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Sydney Herlihy
Inquiry Research Paper
Mrs.Funk 23
4/18/14
Cult Leaders Using Brainwashing
Cults are mostly religious groups in which people come together and bond over the
similarities that they share usually leading to the act of brainwashing and mind control. Although
it seems that you have the choice of religious decisions, many cult leaders have used
brainwashing to get control of people and getting in to their minds.
The Beginning
The feeling of being incomplete is a feeling like none other. When feeling empty, people
try to look for others that can fill the void. Cult leaders find people of which they can take
advantage . As read in the article Questions of Cults, the cult leaders do different things to
find people they can manipulate, like getting involved in depression chat rooms and recovery
groups. The people in these chat groups for depression are weaker than usual and lonely. Once
they find you, they do not leave you alone. They will meet you places, find you after school or
work. Want to talk to you and find out more information. They do whatever they can to get you
to get involved in whatever they say they are doing. They seem like they are just caring and
want to do they best for you, but in reality they want to capture you in their plans. According to
the Help Guide Depression is much more than the sad feeling inside, It is where your moods
go from normal to feeling dark and your everyday struggles become just a little bit harder than
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usual. The feeling of hopelessness and helplessness in the pit of your heart. There is so much
more to depression and all of the symptoms add up to make you weaker and more vulnerable.
Cult leaders know this because they have once, or may still have depression or other types of
mental issues.
I Am Bad
Because the victims are weaker and more vulnerable the leaders try and tell them that
they are bad. They attack the victims and tell them that they are not who they think they are filled
with sin. They do not want them to think that they are getting pulled under. According to Cult
Watch, the leaders do not want them to know what they are getting into beforehand, so they
hide the truth and wait until they feel they are ready for it. They say that they are full of hate and
evil making them want to get involved in whatever means necessary to get out of the sinful ways.
They claim to have direct contact with God and that they are there to help make them a better,
less evil person. They make them believe that they are evil and have themselves believe that they
are bad. They say they can help them and try and confuse them by showing small gestures of
care and love. The victim is so confused and their guilt is pretty much gone, not knowing why
they are wrong, but just knowing that they are wrong.
Start of Control
This is the start of total control. They have their followers at thier weakest point of
vulnerability. They are already telling themselves that they are bad and everything that they are
thinking on thier own is not right. As read on the website Cult Watch, cult leaders want them
to believe that everything they are saying is better than what the victims have to say. Whatever
comes out of their mouth is wrong. They tell them the correct thing and will defend their
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answers as best they can. They try and go on about their correct answer and sometimes to do that
they will go on about things you do not know and confuse you into accepting what they have to
say. Trust is appearing.
Trust
They begin to trust thier leader not doubting anything they say. It would be hard not to
when everything they tell them they have a good explanation for it. They have the outstanding
ability to win over their followers. In the article Cult Leaders, they say how leaders becom like
the followers bestfriend and tell them that they do not need anybody else. Often, leaders tell
them that they need to stay away from all family and friends because they will ruin them and try
to suck them back under, to the way they used to be. Evil and a sinner. Since they have trust in
thier leader they believe them and trust that they are telling them what they feel is best they will
do what they say. Blocking out everyone in the real world, meaning thier mom, dad, siblings and
friends. Their only friends are the people, in what they think is a religious group of buddies that
will always have thier back. They will begin to trust and believe in them so much that they will
do literally whatever their leader says to do. Some cults get out of hand and do some pretty bad
things, from stealing to murdering others from the will of their leaders. There have been many
records of religious cults, but one worldwide known cult is the Manson family cult.
Manson Cult
The Manson cult is based off the faith group Church of God, Family of Love and The Family.
This group consists of more than 100 followers and was run by a man named
Charles Manson. He was known as both God and Satan. It was a doomsday cult that he
made based on himself that was assembled by The Family. He told people that he was
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reincarnated, and was the reincarnation of Jesus Christ. He told people so many lies about
himself to get others to follow him. He made himself out to be a wonderful person that cared
about others and the environment. In the article Possible Motives for Murder, it says that
Charles Manson was known to be very hostile to the society and that he wanted to seek revenge.
He wanted to seek revenge on anything that stopped him from doing exactly what he wanted,
like a time when he got rejected by a show business that he wanted to be in.
Family Actions
The Manson Family made many criminal acts. Charles Manson never actually committed
a firsthand crime. What he did was he used the tactics of brainwashing and was able to tell his
followers exactly what he wanted them to do. In the magazine Most Famous Lady Killers, it talks
about the Manson Sisters. There were three girls that were completely and utterly devoted to
their leader. Charles Manson told them to go into this Los Angeles house and kill every single
person as gruesome as they could. In this house were three people. The house was owned by a
famous actress Sharon Tate and was eight and a half months pregnant. She, her husband and her
stylist were killed by gunshots and were repeatedly stabbed. This is now know as the Tate
Homicides.
Marked
Charles Manson and his family had a swastika marking on their foreheads. It first started
with just himself. He shaved his head and engraved the symbol inbetween his eyebrows. Once he
did that, all of his followers did the same. He is now married to a woman named Starr, she is a
hard core follower and is also bald. She claims to be in love with him, only meeting him in the
cells of a prison.
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All in One
Cult leadership is based mostly on the brain washing tool of its followers. It first starts
with the getting to know the victim and finding people who are vulnerable and weak, then the
leaders tell them that they are evil, they get their trust and start to completely take over their
mind. It results in the victims becoming totally obsessed to their group. They become totally
detached from the world and the only thing that they are worried about is the people they trust.
The cult leaders brainwash them into doing whatever they want their followers to do.
Brainwashing has become a frequent tool used by many cult leaders to get others to follow them.
Their religious freedom is getting ripped away from them one step at a time and they are not
even aware of what is happening to their lives.