Cults: Lauren Hough’s Story
By Ray Stern
Are you at risk of being indoctrinated? Most people think they aren’t, and yet cults are a social phenomenon that sweep people up and pull the wool over their eyes, sometimes blissfully unaware that they’ve been manipulated. Others, such as Lauren Hough, are born into cults and are fortunate enough to escape. How does this happen, and how does one escape a cult?
Lauren Hough was born into the Children of God, a doomsday Christian cult, and didn’t escape with her mother until she was 15 years old. Her parents were indoctrinated when they were young, only 19 years old. They acted as cult missionaries, traveling around the world, bringing Lauren with them (Gross, 2021). How did they get sucked into this situation? Well, it starts our slow, and typically the victim of indoctrination is in a vulnerable situation—be it mentally, financially, or physically. The cult takes them in, often using the foot-in-the-door technique (asking for a small favor, which makes people more likely to accept a bigger request later) (Travers, 2024). While the cult takes care of the individuals, they preach that they know the truth and that they can bring salvation to anyone who joins. They start to isolate the victims from the rest of their friends and family until all they have left is the cult, and cult becomes the center of their world.
While cults claim they speak the truth, they can often preach odd and factually incorrect information. While in the Children of God, Hough was taught bizarre things, such as that heaven was on the moon, and that animals could talk to Noah and that’s why they got on his ark (Gross, 2021). Someone born into this wouldn’t question it, but someone new might struggle to accept these views yet still want to be a part of the cult. This causes cognitive dissonance, and often self-justification is needed to settle their minds, forcing info to align with the cult, and casting everything else out as false. The echo chambers the cult provides enforces these views, and constant propaganda keeps them from questioning what they “know”.
Other tactics involve punishment, although it is not used for converting members, but rather keeping them in line. Hough would be punished for asking questions or not smiling enough, and at one point she was even put in solitary confinement, which is basically psychological torture (Gross, 2021). Obedience was highly prioritized, yet the children’s safety was not. This becomes blatantly obvious when recognizing that Children of God was a sex cult that abused children. Hough was one of these victims.
So, how did she escape? Unfortunately, there was no big hurrah, just one moment that brought her mother clarity. Her mother already had some concerns about education and was preparing to leave long before this, she just needed a push; Her mother found out that Hough was being sexually harassed, which was the final straw that broke the camel’s back and convinced her mother to leave the cult, taking Hough with her (Gross, 2021). The truth became too glaring to look away from—the cult was a harmful and dangerous environment.
So, if it seems so obvious on the outside looking in that something isn’t right here, why do victims of cults struggle to accept that fact and leave? Lauren struggled with a similar question, asking her parents directly with no solid answer. Her best guess is that “By the time they realized what was going on, you know, 20 years had gone by… They thought they were doing the best they could.” They fully believed they were serving and worshiping Jesus Christ, just as he would have wanted.
Leaving a cult isn’t easy, with no support networks or knowledge outside of the cult, but it is possible. There are even support groups dedicated to helping people leave cults, offering guidance, community, and knowledge that can help them figure out who they are as an individual and their role in the world. The first step of leaving a cult is the hardest: understanding the situation, after that, they must decide when it would be best to leave, find a landing pad (shelter, friends or family outside of the cult). Once that’s established, they can leave and start rebuilding their life (Hilliard, 2024).
References
Gross, T. (2021, April 20). After growing up in a cult, Lauren Hough freed herself by writing the truth. NPR. https://www.npr.org/2021/04/20/989032183/after-growing-up-in-a-cult-lauren-hough-freed-herself-by-writing-the-truth
Hilliard, R. (2024, May 22). How to leave a cult. People Leave Cults. https://www.peopleleavecults.com/post/how-to-leave-a-cult
Travers, M. (2024, May 2). 3 ways cults “bait and trap” common people–according to a psychologist. Forbes. https://www.forbes.com/sites/traversmark/2024/04/26/3-ways-cults-bait-and-trap-common-people-according-to-a-psychologist/