6 ms·

Cults have common and shared warning signs: https://medium.com/@zelphontheshelf/10-signs-youre-probably-in-a-cult-1921eb5a3857 https://medium.com/@zelphonthesh

Cults have common and shared warning signs: https://medium.com/@zelphontheshelf/10-signs-youre-probably-in-a-cult-1921eb5a3857 https://medium.com/@zelphontheshelf/10-signs-youre-probably-... 1. The leader is the ultimate authority 2. The group suppresses skepticism 3. The group delegitimizes former members 4. The group is paranoid about the outside world 5. The group relies on shame cycles 6. The leader is above the law 7. The group uses “thought reform” methods 8. The group is elitist 9. There is no financial transparency 10. The group performs secret rites Also, not all cults are religious. Some are tied to economic activity (MLMs are very culty, for example), and dysfunctional families often take on a cult-like atmosphere, with a charismatic and controlling parent backed by enablers as they abuse a scapegoat and dominate the family.

camjohnson26 4y ago
It’s been posted here before but The Guru Papers is a great exploration of the workings of cults and authoritarianism. https://www.amazon.com/Guru-Papers-Masks-Authoritarian-Power-ebook/dp/B007WL0JHE https://www.amazon.com/Guru-Papers-Masks-Authoritarian-Power...
- mistrial9 4y ago
  I enjoyed reading "Holy Madness: Spirituality, Crazy-Wise Teachers, and Enlightenment" by G. Feuerstein. great re-visit of the sometimes ridiculous counter-culture of the 1960s and 1970s West.
prirun 4y ago
In summary, every religion.
- mistermann 4y ago
  https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/2MD3NMLBPCqPfnfre/cached-thoughts https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/2MD3NMLBPCqPfnfre/cached-tho... What I like about this article is that the author suffers from the very phenomenon they are describing, demonstrating how ubiquitous and hard to detect in oneself it is.
- noobker 4y ago
  > every religion The world's beliefs are many and varied. There are plenty of religious groups that provide a foundation for a healthy life instead of insisting they are the only means to achieving it. You'll be hardpressed to apply this list of grievances to the average Buddhist community, for instance. Sikhs, Jains, Baha'i, Quakers -- many more come to mind.
  - kragen 4y ago
    You know, I was just thinking about how closely the Baha'i communities I knew fit this definition. #1 and #6 apply to Baha'u'llah, of course, but since he's been dead for quite a while it's less of an issue. More concerningly, they could plausibly be applied to many LSA, NSA, and UHJ members: there are explicit injunctions in the writings against using the secular legal system to resolve disputes among Baha'is, and in most communities there are people in the LSA who the LSA will definitely never rule against in any dispute. In general, criticizing members of the LSA, NSA, or UHJ is strongly discouraged as "creating disunity", even more strongly than publicly criticizing other people. #2 and #3 are pretty extreme. If you have social contact with a Covenant-Breaker you are likely to lose your voting rights. #4 is of course somewhat true because most Baha'is know someone who has been imprisoned or killed (in Iran) for being Baha'i, or at least know someone who knows someone. You'd have to be pretty irrational not to be somewhat paranoid under those circumstances. I'm not sure what is meant by #5, but shame of course has a prominent place in the Baha'i faith, as in any religion. Going through the list, though, I think that to a significant extent it's just a rough definition of "religion" or "culture", plus elements of leadership. Is Thomas Jefferson "above the law"? Is Muhammad? Of course they are, you can't prosecute them. Is the US Government? Yes, it has "sovereign immunity". You'd be hard-pressed to find any culture that didn't consider itself superior to the outgroup, yet vulnerable to attacks from it, or that didn't enforce some degree of ideological conformity, or that didn't shame deviations from its norms.
- retrac 4y ago
  One criteria that's fairly defining of a cult, by my definition, is major operational secrecy. People who join don't know what the higher-ups are doing. Indeed, they often don't know the fundamental doctrines of the cult! E.g. people who join Scientology don't get the whole "God is a space alien" package dropped on them until they're many, many $10,000s down the hole already. Now, let's take Catholicism, probably the major faith most often accused of cult-like behaviour. It certainly has some of the most political structure and (pardon the pun) orthodoxy of the major religions. But Catholicism is also extremely open. There are no fees to join. There are no mandatory payments. There are no doctrinal secrets. They're entirely open about everything they believe, up front. You don't get whacked with some dark secret ten years in. They also don't really attempt to control most, let alone all, domains of of members' lives. They go about careers, etc. as they see fit. They're also tolerant of internal criticism and dissent; you've got some Cardinals in favour of gay marriage, and some of the loudest voices about the systematic sex abuse problem (one of the biggest reasons one might call them a cult) are coming from adherent Catholics, who aren't automatically excommunicated or given other traditionally cult-like handling for their dissent. Such difference seems very significant to me. And I'm an atheist and decidedly anti-religious, for what it's worth.
  - prirun 4y ago
    > Now, let's take Catholicism ... They also don't really attempt to control most, let alone all, domains of of members' lives. Really? "The Catholic position on contraception was formally explained and expressed by Pope Paul VI's Humanae vitae in 1968. Artificial contraception is considered intrinsically evil, but methods of natural family planning may be used, as they do not usurp the natural way of conception." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_views_on_birth_control https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_views_on_birth_contr...
    - retrac 4y ago
      Having a strong stance in one domain != moral totalitarianism. Some branches of Jainism recommends brushing the sidewalk ahead of you so as to avoid destroying any insects unnecessarily. A totalitarian religion controlling all aspects of life? Or just a profoundly intense moral doctrine that, naturally, has ramifications throughout many aspects of life if you accept it?
- dotnet00 4y ago
  This may be a fun r/atheism tier quip, but most eastern religions don't fit this mold, being too vaguely defined/unorganized for any cult analogies to apply.
andrewla 4y ago
> Also, not all cults are religious Now we're well into the map vs territory. In the attempt to define a cult (something which we intuit) we end up fixated on the boundary between what is a cult and what is not a cult, and try to create a taxonomic rule-based classification. The mistake is then to assume that that rule-based classification defines what a cult is (rather than attempts to describe what is a cult) and you end up saying that something (like MLMs) are a "cult" even though they are not! I mean, you can make an analogy to a cult, or show cult-like properties, but absent a religious motivation (where "religious" itself is a similarly nebulous concept) it's not a cult. If your rule-based model defines something which is not a cult (subjectively) as a cult (objectively), then your definitions are bad, period, and you should stop using them. Instead, embrace fuzziness and subjectivity and look for the interesting properties of "cult", and learn what it teaches us about language and society.
- sparkie 4y ago
  Some people have been saying we are a cult, but they are not using the correct definition of "cult," in our opinion.
  - andrewla 4y ago
    Exactly this! The attempt to reduce "cult" to a strict rule-based definition means you can be endlessly mired in semantic debate rather than actually address the operational parameters that make an organization or association unattractive to join, which is usually what people mean when they say "that's a cult". "Cult" carries a ton of baggage. You say "hey, that MLM you want to join satisfies 4/10 properties of a cult -- it's a cult!" and the baggage is "Jonestown was a cult and they all died. Heaven's gate was a cult and they all died. Branch Davidian was a cult and they all died." It's a rhetorical sleight of hand, nothing more, and it will not convince anyone or create an interesting discussion; it'll just come down to some argument about whether Catholicism is a cult. In order to actually get anything useful, you have to show how the cult-like properties either inevitably lead to the negative consequences (which is nigh impossible; some of these definitions apply to little league teams) or talk about the specific negative or questionable behaviors of the organization itself.
nkingsy 4y ago
My litmus test is when the leader starts sleeping with everyone, or shows some other selfish motive that makes the “above the law” stuff necessary to avoid cognitive dissonance.
- cainxinth 4y ago
  It's not on the list, but that one is definitely common, too. Whenever someone says they have a direct line of communication with a deity, you just know there is a good chance they are going to follow up with: "And I just got off the horn with the big guy and he says I'm allowed to bang anyone I want."
- mistrial9 4y ago
  add to that - its not "sleeping" .. it is sex.. sometimes very energetic sex. Sex activity is deeply tied to social constructs, and at the same time powerful forces of the mind and body in a very personal way .. sex activity in a group like that has been the raison d'etre of many orthodox religious orders.. anti- that is, to ban and demolish that, basically.. because it does work.
- SilasX 4y ago
  Approximate line from the Waco miniseries on Netflix: "Why is it, that whenever God speaks to a prophet, it's always to tell him to have sex with a bunch of women?"
tremon 4y ago
Are any of those required or sufficient? Because I see a lot of overlap in those "warning signs". I could probably whittle it down to just three observations about group dynamics: - sharp distinction between in-group and out-group (covers 3, 4, 8) - high degree of social control (covers 5, 6, 7, 10) - truth is a social construct (covers 1, 2, 7, probably 9 as well)
- Viliam1234 4y ago
  By the way, I prefer this list: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thought_Reform_and_the_Psychology_of_Totalism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thought_Reform_and_the_Psychol... I think that if you try to compress the information too much, it becomes too abstract and meaningless. Your local library also distinguishes between members and non-members, but it doesn't imply that they slander the former members, or are paranoid about people who buy their own books. Social control can be achieved by different ways; for some reason it seems important that cults use shame as a specific psychological tool. Many cults would strongly object against the words that "truth is a social construct", despite the fact that they use it exactly that way. There is a social mechanism that seems unusually successful at hacking human brains. It has probably been reinvented many times independently by various abusive people, but some people also copy some behaviors from their previous groups. Lists like this are attempts to describe the mechanism. The individual points are not independent things, but parts of a complex whole, reinforcing each other. For example, it is easier for the group to shame you, after they have convinced you that all your achievements outside the group are worthless. And it is easier to convince you that everything outside the group is worthless, if they falsely exaggerate the value of the group, and then apply black-and-white thinking (our group is miraculous, the world outside is not, therefore the world outside is worthless). Black-and-white thinking comes easier if they convince you that the teachings are super important, so it is important to get them absolutely right. Etc.
mostertoaster 4y ago
I think the issue with any definition and why people say “everything is a cult”, is because I read this list and it makes me feel like progressivism is a cult based on it. Though I’m sure a progressive would say Trumpism is a cult. LDS is accused of being a cult. But they’re generally nice neighbors. Is it still a cult if it gets big enough? Islam would’ve once been a cult as well as Christianity. At the very least it seems any religion is a cult. We can argue then about whether something is religious or not.
- IIAOPSW 4y ago
  >Is it still a cult if it gets big enough? To draw an analogy, if a street gang gets big enough and controls enough territory, is it a government? The obvious follow up question is that if these phenomena only differ in size of membership, what makes one "legitimate" and the other not? Is there such a thing as a legitimate government and a legitimate religion, or are they all just another level of street gangs and cults? For governments anyway we have an answer. Sure at some level the organization of hard force in the form of police is subject to the same practical considerations and constraints as the organization of hard force in the form of a gang, and will thus take a superficially similar form, but a gang does not give you a day in court nor does it set up a system of fair and impartial trials nor does it let you vote on its rules. A gang is fundamentally self serving. It exists for the enrichment of itself at the expense of those outside of it. A democracy, in contrast, directly contradicts the premise "the leader is above the law." So there is such a thing as a "legitimate government". Existence and uniqueness of "legitimate religion" is left as an exercise for the reader. (btw Trumpism is absolutely a cult. Just look at it, they had to invent the word "Trumpism" to describe the phenomena because it did not fit any other defined political philosophy and the only constant non-contradictory belief it has is loyalty to Trump himself. Seriously, try defining Trumpism in some way other than "agreeing with what Trump says no matter what." Its impossible. That's a cult.)
  - dayjaby 4y ago
    Just curious: do you think that any government where the leader is not above the law is legitimate?
deleted 4y ago
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lormayna 4y ago
As someone that is growth up in a religious semi-cult, this is impressive. It's just the description of the environment where I grow up.
pessimizer 4y ago
Instead of writing an elaborately referenced reply to andrewla, I decided to mention that the current term people are using is "high-demand groups" because to monotheists, part of the "cult" definition is tied up in the deviation from their religion. If we're talking about extremely insular, high-commitment groups that tend to punish people who leave, we might as well leave behind a word that is just as often used by monotheists to refer to heretics. "Cult" and "occult" are from "hidden" anyway, as in you'd better hide if you're a heretic.

camjohnson26 4y ago

It’s been posted here before but The Guru Papers is a great exploration of the workings of cults and authoritarianism. https://www.amazon.com/Guru-Papers-Masks-Authoritarian-Power-ebook/dp/B007WL0JHE https://www.amazon.com/Guru-Papers-Masks-Authoritarian-Power...

mistrial9 4y ago
I enjoyed reading "Holy Madness: Spirituality, Crazy-Wise Teachers, and Enlightenment" by G. Feuerstein. great re-visit of the sometimes ridiculous counter-culture of the 1960s and 1970s West.

prirun 4y ago

In summary, every religion.

mistermann 4y ago
https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/2MD3NMLBPCqPfnfre/cached-thoughts https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/2MD3NMLBPCqPfnfre/cached-tho... What I like about this article is that the author suffers from the very phenomenon they are describing, demonstrating how ubiquitous and hard to detect in oneself it is.
noobker 4y ago
> every religion The world's beliefs are many and varied. There are plenty of religious groups that provide a foundation for a healthy life instead of insisting they are the only means to achieving it. You'll be hardpressed to apply this list of grievances to the average Buddhist community, for instance. Sikhs, Jains, Baha'i, Quakers -- many more come to mind.
- kragen 4y ago
  You know, I was just thinking about how closely the Baha'i communities I knew fit this definition. #1 and #6 apply to Baha'u'llah, of course, but since he's been dead for quite a while it's less of an issue. More concerningly, they could plausibly be applied to many LSA, NSA, and UHJ members: there are explicit injunctions in the writings against using the secular legal system to resolve disputes among Baha'is, and in most communities there are people in the LSA who the LSA will definitely never rule against in any dispute. In general, criticizing members of the LSA, NSA, or UHJ is strongly discouraged as "creating disunity", even more strongly than publicly criticizing other people. #2 and #3 are pretty extreme. If you have social contact with a Covenant-Breaker you are likely to lose your voting rights. #4 is of course somewhat true because most Baha'is know someone who has been imprisoned or killed (in Iran) for being Baha'i, or at least know someone who knows someone. You'd have to be pretty irrational not to be somewhat paranoid under those circumstances. I'm not sure what is meant by #5, but shame of course has a prominent place in the Baha'i faith, as in any religion. Going through the list, though, I think that to a significant extent it's just a rough definition of "religion" or "culture", plus elements of leadership. Is Thomas Jefferson "above the law"? Is Muhammad? Of course they are, you can't prosecute them. Is the US Government? Yes, it has "sovereign immunity". You'd be hard-pressed to find any culture that didn't consider itself superior to the outgroup, yet vulnerable to attacks from it, or that didn't enforce some degree of ideological conformity, or that didn't shame deviations from its norms.
retrac 4y ago
One criteria that's fairly defining of a cult, by my definition, is major operational secrecy. People who join don't know what the higher-ups are doing. Indeed, they often don't know the fundamental doctrines of the cult! E.g. people who join Scientology don't get the whole "God is a space alien" package dropped on them until they're many, many $10,000s down the hole already. Now, let's take Catholicism, probably the major faith most often accused of cult-like behaviour. It certainly has some of the most political structure and (pardon the pun) orthodoxy of the major religions. But Catholicism is also extremely open. There are no fees to join. There are no mandatory payments. There are no doctrinal secrets. They're entirely open about everything they believe, up front. You don't get whacked with some dark secret ten years in. They also don't really attempt to control most, let alone all, domains of of members' lives. They go about careers, etc. as they see fit. They're also tolerant of internal criticism and dissent; you've got some Cardinals in favour of gay marriage, and some of the loudest voices about the systematic sex abuse problem (one of the biggest reasons one might call them a cult) are coming from adherent Catholics, who aren't automatically excommunicated or given other traditionally cult-like handling for their dissent. Such difference seems very significant to me. And I'm an atheist and decidedly anti-religious, for what it's worth.
- prirun 4y ago
  > Now, let's take Catholicism ... They also don't really attempt to control most, let alone all, domains of of members' lives. Really? "The Catholic position on contraception was formally explained and expressed by Pope Paul VI's Humanae vitae in 1968. Artificial contraception is considered intrinsically evil, but methods of natural family planning may be used, as they do not usurp the natural way of conception." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_views_on_birth_control https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_views_on_birth_contr...
  - retrac 4y ago
    Having a strong stance in one domain != moral totalitarianism. Some branches of Jainism recommends brushing the sidewalk ahead of you so as to avoid destroying any insects unnecessarily. A totalitarian religion controlling all aspects of life? Or just a profoundly intense moral doctrine that, naturally, has ramifications throughout many aspects of life if you accept it?
dotnet00 4y ago
This may be a fun r/atheism tier quip, but most eastern religions don't fit this mold, being too vaguely defined/unorganized for any cult analogies to apply.

andrewla 4y ago

> Also, not all cults are religious Now we're well into the map vs territory. In the attempt to define a cult (something which we intuit) we end up fixated on the boundary between what is a cult and what is not a cult, and try to create a taxonomic rule-based classification. The mistake is then to assume that that rule-based classification defines what a cult is (rather than attempts to describe what is a cult) and you end up saying that something (like MLMs) are a "cult" even though they are not! I mean, you can make an analogy to a cult, or show cult-like properties, but absent a religious motivation (where "religious" itself is a similarly nebulous concept) it's not a cult. If your rule-based model defines something which is not a cult (subjectively) as a cult (objectively), then your definitions are bad, period, and you should stop using them. Instead, embrace fuzziness and subjectivity and look for the interesting properties of "cult", and learn what it teaches us about language and society.

sparkie 4y ago
Some people have been saying we are a cult, but they are not using the correct definition of "cult," in our opinion.
- andrewla 4y ago
  Exactly this! The attempt to reduce "cult" to a strict rule-based definition means you can be endlessly mired in semantic debate rather than actually address the operational parameters that make an organization or association unattractive to join, which is usually what people mean when they say "that's a cult". "Cult" carries a ton of baggage. You say "hey, that MLM you want to join satisfies 4/10 properties of a cult -- it's a cult!" and the baggage is "Jonestown was a cult and they all died. Heaven's gate was a cult and they all died. Branch Davidian was a cult and they all died." It's a rhetorical sleight of hand, nothing more, and it will not convince anyone or create an interesting discussion; it'll just come down to some argument about whether Catholicism is a cult. In order to actually get anything useful, you have to show how the cult-like properties either inevitably lead to the negative consequences (which is nigh impossible; some of these definitions apply to little league teams) or talk about the specific negative or questionable behaviors of the organization itself.

nkingsy 4y ago

My litmus test is when the leader starts sleeping with everyone, or shows some other selfish motive that makes the “above the law” stuff necessary to avoid cognitive dissonance.

cainxinth 4y ago
It's not on the list, but that one is definitely common, too. Whenever someone says they have a direct line of communication with a deity, you just know there is a good chance they are going to follow up with: "And I just got off the horn with the big guy and he says I'm allowed to bang anyone I want."
mistrial9 4y ago
add to that - its not "sleeping" .. it is sex.. sometimes very energetic sex. Sex activity is deeply tied to social constructs, and at the same time powerful forces of the mind and body in a very personal way .. sex activity in a group like that has been the raison d'etre of many orthodox religious orders.. anti- that is, to ban and demolish that, basically.. because it does work.
SilasX 4y ago
Approximate line from the Waco miniseries on Netflix: "Why is it, that whenever God speaks to a prophet, it's always to tell him to have sex with a bunch of women?"

tremon 4y ago

Are any of those required or sufficient? Because I see a lot of overlap in those "warning signs". I could probably whittle it down to just three observations about group dynamics: - sharp distinction between in-group and out-group (covers 3, 4, 8) - high degree of social control (covers 5, 6, 7, 10) - truth is a social construct (covers 1, 2, 7, probably 9 as well)

Viliam1234 4y ago
By the way, I prefer this list: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thought_Reform_and_the_Psychology_of_Totalism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thought_Reform_and_the_Psychol... I think that if you try to compress the information too much, it becomes too abstract and meaningless. Your local library also distinguishes between members and non-members, but it doesn't imply that they slander the former members, or are paranoid about people who buy their own books. Social control can be achieved by different ways; for some reason it seems important that cults use shame as a specific psychological tool. Many cults would strongly object against the words that "truth is a social construct", despite the fact that they use it exactly that way. There is a social mechanism that seems unusually successful at hacking human brains. It has probably been reinvented many times independently by various abusive people, but some people also copy some behaviors from their previous groups. Lists like this are attempts to describe the mechanism. The individual points are not independent things, but parts of a complex whole, reinforcing each other. For example, it is easier for the group to shame you, after they have convinced you that all your achievements outside the group are worthless. And it is easier to convince you that everything outside the group is worthless, if they falsely exaggerate the value of the group, and then apply black-and-white thinking (our group is miraculous, the world outside is not, therefore the world outside is worthless). Black-and-white thinking comes easier if they convince you that the teachings are super important, so it is important to get them absolutely right. Etc.

mostertoaster 4y ago

I think the issue with any definition and why people say “everything is a cult”, is because I read this list and it makes me feel like progressivism is a cult based on it. Though I’m sure a progressive would say Trumpism is a cult. LDS is accused of being a cult. But they’re generally nice neighbors. Is it still a cult if it gets big enough? Islam would’ve once been a cult as well as Christianity. At the very least it seems any religion is a cult. We can argue then about whether something is religious or not.

IIAOPSW 4y ago
>Is it still a cult if it gets big enough? To draw an analogy, if a street gang gets big enough and controls enough territory, is it a government? The obvious follow up question is that if these phenomena only differ in size of membership, what makes one "legitimate" and the other not? Is there such a thing as a legitimate government and a legitimate religion, or are they all just another level of street gangs and cults? For governments anyway we have an answer. Sure at some level the organization of hard force in the form of police is subject to the same practical considerations and constraints as the organization of hard force in the form of a gang, and will thus take a superficially similar form, but a gang does not give you a day in court nor does it set up a system of fair and impartial trials nor does it let you vote on its rules. A gang is fundamentally self serving. It exists for the enrichment of itself at the expense of those outside of it. A democracy, in contrast, directly contradicts the premise "the leader is above the law." So there is such a thing as a "legitimate government". Existence and uniqueness of "legitimate religion" is left as an exercise for the reader. (btw Trumpism is absolutely a cult. Just look at it, they had to invent the word "Trumpism" to describe the phenomena because it did not fit any other defined political philosophy and the only constant non-contradictory belief it has is loyalty to Trump himself. Seriously, try defining Trumpism in some way other than "agreeing with what Trump says no matter what." Its impossible. That's a cult.)
- dayjaby 4y ago
  Just curious: do you think that any government where the leader is not above the law is legitimate?

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

lormayna 4y ago

As someone that is growth up in a religious semi-cult, this is impressive. It's just the description of the environment where I grow up.

pessimizer 4y ago

Instead of writing an elaborately referenced reply to andrewla, I decided to mention that the current term people are using is "high-demand groups" because to monotheists, part of the "cult" definition is tied up in the deviation from their religion. If we're talking about extremely insular, high-commitment groups that tend to punish people who leave, we might as well leave behind a word that is just as often used by monotheists to refer to heretics. "Cult" and "occult" are from "hidden" anyway, as in you'd better hide if you're a heretic.