Social Work and the Satanic Panic, Then and Now | Part 2
In my previous post I did my best to provide a little background on a vast subject, in this post I continue explaining my concerns as a psychotherapist and social worker on the current increase in Satanic Panic and related conspiracy theories.
I entered the mental health field in 2008 and spent the next 15 years working in community mental health settings, mostly helping people with chronic mental illness, substance use disorders and the devastating impacts of multigenerational poverty. Almost all my clients had publicly funded insurance like Medicaid and Medicare, which come with a high level of requirements for documentation, diagnostic codes indicating a covered illness, and “evidenced based practices”. It was a relatively straight-laced approach to the provision of mental health treatment, definitely a medical or illness-based model with a heavy focus on psychiatric medications and cognitive behavioral therapy.
When I entered private practice, a whole new world opened up of different ways of thinking about therapy, some of which were rather “woo” and involved practices I had never heard of. As a relatively newly trained EMDR clinician, I began reading and researching and became aware of some luminaries in the EMDR field like Ariel Schwartz, Robin Shapiro, Roger Solomon and others. While doing some looking around online to understand more about the various approaches to trauma therapy, I came across a podcast that included interviews with the above three practitioners, as well as an interview with a woman who claimed to be a survivor of Satanic Ritual Abuse. I was quite surprised to see a classic SRA narrative alongside well respected EMDR practitioners, and wondered how these licensed clinicians would feel about being alongside this interview with frankly preposterous claims that are accepted at face value by the interviewer. I have listened to more interviews of this particular person and I have a lot of thoughts about it, but as she is not a clinician I will move on. Below is the link to this podcast.
#17 – Healing From Satanic Ritual Abuse with Lisa Meister
The more I explored the trauma therapy world in general, the more alarmed I got and the more unsure about what the hell was going on in some corners of the profession. I realized the Satanic Panic had not gone away, perhaps it went a bit underground but seemed to be having a resurgence along with some strange bedfellows including “deliverance”(i.e exorcism) oriented Christian churches, QAnoners, wellness influencers, and so on.
I have always been intrigued by cults and conspiracy theories, because what people think and believe and how they make meaning in a complicated and confusing world is probably the most interesting question I have. Working with clients with schizophrenia and other psychotic illnesses, I have spent quite a lot of time listening to and exploring paranoid thoughts and delusions, from the vague “somebody is out to get me” to extraordinarily complex, bizarre and unshakeable delusional structures. Most delusions run in the categories of religion, aliens, the government, contamination, secret societies, having an important secret role in the world, external control etc. So when QAnon exploded into public awareness in 2016 it felt familiar, but the popularity of it in our society was shocking. Whereas a psychotic delusion in an individual is an internally driven experience, this sort of mass delusion is fed externally through social media. Polls done in 2022 indicate that 16% of Americans believe that the government, media and financial worlds are controlled by Satan-worshipping pedophiles, which seems like an awful lot of people to believe such a thing. So why does this matter to me as a psychotherapist?
It matters because I continue to see the ways in which such beliefs make their way into the practice of therapy and counseling, and into related areas like coaching and the wellness industrial complex. These conspiracy beliefs are not just weird or funny, they are dangerous.
One such case made the national headlines a few years ago when YouTube mommy influencer Ruby Franke was arrested, along with her therapist and business partner Jodi Hildebrandt, on charges of the aggravated child abuse of 2 of Ruby’s children. The details of the case are extremely disturbing, so click the link with caution and I’d highly recommend not looking for any pictures or video. Ruby and Jody were found guilty and sentenced to long prison terms. There is clear evidence that the children were abused in order to exorcise demons from them, as part of the therapeutic practice associated with Jody’s extremely financially lucrative counseling business called Connexions. It’s notable that here too a licensed mental health clinician engaged in an inappropriate, exploitive dual relationship with a client, providing psychotherapy for several members of the Franke family and then becoming Ruby’s business partner and allegedly also her romantic partner.
Ruby Franke & Jodi Hildebrandt CBS News
Unfortunately, this was not an isolated incident. Jodi was a preferred counseling referral for the LDS (Mormon) Church even though she had her license suspended at one point for unethical practice. There is a long list of families damaged by her style of therapy. Additionally, there are related occurrences that have lead to the death of several people, including 2 children, also due to belief in demonic possession. Most notable is the Chad and Lori Vallow Daybell case. Again, look into this case with caution, as it is horrifying. The grim occurrences in this case were substantially driven by a popular book, Visions of Glory. This book based on the supernatural visions of, you guessed it, a licensed mental health clinician, who today is still working with the LDS church in the role of assessing the mental fitness of prospective missionaries. This therapist happened to have Jodi Hildebrandt present at one of his conferences aimed at bringing more religion into therapy.
I am in no way hostile to religion, and in fact my own therapist is Christian clergy. I have served very religious clients with the appropriate respect for, and support of, their beliefs and norms. What I am opposed to is the integration of extremist, demonically-obsessed doomsday conspiracy theories with psychotherapy, and the negative consequences to clients. Speaking of which, here is another story of a therapist affiliated with the LDS who is in prison for demon-related abuse of a client.
Former Utah therapist assaulted patient to rid her of ‘demons,’ charges allege
When it comes to the bizarre intersecting with clinical practice, it’s hard to beat the story of former U.S senate candidate Hershel Walker and his therapist. It came out in the news that Hershel Walker reported a diagnosis of DID (Dissociative Identity Disorder) and, given the intersection of DID diagnosis and questionable clinical practices, I was curious and looked into the story. Hershel Walker was treated by a man named Dr. Jerry Mundgaze, who has developed a diagnostic protocol of—and I am not making this up—handing a client a coloring page of a human brain and inviting the client to color in the sheet, with crayons or colored pencil, in whatever color moves the client in the moment. Mundgaze then diagnoses the client based on these choices, which apparently tell him if the person has anxiety, depression, has been abused, is gay, or has demons. It’s worth noting that this “renowned trauma expert” is color blind and has to have the client tell him what colors were chosen! Mundgaze fell into some controversy some years before this due to his appearance on a British tv show called “Cure Me, I’m Gay”, and his insistence that his treatment can turn gay people straight, so effectively that their brains don’t even LOOK gay anymore! For anybody really interested in the practice of Dr. Mundgaze, the “Oh No It’s Ross and Carrie” podcast did an episode where they actually visited him and experienced the diagnostic technique first-hand.
Another surprise happened recently when I started exploring some basic “parts work” strategies to supplement my EMDR skills. I took a short class on IFS basics for non-IFS practitioners and happened across a review of a book The Others Within Us, by Robert Falconer who is a veteran IFS practitioner. So, demons again, this time in the form of what is called “unattached burdens” (UB’s) which are not a client’s own internal mental parts or archetypes, but literally demons or malicious incorporeal spirits that infiltrate the person’s body at times of trauma or vulnerability. From my readings, Satan does make some appearances in people’s reports of the UB’s, but at least in IFS demon-related exorcisms, there is no physical or verbal abuse or starvation to get the demons to leave, it’s more of a collaborative process and gentle convincing of the UB to leave the client. So that’s good, I guess. It’s tempting to think this is an outlier in IFS therapy, but the introduction to the book was written by none other than originator of IFS, Richard Schwartz himself.
I used to be part of an online group of therapists specializing in religious trauma, and recall a clinician that was part of a Christian-focused IFS group being alarmed at speculation in the group that trans people have demonic parts. It’s one thing for a client to identify that they feel like the are troubled by a demonic entity, and another entirely to for a clinician to assign demonic possession to a population based on their identity.
Book Review: The Others Within Us
There is so much more that I could share on this topic, but these are some basics to help explain my concern about the intrusion of ideas about demons and SRA into psychotherapy. It’s my personal and professional belief that these ideas do not belong in clinical practice, coming from the clinician at least. To sit with clients and explore their beliefs around the supernatural or unlikely occurrences (ie. alien abduction, SRA) is something that I have done with compassion, respect and curiosity and will continue to do. I believe deeply in the value of therapy, but am also aware of the harm that therapists can cause to clients when we do not have our clinical boundaries in place.
All posts are written by Kathryn, no AI.