Being Crazy Is How You Get Into This (Not Out)

And here we go again - listen to Crazy Charley:

Prince Charles lashed out Wednesday at climate change skeptics, saying they are playing "a reckless game of roulette" with the planet's future.

Skeptics are having a "corrosive effect" on public opinion, the British heir to the throne added.

"Their suggestion, that hundreds of scientists around the world ... are somehow unconsciously biased, creates the implication that many of us are secretly conspiring to undermine and deliberately destroy the entire market-based capitalist system," he said.

That can't be possible, right? Because everyone understands their biases, right? Of course - remember this from just yesterday?:

Some of the world’s pre-eminent experts on bias discovered an unexpected form of it at their annual meeting.

But Prince "I talk to trees" Charley's more aware of his biases than they are. We won't belabor the point, but merely leave you with a quote from Join Us, Ondi Timoner's documentary about cults:

"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'."

Oh - what the hell - here's one more, from Deborah Layton of The People's Temple:

"...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...."

Sounds about right from here,...

The Difference Between A Cult Film & Cult Films

Wow - despite the steady chorus of denials anything of the kind is happening - this country's runaway cultism is starting to become the subject independent filmmakers can't get enough of:

First, from a few years ago, there was Ondi Timoner's Join Us. But this year we've got David Wants to Fly finally coming to the United States, Martha Marcy May Marlene being released later this year; the cult-themed Sound of My Voice (because cultists are such good listeners) is now screening at the Sundance Film Festival, and it's just been announced that production on a movie about the Manson Girls is to begin.

Not too shabby for a subject that, just a few years ago, many said we were "crazy" to cover. It's going to get really serious when filmmakers start connecting cultism to the history (and failures) of modern corporate culture - along with the Boomers who orchestrated integrating NewAge throughout society.

We don't think anybody but ourselves, and other serious cult-watchers, are prepared to deal with the reality, or the fallout, from that - but mark our words:

It's the next phase - and it's coming,...

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.

Join Us

"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'."

-- A line of dialogue from Ondi Timoner's new film, Join Us, which is "exploring why America is the number one breeding ground of cults in the world, and how mind control can happen to just about anyone."

"It's like joining a church, you have to be a believer, you have to have the right set of views."

-- A line of dialogue from Even Coyne Maloney's new film, Indoctrinate U, "about free speech on college campuses."

"I think the guy's a con artist."

-- A line of dialogue from Kevin Leffler's new film, Shooting Michael Moore, that shows "while writing books and shooting films that expose America’s inequities and presenting himself as a moral compass, he abused the non-profit status, engaged in questionable tax practices, violated environmental laws, and invested in Halliburton, oil stocks, leading drug companies, and HMO-chains. Additionally, contrary to his public persona, he used and deceived both the “little people” as well as U.S servicemen, and Flint’s populace is still waiting for him to bring promised jobs."