How did the Japanese cult, Aum Shinrikyo, Aum for short, utilize violence to their advantage to create a reputation that furthered their goals? An act of domestic terror in 1995, and all the smaller terroristic acts committed in the early 90s, by this cult is violence used to build a reputation for themselves. After trying to gain political legitimacy, and failing, cult leader Shoko Asahara turned to building up his credibility and reputation by using violence. The numbers of people involved in the cult and the worth of the organization itself is one indicator of the success of the cults reputation building. While the cult was growing, the numbers of people who hated the group were growing as well, which begs the question of the violence used …show more content…
Not only did they grow financially, their membership grew immensely after they gained government recognition. They went from having an insignificant number, not even worth defining in 1984, to 10,000 in 1992 to about 50,000 members worldwide in 1995. As they got larger, they became more dangerous, with numerous reports of physical assaults and kidnappings of young new members. Lawyer Tsutsumi Sakamoto, who represented many anti-Aum groups, was kidnapped and murdered not long after the government recognition of the group. The complete lack of government response to this murder, reassured the cults confidence that they would not get in trouble for whatever violent acts they commit, of course this did not last after the 1995 terror attacks (U.S. Cong. Senate. Gov’t …show more content…
The sarin was intentionally released in that neighborhood because judges in a real estate case that was being heard against Aum Shinrikyo, lived in that area. Because of this attack, seven people were killed and several hundred others were hospitalized. In March of 1995, the cult released sarin gas into the Tokyo subway system. On several different trains, packages were left and punctured, so the liquid would spread throughout the cars, then evaporating and affecting those encountering affected air. By the end of the day that the gas was released, fifteen subway stations were impacted. In each station, about 300 to 400 people were affected by the gas (Olson 1999, 513). Roughly 3,800 people were injured, with 12 dying because of the attack (Olson 1999,