

Sorry, hard disagree.
I also don’t want to argue. So feel free to say what you like about this, but I won’t respond. I’ll just drop some thoughts for consideration.
- Cults don’t have to be religious, and even then there’s a difference
- Harm doesn’t just come from being militant or political
- The mechanisms of disbanding suck as much as the criminal justice system and states in general do
- This isn’t just about the US
Jehovas Witnesses, Moonies, Scientology and so many more are still ongoing. Cult mechanism are literally some of closest stuff to brainwashing there is. They are malign. The followers are victims, and collectively this absolutely should be addressed.
Also, I am not offering any kind of solution here, I.e. to just go after the cults and disband them. As others have said it’s nuanced.





On a related note, I don’t remember the best resources I’ve come across, but here’s something for a bit of an idea:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Memory_error
Legally, there is the concept of contemporaneous notes in many countries. Meaning if you write something down shortly after the event occured it can have legal validity.
There is also hypnotherapy, EMDR, and other forms of therapy, where many people can access memories that they couldn’t. I was surprised myself how many memories I could access with EMDR.
I find the concept appears to be similar to meditation and lots of sensory information + association. How stuff felt, sounded, smelled, where you felt in your body etc.
Less related, but there’s also Method of Loci etc. to remember lots of very specific things