There is an interesting article in the Volume 5, Number 3 (2006) of Cultic Studies Review (http://www.culticstudiesreview.org) and I wanted to share a few of the interesting points related to anti-social cult leaders. While application to a seasoned cult like the Watchtower may be more ambiguous than a one-leader organization, I would like to know your viewpoints as to how you may have noticed any of these tendencies among elders and other leaders within the Watchtower organization. It certainly applies to Rutherford for one! - Randy
Cult Leader Behaviors Within the Cult
When an antisocial or psychopath enters a cult, a power struggle may be initiated with existing leadership. The antisocial cult leader may cultivate a “cadre” of fellow travelers who will readily support the leader’s every action. The antisocial cult leader grooms people who will reflect his or her own core beliefs and desires. Such a leader might exhibit a superficial, glib manner that clashes with the more open and honest personality style of most “normals” in a cult. (In contrast to cult leaders, “normals” are usually more characterized by genuine, open communication and a desire for growing relational depth with others not based on merely ulterior motives). Normals who enter a cult may find to their dismay that they either must leave the cult (and it is estimated that about 10% of cult members do leave very soon after they join) or accept the leadership style of the cult leader.
After the cult leader consolidates his authority by means of manipulative tactics, anything may happen. One ex-cult member related that the requested surrender to the cult leader and the cult’s ideology and practices was accompanied by demands for ‘submission’ to the leader. Submission in a cult may be accompanied by loss of autonomy in areas of life previously under personal control, such as the ability to visit family and friends ‘outside’ the cult, the loss of personal freedom of movement, and the requirement of daily disciplines such as incessant chanting, fasting, or doing tedious religious ‘exercises’.
Identification with the Aggressor
As part of a personal survival strategy cult, new members may end up “identifying with the aggressor” (a condition first noticed by the psychotherapist Anna Freud among World War II concentration-camp survivors). This identification with the aggressor causes the affected individual to “team up” with the cult leader in order to survive, and also to take on some of the aggressive personality characteristics of the cult leader.
According to Dutton (1998, p. 140), a severe trauma experience is sufficient to cause some normals to begin identifying with the aggressor. If a cult member begins identifying with the aggressor, that person has, in effect, become psychologically conditioned to function like a “personality extension” of the cult leader. Historically, it is known that antisocials such as the Nazi leader Goering during World War II influenced their subordinates to engage in antisocial behaviors toward weak and vulnerable war prisoners. When a cult member identifies with the aggression of the cult leader and becomes like a personal extension of the leader, the influence of the leader is greatly extended. New persons entering the cult may then be subjected to a concentrated, combined, malignant social influence that emanates from the teaming up of the antisocial followers with the cult leader. The resulting group social influence aids the cult leader in controlling and quickly breaking down the new cult members into social acquiescence and ultimately behavioral dependence.
Why Cult Leaders Act As They Do
When ASPD [Anti-Social Personality Disorder] is observed, it has been found to be a stable personality organization that is ego-syntonic—that is, it does not cause internal conflict within the ego. This means that cult leaders who are antisocial do not feel distress or feel like they need to change their ways or voluntarily enter treatment. In actuality, antisocial cult leaders are thought to have a self-opinion somewhat like the following: “Nothing is wrong in my world; I am in control of my surroundings, and I like the way things are.” Samenow (Public Seminar, Colorado Springs, 2002), after spending thousands of hours interviewing antisocial personalities in prison, characterized the antisocial personality as constantly seeking to avoid a “zero state” of feeling low, powerless, and down. According to Samenow, persons with ASPD tend to actively avoid this emotional “zero state” by manipulating and controlling others to gain what they want and thus keep their mood up, even if the resulting actions involve severely violating the rights or persons of others.
Viewed from this perspective, it is reasonable to assume that cult leaders understand what they are doing when they encourage group members to use techniques such as “love bombing,” or concentrated, focused “attention” when it is time to recruit new members. After the new cult member attaches to the group, other emotional and psychological tactics may also be brought into play to complete the breaking down of any remaining resistance to the will of the leader. (Note: When this process of breaking down the will of the cult member is in process, it may be explained to the new cult member as being necessary, with an explanations such as “it is necessary to purge any remaining worldly influence or compromise with the world that is still left from your previous contact with the world.” One way the new cult member is “softened up” is not to be allowed any further contact with family, friends, or mental-health professionals or religious leaders.)
The power and control of the cult leader within the group and over the new member’s personal life is further extended by “drying up” emotional “safe havens” within the cult for the new member. This can be accomplished by means of loyalty checks. The new member thus finds the group tone militates against resisting cult demands, whether reasonable or unreasonable. To enforce the cult leader’s wishes, the new member maintains a constant stance of internal discipline.
Historically, accounts of emotional and psychological manipulation by cult-like individuals(s) have been reported as early as the First Century A.D. For example, the Christian writer Paul writes in a public letter to the church in the city of Corinth warns about so-called religious leaders who “strike in the face,” “oppress and exploit,” and “take persons to themselves” (Delling, 1965, p. 5). In contrast to this kind of treatment, the apostle Paul states to the Corinthian church members, “Nevertheless, we have not used this power” (I Cor. 9:12b, 1975, The Greek New Testament).
Control over the person can also be gained by forced public confession of “wrongdoing” or “wrong thinking,” which also represents an egregious invasion of privacy. Additionally, required affirmations of loyalty to the cult leader and the professed “doctrine” of the cult, as well as verbal and/or physical “disciplining” (which actually may be verbal and physical abuse), may be practiced. However, at the point that physical or sexual abuse occurs, some cult members leave. Additionally, Martin et al. (1992) found that ex-cult members whom they treated had developed clinical levels of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) symptoms, dependent personality disorder, depressiveness, and clinical levels of anxiety as measured by the MCMI-I personality assessment.
Ideologies and Cult Leaders
Contemporary religious and philosophical ideologies should not be considered as somehow providing support for or legitimizing the antisocial, illegal behaviors of cult leaders. Instead, it is the active, antisocial personalities of these cult leaders that particularize the culture of the cult. By way of contrast, the many independent Christian house churches in the United States do not usually lead to the formation of cults. Rather, cults more likely derive their particular individualistic character under the active leadership of a religious antisocial such as David “Moses” Berg of the Children of God (observed by the author in the late 1970s in Huntington Beach, California).
The aggressivity of the cult leader David Berg was observed to the author during Berg’s public meetings and serves as a personally observed case study. These meetings could be better characterized as occasions by an angry Berg for an unwarranted and vociferous condemnation of the gathered audiences. Upon hearing Berg’s loud and strident voice coming from inside a Huntington Beach storefront, curious passersby who entered the ongoing “worship service” were verbally accosted by Berg as he depicted a terrifying and personal wrathful God toward sinful man, delivered with an almost out-of-control hysterical fervor. The zealous nature of the presentation resulted in a powerful emotional experience for the audience.
The individual responses of those acquiescing children and adolescents who on-the-spot “made their peace with God” after hearing Berg’s angry depiction of God’s wrath, doom, and punishment are perhaps best explained as being like the actions of persons who receive communion from an unholy, abusive priest: The sacrament is not tainted by the venality of the priest. Unfortunately, some of those trusting young people who subsequently joined Berg’s Children of God movement to be saved by the prophet Berg ended up being sexually molested by Mr. Berg according to ex-member reports that were widely published in the national news media.
Thus, in contrast to noncultic ethical religious leaders, antisocial cult leaders can be distinguished by their mistreatment and abuse of their followers. Instead of acting with responsibility toward persons who genuinely seek to personally commit themselves to a cause, antisocial cult leaders engage in manipulation, domination, and exploitation for their own ends. These antisocial leaders seem to have a seemingly inexhaustible flow of an evil and self-serving impulse to control, abuse, dominate, and take advantage of unsuspecting cult followers.
So what do you think? Any examples of this you have seen in your own experience?