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Mind Control VS Brainwashing

Mind control is just as it says on the box--the villain is controlling their target directly in some way to make the target do the villain's bidding, in spite of themselves. (Terra in FF6 is an example of this)

Brianwashing is forcing the target to do the villain's bidding, being exploited by the villain to become a minion/villain themselves or by willingly giving themselves up to the villain's control in some cases. (Jafar in Disney's Aladdin is a good example of forcing a target, especially when Aladdin breaks the cobra staff's hold on the Sultan, and explains "Jafar's been controlling you with this!" The TV series has a whole lot of different ways of brainwashing, actually.) The Whole Wicked/ Black Lady storyline in Sailor Moon is an example of the second type--Wiseman taking advantage of Chibiusa/Reni's fears of being abandoned/left alone in order to manipulate her to do his bidding)

The difference is if the target has some form of a choice (or the illusion of a choice.) to become a minion. That said, both conditions can be fought against, and broken.
 
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Ultimately it comes down to semantics and depends on what you're referring to in context.

Most people when they hear "mind control" will think of something akin to Professor X, psychically altering Logan's mind to make him think he's a six year old girl because he keeps smoking in Cerebro. (I watched X-Men 2 recently as you can tell.)

But "brainwashing" or known by a bevy of other synonyms such as coercive persuasion often refers to the more real techniques of psychological control to manipulate individuals to change their beliefs and values in order to induce cooperation, which is why citizens tend to go along with things like genocides or join cults.

Of course there's some overlaps in verbal usage of the two since the bleeding of definitions always happens as words and culture evolves but this is just my two cents.
 
I can imagine that brainwashing would be harder to break than mind control. With mind control, you just have to take out the thing doing the controlling, whether it is a device or a person.

Not sure about Brainwashing. I can see it being harder if the person being brainwashed was very young when the brainwashing started.
 
Greninjaman said:
Not sure about Brainwashing. I can see it being harder if the person being brainwashed was very young when the brainwashing started.
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(CW// Emotional Abuse)

Another thing that makes brainwashing harder to escape is that, with good brainwashing, the victim can deny anything that's wrong. Things like gaslighting and the cycle of "hurting the person, profuse apologizing/denial, honeymoon phase" can make the victim think that they themselves are the problem.

Being raised on brainwashing can make it feel normal, but a brainwasher can also exploit a victim's emotional vulnerabilities regardless of age or other factors.
 
Torchic W. Pip said:
(CW// Emotional Abuse)

Another thing that makes brainwashing harder to escape is that, with good brainwashing, the victim can deny anything that's wrong. Things like gaslighting and the cycle of "hurting the person, profuse apologizing/denial, honeymoon phase" can make the victim think that they themselves are the problem.

Being raised on brainwashing can make it feel normal, but a brainwasher can also exploit a victim's emotional vulnerabilities regardless of age or other factors.
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What are ways that one could break the brainwashing?
 
Another difference between Mind Control and Brainwashing is that mind control is often forced upon the target, often against their will, and is treated more like a direct weapon against the victim. The Battle City arc in the original Yugioh is a good example of this, especially the Yugi VS Marik-controlled Joey. And as demonstrated in that very same Duel the mind control can be weakened and eventually broken with the right amount of willpower and/or other factors. So mind control is much easier to break because even a simple jogging of a certain memory or whatnot can loosen its grip and allow the one who is under mind control to start fighting back.

Brainwashing, however, is often used in more subtle ways. Like several examples above, brainwashing can be implemented through simple things like manipulating someone at a young age or using sweet-sounding lies to coax a victim into doing what the villain wants. It's also significantly harder to break due to the fact that in several cases the victim either doesn't know any better or doesn't believe what they're doing is wrong. That's exactly how cults, terrorist groups, and such form. Look at Breath of Fire 2, for example, with St. Eva, a religious cult that cropped up and is secretly run by a demon wanting to revive and destroy the world. The people who became part of St. Eva were brainwashed to the point they were willing to die for their cult, ultimately doing so when the main church was destroyed with all the brainwashed worshipers due to the heroes getting involved. While brainwashing can be broken, which would require quite a bit, by that point it's often too late to change the villain's plans in any significant ways or even outright stopping it.
 
Greninjaman said:
What are ways that one could break the brainwashing?
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Therapy

In my opinion, it takes a lot more to break out of brainwashing. For one, the victim has to understand that what they're going through is wrong and not okay (Source: :)). Then they have to leave the perpetrator and undo all of the lessons they learned from the brainwashing. It's not as simple as flipping off a switch.
 
Torchic W. Pip said:
Therapy

In my opinion, it takes a lot more to break out of brainwashing. For one, the victim has to understand that what they're going through is wrong and not okay (Source: :)). Then they have to leave the perpetrator and undo all of the lessons they learned from the brainwashing. It's not as simple as flipping off a switch.
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Agreed on it not being that simple.
 
Ooh this is old but I think i have an idea…

so let’s take two characters from my verse. Serena and Cheren.

serena was directly mind controlled by team flare using zygarde, effectively taking control of her whole mind In pretty much the snap of a finger.

cheren however was more… convinced into thinking team plasma was right. Team plasma didn’t do anything directly to his brain, but managed to pretty much change the way he thinks using lies and manipulation.

its more complicated than that but that’s all I have?
 
I find brainwashing way more interesting than mind control, narratively speaking. With mind control you take a character and remove it from the plot. They have no agency nor input and are basically held hostage by the perpetrator. It's not clearly bad but it doesn't bring too much to the table outside of a mild sensation of danger and maybe some cool but ultimately weightless fights. And most of the time, there are zero consecuences in the end.

With brainwashing, on the other hand, you have a chance to explore the character inner self. Their morals, their beliefs, their virtues and flaws, their relationships with the other characters. You also get a chance to explore the villain motivations and put a good contrast between them with dialogue driven scenes. The brainwashed character will have a voice, and responsibility of their own actions. They will experience character development (for bad or good) and something will change in them and how they interact with the others. With mind control, all boils down to a rescue mission. With brainwashing you can explore betrayal and human comprehension with their friends/allies and make them re evaluate their bonds.

One gives you tools, the other makes you skip the work process
 
I don't think mind control inherently is "lesser than" brainwashing. It is less work, but like... imagine the ethical dilemma of a world where, say, certain pokemon can control other people. What kind of laws and regulations are in place to prevent that? How do those that can mind control feel about it? Do they even use it? Why or why not? How do you even learn mind control if there are restrictions on it? What themes of losing control over your own self could possibly be explored in a mind control story, especially once the effects wear off and the character realizes what happened? I do think, however, that a lot of amateur writers gloss over the ramifications of mind control and use it as a quick way to turn a character against their friends.
 
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