ from non-cultic groups – and of the tactics often used to engender a high level of commitment, a key element of recovery.


Deception


          Deception lies at the core of mind-manipulating and cultic groups and programs. Many ex-members and supporters of cults are not fully aware of the extent to which they have been tricked and exploited.


          The following checklist of characteristics helps to define such groups. Comparing the descriptions on this checklist to bring your attention to aspects of the group with which you were involved may help bring your attention to areas of group life that are a cause for concern.


          If you check any of these items as characteristic of the group, and particularly if you check most of them, you might want to consider reexamining these areas of the group and how they affected you. Keep in mind that this checklist is meant to stimulate thought. It is not a scientific method of “diagnosing” a group.


Checklist of Cult Characteristics


          We suggest that you check all characteristics that apply to you or your group. You may find that your assessment changes over time, with further reading and research.


q  The group is focused on a living leader to whom members seem to display excessively zealous, unquestioning commitment.

q  The group is preoccupied with bringing in new members.

q  The group is preoccupied with making money.

q  Questioning, doubt, and dissent are discouraged or even punished.

q  Mind-numbing techniques (such as meditation, chanting, speaking in tongues, denunciation sessions, debilitating work routines) are used to suppress doubts about the group and its leader(s).

q  The leadership dictates sometimes in great detail how members should think, act, and feel (for example: members must get permission from leaders to date, change jobs, get married; leaders may prescribe what types of clothes to wear, where to live, how to discipline children, and so forth).

q  The group is elitist, claiming a special, exalted status for itself, its leader(s), and members (for example: the leader is considered the Messiah or an avatar; the group and/or the leader has a special mission to save humanity).

q  The group has a polarized us-versus-them mentality, which causes conflict with the wider society.

q  The group’s leader is not accountable to any authorities (as are, for example, military commanders and ministers, priests, monks, and rabbis of mainstream denominations).

q  The group teaches or implies that its supposedly exalted ends justify means that members would have considered unethical before joining the group (for example: collecting money for bogus charities).

q  The leadership induces guilt feelings in members in order to control them.

q  Members’ subservience to the group causes them to cut ties with family and friends, and to give up personal goals and activities that were of interest before joining the group.

q  Members are encouraged or required to live and/or socialize only with other group members.


The Distinction Between Cultic Groups and Non-Cultic Groups


          Making the distinction between cultic groups and non-cultic groups is significant. Group propaganda often tries to blur the distinction between cults, sects, communes and society’s organizations, (“The Catholic Church is a cult.” “The Marines are a cult.”).


          “I have had to point out why the United States Marine Corps is not a cult so many times that I carry a list to lectures and court appearances. It cites 19 ways in which the practices of the Marine Corps differ from those found in most modern cults….


          Cults clearly differ from such purely authoritarian groups as the military, some types of sects and communes, and centuries-old Roman Catholic and Greek and Russian Orthodox Orders. These groups, though rigid and controlling, lack a double agenda and are not manipulative or leader-centered. The differences become apparent when we examine the intensity and pervasiveness with which mind-manipulating techniques and deceptions are or are not applied.


          Jesuit seminaries may isolate the seminarian from the rest of the world for periods of time, but the candidate is not deliberately deceived about the obligations and burdens of the priesthood. In fact, he is warned in advance about what is expected, and what he can and cannot do….


          Mainstream religious organizations do not concentrate their search on the lonely and the vulnerable … Nor do mainstream religions focus recruitment on wealthy believers who are seen as pots of gold for the church, as is the case with those cults who target rich individuals …


          Military training and legitimate executive-training programs may use the dictates of authority as well as peer pressure to encourage the adoption of new patterns of thought and behavior. They do not seek, however, to accelerate the process by prolonged or intense psychological depletion or by stirring up feelings of dread, guilt, and sinfulness …


          And what is wrong with cults is not just that cults are secret societies. In our culture, there are openly recognized, social secret societies, such as the Masons, in which new members know up front that they will gradually learn the shared rituals of the group … In [cults] there is deliberate deception about what the group is and what some of the rituals might be, and primarily, there is deception about what the ultimate goal will be for a member, what will ultimately be demanded and expected, and what the damages resulting from some of the practices might be. A secret handshake is not equivalent to mind control.


How the United States Marine Corps Differs from Cults


  1. The Marine recruit clearly knows what the organization is that he or she is joining … There are no secret stages such as people come upon in cults. Cult recruits often attend a cult activity, are lured into ‘staying for a while,’ and soon find that they have joined the cult for life, or as one group requires, members sign up for a ‘billion year contract…’

  2. The Marine recruit retains freedom of religion, politics, friends, family association, selection of spouse, and information access to television, radio, reading material, telephone, and mail.

  3. The Marine serves a term of enlistment and departs freely. The Marine can reenlist if he or she desires but is not forced to remain.

  4. Medical and dental care are available, encouraged, and permitted in the Marines. This is not true in the many cults that discourage and sometimes forbid medical care.

  5. Training and education received in the Marines are usable later in life. Cults do not necessarily train a person in anything that has any value in the greater society.

  6. In the USMC, public records are kept and are available. Cult records, if they exist, are confidential, hidden from members, and not shared.

  7. USMC Inspector General procedures protect each Marine. Nothing protects cult members.

  8. A military legal system is provided within the USMC; a Marine can also utilize off-base legal and law enforcement agencies and other representatives if needed. In cults, there is only the closed, internal system of justice, and no appeal, no recourse to outside support.

  9. Families of military personnel talk and deal directly with schools. Children may attend public or private schools. In cults, children, child rearing, and education are often controlled by the whims and idiosyncrasies of the cult leader.

  10. The USMC is not a sovereign entity above the laws of the land. Cults consider themselves above the law, with their own brand of morality and justice, accountable to no one, not even their members.

  11. A Marine gets to keep her or his pay, property owned and acquired, presents from relatives, inheritances, and so on. In many cults, members are expected to turn over to the cult all monies and worldly possessions.

  12. Rational behavior is valued in the USMC. Cults stultify members’ critical thinking abilities and capacity for rational, independent thinking; normal thought processes are stifled and broken.

  13. In the USMC, suggestions and criticism can be made to leadership and upper echelons through advocated, proper channels. There are no suggestion boxes in cults. The cult is always right, and the members (and outsides) are always wrong.

  14. Marines cannot be used for medical and psychological experiments without their informed consent. Cults essentially perform psychological experiments on their members through implementing thought-reform processes without members’ knowledge or consent.

  15. Reading, education, and knowledge are encouraged and provided through such agencies as Armed Services Radio and Stars and Stripes, and through books, post libraries, and so on. If cult do any education, it is only in their own teachings. Members come to know less and less about the outside world; contact with or information about life outside the cult is sometimes openly frowned upon, if not forbidden.

  16. In the USMC, physical fitness is encouraged for all. Cults rarely encourage fitness or good health, except perhaps for members who serve as security guards or thugs.

  17. Adequate and properly balanced nourishment is provided and advocated in the USMC. Many cults encourage or require unhealthy and bizarre diets. Typically, because of intense work schedules, lack of funds, and other cult demands, members are not able to maintain healthy eating habits.

  18. Authorized review by outsiders, such as the U.S. Congress, is made of the practices of the USMC. Cults are accountable to no one and are rarely investigated, unless some gross criminal activity arouses the attention of the authorities or the public.

  19. In the USMC, the methods of instruction are military training and education, even indoctrination into the traditions of the USMC, but brainwashing, or thought reform, is not used. Cults influence members by means of a coordinated program of psychological and social influence techniques, or brainwashing.”

Adapted from Cults In Our Midst: The Hidden Menace to Our Everyday Lives, Margaret Singer with Janja Lalich, Jossey-Bass, 1995. Reprinted with authors’ permission.

AFF News, Vol. 2, No. 4, 1996

"Crazy" Therapies: What Are They? Do They Work?

Excerpts from the book by Dr. Margaret Thaler Singer and Janja Lalich

The Therapeutic Relationship

               The relationship between patient and therapist is unique in important ways when compared to relationships between clients and other professionals such as physicians, dentists, attorneys, and accountants. The key difference is present from first contact: it is not clearly understood exactly what will transpire.  There is no other professional relationship in which consumers are more in the dark than when they first go to see a therapist.

               In other fields, the public is fairly well informed about what the professional does. Tradition, the media, and general experience have provided consumers with a baseline by which to judge what transpires. If you break your arm, the orthopedist explains she will take an X ray and set the bone; she tells you something about how long the healing will take if all goes well and gives you an estimate of the cost. When you go to a dentist, you expect him to look at your teeth, take a history, explain what was noted, and recommend a course of treatment with an estimate of time and cost. Your accountant will focus on bookkeeping, tax reports, and finances, and help  you deal with regulatory agencies.

               Consumers enter these relationships expecting that the training, expertise, and ethical obligations of the professional will  keep the client’s best interests foremost. Both the consumer and the professional are aware of each person’s role, and it is generally expected that the professional will stick to doing what he or she is trained to do. The consumer does not expect his accountant to lure him into accepting a new cosmology of how the world works or to “channel” financial information from “entities” who lived thousands of years ago; or for his dentist to induce him to believe that the status of his teeth was affected by an extraterrestrial experimenting on him. Nor does the patient expect the orthopedist to lead him to think the reason he fell and broke his arm was because he was under the influence of a secret Satanic cult.

               But seeing a therapist is a far different situation for the consumer. In the field of psychotherapy there is no relatively agreed upon body of knowledge, no standard procedures that a client can expect. There are no national regulatory bodies, and not every state has governing boards or licensing agencies. There are many types and levels of practitioners. Often the client knows little or nothing at all about what type of therapy a particular therapist “believes in” or what the therapist is really going to be doing in the relationship with the client.

               In meeting a therapist for the first time, most consumers are almost as blind as a bat about what will transpire between the two of them. At most, they might think they will probably talk to the therapist and perhaps get some feedback or suggestions for treatment. What clients might not be aware of is the gamut of training, the idiosyncratic notions, and the odd practices that they may be exposed to by certain practitioners.

               Consumers are a vulnerable and trusting lot. And because of the special, unpredictable nature of the therapeutic relationship, it is easy for them to be taken advantage of. This makes it all the more incumbent on therapists to be especially ethical and aware of the power their role carries in our society. The misuse and abuse of power is one of the central factors in what goes wrong.

Questions to Ask Your Prospective Therapist

               Ultimately, a therapist is a service provider who sells a service. A prospective client should feel free to ask enough questions to be able to make an informed decision about whether to hire a particular therapist.

               We have provided a general list of questions to ask a prospective therapist, but feel free to ask whatever you need to know in order to make a proper evaluation. Consider interviewing several therapists before settling on one, just as you might in purchasing any product.

               Draw up your list of questions before phoning or going in for your first appointment. We recommend that you ask these questions in a phone interview first, so that you can weed out unlikely candidates and save yourself the time and expense of initial visits that don’t go anywhere.

               If during the process a therapist continues to ask you, “Why do you ask?” or acts as though your questioning reflects some defect in you, think carefully before signing up. Those types of responses will tell you a lot about the entire attitude this person will express toward you – that is, that you are one down and he is one up, and that furthermore you are quaint to even ask the “great one” to explain himself.

               If you are treated with disdain for asking about what you are buying, think ahead: how could this person lead you to feel better, plan better, or have more self-esteem if he begins by putting you down for being an alert consumer? Remember, you may be feeling bad and even desperate, but there are thousands of mental health professionals, so if this one is not right, keep on phoning and searching.

1.    How long is the therapy session?
2.       How often should I see you?

3.       How much do you charge? Do you have a sliding scale?

4.       Do you accept insurance?

5.       If I have to miss an appointment, will I be billed?

6.       If I am late, or if you are late, what happens?

7.       Tell me something about your educational background, your degrees. Are you licensed?

8.       Tell me about your experience, and your theoretical orientation. What type of clients have you seen? Are there areas you specialize in?

9.       Do you use hypnosis or other types of trance-inducing techniques?

10.    Do you have a strong belief in the supernatural? Do you believe in UFOs, past lives, or paranormal events? Do you have any kind of personal philosophy that guides your work with all your clients?

11.    Do you value scientific research? How do you keep up with research and developments in your field?

12.    Do you believe that it’s okay to touch your clients or be intimate with them?

13.    Do you usually set treatment goals with a client? How are those determined? How long do you think I will need therapy?

14.    Will you see my partner, spouse, or child with me if necessary in the future?

15.    Are you reachable in a crisis? How are such consultations billed?

After the Interview, Ask Yourself:

1.       Overall, does this person appear to be a competent, ethical professional?

2.       Do I feel comfortable with the answers I got to my questions?

3.       Am I satisfied with the answers I got to my questions?

4.       Are there areas I’m still uncertain about that make me wonder whether this is the right therapist for me?

Remember, you are about to allow this person to meddle with your mind, your emotional well-being and your life. You will be telling her very personal things, and entrusting her with intimate information about yourself and other people in your life. Take seriously the decision to select a therapist, and if you feel you made a mistake, stop working with that one and try someone else.

How To Evaluate Your Current Therapy

               What if you have been in treatment a while? What do you ask or consider in order to help evaluate what is going on? The issues below may assist.

  1. Do you feel worse and more worried and discouraged than when you began the therapy?

Sometimes having top access one’s current life can be a bit of a downer, but remember, you went for help. You may feel you are not getting what you need. Most important, watch out if you call this to your therapist’s attention and he says, “You have to get worse in order to get better.” That’s an old saw used as an exculpatory excuse. Instead of discussing the real issues, which a competent therapist would, this response puts all the blame on you, the client. The therapist one-ups you, telling you he knows the path  you have to travel. It’s an evasion that allows the therapist to avoid discussing how troubled you are and that his treatment or lack of skill may be causing or, at the very least, contributing to your state.

  1. Is your therapist professional? Does he seem to know what he is doing? Or do features such as the following characterize your therapy:

·         The therapist arrives late, takes phone calls, forgets appointments, looks harassed and unkempt, smells of alcohol, has two clients arrive at one time, or otherwise appears not to have her act together at a basic level.

·         The therapist seems as puzzled or at sea as you do about your problems?

·         The therapist seems to lack overall direction, has no plans about what you two are doing.

·         The Therapist repeats and seems to rely on sympathetic platitudes such as “Trust me,” or “Things will get better. Just keep coming in.”

·         The therapy hour is without direction and seems more like amiable chitchat with a friend.

  1. Does your therapist seem to be controlling you, sequestering you from family, friends, and other advisers?

·         Does the therapist insist that you not talk about anything from your therapy with anyone else, thus cutting off the help that such talk normally brings to an individual, and making you seem secretive and weird about your therapy?

·         Does the therapist insist that your therapy is much more important in your life than it really is?

·         Does the therapist make himself a major figure in your life, keeping you focusing on your relationship with him?

·         Does the therapist insist that you postpone decisions such as changing jobs,  becoming engaged, getting married, having a child, or moving, implying or openly stating that your condition has to be cured and his imprimatur given before you act on your own?

·         Does the therapist mainly interpret your behavior as sick, immature, unstable? Does he fail to tell you that many of your reactions are normal, everyday responses to situations?

·         Does the therapist keep you looking only at the bad side of your life?

  1. Does your therapist try to touch you?

·         Handshakes at the beginning and end of a session can be routine. Anything beyond that is not acceptable. Some clients do allow their therapist to hug them when they leave, but this should be done only after you’ve been asked and have given your approval. If you are getting the impression that the touching is becoming or is blatantly sexualized, quit the therapy immediately.

·         Are you noticing what we call “the rolling chair syndrome”? Some therapists who begin to touch and encroach on the bodies of their clients have chairs that roll, and as time goes by they roll closer and closer. Before you realize what’s happened, your therapist might have rolled his chair over and clasped your knees between his opened legs. He may at first take this as a comforting gesture. Don’t buy it!

  1. Does your therapist seem to have only one interpretation for everything? Does she lead you to the same conclusion about your troubles no matter what you tell her?

You might have sought help with a crisis in your family, a seemingly irresolvable dilemma at your job, some personal situation, a mild depressed state after a death of a loved one, or any number of reasons. But before you were able to give sufficient history so that the therapist could grasp why you were there and what you wanted to work on, the therapist began to fit you into a mold. You find that, for example, the therapist insists on focusing on your childhood, telling you your present demeanor suggests that you were ritually abused or subjected to incest, or that you may be a multiple personality – currently three very faddish diagnoses.

–Excerpted with permission from “Crazy” Therapies: What Are They? Do They Work? By Dr. Margaret Thaler Singer and Janja Lalich.

James Ray’s attorneys seek to exclude witnesses

Arizona Family, January 26, 2011

FLAGSTAFF, Ariz. (AP) — Defense attorneys for a self-help guru facing manslaughter charges are asking a judge to keep two of the state’s witnesses from testifying at trial.


James Arthur Ray’s attorneys say the testimony of a man who studies cult behavior and a corporate risk management expert is irrelevant and would distract the jury.



Ray has pleaded not guilty to three counts of manslaughter stemming from the deaths of three people following a sweat lodge ceremony he led near Sedona in 2009.



Prosecutors say Ross will explain why participants felt they couldn’t leave the ceremony, and Steven Pace will speak to safety measures.



If Ross’ testimony is allowed, prosecutors want the judge to prohibit the defense from bringing up his criminal history or cult deprogramming practices.


Ray’s trial is set to begin Feb. 16.



Scientology and Its Discontents

October 2, 2011


Scientology and Its Discontents 1

Scott Lauder, Hulton Archive, Getty Images
In 1968, L. Ron Hubbard used his Electrometer to determine whether tomatoes experience pain. He concluded that they “scream when sliced.”

Enlarge Image

By Seth Perry
This past spring, in a course I called “American Scriptures,” my students and I listened to excerpts of a recording of L. Ron Hubbard lecturing on a boat in 1968. I had obtained the recording—which the Church of Scientology, the religious organization Hubbard founded, considers not for public circulation—from WikiLeaks, along with a transcript. I photocopied the relevant portions of the transcript and handed them out in class as aids to listening. The transcripts helped enable discussion of particular passages and allowed students to follow Scientology’s famously idiosyncratic lingo—”squirreling,” “ARC break,” “F/N.”
We did something similar with media productions of various other American religious movements, but what inevitably set Scientology’s apart was that as I handed out the transcripts, I told the students that I would have to ask for them back at the end of class. I explained that I did not want to be accused of having reproduced Scientology materials for circulation, thereby risking a lawsuit. My students, with some mirth, thought I was being a little dramatic, and maybe they were right—but I took the transcripts back all the same.
This classroom moment exemplifies the tensions inherent in studying and teaching Scientology. Hubbard’s teachings contain fascinating religious content that demands serious study—by those interested in religion writ large, and by those, like me, who study its American iterations. The organization that Hubbard created, however, frustrates that study.
The Church of Scientology has sought—through litigation and through extralegal harassment—to limit access to its materials and to discourage outsiders’ discussion of its teachings. Moreover, the church’s public profile—that of a belligerent, mendacious institution that produces couch-jumping celebrities—shadows the study of Scientology in the classroom. Students who are trying to take Scientology seriously as a religion worthy of study must come to terms with stories such as that of David Miscavige, the worldwide leader of the Church of Scientology, forcing his subordinates to compete to keep their jobs in a violent game of musical chairs set to the tune of Queen’s “Bohemian Rhapsody.”
Two new books will make analysis of the Church of Scientology’s history and character easier. Janet Reitman’s Inside Scientology: The Story of America’s Most Secretive Religion (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2011) is, as she intended it to be, “the first objective modern history of the Church of Scientology.” A careful, tireless reporter—she first wrote about Scientology forRolling Stone, in 2005—Reitman elaborates a more thorough and more human account of Scientology’s complicated history than has ever been available. Hugh Urban, a professor of religious studies at Ohio State University, has written an equally essential work in The Church of Scientology: A History of a New Religion (Princeton University Press, 2011), which is more concerned with the questions Scientology raises than about Scientology itself.
Urban’s interest is in using the church as “a critically important test case for thinking about much larger legal and theoretical issues in the study of religion as a whole.” “Religion,” he observes, as an academic area of study and as a label with moral, legal, and financial implications, does not have a static definition. In the 20th century, Scientology claimed the status of a religion over the objections of government agencies and public critics, and the ensuing process of negotiation allows us to watch the questions of religion being worked out with a unique level of transparency. “Which groups do we privilege with the label ‘religion,’ and which do we exclude?” Urban wonders. “More important, what are the stakes—legal, financial, and political—in laying claim to the status of religion?”
The two authors agree that Lafayette Ronald Hubbard understood those stakes. He was born in Nebraska in 1911, and his early life is the subject of two very different narratives. According to the church, he was an intrepid explorer, a war hero, a scientist, “the most published and translated author of all time”; to critics, he was a ne’er-do-well, a Navy junior officer who opened fire on some Mexican islands during World War II, a college dropout, a hack. The two narratives come together, though, around the publication of Dianetics,in 1950. Presented as the fruit of Hubbard’s research into the workings of the human mind, Dianetics had nothing religious about it. It is a self-help book based on the idea that traumatic events in one’s past are the source of all mental and most physical ills. By reviewing those events with the help of an auditor trained in Dianetics, those events could be cleared, Hubbard wrote—dissolved, their negative effects eliminated.
Despite criticisms from mental-health professionals, the Dianetics movement took off in 1950, spawning a network of loosely affiliated foundations. By one estimate, the foundations took in over a million dollars in the first year—and spent it all. As initial interest in the movement waned, Hubbard accepted funds from a wealthy supporter, effectively ceding control of his creation. In 1952 the remnant organization declared bankruptcy, and Hubbard was essentially back where he had started.
Spinning personal authority out of nothing more than one’s own assertions of special knowledge—the defining and most elusive ability of a prophet—is a supremely difficult thing. Hubbard did it not once but twice. He rebuilt around what he called, in an internal letter in 1953, “the religion angle.” Hubbard’s move into religious territory is typically thought of as a bald-faced strategy for tax evasion, but Urban demonstrates that the shift happened “in fits and starts” and was motivated by a number of concerns, perhaps not all of them financial. During “auditing”—Hubbard’s counseling method— Hubbard said he had found that many subjects spoke of traumatic events in their pasts which could not have happened to them—could not, that is, have been events of their current lives. Hubbard’s research, he said, led him into past lives and reincarnation—clearly, he felt, religious subjects. His thought expanded to contemplate his subjects’ past lives as other beings, as other forms of being, on other worlds, across a vast expanse of time. The methods and principles of Dianetics (Hubbard came to refer to the book itself as “Book One”) are still essential to Scientology—your past is still the source of the problems of your present. That past, though, now extends 76 trillion years. You have a lot of problems.
For the Church of Scientology, Hubbard wrote a creed, mandated that his officials dress like ministers, designed a cross, and created ceremonies for births, weddings, and funerals. Stung by the collapse of the decentralized movement that had grown up around Dianetics, he placed a powerful institution at the center of everything—auditor training and all publications flowed from it, and money flowed in, from individuals and from subsidiary organizations set up on a strictly controlled franchise model. Along with most previous works on Scientology, the two new books share a preoccupation with this institution.
Urban defines Scientology by the transparency of the institution’s adoption of religious trappings—”Scientology is a self-conscious attempt to make a religion, that is, a concerted effort to use explicitly religious sorts of discourse to describe, defend, define, and redefine itself,” he writes—and makes the process of this reimagination the centerpiece of his book, using it to talk about how claims to religious status are adjudicated in American law and public culture. He contextualizes Scientology’s birth in the mid-20th century—focusing, for instance, on the cold-war mentality behind the church’s constant suspicions and various CIA-like operations against perceived critics—and its future in the 21st, thinking through the significance of the Internet age for a religion that has depended on the modulated release of secrets.
For her part, Reitman is most concerned with the abuses that have been perpetrated by the institution. She spends no fewer than four chapters on the case of Lisa McPherson, the young woman who died in the care of Scientologists in 1995 after declining conventional medical care on their advice. Operation Snow White—the Church’s shockingly successful attempt to infiltrate the IRS, the FBI, the Justice Department, and other government agencies in the 1970s—looms large.
Reitman carefully relates stories from former Scientologists about life in the Sea Org, Scientology’s elite management corps, and these range from the frightening (accusations of forced labor and imprisonment) to the surreal: For much of his career, Hubbard gave orders through what he called his Messengers—mostly adolescent girls who were required not only to convey his words verbatim, but to imitate his voice while doing so. Her final chapter opens with the story of Miscavige’s game of musical chairs and continues with one couple’s harrowing story of escape from the church’s inner sanctum.
The unearthing of the church’s complicated, often ugly history is an essential part of the study of Scientology, but it does not need to be the sum total of that study. In both books, the religion that is Scientology is inseparable from the institution that is the Church of Scientology. Reitman takes some important steps in the direction of distinguishing the two, but with the exception of her interviews with one young woman, neither she nor Urban has significant material from current members of the church, and neither is able to present a clear idea of what it actually means for an average person to be a Scientologist. Urban asks what it means for Scientology to be regarded as a religion by various outsiders, but no study has yet answered the question of what it means for Scientology to act as a religion for its adherents.
A collected volume, Scientology, edited by James R. Lewis, published by Oxford in 2009, contains some essays that attempt to bring discussion of Scientology to this level—thinking through, for example, “The Development and Reality of Auditing,” as one essay is titled—but much work remains to be done.
Future research will need to populate the world of Scientology with the range of characters that populate studies of other religions—from the militant and evangelistic to the lukewarm, the familially obligated, the dissenting. These people are the texture of a religion, and they participate primarily at local levels, far removed from the inner workings of the Sea Org and the behavior of David Miscavige.
To bracket the institutional presence and look instead at the content of Scientology opens up the possibility of looking at how individuals have understood and applied Hubbard’s writings in their own lives. The material is rich—whatever else he was, Hubbard was an accomplished writer, and his texts exhibit a complexity at odds with his own demand that they be understood and applied in exactly one, officially approved way.
There is more to Scientology’s appeal, perhaps, than an aggressive sales pitch. Extracted from their smothering institutional context, the faith commitments of Scientology have an aesthetic depth that has not been explored by commentators outside the church. “Pain is extremely perishable. Pleasure is recorded in bronze,” Hubbard wrote in Dianetics. The Hubbard of Book One has an often graphic contempt for violence against women—an attitude that the world could certainly use more of—as well as a special concern for the well-being of children. Scientology’s ideal state of “clear,” Hubbard wrote, is, among other things, a return to childlike wonder:
“The glory and color of childhood vanishes as one progresses into later years. But the strange part of it is that this glamour and beauty and sensitivity to life are not gone. They are encysted. One of the most remarkable experiences a clear has is to find, in the process of therapy, that he is recovering appreciation of the beauty in the world.”
In the light of such a sentiment, Tom Cruise’s erratic behavior on Oprah’s couch is maybe not so strange after all.
The precise methods of auditing, moreover, might appear odd, possibly even harmful, but the goal—to identify emotional hang-ups and face them as a means of eliminating them—is hardly unique to Scientology. Nor is the idea that your past is holding you back. Portions of Hubbard’s teachings that were once secrets now circulate widely online, drawing laughs (the famous intergalactic-war narrative; the belief that we all share an evolutionary memory of having once been a clam). The church bristles at discussion of such things, quite often to the extent of bringing in its lawyers.
At his best, though, Hubbard was unconcerned with ridicule. “Tell people who want to invalidate all this, ‘Your criticism is very just. It’s only fantasy,'” he wrote in A History of Man, in 1952. Urban quotes a fascinating line from an early lecture in which Hubbard leaves the door open for an expansive, playful understanding of his thought. “I’m just kidding you mostly. … I don’t believe any of these things and I don’t want to be agreed with about them. … All I’m asking is that we take a look at this information, and then go through a series of class-assigned exercises. … Let’s see if we can’t disagree with this universe, just a little bit.”
At the same time, the church’s strict enforcement of discipline and its aggressive attitude toward outsiders is directly traceable to Hubbard. In journalism and scholarship, the relentless focus on its institutional history reflects, oddly, an acceptance of the church’s own stance that the religious content of Scientology is inseparable from the institution. Hubbard infused the Church of Scientology with an authoritarianism unrivaled even in the realm of religious organizations.
Hubbard’s attitude toward his own and the church’s authority is crystallized in a 1965 missive known as “Keeping Scientology Working,” which he periodically rereleased and relentlessly emphasized until his death. “KSW,” in Scientology’s ubiquitous shorthand, makes plain that “standard tech”—Hubbard’s term for his own teachings—always works. In cases where a subject is not getting better through auditing, whatever is being applied is by definition not standard tech but something broken, either through misapplication of Hubbard’s methods or—much worse—through the personal innovations of the auditor. Hubbard called this “squirreling”—”going off into weird practices or altering Scientology.” Moreover, any attempt to apply the principles of auditing beyond the auspices of the church is by definition squirreling.
Such thinking, however, is always misguided—ideas and practices never stay in the boxes that authorities build for them. Squirreling is the rule of religion, not the exception. Reitman interviewed a number of people who have left institutional Scientology but still find value in Hubbard’s teachings, and she goes the farthest in positing that “Scientology as a philosophy” may have a future beyond the church as it has been known, offering an endorsement in her acknowledgments. If there is an argument to her book, it is that Scientology is due for its Reformation. “That a number of [ex-Scientologists] still value L. Ron Hubbard’s technology, if not the organizational management of the Church of Scientology, … is a testament to the growing number of Scientologists who hope to form an independent, and free, movement. I wish them all the best of luck in doing so.”
Scholars will remain indifferent to such endorsements, but the growth of Scientology outside of the church’s auspices would be an interesting thing to observe. Reitman and Urban have brought the study of Scientology to a crucial, long-delayed point—their work will allow for more critical reflection on an important part of 20th-century American religion. With this history available as a resource, scholarship on Scientology will be able to move away from obsession with the checkered history of a single institution and encompass the variety of ways in which individual Scientologists have lived their faith both within that institution and outside of it.
Seth Perry is a doctoral candidate at the University of Chicago Divinity School and a Mellon Dissertation Fellow at the University of Pennsylvania’s McNeil Center for Early American Studies.

“Cults” and Globalization: Reflections and Questions

Mike Kropveld

Revised from a presentation at the International Symposium on Cultic Studies (Bangkok, Thailand), organized by Graduate School of Philosophy and Religion, Assumption University, Thailand and the Institute of Religious Studies, Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences, China, December 15–16, 2011.

In my presentation today, I will give an overview of definitions for cult. Then I will briefly discuss harm and intervention.

Definitions for Cult

A couple of months ago, a media storm occurred after an American evangelical pastor referred to Mitt Romney, a front-running candidate for the leadership of the United States Republican Party, as a member of a cult because of his membership in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (commonly referred to as Mormons).[1] The pastor later qualified his statement by saying that he viewed the Mormons as a theological cult.

I have often heard the statement, “We all know what a cult is.” In my opinion, however, the belief that we all know what a cult is, is both a presumption and a generalization.

In fact, no one agrees on how to define a cult. For example, in France, a country that has taken an active approach to dealing with cults, the president of MIVILDUES, the French government agency that deals with this issue, recently stated, “There is no legal definition of a cult in France, not more than elsewhere in the world. I don’t know any country in the world with a definition for it.”[2] The many government reports that have focused on cults over more than twenty years confirm this statement.[3]

The word cult may be one of the most confusing terms to use. The word is derived from the French word culte, which comes from the Latin noun cultus, meaning care, labor; cultivation, culture; worship, reverence… And so by this definition we can apply the term cult to any group of religious believers: Southern Baptists, Mormons, Jehovah’s Witnesses, Roman Catholics, Hindus, or Muslims. However, the term has since been assigned very different meanings. Whereas the original meaning of cult is positive, more recent definitions vary from neutral to extremely negative.[4]

In the past two decades, pejorative connotations to the word cult have become more common. For many, the term raises images of people lining up for their fatal drink of Kool-Aid[5] or carrying out brutal acts at the behest of an omnipotent leader.[6]

Lists of so-called cults[7] have been created, leading to the assumption that all such groups are similar and dangerous. By extension, because a group has not made it to a list does not necessarily imply it does not pose a problem.

At times, I have been criticized for “muddying the waters” with regard to the term cult. Some people have expressed frustration when I do not respond with a “yes” or “no” when asked whether or not a certain group is a cult, or whether it is a cult or a religion, or whether or not the group in question is dangerous. After all, they are directing their questions to theexecutive director of Info-Cult!

Info-Cult’s view is that individuals can have a positive experience in a so-called “bad” group or a bad experience in a so-called “good” group. The reality is that groups in our society exist on a continuum, from groups that value the integrity and opinions of each of its members, to high-demand groups that function according to the leader’s wishes and demands. And a variety of factors may influence the experience someone might have in a group, or the impact a group may have on society. Some such factors to consider include

?     the general functioning and evolution of a group;

?     the relationships among its members;

?     the psychological needs and personalities of the members; and

?     the leader’s influence on the members.

In 2006, I co-authored a book entitled The Cult Phenomenon: How Groups Function.[8]This book examines how Info-Cult has evolved over the years with regard to its view on how groups function, the reasons individuals join such groups, and the nature of the relationship between groups’ leaders and their members and society.[9]

I was motivated to write this book, in part, by the thousands of calls Info-Cult had received since its inception in 1980. The callers usually were looking for information and used the termcult to refer to a wide variety of groups, including the following:

?     Religious, political, psychological, and commercial groups in which the leader(s) appear(s) to exert undue influence over followers, usually to the leader’s(s’) benefit

?     Fanatical groups, regardless of whether or not leaders exert a high level of psychological control

?     Terrorist organizations, such as Bin Laden’s group, which induce some members to commit horrific acts of violence

?     Religious groups deemed heretical or socially deviant by the person attaching thecult label

?     Any unorthodox religious group—benign or destructive

?     Communes that may be physically isolated and socially unorthodox

?     New Age, psychotherapeutic, “healing” groups that advocate beliefs in a transcendent order, or actions that may occur through mechanisms inconsistent with the laws of physics

?     Any group embraced by a family member whose parents, spouses, or other relatives conclude—correctly or incorrectly—that the group is destructive to the involved family member

?     Organizations that employ high-pressure sales or recruitment tactics, or both

?     Authoritarian social groups in which members exhibit a high level of conformity and compliance to the expectations and demands of leaders

?     Extremist organizations that advocate violence, racial separation, bigotry, or overthrow of the government

?     Familial relationships in which one member exerts an unusually high and apparently harmful influence over the other member(s)—e.g., certain forms of dysfunctional families or battered women’s syndrome[10]

If a group is labeled as a cult, we should be asking the following questions: Who labeled the group, and how has that label been designated? What criteria have been used and what research has been undertaken to evaluate the group? And, equally significant, what information does the label provide, for example, about the group’s

?     beliefs;

?     rules and norms;

?     history and evolution;

?     role of leadership and members;

?     views on children, women, and the elderly; and

?     interactions with the community at large.

Regardless of the label that we use to describe a group, the fact remains that social dynamics of groups, of any kind, are complex; and we should observe and understand each group individually. At all costs, we should avoid the temptation to lump groups together.

At the same time, it is wise to keep in mind how we use terminology related to the issue of cults and new religious movements—in particular, those terms that promote a dichotomy of good versus evil and do little to contribute to a better understanding of this issue, and to support dialogue among those with differing views.[11] Examples of these terms are anti-cult movement, pro-cult movement, and cult apologist. these divisive labels function as “thought-terminating clichés,” to use an expression from Robert Lifton’s seminal book, Thought Reform and the Psychology of Totalism.[12]

Harm

As much as I encourage a nuanced approach to defining the term cult and understanding the cult phenomenon in general, I think we would all agree that there are groups that do harm. To quote Michael Langone of the International Cultic Studies Association (ICSA): “Some groups may harm some people sometimes, and some groups may be more likely to harm people than other groups.”[13] I would add that contributing factors include a group’s location, the nature of its leadership, and at what period in its history we are looking at it.

In fact, it has been observed that members of groups can be harmed in different ways, including psychologically, physically, and financially. Following are examples of each:

Psychological Harm

?     Denial of affection

?     Attacks on self-esteem

?     Limited or restricted access to information

?     Limited or restricted access to education

?     Child neglect

?     Dependant-adult neglect

?     Elder neglect

Physical Harm

?     Physical abuse

?     Food and sleep deprivation

?     Refusal to provide access to adequate medical treatment

?     Sexual abuse

Financial Harm

?     Fraud

?     Financial demands by the group that threaten the individual’s financial well-being

?     Nonremunerated work

Whenever there is an imbalance of power, the potential for abuse in many different relationships, such as the following, exists:

?     Parent–child: child abuse

?     Husband–wife: spousal abuse

?     Professor–student: psychological abuse, sexual abuse

?     Therapist–client: psychological abuse, sexual abuse

?     Boss–employee: workplace abuse

?     Pastor–parishioner: sexual abuse, financial abuse

?     Government–citizens: human-rights abuse

Therefore, it should come as no surprise that people in religious, therapeutic, New Age, occult, or other types of groups can be at risk of being harmed.

We need to be prudent, however, because in some cases we can view harm subjectively and assign a meaning that is culture-bound. For example, in Russia some groups are seen as harmful and often described as cults because they are perceived as a threat to the traditional culture and religion; they view certain groups as a form of Western imperialism. Recently, a member of the Jehovah’s Witnesses, whose publications are considered to be “extremist literature,” was arrested for possession of the group’s writings.[14] In contrast, in North America, Jehovah’s Witnesses not only are free to possess their literature, but also are permitted to hand it out on city sidewalks or by going door-to-door.

At the outset of my presentation, I noted what an American evangelical pastor had to say about Mitt Romney. That example illustrates that some groups are labeled cults because they deviate theologically from some other group’s(s’) beliefs.[15]

Intervention

In determining whether or not a group poses a risk and the nature of the risk, and in making a fair and informed assessment about an individual or a group, it is important to ask the following questions:

1.      To what extent have we accepted the accusatory assessments made by certain individuals or groups, without checking the accuracy of the allegations made?

2.      Do we ask for documents or other empirical facts in order to make an informed and critical evaluation?

3.      Do we readily accept allegations against controversial groups because we believe they are capable of doing what they are accused of?

4.      If there are reports about problems associated with a group, how prevalent are the problems?

5.      Do we assume that those involved in a controversial group or the group under consideration have not changed over time?

6.      Where and how was the information about the group obtained? How representative is the information, and, depending on the source, what other factors should we be considering?

7.      What evidence is there for determining whether the information is accurate?

8.      Did the information come from current members, former members, families with a loved one involved, or from professionals/other experts?

9.      Has anyone attempted to establish a contact with the individual or group?

10.   Have we informed ourselves about what is happening in the group: its origins, its doctrine, its leader(s), the leader’s(s’) role, and the motivations and experiences of the members?

After we have evaluated a particular group, we must be open to the possibility that there may be insufficient facts to support any intervention. This conclusion may lead to a decision either to monitor the situation or to take a wait-and-see approach. We also should consider the simple fact that it may be a case of smoke and no fire.

If an intervention by agencies of the state is warranted, the following questions can help us in coming to a decision about a suitable course of action. These questions can also be helpful for families who are dealing with a loved one involved in a group.

1.      What do we hope to achieve in intervening? Have the motives and objectives been clearly and precisely established?

2.      What strategies can we take to reach our goal?

3.      What are the pros and cons of adopting a particular approach (with a focus on the cons)?

4.      What are the criteria for evaluating whether or not an intervention is successful? For example, is the approach making things worse? And if so, how could it be modified?

There are other considerations to keep in mind:

?     Laws in different countries require that certain professionals are legally and ethically bound to report to protective services when there is even a suspicion of harm to a child, a senior, or to a dependent adult.

?     What appears to function in one country may not be applicable in other countries because of factors such as each country’s history, culture, laws, relationship with religion, and past experience with cultic or totalistic movements.[16]

?     Governments have at their disposition an enormous amount of power and, in dealing with any group, should be extremely cautious in wielding that power. Unless there is a serious and legal reason, the state should show restraint.

?     Different situations may call for different criteria to determine whether or not an intervention is appropriate and feasible. For example, should a family intervene when they have a loved one in a group they perceive to be harmful? Should state authorities intervene to control certain cultic groups?

In closing, I have raised a number of questions in this presentation that I and others have asked over the years, and I would be very interested in what you have to say. Thank you.

Notes

[1] Anderson Cooper 360°, CNN, October 8, 2011 (http://www.mediaite.com/tv/anti-mormon-pastor-to-anderson-cooper-romney-may-belong-to-a-cult-but-he-is-better-than-obama/).

2 France 3, Sun, July 3, 2011, with guest George Fenech, English translation (http://www.sott.net/articles/show/235545-Georges-Fenech-of-MIVILUDES-Nemesis-of-the-Scientific-Method).

3 Mike Kropveld and Marie-Andrée Pelland, The Cult Phenomenon: How Groups Function,Info-Cult (2006). See Appendix 6: Governments and the Cult Phenomenon, p. 165–168 (http://infosect.freeshell.org/infocult/phenomene/English/HTML/doc0018.htm#R248).

4 Ontario Consultants on Religious Tolerance (http://www.religioustolerance.org/cults.htm).

5 Refers to the manner in which the members of Peoples Temple died in a mass murder/suicide in Jonestown, Guyana, November 18, 1978. Marshall Kilduff and Ron Javers,The Suicide Cult: The Inside Story of the Peoples Temple Sect and the Massacre in Guyana,Bantam Books (1978). Mary McCormick Maaga, Hearing The Voices of Jonestown, Syracuse University Press (1998).

6 Two examples that are especially significant in the province of Quebec where I reside are 1) The Order of the Solar Temple, in which more than seventy people died in three countries, in murder and ritual collective suicides operated in the province of Quebec. The murder/suicides were precipitated by the murder in September 1994 in Morin Heights, a village outside of Montreal, of a husband and wife and their three-month-old baby, who had tried to escape from the group. 2) The group led by Roch “Moses” Theriault had a history of physical and sexual abuse of its members, including the murder by Roch Theriault of one of its members.

7 For example, see the following: 1) France—“Les Sectes en France” Rapport Fait au Nom de la Commission D’Enquête sur les Sectes (le 22 décembre 1995) (http://www.assemblee-nationale.fr/rap-enq/r2468.asp). 2) Belgium—Chambre des Représentants de Belgique:ENQUETE PARLEMENTAIRE visant à élaborer une politique en vue de lutter contre les pratiques illégales des sectes et le danger qu’elles représentent pour la société et pour les personnes, particulièrement les mineurs d’âge. (28 avril 1997); Partie I (http://www.lachambre.be/FLWB/pdf/49/0313/49K0313007.pdf); Partie II (http://www.lachambre.be/FLWB/pdf/49/0313/49K0313008.pdf).

8 Mike Kropveld and Marie-Andrée Pelland (see Note 3).

9 See Note 3. See also Mike Kropveld, “Governments and Cults.” Presentation given at the INFORM/CESNUR conference, Twenty Years and More: Research into Minority Religions, New Religious Movements and ‘the New Spirituality.’ London, England (2008) (http://infosect.freeshell.org/infocult/kropveld_inform2008.pdf).

10 Adapted from “The Definitional Ambiguity of ‘Cult’ and ICSA’s Mission,” Michael D. Langone, PhD (http://cultmediation.com/infoserv_articles/langone_michael_definitional_ambiguityofcult.asp).

11 Michael Kropveld, “An Example for Controversy: Creating a Model for Reconciliation,”Cultic Studies Review, Vol. 2, No. 2, 2003, p. 130–150. Accessible athttp://infosect.freeshell.org/infocult/ControversyCSR.doc

12 Robert Jay Lifton, Thought Reform and the Psychology of Totalism: A Study of “Brainwashing” in ChinaW. W. Norton and Company (1961).

13 Michael Langone, Cultic Studies Journal, Vol. 18, 2001, p. 1.

14 A previous version of this paper, presented in Bangkok, indicated that the arrested member was sentenced to 2 years in prison. This information came from the article in Asia News, “Jehovah’s Witness gets two years in prison for possession of ‘extremist literature’”(http://www.asianews.it/news-en/Jehovah%E2%80%99s-Witness-gets-two-years-in-prison-for-possession-of-%E2%80%9Cextremist-literature%E2%80%9D-19529.html). I could find no other reference to that information, and other reports indicate that the arrested member was sentenced to 100 hours of community service. Sophia Kishkovsky, “Russian Terror Law Has Unlikely Targets,” The New York Times, November 3, 2011(http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/04/world/europe/russian-terror-law-has-unlikely-targets.html). “Russian court finds Jehovah’s Witness guilty of inciting hatred,” Amnesty International, 3 November 2011 (http://www.amnesty.org/en/news/russian-court-finds-jehovahs-witness-guilty-inciting-hatred-2011-11-03).

15 “Counter-cult” groups are composed primarily of conservative Protestant Christians who label groups as cults for having unorthodox or heretical beliefs according to their interpretation of the Bible. Ontario Consultants on Religious Tolerance (http://www.religioustolerance.org/ccm.htm).

16 For more details, see the following: 1) Mike Kropveld and Marie-Andrée Pelland (see Note 3), and 2) Mike Kropveld, “A Comparison of Different Countries’ Approaches to Cult-Related Issues.” Paper presented at the European Federation of Centres of Research and Information on Sectarianism (FECRIS) Conference, Cults and Esotericism: New Challenges for Civil Societies in Europe (HamburgApril 28, 2007) (http://infosect.freeshell.org/infocult/HamburgpresentationFECRISFinal-web.pdf).

About the Author

Mike Kropveld is founder and executive director of Info-Cult/Info-Secte (1980) based in Montreal, Canada (www.infocult.org). He is on the Board of Directors of the International Cultic Studies Association (ICSA) and of the International Society for the Study of New Religions (ISSNR). Email: infosecte@qc.aibn.com



[1] Anderson Cooper 360°, CNN, October 8, 2011 (http://www.mediaite.com/tv/anti-mormon-pastor-to-anderson-cooper-romney-may-belong-to-a-cult-but-he-is-better-than-obama/).

[2] France 3, Sun, July 3, 2011, with guest George Fenech, English translation (http://www.sott.net/articles/show/235545-Georges-Fenech-of-MIVILUDES-Nemesis-of-the-Scientific-Method).

[3] Mike Kropveld and Marie-Andrée Pelland, The Cult Phenomenon: How Groups Function,Info-Cult (2006). See Appendix 6: Governments and the Cult Phenomenon, p. 165–168 (http://infosect.freeshell.org/infocult/phenomene/English/HTML/doc0018.htm#R248).

[4] Ontario Consultants on Religious Tolerance(http://www.religioustolerance.org/cults.htm).

[5] Refers to the manner in which the members of Peoples Temple died in a mass murder/suicide in Jonestown, Guyana, November 18, 1978. Marshall Kilduff and Ron Javers, The Suicide Cult: The Inside Story of the Peoples Temple Sect and the Massacre in Guyana,Bantam Books (1978). Mary McCormick Maaga, Hearing The Voices of Jonestown, Syracuse University Press (1998).

[6] Two examples that are especially significant in the province of Quebec where I reside are 1) The Order of the Solar Temple, in which more than seventy people died in three countries, in murder and ritual collective suicides operated in the province of Quebec. The murder/suicides were precipitated by the murder in September 1994 in Morin Heights, a village outside of Montreal, of a husband and wife and their three-month-old baby, who had tried to escape from the group. 2) The group led by Roch “Moses” Theriault had a history of physical and sexual abuse of its members, including the murder by Roch Theriault of one of its members.

[7] For example, see the following: 1) France—“Les Sectes en France” Rapport Fait au Nom de la Commission D’Enquête sur les Sectes (le 22 décembre 1995) (http://www.assemblee-nationale.fr/rap-enq/r2468.asp). 2) Belgium—Chambre des Représentants de Belgique:ENQUETE PARLEMENTAIRE visant à élaborer une politique en vue de lutter contre les pratiques illégales des sectes et le danger qu’elles représentent pour la société et pour les personnes, particulièrement les mineurs d’âge. (28 avril 1997); Partie I (http://www.lachambre.be/FLWB/pdf/49/0313/49K0313007.pdf); Partie II (http://www.lachambre.be/FLWB/pdf/49/0313/49K0313008.pdf).

[8] Mike Kropveld and Marie-Andrée Pelland (see Note 3).

[9] See Note 3. See also Mike Kropveld, “Governments and Cults.” Presentation given at the INFORM/CESNUR conference, Twenty Years and More: Research into Minority Religions, New Religious Movements and ‘the New Spirituality.’ London, England (2008) (http://infosect.freeshell.org/infocult/kropveld_inform2008.pdf).

[10] Adapted from “The Definitional Ambiguity of ‘Cult’ and ICSA’s Mission,” Michael D. Langone, PhD (http://cultmediation.com/infoserv_articles/langone_michael_definitional_ambiguityofcult.asp).

[11] Michael Kropveld, “An Example for Controversy: Creating a Model for Reconciliation,”Cultic Studies Review, Vol. 2, No. 2, 2003, p. 130–150. Accessible at http://infosect.freeshell.org/infocult/ControversyCSR.doc

[12] Robert Jay Lifton, Thought Reform and the Psychology of Totalism: A Study of “Brainwashing” in ChinaW. W. Norton and Company (1961).

[13] Michael Langone, Cultic Studies Journal, Vol. 18, 2001, p. 1.

[14] A previous version of this paper, presented in Bangkok, indicated that the arrested member was sentenced to 2 years in prison. This information came from the article in Asia News, “Jehovah’s Witness gets two years in prison for possession of ‘extremist literature’”(http://www.asianews.it/news-en/Jehovah%E2%80%99s-Witness-gets-two-years-in-prison-for-possession-of-%E2%80%9Cextremist-literature%E2%80%9D-19529.html). I could find no other reference to that information, and other reports indicate that the arrested member was sentenced to 100 hours of community service. Sophia Kishkovsky, “Russian Terror Law Has Unlikely Targets,” The New York Times, November 3, 2011(http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/04/world/europe/russian-terror-law-has-unlikely-targets.html). “Russian court finds Jehovah’s Witness guilty of inciting hatred,” Amnesty International, 3 November 2011 (http://www.amnesty.org/en/news/russian-court-finds-jehovahs-witness-guilty-inciting-hatred-2011-11-03).

[15] “Counter-cult” groups are composed primarily of conservative Protestant Christians who label groups as cults for having unorthodox or heretical beliefs according to their interpretation of the Bible. Ontario Consultants on Religious Tolerance (http://www.religioustolerance.org/ccm.htm).

[16] For more details, see the following: 1) Mike Kropveld and Marie-Andrée Pelland (see Note 3), and 2) Mike Kropveld, “A Comparison of Different Countries’ Approaches to Cult-Related Issues.” Paper presented at the European Federation of Centres of Research and Information on Sectarianism (FECRIS) Conference, Cults and Esotericism: New Challenges for Civil Societies in Europe (HamburgApril 28, 2007) (http://infosect.freeshell.org/infocult/HamburgpresentationFECRISFinal-web.pdf).

About the Author

Mike Kropveld is founder and executive director of Info-Cult/Info-Secte (1980) based in Montreal, Canada (www.infocult.org). He is on the Board of Directors of the International Cultic Studies Association (ICSA) and of the International Society for the Study of New Religions (ISSNR). Email: infosecte@qc.aibn.com

Chapter 22: Ideological Totalism

Thought reform has a psychological momentum of its own, a self-perpetuating energy not always bound by the interests of the program’s directors. When we inquire into the sources of this momentum, we come upon a complex set of psychological themes, which may be grouped under the general heading of ideological totalism. By this ungainly phrase I mean to suggest the coming together of immoderate ideology with equally immoderate individual character traits — an extremist meeting ground between people and ideas.