I’ve been thinking about a conversation I had a few months ago with Pat and Joe—two cultism specialists who are also life partners.
First, what is cultism? A cult can include any community where people seem brainwashed into believing the unbelievable. By this definition, some would consider even benevolent spiritualism as cultic. The difference, however, is a grade of harm. Suffice it to say that for common parlance, a cult is a belief system that causes personal or social harm. Cult specialists would specify that their only job is to protect people who are endangering themselves and others with the kind of magical thinking that results in physical, psychic or material violence. And the strategy for harm is authored almost every single time, by a malignant narcissist, or psychopath.
I think it’s worth noting at this point, that one of the most important books on the subject, referenced frequently by Pat and Joe—Thought Reform by Robert J Lifton—is about the political state, and how indoctrination and brainwashing came hand in hand as strategies for controlling popular masses. Which is to say, most cults are actually political belief systems, not religious fringe groups.
I think the cultism experts would describe what they do as primarily an act of sympathy and compassion. Rather than to call what they do a rescue or de-programming, they prefer to talk about the relationships they build with people with whom they have shared experiences. By extrapolation, this remind us that we all have shared experiences, as humans.
Pat and Joe are themselves ex-cult members so the shared experience is literal. For over twenty five years, each of them was deeply immersed in Transcendental Meditation (aka TM), and they’re proud to say they got really high on the charts of TM cultic dominionism. To the extent that only an unprovable ratio of reincarnations can give members of the cult any real superior power, these guys achieved higher status by succeeding in the other kind of power acquisition: expanding TM’s multi-level real estate marketing network.
I think they prefer not to be called extraction experts, or to use the phrase de-programming, because it implies an outside-in/top-down approach to an otherwise very human experience of seeking community and validation. But “cult extraction” is the language I’d use to summarize their work much in the same way one has to sometimes be “rescued” from domestic violence or abduction.
Throughout our conversation, Pat and Joe emphasize repeatedly that people who find themselves in cultic situations are in desperate need of a validation, a need that is created in the first place, by psychopaths who desire unquestioned status. One of them offers that there might be some evolutionary biological advantage to the growing number of malignant narcissists, for why would the mentality proliferate if it were only a liability to humans? One of their working theories is that cultic narcissism represents the human need for absolute power, created in a vacuum of any control.
I remind myself that we need to stop vying for absolute power and accept our loss of control lest we become malignant narcissists ourselves.
They share two statistics with me that I can’t stop thinking about.
There is a clinical device for determining a person’s suggestibility to hypnosis and mind control. That suggestibility is rated on a scale of 1-7, where 1 is someone highly unlikely to be sedated through words, and 7 is someone so susceptible that they can undergo major surgery without anesthesia. A highly susceptible person sounds like an obvious mark for a con, but the thing of it is, according to this statistical analysis, most people with high susceptibility to hypnosis (presumably clocking in around 6 or 7 on this scale) happen to work in creative professions. In short, artists are more likely to become susceptible to cultic influence. This is one of the brilliant ways Pat and Joe have redetermined their relationships to people in cults—there is a direct correlation between a person’s creative acumen and their absolute vulnerability to fantasy, because of course there is. When we are victimized for having pure imaginations, it is not the fault of the victim but the act of the cultic leader who manipulates our fantasies. These leaders create what these experts call “a prison of specialness” and have us begging for more validation. We should not conclude that high suggestibility is at fault for being taken advantage of. We should redirect the imagination to something at least more benign but potentially more cosmic and ferocious, and less harmful, less violent. When cruelty takes place, let us point at the perpetrator, not the victim for wanting to be out of their minds.
The second statistic is less poetic but so much more profound: 90% of people in harmful cultic situations, find their own way out. Let me say that again: the overwhelming majority of people in cults find their own way out. I feel very much for the remaining 10% but am heartily impressed at the balance. We can lead each other out of this.
Omg Anne so good, careful there with your cultishly good words lol.
“When we are victimized for having pure imaginations, it is not the fault of the victim but the act of the cultic leader who manipulates our fantasies.” 🖤