Inside Landmark Forum (transcript)

SET OF PIECES A CONVICTION

HOST ELISE LUCET

Brigitte Thelier and Pierre, as former students of Landmark Education, You lived through this moment of returning to early childhood fears.  What were you feeling at that moment?

BRIGITTE THELIER

I took it as a game of his, a game that makes you very, very scared, But still a game, so, I didn’t want to be a part of this mechanism.  I understood that it wasn’t the right place for me.  

ELISE LUCET

Already?

BRIGITTE THELIER

Already.  So, of course, I did what everyone else was doing.  And it’s frightening to see again, as in the clip, people breaking down, crying.  It’s emotional abuse.  Why, in a personal development workshop, bring out suffering through abuse, bring out fears?  

ELISE LUCET

Same for you, Pierre?

PIERRE

I remember the exercise very well, but I didn’t do it.  I thought it was stupid.  I didn’t get into it at all.  I opened my eyes and looked around, and when you open your eyes, it’s appalling.  There’s a little bit of giggling and some more or less go along with the game, But some people are completely taken in who break down like that man, absolutely.  

ELISE LUCET

So, Christian Lujan, you are a psycho-sociologist and psychoanalyst.  Why did Alain Roth bring out these fears from childhood?  What’s the purpose?  

DR. CHRISTIAN LUJAN, PSYCHOANALYST

He is in a position of total power. And we're in a mechanism that has no place for the subject. Individuals are objects, objects of this total power. Everything is in coded language. Everything is organized, everything is structured. The goal is to destabilize the individual and to negate - and I emphasize this - the notion of the subject. The individual doesn't own his own past. Only they know what's good for him. At any moment, an exercise like this can take away a person's introspection.

ELISE LUCET

So, Jean-Pierre Jougla, you’re an expert in brainwashing.  We’re quite struck at the beginning of this clip where Murielle can’t even ask a question.  What’s happening there?

JEAN-PIERRE JOUGLA

He makes fun of any response of hers.  But that’s not the problem. It’s the stranglehold he puts in place.  And what frightens me is that in very little time, 3 or 4 days, we’re seeing what takes a cult 2 to 3 years to instill.  The cult phenomenon is gaining momentum.  And reviving childhood fears is not harmless.  It puts the students, at least the ones who go along with the game, in the position of a child.  This sets up the strangle hold of the guru.  Because there’s an incest-like relationship between an all-powerful father and a child who is not even allowed to doubt, to question, to think critically.  The only thing left is to listen.  

ELISE LUCET

Let’s return to our voyage into the heart of Landmark Education.  The students are beginning their third day of The Forum.  Many of them are worn out, awaiting new ordeals.  But the tone is going to change radically.