Talk:Cult checklist

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There are three different versions, and a look at the diff will show that they have much in common. Some entire paragraphs are word for word identical. --Uncle Ed (El Dunce) 17:06, 15 Oct 2004 (UTC)

The article states:

"Cults ascribe events to supernatural influences even where such influences may not exist"

I'm interested to know of instances where we know that supernatural influences *do* exist! :) The way this is now written it sounds like we're saying that it is a given that a) there is such a thing as the supernatural and that b) it does have influence on at least some events, cults just ascribe the supernatural to other events.AndyL 05:50, 16 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Contents

[edit] So is the U.S. a cult or what?

(yeah yeah, flamebait, whatever)

1. A movement that separates itself from society, either geographically or socially;

getting there - immigration laws getting stricter, third degree in order to get visa, etc.

2. Adherents who become increasingly dependent on the movement for their view on reality;

tonight on FOX!

3. Important decisions in the lives of the adherents are made by others;

Well, that's true for just about every state.

4. Making sharp distinctions between us and them, divine and satanic, good and evil, etc. that are not open for discussion;

Dubya's crusade against the axis of evil. Don't mess with Texas!

5. Leaders who claim divine authority for their deeds and for their orders to their followers;

I think Bush actually said on several occassions that he takes orders directly from the almighty.

6. Leaders and movements who are unequivocally focused on achieving a certain goal.

Operation Iraqi Liberation...

[edit] So is the Left a cult or what?

(yeah yeah, flamebait, whatever)

1. A movement that separates itself from society, either geographically or socially;

getting there - academic approval and promotion is dependent upon toeing the party line (q.v. President of Harvard).

2. Adherents who become increasingly dependent on the movement for their view on reality;

tonight on BBC!

3. Important decisions in the lives of the adherents are made by others;

"Die Partei, die Partei, die hat immer recht!"

4. Making sharp distinctions between us and them, divine and satanic, good and evil, etc. that are not open for discussion;

Christians and conservatives and Jews and Israel are evil, liberals and Palestinians and Muslims are good (even if the latter two engage in suicide bombing or fly into a rage following the publication of a few line drawings).

5. Leaders who claim divine authority for their deeds and for their orders to their followers;

Starhawk has a mandate from Mother Earth to halt the "neocon-Judeochristian atrocity machine".

6. Leaders and movements who are unequivocally focused on achieving a certain goal.

Communism, anarcho-primitivism, Eric Pianka...

[edit] Wikisource?

Given that a great deal of the article is primary source material shouldn't the actual checklists themselves be moved to Wikisource with the article on wikipedia being about them rather than a wholescale citation?AndyL 22:03, 17 Oct 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Disputed warning

The lists here are existing checklists and should not be changed by Wikipedia editors. The checklist by Lifton;/milieu checklist is now quite different from its original. Andries 21:31, 25 Dec 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Edits

I removed unattributed text and other text that seems to be original research or unattributed opinions. Left all other material that is well referenced. The article now meets NPOV, so I have removed the disputed tag. If editors want to re-add the text to the article, please provide attributions and/or citacions. --Zappaz 01:09, 21 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Although it deleted a lot of material, I favour this edit — much more NPOV now, although it could use some discussion of what these checklists have in common, what they're used for, whether they're a good idea, etc. Deco 01:35, 21 Feb 2005 (UTC)
Thank you, Derrick. I agree that a discussion about these checklists and how these are applied can be a worthy addition. I will research this further. --Zappaz 05:22, 21 Feb 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Problem of definition: what IS a cult?

We have articles on:

How do these articles relate? What is the common thread that weaves them together? Are cults nothing more than groups which are targets for someone's hostility? -- Uncle Ed (talk) 15:50, Mar 15, 2005 (UTC)

That is a good question, Ed. Cult and anti-cult articles are popping out like mushrooms after a rain. We ought to find a way to combine all these. For example: we worked quite a bit on Anti-cult movement, only to spawn another one a few days ago Opposition to cults and new religious movements, with very much the same info. I am working hard to keep these articles balanced and within NPOV, but it is a uphill thing most of the time... --Zappaz 17:42, 15 Mar 2005 (UTC)
I have no objection to having multiple articles on the same topic. "Cults" is a big topic, and dividing it into several articles is a necessity.
Some of the articles are only needed temporarily. Once it becomes clear that a given page is merely a sub-topic of another page, we can merge it into the latter. But often it turns out the page can (and should) stand on its own. My favorite example is the Chilean coup of 1973, which to this day is still distinct from both Augusto Pinochet and History of Chile. -- Uncle Ed (talk) 18:33, Mar 15, 2005 (UTC)

Defining a cult is tough. One problem is that the main difference between a cult and a religion is often market share. From the checklists given, several mainstream religions qualify as cults. Since cults are viewed as "bad", this creates unhappiness. --Nagle 19:18, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Why the NPOV warning?

Each list has been sourced and the purpose of the list has been mentioned so the NPOV warning is wrong, in my opinion. We cannot expect Wikipedia to give a coherent, consistent viewpoint on the matter, taking into account that this does not exist outside of Wikipedia. neither in the community of scholars or elsewhere. So we should accept here that these cult checklists do not match with the definitions of cult. Andries 18:40, 22 Mar 2005 (UTC)

The well deserved NPOV warning is in part due to the intro paragraphs:

A cult checklist is a set of criteria which may be applied to a new religious movement to determine whether it is a "cult". These checklists vary greatly, depending upon the point of view of their creators.

The above is pure POV.

While the religious, philosophical, and spiritual beliefs vary widely, many believe that the actions of cults show characteristic similarities. Several popular checklists of "cult behavior" have been circulated by the Anti-cult movement, and sources differ in the terminology they use and how they group the behaviors together. These checklists are considered to be un-scientific.</bockquote>

My highlights. Who are these "many" that "believe" on these lists?
Fix these and we can remove the NPOV warning. Thanks. --Zappaz 20:02, 22 Mar 2005 (UTC)

[edit] * Criticism of gurus and assesment of their authenticity

If anyone reads Criticism of gurus and assesment of their authenticity they will see that it directly connected to cults and cult checklists.

Some of these gurus were found to be abusing their status and to be either charlatans, self-deceived, businessmen pretending to be saints, cult leaders or a combination of these.
The history of various gurus, religions, sects, new religious movements and cults has shown that the question how to assess the authenticity of a guru is difficult, especially when the guru is still young.

Can anyone tell me why a reference to this material should not be added to the "see also" section? Thanks-Willmcw 06:28, Apr 18, 2005 (UTC)

I do not see how an article on "Cult checklists" have anything to do with an article about Gurus. I do not see the connection. --Zappaz 17:07, 18 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Most cult leaders are gurus. If the leader is a charlatan then the group will likely harm its members. Predicting harm is the (often implicit) aim of the cult checklist. Andries 17:21, 18 Apr 2005 (UTC)
Most cult leaders are gurus. What a POV'ed propostion... (a) define cult as negative, (b) define guru ans negative, (c) define checklist as a way to label a religion a cult and a spiritual teacher a cult leader! Revereted. --Zappaz 23:05, 18 Apr 2005 (UTC)
Even if only some cult leaders are or have been gurus, or been called gurus, then it is logical to connect that meterial to this article. If the link is rejected, then the alternative is to copy the text in here as well. -Willmcw 23:59, Apr 18, 2005 (UTC)
Zappaz, I never meant to define gurus as negative. What I meant to say is that people end up in abusive small religious groups (that most people would call cults) partially because they can not distinguish between reliable and unreliable gurus. Besides the fact that the article about gurus links to this cult checklist article strongly indicates that there is a connection.
I am certainly not the only person who thinks that the subject of gurus and cults overlap. Much of the general public thinks the same. Some scholars too. For example the psychiatrist Alexander Deutsch described a cult called the Family led by a psychotic guru called Baba.
I really cannot understand your opinion about cults and gurus that I consider unrealistically uncritical. Even when I was a self-deluded follower of SSB I did not have your kind of extremely lenient opinions. Andries 05:44, 19 Apr 2005 (UTC)

You have yet to substantiate the rationale behind linking an article about a so called cult "check lists" with an articloe about spiritua teachers, aka in the West as "Gurus". Saem applies to including that text here. (Don't try to be clever :))--Zappaz 02:40, 19 Apr 2005 (UTC)

What kind of substantiation are you looking for? The topics overlap, identifying false gurus and indentifying cultic-behavior. That is sufficient reason for a "See also" mention, unless any editors can prove otherwise. If that doesn't work, we can duplicate the relevant passages here. Cheers, -Willmcw 03:37, Apr 19, 2005 (UTC)

Nope, sorry. There is only one reason for linking and is a POV reason. Reverted. --Zappaz 23:31, 19 Apr 2005 (UTC)

This article is a collaboration. Individual editors are encouraged to contribute, but ultimately decisions are made by consensus. One editor is refusing to allow a simple link between articles, while two other editors believe that it is valuable and appropriate. Should we take this to RfC? The level of discussion here does not seem likely to lead to agreement. -Willmcw 23:38, Apr 19, 2005 (UTC)
Nonsense Zappaz, there are very good NPOV reason to put this the guru into the see also list. Why don't you give a detailed rebuttal to what I have written here? Andries 06:08, 20 Apr 2005 (UTC)

[edit] James Lewis

Who is this person? Is he notable enough to have a full section on his name? --Zappaz 00:41, 22 Apr 2005 (UTC)

James Lewis is certainly notable. I came across a book by him here that I read/glanced over and considered unrealistically uncritical. Andries
A book? Can you share? A scholar? I researched this person and found zero citations. Thanks. --Zappaz 17:41, 22 Apr 2005 (UTC)
I noticed that Lewis showed the same tendency in his writings as Melton: belittle every criticism of alternative religion as if it is anti-cult propaganda that should not be taken seriously. I find this attitude highly misguided and potentially harmful for people rely on his writings. No wonder that the two of them were paid for their trip by Aum Shinrikyo to defend the group. I really do not want to generalize about other scholars but Melton and Lewis really go too far. [1] Andries 08:12, 23 Apr 2005 (UTC)


[edit] difference between scholars and anti-cultists?

I was a main contributor of the following sentences but I now start to doubt whether this is true. I have never seen an explanation of any list neither by scholars or social scientist nor anti-cultists. So these sentences should be re-worded. The lists pop up without explanation.

A few lists have been created by social scientists and scholars who claim to have based their lists on scholarly or empirical research to predict dangerous situations (See Eileen Barker's). The creators of other lists do not explain how they created the list and do not claim that this has been done following scholarly or scientific standards.

Andries 07:10, 17 May 2005 (UTC)

[edit] How the list was created?

Hi folks. Is it really necessary to have sentences like "Barker does not describe how she created the above list"? It would be better to take such sentences out and take note only when someone does describe how their list was created (although I expect that a description of "how my list was created" is probably pretty rare). Tanaats 00:49, 1 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] bonewits is a personal website--remove from list?

although Isaac Bonewits' list is just a personal website, I'll wait for some comment indicating its importance before deleting. BabyDweezil 17:53, 6 February 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for discussing this first. Are you referring to this site? If so, it is just a convenience link. The real cite is to his book Real Magic. I think that the convience link should stay in. Tanaats 20:56, 6 February 2007 (UTC)
I know this comment is a little late coming, I just happened upon this article tonight. Personal sites are permissible if the person is significant or college educated. Bonewits has a bachelor degree and founded the ADF Druid religion. He employs academic principles. Provided his site does not violate Wikipedia criteria like NPOV, etc. it should be included. Just my two cents worth John196920022001

[edit] Distinguish non-cult from Cult

At the same time, it is equally important to separate and safeguard the non-cults from being misinterpreted as cults and that can be done by not being fanatic thereby calling anything foreign a cult. To cite an examples, as reported by a European friend of mine, a small Hath Yoga centre in a locality was forced to shut down by condemning it as a Cult. This is absolute ignoroance and immaturity in spirituality which again is the cause of these spurious cults im modern times having got the better of our senses. Hath Yoga is an ancient, traditional and time proven science given to us by great sages of India. It comprises only body postures and breathing regulation exercises. What could be wrong with that ????

What country? Andries (talk) 13:18, 25 November 2007 (UTC)