Archive for Society

THE ABNORMAL IS NORMAL

{ March 1, 2007 @ 10:43 am } · { Cults, Life, Society }
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Cult watching is a minority sport. This is a mistake, for a cult is a mirror of society. The beauty of a cult is that it is an extreme microcosm of what goes on in our culture and our lives. Indeed, throughout life we all express cultish behaviour.
The most obvious example of this cult behaviour is the veneration of a pop star. He is put on a pedestal as if a god, and fans by the million behave and dress like him. Yes, it is watered down, certainly, but it is sociologically identical to the guru/disciple relationship.
At every stage of our life we get involved in cult behaviour. In a normal family home, children will learn automatic loyalty and authority in a parent. This programs the future cult member for such obedience.
Eventually the child will rebel, but goes straight into another cult through fashion, gang membership, or the pop star veneration above. As he grows up, he will hopefully get a partner and children of his own, where he puts himself on a pedestal as the arbiter of all knowledge and standards to his children.
In work, modern corporate enterprise encourages loyalty to the ‘company.’ I’ve spoken to many such minions, and they truly believe everything their company stands for. This is cult behaviour par excellence – and usually just as delusional.
Occasionally we get an example of cult behaviour so over-whelming that it is hard to deny. Consider the simmering hysteria in the UK in the week following the death of Diana, Princess of Wales. If that wasn’t cult berhaviour, I don’t know what was.
Cult watching should increase – it tells us more about ourselves than normal life. Perhaps this is because the abnormal is simply the extreme of the normal.

© Anthony North, March 2007

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WHAT HITLER REALLY WAS

{ February 21, 2007 @ 10:33 am } · { Cults, History, Society }
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Norman Mailer has written a novel asking when Hitler became evil. To me the question is pointless. Evil is a supernatural invention allowing people to be not responsible for their actions. To be evil is to be taken over by the Devil, and there is nothing you can do about it.
This said, I believe Hitler, and the German process of Nazification, can be answered through the same psychology and sociology as the cult. In my post, The Guru, I point out that the classic guru is a loner with an abnormal upbringing who descends into a form of mental illness.
The ‘cure’ to the illness is to believe in something, and the transition at the end of this process can lead to a charismatic who can ‘hypnotise’ all who come across him. This process applies to cult gurus and Hitler alike.
As for the cult/nation itself, in the post, Who Joins a Cult, I make it clear that cult disciples are invariably intelligent, young and middleclass. They are searching for something and will eventually believe anything.
If we really want to understand what happened in Germany leading to World War Two, we must understand cult mentality and sociology, and realize it can so easily transfer to society in general.

© Anthony North, Feb 2007

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WHO JOINS A CULT?

{ February 9, 2007 @ 2:35 pm } · { Cults, Religion, Society }
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The popular conception of the typical cult disciple is of a person of low intelligence – after all, they must be to be taken in by a cult guru. In addition, they are often thought to be down-and-outs, accepting the weirdness and discipline of the cult because it is better than the streets.
A study in the 1990s by Eileen Barker shattered this perception, and confirmed what cult watchers had long known to be true. She showed that the vast majority of cult members were intelligent and middleclass. So how could they be ‘brainwashed- – if that is the term – so easily?
If an intelligent person looks at the world around him and doesn’t feel like he belongs, he will inevitably search for meaning in his life. To such a person, non-meaning deflates the personality. And as the search proves futile, the point comes when any meaning will do.
If a guru comes along and offers the meaning he craves, the person is open to influence, and in no time at all, his life has been turned upside down and put back together again in the cult. And once inside, the life he used to lead becomes an alien country.

(c) Anthony North, Jan 2007