Cults

[ver$hy ver$h]

Whozat then?

 

[shakahislop]

they aren't cults but you can see where the us right-wing dickhead critique of the universities being cults that indoctrinate the children comes from. all those colleges out in the absolute middle of nowhere with outrageously good facilities, where more or less everyone attending has a fuck ton of money. no need to leave the community. or in a lot of cases nowhere to go, coz they're in the middle of a load of fields, with the nearest small city a couple of hours of drive away. or they're part of a town, but half the town is the college, and the other half is for people who provide services to the college. very much communities which are isolated from the rest of the world. there's a load in new england. oberlin, cornell, bennington. i think some of the contours of the social justice thing aren't unrelated to these places being so insular.

 

[ver$hy ver$h]

Someone from the Met came out a while back complaining about interference from the Freemasons.

Freemasons are blocking reform, says Police Federation leader

Steve White, stepping down as chair, says the society is thwarting progress of women and BAME people

www.theguardian.com

Why the secret handshake between police and Freemasons should worry us | Duncan Campbell

It is as clear as ever that membership of both bodies is incompatible with public service, writes the former Guardian journalist and freelance writer Duncan Campbell

www.theguardian.com

 

[Mr. Tea]

O9A *

* Order of Nine Members
aka
Temple 88

@Mr. Tea - hate to break it to you but you'd be an OPFER according to their ideology

Has @WashYourHands put you up to this by any chance?

 

[Mr. Tea]

Oh right. I thought there were tons of those guys in Hollywood though? I mean he's obviously the most high profile, but aren't there others who are fairly big deals?

 

[ver$hy ver$h]

they aren't cults but you can see where the us right-wing dickhead critique of the universities being cults that indoctrinate the children comes from. all those colleges out in the absolute middle of nowhere with outrageously good facilities, where more or less everyone attending has a fuck ton of money. no need to leave the community. or in a lot of cases nowhere to go, coz they're in the middle of a load of fields, with the nearest small city a couple of hours of drive away. or they're part of a town, but half the town is the college, and the other half is for people who provide services to the college. very much communities which are isolated from the rest of the world. there's a load in new england. oberlin, cornell, bennington. i think some of the contours of the social justice thing aren't unrelated to these places being so insular.

And when their kids come back from uni they'll be much less inclined to let their Fox News talking points slide.

 

[william_kent]

Has @WashYourHands put you up to this by any chance?

ha ha - no, but to be honest I'd be an OPFER as well according to their ideaology, and I'm just drunk and then you brought up "satanism" and, sorry, it was too easy a target, but it's all love

I once had a friend who answered a small ad about "tending to a herb garden" and he was horrified when it turned out to have been posted by the "elderly gentleman from Reading" who was one of the nine members of the ONA that we could identify at that time

the"elderly gentleman from Reading"wore a cravat and the walls of his abode were adorned with prints of young boys engaged in "roman wrestling"

needless to say my friend declined the job offer

 

[ver$hy ver$h]

Oh right. I thought there were tons of those guys in Hollywood though? I mean he's obviously the most high profile, but aren't there others who are fairly big deals?

This is what I mean. Obviously it's not like we could do anything anyway, but it's just accepted that Tom Cruise is a Scientologist and people don't bat an eye.

As for others, there are but most of them aren't as high profile as him. Giovanni Ribisi's one; Ethan Suplee's one; Michael Peña's one; Will and Jada Pinkett Smith are rumoured to be, so Will would be up there with Cruise.

 

[ver$hy ver$h]

he was horrified when it turned out to have been posted by the "elderly gentleman from Reading" who was one of the nine members of the ONA that we could identify at that time

 

[Mr. Tea]

This is what I mean. Obviously it's not like we could do anything anyway, but it's just accepted that Tom Cruise is a Scientologist and people don't bat an eye.

As for others, there are but most of them aren't as high profile as him. Giovanni Ribisi's one; Ethan Suplee's one; Michael Peña's one; Will and Jada Pinkett Smith are rumoured to be, so Will would be up there with Cruise.

To play devil's advocate for a sec, is this really that much worse than any given famous actor being Catholic, given the Catholic church's well known tendencies towards tolerating and even covering up child abuse of various kinds?

 

[padraig (u.s.)]

again, the kind of thing that seems much more part of the american fabric, there is something more permissive and accepting in the US i think.

Without actually knowing, my guess would be that Satmars owned a significant % of Williamsburg real estate pre-gentrification, and Hasidic sects are extremely socially cohesive so they look after their own - that town I mentioned is sustained I believe by a combination of copious govt aid and contributions from wealthy Satmars back in Brooklyn. The dark flipside of that cohesiveness is ofc extreme social control - punishment and ostracization for any deviation - and insularity, i.e. refusal to go to secular authorities for things like domestic abuse, child abuse, etc.

And yes, cults and new religious moments appeal to multiple core elements of the American character - religiosity, freedom, self-making, etc. Our founding myth is literally about a radical sect fleeing England to find religious freedom on a frontier. Obviously like any founding myth that flattens out a much more complex process and elides or just omits what you could call subaltern voices (Native Americans and Black people, as well as White indentured servants), and reflects later contemporary political demands rather than historical reality - Thanksgiving was officially declared a holiday by Lincoln in 1863 as a Civil War morale booster - but despite those things it also, like all founding myths, reflects something powerful about idealized national self-identity.

Cults also intersect with the American appetite for grifters, the original rise and grind self-made men (and women). In that sense you can make a serious case for Mormonism as the ultimate American story, a literal conman founding a cult that survived persecution to become the fastest growing religion - iirc - in the country.

 

[padraig (u.s.)]

I'm gradually typing these posts on my phone in between sets at gym btw so of they're a bit scattershot that is why

 

[padraig (u.s.)]

Nothing more American than getting swole and talking about religiosity

 

[Mr. Tea]

And THE LORD sayeth unto Joshua, He that hath faith in Me shall have henchness everlasting.

 

[ver$hy ver$h]

To play devil's advocate for a sec, is this really that much worse than any given famous actor being Catholic, given the Catholic church's well known tendencies towards tolerating and even covering up child abuse of various kinds?

I don't know. It's better than him joining the Catholic church if we're going on the crimes of each organisation, but Scientology being such a recent creation and without the cultural reach and weight that means millions of people worldwide are Catholic seems the less acceptable one to be an active member of, particularly when he's alleged to hold a prominent role within the hierarchy in a way he couldn't if he were a Catholic.

 

[Mr. Tea]

I don't know. It's better than him joining the Catholic church if we're going on the crimes of each organisation, but Scientology being such a recent creation and without the cultural reach and weight that means millions of people worldwide are Catholic seems the less acceptable one to be an active member of, particularly when he's alleged to hold a prominent role within the hierarchy in a way he couldn't if he were Catholic.

OK, if we're talking concentrations of evil then the CoS no doubt wins hands down.

 

[woops]

OK, if we're talking concentrations of evil then the CoS no doubt wins hands down.

scientology is messed up no doubt but they've yet to hold inquisitions or burn anyone at the stake so far as I'm aware. i think they're as bad as each other

 

[padraig (u.s.)]

I've seen a few things by "hikers" about how the Yellow Deli on the Appalachian Trail is a white supremacist twelve tribes net to trap unsuspecting pure blood white hill walkers into the 14 words

it's confusing because in the UK we have an unrelated twelve tribes which is a full on african carribean rasta org*

* a friend of mine works with a full on 12 tribes rasta lady who bangs on about HAARP, who refused to wear a mask during lockdown because of SCAMDEMIC, and maybe believes in UFOs

Didn't see this before but yeah the U.S. 12 Tribes have extremely weird, problematic views on and complex relationships with Black people and Judaism. They're similar to Mormons in that regard. One time in Burlington I overheard a 12 Tribes guy (I think) trying to explain their view of Jews and Israel to some regular hippies. Real galaxy brain stuff.

 

[Mr. Tea]

Didn't see this before but yeah the U.S. 12 Tribes have extremely weird, problematic views on and complex relationships with Black people and Judaism. They're similar to Mormons in that regard. One time in Burlington I overheard a 12 Tribes guy (I think) trying to explain their view of Jews and Israel to some regular hippies. Real galaxy brain stuff.

I'd love to see these guys go head to head with the Black Hebrew Israelites.

 

[Murphy]

O9A *

* Order of Nine Members
aka
Temple 88

@Mr. Tea - hate to break it to you but you'd be an OPFER according to their ideology