Lessons on Leaving

Were you brainwashed?

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During a recent podcast interview, my friend and fellow survivor Lisa Kohn shared that while she was on tour to promote her memoir To the Moon and Back: A Childhood Under the Influence, she had the opportunity to be interviewed for a popular daytime talk show.

She said that before she went on stage the producer was doing a pre-interview and asked her ‘were you brainwashed?’

I was tempted to completely derail the conversation and delve into a treatise on what thought reform is, and why asking a survivor if they were brainwashed is a stigmatizing question - at best. But I refrained and decided to explore those issues in this episode instead.

Resourced mentioned:

  • Take Back Your Life: Recovering from Cults and Abusive Relationships bu Dr. Janja Lalich & Madeline Tobias. 
  • Pseudoscience and Minority Religions: An Evaluation of the Brainwashing Theories of Jean-Marie Abgrall by Dick Anthony.
  • Brainwashing and the Moonies by Geri-Ann Galanti, Ph.D.
  • Brainwashing: The Science of Thought Control by Kathleen Taylor Ph.D..
  • Thought Crime, an article on the Guardian by Kathleen Taylor Ph.D..
  • Terror, Love and Brainwashing: Attachment in Cults and Totalitarian Systems by Alexandra Stein, Ph.D..
  • Deception, Dependency, and Dread in the Conversion Process by Michael D. Langone, Ph.D..
  • Thought Reform and the Psychology of Totalism: A Study of "Brainwashing" in China by Dr. Robert J. Lifton.
  • A 1957 there was a symposium panel of experts at the New York Academy of Medicine to discuss the topic of mind control.
  • Psychotherapist Rosanne Henry’s website, https://www.cultrecover.com/.
  • Bad Moon Rising, by John Gorenfeld.
  • Moonwebs: Journey into the Mind of a Cult, by Josh Freed.
  • The Relational System of the Traumatizing Narcissist, by Daniel Shaw.
  • How Lifton’s Eight Criteria for Thought Reform applies to NXIVM’s Executive Success Programs, by Paul Martin, Ph.D..

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    Lessons on LeavingBy Jen Kiaba
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