Brainwashing is often viewed as a Cold War relic—think '60s films like "The Manchurian Candidate" and "The IPCRESS File." But Rebecca Lemov, professor of the history of science, argues in her recently ...

Brainwashing doesn’t always look dramatic; it often employs subtle tactics to bypass critical thinking and reshape beliefs and identities. Indeed, various models have been proposed over the years to ...

From Communist reeducation camps to manipulative media algorithms, mind control is a real and often remarkably effective tool, contends historian Lemov (World as Laboratory) in this trenchant study.

In Orwell's novel, members of the Ingsoc party must accept paradoxical slogans such as "war is peace". Source: Joel Frohlich (created with Midjourney) This post is an adapted except from my Substack ...

As sniper suspect Lee Boyd Malvo stands trial this week, his insanity defense relies on a controversial claim rarely heard in courtrooms: The defendant was brainwashed to kill. But whether Malvo is a ...