Ever wonder what turns normal folks into true believing cult members?

"They're crazy!"

Maybe.

In 1953 Robert Lifton studied 40 brainwashing victims—25 Americans, 15 Chinese—and deduced 8 criteria for thought reform ... "Ideological Totalism:"

https://justinowings.com/thought-reform-brainwashing-and-cults/ THREAD:

Ideologies are systems we use to make sense of the world. Usually helpful, ideologies come in all shapes and sizes and are often kept by groups:

• Religions
• Political affiliations
• Teams, or organizations
• Family
• … Even fitness groups and diets

You likely adhere to a number of ideologies right now.

So long as your ideologies are flexibile, they can serve you, helping you navigate the complexity/uncertainty of life.

But sometimes ideologies go rogue. They take on a life of their own, and go from helpful to harmful by making a subtle shift:

They go from being a way to make sense of the world to being _the_ way to make sense of the world.

When an ideology becomes "the way" and is adopted by an enthusiastic group looking to spread the word, the shift toward something more like a cult takes flight.

It's here awareness of Robert Lifton's 8 criteria becomes incredibly useful.

So let's take a look.

Here are Lifton's 8 criteria for "ideological totalism:"

1. Milieu Control

“Milieu” is your social environment. As it pertains to thought reform/brainwashing, “Milieu Control” is control over the flow of information. Active filters over individual perception.

2. Mystical Manipulation

"Initiated from above, [Mystical Manipulation] seeks to provoke specific patterns of behavior and emotion in such a way that these will appear to have arisen spontaneously."

...Anything from conjuring magic to legerdemain—even presents from Santa Claus.

3. Demand for Purity

The Demand for Purity is a natural extension of simplifying the world into black/white, right/wrong, “the pure and the impure.”

As Lifton shares, “anything done to anyone in the name of this purity is ultimately moral.”

All are sinners. All must repent.

4. Cult of Confession

The Cult of Confession—confession either to the group or to leaders within it—is a natural outcome of the Demand for Purity.

By confessing "sins," members purge their impurities and renew their commitment to the ideology and group.

5. “Sacred Science”

While every ideology makes assertions _of_ truth, for cults, ideological assertions/assumptions are _the_ truth. They are beyond dispute ... “Science.”

6. Loading the Language (1/2)

What better way to control thought than to control language?

https://twitter.com/justinowings/status/1079380072254136320

Cults use catchphrases/words to compress abstract arguments into pithy, influential phrases—what Lifton called the “thought terminating cliché:”

6. Loading the Lanugage (2/2)

3 tells for loaded language:

i. Repetition. Words/catchphrases become clichés.
ii. Pre-loaded judgment. Persuasive slants are used to influence and end thought.
iii. Exclusivity. Outsiders have no authority to dispute meaning/assumptions.

7. Doctrine Over Person

This can be thought of as rewriting history—either the history of the group or the actual experiences of individuals within it.

E.g. Totalist States employ Doctrine Over Person by blaming the shortcomings of the State on outside influences.

8. Dispensing of Existence

"You're either with us or against us."

Totalist ideologies see outsiders as potential threats who must be converted … or eliminated. It's in effect human sacrifice, either the figurative sacrifice of the self or the literal sacrifice of outsiders.

Remarks:

Lifton's ultimate realization in writing Thought Reform was that totalist ideologies are built on the innate human desire to find meaning in our existence.

Lifton wrote, "Some potential for this form of all-or-nothing emotional alignment exists within everyone ... Any ideology—i.e. any set of emotionally-charged convictions about man/his relationship to the natural/supernatural world—may be carried in totalist direction."

In other words, each of us carries the potential to fall into an ideological trap whereby "a way" to understand the world becomes "the way."

Understanding Lifton's 8 criteria can help us avoid that fate.

I've gone more in depth on this subject here:

https://justinowings.com/thought-reform-brainwashing-and-cults/

Candidly I see much overlap between Lifton's 8 criteria and the world today. If you're like me and find this topic interesting and relevant to our times, let's keep the discussion going.