Brainwashing

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Brainwashing

"Brainwashing" is a term with negative connotations, used to refer to the recruitment processes of disfavored religious and political groups. It represents one of the most effective social weapons adapted for use in efforts to exert social control over so-called New Religious Movements, sometimes referred to by the similarly negative term "cult."

The term was developed in the anti-Communist hysteria of the 1950s, first being used by Edward Hunter, a CIA operative paid to write propaganda about the Communist takeover in China. He developed the ideologically based term to describe the processes whereby ordinary Chinese citizens were allegedly converted to Communist beliefs. Others used the term to refer to methods used in Korean POW camps, especially after some POWs chose to remain in Korea rather than return home.

The ideological term became popularized and was a staple in the linguistic arsenal of the anti-Communists. Brainwashing then developed a life of its own, being used to refer to any questionable practices of recruitment and socialization. The term achieved fame and became a part of everyday lexicon when defenders of Patty Hearst attempted to use the brainwashing metaphor to explain why she had begun to cooperate with her captors in the Symbianese Liberation Front, going so far as to rob banks with them.

The term was ready-made when controversy erupted in the late 1960s and early 1970s over the development of many New Religious Movements in American society, such as the Unification Church and the Hare Krishna Movement. Those opposed to the groups, including many parents who were unsatisfied with the religious choices of their children, sought a simple explanation of why some of America's brightest and best would choose to abandon their normal career trajectories and families to follow a strange and new religion. Thus brainwashing became a popular explanation of such events: People were brainwashed and being held under mind control; they did not join of their own volition but were tricked into participating, according to the brainwashing perspective.

Such ideas rejected notions of free will or agency on the part of the joiner. The paternalism of designating decisions made by young people choosing to try out another ethic or belief system as resulting from brainwashing seems obvious, but it was often overshadowed by genuine concerns of parents for their children's well-being, even if those children were of age.

Thus many parents chose to intervene in their children's religious choices, giving rise to the new pseudo-profession of deprogramming. Deprogrammers kidnapped thousands of young people out of newer religions, subjecting them to considerable physical and psychological coercion in an effort to get them to leave their group of affiliation. This controversial process, which has been used less in recent years (mainly because of some adverse legal decisions), was based almost entirely on the idea that because of brainwashing the members had to be "rescued" by those wanting to "help them exercise their free will."

Originally the concept of brainwashing was based on the physical coercion allegedly used by the Chinese against Korean POWs and by the Communists in the 1950s who gained control of China. Supposedly the use of physical coercion not only could result in compliance, but could also, if skillfully done, turn the person into a robotlike entity programmed to follow orders at the exertion of certain stimuli. Films such as The Manchurian Candidate were based on this view of brainwashing. Such views have been soundly critiqued by scholars (e.g., Anthony 1990; Anthony and Robbins 1994; Barker, 1986; Richardson 1991, 1993).

This robot conception was not applicable in the circumstances of recruitment to new religions, since few examples of physical coercion could be found in such groups. However, enterprising legitimators of the anti-cult movement redefined brainwashing in a creative way. They developed the concept of "second-order brainwashing," which referred to the use of psychological coercion, including even positive emotion, in recruitment. This approach to recruitment, in which people were encouraged through positive emotion and affective ties to join a group, was deemed even more insidious and effective than the original physically coercive methods of the Communists. Thus the anti-cult movement attempted to redefine brainwashing, placing more emphasis on psychological coercion than on physical coercion.

Although brainwashing as an explanation for participation in new religions has fallen from favor in recent years among scholars and in the courts, the term is still quite popular in general parlance. A few scholars have made efforts to revive the term, but with little success among the scholarly community. Most scholars accept research results indicating that newer religions are actually very small (even if very well publicized) and have very high attrition rates. Both of these characteristics undercut any effort to support so-called brainwashing theories of recruitment.

Bibliography

Anthony, Dick. "Religious Movements and Brainwashing Litigation: Evaluating Key Testimony." In InGods We Trust, 2nd ed., edited by Tom Robbins and Dick Anthony. 1990.

Anthony, Dick, and Thomas Robbins. "Brainwashing and Totalitarian Influence." In Encyclopedia of Human Behavior, edited by V. S. Ramachandran. 1994.

Anthony, Dick, and Thomas Robbins. "Negligence, Coercion, and the Protection of Religious Belief." Journal of Church and State 37 (1995): 509–536.

Barker, Eileen. The Making of a Moonie: Choice or Brainwashing? 1986.

Richardson, James T. "Cult/Brainwashing Cases and the Freedom of Religion." Journal of Church andState 33 (1991): 55–74.

Richardson, James T. "A Social Psychological Critique of Brainwashing Claims About Recruitment to New Religions." In The Handbook of Cults and Sects inAmerica, edited by Jeffrey Hadden and David Bromley. 1993.

Richardson, James T., and Brock Kilbourne. "Classical and Contemporary Brainwashing Models: A Comparison and Critique." In The Brainwashing/Deprogramming Controversy, edited by David G. Bromley and James Richardson, pp. 29–45. 1983.

James T. Richardson

Contemporary American Religion