Malignant cults and sects – addiction and prevention The current era is characterized by the presence of various socio-pathological phenomena, such as unemployment, crime, youth delinquency, addictions, etc. One of them, which is growing rapidly worldwide, is the presence of and dependence on pernicious cults and sects. But if we want to talk about them, it is necessary to first define what a sect is. Basically, in the eyes of the general public, the sect is perceived as something a priori negative, destructive and dangerous. However, it may not always be true. In the basic definition, we speak of it as a religious community, differing in creed and ceremony from the official mother church, or as a closed group of people that split off due to different opinions, principles, etc. from some organization (Šaling – Šalingová – Maníková, 20025, p. 583). This means that even many established religions in the present time could be labeled as sects in their beginnings and they were labeled as such (e.g. Christians who broke away from Judaism, Evangelicals who broke away from Catholics, etc.) The essential thing is that as long as such a group can respect personality and freedom, or free will of its members, has a real chance to become a generally recognized registered church over time without being considered destructive. The situation is different with the so-called pernicious sects. In their case, it is also a grouping of people that we could define according to the above definition, but it is also a grouping "whose focus poses a danger to society by "making" its members into unfree individuals completely subordinated to the ideological intentions of the sect" (Jusko, 2009, p. 138). Rusnáková (2009, p. 19-22) further adds that the personality of a member of such a destructive community loses its uniqueness and becomes dependent on the personality. It subordinates its actions, thinking and experience to the leader, who abuses the given personality to fulfill his needs and goals. It is also a group separated under the leadership of a community, or it can also be a newly formed community, mostly religious (although this may not be the rule - but then we are talking about a cult). for example, based on the inventions of the founder, freedom of thought and respect for individual freedom are not met with understanding.
- Authoritarian leadership (requires maximum obedience and submission to the sect leader, who has absolute power over the lives and thinking of the members)
- Elitism and exclusivity (the sect claims to be the only true, select, elite group of people who alone know the truth)
- Spreading dogma (The sect and its members spread teachings that they consider to be the only universal truth that must not be doubted)
- Strictly prescribed rules and principles for the life of members (the sect prescribes to its members how they should behave, express what they can and cannot do, who they can and cannot associate with, etc., while often reaching into the intimate spheres of human life)
- Faith exalted above reason (teachings simply have to be believed and not thought about, even if they often defy logic)
- Belief of persecution (the sect claims that society persecutes them because of their faith and only to prevent them from achieving salvation, truth, etc.)
- Sanctions and punishments (those who do not fully obey the teachings are forced to do so by various punishments, sanctions, ridicule, etc.)
- Psychological manipulation (they use it both when recruiting new members and also when influencing already active members to keep them in the sect's beliefs). (Škodová, 1996)
Above we have listed the signs by which pernicious cults and sects manifest themselves. But in order to get a better idea of what some of them mean, we will also give a few examples.
Authoritarian leadership was exemplified, for example, in the People's Sanctuary sect. This sect was founded in the USA in 1955 by James Warren Jones. After he had to leave the USA (1974) due to accusations of suppression of freedom and human rights, as well as his own paranoia that someone wanted to destroy him, he built his own town Jonestown with his followers in the jungle of South American Guyana, where he lived together with his believers. His influence on the members was so strong that, based on his request, 909 people, including himself, committed mass suicide in this town on 18 November 1978.
We also mentioned above that pernicious sects impose strict rules and principles for the lives of their members, often interfering with a person's personal and intimate spheres. It is quite common for sects to forbid their members from contact with their previous families, including their parents, spouses or children. As a concrete example, we will mention the Unification Church (which we can also know as Moonists, according to the founder Sun Myung Moon). It is natural that they do not recognize marriages concluded before joining the sect, unless the partner also joins them. In this sect, a person does not choose his husband himself, but is chosen for him by the leadership of the sect on the basis of a questionnaire that he sends in advance. He often sees his future husband or wife for the first time on the day of the mass wedding. To an even greater extent, the sect interfered in the personal lives of the members of God's children. For example, such naturalness as parental rights was denied. The children in this sect were not the children of their parents, but of everyone, and that is why they used the names father and mother for all adults in the sect. Also, people did not even decide on their own sexuality, as denying sexual intercourse to another member of the sect was inadmissible.
Sects can also be divided from several points of view. The first aspect we will mention is the aspect of officialdom. Based on it, we recognize: a) De jure sects (Here we include those that may or may not be harmful. They are therefore all those that are not registered religious societies in the given country, including those that have a chance to become officially recognized religions over time. We are based here on the basic definition of sects. There are currently 18 registered churches and religious societies in Slovakia. Their list can be found on the website of the Ministry of Culture of the Slovak Republic - http://www.mksr.sk/posobnost-ministerstva/cirkvi-a-nabozenske-spolocnosti-/registrovane-cirkvi-a-nabozenske-spolocnosti-f9.html). b) De facto sects (Sometimes it happens that even such religious societies manage to register, which nevertheless meet all the listed signs of pernicious cults and sects. Thus, even if de jure we cannot call them sects, de facto they are). c) Sects de jure and de facto (Within pernicious cults and sects, this is the most numerous group. We therefore include here all religious communities that are not in the list of registered churches, have not gone through the registration process and at the same time fulfill all the characteristics of pernicious cults and sects).
The second aspect from which we can divide malignant cults and sects is the ideological aspect (or also of philosophical characteristics). Here we distinguish: a) religious sects (oriented to religious faith) b) political cults (focused primarily on political dogma) c) psychotherapeutic-educational cults and sects (abusive psychotherapeutic or pseudo-psychotherapeutic procedures) d) commercial cults (oriented to the power of money and profit at any cost) (Škodová, I. – Škodová, Z., 1996)
Above, we gave several examples of the extent to which pernicious sects interfere in a person's life, thereby actually devaluing him. But this raises the question of how it is possible that people are so willing to believe in some ideology or teaching that they voluntarily submit their lives to it. We deliberately used the term voluntarily, since this is exactly what pernicious sects most often argue about. It is the result of psychological manipulation, which is used from the first contact - recruitment with a potential member. Not all recruiters use psychological manipulation. We can divide recruiters into 2 groups. The first, although dangerous, but not to such an extent, are ordinary members of sects. They try to spread the "truth" that they themselves believe, as they themselves are manipulated and that without mastering the techniques of manipulation. Much more risky are the trained recruiters who are carefully selected and in whose training the sect invests a lot of time and money. As Škodová (1996) states, such recruiters will try to make a non-intrusive, sympathetic impression during the first contact with the aim of instilling trust in us. They will ask questions about generally recognized values (Would you like to be happy in life? Would you like to be healthy? Would you like peace in the world? Would you like to have a happy family? etc.), to which a person basically answers positively - Yes. Subsequently, they will offer possibilities that it is all possible, that it is possible, while always referring to the same author or person who wrote a certain work. Throughout the conversation, they will look for a person's flaws that they could use against him, but they will talk very little and vaguely about themselves. Here we must add that a trained recruiter will act like an ordinary person who happened to join your conversation, as if he met you by chance, so that the victim does not notice that there may be something suspicious about his behavior. In the same way, the above-mentioned "yes" questions, or questions about the person of the victim, are subtly integrated into a normal conversation without arousing suspicion. Also for questions about philosophy, or the teaching that the victim conveys will answer vaguely and vaguely. His goal is not to convince the victim of the truth of his teachings, but only to arouse in her doubts or interest, through which she can accept an invitation to a lecture or discussion where she will learn more. There, the victim will already, without realizing it, be taken by several manipulators, thus losing the de facto advantage of a one-on-one conversation and thus being easier to manipulate. The pressure on the individual increases over time. The psychological manipulation itself subsequently takes place in three phases, often during several days of training or training (the victim may still have no idea that it is a pernicious sect, since the mentioned events have names and are also organized by various civil associations founded by the sect, which abuse terms such as scientific, research, Christian, empirical, lecture, discussion, personality development, etc., which do not arouse suspicion). Škodová (1996) states that in the first phase of psychological manipulation, the sect tries to break down the individual's personality and deprive him of rational thinking. It achieves this through several techniques. Among other things, it is the physical exhaustion of the organism (the day is constantly filled with various duties, the victim's usual routine of the day changes, etc.) Subsequently, the victim is saturated with conflicting information at such a pace that he cannot process it and think about it. Thus, he loses the ability to rationally evaluate the facts. In the second phase, the victim is offered a new teaching - the teaching of the sect. This, on the other hand, is conveyed slowly, clearly, by repetition, so that the information can be stored in the victim's mind and the victim can internalize it. In the third phase, the victim is already accepted as a member by the ritual, but he still makes sure that he keeps and confirms the newly accepted teachings.
Psychological manipulation causes the manipulated person to become dependent on the manipulator (in this case, a pernicious sect). It is a non-substance addiction. In the case of pernicious cults and sects, we recognize several types of such addiction. The first kind is ideological dependence. That is the addiction that is acquired through cult thinking. The individual can no longer think rationally, the sect thinks for him in everything. The second kind is social dependence. It is an addiction caused by membership in a sect, belonging to this group. A member of the sect very often cuts off contacts with everyone he knew until then, including friends, children, and family, and thus remains dependent only on the community of the sect. The third type of addiction is financial addiction. When joining a sect, a member often hands over all of his property, as well as his other income, or a substantial part of it, and thus does not have sufficient financial resources to return to society outside the sect. In the case of commercial cults, he often goes into debt for the vision of a potential high profit, which, however, never comes, and also based on this, he becomes economically dependent on the cult, which allows him to at least fulfill his basic financial demands and needs.
Once a person becomes addicted to a pernicious sect, it is very difficult to help them out of this addiction. For this reason, it is necessary to catch it already in the first stages of the development of addiction. With early intervention, there is a higher chance that it will be possible to prevent the full development of addiction to the sect. Rusnáková (2011, p. 19) defined basic symptoms that may indicate an emerging problem. They are:
- unreasonable refusal of contact with family, friends and close surroundings,
- graduation, leaving work in order to engage in "meaningful activities",
- change in eating habits,
- practicing rituals (meditations, singing, reciting texts, etc.),
- change or neglect of the exterior,
- change of expression,
- changing the circle of friends,
- giving up hobbies or usual activities,
- a tendency to withdraw into oneself, or, on the contrary, excessive activity or recruitment.
As we have already stated, when addiction to a pernicious cult or sect develops, it is very difficult to help the victim. Therefore, prevention is the most effective for this addiction, as well as for other addictions. It also consists in the fact that people avoid situations that could lead to their psychological manipulation, or could develop an incipient addiction in them. In this, it is possible to ask for help from professionals who provide advice in this area. Therefore, if someone notices that someone around him or someone close to him is showing the signs we have defined, it is advisable to seek such help. In Slovakia, for example, there is a civic association Integra based in Banská Bystrica, which has been dedicated to helping victims of pernicious cults and sects for a long time. In it, they will be provided with individual personal counseling or crisis counseling through correspondence, e-mail, or telephone. It is also appropriate to organize workshops, discussions or seminars for the public, where the latter can learn from experts about the risks associated with pernicious cults and sects. And finally, we can summarize a few recommendations that can help potential victims avoid risky situations on their own. The first of them is not to communicate with people who are trying to publicly promote some kind of teaching (handing out flyers, selling books on the given topic,...), often also on the street, or through personal visits to homes. It is also advisable not to be trusting of people we meet by chance. Especially if, as we wrote above, they have a lot of questions about our person, our feelings and attitudes towards life. On the contrary, it is advisable to ask a lot of questions about the other party right from the get-go and check whether the answers are not evasive and non-specific. If we notice that a person keeps referring to some author, his experiences, life, etc., it is good to try to get him to say at least some doubt about the person in question, or about the philosophy he is trying to present. Members of pernicious cults and sects may not question the teaching or its author (usually the leader or founder of the sect). Another recommendation is that people should not participate in events about which they have little information or whose organizer they do not know. If the organizer was a serious institution, it should not be a problem to find it on the Internet, or there is a chance that someone from our neighborhood might know about it. Therefore, it is good to check such an institution in advance to the extent that it is within our capabilities. If, despite this, a person happens to be at the mentioned event, it is necessary to pay attention to the extent to which different and disagreeing opinions are accepted. If he notices anything suspicious, he needs to overcome the unpleasant feeling of being singled out from a group he doesn't know anyway and leave. It can also help others who are afraid to take such a step first, despite the fact that they do not agree with the things presented. The human individual should always be able to think for himself and should not give this right into the hands of pernicious sects, for whom he is just another adept to be exploited for their own benefit.
Author: PhDr. Peter Papšo, PhD. List of bibliographic references
JUSKO, P. 2009. Social work with youth and sociopathological phenomena. Banská Bystrica: PF UMB, 2009. ISBN 978-80-8083-705-1.
RUSNÁKOVÁ, T. 2006. "SECT" diagnosis. In: Dimension. Year 11, 2009, no. 4, ISSN 1335 – 2660.
RUSNÁKOVÁ, T. 2011. Dependence on psychomanipulative groups – sects, movements I. In: Sociálna prevencicia, vol. 6, 2011, no. 4. ISSN 1336 – 9679.
ŠALING, S. – ŠALINGOVÁ, M. – MANÍKOVÁ, Z. 2002. Dictionary of foreign words. 2nd ed. Bratislava: Samo, 2002. ISBN 80-967524-7-2.
ŠKODOVÁ, I. 1996. Pernicious cults and sects. Banská Bystrica: KPPP, 1996.
ŠKODOVÁ, I. – ŠKODOVÁ, Z. 1996. Everything you wanted to know about sects, but had no one to ask. Banská Bystrica: OZ Integra, 1996.