Combating Cult Mind Control: The Guide to Protection, Rescue and Recovery from Destructive Cults

by Steven Hassan

No Way Out In a destructive cult, there is never a legitimate reason for leaving. Unlike healthy organizations, which recognize a person’s inherent right to choose to move on, mind control groups make it very clear that there is no legitimate way to leave. Members are told that the only reasons that people leave are weakness, insanity, temptation, brainwashing (by deprogrammers), pride, sin, and so on. Members are thoroughly indoctrinated with the belief that if they ever do leave, terrible consequences will befall them, their family and/or humanity. Although cult members will often say, “Show me a better way and I will quit,” they are not allowed the time or given the mental tools to balance the evidence for themselves. They are locked in a psychological prison. This belief—that there is no way to leave and still be fulfilled and be a good person—is at the heart of Lifton’s eighth criterion, “Dispensing of Existence”