Conditioning and vulnerability to cults.

Many people who fall prey to high control groups— many of which we would call “cults”— were conditioned to do so by their families and churches growing up. 

Vulnerability to coercive control has nothing to do with intelligence. 

It has a LOT to do with what we’ve been primed to believe and respond to. 

When we’re kids, we do not have the psychological skills or tools to evaluate claims made by the adults around us. 

When we’re kids, we instinctively seek out interpersonal safety— and that, more often than not, means fitting in with the group around us as best we can. 

We don’t know what’s “true” or “real”— but we do know what we’re “supposed” to do and say in order to fit in with our family or church. 

In certain families and churches, we learn that, in order to be relatively “safe,” we need to keep questions or criticisms to ourselves. 

In certain families and churches, we are taught that to question the adults who hold positions of authority is “sinful.” 

The mythology of many religious traditions specifically include stories about how spiritual luminaries believed their creed without question, doubt, or hesitation— and we are strongly encouraged to follow their example. 

We get this message again and again, implicitly and explicitly. We get that message so often that many people reading this know exactly the stories I’m talking about— they’re so familiar to us that they’re just part of our cultural fabric. 

All of it amounts to years of conditioning. Every day, our ideas about what “truth” looks and feels like, what “leadership” looks and feels like, what “loyalty” looks and feels like, got conditioned. 

Then there was all the conditioning we got at home— much of which reinforced and was reinforced by what we were taught at church. 

We were explicitly taught to honor and obey the “leaders” of our household— our parents or caretakers. 

In certain families, there were consequences for not honoring and obeying them— such that we developed a reflexive habit of suppressing doubts and questions. 

Fast forward to adulthood— it’s not like all that conditioning just goes away. 

There is a myth that vulnerability to high control groups or cults has something to do with some sort of psychological “weakness”— but I don’t agree with that. 

High control groups and cults certainly do prey on people who are wounded— but I think the biggest vulnerability to coercive control now, is having been raised in a form of a high control group growing up. 

Our early conditioning impacts what we understand to be appropriate in communal or spiritual contexts. 

Our early conditioning impacts what we understand to be appropriate behavior from spiritual or organizational leaders. 

Our early conditioning impacts what we understand to be “loyal” or “disloyal” behavior. 

And our early conditioning impacts our ability and inclination to leave a group when we’re no longer in sync with its message or goals. 

I’m not saying that everyone who grew up in a heavy handed familial or spiritual environment will go on to become involved in a cult. 

But I AM saying that lots more people are lots more vulnerable to cults and other high control groups than we realize.

It’s also worth noting that not every cult or high control group is spiritual in focus— but our early exposure to high control families and churches absolutely makes us more vulnerable to political and ideological cults as adults as well. 

It is not about intelligence. It is not about “strength” or “weakness.” 

It is about programming, priming, and conditioning. 

People who get swept up in cults or high control groups are victims— not just of the group they get involved with, but of their early conditioning as well.