Cult Scare [Kindle Edition]

Kirsten Nielsen (Author)

 

Product Description

A true story, "Cult Scare" is a firsthand account of the shocking kidnapping of Kirsten Nielsen.

The year was 1976. Kirsten was a rebellious seventeen-year-old Californian who had just run away from home. She hit the road, hitchhiking across the country, looking for love and a place to belong. She found what she was looking for in a community in Chattanooga, Tennessee.

Two years later in 1978, the infamous Jonestown mass suicide happened in Guyana. Mass hysteria and a "cult scare" analogous to the anti-Communist "Red Scare" of the previous generation began springing up everywhere.

In the late '70s, the method used by anti-cultists to "bust cults" was through deprogramming. Several members of the Chattanooga Community were violently seized from the peace of the community only to be harangued, harassed, threatened, and humiliated for adherence to their chosen religious beliefs. The most publicized deprogramming was that of Kirsten Nielsen in 1979, who at the age of 21 and on the day of the wedding of her twin sister, was kidnapped by her parents and associates of Ted Patrick, the notorious Cult Awareness Network deprogrammer.

This is Kirsten's story.


Note from Louise Ayr:
The book includes some other people's experiences of joining a community which they were happy to be with, and how some other people intevened, thinking it was in their best interests. It often cost a lot of money for "cult experts". Deprogramming from cults got a bad name partly because of this.

It is difficult to know how best to advise anyone who loses a family member to a cult-like organisation. Some cults are based on double-standards, and do not let members leave.

This book appears here because it shows a different viewpoint, not just the experiences of the main author Kirsten Nielson, but there are other accounts too. Internet links are provided for further information.