Relationship

Coldness

In this chapter we will address a prominent component of paranoid behavior that clinical descriptions have always emphasized, namely: the way of relating to others, of bonding, differs substantially from what we can consider "normal" or healthy. Furthermore, that particular way of relating makes others uncomfortable and tends to produce a reaction of rejection in the environment which, in turn, reinforces the IPP's relational difficulties.

Paranoid personality

"Tends to produce displeasure or animosity in others" (80).

Querulants

"The premorbid traits of litigious-querulant delusional disorder include [...] emotional coldness" (50).

Paranoid personality

"The affectivity of these individuals is restricted and they may appear 'cold' to others" (2).

Paranoia

"[...] their relations with their family are those of a stranger, of someone from another world; their attitude toward their relatives is cold, superficial, lacking in naturalness, even hostile" (41).

Paranoid personality. Millon (2004).

"Spouses can report that the paranoid individual is cold and rational, reticent to share their emotions, intolerant of intimacy, and unnecessarily reserved" (52).

Paranoid personality

"They often boast of always being objective, rational, and lacking in emotion" (2).

Victimists.

"[…] other recent studies indicate that victimism, the persistent feeling of being a victim, can be a stable personality trait […] characterized by […] lack of empathy with the suffering of others" (14).

Cold

The distinction between "warm" people or relationships and their "cold" (or "distant") counterparts belongs to popular psychological knowledge. It is a dimension of human behavior whose two poles are named with allusions to temperature or distance. Ethology provides us with a plausible explanation as to the reason for these metaphors borrowed from physics.

When two baboons groom each other, or when two chimpanzees melt into an embrace, their behavior is not something casual and irrelevant. They are conveying a message that, expressed in words, would say something like: "at this moment I do not intend to attack you or take advantage of my hierarchical position (in the case of the superior on the social scale), I am not dangerous, we can set aside the tensions and violence implicit in our hierarchical relations and enjoy each other's company in a relaxed way." Grooming and embracing, behaviors that involve physical contact (and, therefore, the greatest closeness possible, as well as the perception of the bodily warmth of the other), constitute what ethologists call "affiliative behaviors," which serve to reinforce social cohesion –among the members of the same pack– and to ease the tensions inherent in intraspecific aggression.

When we say of a person that they are "warm" we are surely referring to the human version of this pattern of behavior shared with our primate relatives.

Now, in human beings direct physical contact (while still retaining its value for conveying the affiliative message) can be replaced by words and by what is known as extraverbal language (gaze, gestures, tone of voice...). It is likely that conversations between people –often very sparse in content, or filled with platitudes, repetitions, and facts already known to both parties– play in our species a role similar to that of reciprocal grooming in the majority of primates, who continue to groom each other even when no lice remain. If people insist on talking about everyday life, or about their emotions, or about interpersonal matters of their own or relating to others, it is because conversation serves another purpose beyond the mere transmission of information, just as grooming responds to more ends than hygiene.

The opposite attitude is "cold" or "distant" and it is the one that has been associated with paranoid personality and paranoia. The PI would be incapable of developing warm or affiliative behavior (through physical contact, conversation, gesture, or gaze), or would feel a profound aversion to it, or at the very least a discomfort, which would lead them to attempt to avoid it.

Paranoid personality. Clinical case.

"He avoided intimacy…" (5).

Paranoia

"The paranoiac seems to refuse the expression of any need for or desire toward the objects of the world" (55).

That the PI avoids intimacy is compatible with a part of them still desiring it. It is simply that it is impossible for them, whatever the reason may be.

The paranoid relationship. Tizón.

"But none of this should make us forget or fail to perceive the moments in which, from the very first interviews, the patient's genuine longing for affection, tenderness, honesty, and continuity in the other becomes apparent — that is, their (ambivalent) desire to trust someone. All the more so because, due to their fundamental conflict, even consciously, they cannot ask for affection; they can only obtain it through pain, self-immolation, domination..." (75).

In psychometric tests, PIs also acknowledge their tendency to be on guard, defensive, especially with those ("friendly") people who approach them too closely. And this discomfort with excessive closeness has also become evident with psychotherapists.

Paranoia

"In treatment or counseling sessions with delusional patients, one can sometimes gauge the intensity of the person's delusions by the amount of personal closeness. If the clinician gets too close, the delusions increase" (72).

Although, on the other hand,

Paranoia

"If the clinician becomes too distant, the delusions [also] increase" (72).

The PI's distancing manifests itself, first and foremost, in the way they move their body and contract their musculature.

Domestic tyranny

"Their rigid body posture, their assured and rational speech…" (18).

A rigidity that reflects the tension of someone who is incapable of trusting others and does not want or does not dare to draw closer and, certainly, does not invite others to do so.

Paranoia

"[...] bodily contact is often [a matter] very delicate in these patients…" (53).

In their avoidance of contact, the PI also keeps their distance in the most literal sense of the word.

Paranoia

–As a good 'paranoid', she left her things on the nearest chair and sat down in the farthest one (comment from a psychiatric nurse).

The sexuality of the paranoid individual (PI), also cold, will tend to be excessively mechanical and centered on genital pleasure, or lacking in spontaneity and conceived as the fulfillment of a duty. A paranoid patient was capable of having sexual relations with her husband as long as he gave her a few days' notice of the date and time of the event...

Bearing in mind that conversations, including the most trivial ones, play that role of affiliative behavior, it is reasonable to think that the PI will be a person of few words. In the consulting room, it is a common complaint among family members.

Domestic Tyranny. Clinical Case

- [...] always upset over one thing or another, and there was total mutism, not saying a word to me.

The PI likes to see himself as someone solid, self-sufficient, and free from ties and dependencies. Since feelings of love and tenderness appear to be absent, they can hardly be expressed.

Reformers

"History provides us with figures whose traits are strongly pronounced, of a somewhat dry character [...] in whom any feeling of love is absent" (22).

Paranoid Personality

"Also generally, they lack passive, gentle, sentimental and tender attitudes" (2).

Jealous.

"That is why, when the object of jealousy later becomes the genuine victim of the jealous person (in a relationship that has lasted years and can no longer be inspired by desire for the object, who is constantly kept close at hand), they realize that it is not the love that inspires them which provoked the jealousy, but rather that it is another matter. Furthermore, they have sufficient indications to think that the jealous person does not love them, even hates them and, outside the moments of anguish aroused by jealousy, perhaps shows their emotional indifference; yet this does not make them any less jealous" (13).

Oxman's research on paranoid patients confirms this difficulty of the paranoid individual in expressing their affects. And it makes evident that neither hostility nor negative feelings can be shown in an open manner.

Paranoia

"On average, paranoid patients [...] express neither positive nor negative affects toward others" (55).

Among the multiple manifestations of coldness we cannot overlook the inability to understand the emotional motivations behind the other person's behavior.

Querulants

"He also observed that they have a cold emotional nature that excludes a closer understanding of others' points of view, which he believed would contribute to the onset of the disorder" (65).

Domestic tyranny

"[...] It is these same feelings that lead them to adopt, in some cases, defensive behaviors: they withdraw, they escape from home, they do not allow any emotional or physical closeness, they totally reject sexual relations, and so on.

This change in the woman's attitude is what the man fails to understand, giving rise to selective blindness. What the abuser cannot understand is that, because of his violent behavior, his wife adopts defensive attitudes, setting limits so as not to continue suffering the mistreatment" (18).

The jealous woman also becomes unsympathetic. A jealotípical patient who was extraordinarily hostile toward her husband reproached him contemptuously in my presence for his lack of sexual initiative, without realizing the devastating antierotic effect of her own demeaning behavior.

And that same lack of subtlety in the PI toward anything that carries an emotional connotation is what leads to the loss of the sense of humor.

Paranoid personality

"They do not possess a true sense of humor and, in general, they are serious" (2).

Paranoia

"[...] in the clinical picture of paranoia. Among the objective characteristics are included [...] the lack of a sense of humor..." (50).

Deprived of the possibility of understanding the nuances of the behavior of those around him, the PI clings to forms as the only alternative that can provide him with security. The formalism of the paranoid-paranoiac's behavior has been underlined by a good number of authors.

Jealous

"One must mind one's manners, which are, ultimately, the norms. And the norms are there to be followed, they must be accepted as the only way to ground an 'exact', unequivocal judgment of each person, and there are different norms depending on sex, age, marital status, and so forth. The conservative rigidity of the jealous person, the normative sacralization, their 'seriousness' constitute very characteristic traits of their profile, with their counterpart: lack of a sense of humor, inability to grasp the comic, intolerance of ambiguity, irritation at hints and double meanings" (13).

Querulants

"Kraepelin (1905) described the syndrome of the persistent litigant and made comments on the general style of the litigant's correspondence. He mentions that the form of the letters is like that of a legal document..." (65).

The corollary of the IP's emotional isolation is that he feels lonely and misunderstood: he acknowledges this in multiple-choice tests. He creates a world of his own in which others are absent, at least on the emotional level, and where it seems that the only thing that truly matters to him is himself or his own affairs.

Querulants

"The premorbid traits of litigious-querulant delusional disorder include [...] egocentricity" (50).

Abstract interests

Maoist Leninism

"This loyalty was based above all on a relationship of dependency, rather than on trust. Mao, who was incapable of feeling affection for anyone, did not expect others to have this type of feeling toward him" (23).

The emptiness and loneliness that necessarily derive from the impossibility of establishing warm relationships seem to be mitigated, in many cases, by a selective orientation of attention and affections toward great ideas and theoretical and abstract concerns, far removed from everyday life.

Factor QIV of the 16PF test

"Interested in fundamental thoughts on the theoretical or the artistic" (39).

Delusion of grievance

"On the contrary, the altruistic variety rests on an abstract idea and is expressed through impersonal theories concerning the sciences, philosophy, politics, religion, etc. (inventors, reformers, prophets, thaumaturges)" (22).

Reformers

"The attentive and serious character of these young people naturally drives them toward austere studies in which they tend to succeed.

Philosophical, religious or social meditations determine the choice of their career, often in spite of the real obstacles they encounter" (22).

Reformers. Case Eduardo V.

"Like that of the ancient Greeks, his philosophy had a cosmogonic foundation. [...] he admitted a trinity of simple bodies: water, air and fire, and this trinity constituted a kind of divinity" (22).

The counterpoint to this hypertrophy of ethereal concerns is that the practical sense of the IP tends to be diminished.

Factor QIV of the 16PF test

"[...] indifferent, though not necessarily ignorant, of practical aspects" (39).

Oxman's research on the semantics of paranoia confirms this distancing from the everyday, upon finding the following:

- A decrease, relative to controls, in references to "natural objects" (specific places, animals, etc.) as well as a decrease in allusions to time (day of the week, hour, duration of an activity, etc.); which suggests a distancing from concern with day-to-day matters.

Paranoia

"The controls scored higher [than the paranoiacs] in the category of natural objects [The article provides the following examples of this type of word: island, beach, birds, migrating…]" (55).

Paranoia

"This group [that of the controls] also scored higher in temporal references [The article provides the following examples of this type of word: Sundays, Mondays, morning, hour...]" (55).

- In addition to this distancing from everyday matters, an increase in references to abstract themes (political, artistic, etc.) can be observed. A patient who was supposedly meant to talk about himself stated:

Paranoia

"I was sitting here recalling the exact nature of control and how control changes… We are faced with a conditioning process called America [politics] and America is all stirred up right now because of William F. Buckley… I am of the opinion [in the form of a message] that America has undergone some kind of spiritual change" (55).

Passions

It is important to note that the difficulty the PP has in displaying warm behaviors in everyday relationships with others does not mean in any way that they lack emotions. Certainly —both in cohabitation, conversation, and sexuality— they are incapable of enjoying another person's company, of communicating, of empathizing with whoever is in front of them and, for that reason, they feel alone. They do not know how to practice the human version of quiet, prolonged grooming. But what they are capable of, perhaps to compensate for that emptiness, is becoming passionately devoted to abstract ideals, to group identities, and even to flesh-and-blood people whom (as occurs in erotomanic delusion) they may never have met or may have known only superficially. This love of the PP, however, does not include true intimate contact. The following quote dramatically illustrates that dichotomy between passionate love and the absence of authentic personal relationships.

Erotomania. Clinical case.

"One of our patients met, ten years ago, a young priest by whom she felt instantly attracted. She gives a flattering description of him: 'If only they knew, she says, how beautiful and gentle he is! I liked him for the seriousness of his character, the simplicity, the innocence of his words; I bonded with him as with a child. It seemed to me that he had not been made like the rest of men, that he must suffer in his isolation, that the affection of a woman was indispensable to him. I saw him as something that must not be touched, as a sacred object to be adored [...]

In the asylum, this woman is extremely reserved, very proper, with a slightly old-fashioned elegance that, in the bleak environment in which she lives, shows that she has not let herself go; she takes care of herself out of self-respect since she never seeks out any man; she shows herself as distant from men as from women, and after ten years of confinement during which she has not made a single complaint or demand, her ideal remains as vivid as on the first day; when she speaks of it her eyes lift up, she becomes enraptured" (22).

Reformers and regicides

"One can, so to speak, deduce from the foregoing that the genital life of these individuals will be singularly reduced. Some are of absolute chastity, like Caserio, Clément, Chatel, of whom it is known that they find the satisfaction of their youthful urges only in mystical exaltation. At the moment of his arrest, Stapss was carrying the portrait of a young woman for whom he professed a love as pure as it was passionate and who seemed to inspire him in the carrying out of his criminal project" (22).

At other times the object of the PP's passions are not people.

Reformers

"Mystical preoccupations are of paramount importance in the construction of the personality of the idealist of justice; they exist by definition in Torquemada and Calvin; as for Robespierre, one need hardly be reminded that his entire revolutionary career is dominated by mystical preoccupations, whose formula asserts itself painfully through successive gropings in which the continuity of the tendency is evident, and ends with the apotheosis of June 8, 1794, in which he solemnly burns the effigy of Atheism and consecrates the cult of the Supreme Being in attire from which the aristocracy of the ancien régime is only tempered by a tricolor silk sash"(22).

Paranoid character

"[According to Montassut, 1925][...]the essential traits of the paranoid character are the following:

[...]love of nature, etc."(44).

Detachment

The limitations of the PI in their capacity to communicate end up seriously affecting their relationship with the people in their immediate surroundings.

Paranoidism in general

"Miller observed that marital conflicts were not primarily due to sexual difficulties but rather[...]an unwillingness to discuss the causes of marital friction"(73).

If we add to the diminished faculties for establishing satisfying personal bonds the intense passions that the PI experiences, it becomes understandable that they so frequently tend toward estrangement from their supposedly loved ones and toward the failure to honor commitments for which they find no meaning. This estrangement is, in the first place, psychological. Oxman was able to verify that the language of the paranoid individual is characterized by a reduction in references to family members.

Paranoia

"This sense of introversion is further increased by the avoidance by paranoid subjects of [...] family-related words [The article provides the following examples of this type of words: son, sister, husband...]" (55).

And, secondly, a distancing also occurs on the factual level.

Delirio de reivindicación

"[...] does not hesitate to sacrifice his fortune, his family, his freedom and his very life" (70).

The most striking aspect of these "sacrifices" is the radical way of washing one's hands not only of their former spouses, but also of their own children.

Querulants

"He was divorced and rarely saw his children" (65).

This behavior of the PI responds both to the complete insensitivity to the emotional needs of a child, needs that he barely perceives, and to the delusions of grandeur and the irresistible attraction to megalomaniacal goals and paranoid preoccupations.

Paranoia. The Aimée Case.

"Her husband finds out that, without his knowledge, she has resigned from the administration that employs them, and that she has applied for a passport to America using a forgery to present the required marital authorization. She invokes that she wants to go seek her fortune in America: she will be a novelist. She acknowledges that she abandoned her son. Currently this acknowledgment produces in her no more than a modest embarrassment: she launched into this enterprise for her son" (44).

Querulants. Clinical case.

"He continued working as a truck driver, but he spent all his free time in the library studying law. The injustice he had suffered and its legal implications became the sole objective of his life. Mr. became estranged from his family, isolated himself, and finally divorced and left at the age of 50" (50).

More often, we witness a situation of relative abandonment in which the IP becomes only partially estranged.

Paranoid personality

"The child's father was a paranoid loner who argued with and distanced himself from everyone.

[...] The special atmosphere of the mansions of his childhood stemmed from the contrast between his parents' apparent generous satisfaction of material needs and their disregard or frustration of emotional ones. The parents were often absent during the patient's early childhood. He was raised by servants in a nursery, barely visited by his father and mother even when they were at home. When in the presence of his parents, he felt humiliated and diminished by them, especially in response to any emotional display on his part. The family ideal was to be cold, witty, and detached" (71).

If it is true that the member of the paranoid contagion group suffers a state —albeit transitory— of paranoidization, then one can expect that —in parallel— his capacity for establishing warm bonds will also be affected, that he will experience the same attraction that the paranoid individual feels toward abstract matters and that he will show the same inclination to become passionate about impersonal beings, whether great ideas, group identities, or, paradoxically, persons. And one can expect that, as a derivation of all this, the same tendency toward isolation and the abandonment of responsibilities toward one's own will arise in him. That is to say, that the same phenomena we attribute to the paranoid individual will repeat themselves in the follower. Let us begin with the first.

Does the member of the paranoid contagion group become a "cold" person?

Coldness in the paranoid group

The adept's coldness toward the outside world

Some autobiographical accounts suggest that yes, one grows cold or distant, at least in relation to the people in one's previous environment.

Sectarian groups. Scientology.

"With the idea of erasing my reactive mind (memories and emotions) —J. C. N. explained—, they started turning me into a robot. With them, I could remember things I had experienced before, but I did so without the slightest feeling. I remembered, for example, my father's death, but I felt absolutely nothing" (63).

Leninist-sectarian groupuscule. SLA.

"Shortly after ten in the morning, the television cameras captured the scene of my parents, accompanied by my sister, stepping off the airplane at Los Angeles International Airport [...] I felt no emotion upon seeing them after so long. In fact, it occurred to me that they looked dead, as if they were in another world separate from mine" (32).

And beyond these sensations, which might be momentary, a real and lasting change takes place in the way one relates to formerly loved ones. Some paranoid contagion groups even instill doctrines that give meaning to this change.

Unspecified sectarian group

"His theory [the leader's] was based on the idea that the pace of life in today's society made it impossible to develop a true family, given the many obligations that a father with two or three jobs had to fulfil, and who therefore was hardly ever at home.

To this he added that most fathers had no true vocation for fatherhood and that they found themselves pushed into it by the arrival of children, without it being their genuine desire and without any knowledge of how to parent, causing more harm than good to their own children.

[...] At the end of the day, within a few days my parents were already perfect strangers to me, and that is how I behaved with them" (4).

But such doctrines are by no means indispensable for the adept to experience emotional distancing.

Domestic tyranny. Rachel's case.

"My children had become strangers to me and I to them" (76).

A distancing that could recede when the paranoid induction ceases.

Domestic tyranny. Rachel's case.

"Five years after leaving Fred [...] my relationship with my children is slowly recovering and is becoming increasingly solid" (76).

The emotional distancing from the pre-cult environment is a very striking fact and one that, in many cases, occurs without an explicit mandate to that effect. On the other hand, groups that limit, in certain specific respects, the display of warm behaviors are not exceptional.

Cult groups. Hare Krishna.

"- Mom, don't kiss me, you're going to contaminate me! - J.B. snapped at his mother the first time he met her after becoming a Hare Krishna.

Before and after his experience, J. has always had a perfect relationship with his parents, siblings, and friends…" (62).

The impersonal interests of the paranoid contagion group

Affiliative behavior in humans, the equivalent of grooming, includes not only the expression of emotions but also the exchange of comments about the circumstances of daily life. We have already noted that in the obsessive personality, by contrast, an orientation toward abstract and theoretical matters removed from both emotions and everyday life predominates. Something similar occurs in the paranoid contagion group.

Among those abstract topics, which attract obsessive personalities and paranoid contagion groups alike, we must highlight those we may call "schizotypal" (esotericism, magic, occultism, ufology…), which in some paranoid contagion groups constitute the core subject matter while in others they are simply additional elements.

Folie à famille. Case of supernatural healers.

"Both were very interested in paranormal subjects" (51).

Nazism

"... In 1920 (Hess) enrolled at the University of Munich to study History, economics (at his father's request) and geopolitics. It was geopolitics that would play an important role in his later life. The study of geopolitics concerns the influence of geography on a country's politics. One of the professors in this field was Karl Haushofer.

Haushofer was a man of surprising persuasive ability and unusually unconventional political ideas and theories. He had earned a certain renown as a general during the war, and his students saw him as a great authority at a time when all values and norms seemed to be wavering. He often seasoned his lectures with references to the significance of astrology and the suprasensorial, the imperceptible side of Germany's history. Haushofer believed that the era of the great maritime powers had come to an end and that their place would be taken by land forces. If Germany could acquire living space, the possibilities would be endless. Haushofer's theories would continue to influence Rudolf Hess.

... Although there has always been an air of secrecy regarding Hess's cooperation, it is now accepted that Hess introduced Haushofer's ideas to Hitler. Haushofer visited Landsberg frequently and it is precisely those ideas of race and living space that form the essence of Mein Kampf..." (78).

Nueva Acrópolis

"We are, as they teach, formed by four material bodies: Etheric-physical, pranic or vital, astral or emotional, and the kamamanasic or concrete and desire mind. The spiritual parts are Manas or pure mind not led by desire, Budhi or intuition, and Atma or spark of the spirit in union with God or the Cosmos. By dint of repeating this scheme one takes it on as one's own and ends up functioning according to it" (59).

The fascination with great historical themes also distinguishes PCGs. It tends to be a fanciful historiography, riddled with the biases introduced by paranoid paralogy and paying very little attention to — when not outright hostile toward — scientific rigor.

Nazism

"The Aryan renounced the purity of his blood and with it the right to remain in the eden he had created for himself. He was engulfed in the confusion of the races and gradually lost his civilizing capacity until he ended up resembling, both in mind and body, the primitive aboriginal race he had originally subjugated far more than his ancestors did" (35).

And particularly attractive is everything related to ideologies and, in general, to isms.

Leninism. Shining Path.

"Throughout the third conversation, Guzmán [President Gonzalo] presents himself as increasingly imbued with his professorial role. He delivers lengthy speeches on Marxism and Maoism, illustrated with examples and historical comparisons from the civil war in China. The most interesting passage is perhaps Guzmán's argumentation in defense of the claim that gonzalismo does not exist, but rather Gonzalo thought" (16).

Sectarian groups. TFP.

"In his book Indigenous Tribalism, a Communo-Missionary Ideal for Twenty-First Century Brazil, Plinio Corrêa de Oliveira denounces the most recent progressive onslaught in Brazil: neo-missionary communo-structuralism. Drawing on vast documentation, the author demonstrates that this new current advocates the demolition of the current order in order to replace it with the tribal way of life" (17).

(Sic). There is no doubt that the attraction to grand philosophical concepts responds to the same dynamic.

Sectarian groups. TFP.

"Individuation, which for gnosis is evil, is a principle of inequality. Hierarchy — whatever form it takes — is the offspring of individuation. The universe — according to the Gnostic — is redeemed from individuation and inequality through a process of destruction of the 'self', which reintegrates individuals into the great homogeneous Whole. The realization, among men, of absolute equality, and of its corollary, complete freedom — within an anarchic order of things — may be seen as a preparatory stage of that total reabsorption" (19).

Sokagakkai

"— As a result of his ten years of study of the value theory of Dr. Kiichiro Soda, Tsunesaburo Makiguchi, first president of our organization, reached the conclusion that the three highest values are beauty, benefit, and goodness, rather than truth, goodness, and beauty, as classical philosophers had defined them. Having discovered an error on the part of philosophers in failing to consider benefit — which is of considerable interest to economists — Makiguchi developed a new theory, according to which the creation of the value of benefit surpasses the creation of beauty and goodness, and the creation of all three leads to the growth and development of personality" (36).

One consequence of the exaggerated interest in theoretical and abstract subjects is the use of language that is hardly comprehensible to those who are not members of the group, which contributes to reinforcing their isolation.

The adept's fervor

Continuing with the parallels between the IP and the member of the paranoid contagion group, it is now appropriate to speak of the passion that both feel. In the latter, this passion is directed above all toward the group as a whole. For the adept of the cult group, their militancy admits not even the remotest comparison with any other form of belonging. When they take the group as their "true" family, this is not a mere rhetorical expression, nor a simple acknowledgment of the degree of absorption they undergo, but rather an expression of the intense feelings of love awakened in them by that social being which has adopted them as its own child. In nationalism, this loving component plays a far more relevant role than its feeble theoretical postulates.

Nazism

"The National State... will not be defended by the bastions of any fortress, but by the living walls of men and women enchanted with love for the fatherland and with fanatical nationalist enthusiasm" (35).

Maoist Leninism

"– If you take part in these celebrations, you will receive a fine lesson in patriotism –Mao had told me–. Participate and you will love your country even more" (23).

The members of paranoid contagion groups are equally inflamed by the exposition of great principles and utopian projects.

Cult groups. TFP.

"Tradition, Family and Property is not, therefore, just any slogan. It is the anticommunist slogan par excellence, which attracts the sympathies of all those who love Christian civilization, and provokes aversion, when not hatred, in all those who, to a greater or lesser degree, have allowed themselves to be infected by the virus of communism" (17).

Soviet Leninism

"But I am spiritually preparing myself to leave this earthly world and I feel nothing but an infinite love for [...] the cause..." (from Bukharin's letter to Stalin, before being executed, published in 66).

Love for the leader is also, as we already know, a common experience among members of paranoid contagion groups.

Maoist Leninism

"What there was no doubt about was that the crowd loved and respected Mao. All those who took part in the parade had gone through a careful selection process; all of them were required to love Mao" (23).

Maoist Leninism

"The faith of the Red Guards was blind. Their battle song reflected this very well: 'The sky is vast, so is the earth / but not as vast as the Party's love for the people. / The father is dear, so is the mother / but not as dear as Chairman Mao" (56).

Uncontrolled outbursts of collective weeping and fits of hysterics are a characteristic image that habitually follows the death of totalitarian leaders, always united with their peoples by an intense mutual love. Those same feelings, even more exaggerated, are those manifested by militants of cult groups. In some Hindu groups, love for the leader — expressed through worship or prayers — constitutes the doctrinal core and their practice, and is the path through which it becomes possible to escape the cycle of reincarnations.

The militants of paranoid contagion groups not only love the group and the leader passionately, but also their fellow militants. They claim to experience an intense solidarity never felt before. They love and feel loved.

Soviet Leninism

"But I am preparing myself spiritually to leave this earthly world and I feel nothing but an infinite love for all of you, those of the party..." (from Bukharin's letter to Stalin, before being executed, published in 66).

Cult groups. The Patriarch.

"I can try to explain it by telling you that the expression 'love thy neighbor as thyself' is lived here and not merely stated" (12).

Cult groups. Moonies.

"I remember a day when I was sitting on a bale, exhausted and alone, in the midst of the famous manure, when Luigi appeared. And he did not say 'hurry up, this task needs to be done' but instead walked the 100 meters separating him from the house and came back with a tea and some biscuits. His gesture moved me, for he, who worked even harder than the others, had dedicated part of his time to attend to me. I felt joy because it was a form of love that manifested itself through deeds..." (67).

I know of some groups in which this type of generous gesture is regulated, and the adept knows that they will be congratulated and given a gift on their birthday, that they will receive certain care on the day they fall ill, etc.

Detachment from the world

The cooling of prior bonds, together with the fascination with the group and its grand ideals, leads —exactly as occurred in the case of patient Aimée— to the complete rupture of the relationship with family and the pre-cult environment, and to the abandonment of previously undertaken responsibilities. This is perhaps the best-known trait of cult groups, one that occurs in either a compelled or spontaneous manner, whether consciously or inadvertently.

Cult groups. Moonies.

"(..) to be faithful to Moon, one must abandon what one loves" (9).

This dynamic is less evident in SPs. But the perfectly fanatical totalitarian subject is also someone who, enthused by his cause and emotionally desensitized, devotes himself entirely to his objectives at the expense of his family and other loved ones. Some regimes —such as the Chinese— simply imposed this behavior, which seemed to them the most logical.

Maoist Leninism

"For five, ten, fifteen years, or an entire lifetime, depending on the return of each person's influences within the circles of power, former Red Guards were confined to rural labor camps, villages, provincial units, and border zones. They remained separated from their families by hundreds or thousands of kilometers, they lived at subsistence level, their studies cut short, they were entirely deprived of sexual relations until late, state-authorized marriage, they saw their partners and coupled with their spouses only during New Year holidays, they left their newborn babies with grandmothers because they had to integrate into their distant workplaces" (64).

Child abandonment

The detachment of the IP which, as we were observing, expresses itself in its starkest form in the tendency toward abandonment or neglect of one's own children, is equally reflected among the members of cult groups.

Sokagakkai

"Children who have been practically abandoned by activist parents have fallen into delinquency; the inactive or non-member husband of an activist woman has been subjected to intense domestic pressure; some former members cite as the reason for their disenchantment an almost total lack of free time with the consequent discord and family disintegration" (81).

Nor is it uncommon for there to be an almost total relinquishment so that others take care of them. The following quote clearly shows us that combination of 1) irresistible attraction to great ideals with 2) the anesthesia of the capacity to perceive the emotional needs of others.

Unspecified cult group

"When my son was six months old, he passed into the care of other group members, from nine in the morning until five in the afternoon. In the evenings, he was in the care of our group, where parents took turns looking after the children. If I was lucky, I spent one evening a week with my son, together with the other children, as well as a little while on weekends.

We believed we were raising our children in the healthiest way possible, by offering them a collective childhood. We believed that, for children, all adults were interchangeable, that it did not matter how much time children saw their real parents or even whether they saw them at all. We believed we were raising children who would not be spoiled by the individualism and selfishness of our culture, that they would grow up with a strong sense of responsibility toward society. We had high ideals, but very little real knowledge of the development and the genuine needs of children. Our theories honored children, but in practice, children's needs were always placed at the lowest level of our priorities. Political work always came first. This is an example of how my belief system prevented me from seeing the realities around me. The only way to live as a parent within this system was to try not to think about the children. From the moment I handed my son over in the morning until I picked him up somewhere between eleven at night and two in the morning, I barely knew how to be a mother to him" (76).

With regard to domestic tyrannies, in clinical practice I have on several occasions been struck by an attitude of a certain detachment and neglect in the care of their own children, not only on the part of the tyrants but also of their wives. An attitude that could not be attributed solely to depression or overload, but to a certain indifference. The same indifference that allows them to be accomplices, with excessive frequency, in the sexual exploitation of children.

Mass tyrants (and their wives), in this respect as well, tend to behave like domestic ones.

Maoist Leninism.

"Neither Mao nor Jiang Qing paid much attention to their daughters and only saw them very occasionally. Both studied at boarding schools and, even when they came home for holidays, they ate with Mao or Jiang Qing only a few times a year"(23).

The coldness among the members of the PCG

To recap, the idea seems to be confirmed that in the sectarian individual the same sequence of phenomena occurs as in the IP: coldness or cooling of the bond (at least with people from the pre- or extra-cult environment), attraction to abstract subjects, intense passion, detachment from the social network, and the abandonment of prior personal responsibilities. With the particularity that the abstract interests and passions are, in this case, shared.

The question that arises, at this point, is: does that same coldness occur in the relationship between members of the same group?

We already know that, according to the members, the answer is no. Quite the contrary — they feel loved, happy, and united, or so they say. Even to the eyes of external observers, it may appear that the members of the PCG are not cold people. Shortly before committing mass suicide…

Cult groups. Reverend Jones's People's Temple.

"Everything was going well, it seemed. The visitors were doing exactly what they had made the trip there for: the 'relatives' were talking, [Senator] Ryan was talking, Lane and Garry were advising and the journalists were interviewing. After the difficulties encountered in getting there, the people of Jonestown seemed very hospitable. I could not explain to myself why such a fuss had been made. The buildings were impressive, the people seemed healthy, reasonable and warm" (42).

However, several references suggest that, despite appearances, paranoidization would also affect the bonds between the group's members.

1) Prohibition of friendship.

In several APs there exist unusual express prohibitions on the establishment of friendship, or "special," relationships. The solid, lasting and trusting relationship between their members seems unacceptable to them.

Cult groups. TFP.

"Among the members of this group, friendship relationships are forbidden" (61).

In another cult group, in which friendship relationships are also explicitly forbidden, members are expected, when they are moved to a different home or city or country of residence, to maintain absolutely no contact whatsoever, whether by telephone or by correspondence, with those people with whom they have lived in close proximity, even for many years. In any case, the itinerant life of some members is necessarily incompatible with the establishment of deep personal bonds.

Cult groups. Moonies.

"I remained in France until March 1976. Then we departed for Italy to carry out the same functions there. I was there until June 1976. Afterwards we left for Germany, where I decided to stay in Munich until November 1976. Then I returned to Italy to promote our newspaper at the request of a Crusade leader in Germany [...] I was there until December 1977. Then I returned to Germany to carry out the sale of our newspaper, an independent conservative anti-communist newspaper, but of a spiritual tendency, called Der Report. This weekly only existed in Germany. In May 1978, I departed for England" (9).

Also common are rules that prohibit specific aspects of "proximity behavior" among group members.

Sectarian groups. TFP.

"The Camaldolese monks cannot speak, the silence is absolute, they are expressly forbidden from looking each other in the face, and they must always wear their hood up" (61).

2) Formalism.

Some APs, of an openly authoritarian orientation, teach their followers to maintain a serious, rigid, even martial attitude, which calls to mind clinical descriptions of the paranoid character. They may also impose excessive formality in personal interactions (formalism being another characteristic of paranoid behavior ).

Sectarian groups. TFP.

"TFP members [mostly young people] only address each other informally, breaking their usual manner of interaction, in the presence of potential new members" (61).

3) Insensitivity.

Here is a curious variant of that attitude of rejection of the normal attachment to loved ones, which reveals the complete lack of attunement to people's emotional needs.

Nazism.

"Therefore, a broad educational effort must be developed, through the Press, Radio, PK Reports and newsreels, aimed at spreading throughout the Homeland the conviction that the soldier, or in his case the officer, must remain among his other fallen comrades, and that the graves in field cemeteries are cared for and under the protection of the nation, so that the transfer of the body is not only unnecessary, but even anti-National Socialist" (7).

4) Lack of communication.

Unspecified cult group.

"Friendships within the group formed quickly, were superficial and offered a false sense of intimacy" (76).

Unspecified cult group.

"The powerful prohibition against free and open communication leads to profound social isolation, atomization and alienation [...] In fact, many members confess feelings of despair when they find themselves outside the environment" (40).

Regarding interpersonal communication, this is equally affected. Former members with a sufficient capacity for observation and introspection describe an alteration similar to that which Oxman found in paranoid patients: neither positive emotions nor anything related to anger or distress can be expressed freely and without restraint. The former tend to be rejected as childish and absurd sentimentalisms that distract from truly important things (such as reciting a mantra or proselytizing). As for negative emotions, these must necessarily be suppressed (before others and before oneself) insofar as they threaten the image of perfection and harmony that must be maintained at all costs. Therefore, there is no room for anger, nor for the anguish that springs from doubt, nor for doubt itself, nor for anything that breaks the myth of shared happiness and seamless unity. A cult group practices the rule of not filing letters in which its members set out personal problems. They have no place. Under no circumstances can distress be admitted, much less that it could be provoked by the group.

Unspecified cult group.

"Numerous psychological studies on conformity have confirmed that people tend to conform to the group's reality and alter their opinions and feelings about a reality that appears objective when they know how the majority perceives reality. By making it taboo to express negative or ambivalent feelings regarding totalitarian social sanctions, an atmosphere of intrapsychic isolation is promoted, leading to a progressive state of confusion and sense of powerlessness among members. They begin to feel that they are alone in their feelings of negativity and doubt, and over time they attribute these to a state of personal psychological dysfunction. Thus, the cult environment creates and maintains among its members a state of exaggerated fear of nonconformity.

This particular dynamic is the main reason why mind control proves effective in maintaining social solidarity, despite the prevalence of contradictory feelings among the majority of its members. Members are conditioned to believe that all dissatisfaction is intra-individual, rather than a result of the interaction between the individual and the environment. Difficulties with the social structure are viewed as personal weakness, and it is assumed that the etiology of personal distress bears no relation to the extreme limitations of life in the group: celibacy, poverty, long working hours, and sleep deprivation" (40).

Unspecified cult group.

"[...] Any expression of depression or sadness was seen by the Guru as 'the invasion of hostile entities and satanic forces.' Typically, depressed and emotionally unstable members were stigmatized and labeled as impure, unspiritual, and physically weak. In most cases they were expelled from the group.

A woman explained that the Guru was afraid of mentally ill people and feared they could bring bad publicity to his community. Two members he spoke with had suicidal thoughts while they were in the group. The Guru told them to leave the community if they could not resolve their depression, because he believed that depressive people were 'contagious' and that they had a detrimental effect on the well-being of the community as a whole" (40).

Unspecified cult group.

"I found it very difficult to maintain this level of self-control on a daily basis, and quite often my true 'self' tried to come out, only to instantly collide with the wall. I especially remember one day when we were interviewed to find out how we were carrying out our work. 'Are you satisfied? How do you feel?', they asked me in a cordial manner. I responded spontaneously that I felt like a caged animal pacing back and forth with no way out and ready to explode at any moment. The leader's response was swift and forceful: I was forbidden from participating in the life of the group and was not allowed to leave the house for a period of time; no one was permitted to speak to me, including my husband and my other housemate. I spent the entire time writing self-criticisms and punishing myself for those feelings" (76).

This repressive climate that makes frank conversation impossible also occurs in totalitarian societies.

Maoist Leninism.

"At once, my father woke up and hastily covered her mouth with his hand. Through her tears, my mother heard him whispering in her ear: 'Don't let them hear you cry! If they do, you will be criticized!' Being criticized was a serious problem. It meant that her comrades would not consider her worthy of 'belonging to the revolution'. Perhaps even a coward" (38).

Maoist Leninism.

"Although the disappearance of such beautiful plants [when the parks were razed during the Cultural Revolution] deeply saddened me, I felt no resentment toward Mao. On the contrary, I hated myself for harboring sad thoughts. By then, 'self-criticism' had already become a habit in me, and I automatically reproached myself for any instinct that ran counter to Mao's instructions. In fact, such feelings frightened me. Discussing them with anyone was entirely out of the question, so I tried to suppress them and acquire a correct philosophy. I lived in a state of permanent self-accusation" (38).

In this way, the member of the totalitarian cult group behaves like the paranoid-paranoiac individual who, in the privacy of the multiple-choice test, acknowledges feeling unhappy and prone to crying, but who, in front of others…

Factor QIV of the 16PF test.

"They acknowledge making great efforts to prevent others from noticing that they are feeling downcast" (39).

5) Lack of solidarity.

So, at bottom, the camaraderie perceived by the members of the paranoid contagion group does not amount to a relationship of genuine intimacy, nor a true concern for the personal problems of others.

Cult groups. TFP.

"There is a strong sense of brotherhood in working toward the end of the cause. Everything personal must be set aside. When I first came I was looking for help with my family difficulties. They listened to me and I felt understood. But it is an illusion. When you start thinking about yourself — your studies, your pleasures — things change. You have no family. People are moved from one place to another" (61).

Moreover, the PA is profoundly unsolidary with its followers, from whom it demands continuous renunciations of their authentic personal interests.

Sectarian groups. Moonies.

"I donated the money from the bank account to the center, and I would have given them my car if it hadn't been registered in my parents' name... I was asked to sacrifice my 'Isaac,' a term used by the Moonies to refer to that which members hold most dear. In my case it was my poetry. I threw away everything I had written (around 400 poems)" (31).

Unity and coldness

How can the supposed camaraderie and solidarity, of which the followers of sectarian groups boast, be compatible with this last set of observations that point in precisely the opposite direction?

Nueva Acrópolis

"The internal, esoteric journey begins with probationism. When this phase is completed, a ceremonial celebration is held to flatter the one who has passed the tests that allow the continuation of the spiritual path in pursuit of the Ideal. The neophyte is embraced and publicly applauded with cheers full of emotion which one is then obliged to profess toward the newcomers who join" (59).

Sokagakkai

"Although the journey of the Kosen-rufu of the Mystic Law is long, together, let us advance, encouraging one another" (36).

There is certainly an intense experience of love and solidarity, but insofar as these are individuals who stimulate one another to push in the same direction. Whether for a great cause…

Nationalism

"The emotions that gripped Europe in 1914 had little to do with anger, hatred or greed. Quite the contrary, they numbered among the most 'noble' feelings that human beings can have the fortune to experience: generosity, solidarity and devotion to a great and worthy cause" (24).

Sectarian groups. The Reverend Jones's People's Temple.

"The column went on to describe the solicitous, solidary and happy life in Guyana. 'The profound degree of relationship that we know here stems not so much from sex as from sharing and living the highest ideals. We have gone beyond alienation" (42).

(…) or against a formidable common enemy. The close relationship between perceived solidarity and the struggle against the enemy has already been noted by others on numerous occasions.

"Not even fraternity is necessarily a safe dream, since most of the time it appears as a solution that sets the people belonging to a tribe, a nation, race, or class, against the others, and that must ensure cohesion and unity in the struggle and enhance mortal enmity" (47).

The experiences of solidarity and harmony that appear among the militants of the paranoid contagion group are similar –allowing for the differences– to those established among the fans of a football team who enthusiastically sing the same anthem and insult the referee in unison. In the "altered state" of the warrior, contact between those fighting on the same side is easy, a great familiarity arises spontaneously, as well as a tendency to avoid conflicts and to submit to a common authority, to coordinate and to sacrifice oneself for victory and for one's fellow combatants. Among those fighting on the same side –furthermore– intense feelings of camaraderie emerge. But all of this, beyond appearances, has little to do with the development of warm, personal, and deep bonds. When all is said and done, on the battlefield there is no room for sentimentalism.

In the paranoid contagion group, just as in the obsessive personality, this type of close bonds are buried beneath a thick layer of symbols, concepts, and abstract reflections, beneath the incessant activities and beneath the constant appeal to the achievement of common objectives, which are the only thing worth attending to. If any emotion may be expressed, it is joy or exaltation.

Unspecified sectarian group.

"[...] Joy was the emotion he most wanted to see in his community. He gave lectures explaining the importance of showing a happy face to the outside world and, furthermore, he explained that the unhappiness of a member could bring about the physical and psychic destruction of the Guru. Those suspected of causing the Guru's illness were shunned like pathogens by the majority of the community's members"40).

This is surely the explanation for why adherents and external observers, on the one hand, and former adherents, on the other, can paint such a contrasting picture of what happens with interpersonal relationships within paranoid contagion groups. It is common among former cult members that the affection and the rapport they had previously felt so intensely, come to be recognized as fictitious, when not outright theater.

Sectarian-Leninist groupuscule. SLA.

"The tangle and the surprising truth for me is that I felt relieved that they were all dead and now out of my life. I had never loved Cujo. It would be closer to the truth to say that I despised him. I had hated and feared Cinque [...] Angela Atwood (Gelina). She was the only one with whom I was able to converse on a quasi-personal level" (32).

The delusion of love

So in PAs there is a striking contrast between the perceived reality of solidarity, warmth, and mutual aid, and the other reality of incommunication and loneliness. The Guyanese community of Reverend Jim Jones illustrates this for us. On one hand, extreme material deprivations, with grueling working hours, a meager diet, and sick and elderly people poorly cared for. A day-to-day existence of terror in the face of continual and severe punishments, of denunciations, and of unexpected yet frequent macabre simulations of suicide… And, at the same time, the members of the group were convinced they were living in a community that stood as a shining example of love, generosity and happiness. Moreover, they were even capable of conveying to visitors and external observers that image.

The contrast that exists in PAs between, on one hand, the solidarity and camaraderie that the adherents perceive and describe, and, on the other hand, another completely different reality, when not opposite, is truly disconcerting.

Equally paradoxical is the delusional erotomanic patient, who feels and believes herself to be loved and protected, thanks to the –eloquent– proofs her beloved leaves her. But the truth is very different: the beloved does not love her or protect her and, often, does not even know her. Once the harassment begins, the "object" moves from ignorance or indifference to an attitude even more opposed to the one imagined by the patient. He feels dread instead of love. And he does not protect her, but rather flees from her presence. But the delusion –in this case, of love– stands unscathed in the face of evidence or arguments.

Erotomania.

"[...] the patient interprets all denials of love from the object, however vigorous they may be, as secret affirmations of love, or attempts to remove the other women from the path of the 'lovers'" (69).

The gratifying experience of feeling loved in Clérambault's delusion is not far removed from that of patients with mystical delusions.

Mystical delusion.

"They imagine themselves to be the object of his complacency and his particular predilections. They believe themselves to be not only the brides of God, but also the preferred brides and flooded with all the favors of their husband" (22).

All of this compels us to ask ourselves whether the cult adherent might not be suffering from the same alteration in the perception of reality as erotomania patients: a delusion of love. Paranoid behavior would be characterized not only by the propensity to see enemies and dangers where there are none, but also by a tendency to imagine, and to take as real, nonexistent affections and solidarities. In the IPP, the evaluation of those it counts among its enemies is just as distorted as that of those it perceives as friends or allies.

Three notable parallels would arise between cult adherents and erotomania patients:

Adherents develop intense feelings toward people they barely know and with whom no authentic personal relationship exists. They love the other members of the group by virtue of belonging to it, even those they do not know personally, in exactly the same way that erotomania patients fall in love with someone they have never had any dealings with.

Like erotomania patients, they feel loved and protected, when in reality this is not the case. Patients can hardly be loved or protected by someone who does not know them, but…

Erotomania.

"[...] They are persuaded not only of the possibility of reciprocal feelings, but also of their existence. And they proclaim it" (22).

Erotomania.

"Continuous Protection of the Object" (15).

In sectarian groups of a certain size, most members do not usually have personal contact with the leader, which does not prevent them from developing "positive" self-referential feelings; they feel that their leader knows them personally and helps them. The experience, so common among psychotic patients, of the television directing messages specifically to each one of them, is common among members of sectarian groups in relation to the leader.

The following two quotes provide us with a good example of deluded solidarity, referring not to the small core of the SLA, but to the group they perceived as the "broader we": the people.

Sectarian-Leninist groupuscule. SLA.

"He decided he would go out and ring the neighborhood doorbells; he would identify himself and enlist new recruits into the SLA to help us get food and continue with the revolution. Fahiza thought the idea was brilliant. I thought he was drunk. 'Everyone in this neighborhood is poor,' Cin explained, 'and now that they know who we are, everyone will want to help.'[...] The people would receive him with open arms, our leader promised" (32).

Sectarian-Leninist groupuscule. SLA.

"Weren't those Chicanos fantastic?" exclaimed Teko. "Minorities really believe in the SLA and in what we're trying to do... That guy gave us the car. He knew we really needed it. He understood that we weren't stealing it... Black people and Chicanos are like that. If they think you really need something they share it with you." He went on at great length, ignoring the obvious fact that the submachine gun in his hands had frightened that poor man who didn't know what to do" (32).

When the personal relationship does exist, and the delusional love does not refer to an unknown person, equally grotesque interpretations of reality occur. Now, small gestures of generosity, spontaneous or forced, are magnified to the point of absurdity, the indifferent glance is transformed into a glance of complicity, the obedience that fear produces is nothing more than voluntary collaboration, and even mistreatment becomes proof of love.

Sectarian groups. Baba and his Family.

"A devotee was beaten 20 times by Baba. He accepted it as a message of love and prostrated himself naked on the snow in gratitude to his guru" (21).

The term erotomania reminds us that the disorder is frequently associated with a marked euphoric exaltation of mood (although etymologically the origin is different).

Erotomania. Clinical case.

"But this love was so pure, so ideal at first, that it metamorphosed me. I was so happy that instead of withering away I gained weight, my countenance reflected such an expression of happiness that the people around me were astonished" (22).

Later I will comment on the frequent diffusion of states of exaltation/euphoria within paranoid contagion groups. For now, it is sufficient to emphasize that generalized hyperthymia facilitates contact among group members, creates a sense of familiarity and spontaneity, and is closely associated with the shared perception of mutual love and solidarity.

Delirious love and solidarity are not exclusive to erotomania, but also occur in other paranoid disorders, such as some mystical delusions. In these, the patient feels loved, guided and protected by God. In clinical practice, we have had occasion to see patients who felt followed and protected by angels that no one else could see. They, however, could feel their presence. The delusion, here, is twofold: the patient deludes a presence and also deludes a loving and beneficent attitude directed toward their person.

The same phenomenon occurs in paranoid contagion groups.

Messianic movements. Aldebert (8th century).

"Aldebert also believes himself to be surrounded by an army formed by eight guardian angels" (8).

Pentecostalist cult group. Clinical case.

"– They never stopped telling us about the demons and the angels that were everywhere. You came to feel their presence. On one occasion, returning home with my children, I saw a bright light and, believing it to be an angel, I stood there for 20 minutes gazing at it in ecstasy. Then I understood it was a streetlamp" (61).

Secretiveness

Paranoia

"[...] in the clinical picture of paranoia. Among the objective characteristics are included [...] secretiveness..." (50).

Paranoid personality

"These individuals are considered by others as reserved, secretive, distant and scheming" (2).

These statements are based on the clinical observation of cases such as the following:

Paranoia. Clinical case.

"Only now does it become evident that he had suffered 20 years of marked persecution mania and a delusion of grandeur" (41).

Jealous. Clinical case.

"The wife is astonished that this scene, not remembered by her, is of such great importance and such singular significance to him. Even more surprising to her is that, in the insistent conversations on the subject to which she finds herself forced by him, she discovers that the suspicions about her began twenty years earlier, shortly before the marriage…" (13).

The secretiveness of the IP, of course, carries over into the clinical setting.

Querulants

"In this group, family relationships are difficult to assess, given that they often do not disclose personal information during interviews" (65).

Paranoia

"When one approaches an event that seems to have been pivotal on a biographical level, one perceives that the account appears to have been subject to a more or less perceptible redirection, such that one is left disappointed by the few significant elements obtained…" (53).

This resistance to revealing personal information can greatly hinder diagnosis.

Delusion of interpretation

"Diagnosis becomes more arduous when certain patients stubbornly conceal their delusional ideas; this dissimulation, sometimes prolonged, is difficult to dispel" (70).

Persecuted-persecutors

"[...] on the contrary, the diagnosis of these reasoning persecutors is often more prolonged and difficult to establish. In some cases, indeed, certainty can only be reached through a very prolonged examination, through exact knowledge of the patient's background, and through a kind of meticulous investigation into the various actions of these patients, into the reality of the facts they present, and into the part of truth or falsehood contained in their true or imaginary accounts" (60).

The mGP are likewise not immune to the dynamics of concealment.

Domestic tyranny. Rachel's case.

"The children began spending more time with their biological father, from whom the true nature of our family was concealed. We had sworn to keep the secret, compelled by Fred" (76).

The link between secrecy, on the one hand, and, on the other, the distrust and war mentality in which the IGP lives, is quite evident. Secrecy is a means of protection, the way of not showing the enemy one's vulnerable points and of not giving it an advantage.

Nazism

"Despite their inclination to criticize everything we do, the democracies never miss an opportunity to imitate us when we take measures aimed at simplifying our organization. It is for this reason that, from now on, it will be advisable not to speak in the press about our innovations in this area since, by acting as we have until now, we make such information available to enemy nations and allow them to benefit from our own experiences. In this domain as well, silence is today strictly required" (34).

Concealment

What is it that the IGP attempts to keep secret?

Concealment of presence

The clearest manifestation of paranoid secrecy occurs in some APs that are, or attempt to be, precisely, secret societies. These are groups that operate out of public view, concealing their presence, their activities, and their organizational structures, functioning in such a way that allows them to see (and act) without being seen. Secret societies attempt to be completely invisible without thereby renouncing the carrying out of actions perceptible to the rest of society.

However, some forces push APs in the opposite direction from secrecy: the proselytizing objective that necessarily requires making oneself known, as well as the practical complications of all kinds that are usually generated by not granting legal recognition to a group, especially when it acquires a certain size. Consequently, the absolute opacity of secret societies tends to be limited to those groups liable to be subject to persecution or social rejection (terrorists, satanic cults, etc.).

A particular group may choose to stop being a secret society, yet, nonetheless, retain the fascination with opacity.

Nazism

"As police and combat troops, without scruples or mercy, the SS progressively lost some of their primitive character. Especially during the war, where they were often forcibly enlisted. Nevertheless, Himmler preserved an 'SS mystique,' and persisted in giving his organization the air of a secret league, with initiation ceremonies in the cathedral of Quedlinburg" (20).

Concealment of membership

A variant of the secret society is one in which the group as such operates openly in its environment, but the majority of its followers are under a mandate to conceal their membership.

Sectarian groups. Ordo Templi Orientis.

"The kids in the neighborhood didn't know. Nor did the school authorities. To the outside world I had nothing special about me, but neither had I been taught the skills that would have been useful for socializing in the school playground. I was a confused, alienated, lost girl, who during school breaks would usually talk to the trees or, later on, read. Not only did I lack common experiences and skills to share with the other kids, I had also been warned that I should not talk to others. I knew two children from the community who the authorities had separated from their parents. I was afraid that if I ever revealed my parents' practices, the consequences would be terrible, for them and for me. The outside world was horrible. My lips were effectively sealed by terror for thirty years" (76).

Concealment of the power structure

Sectarian groups. El Patriarca.

"The nominal composition of this International Directorate is not public, but its members, logically, coincide with the most influential figures in the organization and occupy all positions of trust..." (63).

Concealment of activities

Sectarian groups. El Patriarca.

"The doctors of many departments, called upon to examine young members of the Association, are unanimous in lamenting that their actions are limited to guidance, to a request for additional examinations or treatment, without being able to verify the execution thereof. Indeed, their prescriptions will, or will not, be taken into account by the Association. They will be consulted only at the request of those in charge and will not regularly see the residents" (From the report of the French Interministerial Commission that investigated El Patriarca, cited in 63).

Sokagakkai

"The internal workings of Sokagakkai are not sufficiently open to the non-member as to allow a judgment on the relative degree to which the strategic and tactical consistencies and changes described are the result of personality, the size of the organization, or environmental influences" (81).

Sokagakkai

"The Gakkai does not publish reports of its financial activities, a policy that has produced numerous rumors [...]" (81).

Cult groups. Moonies.

"Chief Inspector Sabineau concludes: 'The AUCM appears not merely as a non-profit association (1901 law), but as a genuine commercial enterprise.' His colleague Morvan drives the point home: 'As a non-profit association, the AUCM seems to have forgotten its statutory objective, which is the unification of the world under God. More concerned with profitability, it uses a spiritual message to obtain one million francs in profits each year, the use of which it cannot account for, but which the incessant travels of its members across borders could well explain. This concealment is all the more convenient in that no general assembly is held, no rendering of accounts is carried out, no vote is cast..." (9).

North Korean Leninism

"Like its leaders, North Korea, once again at odds with the world following the refusal to allow inspection of its nuclear facilities, has hardly any friends" (3).

The fixation on mystery, on secrecy, manifests itself in four interesting behaviors and themes shared by the IP and the GCP:

Silence

Evasive discourse

Masks

Discretion

Silence

The most evident behavioral expression of secretiveness is silence. The IGP prefers to remain silent rather than give itself away.

Folie à deux. Clinical case.

"[...] or withdraws into a systematic mutism..." (46).

A mutism that tends to be selective toward a specific person.

Sectarian groups. Morabitum.

"The morabitum, claiming that the press is against Islam and dominated by Zionists, refused to speak for this report..." (49).

Evasive discourse

Persecuted-persecutors

"[In their writings] they proceed almost always by allusion, and their most repeated assertions are full of reticence and innuendo. They assume that the facts they speak of are known to everyone, that others must only be mentioned in half-words, in an opaque and indirect manner, for fear of compromising themselves; other facts, on the contrary, must be proclaimed very loudly in order to draw attention to them" (60).

The persistent determination to "not let anything slip" produces a peculiar, slippery discourse, which the paranoid contagion groups describe with terms such as "prudence" or "discretion".

Nazism

"I believe that one must exercise the utmost prudence in what we communicate to our allies. Unfortunately, I have observed that the Italians themselves, when the matter of the communications I make to them does not relate immediately to their own interests, do not observe in this regard sufficient discretion..." (34).

It is easier to recognize than to describe that particular elusive character of paranoid discourse which allows the patient to sidestep those issues they do not wish to address, hindering the clinician's task of finding out what is happening to their patient.

The evasive attitude may manifest itself in the elimination of certain words from everyday use.

Nazism

"No one in Hitler's permanent circle dared to mention the words 'concentration camps', much less openly ask whether they existed" (78).

Or driving the creation of a vocabulary of their own, known only to the members of the group.

Sectarian groups. TFP.

"Since TFP members believe that the "bucha" (the secret church in the service of the devil and the Revolution) spies on them and attempts to intercept their communications, they use a peculiar gesture (extending three fingers of the hand) to refer to the "bucha" when they do not wish to be heard, or when dealing with sensitive matters, or when they want to indicate that someone is a "buchero".

They likewise use key words in their telephone conversations" (61).

The evasive style may go so far as to give the IPP's discourse a certain enigmatic air.

Paranoia. The Aimée case.

"There are those who build stables in order to better take me for a dairy cow.

I am often judged in a way that is different from who I really am" (44).

There is an evident relationship between evasive language and the conflict mentality in which the IGP lives, given that any relevant information can be used by enemies.

Paranoid personality. Clinical case.

"Every little thing you say, they use it against you" (5).

Paranoia. Clinical case.

- At work you can't trust anyone, they snitch, I don't talk to anyone.

Enemies who listen and watch from the shadows.

Sectarian groups. TFP.

"The members of this group are convinced that their telephone calls are being intercepted, and therefore limit their conversations to the bare minimum and the possible leaking of sensitive information" (61).

Masks

Paranoidism in general. Rorschach test.

"Responses of a schizoparanoid tinge complex.

Contents such as [...] 'disguises', 'masks'..." (58).

This type of response in the Rorschach test, not uncommon in individuals with paranoid traits, seems to reflect a clinical characteristic: the inexpressiveness of the face and gesture, which betrays neither the thoughts, nor the feelings, nor the intentions of the patient.

Paranoid personality. Clinical case.

"[...] suppressing the signs of their own emotions and intentions" (5).

Indeed, the PI tends to hide their true self behind a hard and dry expression, as well as an excessively formal manner or, in cases with a more euphoric tone, behind a constant smile, equally deceptive.

These two profiles are also applicable to cult groups. Some impose a serious, cold, and martial attitude while in others laughter and continuous displays of inextinguishable happiness are the norm.

The front organizations through which PAs frequently operate seem to play that same role of masks. They present a completely limited reality, sometimes ambiguous, which conceals the beliefs, the intentions, and even the identity of whoever lies behind.

Cult groups. Moonies.

"It was when they recruited me into 'Crusade for a World,' a front group of the Unification Church, also known as the Moonies" (31).

Discretion

The PI also does not allow others to make inferences from their behaviors.

Paranoia.

"In any case, many of these patients succeed in concealing their struggles and desires so that only initiated persons arrive at a clear understanding of their pathological state and no morbid acts can be discerned in their daily life" (41).

The IGP's obsession with secrecy, with ensuring that nothing about it becomes known, leads it to adopt a particularly cautious behavior, tending to leave no traces…

Paranoid personality. Clinical case.

"He said he sought therapy because his symptoms had intensified due to the pressures of studying. The most notable aspect of the initial interview was that he did not want his family to know he was in therapy ('they don't believe in therapy'), nor did he wish to use his health insurance because he was worried about the possibility that the fact that he was in treatment might become known" (5).

(…) or to destroy them when necessary. A cult group requires that a reserve of gasoline be kept ready at each of its premises in order to swiftly dispose of all documentation when needed. One final act of concealment to be carried out, in other cases, at the moment of the defeat or dismantling of the paranoid contagion group, when the definitive end is already imminent.

Nazism

"The imminent end of the war was precipitating events. On April 14, 1945, Himmler sent a communiqué to the commander of Dachau: 'The camp must be destroyed, no detainee must fall alive into the hands of the enemy. The infirmary must be set on fire'" (45).

Lies

Delusion of grievance. The Aub case.

"[...] deceives..."(70).

Victims playing the victim.

"[…]is associated with numerous undesirable personality traits such as[…]less honestyand humility"(14).

Paranoia. The Aimée case.

"It is necessary, she told her, that you be willing to testify that André (herhusband) hits meand hits the child. I want a divorce and to keep the child"(44).

The striking ability of paranoid patients to conceal their delusions even from those in their close circle and for many years does not depend solely on concealment, but often requires resorting to lying, given that only through falsehoods can the delusionalsubject explainhis attitudes and behaviors without revealing his secret.

Persecuted-persecutors

"Liars and acting in bad faith, they have a particular ability to distort reality"(60).

Lying equally characterizes the adherents of cult groups, especially during the first months or years of militancy, in which they systematically lie to conceal their progressive immersion in the group. "They had never lied to us before, but now they do nothing but lie," is one of the phrases most commonly uttered by family members. I know of more than one Christian group that, in its proselytizing with minors, goes so far as to teach them that such a lie does not constitute any sin, since the parents may be agents of the devil in opposing their budding religious vocation. All descriptions of cult clinical practice found in the literature speak of lying as one of the most frequent behaviors of the adherent.

The following example is quite revealing:

Cult groups. Moonies.

"People bought these items because they believed they were making a donation to a charitable cause. Our consciences had been reprogrammed according to Moon's value system.We told people we were sponsoring programs for Christian youth: a lie. We said we ran rehabilitation centers for drug addicts: another lie. We said we helped orphaned children: more lies. Depending on the inspiration of the moment, we invented whatever lie best suited us to achieve our purposes. Since we believed that saving the world from the hands of Satan and establishing the kingdom of God on Earth was the most important task, we did not consider that we were actually lying" (31).

SPs lie to the outside world and to their own subjects.

North Korean Leninism

"The deception of the North Korean population takes curious forms. Sometimes, the regime inserts propaganda into newspapers fromfriendlycountries, and the official agency reproduces it as information originating from the newspaper in which it was published. 'Tropical Africahighlights the successes achieved in our country by the Great Leader and our Dear Commander,' may be one of the doctored headlines" (3).

Ungerleider's research brought to light a curious psychometric anomaly among militants of cult groups.

Cults in general

"It should be noted that the group of cult members [as opposed to that of ex-cult members] had an elevation on the L scale [of lie, lie]..." (77).

The L scale assesses responses to a series of questions relating to minor faults that are almost universal. Most people readily acknowledge having such faults, but the score on the scale rises in subjects who consciously want to present a good image (typically when the test is used in personnel selection processes), as well as in those who, for various reasons, have an abnormally optimistic perception of themselves. The elevation of the L scale can result in some psychopathological scales that should show an altered score failing to do so. The high scores among cult members suggest that APs induce a change in adherents that makes them disinclined to acknowledge their negative aspects and their own psychological distress.

IPs seem to act in a manner similar to cult militants, denying their failures and shortcomings and, consequently, distorting reality in order to project and to maintain a good image of themselves.

Paranoid character. Clinical case.

"I never confess my ignorance.

If in my presence people talk about things I do not know, when everyone laughs I laugh along.

If they address me directly and I cannot answer, I have wit subtle enough to evade any response that might expose me" (28).

Paranoid character. Clinical case.

"I met a provincial lawyer, with a sparse clientele, embittered, who would gladly recount his student years. In the Latin Quarter he had met Barrès and a few others: 'Oh, yes! Those fellows have been successful. At the time I thought about doing as they did, but bah! …" (28).

The lie of the IGP not only conceals the facts, but can create an entirely fictitious megalomaniacal reality.

Sectarian-Leninist groupuscule. SLA.

"He told me that the SLA was an enormous army [in reality it was made up of eight people], with several armed combat teams, intelligence units, medical teams, and all of it backed by financial support from collaborators with the revolution across the entire country"(32).

The megalomaniacal lie concerns the size of the group, as well as its achievements.

Sectarian groups. El Patriarca.

"Thus, for example, in a magazine from El Patriarca, the total number of admissions of Majorcans between 1979 and the first quarter of 1989 is listed, purely and simply, and the text concludes with the phrase: 'The figures speak for themselves, more than 200 islanders have left drugs behind at Le Patriarche in just 4 years.'

... That is to say that, without any blush or timidity whatsoever, El Patriarca absolutely identifies or correlates admission to its centers with the rehabilitation of the drug addict, something which, unfortunately, is very far from being reality"(63).

The biography of the leader is, very frequently, the object of a falsification aimed at the glorification of his person.

Sectarian groups. El Patriarca.

"If we allow ourselves to be guided by the official biography, repeated ad nauseam in nearly all the books, pamphlets and magazines published by the Association, Lucien Joseph Engelmajer was born in Frankfurt on November 27, 1920.

... And all so as not to be identified as Polish..." (63).

In addition to embellishing his past, the APs jealously conceal from the world and from the majority of followers the illnesses, hobbies, weaknesses and lies of the leader…

Cult groups. Sai Baba.

"To be honest, Sai Baba looks every bit like a pop star. He is settled in a red velvet armchair and rests his delicate little feet on a footstool. Just below, I observe with astonishment a cushion on which there is… an egg! Later I would come to understand the exact nature of the object: among other miracles, Sai Baba has the habit of… laying eggs through his mouth" (8).

Only collective paranoidization explains the unanimous collaboration of the members of the paranoid contagion group in deceiving the outside world; the good image must be preserved at all costs.

Cult groups. The Reverend Jones's Peoples Temple.

"As for outside visitors, as Blakey attested, their presence, which was rarely permitted, gave rise to a theatrical display on the part of the community, as was the case with the Ryan mission: 'Before the visitors arrived, Reverend Jones would explain to us what kind of image we should project. The workday was lightened, the food improved, and sometimes music and dancing were enjoyed. Apart from these performances, there was little joy or hope in our lives. An atmosphere of despondency permeated everything'" (42).

A despondency that vanishes in the presence of visitors.

Cult groups. The Reverend Jones's Peoples Temple.

"If the horrors we had been told about were true, they certainly did not appear to be. On the whole, I found myself favorably impressed" (42).

Cult groups. The Reverend Jones's Peoples Temple.

"The representatives of the American consulate in Guyana had visited the commune four times during the year 1978, the last time on November 7, only eleven days before the massacre. And, according to spokespeople from the State Department, on each visit members of the cult whom their relatives considered, in their complaints, to be held there against their will were privately questioned. John A. Bushnell, Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Inter-American Affairs, declared to the press after the massacre: 'More than 75 members of the cult spoke during the past year with consular authorities, and none of them confirmed the accusations of mistreatment [which, in reality, were habitual]"42).

The same self-embellishing bias underlies the falsification of past events so common in nationalist historiographies.

Turkish nationalism.

"But they belong to a national tradition, which is not the case with the Armenian one, whose genocide during the civil war is entirely ignored in official history: that said, with maximum cynicism in the museum of Van, where no object recalls the centuries of Armenian presence in the region,there are displayed supposed evidence and books are sold according to which the genocide had a meaning opposite to the real one"25).

One reason why the paranoid contagion group and its members are compelled to project a false reality onto their surroundings is proselytism, a mandate that almost always weighs upon the member of the cult group. It is necessary to present a good image if one wishes to attract new members to the cause

Sokagakkai

"I wish that you broaden the circle of your friendships, that you strengthen the bonds of mutual understanding with others and that you increase the brilliance of your knowledge so that you may become the kind of people for whom society feels warm sympathy and in whom it places its trust. I ask this of you and I will be watching as you carry it out"37).

And, in this arduous proselytizing endeavor, lying becomes a perfectly legitimate behavior.

Cult groups. Moonies.

"As soon as I called the center, they immediately took me to another three-day work workshop. When I asked a member why they had not told me the truth about the religious nature of the movement, he answered me with another question: 'Had you known beforehand, would you have come?' Since the members are so imbued with fulfilling sacred goals, there is no room for 'old morality'. The group uses the Bible to 'prove' that God forgives deception on various occasions throughout history in order to make His plans triumph. By accepting the deception I had myself suffered, I was willing to begin deceiving others" (31).

Sectarian groups. The Patriarch.

"A prototypical example can be found in one of Engelmajer's most widely circulated books, Hope in Action, when he recounts the vicissitudes of 'Olga, a thirteen-year-old Spanish girl'. The text attributes to Olga, without any shame and with details that allow her family to be identified, a prostitute mother, an alcoholic father who also acts as the woman's pimp...

In short, the entire Kafkaesque story that Lucien Engelmajer recounts in his book is absolutely false and the product of a fabricating and redemptionist mentality" (63).

Another group of lies are those that are woven around those whom the paranoid contagion group identifies as enemies. The aim is both to discredit them and to encourage mobilization against them.

Nazism

"Fundamentally wrong was the insinuation, every time the guilt for the war was discussed, that only Germany could be blamed for the catastrophe; the right thing would have been to place this responsibility ceaselessly on the enemy alone, even when this did not coincide with reality as the facts were, which was, nonetheless, the truth" (35).

Nazism

"The signatories of the Concordat were not unaware, however, that National Socialism had, from that moment, unleashed a struggle against the Catholic Church. Soon Goebbels and Heydrich initiated proceedings against some monks under the pretext of offenses against public morality and detained some nuns invoking the crime of currency trafficking..." (20).

Sadism

Cruelty

Persecuted-persecutors

"They are ferocious with animals, harsh with inferiors…" (60).

Aggression consists of killing or causing suffering —physically or morally— to others, actively or by failing to render assistance. As occurs in other gregarious animals, mechanisms exist in our species that inhibit the deployment of aggressiveness, since the contemplation of another's suffering blocks or limits our disposition to continue inflicting it and even drives us to help.

Whether because it increases aggressiveness or because the inhibitory mechanisms of aggressiveness become diluted, clinicians know that some psychiatric pathologies present, or can present, with an increase in cruelty, lasting or momentary. This occurs in sociopathic personality and other personality disorders, in schizophrenia, in some delusional disorders, in intermittent explosive disorder, etc. There are likewise pathologies, such as hysteria, in which suffering is administered to those in one's surroundings through somewhat more subtle means.

Now then, one of the most characteristic traits of paranoid behavior is cruelty and a lack of sensitivity toward the suffering of others. Cruelty constitutes a stable trait in individuals with a paranoid personality disorder and is a supervening phenomenon in acute paranoid conditions.

Acute psychoses. Clinical case.

"He became convinced that the two of them were 'psychocopies', doubles who had taken the place of his wife and daughter in order to harm him [...] The delusion grew so strong that S. became violent toward his wife, first verbally and then physically" (6).

The paranoidization induced by the paranoid contagion group also presents with an increase in aggressiveness.

Warriors

"War not only departs from normality; it also inverts the terms of what is just and moral: in war one must kill, one must steal, one must burn cities and farms, and perhaps even one must rape women and girls. Whether or not these activities are 'natural', or in some way instinctive, most men only carry them out when they enter what appears to be an 'altered state'…" (24).

A state in which certain individuals, professionals of violence, live permanently.

Warriors

"In feudal Japan, a commoner who encountered a samurai on the roads had to dismount, bow deeply while averting his gaze, and pray not to fall victim to tsujigiri or 'crossroads cutting', whereby the samurai would test the edge of his sword on a randomly chosen commoner" (24).

If something like this was possible, it is because from their earliest childhood they had learned to familiarize themselves with and not be too impressed by the death of others.

Warriors. The samurai bushido.

"Pilgrimage to all manner of strange places — to places where executions were carried out, to graves, to houses believed to be haunted — formed part of the favorite pastimes of young people. In the times when beheadings were public, not only were small children sent to witness the horrendous scene, but they had to visit the site alone in the darkness of night and leave a mark of their visit on the head that had been severed from the body" (54).

Now then, in this "altered state", cruelty is not merely a duty, a norm, or a cherished cultural tradition — it is a tendency that emerges without anyone or any rule imposing it. The suffering of others ceases to be unsettling and may even prove strangely gratifying.

Delusion of grievance

"No less characteristic than the irresistibility of the obsessive idea is the feeling of relief that follows its satisfaction. The homicidal persecutor, 'seeing his victim on the ground, enjoys a feeling of triumph and recovers his peace of mind at least for a certain time (R. Leroy)" (70).

Delusion of grievance. Aub case.

"At the moment of the presidential election his exaltation keeps growing. He tries to return to Versailles with the aim of assassinating Jules Ferry should the latter be elected. He recounts with pleasure the scene of the attempted homicide at the Bourbon Palace: 'On December 10th the psychological moment had arrived: I had set my trap, H...'s credentials, I reach the room, I put out a lure and threw myself upon him. I was brimming with cold blood, without the slightest hesitation. I land a second blow' (70).

Leninist-sectarian groupuscule. SLA.

"Our Black Muslim comrades would visit us approximately every other day, bringing us food, supplies and newspapers. They always came with the children because, Retimah said, they always asked 'When will we see Jesus?'. Cin would speak to the girls kindly, telling them revolutionary stories in the simple language of fairy tales. Once, the eldest of the girls confessed that she had had a dream in which she had seen herself killing 'a whole bunch of pigs'. This went straight to Zoya's heart, who remarked what a sweet and sensitive girl she was" (32).

The following quote shows us to what extent paranoid cruelty sets in and subsides rapidly —in parallel with patriotic exaltation— and how paranoidization blocks feelings of guilt over any atrocity committed, a guilt that does in fact manifest itself, precisely, when the "altered state" ceases.

Serbian nationalism

"Two weeks ago, Herak and a Serbian married couple, also under arrest for war crimes, took a wrong turn when driving back from the nearby town of Vogosca to Ilidza, on the outskirts of Sarajevo, under Serbian control. A Bosnian army unit stopped them. Almost immediately after being arrested, Herak began telling investigators about his terrible crimes as a Serbian fighter, including an incident in which he used an 11-centimeter hunting knife to cut off the heads of three Bosnian soldiers... The indictment lists 29 individual murders between June and October, including eight rape-murders of Muslim women held as prisoners in an abandoned motel on the outskirts of Vogosca, about eleven kilometers north of Sarajevo.

The indictment also includes the murder of at least 220 other Muslim civilians, in which he has confessed to having taken part... One morning, a 66-year-old Serbian volunteer took him and three other young Serbs there and taught them how to fight pigs, how to hold their heads back by the ears and cut their throats.

Days later, Herak used what he called 'this skill' to cut the throats of three captured Muslims... Herak, his head shaved by his captors, often used the Serbo-Croatian word ciscenje, meaning 'cleansing', to describe his activities as a Serbian fighter, for which he was paid the equivalent of 6.5 dollars a month. When referring to the killing of the Muslim family in Ahatovci, he said that the Serbian commanders had called the operation ciscenje prostora, meaning 'cleansing of the region'...

Herak, looking pale, with sunken eyes and nails so conscientiously bitten that some had virtually disappeared, said that at night he was tormented by the memory of some of his victims, specifically the three men whose throats he had cut. 'In my mind I have images of many things I did, and they come back every night,' he said. 'I fall asleep, I wake up drenched in sweat, I fall asleep again, I wake up and smoke, and Osman is always there. I have dreamed at least ten times about Osman, who would say to me: "Please, don't kill me. I have a wife and two small children."'

He acknowledged that he had had good relations with his Muslim neighbors in Pofalici, who had invited the Heraks to their homes for Bajram, an important Muslim holiday, and whom the Heraks had also invited for Christmas. But he stated that, after joining the Serbian fighters, he began to see them differently. The Serbian commanders told the fighters that the Muslims, who made up 44% of Bosnia's 4.4 million inhabitants before the war, were planning to declare an Islamic republic in Bosnia, which would become independent from Yugoslavia. 'That is what they told us. That is why all of this has had to be done' (10).

If we now analyze what appear to be the determining elements of this characteristic of the IGP, three stand out, namely:

- Hyper-hierarchization, which authorizes and encourages the mistreatment of inferiors or subordinates.

- The importance attributed to messianic goals, which justifies resorting to any means to eliminate obstacles on the path toward them.

Reformers

"This conception has played a great role in the final work left behind by these mystics of equity (Torquemada, Robespierre, Calvin). All three maintain that whoever possesses the truth may impose it by force and punish dissenters with death.

the idealists of justice are capable of torturing all of humanity and destroying it to allow justice to reign unopposed, even if in a desert" (22).

Other paranoid groups. The sebastianisms of Pernambuco (19th century).

"According to the testimony of a member of the group, military exercises were indispensable, as it was necessary [...] to eliminate all those who opposed their sacred end advocated by the law of God" (68).

- The coldness of the bond, which entails desensitization to the suffering of others.

Reformers

"They feel no emotion in the face of suffering given that they have no true goodness; all their affectivity is absorbed by the cult of an abstraction" (22).

Falret's persecuted-persecutors

" completely devoid of moral and altruistic feelings …" (27).

Nazism

"In one of the most chilling speeches delivered during the Second World War, at Poznań, on October 4, 1943, Himmler explained his views to his SS generals: 'What happens to the Russians does not interest me; what happens to the Chechens is of no importance to me. That these people suffer hunger and misery only interests me insofar as we need slaves for our culture. If 10,000 Russian women have to die of exhaustion digging a tank trap, that only interests me in terms of whether the tank trap gets finished for Germany" (Goebbels, quoted in 78).

Belligerence

Let us now set aside the causes or explanations of aggression and cruelty; the fact is that the IPP displays a marked inclination toward belligerence.

Delusion of interpretation

"[...] the majority are committed, but not on account of their delusional ideas, but because of the violent and impulsive character that makes them dangerous" (70).

Paranoia. Clinical case.

- I feel like unleashing against everyone the rage that comes over me…

Delusion of reindication

"Finally, they resort to attempts at blackmail, to insults, to threats, to acts of violence, and sometimes, they set themselves up as vigilantes, organize ambushes and mortally wound those who have condemned them" (70).

Folie à deux. Clinical case.

"Upon seeing me they became alarmed, but before they could make a single movement I placed myself in front of the threshold, warning them that they could only enter after I had done so. 'I am Mr. Dragon, I have come to check on the state you are in and to ask you to go to a health home'. Miss X..., who had seen me near her husband, also afflicted by mental alienation, told me that I was not Mr. Dragon, and then both of them lunged at me. A struggle then broke out whose outcome I could not foresee, as I realized that two steps away there was a hunting rifle; the wretched women tore at my hands, bit me, and the fight could only be brought under control by putting them in straitjackets.

Miss X. was terrible; forgetting all modesty she rolled across the floor in a furious rage. But suddenly a glimmer of hope came to her, she stood up, and stepping into a small sitting room into which I followed her she said: 'What are you afraid of, at least give me your hands'. Had I done so I would have been lost: a large kitchen knife was hidden under the cover of the sofa on which she was sitting" (46).

Although not all cult groups plant bombs or release toxic gases in the subways of major cities, there exists a certain general tendency to establish conflictive relations with the authorities, with neighbors, with former members, or with some group upon which they fix their attention, especially if it is perceived as competition. As for the belligerence of nations, this has been the subject of numerous analyses.

Crime

Paranoid belligerence, obviously, entails a criminal propensity.

Paranoia. The Aimée Case.

"The month of January prior to the attack, she reveals her intentions to her sister, in a scene in which she displays an inner agitation and a violence in her words that the latter still recalls with a shudder. I am prepared for anything, if not I will kill him" (44).

Although paranoid males are more dangerous, especially jealous ones and domestic tyrants, who in recent years seem to be the protagonists of a wave of terror against girlfriends, wives and, quite frequently, ex-wives. Secrecy means that paranoid crime is, on some occasions, completely unforeseen.

Paranoia. Clinical case.

"He had had a magnificent record as a teacher; in the town where he had taught for ten years, before his last posting, he was remembered as the best teacher they had ever had. They (his friends, former students and teaching colleagues) described him as an admirable citizen, serious, somewhat quiet, of manners more gentle than brusque [...] an educated, intelligent, sensitive man [...] who was calm and rational in everything he said [...]. Wagner had spent the evening of September 3, 1913 with his landlady and her daughter, a young teacher, sitting in front of the house admiring the quiet summer afternoon.

That night, Wagner killed his wife and four children, as silently and painlessly as he could. The following night several bonfires awakened the citizens of Muehlhausen, in southwest Germany. Those who ran into the street found a man whose face was hidden by a black veil and who was armed with two pistols. When he had finished firing, eight men and a woman lay dead, and twelve others were seriously wounded.

How can the doctor or the family detect the possibility of such acts of mass violence? Herr Wagner was not only a model citizen, but even until the end he offered no indication of his murderous intentions. Nevertheless, he had been preparing his plans for six years before carrying them out. He carefully stockpiled weapons, secretly practiced his marksmanship in the nearby forests and kept a diary of his activities. For twelve years Wagner had been developing an elaborate delusional system, supposedly based on acts of sodomy he had perpetrated at the beginning of that period. He gradually came to feel increasingly degraded by these acts and ultimately decided that it was necessary to mercilessly kill his wife and children, for the sole purpose of sparing them many years of slander and abuse. Consequently, it would then be necessary to kill the men of Muehlhausen for having forced him to commit this atrocious act"(73).

Sectarian and messianic movements, too, sometimes become criminal.

Other paranoid groups. The sebastianisms of Pernambuco (19th century).

"They lived off the plundering of neighboring farms and on their expeditions they captured men, women, children and dogs who were to be sacrificed ritually according to the cruel prescriptions of their religion" (68).

Messianic movements. Yahweh ben Yahweh (20th century).

"Far gone is the time when Yahweh commanded his disciples: 'Kill a white demon and bring me one of its ears…" (8).

The same homicidal impulse that awakens in states of patriotic enthusiasm.

Serbian nationalism

"To those who say that Serbia is small, we are going to show them what's good for them, to the grave with all of them!" (74).

Serbian nationalism

"The Muslims who took refuge in Gorazde were promised that they could return safely. Those who believed that promise perished. They pushed more than three hundred inside the Old Mosque, near the bus station, and set it on fire. I will never forget their screams of terror and the smell of burning flesh. There were girls who tried to commit suicide, throwing themselves from the rooms where the 'White Eagles' had locked them in to rape them. A neighbor and her 17-year-old daughter were violated, had their throats cut, and were thrown into the river. A girl managed to escape from a dwelling that had been doused in gasoline and set on fire, without skin, without hair, scorched, a living wound, like a ghost or skeleton. They were able to save her and she is hospitalized in Ljubljana. 'I live,' she said, 'to bear witness.'

'Did the Serbs from the village collaborate in these brutalities?'

'A large number of them, yes. It seems incredible, but that is how it was. Only a minority stood apart and even tried to help us'" (30).

Mistreatment

When it does not manifest in murder, paranoid cruelty expresses itself in mistreatment and torture, practices that are on occasion carried out by paranoid patients, that are habitual among domestic tyrants, frequent in paranoid personalities, and almost universal in Leninist and Nazi-fascist totalitarianisms.

Acute psychoses. Clinical case.

"Having endured physical and sexual abuse for several months, his wife left him, taking the child with her" (6).

Nazism

"Mr. Gutterer and Mr. Fischer must prepare a campaign against the treatment given to prisoners of war, which continues to be excessively good. The Minister is thinking of a printed notice, to be entitled 'Decalogue for the Treatment of Prisoners of War,' which must be delivered, with a signature, to the households in which prisoners of war are employed" (7).

One must not lose sight of the existence of mistreatment through denial of assistance or care.

Nazism

"There is a real danger that, under our domination, this indigenous population will grow at an accelerated rate. It is certainly inevitable that, thanks to us, their living conditions will be better and more secure. We must therefore take the necessary measures to prevent the non-German population from growing in such regions. Under these conditions it would be madness to want to create health services along German lines for the use of the indigenous people. So no vaccinations, nor any other preventive measures with respect to the indigenous people. It is also necessary to prevent their desire from taking hold in them; it is better that they continue with the conviction that vaccination is a very dangerous practice" (Adolf Hitler, cited in 33)

Cruelty

Querulants.

"The premorbid traits of litigious-querulant delusional disorder include [...] ruthless character" (50).

The lack of pity is a distinctive hallmark of paranoid violence. All human societies have a code that marks those boundaries which it is not acceptable to cross. But these boundaries, for the IPP, deserve no respect whatsoever. Any degree of cruelty is admissible.

Nazism

"In the Dachau camp, the medical experiments carried out by Sigmund Rascher, an unscrupulous man and fanatical Nazi, became macabrely infamous [...]

On April 5, 1942, Rascher sent his superiors a report explaining his experiments: 'The third experiment developed in such an extraordinary way that, since I am conducting these tests on my own, I called an SS doctor from the camp to serve as a witness. It consisted of an experiment of prolonged oxygen deprivation at an altitude of 12,500 meters, on a 37-year-old Jew whose general condition was good. Breathing continued for thirty minutes. At four minutes the subject began to sweat and move his head. At five minutes cramps appeared; between six and seven minutes breathing accelerated, and the subject lost consciousness; between eleven and thirty minutes breathing slowed, until it stopped completely. Meanwhile, severe cyanosis appeared, and the subject began to foam at the mouth" (82).

Sectarian groups. No-Name Fellowship.

"In December 1987, ten-year-old Aaron Norman died as a result of medical negligence and a beating administered by his father and Doug Kleber. The child suffered from juvenile diabetes but his parents did not seek medical assistance for him, preferring to trust in the power of prayer. When his physical condition worsened and prayer did not seem effective, the church elders were consulted to determine what the problem was. According to the Chicago Tribune of June 21, 1988, the elders determined that Aaron had sinned. The sin was masturbation, but Aaron did not confess the sin. His father decided to beat him with a board because the Holy Spirit had told him that he had been masturbating. As the Spokane County prosecutor stated, 'his father and the elders 'rebuked' Aaron to make him confess, but he did not. Aaron's father and Kleber then struck the boy... At some point a wooden paddle was used until he confessed. When the parents woke up on Sunday morning, Aaron was dead. There were severe bruises on his buttocks" (26).

The brutality manifests itself, for example, in a fascination with weapons and a proclivity to use all those available.

Soviet Leninism

"During the revolution of 1905, finding himself [Lenin] in a state of intense agitation, he urged revolutionaries to adopt tactics that many people would have found abnormal and frightening: to combat the Cossacks, he advocated the use of knives, brass knuckles, clubs, paraffin-soaked rags, nails, cotton, gunpowder, boiling water, and acids 'to be thrown at the police'. He recommended attacking and killing the Black Hundreds, seizing Cossacks separated from their troop, and so forth. The list of savage tactics is so long and so elaborate that it is hard to believe it came from a well-educated man, a writer and journalist. In his moments of mental tension, nervous excitement, or extreme circumstances, Lenin lavished this type of cruel advice" (79).

And it manifests itself in the way such weapons are used.

Domestic tyranny

" such as the husband who attacked his wife with a screwdriver and drove it into her eye, causing her to lose her vision…" (48).

The savagery implies that the IGP is not satisfied with merely killing or carrying out a given punishment, but offers a supplementary dose of cruelty that seems to have no explanation other than sadism.

Crisis cults. Lauliwasikaw (19th century).

"The words of Lauliwasikaw provoked a vivid excitement, whose most immediate effect was to consign to the flames the 'medicine men' and the women accused of witchcraft. The first victims designated by the Shawnee prophet were Delaware Indians, among whom was an elderly woman who was roasted over a slow fire for four days until, at the moment of her death, she recalled that her grandson, upon setting out to hunt, had taken his grandmother's 'medicine bag' with him" (43).

Leninism. Shining Path.

"Official sources state that the corpses showed numerous cuts and mutilations carried out with machetes, spears, and daggers. They add that the assailants continued their feat at the hospital in Satipo, where they sliced off the ears of the fourteen children who were admitted there" (1).

Serbian nationalism

"the 'White Eagles' shoved a butcher's hook tied with a rope to the rear bumper of a car into his mouth and dragged him bound through the entire town so that people could see him and hear his screams. They then slit his throat and played football with his head. Finally, they threw his remains into the river" (30).

These were neither madmen nor drugged individuals, but mostly "normal" human beings, intoxicated by a mixture of fear, hatred, and love of the fatherland. Only in this "altered state" have such aberrant behaviors been, and continue to be, possible.

Orgy of blood

It is striking how little paranoid contagion groups hesitate to sacrifice a large number of human lives when it serves the cause (whether those lives belong to enemies or to their own members).

Leninism. Shining Path.

"55 Asháninka Indians, murdered in the jungles of Peru..." (1).

Nor do somewhat more massive death tolls seem to matter too much.

Maoist Leninism

"In 1957, in a speech delivered in Moscow, Mao said he was prepared to lose three hundred million inhabitants, half of the Chinese population. Even if China lost half its population, Mao said, the country would suffer no irreparable loss. We will produce more people" (23).

The tendency to resort to massacre as the definitive means of solving problems lends states of collective paranoidization a special degree of dangerousness. As a rule, massacres pursue the total elimination of target populations that the paranoid contagion group catalogues as enemies or an obstacle to its projects.

Turkish Nationalism

"In Turkey, the traditional regime had been overthrown in 1908 by the revolutionary nationalists known as the 'Young Turks', who eventually sided with the central powers during the European war. Their ultimate goal was a 'Greater Turkey' stretching from Anatolia to Central Asia, but internally their main objective was the domination of the Armenian Christian minority, which constituted the only significant non-Muslim group in Turkish society. Possibly around one hundred thousand Armenians had been killed in 1894-1896 in the course of veritable Turkish blood orgies. Although Armenian troops fought bravely in the Turkish army during the first phase of the European war, the Armenians also aspired to freedom and autonomy and were said to favour the Entente. In 1915, the Turkish government turned against the Armenians, claiming they were the main source of internal dissent and 'sabotage'. It began to detain Armenians throughout the country except in Istanbul and the Aegean cities. They were removed from their homes and driven en masse, like herds, toward the southeastern border, which many of them never managed to reach. They were attacked and murdered in countless incidents, stabbed, shot or beaten to death, drowned, their belongings stolen and their women often raped or taken away as slaves. When these atrocities finally came to an end, in 1923, approximately one million Armenians had died, that is, half of the pre-war Armenian population of Turkey" (57).

It is nothing short of paradoxical that it was a modernizing movement, concerned with human rights, progress and secularism, that carried out ethno-religious massacres of Christian unbelievers that would never have occurred to its Ottoman predecessors, masters of a state with official Muslim confession.

Other paranoid groups. Tata Dios.

"Finally, in 1872, the messiah launched the attack on Tandil. His men murdered all the foreigners they could find, sparing neither women nor children…" (68).

In totalitarian societies, purges periodically take place, in which internal enemies are eliminated without mercy and en masse (curious is this semantic contiguity, given that in the world of natural and alternative medicines, purges serve to eliminate the much-touted toxins, never identified and which are a genuine imaginary enemy of the hypochondriac naturist; political purges also tend to be directed against imaginary enemies…).

Nazism

"Hitler's revenge was terrible. The leaders of the coup were immediately executed, while several thousand more were put on trial before a people's jury before their death sentences were pronounced. Nearly 5,000 officers, members of the resistance, church leaders and other citizens were executed in the bloody purge" (Goebbels, cited in 78).

An interesting variety of massacre, which numerous paranoid contagion groups have planned throughout the centuries, without ever bringing it to fruition (at least until today), is the one consisting of eliminating all of Humanity except themselves and those who, at the last moment, might convert to their cause.

Messianic movements. The Anointed Savior (15th century).

"Thus, the new messiah must begin by slitting the throat of the Antichrist, that is, the pope, and then all members of the clergy, except those of the mendicant orders. Like a true forerunner of the Khmer Rouge, he must then kill all those who oppose him, without any exception.

Only fourteen thousand people will be left alive. The killings will be carried out by bands of mercenaries. As for the survivors, they will spontaneously form the Church of God. Then, the Anointed Savior will reign over them as emperor and God" (8).

Loved ones and those close

Paranoid cruelty is distinguished, finally, by its capacity to prey upon those nearest and dearest, those with whom, under normal conditions, the inhibitory mechanisms of aggression ought to engage most intensely, whether they be one's own children, siblings, or parents…

Crisis cults. Hau-hau (19th century).

"[...] declared that he was going to kill his own son in order to obtain the salvation of his people [...] it appears that upon attempting to carry out this sacrifice, he managed no more than to break the boy's legs" (11).

Paranoia

"A student who believed himself to be a descendant of Napoleon seriously wounded his mother, his two sisters, and himself when the strange taste of the soup indicated a poisoning attempt" (41).

(…) or of the spouse…

Anabaptist messianisms. John of Leiden (16th century).

" the blind submission to the prophet was freely consented to by all the people; it was so great that they recognized in him not only a teacher but also an avenger of justice; and one day before the assembled crowd, emerging from one of the communal meals that simulated the Last Supper, the king of the New Jerusalem condemned to death one of his wives, guilty of failing him in her trust in the just cause. With a stroke of the sacred sword he himself severed the head of the one who shared his bed; and he plunged the people, in full delirium, into a fantastic, seductive dance around the corpse" (22).

(…) or of those with whom there has been a close cohabitation.

Sectarian-Leninist groupuscule. SLA.

"At the moment the 'pigs' arrived, when the first shot was heard, Cin himself would put a bullet in my brain. He didn't want to have to worry about a hostage during the shootout"(32).