Academics have a key role in persuading the courts and the governments that “cults” and “brainwashing” are pseudo-scientific labels used to discriminate against unpopular religious minorities.
Massimo Introvigne*
*Faith & Freedom Summit IV, Latin American Parliament, Panama, 24 September 2024
Although I have both written and advocated (inter alia, as the 2011 Representative of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, OSCE, for combating racism, xenophobia, and religious intolerance) for freedom of all religions, this paper is about my academic specialty, new religious movements.
In 2018, American scholar W. Michael Ashcraft published what became the standard academic manual about the history of the study of new religious movements.
The academic subfield had largely coalesced since the 1980s around three shared ideas:
- that “cult” is not a valid category, but a label used to slander unpopular minorities;
- that “brainwashing” is a pseudo-scientific theory weaponized for the same purpose;
- that accounts by “apostate” ex-members—i.e., the minority among former members who had turned into militant opponents of the religions they had left (most ex-members are not “apostates”)—, although not uninteresting, should be handled with care and cannot serve as the main source of information about their former movements.
Ashcraft noted that an overwhelming majority of scholars of new religious movements agree with these ideas, while a tiny minority seceded from the mainline, supported the militant anti-cult movements and the “apostates,” and created a separated group of “cultic studies,” which maintained that “cults” were different from legitimate religious and used “brainwashing.” “Cultic studies,” Ashcraft wrote, were never accepted as “mainstream.” “Cultic studies” scholars live in their own bubble, and only rarely appear in mainline conferences and journals, although they receive a disproportionate attention from generalist media, often eager to hear sensational stories about “dangerous cults.”
In the so-called “cult wars” of the late 20th century, mainline academics studying new religious movements crossed swords with anti-cultists and their “cultic studies” supporters in several controversies and court cases. Led by Eileen Barker in the UK and James T. Richardson in the US, scholars confirmed that there was no “brainwashing,” and these labels and theories were no less pseudo-scientific than the ancient claims that “heretics” converted their followers through black magic.
The decisive legal confrontation happened in the US District Court for the Northern District of California in 1990, where Steven Fishman was accused of fraud and financial crimes in his business activities. He claimed in his defense that at the time of his crimes he was temporarily incapable of forming sound judgments, because he was a member of the Church of Scientology and as such under “brainwashing.” Scientology was not a part of the suit and had nothing to do with Fishman’s wrongdoings.
Judge S. Lowell Jensen concluded that “brainwashing” and mental manipulation “did not represent meaningful scientific concepts,” and while defended by a tiny minority of academics, had been rejected as pseudo-scientific by an overwhelming majority of the scholars studying new religious movements. Fishman went to jail and accusing NRMs of being “cults” using “brainwashing” became very difficult in American courts because of this precedent, although the theory remained popular in the media and in some other countries.
The Fishman case became a textbook example of how in democratic countries the position of mainline academics may prevail in courts of law against anti-cult and “cultic studies” advocates even if the latter are supported by certain media. A case in point is the legal story of the Church of Scientology. Scholars of NRMs overwhelmingly believe that it is a bona fide, although unconventional, religion. In a large majority of court cases this position has finally been accepted by courts and administrative authorities, although it is disputed by anti-cultists, journalists, and a tiny but vocal minority of “cultic studies” scholars.
There are, however, exceptions. In Japan, former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe was assassinated in 2022 by the son of a female member of the Unification Church (now called Family Federation for the World Peace of Unification), who wanted to punish him for his support to that Church. The Unification Church was blamed for the crime and an official campaign against both the Family Federation and the Jehovah’s Witnesses followed.
Most Japanese scholars support the anti-cult campaign. One reason is that several Japanese scholars of religion had participated in events sponsored by a movement called Aum Shinrikyo ignoring it had hidden criminal activities. When Aum Shinrikyo organized a deadly terrorist attack in the Tokyo Subway in 1995, some scholars lost their job and others became persuaded that jumping on the anti-cult bandwagon was the only way to save their careers.
In Latin America, anti-cultists advance a novel theory that just as prostitutes victims of human trafficking deny they are victims but are not believable, “cultists” who are “brainwashed” into working without salary for the “cults” or sexually abused may claim their choice is voluntary or deny the rumors of abuse but should not be believed.
Apart from the California case that involved the Church’s Apostle, the largest Mexican La Luz del Mundo church has been among the targets of such accusations. Scholars have helped providing context and distinguishing between the case of the Apostle and discrimination or false accusations targeting the common members of the Church.
Scholars of new religious movements are also trying (with success, in a couple of Argentinian verdicts, while the case of the Escuela de Yoga de Buenos Aires is still pending) to persuade courts of law that some extensions of “human trafficking” charges are just an attempt to resuscitate the old and discredited theories of “brainwashing.”
Academics have a key role in persuading the courts and the governments, which is paradoxically easier than persuading the media, that “cults” and “brainwashing” are pseudo-scientific labels used to discriminate against unpopular religious minorities. Of course, there are abusive and criminal religious groups, but they should be prosecuted for their real common law crimes rather than for the imaginary crimes of “being a cult” and “using brainwashing.”