this post was submitted on 17 Aug 2024
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~~book club~~
Cult. It’s a cult.
Cults are small. Christianity is big. And it was Christians who, during the satanic panic, created a false association in pop culture between cults and abuse. See, back in the 60s, the hippie movement was turning young people away from Christianity and towards new age spiritualities like wicca and thelema. The christians had to put a stop to these cults, so they created a myth that cult=abuse.
Eh, I'm gonna go ahead and keep calling any group with charismatic authoritarian leaders/councils a cult. The word "cult" is inherently tied to worship which involves giving up some of your own agency or, at least, taking things on blind faith or admiration.
Any time you have adherents giving up their free will/agency, that's abuse and manipulation, to me.
Cult - charismatic leader is still alive. Religion - charismatic leader is no longer alive. That's how I see it, at least.
I get that. I definitely leave my definition open for transfers of power from an initial leader to another authoritarian leader or surviving council of leaders that will keep the grift going.
Edit: Or for transfers of power from an initial group or figure of a generally helpful movement to those who would co-opt those ideas or movements for their own goals.
Okay, why don't you go ahead and explain why thelema, one of the cults I mentioned, is abusive. And to help, here's a comprehensive list of the rules of thelema as described by Alistair Crowley:
That's it. That's the entire rules. Okay go!
I'll bite, lol.
There are differences between the letter, the interpretation, and the on the ground practice or manifestations of any "law". Here, the manifestations of this self proclaimed axiom lead to power imbalances, abuse, and conflict.
Without getting too deep into the issues of power dynamics and the abuse of positive and negative rights/freedoms inherent in laissez faire philosophies, Crowley's pithy statement immediately runs into problems whenever any person's "will" runs contrary to another's. At that point, the person with the greater resources (be they procured through grift, gab, inheritance, hard work, or a combination of these or similar traits) will usually dictate what happens and definitely has the stronger hand.
I agree that Crowley's philosophies and a lot of the esoteric writings and movements of the time and those that inspired them are very interesting. What we have passed down to us through record merits study/can help us learn more about human interaction and the ways in which people think.
In the case of Crowley, he was certainly afforded quite the set of silver cutlery at birth with which to lord his ideas and will over others throughout his life. That (combined with his upbringing, learned social viewpoints, and personal psychology which those informed) led to him producing manifestos and, eventually, codifying his thoughts and whims into his writings on Thelema and magical practices.
Already, when a figure shrouds their thoughts and goals in mystery and designedly inaccessible or mutable language (based on that figure's preference at any point in time), I become wary and at least a little interested in the state of mind of such a person.
Looking into Crowley's personal history, as I have over the years, it is apparent that he is a product of his environment and really sought to reinforce his worldviews to overcome trauma and justify his own desires. Regardless of your take on the man, I think we can all agree that he was an eccentric and someone who, today, we would call a "weirdo".
Weird can be good, weird can be bad, but, most of all, what I see with Crowley's eccentricities is a desire to live his life on his own terms by any means possible and to enforce his will upon others. As with any person, his eccentricities do not excuse his failed responsibilities to those he had the power to support and nurture (his family and progeny), nor does it excuse his predation on those of lesser means or will in order to further his own personal desires and goals.
Now, can we glean some good out of the ideas penned by such a troubled and eccentric figure? Sure. Any person's work is subject to critique, interpretation, and integration into our own worldviews. Do I like the seemingly reactionary and petulant take on personal advocacy that Crowley's philosophies can inspire? At times, I do. I see its value as an initial reaction that can spur further thought and introspection and I think that looking into philosophies like this has definitely broadened my own education and worldview.
What I think is most important with cult or cult like figures like this is to put everything into context and read between the lines. No reasonable, sane, or caring person is going to ask someone else to strictly adhere to standards and tenets they have not set for themselves and threaten significant consequences for nonadoption of those principles.
When you have a leader, follower, or council asking others for or imposing such rigorous adherence to their worldview or preferential dogma, it's a good sign that you have a cult on your hands.
Edit: Cleaned this up and clarified a couple sentences as I had a duplicated word and an autocorrect misspelling thanks to mobile.
Okay good analysis. I'm certain Thelemites have come up with solutions to some of what you describe, but I'm not a Thelemite so I can't say what they are.
But it seems to me that your complaint with cults is essentially that they are religions, and that religion must always be abusive. If so, I see no need to pin the abuse on the word "cult".
Take Dalmatians. Dalmatians are black and white with spots, make for popular firefighter companions, and are all dogs. Because Dalmatians are dogs, we also know that they have four legs, fur, sensitive noses, wagging tails, and loyalty to humans. But these traits aren't traits of being a Dalmatian, they're traits of being a dog. If you point at a golden retriever and say "that thing has four legs and a tail! It must be a dalmatian!", you're wrong. It's a dog, and it shares dogness with Dalmatians, but not dalmatian-ness.
Likewise, if your complaint with cults is that they are religions and religions are abusive, there's no use calling religions cults just to point out their abuse. You'd be better off calling them religions.
Please peddle your AI yap elsewhere.
I'm not an AI, I'm just really good at the English language.
Cults can be small. They are not necessarily only small by definition.
If cults can be big, then there's absolutely no difference between a religion and a cult. Personally, I define a cult as either an NRM (The more common use in the 20th century) or a local sect (the more common use in antiquity). Christianity is clearly neither. I am politically motivated not to consider Christianity a cult, because I believe it makes unjust apology for Christianity. Cults are, politically speaking, groups which have been targeted by the Satanic panic. The fact that Christianity is not a cult, and that anti-cult religious leaders have not labelled Christianity a cult, is historically important. We can't go using words in a way that implies Christianity is the victim and confuses the history. I object to calling Christianity a cult precisely because I think ill of Christianity.
OMG, you're starting to get it!
And they're making an argument for using the oppressive, big business, cult's definition of what a cult is? Lol
Cool story bro
It’s a cult
Sure, but that's a fairly narrow definition that ignores a large proportion of the actual dictionary definitions.
A somewhat subjective take that doesn't really explain how the term cult would imply "unjust apology"
Not true, by any commonly accepted definition of the word.
edit: the term cults can include groups "targeted by the Satanic panic" but that isn't a strict definitional requirement.
Christianity does in fact meet many of the dictionary definitions of the word "cult".
You could argue that the normalisation of christianity excludes it from adhering to the definitions that mention "unorthodox" or "small" but those definitions are relatively few.
How so ?
Other than power and money i mean.
I can't find any reference to the word "cult" that, when applied to christianity. would absolve them of the egregious historical shitfuckery perpetrated by and for them.