Eliminating The Ego

O.K., I like this: Scott Adams (of Dilbert fame) has written a piece about that Russian Doomsday cult, which was picked up by Andrew Sullivan, in a "ha-ha, aren't they funny" kind of way, like cultism is so weird, and only happens to Russians or something. The idea there are people following around liars, or people who make no sense, or people who say nothing - right here in the United States before the eyes of the media (and including in the media) and everybody - doesn't seem to make a dent.

I did a post, already, on a movie by Ondi Timoner, called "Join Us", where she explores why "America is the number one breeding ground of cults in the world, and how mind control can happen to just about anyone." She also makes this point:

"When people say, 'There must be a certain type of person involved in the cult phenomena', what they're really trying to say is 'I don't want to accept that this could happen to me'."

But is happening to us - all the time - we just don't want to grapple with it. I saw a quote yesterday, from Jay-Z, where, in a discussion of his latest business deal he said:

“Something must be happening. Madonna did it, she’s not slow.”

Really? Madonna's not "slow"? The woman who was “lobbying the government and nuclear industry over a scheme to clean up radioactive waste with a supposedly magic Kabbalah fluid” isn't proving she's "slow"? She reportedly drinks $10,000 of the stuff. Not to mention "wearing a red thread on her wrist in a Jewish tradition to ward off the evil eye" (a sure sign of brilliance) and calling herself an "ambassador for Judaism" when she ain't even Jewish? What do you call her then? How about a "cultist"? Or is that too strong a word for the delicate sensibilities of all the other cultists?

I don't want to go on with this, so I'll just leave you with the words of Deborah Layton, a survivor of Jim Jones' People's Temple (above) and hope, by looking around the site, you can sort the dynamics of this phenomena for yourself. Miss Layton said:

"...Nobody joins a cult. You join a self-help group, a religious movement, a political organization. They change so gradually, by the time you realize you're entrapped - and almost everybody does - you can't figure a safe way back out...."

Considering that self-help, religion, and politics, are three of the strongest themes running through post 9/11 America, I sincerely hope she's wrong.