By Monica Velin Rodriguez
Stories are powerful. Two weeks ago, on July 2, I was sitting on an aeroplane headed to the annual conference of the International Cultic Studies Association (ICSA). A local Minnesota philanthropist saw the stories my husband and I had shared on the Stop Mandated Shunning website. He was so moved that he wanted to support the cause. He said, “You’re going to help a lot of people, and I’m buying plane tickets for you to attend the conference.” What altruism! I was determined to make the most of this trip.
As a recent defector from a high-control group (Jehovah’s Witnesses), I was familiar with attending annual conventions, wearing a badge and sitting for hours. How would this compare?
Well… it was very different!
The 4-day program included one day of workshops and 3 days of presentations. Speakers travelled to Barcelona from as far as Japan and New Zealand. There were presenters and attendees from Romania, the UK, Belgium, Iceland, Canada, the USA, Spain, Austria, and more. Presentation titles were tantalizing:
- Coercive Control: It’s All About the Impacts
- “You’ll See It — When You Believe It”: The Importance of Belief in Cult Recruitment
- Exorcism, Deliverance, and the Cultivation of Fear in Christian Cultic Groups
- The Legal Landscape of Extreme Persuasion
- Route Planning for Defectors
- Building Bridges: How to Talk to Conspiracy Believers
- A Cult in the Home: Coercive Control of Children
The presentation from the Japanese delegates was especially fascinating. They revealed the drastic change that took place in public attitudes toward cult-like groups in Japan after the assassination of the former Prime Minister, Shinzo Abe. The assassin was a person severely harmed by his mother’s coercive affiliation with the Unification Church (a.k.a. “The Moonies”), which led to poverty and suffering of 2nd-generation members.
Also ground-breaking was the presentation by Spanish attorney Carlos Bardavío Antón, who made headlines early in 2024 after successfully defending AEVTJ (Spanish Association of Victims of Jehovah’s Witnesses) when they were sued for creating a support group for current and former members. Bardavio’s firm also achieved the first formal admission of manipulation by a cult leader, Lama Losel. This established a legal precedent for “coercive control” in Spain.
I was struck by how all these people from diverse backgrounds and varied perspectives were able to come together and exchange information in a respectful and open setting. The lack of rules was somewhat disconcerting: no dress code; no limited list of hotels we were allowed to stay at; no instructions on when we must wear our label badge or when we must sit, stand, or clap. There were even some (gasp!) women organizers. I could go on and on. These people were fully functioning, independent adults, who simply chose to come together due to a shared interest in research, learning and the desire to make the world a more compassionate and self-empowering place.
On Friday evening, I was able to do my personal interview for the new research project on mandated shunning. I was given a detailed explanation of the project and signed the consent form. I learned that any personally identifiable details of my story would be changed in the final report so as to maintain privacy. I appreciated the professionalism and respect.
Finally, on Saturday, there was the presentation my husband and I were especially waiting for—the announcement of the new research project to analyze the psychological and societal harms of “mandated shunning”. Drs. Savin Bapir-Tardy and Windy Grendele of the University of Roehampton, London, explained the history of ostracism rooted in ancient Greece. They detailed how the practice has evolved and is still used today to punish and isolate non-compliant members in certain groups and communities. A low estimate is that 40 million people in the world have suffered from this practice, but experts believe the number is under-reported and actually much higher.
Statistics and historical facts are one thing. Lived experience is another. In the second half of the presentation, Patrick Haeck of Stop Mandated Shunning and the Open Minds Foundation (Belgium) interviewed survivors of mandated shunning, including Eydís Mary Jónsdóttir (Iceland) and Jackie Johnson (USA, Executive Director of ICSA). As they spoke, we the audience were drawn into their stories. You could’ve heard a pin drop. I’m pretty sure I held my breath. Afterwards, everyone on the Stop Mandated Shunning team heard the same thing from other attendees. These were professionals—people who already knew about coercive control, people who had travelled to another city or country and paid to attend this conference—and yet these people were all saying the same thing: “I didn’t really get it until I heard the personal stories.”
Stories are important. Through them, we connect, relate, remember and understand. Please tell your mandated shunning story.