GLORIAVALE DOCO A WHITEWASH FOR ABUSERS?
A new documentary just dropped on Three Now: “Devotion: The Gloriavale Story” is already getting pushback from Gloriavale leavers. Virginia Courage, who watched the three-part series that streamed on Paramount Plus before its NZ release, says that it gives our most notorious cult a PR platform to whitewash itself.
“Cults like Gloriavale are obsessed with their own image and will use any opportunity to be the ‘saviour’ or ‘victim’”, the victim advocate and Decult 2024 panelist told me. “If people watching this doco are not aware of these cult techniques, they will struggle to know what is correct.”
While some of the historic footage is impressive, I’m wondering at what price the film makers’ exclusive access to the fundamentalist Christian community came. It concerns me that that an indoctrinated under-age girl was interviewed as a handpicked “poster child” for Gloriavale and that the current leaders present their highly problematic community as reformed – while the lawyer who is fighting them is framed as a zealot. There’s more that feels off.
Executive producer Dame Julie Christie prides herself on showing “both sides” – but is that an ethical approach when one side represents child sexual abuse, coercive control, misogyny and slave labour, with dozens of convictions? Virginia’s comment: “I did not see or hear ‘balance’, but harm portrayed as a spiritual gateway. It’s just bad practice to ask the harmer if the abuse has stopped.”
The title and promotion of “Devotion” also jarred for me, for instance “They say it’s faith. Others call it a cult”. The criteria for cults are well established by experts and Gloriavale meets every one of them, which seems to escape Christie when asked by RNZ. Their religious beliefs are not the issue. The perceived “devotion” is obedience because of oppression and brainwash.
There are many powerful voices in the doco, and according to one participant, “Gloriavale has been given enough rope to hang itself”. But overall, it is not survivor-centric like TVNZ’s Escaping Utopia. We would love to hear what you think.