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Do you mean “cult” or “Cult”? Are we talking the generic group of people with a shared belief system or the often-associated scam?
Now put those two together…
I don’t really like this article, it dismisses the power a cult leader can have over it’s people and blames the victims. I would say that if the author was starved, increasingly abused in a systematic way, and all sources of support taken away, I bet he would be an enthusiastic follower for at least a little bit of time. If you go in willingly because you have hope that something will help, that doesn’t mean you asked to be abused. A very smug article.
I don’t think it dismisses. It is rather balanced.
That picture of Pam from The Office, “They’re the same picture”
Definition wise, a cult is merely a religion. Christianity is technically a cult.
Colloquially it’s a con to take control of people who join. If they try to keep you from talking to others outside the group, keep you somewhere without allowing you to leave, and/or gaslight you into thinking you’re better off with letting their leaders make decisions for you: it’s a cult.
I’m an atheist and tend to agree but I do give credit to history. Religion did help making people behave better during a time law and order did not really have that far of a reach.
This statement makes no sense at all. Name a time and place in history in which law and order did not exist but religion did and explain how religion made people behave “better,” and how you know the religion did a better job of it than if the religion had not been present.
Hmm, sounds a lot like scientology
Yes, scientology is a cult.
Public support. Religion is just a cult with public support.
Pretty sure the founders are dead, too
A quote I saw on Reddit a while back “the only difference between a cult and a religion is the number of people”.
It’s brainwashed billions of people and stolen trillions of $$. An incredibly successful cult. Purely rotten in the core.
When we go down to the scale of individual, a religion can be a positive way of life/thinking that can give positive meaning to someone’s life.
Not every person who’s a believer is automatically evil.
Absolutely, I was raised Lutheran and volunteered a lot with my youth group, we did massive repairs and overhauls to people’s houses. That felt great. I’m now an atheist, but that doesn’t mean I hate religion, it’s just that the Abrahamic religions suck and are full of hate at its core. The problem happens when people take the scripture to heart and then twist it into what they want. That’s what’s evil.
I am “with” the church since I got the same religion my parents got when I was born. I haven’t left the church and I still pay the church tax, but that’s it. I’m not religious myself.
I don’t know religious people, there are none in my social circle. I don’t know religious people’s practices.
I know that fanatics can be found in many fields of life, not just religion, and I know that things can get messy in the bigger scale and that money and power are involved.
I don’t have anything against religions either. I’m against acts that hurt people though. If a religion is the reason someone causes pain in others, that’s not okay.
