The “Protective” State and application of France’s About-Picard law

France’s “Brainwashing” Law (loi About-Picard)

Recent Applications of Abus de Faiblesse in the “French Cult Wars”.

The About-Picard law (often referred to by its international critics as “France’s brainwashing law”) was passed by the National Assembly in May 2001. The law was named after its co-founders, Senator Nicholas About and Catherine Picard, a socialist deputy in the National Assembly. A government-sponsored anti-cult movement had been gathering force in France since the mid-1990s, following a series of mass suicides perpetrated by the Solar Temple in Quebec, Switzerland and France that horrified the nation and launched a highly sensational coverage of sects in the French media.

The About Picard law was designed, according to Catherine Picard, to “reinforce the prevention of sectarian movements that assault the rights of man and basic liberties”. Its purpose was to control and suppress sects by enabling the state to prosecute “cult” leaders - labelled as “gourous” in France - who (putatively harm their followers through the power of mental manipulation. The About-Picard law created a new category of delit [misdemeanour] called abus de faiblesse [“abuse of weakness”] that pointed to the exploitation of vulnerable followers by ruthless charismatic leaders of “sects”, whose influence was predicted to lead inexorably to various forms of social deviance: fraud, physical and psychological abuse, mass suicide, mental illness, pedophilia, money laundering and the illegal practice of medicine. Any sect leaders found guilty of “abus frauduleux de l’etat d’ignorance ou de faiblesse” could be liable to a five year prison sentence and fines of up to 750,000 euros.

France’s Antisect Movement and Social Control Mechanisms

The two major, government-sponsored anticult groups, UNADFI ^[1] and MIVILUDES ^[2], were instrumental in aiding the alleged victims launching the official allegations. In 2008 a special police squadron was created by MIVILUDES to respond to criminal offenses committed by the sects and trained to conduct raids on les sectes. It was called Cellule d’assistance et d’intervention en matière de dérives sectaires (CAIMADES). In five of the cases listed above ^[3], there was a military-style raid executed by CAIMADES a unit within the Central Office for the Suppression of Violence against Persons (OCRVP) of the Central Directorate of the Judicial Police (DCPJ). OCRVP’s “Domain of Competence” is in violent crimes, listed on its website as: murder, rape, pedophile pornography, unidentified corpses, kidnappings and – “dérives sectaires” (which translates as “sectarian deviations” or “cultic harm”).

The rise of the government-sponsored anti-cult movement in the wake of the Solar Temple tragedy has already been well documented and widely debated, but the purpose of this presentation is to focus on the About-Picard Law and the delit of abus de faiblesse: to track its application over the past 18 years, and to try to assess its efficacy in suppressing France’s sectarian movements (les sectes). To this end, I have gathered data on 32 cases where leaders of sects have been charged of manipulating or exploiting the weakness of their followers (“abus de faiblesse”) and prosecuted in the French courts. In the conclusion is article I will present my findings and hope to shed light on the various “impacts” of this law – on the alleged perpetrators of abus de faiblesse, and, more generally, on the state of religious freedom in France.

Methodology

After approaching several French lawyers and being told there was no central source where I could find a list of all the About-Picard cases since 2001, I turned to various human rights groups, such as La Coordination des Associations et Particuliers pour la Liberté de Conscience (CAP) and Le Centre d’information et de conseil des nouvelles spiritualités (CICNS) for information on five cases. But most of the cases listed below were gleaned from media reports in French newspapers or from the articles on antisect websites such as unadfi.org and prevensectes.com.

It is almost embarrassing to disclose my “social-scientific method” of data collection – which was to type into Google the words “gourou”, “secte” and “abus de faiblesse”. A wealth of sensationalist articles would pop up gleefully describing the latest exposé or unmasking of a gourou or “manipulateur”. In five of the cases, I managed to contact with five of the so-called “gourous” charged with abus de faiblesse, and conducted interviews which yielded details on their situations, but in the other 27 cases, I had to rely on media reports for exaggerated, incomplete and distorted versions of the “facts”. Thus, the results of my inquiry are incomplete, and where I rely on media reports, some of the accounts of the cases are probably unreliable.

The First Application – Arnaud Mussy, 2002-2004

The very first application of the 2001 law was in October 2004, when Arnaud Mussy stood on trial before the Tribunal Correctionnel of Nantes, charged with “abus de faiblesse”. As the prophet/leader of a tiny secte called Néo-Phare, he was accused of the mental manipulation of a vulnerable follower which drove him to commit suicide. Arnaud Mussy was found guilty and sentenced to three years in prison (suspended), and fined 115,000 Euros.

This trial received much publicity in France, for it possessed a valeur juridique, and Mussy’s condemnation possessed a valeur pedagogique, for it was a warning to all “cult leaders” to stop brainwashing, and to all French citizens to stop joining sects. As Mussy’s defense lawyer expressed it, “This is not a conviction that is anodine (neutral). It contains a very strong warning! Here we have the first jurisprudence.”

In 2005 I met Arnaud Mussy and his charismatic twin brother, Olivier Mussy, at their apartment in Nantes and on the basis of our interview wrote a chapter analyzing the Néo-Phare case in my book The New Heretics of France (Oxford University Press, 2011). ^[4]

The Case of Neelam Makhija, an Indo-Canadian Tourist

In August 2016 Neelam Makhija (70), a retired electronics engineer and wealthy businessman, contacted me. He complained to me that for two years he had been under “France arrest”, unable to return to Bombay to visit his grandchildren or to attend to his engineering business in Toronto. Makhijah is from India and has Canadian citizenship, but does not speak a word of French. He had never heard of the About-Picard law until he was arrested, and was bewildered by the charges of abus de faiblesse. He complained to me that he had been geld in jail, and for two years been under “France arrest”, unable to return to Bombay to visit his grandchildren or to attend to his engineering business in Toronto. He had appealed to CAP, the human rights group in Paris, who referred him to my book The New Heretics of France. After receiving his documents, I interviewed him and was struck by his story:

In November 2014 Neelam Makhija visited France as a tourist to spend a holiday with his close female friend, Jaanu, who works as a Life Coach, astrologist and meditation teacher in Lyons. This was his third visit to her over four years) and, as usual, he volunteered his assistance at one of her a meditation workshops before they drove off to Spain for their annual holiday. “I offered to help her in small ways. Mainly by picking up dirty tissues, cooking the meals, cleaning the meditation hall, moving mattresses, unloading the van, opening windows, lighting candles….” This workshop featured the Mystic Rose meditation designed by Osho (a.k.a. Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh). Midway through the week-long workshop, a squadron of heavily-armed gendarmes in kevlar helmets and vests raided the private home where the couple were staying at 7 a.m. and arrested them. Later, Makhija’s lawyer identified this police squadron as sent by CAIMADES (Cellule d’assistance et d’intervention en matière de dérives sectaires), a special force of gendarmes created in 2008 by France’s “anticult” interministerial mission, MIVILUDES, specially trained to recognize and crack down on “sects” or cults.] Makhija noted, “They were all armed and behaved as though they were saving the participants from a very dangerous situation.” When the CAIMADES agents delivered the couple to the prison, Neelam overheard them explaining to the jailer, “They belong to the secte of Osho, the sex guru.” Makhija and his friend, Jaanu, were held separately (garde a vue) in jail for 8 weeks. When I asked, “Why so long?” Makhija replied, “Because we were foreigners and because the Investigating Judge was too busy to see us. There is no Habeas Corpus in France.” (It would be a year before the friends were permitted to meet or communicate again.)

Makhija speaks six Hindi languages but no French, so he couldn’t read the pages of criminal charges against him. The translator assigned to him explained: “that I had used fraudulent techniques to manipulate weak minds to defraud them of their money; and I had used Indian techniques and created a mysterious Indian atmosphere to influence these people, who had weak minds. And that I was a big leader of the sect of the Indian sex guru, Osho.”

After Makhija had been interrogated for 3-4 hours with no lawyer present, he was driven from Lyons to a prison in Fontaineblau where he was interrogated for 3 days – again, through a translator without a lawyer. His money, credit cards, computer and travel documents were confiscated, and the only food available was fish sandwiches. He is a vegetarian.

Makhija protested that he was no guru: “I told them I am an engineer by profession, that I have no experience in leading meditation groups or in coaching people. I speak no French, I took no money and did not know any of her clients.” Later, Makhija found out that a woman from an influential Lyons family who had attended Aashti’s 2011 mediation workshop had worried her husband and father (a distinguished general) by the “changes in her personalty” when she returned, and they had filed a complaint with their local anticult organization, ADFI. The general used his political influence to convince a judge to order Aashti’s phone tapped. After seven weeks in prison, Makhija met the investigating judge (juge d’instruction). She asked him about his Indian spirituality. He explained to her that he was just helping an old friend, and since he did not speak one word of French, how could he possibly have “manipulated” Aashti’s clients?” [The judge later wrote in her report that Neelam Makhija “manipulated people through his silence”.] The more specific charges against Makhija were that, “he was hiding behind Indian philosophy and creating a mysterious atmosphere by using incense, candles, Indian music and techniques”. Makhija explained to the judge that Aashti’s clients had brought their own CDs for the background music; that he had not brought nor selected any of the music, and that the candles and incense had been purchased by Aashti at IKEA. Makhija objected to the term, “hiding behind Indian philosophy”. He told the investigating judge that yes, he was from India, and proud of his culture. He had grown up in a family that dabbled in meditation and attended the lectures of visiting gurus – not for business but in a playful fashion. He objected to the way the sankrit word, “guru”, was used in France. In the Hindu tradition “guru” means a “teacher of truth”, an enlightened being. The great philosophers of the Veads and the Upanishads, Sankara and Patanjali, were among India’s renowned “gurus”. And yet, somehow, in the 20^th-21^st centuries in France, the word “gourou” had come to mean a sort of slimy snake oil salesman who defrauds his follower though brainwashing techniques and should be locked up.

“I explained to [the judge] that most Indians had one or more gurus in their life, that I had had six gurus, so why pick on Osho? I remember as a child staying at my grandmother’s house in Poona, and Osho was giving daily lectures in her neighour’s house, so we went to hear him - once. I visited the Osho ashram twice. I have a high regard for Osho and his teachings, in India he is revered as a great philosopher, his books are in the library of the Indian Parliament. But Osho never visited France, he did not speak French and he never mentions France in any of his famous Discourses – but some ignorant bureaucrat of MIVILUDES – in his racist bias – has decided that Osho is a ‘secte’ (whatever that means). In MIVILUDES’ logic, I really should be called a member of the Ramana “secte” where I spent the last six winters. To me, as an Indian, this makes no sense.”

But Makhija said he felt the investigating judge was not listening to him. “I am familiar with British law, Canadian law and U.S. law. But in France they have a different system. First, someone complains, then the procureur (prosecuting judge) establishes the criminal charges. Next, he picks a juge d’instruction (investigating judge) – usually a friend – whose job is to find evidence to support the initial charges. It seems there is never for a minute the concept of ‘innocent until proven guilty’.”

Makhija noted that all three of his defense lawyers warned him that this investigation process was not neutral, nor was it time bound. “But they said there was nothing they could do about it. ‘This is not London, it is Lyons,’ they said. ‘We defense lawyers have a hard time defending our clients.’ In fact, my lawyer’s assistant warned me, ‘Once you’ve been accused of abus de faiblesse, well, forget it – you’re dead. There’s nothing you can do’.”

Twenty-nine former clients of Jaanu had been tracked down by UNADFI’s lawyers who filed complaints of abus de faiblesse on their behalf (without their knowledge or consent in most cases). By March 2015 the investigating judge had interviewed all twenty-nine. Each declared they had no complaints against Jaanu whatsoever, indeed that they had benefited from her workshops. Most said they had never met Neelam Makhija. The few who had met him said they had never spoken to him because he didn’t speak French.

According to Makhija, the judge’s response was, “But this proves that they are brainwashed! One of the characteristics of abus de faiblesse is that the victims do not realize they are being manipulated”. ^[5] But by July 2015 at the court of appeals, it became amply clear that none of the 29 victims had any complaints. They were dismissed from the case, and three new “victims” were found to replace them. But all three stated they had no complaints against Jaanu or Neelam Makhija. Even so, the procureur (prosecuting judge) recommended to the investigating judge that she charge Jaanu and Makhija with manipulating mentally the three new victims. As a result, the investigation would be extended for at least another year until a hearing with the Tribunal could be scheduled. Makhija noted, “This will extend my France arrest by another year.”

For 22 months Neelam Makhija was charged with conspiring with Aashti to defraud her clients of money (a charge often leveled at therapists). But this charge was dropped at the cour d’appel when the defense lawyers produced bank records that showed no links between the accused parties’ bank accounts. After spending almost two months in jail, Makhija was released on a 50,000 euro bond, and $6000 of his travel funds were confiscated. His lawyers applied for a leave so that he could visit his family in India and attend to his business interests in Canada, but the application was rejected. Finally, in June 2-17 Neelam Makhija’s case finally went to court. All charges were dropped and he was finally able to leave France.

Twenty-four cases of Abus de Faiblesse reported in the Media, 2002-2017

Neelam Makhija’s singular story spurred me to try to find other cases of abus de faiblesse. CAP, the NGO human rights group in Paris, knew only of the five cases they were currently handling - but when I typed the words, “gourou”, “secte” and “abus de faiblesse” into Google, 24 new cases popped up. I was surprised to find that none of France’s biggest, most successful and notorious “sects” (Scientology, Mandarom, Jehovah’s Witnesses, Soka Gakkai) were mentioned. Nor were the high-profile real “gurus” from India, such as Amma or Ravi Shankar, targeted. Most of the accused were involved in alternative healing or psychotherapy, and their operations seemed quite modest. Most of them were seniors, over 65 in age.

In the Table 1 ^[6] are listed 32 cases of abus de faiblesse. The name and honorific title (if available) of the main accused party are provided. In several cases their wives/companions, family members or assistants were charged as accomplices. The dates provided refer to the year the story first hit the news. More detailed information for many of the cases - on the dates of arrests, appearances in the court of appeals or Supreme Court decisions - are still unavailable. The “results” category shows the prison sentences and fines of those convicted. The typical charges that accompany the misdemeanor of abus de faiblesse are will be discussed below.

The Groups and « Gourous » Targeted

1. Psycholanalysts/therapists.

Based on the descriptions provided in media reports, it appears that six of the so-called “gourous” fall into the category of psychotherapists, or psychoanalysts. This is not surprising, since in April 2012 MIVILUDES produced a practical guide, Santé et dérives sectaires, that targeted the « dérives sectaires » of « pseudo-thérapeutes ». ^[7]

Benoit Yang Ting was a Freudian psychoanalyst and “recovered memory” specialist whose clients complained of exhorbitant fees and of his inducing traumatic “memories” of incest that had damaged their family relations. Jaques Masset was a Jungian psychologist whose clients complained of his exorting money and sex from them. Celine Godfroy was a primal scream therapist whose use of ritual nudity and psychedelic drugs evoked complaints from her clients. Gabriel Loison, whose earlier association, Les Jardins de Nature was on the Guyard list of France’s sectes in 1996, was arrested with his female partner on charges of inciting rape, sexual aggression, and corruption of a minor, based on events that occurred in tantric sex workshops in 2011. Dr. Claude David, a psychoanalyst and openly practising homosexual, was the founder and director of Gens de Bernard, a Catholic monastic style therapy commune near Toulouse. He was indicted for physical and sexual assaults on minors, aggravated abuse of weakness, violence, breach of trust and breach of secrecy. Gsouria (“Angelina”) was a Parisian psychotherapist and “voyante” (seer) who charged 100 euros for consultations and whose clients complained she had induced in them false memories of incest. Élisabeth Saccucci was charged with falsifying her credentials as a therapist. André Biry, a « psychanalyse objectialiste » was arrested in July 2015 and charged with money laundering after he attempted to transfer 500,000 euros out of the country. Former clients complained he had charged exorbitant fees for his ineffectual fertility treatments.

The MIVILUDES takes aim:

PARIS - The mental manipulation that characterises sectarian harm is, in the majority of cases, the work of pseudo-therapists who are difficult to identify, as the MIVILUDES clarifies in its new practical guide which will be published Wednesday.

2. Prophets of Spiritual Associations and Communal New Religions

Seven of these cases involved the leaders of NRMs, prophets with charismatic claims. Most of these so-called “gourous” were indicted for extracting money and voluntary labor from their followers, interpreted as “abus de faiblesse au sein d’un groupement sectaire” (abuse of weakness at the heart of a sectarian/cultic group). Hervé Granier, the messianic leader and performing clown of a nameless group of ten followers was indicted for rape of a 14-year old whom he recognized as his “epouse divine.” He was also charged with “abus de faiblesse au sein d’un groupement sectaire” – for demanding voluntary labor and money from his followers to fund the association. Francoise Dercle founded a commune and was accused of stealing 400,000 euros from her followers, of forcing them into voluntary work and involving them in perverse and degrading sexual rituals. Philip Lamy, magnétiseur, spiritualist channeler and owner of a sex club or “club libertin” called Villa Panthère, was indicted for the illegal exercise of medicine, for abus de faiblesse and sexual assault. Luce Barbe founder of a bio-organic farm, ran a voluntary work program over the summer where she invited students to work in orchards and vegetable patches to produce bio products. Plaintiffs claimed she had induced false memories of incest in her followers and convinced youth to abandon their families and their studies to stay and work for her. She was indicted for travail dissimulé, escroquerie, and abus de faiblesse. Dr. Etienne Guillé presents an unusual case. He was a distinguished biochemist, a professor and DNA researcher at CNRS who founded a successful association called Grande Mutation. He gave controversial lecture series that combined spiritual concepts with scientific theories from quantum physics, molecular biology and biochemistry. His stated goal was to explore the secret of physical immortality through Science. Complaints surfaced regarding his alternative healing methods, since he discouraged cancer patients from undergoing chemotherapy in favor of the pendulum. Also, he was accused of encouraging his followers to detach from their families, and was blamed for two suicides.

3. Catholic Lay Movements

Four of these cases feature leaders who might be identified as devout Catholic mystics, voyantes who lead revitalization or fundamentalist Catholic prayer circles: Eliane Deschamps, Augustin Valencourt, two leader in Communauté des Béatitudes and Robert Le Dinh.

4. Immigrant Religions

Three of the indicted – Melite Jasmin, Papa Sané, Sean O’Neill – might be described as the “priests” of exotic religions that were imported into France. Melité Jasmin is a voodoo prestess who seemed to be following the standard voodoo practices familiar to a Caribbean audience (e.g. slaughtering chickens in her courtyard, sprinkling blood on her clients and charging money for shamanistic healing rituals). She was sentenced to four years in prison, and her two daughters who assisted her were also indicted. Papa Sané was a Muslim imam from Senegal who lived with his wife and 17 female disciples. Sean O’Neill was a Krishna devotee who broke away from ISKCON to set up his own ashram composed of girls in their teens who he trained to be his gopis. Among the allegations was the claim he had “imposed a vegetarian regime on his victims” and forced them to “go on the street to solicit other youth to join”. He was sentenced to 15 years in prison for the rape of three teenagers between 2008 and 2010.

5. Other Cases

There are other cases do not quite fit any of the above categories. Francois Ruhaut is an artist and yoga teacher. He and his female partner were charged with abus de faiblesse and with forcing his yoga students to participate in sexual rituals “outside the norm”. Thierry Tilly is a baffling case, and is described in the media as a confidence trickster who ruined a wealthy family by spinning a web of conspiracy theories and embezzling their fortune. Lucien Engelmajer was a Jewish Rabbi who founded the famous drug rehabilitation center, Dianova, near Toulouse. Communal in its social organization, Dianova was branded as a “secte” and Engelmajer was charged with “abus de faiblesse”, “abus de confiance”, “recel”, “blanchiment d’argent” et “abus de biens sociaux.” He was also charged with rape of minors (which he denied) and summoned to the Assize Court. Since he was living in South America at the time, the legal process had little effect on him and he died in 2007 at the age of 87 in Hurricane Dean, the same year of his conviction in the Criminal Court of Toulouse for abus de faiblesse and related charges.

Conclusion

The critiques of the About-Picard Law, voiced by human right groups, lawyers and academics, including myself, represent different disciplinary perspectives – sociology. Political, legal and psychological.

1. La prospettiva della Sociologia delle Religioni

For scholars familiar with the communal studies field, many of the problematic aspects found in these “sects”, explained as harm (derives sectaires) resulting from techniques of manipulation mentale, imposed by gourous on their weak-minded followers for their own narcissistic purposes, might be indentified as familiar patterns found in intentional communities. Many of the examples of abuse in the complaints voiced by ex-members might be seen as examples of what the American sociologist, Rosabeth Moss Kanter, called “six commitment mechanisms”. ^[8] These include the following daily patterns or common rules of communal living:

Sacrifice (giving up worldly possessions and luxuries); Investment (financial donation and voluntary labor); Renunciation (cutting ties with family and friends outside the commune); Mortification (ritual humiliation to subdue the ego). Kanter argues that these patterns are ubiquitous in successful communal utopies, and defines “success” as lasting 25 years or more. Many of the complaints were filed by ex-members. It is well-known that voluntary labour (washing dishes and laundry, cleaning or sweeping floors) is commonly practiced in monasteries (where domestic work is a kind of “worship”) and in Hindu ashrams and Buddhist sanghas (where domestic labour it is explained as “karma yoga” and is imbued with a meditative quality). It appears extraordinary that in the past decade we have witnessed a series of police raids on spiritual communes simply because an ex-member has complained of being forced to wash too many dishes (as in the military-style raids on Ananda in Assisi, Italy, on MISA in Romania and on various spiritual communities in France and Belgium accused of travail dissimulé.

2. The Political Perspective

From a political studies perspective, the fact that the About-Picard law was voted in by the National Assembly suggests that France conforms to the ideal type of the “Protective State” (the state that anticipates and preempts harm to its citizens), as opposed to Barker’s type of the “Laissez-faire State”, of which U.K., Denmark are Holland are examples. ^[9] The organizations set up by France’s state-sponsored anticult movement, UNADFI, which receives funds as a “public service”, and the “interministerial missions” of MILS and MIVILUDES are further indications that France is a “Protective State”.

3. The Legal/Judicial Studies Perspective

There are several characteristics of the legal process in abus de faiblesse cases which appear to undermine the principles of presumption of innocence and the impartiality of the court. First, there is the question of the authenticity and reliability of the alleged victims of abus de faiblesse. It only takes one client or ex-member to file a complain against their former therapist of spiritual master at their local ADFI. This is enough to stimulate investigations and/or arrests, as an article in Le Monde points out (“Seule une victime peut déclencher une enquête”, Le Monde, 18 Novenber 2009). Questions are raised concerning the personal motives of some of the self-styled “victims” when it turns out they are overprotective parents, or jealous, spurned ex-lovers, or competitive co-workers.

The second problem is that the lawyers working for UNADFI (which as a public service receives state funding), or for MIVILUDES are empowered to file complaints on behalf of alleged victims - without the latters’ assent or even their knowledge. When the so-called “victims” protest they are not victims, the court’s response is often to interpret their denial as proof of brainwashing, since brainwashed people don’t realise they are brainwashed. ^[10] Another strategy, if their statement is accepted, is for the Procureur to scrounge up additional “victims”. In the case of Jaanu (Neelam Makhija’s friend), she pointed out that since the police had conducted surveillance on her phone calls for over a year, the names of people who had simply phoned a wrong number to her cell and immediately hung up were included among the prospective clients who were her putative “victims” – and these were complete strangers she had never met or spoken to.

Third, the impartiality of the French courts is in question. MIVILUDES conducts annual training workshops on the « phenomenon of sects » to sensitize the judges to the dangers of sects. This is clearly stated in the 2004 MIVILUDES report to the Prime Minister, for seven years the National School for Magistrates (ENM) has organized a one-week workshop on sects, conducted by the head of sects of the department of criminal affairs and pardons. This workshop is aimed at magistrates and the personnel of various legal administrations. MIVILUDES also noted it is in regular contact with the magistrates designated as correspondents within each Court of Appeals. If France’s magistrates are educated in anticult attitudes and biased perspectives to prepare them for cases involving “cult leaders” it appears unlikely the latter will receive fair and impartial hearings in court.

4. The Psychological Perspective

Finally, the concept of brainwashing is importantly present in the delit of “abus de faiblesse”. The abus de faiblesse concept relies on the highly-contested theory of brainwashing, called “manipulation mentale” or “emprise mentale” in France.

The concept of “brainwashing” dates back to the 1950s. It started with the sudden, inexplicable conversion of American GIs to Communist ideology while incarcerated in POW camps in Korean War. Two American psychologists interviewed these men to investigate the process of conversion, and they each published their research results in 1961. Their conclusions (based on neo-Freudian theory) were that the brainwashing process combines peer pressure, incarceration, threats & beating – thus, the GIs were “coerced first and then convinced”. The scientific validity of the brainwashing theory has been questioned by psychologists and sociologists since it fails the test of Karl Popper’s principle of falsifiability – the inherent testability of any scientific hypothesis. “Brainwashing” is even one of the entries in the “Encyclopedia of Pseudoscience: From Alien Abductions to Zone Therapy”. ^[11] Although the American public still embrace brainwashing as if it were a scientific fact that offers a simple psychological explanation for an individual’s sudden conversion to a radical religious or political movement, since the 1980s the scientific community and the courts have discarded brainwashing theory as lacking in scientific rigor. The vagueness of the brainwashing theory, and the inherent difficulty in proving or disproving its claims puts the alleged perpetrator of abus de faiblesse in what Makhija described as a “Kafkaesque” situation. As Makhija’s experience shows, the court processes tend to be quite prolonged. It can take three to eight years before they are resolved. There are only three cases, to my knowledge, where the abus de faiblesse charges were dismissed. ^[12]

The law of 2001, since its inception, has been controversial and has been criticized by lawyers, magistrates, human rights groups and sociologists of religions for its innate “anticult” bias and its reliance on a disreputable “pseudo-scientific” theory. Its design is based on three “anticult” stereotypical assumptions: first, that all cults, like organized gangs or cartels, are intrinsically, ineluctably prone to harmful and criminal activities; second, that “cult leaders” tend to be “manipulateurs” who have somehow mastered a mysterious, ineluctable technology of mind control, coercive persuasion, brainwashing – which they rely on to convert, control and exploit their followers; and third, that all “cult members”, due to their brainwashed state, are “vulnerable”, faible, psychologically helpless, and therefore cannot be held accountable for regrettable decisions – and hence they must be protected by the state.

It is important to be aware of the social and political context of the loi 2001. It emerged out of the anticult activism of France’s state-sponsored “antisecte” movement which established a series of interministerial missions at the highest level of government, whose stated mission was to lutter contre les sectes, or “fight cults”. Hence, one finds a strong bias against new alternative religions written into the About Picard law.

One might argue that there are positive aspects to the law. It enables the state to penalize hypnotherapists who specialize in the controversial practice of recovered memory; those who induce “faux souvenirs” in their clients, which often result in the destruction of family relationships. But the negative aspects of the About Picard law are quite clear. The law is based on an unrealistic notion of a new religion created and fostered by “anticult” lobbyists and activists, who willfully choose to ignore the rich data and complex theories found in the social scientific field of new religious studies. Failing to understand what new religions are, their different types, developmental patterns and basic characteristics, it must inevitably fail in its mission to control or root out sects in France. Second, the law undermines the religious freedom of French citizens (and in Neelam Makhija’s case, visiting tourists) by targeting spiritual outsiders. These include not only the charismatic prophets of NRMs, but also the avant garde therapists who explore and incorporate into their practice radical techniques in psychotherapy that might have been shocking or “cutting edge” in the 1960 – such as Janov’s “primal scream”and Fritz Perls’ “Gestalt therapy”. These techniques are widely used today in North America and Western Europe, but in France they are seen as techniques of manipulation mentale that are used to disorient, exploit and harm weak, suggestible people. Finally, the law targets the religious experts of immigrant communities; African Pentacostal ministers, Voodoo priestesses, and the sheikhs and imams of Muslim Sufi orders. These leaders are serving spiritual needs of their flock in exactly the same way they would in their own countries, but they suddenly find themselves are branded as deviants in France and labeled as manipulateurs and gourous – with the result that Africans, Haitians and Muslims feel less welcome and find it more difficult to integrate into French society.

NOTES

 [1] ⬆︎ The Union Nationale des Associations de Défense des Familles et de l’Individu (UNADFI) is a French anti-cult association founded in 1974, recognized as a public utility association by a decree of 30 April 1996, and directly subsidized by the French State.

 [2] ⬆︎ Mission interministérielle de vigilance et de lutte contre les dérives sectaires.

 [3] ⬆︎ These cases are: Centre for the Teaching of Biodynamisme, Celine Godfroy, Gsouria, Papa Sané, Grande Mutations.

 [4] ⬆︎ The research trip was supported by SSHCR grant to study France’s antisecte movement, titled, “French Sects in Social Context: A Study of France’s Management of New Religious Movements” (Standard Research Grant from the Social Sciences and the Humanities of the Federal Government of Canada, 2005-2008).

 [5] ⬆︎ This might sound ridiculous and even “made up”, but the judge in Arnaud Mussy’s trial made a similar statement in response to the Peraltas’ affadavits in which they denied being victims and said Mussy had never manipulated them.

 [6] ⬆︎ It should be noted that this is a study in progress, and I have I relied heavily on media reports which tend to sensationalize, exagerrate, and distort the facts. Nevertheless, the table below is a useful tool. It shows what kind of professions/groups are targeted in what years, and what penalties are meted out. This data will be elaborated on and analyzed below.

 [7] ⬆︎ romandie.com, AFP, 11 avril 2012.

 [8] ⬆︎ Rosabeth Moss Kanter: Commitment and Community: Communes and Utopias in Sociological Perspective: Commitment and Social Organization: A Study of Commitment Mechanisms in Utopian Communities. American Sociological Review. Vol. 33, No. 4 (Aug., 1968), pp. 499-517.

 [9] ⬆︎ Eileen Barker’s speech at the meeting of the Religion and Diversity Project, October 26, 2017 at the University of Ottawa.

 [10] ⬆︎ An example of this is in my account of Arnaud Mussy’s trial in The New Heretics of France (2011). The Peralta couple, who fell while rock climbing, were named by the Procureur as “victims” of Mussy. When Mussy’s lawyer submitted their affadavits to the court in which they denied ever attempting suicide or being manipulated by Arnaud Mussy, the response was, “This proves they have been manipulated”.

 [11] ⬆︎ William F. Williams, Routledge, 2013

 [12] ⬆︎ In April 2005, Myriam et Pascal Michelena, former members of the Communauté  des  Béatitudes deposed a complaint for escroquerie (fraud) and abus de faiblesse against the community that was dismissed by the judge in 2008.The other case involves an exorcist from the Ukrainian Church from Elven, featured in the news in March 2011.