Online Conspiracies and Virtual Cults

[Archival audio collage, news coverage of cults and conspiracy theories]

Robert Pease (host)

Sure seems like we live in pretty ripe times for cults and conspiracy theories. This is the Purple Principle, a podcast about the perils of polarization. I’m Robert Pease. 

Emily Crocetti (host)  

And I’m Emily Crocetti. How does misinformation swirl up into a conspiracy theory? And how does a conspiracy theory develop even further into a blindly devoted cult?  

Robert Pease (host) 

Are there more of these movements today in our digital and polarized society, or just more talk about anything sensational? A lot of questions in this episode and three informed guests to help us understand conspiratorial thinking and cult participation. 

Emily Crocetti (host) 

Dr. Steven Hassan is an experienced cult therapist who speaks and writes from personal experience – maybe a little too much personal experience. The author of the 2019 book, The Cult of Trump, Dr. Hassan was enticed into the Unification Church decades ago at the tender age of 19. 

Dr. Steven Hassan  

And my girlfriend dumped me and I was sitting in the cafeteria, and three attractive women smiled and asked if they could sit at my table. And they said they were students, they were dressed like students, and they were basically lying to me. I even asked, “are you part of some religious group?” “Oh, no, we’re just a group of students trying to make the world a better place.” 

Robert Pease (host)   

University of Southern California Professor Doni Whitsett has made the study of cults her life’s work, dating back to another ripe era for cult appeal, the 1970s, when Scientology, The People’s Temple, and the Unification Church attracted big followings.

Dr. Doni Whitsett 

The traditional cults in many ways are set up for people to better themselves. But the internet cults, they give explanations. I would say that’s the difference. They’re giving people explanations for why things are happening. What they do is they put together seemingly disparate events and tie them up nicely in a little package to explain things.

Emily Crocetti (host) 

And Rachel Bernstein is a behavioral therapist specializing in cult deprogramming and also the host of the long running podcast IndoctriNation.

Rachel Bernstein

I think cults do still occupy a physical space and it’s just in the brain. Many people are getting into very controlling organizations, just having never met the people in person. So I think the distance actually can create more of a bond, because you fill in the blanks with what you want to be true about the group, and what you want to be true about the people you’re talking to. 

Robert Pease (host) 

Bit of a scary observation there – that cults don’t need physical proximity to recruit and retain a large and loyal following.

Emily Crocetti (host) 

And that makes it difficult to distinguish between a viral conspiracy theory online and a full-fledged traditional cult, on- and offline. So we asked Rachel Bernstein about that distinction, and also the appeal of the more recent online movements, like QAnon.

Rachel Bernstein

There are a number of people who believe in conspiracy theories, and there are a lot of people who are prepping for the end times and building their underground bunkers and believing in the lizard people, etc, etc. What I think is important is that for some people, they believe that by buying their generators and their beans that they can use to grow things after the nuclear war happens or the storm comes, that they are doing it for themselves. It makes them feel protected. It also might make them feel a little superior because they feel like they found the answer. And you have instead people who say, I want to be a part of something, I need to connect with other people who feel the same way. I want to go to marches. I need to know that we’re all speaking the same language. Those are the people who join cults. Those are the people who need to be surrounded by it. So it becomes their entire life and their whole social circle.

Robert Pease (host)

Well, we do want to ask a few questions about QAnon. It’s very puzzling to us. And it seems to us that it doesn’t really have a normal type of cult leadership, that it’s a little bit of a headless horseman.

Rachel Bernstein

You know, this headless horseman idea is really fascinating because even when people get involved in cultic groups where they know the leader, they don’t actually really know the leader. They know how the leader represents himself or herself, they know sort of the narcissistic outward persona. And so it’s not usually until they’re very involved and they see things from behind the scenes that they really get to know who the leader is and what the leader is really like. So I think there are a lot of headless horsemen. What’s also interesting about QAnon is that the messages have come out in these kinds of puzzles and riddles. And it’s created a scenario where people lean in to decipher and they feel really proud of themselves that they’ve deciphered it the right way, whatever that means, because you only know if it’s the right way if the leader confirms it’s the right way. But people will pour over this like it’s the Dead Sea scrolls and give it that kind of importance.

Robert Pease (host)

So let’s talk about what else might make people more susceptible to these kinds of appeals. One of our previous guests said it wasn’t a coincidence that extremism arose in areas of economic decline that had possibly been hit hard by the opioid epidemic. Does that make sense to you?

Rachel Bernstein

There are preconditions. I’m sure the opioid epidemic plays a big role. I know that what also has affected people is feeling disenfranchised and feeling disconnected. And so much of what I hear about from people is that they care about the issue as an issue. And then from other people in equal measure that they liked the connection and that they stayed involved in an organization, even beyond the point where they started seeing that it wasn’t quite making sense. And I think for many people, the connection was the first priority and the beliefs or the theology or the political leanings were secondary.

Robert Pease (host) 

So, Emily, I have to confess, it’s a personal relief for me there’s nothing unhealthy about my setting up a ping pong table in my end-times bunker. 

Emily Crocetti (host) 

Maybe. But let’s fold that table up for a moment and emphasize a couple of important points. First, that people can engage separately and individually in conspiratorial thinking, but cults satisfy a larger social need. 

Robert Pease (host) 

And second, that QAnon draws people in like many popular online games with clues and twists and that feeling of progress and discovery.  

Emily Crocetti (host) 

And that seems like a new thing. But Professor Doni Whitsett of USC has thoroughly researched the history of cults. So we asked whether she’s surprised that cult-like groups are forming online without a physically isolated compound.

Dr. Doni Whitsett 

Well, I would say it’s not really surprising, but it certainly is new, and you’re right that in the old days, you know, the original cults, I would say of modern day – because there’ve been cults, you know, forever – but the cults that you’re referring to, the Moonies, the Children of God, all of those, they would take people, they would invite them to a dinner in the mountains somewhere. So it’s not surprising. Because certainly in this age of isolation, people are looking for connection. I think the bonds actually can be just as strong because one of the main things that attracts people is the sense of community of like-minded people and giving people a sense of purpose.

Robert Pease (host)

So, again, thinking back a ways to the sixties and seventies, it seemed like there were a lot of, kind of anti-establishment cults, communes. There were different names, sometimes ashrams. Whereas today, we see cults that are anti-government, anti-expertise. What are the similarities or differences? 

Dr. Doni Whitsett 

Well, first I’d like to correct something a little bit. We still have those other cults. They’re just not as much in the news, sensationalized. But you know, as a therapist, I’m getting a lot of clients who have come out of Bible-based groups, yoga groups, new age groups. So, the sexy ones now, if you will, are the political cults. So let me say that I think all cults meet a need and people are vulnerable in some way. 

Robert Pease (host)

Listening to some of your lectures, which may have been more about traditional cults, rather than online cults, it seemed that joining those cults, their recruitment process was very incremental. You have a little bit of a humorous observation that no one comes up to you and says, “do you want to give away all your money and time and sever ties with your family and join a cult?” That’s not a really great sales pitch. But QAnon is not very subtle. I mean, they come right at you with a pretty outlandish theory, and yet they’re able to recruit. How are they able to do that?

Dr. Doni Whitsett 

Well, that’s a good question. I do think that they appeal to certain personality qualities in people. And there has been some research looking at what are the possible predictors for someone to basically go down the rabbit hole. For example, people who are more fearful and anxious. Another explanation is that some of these people have what’s called a schizotypal personality disorder. It’s kind of like magical thinking, or they look at the world kind of in a different way, kind of at an angle, I sometimes say, and they’re interested in the paranormal. Another quality, a personality quality, quite honestly, is narcissism. Because people who have an exaggerated sense of their own importance or their sense of self-esteem, when in fact there isn’t much to base it on there, isn’t a lot of reality supporting that, they cannot stand it if they fail or if they don’t meet their goal. And quite honestly, we had an example of that with Trump, because he lost the election. And of course that can’t possibly be so, because he was so wonderful. And so he created an explanation for why he lost: it was a steal or the ballot boxes were stuffed or whatever it was.

Emily Crocetti (host) 

Oh, jeez…must we talk about Trump?

Robert Pease (host) 

I hear you, Emily. It’s been so nice not to have that polarizing force dominate all our news the past few months. But that is another of our questions. Have we as a nation just spent four years in cult territory headquartered from the White House? There’s no shortage of prominent Republicans who have expressed that fear.

[Archival audio collage, Republicans talking about the cult of Trump]

Emily Crocetti (host)

And if we have been in cult territory the past four years, are we in the clear now, or is there much more to come? We learned from Dr. Jay Van Bavel back in Season One that cults don’t wind down very easily, even after doomsday.

Jay Van Bavel

And there’s been a couple of studies where they have looked at what happens when certain cults predict the end of the world, and they’ve been able to study what happens the day that the prediction doesn’t come true. What you might expect is that cult members should update their beliefs. They should be like, “Oh my goodness, this cult was totally wrong. What was I thinking? I’ve got to rebuild my life and I’ve got to leave this cult.” But that’s not what happens. In fact, a couple of studies have found that if anything, the opposite happens. They immediately start to look for rationalizations. And so in that situation, they actually double down on this identity they have with this cult. 

Robert Pease (host)  

Dr. Steven Hassan is uniquely qualified to address these questions. Again, he was recruited by the Moonies out of his college cafeteria at age 19, then, ironically, saved by a car accident two years later that landed him in the hospital where his family could finally reach him.  

Emily Crocetti (host) 

And he has spent his entire professional life studying cult psychology and providing cult deprogramming to individuals and families. So we asked him, if doomsday cult members simply double down on their resolve after doomsday, how does any cult ever meet its doom? 

Dr. Steven Hassan 

There are a lot of cults whose leaders are dead and the cult continues. And there are cults where the leader is in jail and the cult continues. A lot of people leave, but there’s still some people indoctrinated. And we’re information beings. We really are. So if we’re in a media bubble where we’re only hearing propaganda and we’re told anything else is fake news, or the media is the enemy of the people, and we do what’s called thought stopping. It’s a cognitive behavioral technique where we shut off any doubt about Trump, the doctrine, the policy. You can be in a cult without the cult leader for a really long time.

Emily Crocetti (host)

Are there instances when the leader is there, but people leave at a mass rate and why would that happen or how does that happen?

Dr. Steven Hassan 

So it usually happens that a mass defection occurs when a top leader leaves and explains why they’re leaving. So for example, the Jehovah’s Witnesses have been around since the 1800s. They have some 8 million people in it. And I think it’s about 20 years ago, one of the governing body, Raymond Franz, left. And he said, I want to follow the Bible, and the Watchtower is not using the Bible. So I’m going to leave and follow Jesus instead of the Watchtower Doctrine. And a lot of people left, like a lot, because they liked him and respected him. But meeting former members who are happy and fulfilled is the thing that cult leaders fear the most. I also want to just say a bunch of people that I’ve talked to who are QAnon people were Bernie people. They were Democrats, they were liberals, they were Progressives. And they didn’t like Hillary Clinton. They bought into the disinformation and whatever and then they got recruited into QAnon. So I think the most important frame isn’t left or right anymore. I think the most important frame is authoritarianism versus democracy and pro-human rights.

Robert Pease (host)

We had Jay Van Bavel of NYU on an earlier episode. He’s a neuroscientist and he talked about dogmatism and how the extreme right is the most dogmatic, but the extreme left is pretty dogmatic too. 

Dr. Steven Hassan 

A hundred percent. So, I mean, what helped me get out of the Moonies was learning about Chinese Communist brainwashing techniques. So, again, the issue isn’t left or right. The issue is authoritarianism and whether or not people are encouraged to reality test and challenge authority.

Emily Crocetti (host) 

A great point there from Dr. Hassan. Factoring cult psychology into our politics, it’s not a simple question of who’s more left or right or center. It’s who’s more authoritarian versus who’s more democratic, open to criticism and new information. 

Robert Pease (host) 

But before we leave Dr. Hassan, let’s hear him respond to his own friends questioning the fact that he’s a cult deprogrammer, yet he goes to temple every week.

Dr. Steven Hassan 

You know, there are some people who tell me, Steve, you know so much about group dynamics, how can you belong to a Jewish Temple? And I say, because I like it. Well, how could you do this, there’s so many problems with Judaism? I go, yeah, but the people that I hang out with are non-dogmatic and we love to be there for each other. We enjoy the rituals. I like to study Torah. And I feel no guilt if I’m not showing up for services or whatever, I just enjoy being part of a group.

Emily Crocetti (host) 

That’s good to know. If you’re happily and voluntarily attending a belief-based group regularly, with no coercion, chances are you’re not getting sucked into a cult, and you won’t be.

Robert Pease (host) 

But a lot of us independents didn’t sign up for the cult like politics of the past few years. Let’s hear from Rachel Bernstein on the question what did we just experience, with so much of the nation obsessively engaged in either pro-Trump or, for that matter, anti-Trump passions? 

Rachel Bernstein

So I think when you are looking at any kind of an organization, whether it is a Bible-based organization or self-help group or government, the health of it is going to depend on the health of the leader. And so I find in a lot of unhealthy groups, you have what I call trickle-down narcissism. So we had this whole situation that was created around Trump to behave very much like a cult. And part of the reason that I thought that was because of my work, but also because once things started coming out in the news about the things that he was doing, I was getting a lot of calls from former cult members saying that their nerves were on edge because it was all too familiar. A former, actually he was second in command in a cult, he told me that’s how he felt when he was watching what was happening on the news. He could see this kind of hypnotic trance in people’s eyes. And also that facts don’t matter. You can only check out your “facts” with other people within that way of thinking. So you never get to make a fully educated decision. You never get to use your critical thinking. And also in cults, there’s black and white thinking. You’re either for us or you’re an enemy. And that was very much a part of this administration.

[Archival audio collage, Trump supporters]

Robert Pease (host)

We think most of our listeners are independent or unaffiliated voters who aren’t that comfortable with political parties. And it just seems like almost every political convention where a presidential candidate is nominated is kind of cult-like. People are kind of glassy-eyed and just cheering at absolutely anything that goes on. So how do we make the distinction between like normal political party allegiance and a cult-like following?

Rachel Bernstein

Right. It’s a good question because we get excited about the people we’re excited about. And we want something to be different about them and earth-changing about them. And within a healthy administration, while they have people who are very gung-ho and very committed to a particular party, they are still allowed to have a dissenting view. And they’re allowed to go to the person in charge and say, I don’t know how I feel about this. Or it’s okay for them to say, I agree with most of the things let’s say that Obama did, but I disagree with others and that’s okay. But within unhealthy administrations and regimes, that’s never okay. And if you do voice any kind of concern or a question or parse out what you agree with and what you don’t, you’re a traitor, and that’s the distinction for me.

[Archival audio collage, Trump demands loyalty]

Robert Pease (host)

So as you think back historically to the worship of the Kennedys and things like that, have you seen this kind of cult-like situation on the far left as well?

Rachel Bernstein

Yeah. I think the far-anything is going to be filled with people who are going to be fans, kind of no matter what. That’s become part of who they are. They don’t want to see things in a different way. I know with JFK, there was this whole idea, and I know it wasn’t a word they came up with, but it was somebody else who was doing some advertising for them coming up with this idea, of Camelot. There is this notion that there is this magical power around these people and they can do no wrong. And for a lot of people, that’s how they really see it. And for other people, that’s how they need to see it because that’s their wiring and that’s the way they need to see people, as ultimately perfect, in order to feel excited about them.

Robert Pease (host)

So it seems that at least in some cases, cults do eventually fade or lose followers. And Trump has lost an election. He was a historically unpopular president. And he’s been de-platformed. And it would seem like these things might add up to diminish his appeal over time, or is a cult following so fervent that none of those things really matter?

Rachel Bernstein

So, it’s both. So what happens when you have a cult leader who is dethroned, or arrested, you still have cults that are run by leaders from prison. And so what happens is you do have some people who leave, who wake up, where the spell is broken, and they can see that they were caught up in something where they weren’t quite seeing the truth along the way. And suddenly it just hits them squarely between the eyes and that’s it. And they’re done. And it’s very hard, because it’s a great sense of loss. They’re really disillusioned and they have kind of a dopamine crash and get despondent, but are happy to at least know the truth. Then you have the people who cling more deeply and with more fervor to the leader who they think has become a martyred figure, an unfairly crucified figure, someone who is now the victim of the people who they’re trying to fight against, the victim of the media or victim of liberal politics, or whatever else.

Robert Pease (host)

But as you’re watching the Trump Presidency, knowing all that you know about cult followings, was there anything that the opposing party, the Democrats, could have done to undermine his appeal? Or were there times you felt like, Oh, they’re playing right to his strengths?

Rachel Bernstein

So the way the Democrats were handling Trump was quite the opposite of the way you handle somebody who thinks of himself as above all other humans. The Democrats probably hadn’t dealt with this kind of personality disorder before and the power that it wields and holds over people. If you go head to head with someone, if you battle with them, they love it  And so a lot of Democrats, I think, thought that they were really shaming him and he was going to learn his lesson. Nope. So you have to work from behind the scenes to strip someone of their ability to make certain decisions or to be in charge of things. You can’t go head to head with them. You will lose, and you will look like crazy people trying and pulling your hair out, trying to make sense of things. And so I think when I noticed too that he was brought up on charges twice and nothing came of it, in those moments I was very worried. So were other former cult members. Because when you have someone who wants to get away with things and they’re brought up on charges and then they somehow don’t have consequences placed against them, it emboldens them. I thought, Oh no, it’s going to get worse. And it did. And there was no way for it not to because you’re creating more of a monster. You’re creating someone who feels infallible and it’s been proven that they can get away with anything. And so I think that it’s really unfortunate that the Democrats didn’t have someone guiding them, not just on political ideas, but how to deal with this kind of personality disorder.

Emily Crocetti (host)

When intervening in something like a political extremist cult versus maybe another type of cult, have you had experience with those two different things? Do you intervene in a different way, or is it kind of the same when it comes to trying to bring somebody back from their trance? 

Rachel Bernstein

I actually think it’s very similar. One of the things though that has been kind of a differentiation with the work that I’ve done, similar to people who have been radicalized, there’s a hostility and an aggression and an insulting nature and personally insulting nature that comes with talking to a lot of people who were avid Trump followers, people who are QAnon believers, people who got involved in Proud Boys and other movements where it was really pretty intense. When I talk to people who’ve gotten involved in cults, I can by and large have a conversation with them. But I have found that when I’m working with people who are involved in that, this kind of thinking that we’ve seen now, in this kind of vitriol, they can almost not tolerate even just having a conversation. I’ve even seen it on Zoom, where they’re sitting in a chair in front of the camera and then suddenly they’re up and they’re pacing and they’re mad and they get into the camera really close. And they’re just in this state of agitation. And that’s not typical, actually, for cult members. Cult members will sit and usually have a conversation with you, if you’re not attacking the group and you’re just wanting to talk. 

Robert Pease (host)

Well, that brings up the difficult question. How do we, with minimum damage or pain, get completely beyond the Trump era? We see a lot of reasonable Republicans leaving the party, you know, becoming independents and I’ve been an independent my whole life. Normally I would say, yes, we’d love to have more independents. But is it a good thing for the Republican party to become even more homogenous and extreme?

Rachel Bernstein

I think it’s frightening. I do think that there need to be moderate voices everywhere. And I want Republicans, just like Democrats and independents, to think about not only what is most in line with their ethical core and their political views, but what’s best for their party. And I think if you have voices of reason in your parties, then you have diplomacy, then you have sanity. Then you have a system that is the way it was set up to be where there can be discourse, even if there is disagreement. And so I am afraid of the people who are more reasonable, more open, more – as I see it – sort of fair-minded, leaving in droves because then you are left with the people who are more reactionary, who I think have more blind faith and who are less encumbered by the facts and that’s dangerous.  

[Archival audio collage, cults]

Robert Pease (host) 

That was Rachel Bernstein, host of IndoctriNation, a great resource to learn about cult psychology and how to protect oneself and loved ones from those risks. There’s more information at rachelbernsteintherapy.com.

Emily Crocetti (host) 

We also heard from cult therapist Dr. Steven Hassan. He’s the author of the 2019 book, The Cult of Trump. His blog about cult-related issues can be found at freedomofmind.com.

Robert Pease (host) 

And we visited with Professor Doni Whitsett, a Clinical Professor of Social Work at USC, who specializes in cultic studies and therapy. 

Emily Crocetti (host) 

We got some great insights from all of our guests, including the not-so-encouraging news that cults can linger on quite a long time even without their founders.

Robert Pease (host)  

But the behavioral health of the leader will say a lot about whether any social group, or political party, will take things in a cult-like direction. 

Emily Crocetti (host) 

Not all conspiracy theories rise to the highly social level of a cult. But, unfortunately, both are doing quite well in the digital age. Social isolation develops that emotional void.

Robert Pease (host) 

And filling that void online can quickly  spiral out of control. Next episode we’ll look at one such group – the remarkably large number of people who reject all available science and logic and loudly proclaim, the Earth is Flat. 

Emily Crocetti (host) 

We’ll be talking to documentary filmmakers Daniel Clark and Nick Andert. They spent a lot of time with some surprisingly engaging folks within the flat earth community. And the result was their highly insightful and entertaining documentary film, “Behind the Curve,” viewable on Netflix. 

Daniel Clark and Nick Andert

We told him that we were doing a documentary on the flat earth community and the movement itself. We never claimed to be flat earthers. And so we reached out to Mark and he said, if you’re willing to come up here, I’ll talk to you and give you the time on camera. And so we did that. And then when we finished with him, we knew we wanted to pursue it further. And he offered to introduce us to different people in the community. 

Robert Pease (host)

We hope you’ll join us for that episode and if you enjoy the show, please share our episodes with a friend. You can also subscribe to our newsletter, like us on Facebook, follow us on Twitter and Instagram, and leave us a review on Apple Podcasts. You’ll find all of these links in our show notes, and on our website, purpleprinciple.com. This has been Robert Pease and Emily Crocetti for the Purple Principle team: Alison Byrne, Producer; Kevin A. Kline, Senior Audio Engineer; Emily Holloway, Digital Operations & Outreach; Dom Scarlett, Research Associate. Our resident composer is Ryan Adair Rooney. The Purple Principle is a Fluent Knowledge production.Karen M. Douglas, Robbie M. Sutton, and Aleksandra Cichocka (2017). “The Psychology of Conspiracy Theories.”