Let's Talk About Sects

In January 2018, Avi started seeing a new psychologist in Melbourne, Australia. She'd experienced childhood trauma, and wanted to get some help with managing panic attacks. The registered psychologist she found seemed to be a great fit. But a couple of months into the 2020 lockdowns, Avi realised that her life had become completely entwined with her psychologist’s. Over time, Avi came to understan...

Samael Aun Weor claimed that he could remember his own birth, and had identified the only true path to spiritual development. Crucial to his religion was a sexual practice that involved couples never reaching orgasm. Though many who follow his belief system understand sickness to be a result of one’s own karma, their master died of stomach cancer in 1977. He claimed that when he died, he would be...

Sarah Edmondson is an actor, voice over artist and activist who spent 12 years in NXIVM , rising from student to coach to eventually running her own center in Vancouver, Canada. After becoming involved with its secret society, DOS, she managed to escape and alongside her husband Anthony ‘Nippy’ Ames, became a whistleblower on the cult and worked with the FBI to expose Keith Raniere’s crimes. Today...

Sarah Steel's debut book Do As I Say is published by Pan Macmillan Australia, and out on 28 June 2022. It will be available in audiobook , ebook and paperback . This is chapter 1, read by Sarah for the audiobook release. "In times of uncertainty when you long for simple answers and have a deep desire for community, you can find yourself incrementally handing over your agency to a charismatic but a...

Lisa Kendall spent the ages of 9-19 in The Move of God, Sam Fife's Apocalyptic cult. Today, she devotes her time to working on policy changes that will help former cult members and children in high-demand organisations. For this bonus episode she speaks about her work with Counter Cult Coalition, the organisation she founded alongside spiritual abuse expert Kent Burtner. From its Facebook page : “...

KwaSizabantu means “the place where people are helped” in Zulu. Erika Bornman spent most of her childhood years at the KwaSizabantu Mission. Her memoir Mission of Malice is about her childhood, and about her life since leaving. It’s an incredible read.   Daniel Schricker is a composer and writer based in Adelaide, South Australia. He also spent his childhood and teenage years in KwaSizabantu,...

David Freeman was handed over to Anne Hamilton Byrne at the age of two, when he went to live with the other children at The Family’s Lake Eildon property. It took 12 years before he was rescued by the police, and given his freedom. At 15, he vowed not to tell anyone about his childhood in the notorious Victorian cult, and it was a promise he kept for 25 years.   Guest: David Freeman   Fu...

Gloriavale Christian Community is recognised around New Zealand for the distinctive dress of its members, especially the women, who wear headscarves to denote submission to men, and a neck-to-ankle garment designed by the group’s Australian founder, Neville Cooper. Some say the community represents a pious life set up around ideals of sharing everything, but others say the way it’s set up is breed...

Gloriavale Christian Community has found itself in the New Zealand media headlines on multiple occasions. Its founder was once jailed for sexual abuse, but community members were convinced that it he was jailed for preaching the gospel. Followers claim that their way of life is all about the common good and nobody having more than anyone else. Former members say their time there was dominated by e...

Violet Pryor told her followers that she was God. They gave up their money and possessions to keep her in comfort. David Ayliffe became one of her key Pillars, a right-hand man. After her death, he became the leader of the cult she had created in Sydney, Australia – the Zion Full Salvation Ministry.   Guest: David Ayliffe   Full research sources listed here . You can support us on P...

As he was about to turn 17, Remy Attig was keen to get away from his parents’ fracturing marriage, and ready for something to give his life purpose. The Master’s Commission program seemed like just the thing to set him up for a life of travel and spreading the word of God. Instead, it ran him ragged, instilled fear, built on his internalised homophobia, and set him up for unhealthy relationships a...

Lindy Jacomb was born into the Exclusive Brethren in Auckland, New Zealand, and was told there was no longer a place for her there in 2008. Her family cut off all communication with her and she was forced to start a new life at the age of 20, without any of the people she knew and loved.   Guests: Lindy Jacomb and Michael Bachelard   Full research sources listed here . You can support us...

Lindy Jacomb was born into the Exclusive Brethren in Auckland, New Zealand, and was told there was no longer a place for her there in 2008. Her family cut off all communication with her and she was forced to start a new life at the age of 20, without any of the people she knew and loved.   Guests: Lindy Jacomb and Michael Bachelard   Full research sources listed here . You can support us...

As a disaffected youth, Shannon Bundock was drawn to progressive ideas. In her late teens she moved into the city, to a poor neighbourhood in Vancouver, Canada, where she became hyper aware of the inequality all around her. The activists who were trying to do something about this in the early 2000s ignited her passion for radical politics. At 19, Shannon was ready to dedicate herself wholeheartedl...

Natasha Tiku wrote for Gawker in 2013, “Everyone is interested in doing fun things with their bodies. But the impulse to systematize, replicate, package, sell, and build an ideology around it is uniquely Silicon Valley.” She was writing about an organisation that was monetising the female orgasm. And they weren’t the only ones doing so.   Guests: Christine Talbott Acosta, Ruwan Meepagala, Sas...

Natasha Tiku wrote for Gawker in 2013, “Everyone is interested in doing fun things with their bodies. But the impulse to systematize, replicate, package, sell, and build an ideology around it is uniquely Silicon Valley.” She was writing about an organisation that was monetising the female orgasm. And they weren’t the only ones doing so.   Guests: Christine Talbott Acosta, Ruwan Meepagala, Sas...

Laura McConnell was born into a fundamentalist Christian sect that claims it has no name. Former member Elizabeth Coleman told Nathan Jolly for news.com.au earlier this year that, “It is of utmost importance to them that they do not have an official name or headquarters or centrally identifiable presence anywhere on earth.”   From his investigative reporting in 2013, journalist Chris Johnston...

Helen Zuman describes herself as “a tree-hugging dirt worshipper devoted to turning waste into food and the stinky guck of experience into fertile, fragrant prose.” Her memoir ‘Mating in Captivity’ details her experiences joining Zendik Farm, a commune in North Carolina with the motto ‘Stop Bitching, Start a Revolution’, which she came across in 1999. Helen stayed until 2004, but it wasn’t until t...

Journalist A.M. Gittlitz released his book I Want to Believe: Posadism, UFOs and Apocalypse Communism earlier this year. In it, he explores the fascinating world of the Posadists – a Latin American Trotskyist group who are best known today for their zany beliefs around extra-terrestrial and dolphin intelligence. But their movement had a lot more to it than this, and in its later days would devolve...

The Children of God, later known as The Family, became notorious for their practise called “flirty fishing”. They believed in bringing up their children to have no inhibitions around sex, but the ramifications of their approach to this would echo through the generations as trauma, and result in a shocking murder-suicide committed by the very son prophesied as the Prince who would lead them through...

The Children of God, later known as The Family, became notorious for their practise called “flirty fishing”. They believed in bringing up their children to have no inhibitions around sex, but the ramifications of their approach to this would echo through the generations as trauma, and result in a shocking murder-suicide committed by the very son prophesied as the Prince who would lead them through...

John Robert Stevens wrote when he was just 14 years old: “My joy must be in doing His will, in being His slave, in the confidence that whatever comes to me, when following Him, is His doing. In a real sense, I make Him responsible for my life.” He was writing about Jesus Christ, but it would turn out in the decades following that he could well have been writing to his future devotees as to how the...

In 1996, journalist Madeleine Bunting wrote for The Guardian UK: “Most of the 130,000 Buddhists in this country are in the caring professions, or are academics, or are part of an ex-hippy culture; they are trusting, idealistic and naive. They thought Buddhism was immune to the fanaticism and hypocrisy which riddles all religions. The controversy surrounding the NKT is shattering illusions that Bud...

Hare Krishnas are often seen as joyous, harmless people, dancing their way through the streets, chanting to bells in their colourful robes. But in one particular Australian offshoot, a young woman named Lina told me about her not-so-harmless experiences.   Full research sources listed here . You can support us on Patreon or Acast+ , with a one-off donation , or grab some merch . Sarah Steel's...

WANTED: families to volunteer to live for six months in the Australian outback “to advance the frontiers of social science.” Be part of a cutting edge research project to test the ideal human environment.   In a country known for a population that loves to travel, the write-ups appealed to plenty of adventurous spirits. Little did they know the reality of what they would be getting themselves...