I think steve hassan has said something about intelligent cult members - they're not necessarily easier to wake up because they can invent more convoluted defenses and rationalizations for the cult beliefs. You can have all the intelligence in the world, but if its goal is to defend the irrational it's not worth anything. Without intellectual honesty, intelligence is useless.
Regarding evolution, my favorite defense (relying on the age old strategy of conflating evolution with abiogenesis) was that scientists hadn't been able to make life in a lab so how much less likely is it to happen randomly? Then, for follow up: Even if scientists could use their intelligence to create life - who made the scientists? Looking back though I was just regurgitating and not really thinking. Luckily I stopped trying to defend the creationist stance at around 14 or 15 and just hoped that it was true in spite of the fact that evolution made so much more sense.
The stupidest belief, though, was my long held stance of rational ignorance. I often thought of investigating the cult, but the indoctrinated belief that all I'd find is angry bitter liars kept me from even taking a moment out to look because it would just be a waste of time. Once I shed the certainty that so-called apostates were 100% wrong and motivated by anger and hatred, it didn't take long to shed the few remaining stupid beliefs I had left at that point.
