Professional cult deprogrammer Rick Alan Ross joins WIRED to answer the internet’s burning questions about cults. What makes a cult a cult exactly? What are some signs you’re in one? How do cults differ from religions? Can a family be a cult? And why are Americans seemingly so susceptible to cults? Rick Alan Ross tackles these questions and many more on Cult Support.
Director: Lisandro Perez-Rey
Director of Photography: AJ Young
Editor: Richard Trammell
Expert: Rick Alan Ross
Line Producer: Joseph Buscemi
Associate Producer: Paul Gulyas
Production Manager: Peter Brunette
Production Coordinator: Rhyan Lark
Casting Producer: Nicholas Sawyer
Camera Operator: Shay Eberle-Gunst
Sound Mixer: Paul Cornett
Production Assistant: Shenelle Jones
Post Production Supervisor: Christian Olguin
Post Production Coordinator: Ian Bryant
Supervising Editor: Doug Larse
Additional Editor: Paul Tael
Assistant Editor: Justin Symonds
Director: Lisandro Perez-Rey
Director of Photography: AJ Young
Editor: Richard Trammell
Expert: Rick Alan Ross
Line Producer: Joseph Buscemi
Associate Producer: Paul Gulyas
Production Manager: Peter Brunette
Production Coordinator: Rhyan Lark
Casting Producer: Nicholas Sawyer
Camera Operator: Shay Eberle-Gunst
Sound Mixer: Paul Cornett
Production Assistant: Shenelle Jones
Post Production Supervisor: Christian Olguin
Post Production Coordinator: Ian Bryant
Supervising Editor: Doug Larse
Additional Editor: Paul Tael
Assistant Editor: Justin Symonds
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TechTranscript
00:00I'm culty programmer Rick Allen Ross. Let's answer your questions from the internet.
00:05This is Cult Support.
00:12Atjoysfree11 asks, What are the signs I'm in a cult?
00:16Social isolation. Being cut off from family and old friends.
00:20Unable to ask critical questions regarding the leader of the group or the group's behavior.
00:26A feeling that if I leave, I must be wrong.
00:31And there's just no checks and balances to the leader's power
00:35or transparency regarding the group's finances and many of its actions.
00:40If you begin to get that kind of gut feeling that you're in a cult, maybe you are.
00:46And it's time to take a step back, unplug, and look over those warning signs.
00:51Atcreation247 asks, What makes a cult a cult?
00:55There are three primary core characteristics that form the nucleus
00:59for virtually any definition of a destructive cult.
01:02Number one, that there is an absolute totalitarian leader
01:06that is the defining element and driving force of the group.
01:09And that leader becomes an object of worship.
01:12Number two, the leader uses identifiable techniques of coercive persuasion to gain undue influence.
01:20And number three, having acquired undue influence,
01:23the leader uses it to exploit and do harm to his or her followers.
01:28It's important at this point to understand that not all cults are religious.
01:33For example, Charles Diedrich led a group called Synanon,
01:38which was a drug rehabilitation community.
01:41It wasn't about religion, but Diedrich had absolute power and control.
01:45A corporation like Apple could be seen as a cult, but a benign cult.
01:50Steve Jobs, when he was alive, was the defining element and driving force of the corporation.
01:56The followers of Taylor Swift can be seen as a cult following,
02:00but Taylor Swift is not using coercive persuasion to gain undue influence over her following.
02:06In the case of North Korea, the leader is worshiped as a virtual god on earth.
02:13And he is the defining element and driving force of the entire country.
02:18And the people are locked in, in a kind of social isolation.
02:22There has been starvation, deprivation.
02:25So, I see North Korea as an example of how an entire country can become a destructive cult.
02:31NosyPeach5 asks, can a family be a cult?
02:34Yes, there can be family cults.
02:37Typically being dominated by a father figure who has absolute control over the family,
02:43who literally never lets his children grow up.
02:46They stay in the family, they work, bring their paychecks to the family leader.
02:51And the marriages and the dating and everything is controlled by that parent who leads the family cult.
03:00A cult only requires at least one follower.
03:04So, you can have an abusive controlling relationship where the abusive partner is in the role of a cult leader.
03:11For example, Tina Turner and Ike Turner.
03:14Tina Turner was isolated.
03:16She was cut off from friends until she finally left.
03:19AtBugHatesHugs asks, why do cults believe the end is near?
03:24If I had a cult, I'd just be like, let's all just have fun.
03:28I don't know when the end will be.
03:30That's an interesting thought.
03:32But if you're a cult leader, what you're looking for is a leverage point.
03:36So, if you tell people that the end is near,
03:39and the only safety they can be sure of is within your group,
03:43you now have a means to get them to cleave closer to you.
03:48So, doomsday becomes a coercive persuasion technique.
03:53An example of a doomsday cult would be the Waco Davidians led by David Koresh.
03:59Koresh said that the end was imminent, that he would judge the world,
04:03and that only those that were with him in what was at one time called Ranch Apocalypse would be safe.
04:10When I did deprogrammings of Waco Davidians,
04:13they were frantic at times to get into the compound to be with Koresh
04:19so that they would be protected.
04:21They made weapons illegally in the compound,
04:24arming themselves to defend themselves against what he said was Satan.
04:29The compound was raided by the BATF, Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms,
04:34and there was a shootout.
04:35People died.
04:36The FBI encircled the compound.
04:38There was a 51-day standoff.
04:40David Koresh decided it was time for the end, and the place was burned down.
04:46All the members dead.
04:48At East of the Wood asks,
04:50How are cults different in any way from religion?
04:54First of all, religious organizations typically have democratic governance,
04:58checks and balances, transparency, and accountability.
05:02You are not made to feel that you've turned against God simply by leaving a particular church.
05:07It has been said that religions began as cults,
05:11and in some sense you can see that in the case of the Mormon Church,
05:16or Jehovah's Witnesses, or Seventh-day Adventism.
05:19It began with an absolute charismatic leader
05:22that was the defining element and driving force of the group.
05:25If we look at Mormonism, we see that first there was Joseph Smith,
05:29then there was Brigham Young,
05:30but over a period of time the group evolved beyond that point to governance of many people,
05:36and the group moved closer and closer to the mainstream.
05:40At Miss Ressi asks,
05:41Do cult leaders know they are cult leaders?
05:44A cult leader can be seen as very much like a con man,
05:47except they run the same con on the same people indefinitely.
05:52Do they know that they're manipulating?
05:53Yes, I think they do.
05:55But they feel that anything they do is justified.
05:59The ends justify the means, and they determine what ends are just.
06:03At Maria's Ghost asks,
06:05Which cults have a good online presence, might f*** around and get indoctrinated?
06:10All of the major groups have an online presence.
06:14They have YouTube channels, they have followers on TwitterX,
06:17they have Facebook pages,
06:19they have search engine optimized themselves so that they will insinuate themselves in searches.
06:26People can become completely indoctrinated in a cult without ever meeting the leader.
06:31They can do this by watching the leader's YouTube videos,
06:35and communicating with people online.
06:37One example of a well-known cult online would be a group called the TikTok cult.
06:43They follow a minister by the name of Shin who put together a church online,
06:48and according to complaints,
06:49exploited people who are dancers in the entertainment industry
06:53to create very popular clips for TikTok to make money.
06:58And they would actually live in a community in group housing and be controlled by this group.
07:04But everything would be based on what they were doing in large part online.
07:09At Skin the Fool says,
07:11I still think about the scene in Midsommar,
07:13the Harga women surrounding and holding Dani,
07:17and wailing with her in empathy,
07:19sharing her pain so beautiful yet so horrifying.
07:22I've seen Midsommar and I would say that it's really not about empathy.
07:26It's about quelling Dani's feelings.
07:29The group wants to essentially anesthetize her
07:33so that she no longer will be a problem.
07:36So by surrounding her, they have encapsulated her.
07:40And it's almost as if they're saying,
07:42Dani, you no longer have your own individual feelings.
07:45There is just the group.
07:47I think the best film that you can watch to see how cults really work
07:53is a 2011 film, Martha, Marcy, May, Marlene.
07:57It directly mirrors what it would be like to be in a cult
08:02and leave a cult and how difficult the recovery might be.
08:06At GreggsVO asks,
08:07How do cult leaders get people to believe they are God in the flesh
08:11when I can't get my children to wear shoes when they leave the house?
08:15It's all about cutting people off from any outside frame of reference
08:18or accurate feedback about what's going on.
08:21When was the last time that you were in a theater
08:23and there was a standing ovation and you sat and did nothing?
08:27Didn't the people around you cause you to stand up and clap too?
08:31Well, that is what goes on in cults, only on a much more intense level.
08:35I have met cult leaders face to face.
08:38Some of them quite charismatic, others really not at all.
08:42But what they all share in common is that they are malignant, narcissistic people.
08:47I feel like I'm meeting the same person over and over again
08:51because their personalities are so similar.
08:54ChoiceCheck3900 asks,
08:56Do cults recruit based on appearance?
08:59I think I was recruited because to be blunt, I'm ugly as f**k
09:03and people probably think I'm easy to extort from.
09:06Typically, what cults want are people that are healthy,
09:10relatively young, that can work for the group.
09:13They're not interested in anyone based on appearance
09:17other than are you able to produce for the group.
09:20At MXHeadroom asks,
09:22Why do all cults get so weird and crazy about sex?
09:26Well, not necessarily all of them.
09:28Some of them may demand celibacy.
09:31Marshall Applewhite, Heaven's Gate, the people were celibate,
09:34even castrated to ensure that celibacy.
09:38But sex is power.
09:39And in many groups, the leader will use sex to control people.
09:44And much like a rapist, he will dominate members of the group sexually.
09:49Charlie Manson did that.
09:50David Koresh did that.
09:52It wasn't about sex.
09:53It was about power and control.
09:56At Judicale asks,
09:57Is there a cult that isn't problematic?
10:00My favorite example is Arcosante.
10:02This is an experimental city community being built north of Phoenix, Arizona.
10:08And it was initially led by the architect Paolo Soleri,
10:12who was the driving force and defining element of what he called arcology,
10:17a philosophy based on building cities where there was no urban sprawl.
10:22And I think that Paolo Soleri meant to be good.
10:25I received no complaints about him over the years.
10:28And when he died, he left everything to a foundation to continue to build Arcosante,
10:34which is known for its famous Cosante bronze bells.
10:38Arcosante is really an example of what can be seen as a benign cult,
10:43a personality-driven group that does no harm.
10:46At Matt Burns asks,
10:48Can Trumpism as a whole be considered a cult?
10:51Well, I don't think so.
10:52It's a political faction.
10:54And I think that for us to use the word cult in a derogatory sense,
10:59just to denigrate some group is an abuse of using that word.
11:03He could be seen as a very shrewd salesman
11:07who has honed a message that appeals to a large group of people.
11:11Those people already had those beliefs and concerns
11:15that made them responsive to that message.
11:18One time Donald Trump was on a speaking tour
11:21and he encouraged people to get vaccinated regarding COVID.
11:25And the crowd booed him.
11:27And then he walked back what he said and the audience kind of changed.
11:32I don't know cult leaders that get booed.
11:35And I don't know cult leaders that walk their beliefs back
11:39and morph in order to please their followers.
11:43It's the other way around.
11:44QAnon, I think, is a destructive cult, but it's a really strange one
11:49in that the leader is anonymous.
11:51We really don't know who does the Q drops.
11:54QAnon believers, I think, by the way they're embedded online,
11:58are very much in line with cult followers.
12:02At zbzebs asks,
12:04Is Scientology a cult? I don't get it.
12:07In my opinion, Scientology fits the profile of a destructive cult.
12:12I think the brilliance of L. Ron Hubbard was to create this machine
12:17filled with redundancies of control.
12:19There's training and then there's supervision of that training,
12:23information gathered on people.
12:25And it's very difficult for people to navigate their way out
12:29as some celebrities have, like Leah Remini or Lisa Marie Presley.
12:34One of the things that Scientologists believe
12:38is that there are people called SPs, suppressive persons.
12:41Those are people that are trying to suppress
12:45your road to success.
12:47If someone is an SP in your life, you may be asked to disconnect from them.
12:52And this is Scientology's way of controlling social interaction
12:56by declaring people SPs, by also saying,
13:00Well, this person is a potential trouble source, a PTS.
13:04Hubbard really established a model that would be copied by many people
13:10that have been called cult leaders
13:12to perpetuate their own control over their respective groups.
13:17At Best of Luck Kesha asks,
13:18I really want to know what makes America so unusually susceptible to cults.
13:23Well, nothing really.
13:24I mean, cults are a global phenomenon.
13:26They're in Asia, they're in the Middle East, they're in Europe.
13:29But I think what makes the United States unique
13:32is the protection that we afford groups that claim to be a religion.
13:37We in the United States have the First Amendment to protect religion
13:41and groups called cults have used that protection in a way that benefits them.
13:46You get 501c3 tax exempt status.
13:49What groups understand is that if I set up shop in the US,
13:53I can make money and have very little accountability.
13:57It's been reported that L. Ron Hubbard once said,
14:00If you really want to make money, start a religion.
14:03At any rate, Scientology didn't start out as a religion but became one.
14:07At Mankatten asks,
14:09What is the craziest cult you've ever learned about, famous or not?
14:12This guy, Marshall Applewhite,
14:15his students were discipled by him to believe that he was essentially
14:20the reincarnation of an extraterrestrial being
14:23that would take his people to a kingdom beyond this world.
14:28And they were sequestered, held within a mansion in Southern California
14:33where he controlled their every move.
14:35What they wore, their haircuts.
14:37He himself castrated himself and encouraged other members to do the same.
14:43And a number of the male members were castrated.
14:45Marshall Applewhite told his followers that the end of the world was coming
14:49and that they had to prepare for it.
14:51But what really probably caused the end was the death of his beloved Bonnie Nettles.
14:57When she died, he felt that he had nothing left to live for.
15:01Ultimately, they all died together at his orders.
15:05There were 39 bodies found in shrouds in this house, dead.
15:10At Andrea Waves asks,
15:12A friend has a loved one in a cult and we are at a loss for how to help this person
15:16and there aren't super clear steps.
15:18Have you helped someone leave a cult?
15:20Do you have advice?
15:22I've done over 500 interventions to get people out of destructive cults.
15:27First of all, in responding to someone who's involved,
15:30don't be critical.
15:31Don't have arguments with them.
15:33Don't say, oh, you're in a cult.
15:35Because the group may coach them to cut off communication with you if you do that.
15:41So instead, be a good listener and also keep your lines of communication going.
15:47Let them know that you care about them.
15:49Now, an intervention may be the way you go eventually.
15:53But initially, it's important to find out more about the group,
15:56the leader, and what's actually going on.
15:59At CallMeD asks,
16:01So how does cult deprogramming work?
16:03Can we get started now?
16:05A deprogramming begins as a surprise.
16:08Someone comes to visit with their family.
16:10There's some type of get-together.
16:12In the beginning, the person may be rather upset about that.
16:15Why did you not tell me this was coming?
16:18Well, the reason is because then you would share that with other people in the group
16:22and they very likely would keep you from participating.
16:26You're asking them to unplug from the group during that period of time,
16:30which means all electronic devices, all access to the internet, no texting with other members.
16:37There are four blocks of conversation in a cult deprogramming intervention.
16:42The first one is defining what is a destructive cult
16:46and looking historically back to, say, terrible cult tragedies in which people died.
16:52And then saying, what do all of these groups share and have in common?
16:56And how would that parallel the group that you're in?
17:00Second, what is coercive persuasion?
17:02What is thought reform?
17:04And how do those steps parallel again to what you're experiencing in the group that you now belong?
17:11And then number three, what has the group hidden from you?
17:16Is there information that the group doesn't share readily
17:19that you should know to make a more informed decision about continuing in that group?
17:24And so then I present research that I've gathered about the group's history,
17:30its finances, lawsuits for personal injuries, criminal complaints, etc.
17:36At the end of a cult intervention, which could last three to four days,
17:41the person who is the focus of the intervention will make their choice
17:45to continue with the group, not to continue with the group, to take a break.
17:49That's up to them.
17:51About 70% of the people I work with will decide to take a break or leave the group completely.
17:56At Eccles Park says somewhere in some random Airbnb,
18:01some cult is about to do some weird sh** today.
18:04Welcome to the world online that cults often populate.
18:08There is an example of a cult leader using an Airbnb to create a cult compound.
18:13Allegio Bishop had a group called Carbon Nation.
18:17He had 35,000 followers on Twitter, X alone.
18:20He also was on Facebook.
18:22He would create compounds by booking Airbnbs online and then reel people in.
18:28These would be located in relatively isolated places in Panama, Costa Rica, Mexico.
18:34Eventually, he would be prosecuted in the United States for rape and unlawful imprisonment.
18:40And he's now serving a life sentence without parole in Georgia.
18:44At 606hey asks,
18:46Now, how did Mother God even accumulate followers?
18:50Like other cults seem at least somewhat convincing.
18:53When Mother God, who I knew as Amy Carlson, died,
18:56she had hundreds of thousands of dollars in cash
18:59and probably over a million dollars in real estate holdings.
19:02How did she do it?
19:04The internet.
19:05She had followers online through social media.
19:09She would stream online, which would garner attention.
19:12And then she had a small group that was devoted to her that lived with her.
19:17It was the inner circle that really was being abused, not the people that were online.
19:24They were, if you will, the cash flow that provided her with money
19:29in which she could buy property and finance her group.
19:32How could they believe what Amy Carlson said?
19:36Because they were isolated.
19:38They were cut off from the outside world, the immediate followers.
19:41Amy Carlson, Mother God said that she was in a previous life,
19:45Marilyn Monroe and other famous people.
19:48She claimed to be God literally on Earth.
19:51And that's why her followers called her Mother God.
19:54At VaporwaveDad asks,
19:57When will we talk about how astrology can sometimes be a gateway
20:01to either knowingly or unknowingly joining a cult?
20:04Some groups do use astrology.
20:06For example, the Kabbalah Center.
20:08They will do astrological charts in an effort to influence people
20:12in how they view the world and what they do in the future.
20:15And they will base that chart on what they know about the individual,
20:19which will make the person feel that,
20:21well, it must be something cosmic because how did they know that?
20:25But in reality, they know your secrets through their process of
20:29recruitment, indoctrination, and examination.
20:34Astrology is an interesting art.
20:37Read all of the zodiac signs, what they say about Sagittarius, Capricorn,
20:43and ask yourself, does that apply to me?
20:46You might conclude that they all apply to you.
20:48The person writing the astrological chart is writing cleverly,
20:53generalizing and writing something that would apply to anyone
20:57to convince people that it has validity.
20:59But when cults use astrology, they use it as a mechanism of control
21:04to persuade people that this is how they should behave in the future
21:09and that this is their destiny.
21:11Mitchipoo wants to know,
21:13I'm sorry, but how the f**k are you falling for MLM schemes
21:17and accidentally joining cults in 2024?
21:20Like what?
21:20Well, Mitchipoo, people don't join cults.
21:24They join movements, groups that they think are very good.
21:27And MLMs are pitching themselves as a way to become successful,
21:32to provide for your family.
21:34An example of an MLM is Amway,
21:37basically a scheme to recruit people in who will buy product,
21:41pay money to the person above them, and it keeps going on and on.
21:46And what MLMs have in common with destructive cults,
21:49though I don't consider them cults per se,
21:52is that they rely on coercive persuasion and identifiable influence techniques
21:57to gain undue influence over participants to take advantage of them.
22:02In this case, to make money off of them.
22:04The dream is the scheme.
22:06It's not about the business.
22:08It's about recruiting people who recruit people who recruit people.
22:13The people at the top are the ones that really make out.
22:17At Epcol asks,
22:18Do you think people who are susceptible to being in a cult
22:21have different brain structure?
22:23Or is it a lack of questioning attitude?
22:25Gee Epcol, you're being really harsh.
22:27In reality, it could be anyone.
22:29What we are dealing with are predatory groups who target people
22:33and pull them in without their consent or their knowledge.
22:37Because frequently it's a bait and switch con
22:40where what you think you're getting into is not what it's about at all.
22:44Eric Hoffer wrote The True Believer,
22:46and he said basically,
22:47If you're happy, you're not up for change.
22:50But if you're unhappy, you are.
22:52When we're in distress, we overlook things.
22:55We're looking for a way to get out.
22:58I have deprogrammed five medical doctors.
23:01One was a orthopedic surgeon, another an anesthesiologist.
23:06They were highly educated, very knowledgeable, intelligent people.
23:10And yet they got caught in a destructive cult.
23:13At Mile by Mile asks,
23:15Do cults have to end in violence?
23:18No, most cults don't end in violence.
23:21In fact, it's only a very small minority of groups
23:24that become violent and have a tragic end.
23:28In most cases, the leader just keeps making money,
23:31benefiting from low-cost labor,
23:33donations from people in the group,
23:36and exploiting the members.
23:37Cults vary by degree in their destructiveness.
23:40But sadly, the ones that we read about,
23:42that we see in documentaries,
23:44are some of the worst and some of the most violent.
23:47At Alex G1 asks,
23:49Can you explain NXIVM in a tweet, please?
23:53I don't know about a tweet, but here we go.
23:55NXIVM was a self-help company that sold courses,
24:00retreats that would take a week, two weeks,
24:03in which you were supposedly being trained
24:05to become a more successful, aware person.
24:09Led by Keith Ranieri, a former Amway distributor,
24:13NXIVM devolved into a stable for Keith Ranieri
24:18to exploit women.
24:19And he created a cult within the cult that he called DOS.
24:23Women were branded, literally, with a cauterizing iron
24:27to denote that they were sex slaves.
24:30Ranieri would go to trial,
24:31and now he's serving what amounts
24:33to a life sentence in prison.
24:35I would meet him in court-ordered mediation hearings,
24:38and I can tell you that he was a strange little man.
24:42He looked like a garden dwarf.
24:45Quite frankly, he stank.
24:47I don't know if he ever took a shower,
24:49how often he took a shower,
24:51because when he walked into the courtroom,
24:53he had an aura, but it wasn't anything charismatic.
24:56It was just a bad aroma.
24:59What Ranieri possessed was a savant-like understanding
25:03of people's weaknesses and how to leverage them for control.
25:07And through his training programs,
25:09people would confess.
25:11They would divulge everything about themselves.
25:14But when cults solicit confession,
25:17typically what happens is they learn all your secrets,
25:21which they then can use as leverage
25:23to essentially force you to comply with whatever they want.
25:28And Ranieri was an expert at employing confession
25:33to control his flock,
25:35which at one point was thousands and thousands of people.
25:39At Miss Sally Jean asks,
25:41Just took Bikram Yoga for the first time
25:43and maybe I joined a cult.
25:45This man, Chaudhry, founded Bikram Yoga.
25:48This is an example of an organization
25:51that is not about religion.
25:52It's about exercise.
25:54But because it was controlled completely by Chaudhry,
25:58and because Chaudhry used coercive persuasion techniques
26:02to exploit women in the group that he sexually abused,
26:06it became known as a cult.
26:08At Z Sam asks,
26:10So I'm watching Escaping the Twin Flames universe.
26:13I'm fascinated by how easy it is to take advantage of people.
26:17Does loneliness make people as vulnerable as poverty?
26:20Well, the Twin Flames universe is a group led by a couple,
26:25and they say that they can find
26:27your true spiritual counterpart.
26:29They call that your Twin Flame.
26:31According to complaints from families,
26:33they manipulate and exploit the people that become involved.
26:37In some cases,
26:38members have actually changed their sex,
26:41thinking that it's the only way
26:43to find their true spiritual mate.
26:46It's been devastating to families,
26:49and it's been coercive.
26:50At Three Forms Our Power House asks,
26:53Who are the Moonies?
26:55The Moonies, as they have been called,
26:57are the followers of Reverend Sung Mong Moon,
27:00who died not long ago in his 90s.
27:03And he created a group called the Unification Church,
27:06which was nicknamed the Moonies,
27:08to reflect how he was its defining element
27:12and driving force.
27:13He claimed to be the Messiah,
27:14and that he alone could bring the world to peace.
27:18Reverend Moon became a very wealthy man.
27:21At one point,
27:21Reverend Moon had a media empire
27:23that included The Washington Times,
27:26United Press International.
27:27He controlled one third of the American fishing fleet,
27:30responsible for about 50% of the wholesale sushi market
27:34in large cities like Chicago and New York.
27:38The labor for those businesses
27:40was provided by dedicated members,
27:42followers of the Unification Church.
27:45They would even submit in their weddings to Reverend Moon.
27:48This is a picture of a mass wedding
27:50in which people that may not have even met each other
27:54are married by Reverend Moon.
27:56Here is a picture of Reverend Moon with his wife,
27:59who now is the titular head of the Unification Church,
28:03which is managed by his children.
28:05Atbenpo234 asks,
28:07Can people born into or raised in cults be deprogrammed?
28:11It's got to be so much harder, right?
28:13This can be done, but it's a difficult process.
28:17Children are dependent upon their parents
28:19to protect them and keep them safe.
28:21And when parents are themselves overwhelmed
28:24and controlled by a cult,
28:26who is there to protect these children?
28:28And there have been many cults
28:30that have horribly abused children.
28:32There is a man, Paul McKenzie,
28:33going through a criminal trial in Kenya.
28:36He is responsible for over 400 deaths.
28:39Almost 200 were children.
28:41He told his followers in the Good News International Church,
28:45the end was near and that they needed to pray and fast.
28:48And they fasted to death.
28:50Over 200 children were led to their deaths
28:54by this man, Jim Jones, in 1978.
28:57He ordered mass suicide by poisoning
29:00and almost 1,000 people died.
29:03There are groups that believe that faith healing
29:06is the only answer to illness
29:08and they prohibit their members
29:10from taking their children to a doctor.
29:12As we're talking about this,
29:14there are millions of people involved in destructive cults.
29:18And many of these people have children,
29:20they have families,
29:21and those children are subject to the whims of cult leaders.
29:24Atpoliticalant asks,
29:27Is involuntary deprogramming legal?
29:29It's only legal if it's a minor child
29:33under the direct supervision of a custodial parent or guardian.
29:37There have been involuntary deprogrammings with adults.
29:41I myself participated in facilitating such interventions.
29:45However, the last one I did was in 1990.
29:48In involuntary deprogramming with adults,
29:51in some extreme cases,
29:53people were picked up while they were fundraising
29:56or outside of the group
29:58and then they'd be brought to a safe house
30:00where the deprogramming would commence.
30:02It can be very daunting to many families
30:05who feel they have no other means of helping someone they love.
30:09But the courts have made it clear
30:11that this type of deprogramming cannot be done.
30:15So those are all the questions for today.
30:17If you're concerned about a group, be careful.
30:20Don't just believe what you're being told.
30:23And if you're a family that is concerned about someone in a cult,
30:27keep your communication open.
30:29Make sure that they know you're there for them
30:32and that you love them.
30:33Don't think that it can't happen to you.
30:36Use your critical thinking
30:37and your ability to research and protect yourself.
30:40Thanks for watching Cult Support.