Brainwashing is the effort to get someone to give up their basic social, political and religious beliefs, usually without the subject being aware that this is happening and accept a contrasting belief system and having limitless power over them for any period of time using physical violence and/or psychological distress. In this critical essay I will discuss how this process works by giving a detailed description of the works of Singer, Robert Lifton and Edgar Schein with critique and how new religious movements produce a new identity for their recruits. With this it is also necessary to know what positive effects it can have on a person to join a new religious movement.
Singer’s six conditions
- Do not let the new recruit know that he/she is being compelled into changing their personality, behavior or beliefs. Make each change so minor that they won’t even know it’s happening.
- Have control over the subject’s physical environment and time. All free time must be spent with the cult in a controlled environment.
- Let the subject think they are powerless by stripping them of all support systems and income, making them unable to function on their own, causing inner confusion having to depend on you.
- Create a manipulative environment, punishing old behaviors by claiming they are bad and evil and should be eliminated.
- Set up a reward system for learning and doing what is acceptable for the group and accepting the group’s beliefs and ideologies. If the person is non-compliant, they will be threatened with expulsion from the group.
- Create a closed system of logic, banning criticism, complaining or doubt. “The individual is always wrong and the system is always right.”
Robert Lifton’s eight themes
- Control the new recruits’ m...
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...round for the last 60 years or so, and not everybody is aware of the power of it. Although it has no magical powers, it can make someone give up everything they know and love.
Resources
Furnham, A. A Sideways View. Why do people join and even appear to thrive in cult-like groups? (24 February 2014). URL: http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/sideways-view/201402/why-do-people-join-cults Date of Access: 23/03/2014
Lalich, J. & Langone, M.D. Characteristics Associated with Cultic Groups.
Steyn, H.C. The “cult” controversy: a reader. Compiled for the Department of Religious Studies & Arabic, UNISA.
Richardson, J.T. A Critique of “Brainwashing” Claims About New Religious Movements. p.160 UNISA press
Robbins, T. Constructing Cultists. Mind Control. P167 UNISA press
Singer, M.T. The Process of Brainwashing, Psychological Coercion, and Thought Reform. p147 UNISA press
Cults are dangerous institutions that have existed for many years, corrupting and reforming the minds of innocent people into believing outrageous doctrines that eventually result in disaster. Horrifying cases involving men such as Charles Manson, Jim Jones and David Koresh have bewildered people and raise the question: how could individuals be easily susceptible to the teachings of these men, so influenced that masses go as far as to commit the unthinkable? Individuals who are in a vulnerable position in search for an identity are attracted to cults because they offer a sense of belonging. In addition, isolation from society contributes to the functioning of a cult for it creates an atmosphere where submissiveness and obedience runs high. These two factors seem to hold true for one of the most notorious cults currently established in the United States and Canada. The Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints or, FLDS, is an international polygamist sect that incorporates belonging and isolation along with a dangerous mentality that have resulted in the abuse of women and children in the name of God.
What’s more, with Robbins melding insights gained from work both past and present, could the insights gained from cognitive science, provide additional understanding into the ways in which totalistic groups are capable of “brainwashing” their adherents? If the frames or schemas are constructed and informed through social conditioning, it seems that they may be subject to re-shaping, and re-definition by a group or a society. While sociorhetorical interpretation’s scope seems to be extremely broad, it may be the approach needed to successfully engage and explain such phenomena.
Bloody rituals and moonlit sacrifices define a cult. As long as religion exists, cults also exist. Initiation involves feats of courage and skill and often results in fatality. Once they complete their initiation they gain the status of an official member. Members advance in rank by following the regulations and being faithful to their deity. New recruits rank lowest and the priest or prophet are the highest ranking members; climbing through the ranks takes years. Judith Lorber, the author of “Believing Is Seeing: Biology as Ideology,” assists in understanding the ideas presented in Sharlene Nagy Hesse-Biber’s article “The Spread of the Cult of Thinness…” ; society gives “cult” members body expectations they must follow for them to secure their places in the “cult” of thinness, or society rejects them.
..., to note that there seems to be no adverse effects while a person is in a cult, as their levels of stress goes down and they seem happier. Overall, the cult mentality is one that continues to be an enigma to society today.
The history of Scientology shows its persistence to keep their members with the promise of spiritual enlightenment. Scientology was founded in the mid-twentieth century by renowned science-fiction author L Ron Hubbard. (Sweeney) The basic foundation of the church stems from the ideas of his best-selling book, Dianetics: The Modern Science of Mental Health. (Anderson) Dianetics was published on May 9, 1950, and the date would become recognized among Scientologists as a religious holiday. Hubbard claimed that the discovery of the science of dianetics is “a milestone for Man comparable to his discovery of fire and superior to his inventions of the wheel and the arch” (Reitman 58). The book’s ideas encourage humanity to rid the individual of any of their mental weaknesses (18). It went on to make its way up the bestseller list by the summer o...
People join cults as a way of feeling a sense of belonging within a community (Winner 2011:417). This need for belonging is eventually why members find themselves so involved that they cannot get out. This is especially true in the case of the cult created by Jim Jones. He established a cultic Church called the People’s Temple, most famously known for being the largest group suicide consisting of 909 people, including 276 children (Nelson 2006). Between five to seven million young adults between the ages of 18 and 25 are involved in cult groups (“Cult statistics” 2010). Nearly 180 000 people are recruited into cults each year (“Cult Statistics” 2010). The sense of identity, purpose, and belonging are appealing aspects to why people join cults as the use of power and manipulation coerces them to stay.
Cults have existed throughout history since the beginning of time. A cult is defined in Webster’s dictionary as a “system of religious worship with a devoted attachment to a person, principle, etc.” Over the past thirty years numerous religious cults have caused “ tens of thousands to abandon their families, friends, education’s, and careers to follow the teaching of a leader they will never meet”(Beck 78).
Cult- a system of religious veneration and devotion directed toward a particular figure or object.
“A cult is a group of religious and dedicated members directed toward a particular belief or figure” (Thriving Cults). Cults are often misjudged and mistreated because what they believe in is strange or different than what the rest of the world believe in. Lesser known cults are often persecuted for what a few evil and corrupted cults did, but they never stop and look and see if the cult is a truly peaceful group. People in cults are often persecuted for being devoted to the cause of the cult they joined. “Certain people lack the inner resources and inner abilities to fully understand the world going on around them. They do not enjoy feeling lost, feeling abandoned, or hopeless” (Church of Reality). “They have no real conception of themselves and a weak and uncertain sense of self-identity or self worth” (Campus Cults). Sometimes we feel that we lose the purpose of living and we need something to fall back to. “Naturally, we follow the advice of people or groups who seem to ...
Fine lines proceed to subsequently blur the separation between a religion and a cult. Throughout history, the label cult has consistently succeeded in disparaging numerous religions including Christianity. To bring a standstill to the confusion amidst all personages, the narrow slash between these two matters need to be entirely divulged and established. Distinctions separating a religion and a cult are elucidated primarily by their treatment of individuals and relations. Variances can be seen through examples of behaviors, the “Moonies” cult, and the works of the Christian religion.
In Huxley’s, Brave New World, there is a society, known as the World State, where people are divided into different castes, and depending on the caste they are set in determines their place in the community and purpose in the world. If one is an Alpha, he/she will be highly intelligent and be a leader of the free world, while one who is an Epsilon has lowered intelligence and is conditioned to do physical labor. From the process of the human beings being created in test tubes, to their birth and development, they are trained to believe in certain truths. Brave New World is a Utopian novel that uses a form of brainwashing to conform people to the ideal society placed in the plot. Other literature works, and real life occurrences, make it evident that brainwashing is used to condition to believe and behave I certain ways, which become their morals and truths.
Smart, Ninian. "Blackboard, Religion 100." 6 March 2014. Seven Dimensions of Religion. Electronic Document. 6 March 2014.
...es use their power to control the weaker groups” (Henslin 2013:21). The leaders try to find the same type of recruits for the cult. They all possess the same type of attributes that make them more susceptible to being a candidate for becoming a cult member. Cult leaders are very smart and strong minded individuals that use manipulation to get what they want and follow what they believe in. People will go to extreme measures to follow their beliefs.
Lifton, R., foreword, Cults In Our Midst, by Margaret Thaler Singer & Lalich (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 1995).
Religious Fundamentalism is not a modern phenomenon, although, it has received a rise in the late twentieth century. It occurs differently in different parts of the world but arises in societies that are deeply troubled or going through a crisis (Heywood, 2012, p. 282). The rise in Religious Fundamentalism can be linked to the secularization thesis, which implies that victory of reason over religion follows modernization. Also, the moral protest of faiths such as Islam and Christianity can be linked to the rise of Religious Fundamentalism, as they protest the influence of corruption and pretence that infiltrate their beliefs from the spread of secularization (Heywood, 2012, p. 283). Religious Fundamentalists have followed a traditional political thought process, yet, have embraced a militant style of activity which often can turn violent (Heywood, 2012, p. 291).