You hear stories about Scientology, where people are prevented from leaving, and Westboro's not like that. If you decide that you don't want to be there, then they will help you leave. The shunning, cutting people off - they're doing that because they believe it is for our highest good.
It’s got to be some kind of cult. Anyone offers you Kool-Aid or a hot shower, say no.
If a mass movement turns into worshipping a particular person, that's a great problem.
The quickest way to recognize a cult is its treatment of Jesus.
Here's an easy way to figure out if you're in a cult: If you're wondering whether you're in a cult, the answer is yes.
We explored cults in 'Sound of My Voice.' I think cults have an underlying spiritual quality.
Culture' and 'cult' derive from the same word; what a culture worships defines it.
Political as well as religious cults can be distinguished from legitimate organizations by their use of doublethink. Though political cults espouse extremist ideologies, not extremist theologies, operationally they are virtually identical to religious cults, and they also go to great lengths to control the vocabularies of their members.
Insane sects grow with the same rhythm as big organizations. It is the rhythm of total destruction.
You can look at anything as a cult. Churches are cults in their own way.
The Tea Baggers, they're not a movement, they're a cult.... Cults tend to populate from within, encouraging members to have huge broods of children and to give them strange names, like Moonbeam, and Trig.
I mean, not wanting to be flip about it, but even within a corporation, you get sort of cult-like behaviors sometimes.
I think people are always looking for gurus. It's the easiest thing in the world to become a guru. It's quite terrifying. I once saw something fascinating here in New York. It must have been in the early seventies--guru time. A man used to go and sit in Central Park, wearing elaborate golden robes. He never once opened his mouth, he just sat. He'd appear at lunchtime. People appeared from everywhere, because he was obviously a holy man, and this went on for months. They just sat around him in reverent silence. Eventually he got fed up with it and left. Yes. It's as easy as that.
Dilbert: Evolution must be true because it is a logical conclusion of the scientific method. Dogbert: But science is based on the irrational belief that because we cannot perceive reality all at once, things called time and cause and effect exist. Dilbert: That's what I was taught and that's what I believe. Dogbert: Sounds cultish.
There's a learned helplessness for a lot of people who are leaving Westboro because you're not allowed to have any kind of independence when you are there so a lot of people don't have practical life skills.
Scientology is destructive and a rip-off.
Many cults start off with high ideals that get corrupted by leaders or their board of advisors who become power-hungry and dominate and control members' lives. No group with high ideals starts off as a 'cult'; they become one when their errant ways are exposed.
I had a very loyal cult-like following, I feel. And I don't mean to complain about that.
It's a bit odd that nobody seems to be using the correct technical term to describe organized Islamic terrorists. They are not a faction of a religion or a social movement. They are a cult. A suicide cult.
South Carolina is not a state; it is a cult.
I'm not like recruiting people and starting a cult and telling people to be fat.
Spiritual life can certainly follow the pattern one sees in the fake martial arts, with most teachers making nebulous and magical claims that never get tested, while their students derange themselves with weird ideas, empty rituals, and other affectations.
The nice girl meets a guy and acts like she joined a cult. In the beginning, a guy might ask her what she likes. The nice girl makes the mistake of shrugging her shoulders and saying: 'I like anything you like.'
Successful cult memes induce intense social interaction behaviour between cult members. This trips the attention detectors.
I get to do all these really nice, little culty things. It seems to be the world that keeps inviting me back.
