How cults recruit and indoctrinate their members

by Michael Bluejay • Last update: December 2024

Ever wonder how someone becomes a cult member?  How exactly do they get sucked in?  The process is remarkably similar from cult to cult, and here I'll explain the basic recipe. 

The first thing to understand is that the indoctrination is a series of small steps.  If the cult’s pitch were, “Come join our group, cut off ties with friends and family who won’t join, and devote all your spare time to it for the rest of your life,” no one would ever join, they’d run the other way screaming.  But the opening pitch isn’t a big ask, it’s something small like, “Come to this party,” or “Come to this art presentation.”  The next ask will get the recruit in a little deeper, but it’ll also be close to the previous ask.  And once the recruit has taken enough small steps they’re a mile from where they started. 

Psychological research has shown that this actually works: when you make a big ask first, you’re unlikely to get it, so the trick is to make a small ask (relatively easy), and then once people have agreed, they’re likely to agree to the next ask, which is bigger than the first, even if they wouldn’t have agreed to that big ask right off the bat:

Now that you know that indoctrination is a series of steps, let’s see how a new recruit goes through those steps.

1. Invitation to a non-threatening event

As we saw above, cult recruiters never give you the hard sell right off the bat, because no one would sign up for that.  Instead, they invite you to a workshop, a poetry reading, a "party", a performance, or some other seemingly innocuous event.  After you agree to that, they keep leading you down the rabbit hole one small step at a time, so you never realize what’s happening.

The invitation might incorporate some other tricks.  For example, famed ex-cult member Steve Hassan originally accepted the invitation from the Moonies because the Moonies used attractive young women as the recruiters.

2. Love-bombing

At the initial party or event, cult members shower the potential recruit with attention and praise.  Psychologists call this "love-bombing".  The cult people are trying to create a positive association in your mind between attending the event and having a good feeling.  So when you're invited to the next event, you'll be more likely to accept because of the good feeling they instilled in you on your first visit.

The love-bombing might continue for a while.  As one AR recruit later said, "Those first months, all my new friends from the AR Foundation were unusually kind to me....Little did I realize, that within a short time, I would cave in to their pressure to be outwardly expressive of a gratitude that I just didn't feel and they didn't deserve."  Another ex-member, commenting on that story, said, "You really got it right as you explained how warm and friendly everyone can seem when they’re in recruitment mode..."

3. Dangling “The Prize‚” front of you

At some point, cult members will suggest that if you join or study with them, you can attain something special, such as, depending on the cult, happiness (most cults), the answer's to the world's mysteries (Scientology), a "cure" for homosexuality (Aesthetic Realism), or fantastic wealth (various multi-level marketing groups).  This offer could come before, during, or after that initial event you were invited to, but it'll be there, because they need you to want something from them, otherwise they have no leverage over you.

At the event, the members will all seem very happy, and you'll probably be introduced to some "success stories", people whose lives have supposedly been totally turned around since joining the group, maybe either attaining the prize or being close to doing so.  Now, so these success stories say, they're finally really happy, or they understand how the world works, or they're no longer gay/alcoholic/whatever, or they've made lots and lots of money, etc.  You're supposed to look at them and imagine yourself attaining that same prize.

4. Extracting an agreement from you that you want the prize

After introducing the prize, they get you to agree that you want it.  This is actually pretty easy, because the prize is usually attractive (who wouldn't want it?), and because admitting your interest in it seems safe because you don't see any obligation attached.  The pitch might sound like any of these:

• "You do want to become financially independent, don't you?"
  
  
• "Wouldn't it be exciting to really know the secrets of the meaning of life?"
  
  
• "Would your life be better if you were no longer [gay/addicted to alcohol/etc.]?"
  
  
• "Is it one of your goals to find a way to truly help the world?"
  
  
• "What have you got to lose?  Isn't it worth [$x or y action] to find out whether this can really change your life?"

Once you agree, the cultists have sunk an important hook into you, and they'll use it.  By the way, notice some of the psychology here:  They don't tell you what you should want, they get you to articulate it.  They're trying to get you to feel that the idea came from you.  In the future, you'll be less likely to argue, because you'd feel like you'd be arguing with yourself.  Once you say what you feel out loud, that becomes part of your identity.  Unfortunately, that means you've taken the first big step into identifying with the cult.

5. Shutting down your dissent by threatening to withhold the prize

By this point, the sell becomes a little harder.  You'll be encouraged to do things that you might rather not, like devote more of your time to the group, start recruiting for them, pay for expensive programs or study materials, or adopt more extreme beliefs.  Naturally, you might resist.  But the cult leaders are ready for that.  When you show any resistance, they simply threaten you that you'll never attain the prize if you keep up that kind of attitude.

This tactic is shown quite plainly in the transcript of an Aesthetic Realism consultation.  The cult leaders shoot down the student's questions by suggesting that he's doomed to a life of homosexuality if he doesn't stop being "difficult".

Threatening to withhold the prize isn't the only way the leaders shoot down objections, though.  Notice that they used another one in the transcript above:  They say that anyone who questions the teachings is simply trying to feel superior.

Actress Sarah Fazeli relates how the Landmark leaders threatened her with not getting the prize when she raised an objection.  Early on she tried to get her money back, and the Landmark rep came back with, "Let’s talk about this. Why do you feel this way? What could you be resisting in your life? What if 'I want my money back' is just a story you are telling yourself?"

Sarah then talked to another rep, who said, "Sarah, can you honestly say you are where you want to be in your life?"  That's exactly out of the playbook.  He followed up with, "What is really going on here? What are you resisting?"  Resisting, trying to feel superior, whatever, it's just always turned around as a criticism ofthe questioner.  And then back to threatening non-attainment of the prize:  "I hear you, Sarah, but I want you to be open to the possibilities that lay ahead for you...."

But maybe the most direct example of holding back the prize was at the seminar that Sarah attended, when a leader chastised attendees for taking unauthorized bathroom breaks:  "You get up and take a break? Don’t blame me if come Sunday everyone else 'gets it' and you don’t. I can’t guarantee the transformation that will happen Sunday at 5pm unless you are here and present every second."

6. Establishment of guilt

Okay, so the recruit is in the door, and no longer asking difficult questions.  The next step is to make the recruit feel guilty.  Yale professor Robert Lifton called this shaming the establishment of guilt in the landmark book about the brainwashing of prisoners of war.  The prisoners had so successfully been made to feel guilty that they came to blame themselves for their own incarceration.

Cult leaders shame their recruits because that makes the recruits feel vulnerable and more susceptible to further manipulation.  It's also used to guilt-trip recruits into getting more involved with the group.  (For example, see this ex-member's story.)

For the already-indoctrinated, playing the shame game ensures that they remain committed to The Cause.   As one ex-AR member said:

Wow.

The Aesthetic Realists actually blew a third of a million dollars on a double-page ad in the New York Times to tell the world about AR, and in that ad they talked about their guilt for not having respected their cult enough:  "We ourselves, we say with shame, resented Eli Siegel and Aesthetic Realism because we respected them so much."  Another ex-member explains where that kind of thinking comes from:

An ex-member of the Zendik cult had this to say:  "For me, the creepiest element of Zendik Farm was the way that shame was used as a control mechanism...if the Zendiks didn’t like something about you, they could shame you into submission by making your private sh!t a matter of public disapproval."

7. Carrot/Stick

Behavior is reinforced by rewarding "good" behavior and punishing "bad" behavior.  Since we naturally seek to minimize pain, this is a pretty powerful tool.  An ex-member of Zendik explains this clearly:

8. Control of identity, information, environment

Once a recruit is firmly in, other techniques can be added to keep them in.  One of the most powerful is getting members to disassociate from the previous family and friends.  The #1 reason a member would leave is because a family member or friend gets them to snap out of it, which is exactly why cults try to sever members' ties with the outside world as soon as they can.  Similarly, they'll usually tell members that they can't trust the media, to get members to ignore any actual honest reporting that's critical of the group or its beliefs.  (Does that ring any bells in the current political climate?!)  Of course, no cult could get people to disassociate from family/friends and distrust the media right off the bat:  first they have to suck you in with the methods above, and then once you're committed to attaining the prize, then the apply the hard sell.

These techniques can work on anyone who's not prepared for them, no matter how intelligent they are.  Mind control is powerful stuff.  But now that you know how the recipe works, you're much more likely to be able to recognize if someone tries to use it on you.