Cult or no cult? (Part 3) THE LAROUCHE MOVEMENT AS A CLASSIC CULT

Hylozoic Hedgehog has had a series of posts on the Factnet about a book by a former member of the australian organization, that wrote a book called "Beyond Common Sense: Pyscho-Politics in Australia" (BCS).

HH quotes some things the author of this book (Don Veitch) has written about the LaRouchecult. The link to his post is: http://www.factnet.org/vbforum/showpost.php?p=378816&postcount=2017

I am quoting some of it here, please go to the original post to read the rest:

/T

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In the last section of BCS (pps. 77-101), Veitch attempts to put the LaRouche operation in Australia into some perspective. Although it is impossible to summarize all of his arguments here, his account is extremely shrewd and at times remarkable. Drawing from his lifelong background as an anti-Communist activist, Veitch essentially sees LaRouche as someone whose entire career mimics a “Leninist”-style cult. Drawing on the writings of Michels, Weber and Robert Lifton, Veitch vividly portrays the LC as a classic political personality cult centered on worshiping the charismatic Great Helmsman:

“At all times the great feats and courage of LaRouche are promoted: he has claimed to be a communicant with God; he speaks to the great minds of history; he has changed the course of human history; he is at the forefront of every contemporary political issue; he is the central concern of evil forces for He alone can save the world in the areas of economics, philosophy, music, physics, mathematics, linguistics, and culture, LaRouche is claimed to have made dramatic breakthroughs, his feats are paraded before the loyal followers.”

Veitch then later quotes Max Weber: “Charismatic domination means a rejection of all ties to any external order in favor of the exclusive gratification of the genius mentality of the prophet and hero.”

Veitch quite insightfully remarks:

“Promotion of LaRouche to absurd proportions is just one of the tactics to keep office workers in line and hard at fund-raising activities. It is the organization’s role to convince the organization itself of this fact. With such blind assurance the organization can ask for the supreme sacrifice. The LaRouche myth has degenerated into an organizational tool is Australia, and susceptible people have gone along with it. The goal of the LaRouche movement IS the LaRouche movement. It exists for no other purpose than to perpetuate its own (self-adjudged) purity of method and doctrine.”

Veitch then continues:

“The major role of the organization is to maintain the organization, and this means maintaining The Leader and those who walk in His Image. A premium is placed on being more loyal than the loyal [Tony and Nancy this means you – HH]. . . . . Thought control within the organization is THE business of the LaRouche-CEC operation. And to this extent, purges are an organizational imperative. An annual purge against evil is conducted. No dissent is tolerated, for if it was, the charisma of the leader and his role as an Agent of History, would dissipate and the game would be over. . . . A compliant, unquestioning ‘lapdog’ attitude in encouraged [Tony and Nancy . . . HH]. Certain chosen members are encouraged to seek out and spy on potential trouble spots and to report back to the ‘leadership.’ . . . The consequence of this internal witch-hunting (the Australian LaRouche organization literally does hunt down the ‘witch-mother’), is the creation of an intimidated organization and a sterility of human thought, quite the opposite from what the organization claims fulsomely to be nurturing – a new Golden Renaissance.”

As a result,

“A main cultural feature of office practice at the CEC, a practice cultivated, encouraged and developed by the leadership, is the culture of the ‘underhand method.’ Such a culture encourages spying, denigration, undermining, paranoia. It is of an authoritarian and undemocratic nature. In any mentally sane organization it would be denounced as ‘backstabbing,’ ‘petty-minded,’ and office infighting, but in the Australian LaRouche organization it is an organizational tool, it is elevated to a semi-mystical process of cadre training. In the end it is corrupting. It encourages megalomania in its leaders [Tony and Nancy . . . Oh, never mind . . . HH], and entrenches their paranoia.”

As a result of this process the entire LaRouche project in Australia was rooted in fraud:

“The Citizens Electoral Councils is an organization which calls upon people to make great efforts for humanity. It considers itself revolutionary, challenging the axioms of society and battling to save the world from an impending holocaust, a New Dark Ages. It appeals to the finest traits of individuals, but in fact betrays them. . . . Whilst the ICLC members are willing to make the sacrifice, believing that this is the unselfish and high minded duty to humanity, what in reality is happening is that they are placing themselves into a controlled environment, and making themselves vulnerable to manipulation.” In short, “The CEC-LaRouche movement is merely repeating the errors of a thousand discredited sects and cults.”

(...)

Veitch concludes Beyond Common Sense: Psycho-Politics in Australia this way:

“The ‘freedom’ or input that adherents of LaRouche in Australia might have is the freedom and input of a McDonald’s Franchisee. When joining up you accept the corporate design, logo and product. There is not changing of the ingredients or the hamburger promotions and franchisors must be gratified in some way.

“One wit has claimed that the LaRouche movement is a combination of a McDonald’s corporate structure, Christ and his disciples, the tub-thumping and martial rules of the Salvation Army, the missionary zeal of the Mormons, and the zealotry of the Communist International (the ‘Comintern’).

“In all these you will find the essential ‘herbs and spices’ of the LaRouche political organization.”

Because the ICLC has become so ossified, the group “is now a self-perpetuating, self-congratulating, inbred, inward-looking oligarchy. Its techniques and technology are out of date. The brain has ossified. Little has been achieved [little that is outside of being sent to jail – HH]. The leadership is made up of ageing increasingly disillusioned misfits, still waiting. Members are, at all times, made subservient, unquestioning and regimented. For those deemed to be ‘backsliders,’ a campaign of psychological terrorism and abuse is directed against them until they either conform or leave. LaRouche in Australia now presides over an increasingly ineffective but deluded group of people.

“In the initial tilt for world power, the message was a Marxist one, in the second long march to world victory, the organization has crawled into a Catholic-ecumenical mould – in much the same way as a hermit crab occupies a new home. This strange mixture has created irreconcilable ‘contradictions’ within the LaRouche structure. This accounts for some of its bizarre behavior.”

The last page of BCS ends this way:

“This then is the story of how a promising start was made to a new political organization capable of challenging existing structures and orthodoxy, but was destroyed by a compliant party secretary, conniving to hand a promising structure over to a foreign organization espousing suspect psychological theories based on highly discredited Marxist dogma. The CEC in Australia is a ‘swamp.’

“That such a process should be allowed to occur is beyond psychoanalysis, beyond common sense, and well into the realm of self-destruction.

“It is impossible to start a renaissance of the mind through a vicious thought-control program.”

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