--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, turquoiseb wrote:
>
> > I honestly don't know which is sadder -- that Judy
> > and Jimbo believe that FFL is all about a battle
> > between themselves and me, or that they think
> > they are winning. :-)
>
> I'll expand upon this, because in its 30 short words
> I think I finally stumbled upon the ultimate test of
> whether a spiritual or religious organization can be
> accurately called a CULT or not.
>
> Those who are "anti-cult" have all sorts of "definitions"
> of what constitutes "cult behavior," but they're often
> so generalized that they apply equally to corporations,
> sports fanatics, and political divisions such as Democrats
> vs. Republicans. But there is one phenomenon that seems to
> me to truly *define* cult thinking, and that's when people
> who believe in or follow a particular philosophy or religion
> or set of dogmatic beliefs take it upon themselves -- on
> a volunteer, unpaid basis -- to "do battle" against anyone
> who dares to criticize or demean or (the worst) laugh at
> the things they consider holy.
>
> This strikes me as a *completely* ego-based activity,
> which is why it seems so out of place in organizations
> that preach (if not actually teach) pathways to what
> they think of as enlightenment. The *dogma* of such
> organizations is almost always couched in the language
> of non-ego and non-attachment, but the activity of "doing
> battle" with that organization's critics is *totally*
> based on ego and attachment. Go figure.
>
> You all know the kinds of people I'm talking about. They
> are the $cientologists who will do or say *anything* to
> "get" the people who dare to criticize $cientology. They
> are the Catholics who are willing to do the same with
> those who criticize or lampoon *their* dogma. And, of
> course, they are the TMers who do the same thing here
> on Fairfield Life.
>
> Such people have clearly nominated themselves (in their
> own heads, that is) as "defenders of the faith," as some
> kind of "dharmic warrior" whose Purpose In Life is to
> find some way to demonize and perform character assassin-
> ation on those heretics who laugh at All Things TM. You
> can *tell* how *involved* they are with what they see as
> their "dharma," simply by watching the hatred creep into
> the comments they make, and by noticing the gloating
> behavior they trot out when they think they've delivered
> some "zinger" that makes them (and thus their "side")
> look good, and that makes the critic (and thus "the
> other side") look bad.
>
> Such people have a tendency to declare "victory" after
> having done something that most people would consider
> mere ego-preening, behavior that would be embarrassing
> in Jr. High School students. But to the unpaid volunteer
> dharmic warriors, getting into long, convoluted arguments
> with someone who represents "evil" while they represent
> "good" is as noble a pursuit as Arjuna going out to kill
> his own relatives on the equally ego-driven battlefields
> of the Bhagavad Gita, simply because he was told to by
> the leader of *his* cult.
>
> This behavior seems to me to be the ultimate definition
> of what it is to be a cultist. Anyone who thinks and acts
> like this is *by definition* more than a little attached
> to the things or people they believe they are "defending."
> Anyone who gets into pissing contests like this, and who
> bases their *own* self worth on how effectively they've
> put down one of their (and thus their org's) "enemies"
> has *by definition* a host of ego problems.
>
> It would be one thing if these people were actually being
> PAID by the organizations in question to do this. But
> they're not. They're doing it for their *own* ego reasons.
> *Their* egos are the ones inflated and made stronger every
> time they chalk up what they believe to be a "win." *Their*
> attachments get strengthened every time they "do battle."
>
> I think it's all very sad. And I've seen spiritual or
> religious organizations in which this behavior *would never
> be tolerated*. If anyone in a position of power with those
> organizations ever caught one of their followers doing
> such stuff, they would come down on them hard, and do
> everything in their power to get them to stop behavior
> that is, after all, perceived by most people without a
> "horse in the race" as Just Fucking Embarrassing. Such
> organizations I would not necessarily class as cults.
>
> But the organizations that actually support or *encourage*
> such behavior, and that *applaud* it (such as $cientology
> and the TMO), them I would definitely class as cults.
>
> How can you tell when you're in danger of becoming a cultist?
>
> When you believe that by doing verbal "battle" with someone
> who criticizes the things you believe, you're doing something
> "positive" or life-supporting.
>
> How can you tell that the organization in whose name you're
> doing these things is a cult?
>
> When the organization itself or its followers applaud you or
> hold you in some kind of esteem for doing them.
>
