Apocolips

Hola!

I would like an opinion to this question, why do people follow weird and possibly destructive religious cults? I'm talking about Jonestown, Heavens Gate, Solar Temple, Arum (that group that gassed the Tokyo subway with sarin). I believe that at first the People' Temple was not a bad thing, and I just think that Jim Jones was very charasmatic and more insane as the years rolled on.

To Heaven's Gate, why would someone follow blindly a whacko dude like Marshall Applewhite, who told his followers that there was an alien transport waiting for them behind a comet, and you must blindly kill yourself to be on that comet? What would cause once normal, healthy people to shave their heads, dress in black (EAT AT OLIVE GARDEN FOR THEIR LAST MEAL), stick five dollars in their pocket and go to sleep? Insane.

Scientology is totally whacked at also. Spend ungodly amounts of money clearing (or auditing your mind and soul) with two tin cans and a rope. L. Ron Hubbard was also insane. It is clearly stated by himself that he created a religion as a tax dodge, but idiots in Hollywood like John Travolta, Tom Cruise, Lisa marie Presley and others buy into it.

To witness the destruction of Scientoloy on a life, Google up Lisa McPherson autopsy photos.

If your going to comment, don't talk about slightly weird faiths like Mormons, Pentecostals, Jehovah's Witnesses, Quakers or other harmless batty people. I want to know what sucks people blindly into these harmful, hellish cults.

:boohoo: :boohoo: :boohoo: Fiddle man in the house!

SENOR

Grizzly

Great questions Senor.

I am going to move this thread to GRD and see if it gets more play.

Grizzly

Vandrare

hej senor!

i would suggest that maybe someone who has been looking everywhere for all the answers and hasn't found them yet, might decide to try the latest guru out. then after getting slightly into the cult, are sucked deeper and deeper by all the mind control techniques and other things that cults do, in a gradual way that they dont realise it, and become trapped. some of the cult leaders can be very charismatic and convincing too.
anyway, just a possible answer...

:-D Anna

Bree

Yeah, man, I totally hear you. Olive Garden. What the hell were they thinking?!?!

Seriously though, here's some food for thought:

Cult Information Centre FAQ

Patterns of cults (I think this is a Christian writer)

How does mind control work?

CultWatch

Tom Sawyer

That is weird.

If they knew it was their last meal and they were going to be leaving the world tommorrow, why the hell would they choose to go to Olive Garden?

I mean seriously, people, it's sometimes OK to splurge just a little. If you're never going to need money again, spend the extra bucks at a fancy restaurant.

It's almost like these folks weren't right in the head.

Pyrrho

With early Christianity, many Christians wanted to be martyrs (and therefore did whatever was needed to became martyrs; see Gibbon's The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, ch. 16 [ch. 15 is worth reading as well]), as they believed that they would thereby earn a place in heaven. That is essentially the same as Jonestown et al., except that it was generally done on an individual basis instead of as a group. There is nothing new about people following loony cults to their deaths.

JaeIsGod

Some people are just stupid. Its the only logical explenation.

enrious

"The world wants to be decieved."

--Sebastian Brant

MollyMac

You can't make an assertion like this and forbid us from commenting! But I'll keep it brief: JWs are NOT harmless - they would let a loved die rather than allow an essential blood transfusion. And Quaker's are NOT batty (or no more so than anyone of any religious faith). If that was a list of 'slightly weird' faiths then Quakers should either not be on it - or all xian denominations should be on it.

RevDahlia

I always found Quakers to be about the least batty xians out there. They actually accomplish good things for society, for one.