Bad Vegan Sarma Melngailis and the curious allure of cults

Sign up for the Independent Women email for the latest news, opinion and features Get the Independent Women email for free Get the Independent Women email for free SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. open image in gallery Sarma Melngailis in Netflix’s ‘Bad Vegan' “Nobody talks about issues related to somebody manipulating your mind. Members use code names - Dr Stein’s was “Clare”, she revealed to The Independent in 2017 - and are under the control of group’s charismatic leader Theophilus Smith. Perpetrators use secrets a lot to do this, telling followers not to talk about anything with other people because they won’t understand, or that they have the answers to everything so the follower doesn’t need to turn to anyone else.” Dr Stein, who teaches about cults and totalitarianism at the Mary Ward Centre in Bloomsbury, London, adds that leaders then alternate between “assault and leniency” as a way to “brainwash” their followers. When someone is in this state, there’s no getting through to them, they literally can’t think because to think about the situation is to think of something terrifying without any way out.” open image in gallery Sarma Melngailis in Bad Vegan But when the people close to someone who is beginning to get sucked into a cult fail to intervene, it can quicken their spiral into the leader’s control.