Steve Hassan: Spotting a Cult, Hidden Hypnotism & Indoctrination in the Digital Age
Mayim Bialik's Breakdown
Mayim Bialik
4.8 • 5.9K Ratings
🗓️ 17 June 2021
⏱️ 85 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Steve Hassan, world-renowned mental health professional and cult & undue influence expert, breaks down classic cult tactics and how those techniques have evolved into the digital age. He details his own indoctrination into the Unification Church of Sun Myung Moon, his subsequent moment of realization that he was a cult member, and his intense deprogramming experience. Mayim and Steve discuss 21st century sects like Scientology, NXIVM, and QAnon, and how cult ideologies may have led to the Capitol insurrection in January of 2021. They explore ways to identify cults and abusers through their authoritarian features and methods they use, such as disorientation, "love bombing", social-psychological compliance, covert hypnotism, neuro-linguistic programming, and deep fakes. Hassan emphasizes media literacy in order to avoid these organizations and provides tips on how to engage with a loved one involved in a cult. Mayim and Jonathan discuss society's servitude to technology and debate about potential solutions.
Steve Hassan's Website: https://freedomofmind.com/
Steve Hassan's Books: https://www.amazon.com/Steven-Hassan/e/B000APQYV4/
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | I got really angry and I said I don't care of Moon as like Hitler. |
| 0:06.8 | I chose him to follow him and I'll follow him to the end. |
| 0:10.6 | Then it got caught up to me and this chill went down my spine. |
| 0:16.2 | That was a big shift that I reacted that way. |
| 0:20.5 | Hi, I'm Miami Ollik and welcome to my breakdown. |
| 0:23.5 | This is the place where we break things down so you don't have to. |
| 0:26.6 | It's Miami Ollik's breakdown. |
| 0:29.8 | She's going to break it down for you because you know she knows a thing or two. |
| 0:34.9 | And now she's going to break down. |
| 0:37.6 | It's a breakdown. |
| 0:38.8 | She's going to break it down. |
| 0:40.4 | And boy are you going to be glad that we are breaking things down today so you don't |
| 0:44.4 | have to. |
| 0:45.8 | Today we're going to be breaking down cults and the mental shifts that occur when you |
| 0:54.2 | are indoctrinated into an authoritarian way of thinking. |
| 0:57.9 | We cover cults with Steve Hassan, a former member of a cult who was deprogrammed in the 70s |
| 1:05.0 | and then became a deprogrammer. |
| 1:07.1 | He's a world-renowned expert on undue influence and cults and boy we talk about everything |
| 1:12.4 | from I mean the cult that he was in to QAnon, to Nexium, to Trump. |
| 1:18.8 | It's a really really it's a great episode and I mean I think they're all pretty great. |
| 1:24.1 | Steve and I have a very similar speech pattern which I tried to rein in. |
| 1:28.2 | It's actually our second time speaking to him because the first time he and I just kept |
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