Cultic Studies Review, Vol. 9, No. 1, 2010, Page 48
―total projective identification‖ dominated by the leader. This process of making a 'bounded
choice' (Lalich, 2004) is marked by a sense of increasing deadness in the member.
I present a conceptualization of the parallels between cultic functioning and the psychic
mechanism of ―folie a á deux‖ as introduced by Perlado in this issue, by drawing on
Grotstein‘s connection of folie á deux with the concept of total projective identification (p.
711). Folie á deux, as defined by Gralnick (in Perlado, this issue) is ―the preponderance of
induced psychotic disorders in persons who live together intimately for a long time,‖
resulting in a dominant/submissive form of relating, and defined by Grotstein as the ―mutual
illusion (fiction) or delusion that unites two or more people in a pathological relationship‖
(1994). I suggest that Lifton‘s description of one effect of cults as an atrophy of imagination
in cult members who share the leader‘s delusion is found in the folie situation, since the
submissive partner stops using imagination to create subjective symbols to translate and
communicate his/her own experience. This loss of subjectivity by the members is well
described in Perlado‘s paper.
Drawing on psychoanalytic theory, I suggest four criteria of creativity that enable active
imagination and a sense of aliveness in subjects using trial projective identification. The
function of these criteria will be illustrated in my discussion of a snippet from case material
with a young man Perlado helped to exit the music cult described in this issue. My
exploration of particular words this former member spoke reflect a postmodern
psychoanalytic emphasis on language as an unconscious conveyor of subjectively created
meaning. This approach to cult recovery is particularly relevant to understanding the impact
of ―loaded language‖ (coerced and repeated use of leader‘s clichés to promote cult doctrine,
as a vehicle to eliminate subjectively created meaning in cults) (Lifton, 1961).
Criteria for Creativity
1. Mourning of Loss. Symbolic, and therefore creative, functioning arises out of the
need to communicate the experience of absence and the mourning of loss. Freud
(1920) first presents this theme with an anecdote about his grandson who throws
and then reclaims a spool of thread that belonged to his mother while repeating
words approximating in German ―fort/da‖ (―gone/there‖) suggesting the child‘s play
constitutes a way for him to symbolize, hence tolerate, his mother‘s absence.
Deri, whose book Symbolization and Creativity provides an overview of Freud
(1920), Klein (1930), Segal (1952, 1957), Winnicott (1953), Lewin (1936), and
others on this theme, states that ―symbolization facilitates separation from primary
‗objects‘ by keeping connected with them via symbol-bridges. The symbol is ‗the
presence of the absence‘‖ (Deri, 1984, p. 47, 62, Lacan, 1966, p. 64, 1996, p.1).
One might defend against extreme loss, often in the form of trauma, by denial of
absence and of intolerable feelings associated with that absence. If absence is
denied, the need to symbolize is undermined. I suggest that in cults, perhaps
through a shared group delusion of the leader‘s omnipotence as well as a belief that
pre-cult relationships and experience are of no value, the deeply entrenched member
– i.e., one who experiences ultimate meaning in life through devotion to the leader—
denies absence and so the need for mourning of loss. Thus, the member‘s capacity
for symbol formation and the creation of subjective meaning risks impairment.
2. Allowance of Opposition. Opposition, characterized by difference, implies the
presence of separate, unbridged elements that have the potential to be constructed,
deconstructed, and reconstructed into various forms. Symbol in language,
particularly metaphor, fulfills a bridging function through its capacity to hold
mutually contradictory elements together, and to therefore evoke deep feeling. For
instance, the metaphor ―sweet death,‖ slang for ―orgasm,‖ bridges the contradictory
experiences of ecstasy and pain.
―total projective identification‖ dominated by the leader. This process of making a 'bounded
choice' (Lalich, 2004) is marked by a sense of increasing deadness in the member.
I present a conceptualization of the parallels between cultic functioning and the psychic
mechanism of ―folie a á deux‖ as introduced by Perlado in this issue, by drawing on
Grotstein‘s connection of folie á deux with the concept of total projective identification (p.
711). Folie á deux, as defined by Gralnick (in Perlado, this issue) is ―the preponderance of
induced psychotic disorders in persons who live together intimately for a long time,‖
resulting in a dominant/submissive form of relating, and defined by Grotstein as the ―mutual
illusion (fiction) or delusion that unites two or more people in a pathological relationship‖
(1994). I suggest that Lifton‘s description of one effect of cults as an atrophy of imagination
in cult members who share the leader‘s delusion is found in the folie situation, since the
submissive partner stops using imagination to create subjective symbols to translate and
communicate his/her own experience. This loss of subjectivity by the members is well
described in Perlado‘s paper.
Drawing on psychoanalytic theory, I suggest four criteria of creativity that enable active
imagination and a sense of aliveness in subjects using trial projective identification. The
function of these criteria will be illustrated in my discussion of a snippet from case material
with a young man Perlado helped to exit the music cult described in this issue. My
exploration of particular words this former member spoke reflect a postmodern
psychoanalytic emphasis on language as an unconscious conveyor of subjectively created
meaning. This approach to cult recovery is particularly relevant to understanding the impact
of ―loaded language‖ (coerced and repeated use of leader‘s clichés to promote cult doctrine,
as a vehicle to eliminate subjectively created meaning in cults) (Lifton, 1961).
Criteria for Creativity
1. Mourning of Loss. Symbolic, and therefore creative, functioning arises out of the
need to communicate the experience of absence and the mourning of loss. Freud
(1920) first presents this theme with an anecdote about his grandson who throws
and then reclaims a spool of thread that belonged to his mother while repeating
words approximating in German ―fort/da‖ (―gone/there‖) suggesting the child‘s play
constitutes a way for him to symbolize, hence tolerate, his mother‘s absence.
Deri, whose book Symbolization and Creativity provides an overview of Freud
(1920), Klein (1930), Segal (1952, 1957), Winnicott (1953), Lewin (1936), and
others on this theme, states that ―symbolization facilitates separation from primary
‗objects‘ by keeping connected with them via symbol-bridges. The symbol is ‗the
presence of the absence‘‖ (Deri, 1984, p. 47, 62, Lacan, 1966, p. 64, 1996, p.1).
One might defend against extreme loss, often in the form of trauma, by denial of
absence and of intolerable feelings associated with that absence. If absence is
denied, the need to symbolize is undermined. I suggest that in cults, perhaps
through a shared group delusion of the leader‘s omnipotence as well as a belief that
pre-cult relationships and experience are of no value, the deeply entrenched member
– i.e., one who experiences ultimate meaning in life through devotion to the leader—
denies absence and so the need for mourning of loss. Thus, the member‘s capacity
for symbol formation and the creation of subjective meaning risks impairment.
2. Allowance of Opposition. Opposition, characterized by difference, implies the
presence of separate, unbridged elements that have the potential to be constructed,
deconstructed, and reconstructed into various forms. Symbol in language,
particularly metaphor, fulfills a bridging function through its capacity to hold
mutually contradictory elements together, and to therefore evoke deep feeling. For
instance, the metaphor ―sweet death,‖ slang for ―orgasm,‖ bridges the contradictory
experiences of ecstasy and pain.
