James T. Richardson and Massimo Introvigne

Date: 2015-10-07; view: 434.

Panics, and the Media

Countermovements, Moral

New Religious Movements,

The modern phenomenon of new religious movements (NRMs)

originated in the late 1960s and early 1970s mainly in the United

States, but then spread to other parts of the world, including especially

Western Europe. NRMs have generated considerable interest and

concern among members of the general public as well as among

societal leaders since their inception. Why these movements developed

at this time in modern Western societies has been the subject of

much speculation and research (Anthony and Robbins 1982; Bellah

1976; Tipton 1982; Wuthnow 1976).

NRMs were first greeted in the U.S. context as a welcome respite

from the throes of anti–Vietnam War demonstrations and other civil

disturbances and social movements. However, concern developed

rapidly as word spread of many young people's getting involved with

‘‘high-demand'' NRMs that were encouraging or even requiring

major changes in lifestyle and career plans. While the number of

young people joining NRMs was never large in proportional terms,

the numbers were large enough to attract the attention of public

officials and the media. Some parents of those joining the groups

were particularly concerned about their offspring giving up career

plans for a life devoted to the strange teachings of a little known

religious figure. Particularly noteworthy was the social origin of most

recruits, who tended to be from relatively well-educated and affluent

backgrounds. Why significant numbers of the best educated and

most affluent generation in American history turned to various new

forms of religion became a major question for many, as the societies

affected by NRMs grappled with the meaning of this unexpected

development of interest in religion among some of its youth.

Parents, siblings, and friends of many NRM recruits occupied social locations

within American society that facilitated drawing attention to the issues

raised by the development of NRMs. When parents became concerned at

news that their son or daughter had dropped out of college to join one of the

new NRM groups, they were socially well connected enough to garner attention

from media and societal leaders to their perceived problem. Contacts

with the media and political leaders followed, with predictable effects. The concerns

of parents resonated with the values of those in positions of societal

leadership, in part because of their similar social origins. Indeed, there are

anecdotes of children of societal leaders joining the NRMs, a development that

made real the grounds for the reactions expressed by some parents of NRM

participants.

As concern grew over NRMs, intense social responses to NRMs occurred

in the form of a countermovement, a hostile public reaction, and scathing media

coverage. Given the forcefulness of the responses to NRMs, it is impossible

to understand their organizational development without incorporating the

societal reactions to them. These responses offer clear illustrations of some

important concepts from the studies of social movements, deviance, and the

mass media. This chapter will focus on the concept of the countermovement,

from the social movements literature, and on the idea of moral panic, from

deviance studies, as key ways to understand the societal reactions to NRMs. We

will also examine the crucial role played by the media in countermovements and

moral panics.

Countermovements

Many social movements provoke countermovements led by those opposed to

the values and actions of the initial movement. NRMs are no exception to this

general rule. Indeed, NRMs rather quickly found themselves collectively and

individually doing battle with various organizations whose purpose was to

oppose specific NRMs or NRMs in general. These organizations, referred to

collectively as the anti-cult movement (ACM), were based on the assumption

that the majority of NRMs were destructive to individuals, families, and even

societies. The broad movement opposing NRMs, which has been referred to

as an ‘‘international social movement industry'' (Shupe and Bromley 1994a:

viii), has been studied by a few scholars (e.g., Shupe and Bromley 1980,

1994a), but not nearly as much as have the various movements that led to the

rise of the ACM. Shupe, Bromley, and Darnell (2004: 185) note that countermovements

such as the ACM derive their ‘‘organization purpose from the

existence of other movements.'' This symbiotic relationship is the most important

aspect of an explanation of countermovements such as the ACM.

As Massimo Introvigne (1993, 1995) notes, the ACM can usefully be subdivided

into two components that are significantly different in their approach

to NRMs. Introvigne refers to one major branch of the ACM as the countercult

movement (CCM), by which he means an ideologically oriented

92 orienting perspectives in teaching nrms

countermovement that focuses on the content of the beliefs of NRMs. CCM

groups, which are mainly made up of evangelical Protestant ministers and

laypeople, are concerned about NRMs' drawing young people away from the

‘‘true faith'' of evangelical Christianity. CCM participants assert that NRMs

represent false religions and that their heresy is grounds for opposing them.

Indeed, the strength of opposition from CCMs is sometimes formidable, deriving

as it does from a tendency for CCM participants to define NRMs as false

religions and even evil (see Cowan 2003). Introvigne (1995) observes that it is

problematic for CCM groups to promote ‘‘brainwashing''-based interpretations

of participation in NRMs, given that CCM groups are themselves often members

of conversionist-oriented religious groups, which are also subject to charges

of brainwashing.However, this problemhas sometimes been overcome, as CCM

and secular ACM participants work together for the common cause of opposing

NRMs. (See Shterin and Richardson 2002 for one example of such cooperation

in a major legal case in Russia.)

The other branch of the ACM represents itself as secular in its focus; it is

concerned with the actions taken by NRMs to recruit and maintain participants,

instead of group doctrines. Participants in this branch are often nonreligious

secular humanists or members of the mental health profession (or

both), although there is a smattering of other professionals, such as ministers

and rabbis, as well as members of the legal profession. The focus on behaviors

is used as a justification by the secular branch of the ACM for actions taken to

suppress participation in NRMs. The claim is that the behaviors used by

NRMs to recruit and keep members are misleading at best and coercive at

worst. ‘‘Deed, not creeds'' is the motto of this branch of the ACM, a mantra

used as a rationale for social-control efforts. The underpinning for this justification

is the ‘‘action versus belief'' distinction that permeates legal considerations

in the United States, where efforts are being made to suppress

groups claiming to be religious.

The organizational structure and ideological posture of both types of ACM

groups are worthy of examination. There are several types of participants in

ACMgroups, including those who have a relative or friend involved in an NRM,

those who claim that their professional expertise can assist with removing or

counseling those in NRMs, and those former members of NRMs who have

chosen to participate in an ACM group. There is sometimes an overlap in

categories, especially the latter two, as a number of ‘‘deprogrammers'' and

‘‘exit counselors'' (terms made part of the lexicon by the ACM) are former

members of NRMs themselves (i.e., Hassan 1988). There is also a significant

difference in the type of professional involved in the two segments of the

ACM, with mental health professionals and lawyers dominating the more

secular ACM organizations while pastors, usually of more evangelical orientation,

have leadership roles in CCM groups.

Each of the three major categories of participants in ACM groups plays an

important role in the group. The first group (those concerned about a friend

or family member in an NRM) furnishes the resources necessary for ACM

groups to function, as well as the primary reason for the groups to exist. The

nrms, countermovements, moral panics, and the media 93

second category (professional experts) furnishes legitimation for the group by

allowing the members' professional credentials to be used in furtherance of

the particular cause of the ACM group. Also, the professionals help develop

and promote an ideological position used to warrant the interventions called

for by the group. The latter category (former NRM members), although representing

a minuscule percentage of former NRM members, also helps with

legitimation and ideological justification by claiming first-hand experience

with the ‘‘evil cult'' from whence they somehow escaped (often through being

deprogrammed themselves (see Bromley 1998; Lewis 1986).

As Shupe and Bromley (1994b) note, there has been considerable organizational

evolution of the ACMs over the decades of their existence. Originally

ACM groups were local or at best regional informal groupings of people,

mostly parents of NRM members. However, eventually some national organizations

coalesced out of these early efforts, and more professional leadership

was attracted. The ACM organizations that survived became more professional

in their orientation and more sophisticated in their tactics (Shupe and

Bromley 1994b: 9–24). Although hampered in the United States by lack of

direct governmental support (unlike similar groups that developed in Europe;

see Richardson and Introvigne 2001), these self-help groups have managed to

impact popular perceptions and even public policy toward NRMs.

Development of a sound ideological basis for interventions has been

crucial to the success of ACM groups as they have evolved. Given the tradition

of a First Amendment guarantee of religious freedom in the United States,

coupled with the fact that most participants in NRMs are of legal age, considerable

effort has been required to develop a rationale that justifies the existence

of ACM groups, as well as their efforts to exert control over NRM groups

and individual members. The ideological basis that was promoted made use

of the brainwashing metaphor derived from the Korean War experience of a

few POWs staying in Korea after the war, as well as the experience referred to

as ‘‘thought reform'' by Robert Lifton in his study of resocialization techniques

used after the communist takeover in China (Lifton 1963).

The brainwashing idea was then popularized by coverage of the Patty

Hearst trial (Fort 1979; Richardson and Kilbourne 1983) and became available

as a culturally acceptable explanation of why otherwise intelligent and welleducated

young people would participate in strange religions. Although the

brainwashing concept had little basis in scientific fact (Anthony 1990; Anthony

and Robbins 2004; Richardson 1993a), it became a ready social weapon

to use against unpopular NRMs (Bromley and Richardson 1983; Richardson

1991). Efforts to employ the brainwashing metaphor against NRMs, especially

in legal cases, were initially quite successful (Richardson 1995). However,

eventually the lack of a scientific basis for use of the term in such a voluntaristic

context, as is usually the case with NRMs, was demonstrated to the

courts, and usage of the term declined (Anthony and Robbins 1995; Richardson

1993a). As Shupe and Bromley (1994b: 9–24) and Anthony (1990)

and Anthony and Robbins (2004) noted, ACM experts became more

94 orienting perspectives in teaching nrms

sophisticated over time in their claims about the process of recruitment and

retention in NRMs, and they shifted the jargon from simple brainwashing to

other mental health and medical terms that seemed more substantial and

defensible. Terms such as post-traumatic stress syndrome and dissociative states

came to be used as explanatory devices, as efforts were continued to define

participation as a mental health problem instead of a religious choice made by

legal adults (Richardson 1993b).

Thus participation in NRMs became ‘‘medicalized'' (Richardson and

Stewart 2004), which helped the ACM groups avoid First Amendment issues

in attacking NRMs in the United States. This ‘‘medical'' approach was also

used by ACM groups in other countries (Anthony and Robbins 2004; Richardson

1996), and it became the dominant method of exerting control over

NRMs during the last few decades. In the European context, the term mental

manipulation was the equivalent of the term brainwashing in the United States,

and was an approach promoted especially by European ACM groups and even

some governments such as in France and Belgium (Duvert 2004; Fautreґ

2004; Richardson and Introvigne 2001).

The key elements of the ACM countermovement, therefore, include its

ideology (the argument that brainwashing or mind control reduces the capacity

of NRM affiliates to make autonomous, voluntaristic choices), countermovement

organizations (that served to mobilize troubled family members, petition

governmental officials, and enlist support from the media to influence

public opinion); rituals through which NRM affiliates can be separated from

groups (the deprogramming ritual designed to pressure individuals to renounce

their affiliations), and apostates (former NRM members who affiliate

with the ACM and offer personal testimony to cultic manipulation).

Moral Panics about New Religious Movements

One way to view the organizational goals of ACM groups is as attempting to

promote ‘‘moral panics'' about NRMs. The term moral panic first appeared in

print in the 1970s, most notably in a book by Stanley Cohen (1972) entitled

Folk Devils and Moral Panics, which offered an explanation for the exaggerated

response to hooliganism by ‘‘mods and rockers'' in England in the early 1960s.

Cohen was struck by the ‘‘fundamentally inappropriate'' reaction to relatively

minor events involving some juvenile vandalism that occurred in one small

seaside resort in England.

The term moral panic has become prominent in the sociology of deviance,

as demonstrated by the well-received volume by Eric Goode and

Nachman Ben-Yehuda (1994) entitled Moral Panics: The Social Construction

of Deviance. As a part of their analysis, Goode and Ben-Yehuda present descriptions

of major actors in the development of moral panics. Included are

(1) the press, (2) the public, (3) law enforcement, (4) politicians and legislators,

(5) action groups, and (6) ‘‘folk devils.'' They also discuss the application of

nrms, countermovements, moral panics, and the media 95

the ‘‘disaster analogy'' to the idea of moral panics, a term which refers to the

tendency to refer to the object of a developing moral panic in terms reminiscent

of a natural disaster, such as a flood or earthquake.

A number of studies of deviance have made use of the concept of moral

panic or related terms over the past few decades as a part of the ‘‘constructionist''

perspective taken from deviance studies (Jenkins 1992, 1998; Richardson, Best,

and Bromley 1991). Surprisingly, the important volume by Goode and Ben-

Yehuda (1994), while discussing many historical examples of moral panics involving

religion, does not deal with the moral panic that developed concerning

NRMs, except for references to ‘‘atrocity tales'' circulated about the Unificationistmovement

(Bromley, Shupe, and Ventimiglia 1979). However, Introvigne

(1999a, 2000) has examined the social reaction to NRMs in terms of a moralpanic

episode.

The term moral panic refers to situations in which something that has

been defined as a social problem becomes the focus of exaggerated attention

from media, politicians and other opinion leaders, law enforcement, and action

groups. The thrust of the focused effort is to garner public support to take action

against the perceived problem. Social problems are themselves socially

constructed, as has been shown by numerous studies. For example, Kitsuse

(1962) discusses the lack of relationship between objective reality and activities

that come to be designated as social problems. The negative definition of NRMs

that developed soon after NRMs began attracting public attention in American

society is a good example of this process of social construction and political

negotiation.

Defining something as a social problem constitutes one level of concern

for the populace and government officials, and this occurred early in the

response to NRMs. However, to move beyond this designation into the realm

of a moral panic represents a significant escalation of concern about a given

social problem. Such a change usually means that some organizational effort

has been successful at redefining the social problem at issue. In the case

of NRMs, it is clear that the efforts of some ACM ‘‘action groups,'' which

Goode and Ben-Yehuda (1994: 28) refer to as ‘‘moral entrepreneurs'' (using

the term from Becker 1963: 147–63), have been crucial. Especially the influence

of ACM groups on the mass media has contributed greatly to the moral

panic that developed over NRMs during the latter part of the last century.

A moral panic could be construed as resulting from the ‘‘overconstruction''

of a social problem, whereby misleading and even false information is

developed and disseminated by those promoting the moral panic. This promotional

activity raises concern, and even fear, among the public that is

greatly disproportionate to the actual threat to society. The issue becomes

prevalence, not existence, and the overall effort is to exploit a few occurrences

to convince the public and government officials that such occurrences are

much more frequent and dangerous than they actually are.

‘‘Folk statistics'' demonstrating the alleged threat are treated as accurate

and are spread by whatever means is available, usually including and especially

the mass media. An example of such a folk statistic discussed by Goode

96 orienting perspectives in teaching nrms

and Ben-Yehuda (1994: 57) is the widely disseminated claim that 50,000

children were being murdered every year in America by Satanists. This same

claim also was found in research in Australia and New Zealand, where it

played a key role in the social construction of the ‘‘Satanism scare'' in that

part of the world (Richardson 1997b). Analogous ‘‘statistics'' have been bandied

about by ACM groups concerning how many people have been involved

in NRMs; however, as Shupe and Bromley have noted (1994b: 15), the total

number of participants in communal NRMs—the ones engendering greatest

concern—was never more than 25,000 at any one time in the United States.

But the amount of air time and column inches given to the alleged cult

problem led many to conclude that the numbers (and the threat) were much

greater than was actually the case.

Moral panics also always involve the development of ‘‘folk devils.'' As

Goode and Ben-Yehuda (1994: 28) note, ‘‘A folk devil is the personification of

evil.'' They go on to state,

All moral panics, by their very nature, identify, denounce, and attempt

to root out folk devils. . . . Folk devils are deviants; they are

engaged in wrong-doing; their actions are harmful to society; they are

selfish and evil; they must be stopped, their actions neutralized. (29)

The ACM developed both a generalized folk devil and some specific ones

over the years in their efforts to oppose NRMs. The generalized version of an

NRM folk devil is the mysterious guru with all-powerful psychological techniques

for hypnotizing or brainwashing those who come within his grasp.

Something of a Pied Piper myth developed concerning leaders of NRMs:

America's youth were considered by some ACM leaders to be defenseless

against the wiles of these all-powerful gurus. There was some specific focus

on a few NRM leaders, such as David Berg, who founded the The Family

International (originally the Children of God), and especially the Reverend

Sun Myung Moon, founder of the Unificationist Church (UC). Public opinion

data from two decades ago suggest that Reverend Moon may have been the

most hated and feared person in America at that time—this in spite of the fact

that Unificationist membership was relatively small and that few people had

actually ever met a member of the UC (Bromley and Breschel 1992; Richardson

1992). Given his oriental origins and the way in which Unificationist

actions (such as mass weddings) drew public attention to the movement,

Moon served as a proto-typical folk devil and was an important target person

for the ACM.

An example of a moral panic that reveals how NRMs can become implicated

in seemingly unrelated events occurred in Italy in 2004. A heavymetal

rock band, The Beasts of Satan, was found to be responsible for three or

more murders that were committed in ways that suggested Satanic ritual

elements were involved. Both secular ACM and CCM groups in Italy immediately

exploited this development, claiming that the group was part of an

international Satanic conspiracy involving as many as 500,000 people in Italy

nrms, countermovements, moral panics, and the media 97

and that this incident was an example of the evils brought on by cults. Given

the paucity of real ex-members of virtually nonexistent Satanic groups in Italy,

the mass media, especially talk shows on radio and television, made use of

other former cult (NRM) members, some of whom were quite willing to say

that their former cult was ‘‘just as bad'' as Satanism. This joining of Satanism

and NRMs contributed at the time to the development of a relatively shortlived

moral panic in Italy.

Sects and cults (the popular, negative, way of referring to NRMs) have

often been seen as quintessential targets of moral panics. They are politically

weak, usually unpopular because of their strange-appearing beliefs and practices,

and are perceived as disruptive of the normal life of ordinary families,

given their tendency to recruit the youth of the society. Jenkins states,

Sects perform a convenient integrative function by providing a

common enemy, a ‘‘dangerous outsider'' against which the mainstream

can unite and reassert its standards and beliefs. Depending on

the legal and cultural environment of a given society, the tension

between sects and the mainstream community might result in active

persecution or it can take the form of ostracism and negative stereotyping.

(1996: 158)

Media and New Religious Movements

It is no accident that Goode and Ben-Yehuda (1994) give primacy to the press

in their discussion of the various key ‘‘actors in the drama of moral panics.''

They discuss press coverage of the mods and rockers episode in England as

involving ‘‘exaggerated attention, exaggerated events, distortion, and stereotyping.''

They discuss ‘‘over-reporting'' of events and the use of language to

make the episodes seem more serious than they were (1994: 24–25). They

note the stereotypic pattern of reporting and state,

The press . . . put together a composite picture, containing a number

of central elements. It was almost as if a new story could be written

simply by stitching these elements together. There was very little

interest in what actually happened; what counted was how closely a

news account conformed to a stereotype. (25–26)

In short, one indication that a moral panic is taking place is the stereotypical

fashion in which the subject is treated in the press.

ACM groups of both types make heavy use of the media. Indeed, arguably

the mass media are the most important resource available to the ACM industry.

The media also make use of ACM groups and are often willing to

publish articles or produce television and radio programs that promote implicitly

or explicitly the views of the broader ACM. This occurs in part because

of a confluence of values between ACM leadership and those directing the

98 orienting perspectives in teaching nrms

media. (See Richardson 1996 for examples of this sharing of common values,

and Beckford 1985 for an analysis of other factors influencing NRM coverage

by the media.)

When NRMs first appeared on the media scene, little research was done

about the role played by the media in the anti-cult scare. There was an initial

assumption that NRMs were widespread, which would explain why so many

people had opinions and some knowledge of them. However, when scholarly

research revealed that there were relatively few NRMs and most were small,

there was a question about why such strong negative opinions were so

widespread among both elites and the general public (Bromley and Breschel

1992; Richardson 1992). This question led to a focus on the function of the

media in disseminating information about NRMs. One notable Gallup Poll

demonstrated this large role: over 90 percent of people interviewed had negative

feelings about Reverend Moon and his followers, but only 2 percent

admitted to ever having seen a member of the UC! Somehow people were

forming opinions without direct experience, and the media seemed the most

likely candidate responsible for ‘‘informing'' the public.

Eventually some serious research was done on media coverage of NRMs

to test the assumptions being made about the impact the media had on perceptions

concerning NRMs. There have been several major studies of media

treatments of NRMs, including in the United States (van Driel and Richardson

1988a, 1988b), Europe, and the United Kingdom (Beckford 1985; Beckford

and Coles 1988; Richardson 1997a; Selway 1992). There have also been

focused studies dealing with related major events, such as the conflagration at

Waco in 1993 (Richardson 1995; Shupe and Hadden 1995).

Much of this research was based on content analysis of print media

coverage in an effort to find out what some media outlets were reporting about

NRMs and what the tone was of the coverage. This approach was first used by

van Driel and Richardson (1988a), and then also applied in Australia (Selway

1992) and the United Kingdom (Beckford and Coles 1988). Results of the

research have been remarkably consistent. Although the amount of media

coverage has varied somewhat, and journalists have become somewhat more

discerning in their coverage over time, the overwhelming finding has been

extreme negativity in coverage of NRMs. This negativity has been demonstrated

by the choice of language (cult versus new religion, for instance, and a

strong tendency to use terms like brainwashing to describe recruitment

practices) and by the selection of ‘‘experts'' quoted in the stories (that is, ACM

spokespersons dominated, with scholars of religion left out). In-depth reporting

seldom occurred; instead, a ‘‘stream of controversies'' (Beckford 1985)

approach was used, with the media feeding on these controversies for material

rather than journalists conducting serious investigative reporting.

This research did not explain the negativity of media coverage, which was

the focus of a subsequent study on the attitudes of journalists who wrote

stories about NRMs (Richardson and van Driel 1997). All journalists who had

written stories in the earlier content-analysis research of van Driel and

Richardson were sent questionnaires in an attempt to assess their attitudes

nrms, countermovements, moral panics, and the media 99

toward NRMs and their knowledge of them. The mailing list of the Religious

Writers Association was also purchased, which included about three hundred

members, and they were also sent the questionnaire. Response rates were low

but the responses were revealing. Journalists who responded knew very little

about the scholarly research on NRMs, and they were prone to regard the

groups as deviant entities in need of control. They were likely to accept the

brainwashing/mind control explanations for why people participate in NRMs.

Indeed, some respondents even indicated being willing to serve as moral

entrepreneurs—something that Beckford (1985) had also noted in his earlier

research in the U.K., in which he found that some journalists even referred

people who had contacted them to ACM organizations.

These findings about journalists' stories about NRMs are revealing, as

they demonstrate that reporters may be disposed to participate in campaigns

to develop moral panics about NRMs. Most journalists producing stories on

NRMs possess little knowledge of the groups about which they are writing,

and they share the values of the dominant culture, which are at odds with the

values espoused by most NRMs. Thus most journalists (and perhaps, by extension,

editors and publishers) seem quite willing to jump on the ACM

bandwagon and defend the normative values of the society of which they are a

part. Few journalists seem cognizant of issues concerning religious freedom;

instead, they seem willing to participate in developing moral panics about

NRMs, not only in the United States but in other countries as well. Thus

representatives of the media in effect play a key role in the efforts of countermovements

to promote concern and even moral panic about NRMs.

Suggestions for Classroom Interactions

In assessing how to teach students about ACMs and CCMs in a way that is both

insightful and reasonably balanced, it is important to remember that college

students are by no means immune to misconceptions about popular culture.

On many unfamiliar subjects, students—like other members of society—rely

on media accounts, fiction, and popular culture. Even graduate students of

religion, who might be expected to be more knowledgeable, are likely to reveal

popular misconceptions, such as that all NRMs members are brainwashed, all

cults are dangerous, and Satanists engage in child sacrifice. These preconceptions

must be taken into account with any assignments designed to help

students understand NRMs and the controversies surrounding them. The

suggestions that follow are premised on the assumption that students have

been familiarized with a countermovement and/or moral framework for interpretive

activity.

It is also important to apprise students of the role that NRM scholars have

played in the public controversy over cults. Some prominent academic scholars

of NRMs have been personally involved in the ‘‘cult wars.'' (See Introvigne

2001; Richardson 1998 for discussion by this chapter's authors about their

personal involvement in the cult wars.) They have debunked folk theories

100 orienting perspectives in teaching nrms

about cults and sometimes have been accused by ACMs or CCMs of being

‘‘cult apologists.'' Some ACM Web sites maintain lists of academics singled

out as ‘‘cult apologists,'' where students may perhaps find their teachers or the

authors of their textbooks. It is therefore useful to discuss with students how

studying NRMs, the ACMs, and the CCM has involved NRM scholars as both

researchers and participants in the controversies surrounding NRMs. (See

David Bromley's chapter in this volume for an extended discussion of

methodological issues in the study of NRMs.)

Both the countermovement and moral panic perspectives are informative

on this point, as each perspective offers an explanation for why academic researchers

are likely to become targets of the countermovement or moral

crusade. Moral panic theory is a valuable interpretive tool because it maintains

that moral panics are usually based on actual problems and dangers that have

been amplified rather than invented by moral entrepreneurs within movements

such as the ACM and CCM. The allegations of these movements

therefore should not be dismissed, but rather the nature, form, and process of

problem construction by oppositional groups can be explained and interpreted

in ways that this volume suggests. In its focus on alliance building, countermovement

theory is useful in interpreting the way that the confluence of

values between ACM representatives and societal leaders has helped the ACM

and CCM influence the media, politicians, and general public.

Teaching about countermovements, moral panics, and the media offers

a unique opportunity to show the social response to NRMs. A variety of assignments

and exercises can be used to demonstrate the predictability of the

occurrence and the forms that current social opposition to NRMs take, how

public perceptions of NRMs are distorted, the dynamics of moral-panic episodes,

and the nature of subversion claims that emerge. Assignments can

include both written and oral presentations and exercises that allow students

to creatively implement the perspective they have gained from their reading.

It may be useful to establish that the contemporary crusades against

cults and sects are by no means new or unique. If students can understand

how intense societal tensions can produce new movements and simultaneously

the social reactions to these new movements, they will be oriented

toward interpreting the sociocultural conditions under which these movements

and societal reactions occur. Creating a cognitive distance by examining historical

cases can be very helpful in this regard, and there is substantial literature

on nineteenth-century anti-Mormonism and anti-Catholicism (Billington

1962; Davis 1960; Higham 1955; Miller 1983) for this purpose. Instructors can

provide baseline information on historical anti-cult campaigns and ask students

to compare these with contemporary anti-cultism. Alternatively, students

can read both historical and contemporary sources and conduct the comparison

via oral or written reports. The allegations of mind control and social subversion

made against Mormons and Catholics (Arrington 1968; Bunker and Bitton

1975; Davis 1960) are strikingly similar to allegations made today against

contemporary groups (Bromley, Shupe, and Ventimiglia 1979; Lewis 2003:

155–213; Richardson and Kilbourne 1983). Apostate accounts, a major source of

nrms, countermovements, moral panics, and the media 101

these allegations, can also be employed for comparisons of historical and

contemporary groups (Bromley 1988a, 1988b). There are numerous apostate

accounts available for comparing nineteenth-century Catholicism, some of

which have been reprinted (Johnson 1998; Monk 1836/1977), and Mormonism

(Givens 1997; Launius and Thatcher 1994; Miller 1983), particularly with

contemporary Unificationism (Edwards 1979; Elkins 1980; Swatland and

Swatland 1982; Underwood and Underwood 1979). The way these important

figures in countermovements and moral panics have been created and used to

heighten a sense of public danger is central to understanding the intensity of

societal reactions to NRMs. These figures are particularly instructive because,

in some cases, their biographies have been almost completely fabricated and

because they have had an impact significantly disproportionate to their numbers

or influence within their respective groups (Bromley 1998; Johnson 1998).

At the same time, it is important not to conflate countermovement-sponsored

apostates with other former movement members or to a priori discredit all

former-member accounts. (See Stuart Wright's chapter in this volume for

perspective on the processes of joining and exiting NRMs that characterizes

most participants' experiences, as well as Richardson, van der Lans, and Derks

1986.) Former members have in a number of cases provided valuable insights

into the internal dynamics of movements (Hong 1998; Muster 1997; Williams

1998) and are an important component of the methodological strategy for

basing assessments on a strategy of triangulation (Carter 1998; Richardson,

Balch, and Melton 1993).

Another way of demonstrating the existence and impact of countermovement

activity and moral panics is through simple class exercises. For

example, Pfeifer (1992) conducted a quasi-experiment in which students were

provided with a brief paragraph describing an intensive socialization experience.

The socialization experience was attributed to one of three groups:

Unificationist recruits, marines in boot camp, or monastic novitiates. Based

on this simple description, respondents were asked to assess the psychological

characteristics of the putative affiliates. Not surprisingly, negative personal

characteristics were most often attributed to Unificationists, despite the fact

that respondents had virtually no personal knowledge of Unificationism and

had never met a Unificationist. This exercise could easily be replicated in a

classroom situation, using a currently high-profile NRM, or students could

conduct the experiment with a sample of acquaintances.

An even simpler exercise is to ask class participants themselves to estimate

the membership size, or solicit estimates from a sample of acquaintances,

of better known, controversial NRMs for which membership estimates

are reasonably reliable. Countermovement activity and moral panics almost

always result in significantly inflated estimates of the size for groups perceived

as dangerous. The first author of this chapter demonstrated this tendency

when teaching a class of judges in the summer of 1986. During a course

on social and behavioral sciences and the law, he was asked to talk about his

research on NRMs. He did this by first asking the class of a dozen judges from

around the country how many members of the Unificationist movement they

102 orienting perspectives in teaching nrms

thought were in the country. Estimates ranged from 300,000 to 1.5 million.

The judges were astounded to be told that there had never been more than

10,000 Unificationists in the United States at any one time and that current

membership was probably less than 3,000.

Either of these exercises leads naturally to a discussion of where individuals

obtain information about NRMs, how distorted information is generated

and circulated, what groups have an interest in generating discrediting

or threatening information about NRMs, and why corrective processes fail to

operate during periods of heightened tensions. The dynamics of moral panics

can be documented by comparing various instances of panic episodes. The

comparison process will reveal the common elements described by Goode and

Ben-Yehuda (1994). A variety of contemporary panic episodes are readily

available for comparison purposes, such as drugs (Reinarman and Levine

1997) and child endangerment (Best 1990; Jenkins 1998). A rich compilation

of theory and research has been produced on the outbreak of fears of Satanic

cults. This episode is particularly useful because it is contemporary and there

are readily available sources that can be used to compare the claims of the

countersubversion movement (Kahaner 1988; Raschke 1990; Terry 1987) with

social scientific analyses of the moral panic episode (Ellis 2000; Richardson,

Best, and Bromley 1991; Victor 1993). There are also direct comparisons of the

anti-cult and anti-Satanic episodes (Bromley 1994; Bromley and Cutchin

1999) and apostate accounts by individuals claiming to have been members of

Satanic groups (Smith and Pazder 1980; Stratford 1988), along with critical

analyses of their claims (Hernstein and Trott 1993; Mulhern 1991). An excellent,

easily accessible video resource on moral panics about Satanic cults

that captures the qualities of moral panics and contains cult stereotypes is the

award-winning 1995 television movie Indictment: The McMartin Trial. The

McMartin case was one of the most sensational Satanic cult cases, in which

daycare center operators were accused of committing multiple instances of

sexual abuse and homicide, an indictment largely based on the testimony of

young children whose accounts were the product of social worker investigatory

techniques (Mulhern 1991; Nathan 1991).

The cult controversy offers an intriguing opportunity to examine the

subversion claims generated by the anti-cult movement against the critique of

those claims by NRM scholars. Students have an opportunity to read and analyze

work by anti-cult proponents, such as leading ACM representative Margaret

Singer (1979, 1995) and CCM figure Walter Martin. Singer's Cults in

Our Midst (1995) and Martin's The Kingdom of the Cults (1977) are classic

works in their respective genres. These treatments of NRMs can be compared

with a variety of works by NRM scholars that conceptualize the groups under

study as new religious movements rather than cults, offer ethnographic descriptions

designed to provide insight into members' perspectives rather than

evaluative claims about dangerous and destructive groups, and link affiliation

with NRMs through socialization rather than brainwashing models.

A variety of texts that interpret NRMs from this perspective are available

for comparison with anti-cult claims (Bainbridge 1997; Chryssides 1999;

nrms, countermovements, moral panics, and the media 103

Dawson 1998, 2003; Hunt 2003). Timothy Miller's volume, America's Alternative

Religions (1995), illustrates NRM scholars' descriptions of a range of

NRMs. Direct analyses of the ACM (Shupe and Bromley 1980) and the CCM

(Cowan 2003) are also available. A single source that encompasses the debates

over cults, and brainwashing in particular, is Zablocki and Robbins's Misunderstanding

Cults (2001).

A comparable view of the debates can be gained through an examination of

Web sites. A good example of an ACM-oriented Web site is one maintained by

Rick Ross (www.rickross.com), while Anton Hein's Web site exemplifies a

CCM viewpoint (www.apologeticsindex.org). Comparable institutionally supported

Web sites include those of the International Cultic Study Association

(www.csj.org) and the Christian Research Institute (www.equip.org).

More academically oriented Web sites include the New Religious Movements

Homepage (http://religiousmovements.lib.virginia.edu) and the Center for the

Study of New Religions Web site (www.cesnur.org). Using either published

works or Web sites, students can prepare summations of anti-cult claims and

NRM scholars' critiques of those claims.

Students can gain perspective on the policy implications of the cult controversy

by analyzing the 1986 Report of the Task Force on Deceptive and

Indirect Techniques of Persuasion and Control (DIMPAC), available at www

.cesnur.org/testi/DIMPAC.htm. The DIMPAC report was submitted to the

American Psychological Association (APA) by a commission chaired by

Margaret Singer; it summarizes the rationale offered for the position of the

ACMs in the late 1980s. (The report ultimately was not accepted by the APA.)

Students can then use the reviews prepared by APA official reviewers Benjamin

Beit-Hallahmi (a scholar who is himself close to the ACMs) and Jeffrey

D. Fisher (available at www.cesnur.org/testi/APA.htm) to identify the basis on

which anti-cult claims have been critiqued.

All of the exercises described above draw on scholarly, media, or countermovement

sources. An alternative exercise that enlists student creativity

is to create a fictional description of a cult. As an example, the information

provided to students would be as follows: A famous movie star, Heidi Bulla,

has converted to a religious group known as the Holy Fourthinity, of which

little is known. It is known that the group numbers at most a few hundred,

that most members are in their late teens to early twenties, that members live

communally, and that the group discourages all contact with family members

and former acquaintances. However, the only available information on the

group is contained in two documents:

1. A pamphlet produced by the movement that describes the revolutionary

discovery of its founder, Brother Four. According to the

pamphlet, the traditional Christian doctrine of the Trinity is based on

historical errors, faulty interpretations, and the fact that the Christian

churches have ignored a key Gnostic document known as the

Gospel of Fire. This document has not been referred to by any

historian and reportedly was lost in the second century c.e.; it has

104 orienting perspectives in teaching nrms

now been revealed by Jesus Christ to Brother Four. The core of the

revelation is that there is a fourth person of the Trinity—the Spirit of

Fire—and that this Spirit must be honored in order to gain enlightenment

and salvation. The Spirit of Fire requests from his followers

worship through certain secret rites during which they light a fire and

ceremonially dance around it to signify their spiritual rebirth.

2. A memorandum sent to the news media by a former member, Charity

Candid, claiming that Brother Four has brainwashed her and that the

Fire ceremony is an intense ritual that extends over many hours during

which members are placed in a trancelike state by the ritualized

singing and dancing. These rituals presage advanced, secret

rituals that allegedly involve members engaging in sexual relationships

with Brother Four. Both the movement and other former

members have vehemently denied Ms. Candid's charges, responding

that Candid was a disgruntled member whose sexual advances were

rejected by Brother Four. As a result of the claims and counter-claims,

journalists have pressed the group and its opponents for information,

and undercover investigative reports are being prepared.

The exercise involves, in the first stage, building on the information provided

here and preparing both the movement's pamphlet describing its

beliefs, organization, and ritual practices and the text of Charity Candid's

memorandum containing an exposeґ of the group as a dangerous cult. In the

second stage, students are divided into three groups, asked to write respectively

a short article for an anti-cult magazine, for an evangelical counter-cult

magazine, and for a scholarly Web site describing the movement. All groups

will use as primary material the pamphlet they have prepared and Ms. Candid's

memorandum. The article for the anti-cult magazine should apply the anticult

model to the Holy Fourthinity. The counter-cult article, while including

(as most counter-cult material now does) elements of the anti-cult model,

should discuss the Spirit of Fire doctrine as heretical. These articles may be

organized as papers or class presentations.

If this exercise is successful, a more advanced exercise can have students

stage a court trial in which former members are suing the group and its

leaders for fraud and for the tort of ‘‘intentional affliction of emotional distress''

resulting from the intense group rituals and high social control. The

group's defense is that the former members were adults who made a voluntary

choice and now regret that choice. The trial pits the cult and NRM models

against one another, and reveals in a more dramatic fashion the complexity of

sorting out and assessing competing claims in a contested situation. In the

aftermath of the trial, students can be asked to reflect on the larger implications

for religious freedom, depending on the outcome of the trial.

The larger objective of these exercises is to develop critical thinking and

analysis skills in the context of a conflict that has now spanned several decades.

By thinking through the intense controversy encompassing NRMs,

students become more adept at understanding the social and cultural forces

nrms, countermovements, moral panics, and the media 105

that shape events around them as well as their personal lives. From this perspective,

a sophisticated understanding of the NRM controversy can serve as a

template for examining a range of other ongoing conflicts and controversies

in the public arena.