Psychedelics as Tools for Belief Transmission. Set, Setting, Suggestibility, and Persuasion in the Ritual Use of Hallucinogens.

The use of psychedelics in the collective rituals of numerous indigenous groups suggests that these substances are powerful catalysts of social affiliation, enculturation, and belief transmission. This feature has recently been highlighted as part of the renewed interest in psychedelics in Euro-American societies, and seen as a previously underestimated vector of their therapeutic properties. The property of psychedelics to increase feelings of collective belonging and transmission of specific cultural values or beliefs raise, however, complex ethical questions in the context of the globalization of these substances. In the past decades, this property has been perceived as problematic by anticult movements and public authorities of some European countries, claiming that these substances could be used for "mental manipulation." Despite the fact that this notion has been widely criticized by the scientific community, alternative perspectives on how psychedelic experience supports enculturation and social affiliation have been yet little explored. Beyond the political issues that underlie it, the re-emergence of the concept of "psychedelic brainwashing" can then be read as the consequence of the fact that the dynamic through which psychedelic experience supports persuasion is still poorly understood. Beyond the unscientific and politically controversed notion of brainwashing, how to think the role of psychedelics in the dynamics of transmission of belief and its ethical stakes? Drawing on data collected in a shamanic center in the Peruvian Amazon, this article addresses this question through an ethnographic case-study. Proposing the state of hypersuggestibility induced by psychedelics as the main factor making the substances powerful tools for belief transmission, I show that it is also paradoxically in its capacity to produce doubt, ambivalence, and reflexivity that psychedelics support enculturation. I argue that, far from the brainwashing model, this dynamic is giving a central place to the agency of the recipient, showing that it is ultimately on the recipient's efforts to test the object of belief through an experiential verification process that the dynamic of psychedelic enculturation relies on. Finally, I explore the permanence and the conditions of sustainability of the social affiliation emerging from these practices and outline the ethical stakes of these observations.

Discursive opportunities and the transnational diffusion of ideas: 'brainwashing' and 'mind control' in Japan after the Aum Affair.

A case study in the sociology of ideas, this article refines the theory of 'discursive opportunities' to examine how intellectual claims cross national and linguistic boundaries to achieve public prominence despite lacking academic credibility. Theories of 'brainwashing' and 'mind control' originally began in the United States in the 1960s as a response to the growth of new religious movements. Decades later in Japan, claims that so-called 'cults' 'brainwashed' or 'mind controlled' their followers became prominent after March 1995, when new religion Aum Shinrikyo gassed the Tokyo subway using sarin, killing thirteen. Since then, brainwashing/mind control have both remained central in public discourse surrounding the 'Aum Affair' despite their disputed status within academic discourse. This article advances two arguments. Firstly, the transnational diffusion of brainwashing/mind control from the US to Japan occurred as a direct result of the 1995 Tokyo sarin attack, which acted as a 'discursive opportunity' for activists to successfully disseminate the theories in public debate. Secondly, brainwashing/mind control became successful in Japanese public discourse primarily for their normative content, as the theories identified 'brainwashing/mind controlling cults' as evil, violent and profane threats to civil society.

Efeitos em termos de produção de subjetividade em movimentos religiosos totalitários no contexto Eclesial Católico / Effects in terms of subjectivity production in totalitarian religious movements at the Catholic Ecclesiastical milieu

Nossa pesquisa visa estudar a produção de subjetividade em instituições e estabelecimentos católicos dedicados à formação religiosa de seus membros. Neste artigo, tomamos como estudo de caso o relato de um exmembro do movimento Focolare. Procuramos descrever seu percurso formativo, sua integração e posterior abandono do grupo religioso. Operando basicamente por subtração e através de acréscimo de imaginário, a tecnologia empregada pelos movimentos religiosos integristas pode produzir uma subjetividade serializada de matiz fortemente fanática, sem espaço para a individualidade, para a iniciativa criadora, para a singularidade. Concluímos com algumas notas psicossociais relativas à compreensão psicanalítica do fanatismo religioso. (AU)

Our research aims to study the subjectivity production into Catholic institutions and environments dedicated to their members’ religious formation. In this article, we analyze as case study a report from a former Focolare member. We focused to describe his formative path, his integration and latter desertion from such group. Basically by subtraction and by imaginary addition, the technology settled to integrated religious movement operates can produce a serialized subjectivity of deep fanatic shade, with no space for individuality, for creative initiative, or for singularity. We come to conclude with some psychosocial notes related to psychoanalysis understanding onto religious fanaticism. (AU)

O que a comparação entre a tradição religiosa e os novos movimentos religiosos nos ensina sobre o sujeito hoje? / Religious tradition and the new religious movements compared: a vision about the subject today

O artigo toma a distinção feita por Freud (1939/1996) em "Moisés e o monoteísmo", entre uma tradição herdada e uma tradição comunicada, para comparar alguns traços das religiões tradicionais com características dos novos movimentos religiosos. Usando os recursos epistemológicos que mais tarde foram desenvolvidos por Lacan, observa que a religião monoteísta mantém relação com uma tradição herdada, pondo em cena um real. Argumenta que tanto essa relação quanto a tradição foram perdidas nas práticas das seitas atuais. Conclui que devido ao afastamento dessa dimensão que remete a um real, as novas práticas religiosas recebem uma inflexão que as coloca ao lado da mera prescrição comportamental, fazendo de seus adeptos, sujeitos de uma nova economia psíquica.

The article resumes the distinction referred to by Freud (1939/1996) in the text "Moses and Monotheism" between an inherited tradition and a tradition transmitted by communication. Uses this distinction in order to compare some traits of traditional religions with characteristics of the new religious movements. Utilizes epistemological tools developed by Lacan to observe that the monotheistic religion is related to the inherited tradition - the one that supposes the dimension of the real. This tradition and the relation that it entails were lost in the sectarian practices of today. It concludes that due to the fact that they are not related to the dimension of the real new religious practices become subject to mere behavior prescription. Their followers being subjects to a new psychic economy.

Movimentos religiosos totalitários católicos: efeitos em termos de produção de subjetividade / Catholic's totalitarian movements: effects in terms of subjectivity production

Nossa pesquisa visa estudar a produção de subjetividade em instituições e estabelecimentos católicos dedicados à formação religiosa de seus membros. Neste artigo, tomamos como estudo o caso de um relato feito por um ex-membro do movimento Focolare. Procuramos descrever seu percurso formativo, sua integração e posterior abandono do grupo religioso. Operando basicamente por subtração e por meio de acréscimo de imaginário, a tecnologia empregada pelos movimentos religiosos integristas pode produzir uma subjetividade serializada de matiz fortemente fanático, sem espaço para a individualidade, para a iniciativa criadora, para a singularidade. Concluímos com algumas notas psicossociais relativas á compreensão psicanalítica do fanatismo religioso.

Our research aims to study the subjectivity production into Catholic institutions and environments dedicated to their members' religious formation. In this article, we had analyzed a report from an ex-Focolare member as a case study. We focused on describing his formative path, integration and latter desertion from such group. Basically by subtraction and by imaginary addition, the technology settled by this kind of integrative religious movement can produce a serialized subjectivity of deep fanatic shade, with no space for individuality, creative initiative, nor singularity. We have concluded with some psychosocial notes related to psychoanalysis understanding onto religious fanaticism.