Change Your Image
samanthapatterson-84959
Reviews
Deprogrammed (2015)
Reprogrammed: Our Cult is the Right Cult
A better title for this propaganda piece might be 'Reprogrammed: Our Cult is the Right Cult' Let's start off by short-circuiting the people who will defend this crap. I'm an atheist, not part of any cult. I work full time, I study, I have friends and hobbies (A favorite technique of cultists like Patrick is to try to strip authority from any who oppose their teachings) Yes, I'm using the same language about him that he would use about any other cultist and that's because he is. He is proud of his use of abuse, torture and re-education techniques that are functionally identical those used by cults, and the military (Oh I went there! Why yes, waking soldiers up for 'drills' at all hours is a form of psychological conditioning that is designed in part of make them ready for emergencies but all to make them more obedient.) These people have the misguided belief that somehow working full time at a job you don't like, having a mortgage and credit card debit, a house full of possessions you don't really use often, etc is somehow different or better than the lives of people who chose to live in a commune. They blither about how people in cults are robots while sticking doggedly to their scripts about the superiority of their own belief system.
When you watch this film, do yourself a favor. Think about all the groups you belong to. Really think, don't just give it 10 seconds. Spend some time. Ask yourself about your life, your church, your big screen TV. Are you REALLY happy or have you just been told these are the things that make you happy. Are you actually any different from 'those poor deceived fools in that cult', or have you just been in the one you're in so long that you don't recognize its trappings.
Disappointing. This could have been an excellent film but it had an agenda and that agenda was selling authoritarianism. It never asked any of the hard questions, never dared challenge the status quo. It was a film for cultists about a cultist attacking other cults in often illegal and violent ways.