Cultic Studies Review, Vol. 2, No. 2, 2003, Page 14
true. When several devotees spoke out publicly about Muktananda‘s sexual abuses, two
loyal devotees were dispatched by Muktananda to threaten these whistle-blowers with
disfigurement and castration (Rodarmor, 1983). Nevertheless, to this day, Muktananda is
worshiped by SYDA devotees as a deity.
Fairbairn and the Moral Defense
I link this determination to protect the cult leader at all cost to one of the most central
formulations in the work of Fairbairn, the influential British Middle School psychoanalyst.
Fairbairn (1943) spoke of a ―moral defense,‖ a way that developing children who are being
neglected or abused by (or receiving inadequate selfobject provision from) their caregivers
will subconsciously agree to ―bear the burden of the badness.‖ By excusing and protecting
their abusers and blaming themselves for the neglect/abuse they are exposed to, these
children choose, speaking metaphorically, to live in a world ruled by a benevolent God
(―good‖ parents), where there is at least hope for redemption, rather than to confront the
helplessness and hopeless despair of living in a world ruled by the Devil (―bad‖ parents).
The child feels, ―if it is me that is bad, there is hope. Maybe I can try to be good. But if it is
my parents that are bad, there is nothing I can do --I am doomed.‖ Cult followers are in a
similar position once they have become dependent on their leader. In cults, the leader
depends on her ability to persuade her followers that she is always right. If anything is
wrong, the follower is always to blame, never the leader, and the leader never lets the
follower forget that those are the rules. By blinding themselves to the corruption and abuse
of their leader, and taking on a sense of sinfulness, guilt and unworthiness in themselves,
followers sustain their tie to the leader, and along with that tie, their hopes for redemption
and salvation. Cult members are constantly obsessed with how they are perceived by the
leader, whether they are good or bad, up or down. While obsessively striving for the
leader‘s approval, they must also learn to accept the leader‘s need to humiliate others, and
to be ready at any time to assume the guilt and shame the leader is constantly seeking to
project on to others.
Fromm and the Magic Helper and Miller and the Prisoners of Childhood
As the world watched the rise of the Nazi Party in the 1930‘s and 40‘s, a literature
developed during and after the Holocaust which attempted to come to grips with, among
other things, how virtually an entire nation of people, the Germans, could be persuaded to
give up their morals, values, autonomy, and integrity, by one man, a charismatic
megalomaniac named Adolf Hitler. Many authors have attempted to find explanations for
this inexplicable horror. The ideas of Erich Fromm, the prominent interpersonal
psychoanalyst whose work was quite popular from the post WWII era and into the 1960s, as
presented in his book Escape From Freedom, are particularly relevant here. (Also see
Becker [1973], especially the chapter entitled ―The Spell Cast by Persons—The Nexus of
Unfreedom.‖ and Berger [1967], particularly the chapter entitled ―The Problem of
Theodicy.‖)
Fromm (1965) examines the relationship of human developmental processes to social,
religious, economic, and political forces in the environment. He notes that the process of
individuation frees a child to ―develop and express its own individual self unhampered by
those ties which were limiting to it. But the child also becomes more free from a world
which gave it security and reassurance‖ (p. 46). Fromm continues:
If the economic, social and political conditions on which the whole process of
human individuation depends, do not offer a basis for the realization of
individuality ...,while at the same time people have lost those ties which
gave them security, this lag makes freedom an unbearable burden. It then
becomes identical with doubt, with a kind of life which lacks meaning and
direction. Powerful tendencies arise to escape from this kind of freedom into
true. When several devotees spoke out publicly about Muktananda‘s sexual abuses, two
loyal devotees were dispatched by Muktananda to threaten these whistle-blowers with
disfigurement and castration (Rodarmor, 1983). Nevertheless, to this day, Muktananda is
worshiped by SYDA devotees as a deity.
Fairbairn and the Moral Defense
I link this determination to protect the cult leader at all cost to one of the most central
formulations in the work of Fairbairn, the influential British Middle School psychoanalyst.
Fairbairn (1943) spoke of a ―moral defense,‖ a way that developing children who are being
neglected or abused by (or receiving inadequate selfobject provision from) their caregivers
will subconsciously agree to ―bear the burden of the badness.‖ By excusing and protecting
their abusers and blaming themselves for the neglect/abuse they are exposed to, these
children choose, speaking metaphorically, to live in a world ruled by a benevolent God
(―good‖ parents), where there is at least hope for redemption, rather than to confront the
helplessness and hopeless despair of living in a world ruled by the Devil (―bad‖ parents).
The child feels, ―if it is me that is bad, there is hope. Maybe I can try to be good. But if it is
my parents that are bad, there is nothing I can do --I am doomed.‖ Cult followers are in a
similar position once they have become dependent on their leader. In cults, the leader
depends on her ability to persuade her followers that she is always right. If anything is
wrong, the follower is always to blame, never the leader, and the leader never lets the
follower forget that those are the rules. By blinding themselves to the corruption and abuse
of their leader, and taking on a sense of sinfulness, guilt and unworthiness in themselves,
followers sustain their tie to the leader, and along with that tie, their hopes for redemption
and salvation. Cult members are constantly obsessed with how they are perceived by the
leader, whether they are good or bad, up or down. While obsessively striving for the
leader‘s approval, they must also learn to accept the leader‘s need to humiliate others, and
to be ready at any time to assume the guilt and shame the leader is constantly seeking to
project on to others.
Fromm and the Magic Helper and Miller and the Prisoners of Childhood
As the world watched the rise of the Nazi Party in the 1930‘s and 40‘s, a literature
developed during and after the Holocaust which attempted to come to grips with, among
other things, how virtually an entire nation of people, the Germans, could be persuaded to
give up their morals, values, autonomy, and integrity, by one man, a charismatic
megalomaniac named Adolf Hitler. Many authors have attempted to find explanations for
this inexplicable horror. The ideas of Erich Fromm, the prominent interpersonal
psychoanalyst whose work was quite popular from the post WWII era and into the 1960s, as
presented in his book Escape From Freedom, are particularly relevant here. (Also see
Becker [1973], especially the chapter entitled ―The Spell Cast by Persons—The Nexus of
Unfreedom.‖ and Berger [1967], particularly the chapter entitled ―The Problem of
Theodicy.‖)
Fromm (1965) examines the relationship of human developmental processes to social,
religious, economic, and political forces in the environment. He notes that the process of
individuation frees a child to ―develop and express its own individual self unhampered by
those ties which were limiting to it. But the child also becomes more free from a world
which gave it security and reassurance‖ (p. 46). Fromm continues:
If the economic, social and political conditions on which the whole process of
human individuation depends, do not offer a basis for the realization of
individuality ...,while at the same time people have lost those ties which
gave them security, this lag makes freedom an unbearable burden. It then
becomes identical with doubt, with a kind of life which lacks meaning and
direction. Powerful tendencies arise to escape from this kind of freedom into
