In 1974, I sat with my fellow Moonies at a rented NYC theatre, watching The Exorcist movie. Afterward, we all went to Tarrytown, where Sun Myung Moon, the man I was programmed to believe was the “Messiah” told us, “God made this movie. This movie is a prophecy of what will happen if you leave the Unification Church!” It was that evening that I experienced extremely effective phobia programming, and I was afraid to think any “negative” thoughts again for fear of demon possession.
Psychological bars, not metal prison bars, were keeping me a fanatical member of the Moon cult. However, I could not imagine walking out and leaving the cult and being happy and fulfilled. It wasn’t until my near-fatal van crash and deprogramming that I could realize that if Moon wasn’t the Messiah, then his prophecy was empty, and that three of my deprogrammers were ex-Moonies, spiritual and happy to be free.
It is nearly fifty years later, and I still hear similar stories from former cult members and trafficking survivors.
“I could have left at any time… but I genuinely believed something terrible would happen if I did.”
The Context of Coercion
Several decades later, in my doctoral research on undue influence and human trafficking, I highlighted that under U.S. federal law, human trafficking is defined by the use of force, fraud, or coercion to enslave a person. This definition applies to both sex trafficking and labor trafficking. I want to focus on the last word, ‘coercion,’ today. This specific definition is crucial, as it enables prosecutors to use coercion as evidence of undue influence.
Crucially, the legal meaning of coercion here goes beyond physical violence. You do not need to physically detain or explicitly threaten someone with violence to have coerced them into trafficking. Federal anti-trafficking statutes explicitly include tactics like psychological manipulation, document confiscation, and use of shame under the umbrella of coercion. In other words, U.S. law acknowledges that you can enslave someone by breaking their will to leave or escape. We see similar examples of this all too often in abusive romantic relationships, where it may take several attempts for a victim to leave.
This intersection of trafficking and psychological influence was at the heart of my dissertation, and it continues to drive my work. It’s one reason I recently rebranded my podcast to Cults, Culture, & Coercion. I specifically want to focus on that last word because the public often misunderstands it. Many people still hear coercion and imagine a situation involving violent threats or physical force. There is no doubt that coercion can involve direct force or intimidation; however, coercion encompasses a far broader spectrum of tactics.
Clarifying Coercion Beyond the Physical Scope
As previously mentioned, coercion is often narrowly associated with overt threats of harm. Classic examples include “holding a gun to someone’s head,” which has become colloquial shorthand for any extreme coercion. In this straightforward sense, coercion means “Do what I want you to do, or you will suffer.” It’s intimidation.
However, it would be a mistake to assume that physical force or explicit threats are the only forms of coercion. The U.S. Office on Trafficking in Persons, for instance, defines coercion broadly to include psychological manipulation.
For instance, gaslighting, where a person or group repeatedly tells someone that their memory or perception is wrong, can lead a person to doubt their own judgment and depend on the abuser’s version of reality. Non-physical coercion can take many other forms. Coercion via guilt and fear, for instance, can present as threatening suicide in an attempt to control a partner’s actions. Threatening someone’s social standing or economic stability is also a powerful form of coercion.
These non-physical acts of coercion all do the same thing. They rob an individual of free choice by invoking some negative consequence if they resist. So, when we talk about cults, authoritarian abuse, or trafficking, coercion should not be seen only as explicit threats of violence or death. At its core, coercion is about instilling terror, helplessness, or false beliefs so that the person feels they have to comply.
Psychological Coercion in Cults
Cults excel at psychological and emotional coercion. This abuse can often be more complex to recognize than brute force, but it is every bit as effective in controlling people. These tactics are used not only in cults but in any coercive relationship, from one-on-one domestic abuse to traffickers grooming their victims.
A common thread among cult leaders and controllers is the reconstruction of reality, identity, and autobiographical memory of their followers. Cult leaders may deny things they previously said or did, accuse members of “misremembering,” or claim that any doubts are proof of the follower’s own sin or insanity. Over time, this erodes the person’s confidence in their own mind, causing the victim to distrust their perceptions and to rely on the leader’s truth. For example, if a member recalls the leader breaking a promise, the leader might berate them for even thinking such a negative thought or attribute it to trust issues. A typical example of this in relationships occurs in the context of infidelity. A partner may confront their cheating partner with strong evidence, only to be accused of not having “trust” or being abusive themselves. By sowing confusion and doubt, the controller actively seeks to control the narrative and solidify the version of events that suits their own interests.
One nearly universal cult tactic is what I call phobia indoctrination. This involves implanting irrational fears to keep you in line. Members are bombarded with terrifying stories of what will happen if they ever leave or even question the group or person.
“You won’t be able to survive without my help.”
“Anyone who leaves this group will go into psychosis.”
“Those who betray the guru are cursed for life and often die horrible deaths.”
Currently, there are tens of millions of people in churches and Mega-churches with individuals claiming to be an Apostle or a Prophet. These people believe this person speaks to God and has the power to cast out demons and do faith healings. People under the control of such an authoritarian group can’t just leave and join another church. They can’t question the leader
These kinds of threats may sound absurd to outsiders or those who have never been involved in a cult situation themselves, but these sorts of threats are both potent and highly effective when controlling group members. The net effect is that leaving the group or disobeying the leader comes to equal certain doom in the person’s mind. Members genuinely believe the only safe place is inside the group. Thus, without ever physically threatening anyone, the controller has effectively created a jail cell with an open door that has a long list of negative imagined consequences for those who exit.
One especially pernicious aspect is that few people understand that talk phobia indoctrination is a control tactic. People understand coercion in a generic sense, but they often don’t realize that many cults quite literally give people phobias. It is unacceptable to look past the fact that many of these organizations are effectively installing a mental illness in the person’s mind. This is a form of psychological enslavement that involves a spectrum of manipulative tactics that override a person’s free will and critical thinking, without needing to resort to physical force.
A Broader Lens on Coercion
Notably, the BITE Model inherently includes the classic trafficking criteria of force, fraud, and coercion. Trafficking experts and law enforcement have found the model to be helpful, and they’ve integrated it into their training and practice. For example, trafficking survivors Rachel Thomas, Carissa Phelps, and I developed Ending the Game. It is a ten-session program taught by women trafficking survivors to help others understand the pimp and trafficker mind control. Anti-trafficking advocates utilize my Influence Continuum and the BITE Model of Authoritarian Control. Law professor Robin Boyle-Laisure wrote an analysis showing how sex traffickers exert control in a manner very much like cult leaders using the BITE Model as a framework. The FBI’s Law Enforcement Bulletin published an article titled A Victim-Centered Approach to Sex Trafficking Cases in which the BITE Model is used to help explain the methods of control used to recruit and indoctrinate individuals into slavery. All these trends indicate that experts are increasingly recognizing coercion as a multifaceted process.
Coercive Control Is Illegal In The Uk And Other Places
You might be thinking that if psychological coercion is so destructive, the law has effective mechanisms to both recognize and punish it. The answer is yes and no. We are making progress, but there are still significant limitations in the legal concept of coercive control.
The term coercive control gained prominence primarily through the work of forensic sociologist Dr. Evan Stark, who in 2007 described how some domestic abusers don’t commit isolated assaults, but instead impose a regime of domination over every aspect of their partner’s life. Stark defined coercive control as a pattern in which coercion is combined with pervasive control to create a “condition of unfreedom” for the victim. In a later paper, he notably points out that those experiencing high levels of interpersonal control often do not experience violence or violent threats, despite reporting high levels of fear. His work was groundbreaking, and it led jurisdictions like England and Wales to criminalize coercive control as a form of domestic abuse.
However, even Stark has pointed out that applying this concept in law has challenges. Stark himself emphasized that coercive control is about the intent and pattern of domination, regardless of the means used. In practice, however, courts often struggle with how to prove and measure this type of abuse. There’s usually a bias to look for physical violence as evidence of seriousness, whereas subtler psychological subjugation might be dismissed as “relationship drama” or, worse, mistaken as consent.
A recent high-profile example illustrates the gap. In 2025, Sean “Diddy” Combs was tried in New York on federal charges, including sex trafficking by force, fraud, or coercion. During the trial, the prosecution presented evidence of an extended pattern of domination over his girlfriend. There were threats to expose intimate videos, career sabotage, financial control, and psychological manipulation. Yet the jury ended up acquitting Combs on the sex trafficking and racketeering charges, convicting him only on a lesser charge. Why? Lawyers argued that the jury concluded that “Combs did not use force or coercion on his victims.” The jurors, like much of the public, may have had a very narrow mental model of coercion. I wonder if subtle forms of psychological terror and entrapment didn’t register as “coercion” to them, or at least not beyond a reasonable doubt.
The Diddy verdict was disheartening. Observers outside the courtroom have jeered and tried to brush off his behavior as “kinky fun,” completely distorting the reality of the abuse. The truth is, Cassie says her “compliance” in organizing lurid parties and staying in that relationship for years was the product of sustained coercive control that distorted her ability to consent freely. There was no single dramatic moment to point to.
Another limitation of the legal approach to coercive control is that it focuses on intimate partner relationships and does not take into account social environments like religious cults, political cults, therapy cults, trafficking, and more. Some countries, like France or Australia, have begun expanding these ideas, but there’s a lag among legal scholars. Even the term “coercive control” itself, while useful, might not explicitly include things like cult indoctrination techniques, hypnosis, or spiritual exploitation.
This is why I continue to conduct scientific research using a free, anonymous survey at bitemodel.com, where individuals can answer questions and receive a score on the Influence Continuum, indicating the healthiness or unhealthiness of the relationship or group. Much more research and development must be done to collect data and refine the model. Then, publication in peer-reviewed journals will help educate people around the world.
In fact, one of my aims is to help create legal standards that enable Judges and juries to evaluate undue influence in a structured manner, taking into account all the elements at play. When you present the holistic pattern of coercion showing that a victim’s entire identity, social circle, finances, and worldview were controlled by the perpetrator, juries can more clearly plot and observe the coordinated program of domination.
It’s heartening that the concept of undue influence is gaining traction in more legal contexts, such as California’s law on elder abuse, which explicitly defines undue influence. And trafficking laws do encompass psychological coercion. We just need the cultural zeitgeist to catch up with the reality that non-physical coercion is just as severe. If a reasonable person on a jury recognizes threats and intimidation but not the gradual mental conditioning aspect, they risk missing a large part of how authoritarian abuse operates.
Bridging the Gap and Promoting Justice
When discussing coercion, I want to bridge my academic focus on trafficking with my public work on cults and coercion. I want readers to know that whether a pimp is grooming a teenager or a cult guru is indoctrinating a recruit, the methods of force, fraud, and coercion can look remarkably similar.
In both cases, the perpetrator systematically breaks down the victim’s autonomy to the point where the victim is acting against their own interests while believing they “chose” it. Recognizing cults and extremist groups as utilizing trafficking methods and vice versa can open new avenues for legal and social intervention and justice.
Ultimately, society must realize that if we see someone working for free, terrified, with the imposed belief that leaving will have serious consequences, then we should recognize that we’re looking at coercive control, not a freely chosen lifestyle. We might respond with more urgency and compassion, rather than just saying “Well, they joined voluntarily.”
Let us consider the following example. The twenty-something-year-old smiling young woman on the street, handing out pamphlets, is paralyzed by fear of not meeting her recruitment quota. She will be forced to endure ground humiliation sessions if she doesn’t. She does not leave because she believes she is saving the world, and she thinks she is personally responsible for the souls of each person she does not save. She does not walk away. Someone of the same mindset recruited her. She doesn’t know that the person has since left, since she isn’t allowed to talk to non-members. She is kept so busy that she doesn’t even notice, nor is she paid for her full-time work.
Nobody is putting a gun to her head and telling her to stay, yet she is not free.
By broadening our understanding of coercion, we empower ourselves to identify abuse that might otherwise slip by. We stop asking “Why didn’t they just leave?” and start asking “What invisible forces were at work in their mind?”
I firmly believe that without information and tools to “reality-test,” free will is stifled. If you’ve been deceived, deliberately kept ignorant, terrorized with phobias, and emotionally blackmailed, how can any choices you make truly be called “free”?
Something that breaks my heart is that many victims describe this experience as “mind rape,” independent of ever talking to another victim or hearing this term. This should emphasize how severe and violating this experience is. Ultimately, whether we use terms like undue influence, brainwashing, thought reform, coercive control, or trafficking by fraud and coercion, the essential issue is the same. As I often say, undue influencers want to tell us what to think, not how to think. They impose their reality and strip us of our agency. But armed appropriately, we can push for laws that recognize this phenomenon.
The human mind, when freed from forces described in the BITE Model of Authoritarian Control, is extraordinarily resilient. People can and do rediscover their authentic selves. I hope that by understanding coercion in all its forms, we not only help survivors recover but also prevent future instances of abuse. An informed society is much harder to brainwash or control.
Want to help advance the science on undue influence?
If you’ve spent time in a high-control relationship, group, or organization, you can contribute to ongoing research by taking a free, anonymous, two-part survey at BiteModel.com. I am also seeking responses from those who have spent time in healthy groups! Thank you so much for your participation.
After your participation, you will be able to view your score and measure how authoritarian your relationship or group is according to our scale. It will also contribute to valuable academic research I am conducting as a Fielding Fellow.
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Resources and Further Reading
Breaking the Chains: The Role of Mind Control in Human Trafficking with Rebecca Bender
Human Trafficking: Learn to Recognize the Signs and Help Save a Life
"However, even Stark has pointed out that applying this concept in law has challenges. Stark himself emphasized that coercive control is about the intent and pattern of domination, regardless of the means used. In practice, however, courts often struggle with how to prove and measure this type of abuse. There’s usually a bias to look for physical violence as evidence of seriousness, whereas subtler psychological subjugation might be dismissed as “relationship drama” or, worse, mistaken as consent." My fellow attorney and I scoured case law to see if there was any recognition of the actual coercion involved within cults. We found the aforementioned excuses, justifications, and escape routes to dealing with the reality of cult control. But law and psychology do not play well together. Having defended murderers, rapists, and other individuals whose acts might have been based on mental issues, I can attest to this inability for the two disciplines to arrive at the center of any Venn diagram. I can also attest to the fact that the legal system has not yet decided whether it exists to punish or rehabilitate, and does both poorly.
My husband and I have differing views on religion and spirituality. Namely, he says it’s silly to think that if you just light this candle on this day, say this prayer at this time, or take a series of steps in a particular order that you’ll see a certain result.
He does work two jobs, though, and he has done since he was a teenager because he also believes that once you turn 18, you move out of your childhood home. Once you get a job, you start building credit. Once you’ve gotten established at work, you start investing in your retirement and saving a little from each check. Once you’ve worked somewhere long enough, you have a conversation about a raise and promotion. Once you have enough saved up, you put a down payment on a house and get a great interest rate because your credit is perfect, and once you reach a certain age, you retire and live off the money you spent your life putting away. Then you die, I guess?
He was raised in a Catholic household, and I am baffled that he doesn’t see how his mind still carries the architecture of religion, and corporations just hijacked it to use him for his labor and purchasing power.