The Family Survival Trust (FST) is a registered charity (No 1121388) whose mission is to prevent, and to provide information on coercive control, cultic behaviour and psychological manipulation. It evolved out of the work of FAIR (Family, Action, Information, Rescue/Resource), Britain's main anti-cult group in November 2007.

History

The Family Survival Trust evolved from FAIR (Family, Action, Information, Rescue), Britain's first anti-cult group. George D. Chryssides, "Britain's anti-cult movement," in ''New Religious Movements: Challenges and Response'', eds. Bryan R. Wilson and Jamie Cresswell, 257–73. London: Routledge, 1999. . p. 260 FAIR was founded in 1976 by MP Paul Rose, as a support group for friends and relatives of "

cult Cults are social groups which have unusual, and often extreme, religious, spiritual, or philosophical beliefs and rituals. Extreme devotion to a particular person, object, or goal is another characteristic often ascribed to cults. The term ...

" members, with an early focus on the

Unification Church The Unification Church () is a new religious movement, whose members are called Unificationists or sometimes informally Moonies. It was founded in 1954 by Sun Myung Moon in Seoul, South Korea, as the Holy Spirit Association for the Unificatio ...

, although in the years following this focus expanded to include other

new religious movements A new religious movement (NRM), also known as a new religion, is a religious or spiritual group that has modern origins and is peripheral to its society's dominant religious culture. NRMs can be novel in origin, or they can be part of a wider re ...

(NRMs) or what it referred to as "cults". In the late 1970s, it started to publish ''FAIR News'' to provide information and reports on new religious movements. FST is a member of FECRIS.

Family, Action, Information, Rescue

Family, Action, Information, Rescue (FAIR) was founded by MP Paul Rose in 1976 to address enquiries from constituents and complaints from parents about their adult children joining NRMs. Its membership includes many committed

Christians A Christian () is a person who follows or adheres to Christianity, a monotheistic Abrahamic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus Christ. Christians form the largest religious community in the world. The words '' Christ'' and ''C ...

; however, FAIR regarded itself and its outlook as

non-religious Irreligion is the absence or rejection of religious beliefs or practices. It encompasses a wide range of viewpoints drawn from various philosophical and intellectual perspectives, including atheism, agnosticism, religious skepticism, ration ...

.Elisabeth Arweck, "Anti-Cult Movement: FAIR, Cult Information Centre (CIC)," in ''Encyclopedia of New Religious Movements'', ed. Peter B. Clarke, 35–8. London and New York: Routledge, 2006. However, NRM scholar George D. Chryssides pointed out at the time that " though FAIR officials ejectedthe term ' anti-cult', FAIR's main strategy seems designed to hamper the progress of NRMs in a variety of ways." It also publicly disapproved of activities like " Moonie bashing". Yet Elisabeth Arweck adds that FAIR's "commitment to raise cult awareness was tempered by repeated warnings against witchhunts". The organization renamed itself as "Family, Action, Information, Resource" in 1994 in order to denote a concern "more with the place of these cults in public life and governments than with the issues of recruitment and

brainwashing Brainwashing is the controversial idea that the human mind can be altered or controlled against a person's will by manipulative psychological techniques. Brainwashing is said to reduce its subject's ability to think critically or independently ...

, although these remain dimportant." FAIR was initially perceived as supporting "

deprogramming Deprogramming is a controversial tactic that seeks to dissuade someone from "strongly held convictions" such as religious beliefs. Deprogramming purports to assist a person who holds a particular belief system—of a kind considered harmful by thos ...

", but then publicly distanced itself from it, citing such reasons as high failure rates, damage to families and civil liberty issues. In 1985, FAIR co-chairman Casey McCann said that FAIR neither recommended nor supported coercive deprogramming and disapproved of those practicing it, considering "coercive deprogramming a money-making racket which encouraged preying on the misery of families with cult involvement." FAIR's applications for government funding were not successful; such funding instead gone to

INFORM (Information Network Focus on Religious Movements) Inform is a programming language and design system for interactive fiction originally created in 1993 by Graham Nelson. Inform can generate programs designed for the Z-code or Glulx virtual machines. Versions 1 through 5 were released between ...

, set up in 1988 by the sociologist

Eileen Barker Eileen Vartan Barker (born 21 April 1938, in Edinburgh, UK) is a professor in sociology, an emeritus member of the London School of Economics (LSE), and a consultant to that institution's Centre for the Study of Human Rights. She is the chairp ...

, with the support of Britain's mainstream churches. Relations between FAIR and INFORM have at times been strained, with FAIR accusing INFORM of being too soft on cults. FAIR chairman Tom Sackville as MP and

Home Office The Home Office (HO), also known (especially in official papers and when referred to in Parliament) as the Home Department, is the United Kingdom's interior ministry. It is responsible for public safety and policing, border security, immigr ...

minister abolished government funding for the INFORM in 1997 but funds was reinstated in 2000. In 1987, an ex-FAIR committee member,

Cyril Vosper Cyril Ronald Vosper (7 June 1935 – 4 May 2004) was an anti-cult leader, former Scientologist and later a critic of Scientology, deprogrammer, and spokesperson on men's health. He wrote '' The Mind Benders'', which was the first book on Scie ...

, was convicted in

Munich Munich is the capital and most populous city of Bavaria, Germany. As of 30 November 2024, its population was 1,604,384, making it the third-largest city in Germany after Berlin and Hamburg. Munich is the largest city in Germany that is no ...

on charges of kidnapping and causing bodily harm to German Scientologist Barbara Schwarz in the course of a deprogramming attempt.

Cultists Anonymous

In 1985 ex-members of FAIR who believed that the group had become too moderate created a splinter group called Cultists Anonymous. The hardliner Cultists Anonymous group was short-lived and rejoined FAIR in 1991.

Activities

The Family Survival Trust runs online support groups for individuals and families affected by cults or extremist groups. The FST hosts an Annual Public Event.

External links

The Family Survival Trust Official site

References