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China Elevator Stories
"Brainwashing: The Science of Thought Control" (by Kathleen Taylor)
Kathleen Taylor explains different forms of brainwashing and the research behind it.
xx/xx/2024
Ruth Silbermayr
Author
Gaslighting, a term commonly associated with the behavior of narcissists, is a form of brainwashing. It is widely recognized today, and I have heard from many Western women who divorced their Chinese husbands reporting that their ex-husbands severely gaslit them, leaving them feeling disoriented. I believe all of us have experienced gaslighting at some point in our lives; no one is exempt. Consider politics—how often have we believed a politician’s promises about implementing certain policies, only to find they failed to follow through once elected? This is one form of gaslighting we frequently encounter.
In my experience, after being exposed to more severe forms of gaslighting, you may feel physical symptoms such as confusion, brain fog, or groggy thinking (inability to think clearly). You may find it challenging to think independently or critically.
In Brainwashing: The Science of Thought Control, Kathleen Taylor explains different forms of brainwashing:
“Brainwashing describes three approaches to mind-changing: by force, by stealth, and by direct brain manipulation technologies. The first two, as I describe in the book, use standard psychological processes; in this sense there is nothing unnatural about mind control. The aim is to isolate victims from their previous environment; control what they perceive, think, and do; increase uncertainty about previous beliefs; increase new beliefs by repetition; and employ positive and negative emotions to weaken former beliefs and strengthen new ones. (Collectively, these can be called ‘ICURE’ techniques).
In brainwashing by force, ICURE techniques are taken to the coercive extremes found in some cults and terrorist organizations. New recruits have few or no options for escape and may have little or no privacy or leisure time. They are surrounded by people, on whom they are dependent, who continually show ostentatious loyalty to the group and hatred and contempt for the ‘enemy’ society—the society from which the recruits may have defected, and of which they must prove themselves dedicated foes. They are rewarded for conformity with affection, status, and other benefits, but these are conditional on their immediate and unquestioning obedience. Sinners face dire penalties.”
Historically, we can observe the ICURE technique at work in documentaries about Hitler’s Nazi Germany and other countries under his rule. Dire penalties, for instance, included non-Jews being killed for aiding Jewish people to hide, escape, or survive.
Brainwashing by stealth, according to Taylor, can be seen in the methods IS used to recruit individuals:
“The first step, hooking interest, may occur when someone looks up information—for example, about IS—on the internet, prompted perhaps by a news story, schoolwork, a friend, or a family member. (…) IS has prioritized technical expertise and maintains a huge, multilingual internet presence, presenting clear, strongly emotive material on many more sites than its opponents are able to close down. (…) Online influences can quickly escalate. Younger people, who make up many Western IS recruits, are used to cyber-friendships, and these new friends display many attractive qualities. They can present themselves as attentive and interested, exciting and exotic, confident and certain of their beliefs, fluent at answering questions, and morally serious and caring (about the target, but also more generally about social injustice). The combination of authority and affection is compelling, and they may be far better at connecting with their targets than are friends and family back home, let alone teachers, government officials, or police. As the new bond strengthens, the contact can test it by making suggestions and demands, such as encouraging targets to join IS or carry out attacks in their home country. As with other similar situations—an abuser charming a partner, a paedophile grooming a child—the supposed affection is strictly conditional on the target’s compliance.”
Although my situation has no connection to IS, the behavior of my Chinese ex-husband when we first met was eerily similar, suggesting that similar methods may be more commonplace. Later, his suggestions and demands escalated during times when I was particularly vulnerable—such as during pregnancy or after giving birth—when I was physically weakened, more dependent on him, and felt I had no choice but to comply, often to ensure the safety of our baby son. For instance, he demanded that I visit his parents in his hometown once our son was a few months old. Once there, I was pressured to stay indefinitely, even as his mother interfered with my parenting, effectively attempting to take my children from me.
Brain manipulation technologies, Taylor notes, also involve the internet. She highlights troubling research conducted on animals (her book was written in 2003):
“More worryingly, researchers have managed to implant false memories in fruit flies and mice, control behavior in worms and mice, and influence beliefs, memories, and decisions in monkeys—and people—by neuroscientific as well as psychological interventions.”
We often assume our minds are resistant to change, but observing the erosion of critical thinking and growing intolerance toward dissent over the past few years, I can’t help but wonder where people’s independent thought has gone. It often feels as though critical thinking has all but disappeared, with obvious patterns of control and censorship resembling a dictatorship rather than the democracy we once enjoyed.
Taylor elaborates:
“We also see that the terror of brainwashing, the fear of one’s mind being broken down and then reshaped to someone else’s specification, draws its power from our preferred view of ourselves as free, rational, decisive individuals. We like to think our minds are strong and solid, pure and unchanging entities (…). We prefer to think that, like diamonds, they keep their shape as the pressure on them rises, until at last (under the force of brainwashing) they shatter into pieces. We tend to believe that mental power derives from reason, so we view emotions as weaknesses. And we think of ourselves as having free will, choosing whether or not to be influenced by other people. To understand whether our beliefs are appropriate, we need to look at the accuracy of these beliefs.”
In Part II, Taylor explores the research behind these insights (I highly recommend her book if you’re interested). She writes:
“Part II shows that the picture of minds as solid and static is misleading. Minds are more like malleable clay than diamonds. We humans are not the resolutely independent individuals on whose unbending rationality so much of consequence is predicated (like the doctrine of criminal responsibility, which expects those it judges to have been acting freely and choosing rationally). Rather, human beings are born and then made; self-fashioned, of course, but also hugely shaped by social circumstances—especially the ideas we take from our societies and the emotions with which we take them. We underestimate the extent to which even mild forms of influence can change the way we think and act.”
The term “brainwashing” is a translation of the Chinese word 洗脑 (xǐnǎo, meaning “to wash a brain”), as Taylor explains:
“The word itself, according to Hunter, is a translation of the Chinese concept of xi-nao or hsi-nao (…). Hunter claims that it dates to the time of Meng K’o (known as Mencius in the West), a fourth-century BC Confucian thinker. If so, it is an early example of the long tradition of applying metaphors to washing and cleaning human minds, spirits, or souls.”
Mencius is written as 孟子 (Mèngzǐ) in Chinese.
I found this book fascinating and highly recommend reading it.
Are you familiar with this book?