Before revision: Controversy According to the President of the National Psychological Abuses Observatory, Patrizia Santovecchi, among the characteristics of Damanhur there are those typical of sects, including the lack of possibility to go out freely due to blackmail , manipulation through the siege syndrome, for which outside the sect are all the enemies constituted by negative energies , and, moreover, the impossibility of criticism and the imposition of total obedience, the estrangement from family members, the complete depersonalization in the individual under various aspects , including for example the assignment of a new name within the community, the deprivation of any kind of decision-making capacity, the need to ask the guru what to do .
After revision: Controversy According to the President of the National Psychological Abuses Observatory; Patrizia Santovecchi; among the characteristics of Damanhur there are those typical of sects, including the lack of possibility to go out freely due to blackmail , manipulation through the siege syndrome, for which outside the sect are all the enemies constituted by negative energies , and, moreover, the impossibility of criticism and the imposition of total obedience, the estrangement from family members, the complete depersonalization in the individual under various aspects (includingandand) the assignment of a new name within the community, the deprivation of any kind of decision-making capacity, the need to ask the guru what to do .