Cultic Studies Journal, Vol. 18, 2001, Page 55
The Millennium is Here – and So are the Cults
Lita Linzer Schwartz
Abington College, The Pennsylvania State University
Abstract
The beginning of a new century and a new Millennium seems to be an
appropriate time to re-examine those movements that claim to have
exclusive knowledge of what measures will save the world and who will be
saved. Special attention is paid to the role of women in the various cults, to
new targets for recruiters, millennial predictions, and to techniques that may
protect youths and others from those recruiters. Consideration of the tie
between cult group characteristics and the attacks of September 11, 2001 is
also included.
Visionaries, or those who advertise themselves as such, said for several years that the world
would self-destruct at the Millennium, that it would be the time of Armageddon, that
salvation only for the chosen fewled by said visionary, of coursewould be available at
the Millennium. This is not an original thought the ―modern‖ version began with
Nostradamus a few centuries ago, and there were similar predictions even 4,000 years ago.
A group leader often ambiguously sets the ―end time,‖ but, as occurred at the turn of the
Millennium, it sometimes coincides with a landmark date. The visionaries, of course, have
the path to salvation at their fingertips. With all of the warnings as well about the potential
disasters that Y2K was to have brought to the world of computers, it is a wonder that these
words are available for you to read and that you are here to read them. Given the
significance of the Millennium to some visionaries, this seems an appropriate time to look
anew at cults.
A Contemporary Orientation
Just so that we all start from the same place, let me share with you two definitions of a cult.
The first says that a ―totalist type‖ cult is
a group or movement exhibiting a great or excessive devotion or dedication
to some person, idea, or thing and employing unethically manipulative
techniques of persuasion and control (e.g., isolation from former friends and
family, debilitation, use of special methods to heighten suggestibility and
subservience, powerful group pressures, information management,
suspension of individuality or critical judgment, promotion of total
dependency on the group and fear of leaving it, etc.), designed to advance
the goals of the group‘s leaders, to the actual or possible detriment of
members, their families, or the community (West &Langone, 1986, pp.119-
120).
A briefer, but equally cogent, definition was given by Robert Lifton, a psychiatrist
particularly well-known for his work on thought reform of prisoners during the Korean War:
Cults can be identified by three characteristics: (1) a charismatic leader who
increasingly becomes an object of worship as the general principles that may
have originally sustained the group lose their power (2) a process I call
coercive persuasion or thought reform (3) economic, sexual, and other
exploitation of group members by the leader and the ruling coterie. (Lifton,
1991, p. 2)
The Millennium is Here – and So are the Cults
Lita Linzer Schwartz
Abington College, The Pennsylvania State University
Abstract
The beginning of a new century and a new Millennium seems to be an
appropriate time to re-examine those movements that claim to have
exclusive knowledge of what measures will save the world and who will be
saved. Special attention is paid to the role of women in the various cults, to
new targets for recruiters, millennial predictions, and to techniques that may
protect youths and others from those recruiters. Consideration of the tie
between cult group characteristics and the attacks of September 11, 2001 is
also included.
Visionaries, or those who advertise themselves as such, said for several years that the world
would self-destruct at the Millennium, that it would be the time of Armageddon, that
salvation only for the chosen fewled by said visionary, of coursewould be available at
the Millennium. This is not an original thought the ―modern‖ version began with
Nostradamus a few centuries ago, and there were similar predictions even 4,000 years ago.
A group leader often ambiguously sets the ―end time,‖ but, as occurred at the turn of the
Millennium, it sometimes coincides with a landmark date. The visionaries, of course, have
the path to salvation at their fingertips. With all of the warnings as well about the potential
disasters that Y2K was to have brought to the world of computers, it is a wonder that these
words are available for you to read and that you are here to read them. Given the
significance of the Millennium to some visionaries, this seems an appropriate time to look
anew at cults.
A Contemporary Orientation
Just so that we all start from the same place, let me share with you two definitions of a cult.
The first says that a ―totalist type‖ cult is
a group or movement exhibiting a great or excessive devotion or dedication
to some person, idea, or thing and employing unethically manipulative
techniques of persuasion and control (e.g., isolation from former friends and
family, debilitation, use of special methods to heighten suggestibility and
subservience, powerful group pressures, information management,
suspension of individuality or critical judgment, promotion of total
dependency on the group and fear of leaving it, etc.), designed to advance
the goals of the group‘s leaders, to the actual or possible detriment of
members, their families, or the community (West &Langone, 1986, pp.119-
120).
A briefer, but equally cogent, definition was given by Robert Lifton, a psychiatrist
particularly well-known for his work on thought reform of prisoners during the Korean War:
Cults can be identified by three characteristics: (1) a charismatic leader who
increasingly becomes an object of worship as the general principles that may
have originally sustained the group lose their power (2) a process I call
coercive persuasion or thought reform (3) economic, sexual, and other
exploitation of group members by the leader and the ruling coterie. (Lifton,
1991, p. 2)
