Cult

===Secular anti-cult movement===
{{Main|Anti-cult movement}}
[[File:Anti-Aum Shinrikyo protest.JPG|thumb|An anti-[[Aum Shinrikyo]] protest in Japan, 2009]]
In the early 1970s, a [[Secularity|secular]] opposition movement to groups considered cults had taken shape. The organizations that formed the secular [[anti-cult movement]] (ACM) often acted on behalf of relatives of "cult" [[religious conversion|converts]] who did not believe their loved ones could have altered their lives so drastically by their own [[free will]]. A few [[psychologist]]s and [[Sociology|sociologists]] working in this field suggested that [[brainwashing]] techniques were used to maintain the loyalty of cult members.<ref name="refRichardsonIntrovigne">{{harvnb|Richardson|Introvigne|2001}}</ref> The belief that cults brainwashed their members became a unifying theme among cult critics and in the more extreme corners of the anti-cult movement techniques like the sometimes forceful "[[deprogramming]]" of cult members was practised.<ref name="ShupeEncy">{{cite book |chapter=Anti-Cult Movement |last=Shupe |first=Anson |year=1998 |page=27 |title=Encyclopedia of Religion and Society |editor=William H. Swatos Jr.|publisher=AltaMira |location=Walnut Creek, CA |isbn=978-0761989561}}</ref>

Secular cult opponents belonging to the anti-cult movement usually define a cult as a group that tends to manipulate, exploit, and control its members. Specific factors in cult behaviour are said to include manipulative and authoritarian [[mind control]] over members, [[Intentional community|communal]] and totalistic organization, aggressive [[proselytizing]], systematic programs of [[indoctrination]], and perpetuation in [[Middle class|middle-class]] communities.<ref>"[C]ertain manipulative and authoritarian groups which allegedly employ mind control and pose a threat to mental health are universally labeled cults. These groups are usually 1) authoritarian in their leadership; 2) communal and totalistic in their organization; 3) aggressive in their proselytizing; 4) systematic in their programs of indoctrination; 5) relatively new and unfamiliar in the United States; 6) middle class in their clientele" (Robbins and Anthony (1982:283), as qtd. in Richardson 1993:351).</ref><ref name="BromleyEncy">{{cite book |chapter=Brainwashing |last=Bromley |first=David G. |year=1998 |pages=61–62 |title=Encyclopedia of Religion and Society |editor=William H. Swatos Jr. |publisher=AltaMira |location=Walnut Creek, CA |isbn=978-0761989561}}</ref><ref>[[Eileen Barker|Barker, Eileen]]. 1989. ''New Religious Movements: A Practical Introduction''. London: [[Her Majesty's Stationery Office]].</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.csj.org/infoserv_cult101/checklis.htm |title=Characteristics Associated with Cultic Groups – Revised |last1=Janja |first1=Lalich |last2=Langone |first2=Michael |website=International_Cultic_Studies_Association |publisher=International Cultic Studies Association |access-date=23 May 2014 |archive-date=30 April 2007 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070430071731/http://www.csj.org/infoserv_cult101/checklis.htm |url-status=dead }}</ref><ref>[[Charles A. O'Reilly III|O'Reilly, Charles A.]], and [[Jennifer Chatman|Jennifer A. Chatman]]. 1996. "[http://faculty.haas.berkeley.edu/chatman/papers/30_CultureAsSocialControl.pdf Culture as Social Control: Corporations, Cults and Commitment]." ''[[Research in Organizational Behavior]]'' 18:157–200. {{ISBN|1559389389}}. Retrieved 6 June 2020.</ref> In the [[mass media]], and among average citizens, "cult" gained an increasingly negative connotation, becoming associated with things like [[kidnapping]], brainwashing, [[psychological abuse]], [[sexual abuse]] and other [[crime|criminal activity]], and [[mass suicide]]. While most of these negative qualities usually have real documented precedents in the activities of a very small minority of new religious groups, mass culture often extends them to any religious group viewed as culturally [[Deviance (sociology)|deviant]], however peaceful or law abiding it may be.<ref>Wright, Stewart A. 1997. "Media Coverage of Unconventional Religion: Any 'Good News' for Minority Faiths?" ''[[Review of Religious Research]]'' 39(2):101–115. {{doi|10.2307/3512176}}. {{JSTOR|3512176}}.</ref><ref>van Driel, Barend, and J. Richardson. 1988. "Cult versus sect: Categorization of new religions in American print media." ''Sociological Analysis'' 49(2):171–183. {{doi|10.2307/3711011}}. {{JSTOR|3711011}}.</ref><ref name=":2">Hill, Harvey, John Hickman, and Joel McLendon. 2001. "Cults and Sects and Doomsday Groups, Oh My: Media Treatment of Religion on the Eve of the Millennium." ''[[Review of Religious Research]]'' 43(1):24–38. {{doi|10.2307/3512241}}. {{JSTOR|3512241}}.</ref><ref name="Richardson" />{{Rp|348–356}}

While some psychologists were receptive to these theories, sociologists were for the most part sceptical of their ability to explain conversion to [[New religious movement|NRMs]].<ref name="BarkerAReview">{{cite journal |author=Barker, Eileen |year=1986 |title=Religious Movements: Cult and Anti-Cult Since Jonestown |journal=Annual Review of Sociology |volume=12 |pages=329–346 |doi=10.1146/annurev.so.12.080186.001553}}</ref> In the late 1980s, psychologists and sociologists started to abandon theories like brainwashing and mind control. While scholars may believe that various less dramatic [[coercion|coercive]] psychological mechanisms could influence group members, they came to see conversion to new religious movements principally as an act of a [[Rational choice theory|rational choice]].<ref name="Ayella">{{cite journal |doi=10.1177/0002764290033005005 |author=Ayella, Marybeth |year=1990 |title=They Must Be Crazy: Some of the Difficulties in Researching 'Cults' |journal=American Behavioral Scientist |volume=33 |issue=5 |pages=562–577|s2cid=144181163}}</ref><ref>[[#Cowan2003|Cowan]], 2003 ix</ref>
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