A series of articles about cults

I am often asked: “Why don’t you put the articles with your interviews on your website?” The answer is simple: media outlets sometimes tend to take words out of context and, in the overall flow of text, give them a completely different meaning. A good example is the series of articles below (published on the news portal TVNET, in Komsomolskaya Pravda and elsewhere). In my own speech I try to avoid the words “cult” and “brainwashing” and similar terms. I consider them offensive and out of place.

• “They Forbade Me to Study and to Celebrate My Birthday: A Young Woman’s Life Before and After a Cult” (Postimees)
• “Cult Leaders in Latvia: ‘The Main Test of Faith Is Your Money’” (Komsomolskaya Pravda)
• “Give God a Like: How Children with Cerebral Palsy and Tuberculosis Are Treated with Prayers” (Postimees)
• “A Deal with God: As If Under Hypnosis, They Took Out Their Wallets” (TVNET)
• “Into a Cult with a Hidden Camera: ‘God Said You Have an Envelope of Money — Give It to Me’” (TVNET)
• “How Not to Change Your Life for €195 and Two Days” (TVNET)

All articles are in Russian; the titles above are my translations.

The point is not to stick labels on groups that seem strange or unusual to us, but to point out destructive features that can appear in any group.

Translated from the Russian original with the help of AI. Read the original (in Russian).