Cult of Personality

There are many ways we can come to define what compromises a Cult. There are a couple of podcasts on the concept of Cults and they fairly do a broad sweep of the subject which can include Bravo’s Housewives franchises to certain types of diets. My personal favorite: The Cult of Dolly Parton. I have to admit that while I respect fandom there is this point where you cross lines, but I am not sure I have heard of anyone altering their body physically and dressing like Dolly daily, relocating to Tennessee and taking up residence near Dollywood to be closer to their icon where her songs are on permanent playlist. The Cult of Kardashians however…..

But the point is that when you become obsessive to the point where all rational thought and all spare time and energy is devoted to a singular subject that you are willing to change your lifestyle, your appearance, donate your money or turn over your finances and independence in which to pursue and remain in the society in which you are a member, you are in a cult. There is the Sarah Lawrence Cult that was in the news of late and a subject of a Documentary and now a play. That is a cult.

There are cults around business, NXVIM is one that stands out as perhaps the most bizarre of those, but I would include Scientology as that is a publishing industry as well as a Real Estate Firm despite having the designation of a “Religion” enabling them tax breaks and exemptions. Nice work if you can get it.

And that is the biggest cult of all – Organized Religion. The idea that you can have a “house” as it is called for worship, draw people in to listen to someone read a version of a book, take that an interpret its meaning, then demand fealty, in turn submission of one’s soul to that and demand money in which to enable you to do it all again and then not pay taxes on earnings, that is to say a hell of a cult.

And like all Cults sex is the big tool, pencil in which to draw and of course the weapon to further the submission of now both body and soul. The Catholic Church really mastered that craft and with that there are more Revelations than in the Bible (pun intended) about other organized Churches that have similar problem, the Southern Baptists are one such example. With that the promises of investigations and repentance, the big tool of Churches that one there, in which to ostracize those who harmed others. In other words, like Police who get busted for shooting/killing/harming someone they are just moved to a new place on the Chess Board. They then spend their days hoping to not get caught again for doing the same or just at least not outed for something they did in the past and promise, pinky swear, to never do again.

When one thinks of Cults almost always you think of Religion. There are many and the cross the globe. The fill a Wiki page and include largely those centered on the concept of faith. But they are more than that. You really have to examine what a cult is, and despite the idea that they are some sort of thrown together crazies who are nuts is actually kind of right and wrong. Charlie Manson was an example of that but when you look at the Cult of Nike Shoes, aka Heaven’s Gate, they were not. They were highly organized, had a dogma, a Hierarchy and in turn financial records, established income and were to all their members it was a “religion.” If they had the appropriate tax documentation and legal registration filed that I cannot answer but I suspect they did. And yes there is a podcast about them too.

And with that the idea of Mass Suicide aka Homicide features in many cults. There was Jim Jones, the above mentioned Heaven’s Gate and this cult in Kenya that had members starve themselves while the founder managed to survive. This is not unlike the one in Tennessee, subject of another documentary The Way Down, about the Remnant Fellowship and their founding Minister, Gwen Shamblin, who died in a plane crash. Guess weight was not a problem in why that plane crashed.

And there is a debate that groups like Heaven’s Gate and many other established groups, almost all of them subjects of movies, documentaries, podcasts and books, such Wild Wild Country. And are they in fact organized religions that simply like Scientology have a different angle on historical canons or are they are a cult? Again, I think ALL and any of it are cults but again I will say that you are free to go in and out of a Church at any time and not feel compelled to shave your head, wear a costume, donate all your money and go live in social isolation dedicated to the faith. Oh wait? Never mind. Still love Audrey Hepburn in a Nun’s Story though.

I have found some similarities to cults, they are all started by Men and then they get Women involved to be the recruiters, the beards, the front faces to show the legitimacy of the organization. Even Jeffrey Epstein had Jizzehlda/Ghislaine or Beard, to pose as his companion in which to enable him to move among the movers and shakers of leadership and finance in which to gain trust, gain money and fuck young girls. The revelations of that family/cult/business is still coming to light. I love the denial by all those whose interests coalesced with Epstein in pursuit of more money (sure but really isn’t sex part of that?) I love that they never saw a “young” girl in his company or on his properties and planes. Really you didn’t? They seem to remember you.

Yes folks Money is a type of cult, where the Billionaires and Millionaires meet, greet, fuck and do it all again in pursuit of money and fame. And all of that comes or do I mean cum, in the forms of buying, planes, boats, art or homes in which to prove how your bank account and dick are the biggest. Look at Newport or Beverly Hills, the Hamptons, Manhattan where they have erect ones lining the sky. Islands or Ranches are another way to hide one’s crimes right in the open and with that they are telling us to fuck off as this is an exclusive cult where membership is closed.

There would be no NXIVM or many cults without the Multi Level Marketing one sees in other business oriented “cults” such as Amway and Herbalife. That is how that nut, Raniere, in NXIVM made a living prior to his founding of that cult. MLMs have been called many names, including network marketing, social marketing, pyramid schemes, Ponzi schemes, product-based sales, referral marketing, and direct sales. MLMs are pyramid schemes that focus on recruiting people to recruit others, presumably giving a cut of the income up the chain. Bernie Madoff anyone?

When you dedicate yourself to preserving a belief, a lifestyle, a type of faith falls in line. Without that you have well just life and free will, and cults do not want free will, they want submission and obsession. The idea that you will have a better life, maybe not on this planet or even when alive but later so keep on believing, starving, earning, worshiping or fucking. That last one is always the biggest element in most cults. Remember they are almost all started by Men. Gwen broke that glass ceiling literally and is now with her God so I assume she can eat now, you don’t need food in heaven. And that Men are well men and they are ruled by the Dick. Why do you think all are Warriors of God and carry a big Sword there?

There are many cults and many types of them. The John Birch Society, the KKK, the White Supremacy movements that have many extensions the same way the Southern Baptists have Churches. Where to you think White Christian Nationalism comes from? I often recall the Westboro Baptist Church. But think of all the Pro Life Movements, where they literally killed Doctors, so much for pro life. And Politics make for strange bedfellows and none are more strange than the obsessive histrionic belief in Donald Trump. I have long said he hit the boxes of having money and fame. We all know that both are due to bluster and production values that the show The Apprentice provided. Like all Churches, Businesses have the Front of the House and the Back of the House. The back runs it all, they collect the money, hide the money and disperse the money, to themselves. It is all a type of grifting, or the long con. And without a certain type of believers that continue to come through the doors there is no way a business can last and you need that door open 24/7. Thank GOD for the Internet as now you never are closed.

The rise of Social Media parallels the rise of White Supremacy as it enabled, permitted, tolerated and allowed it. There were always factions and groups who in their isolation found support but then you have a massive communication too to facilitate it. Fox News and Tucker Carlson became the de facto propaganda machine and in turn those incidents of violence prompted by racial and religious animosity were easily dismissed and the faux rise of “antifa” became the new warrior cry and ones to blame. In my day it was Hippies, before that Communists and so on. The same way the lay elections at Soccer Moms, Tea Partiers and other “groups” that will be the determining factor are just concocted by the Media in which to bring eyes to screens, now those screens are more than Televisions, they are Phones, Computers, IPads and any form of technology one uses to find like. And as in all Math equations, like likes like.

As I watched the recent film on Showtime on Waco and I began to realize the complex web of how Guns and how those with guns meet, interact and the individuals, almost all exclusively white men who are lost and misdirected and use often Religion as their expression of frustration it allowed me to learn more about the way we use whatever tool we have in our kit to become a weapon. McVeigh was prompted by Waco and led him to find an enabler or more than one (which we still do not know and never will) I do find it ironic that it was the current DOJ Head, Merrick Garland who Prosecuted him but I am not sure I agree that it was flawless as he failed to realize that others were involved to help him plan and act upon it. And when we look at many of the mass shootings they are prompted by far more than a lone wolf who did not get laid, were bullied, were Racist, were Homophobic, Misogynist, Anti Semitic or whatever “ist” you need to validate your rage.

Jeffrey Toobin has written a new book, Homegrown, documenting some of this history behind Waco and the fanaticism that grew out of the 90s. The culmination of that was in fact Columbine. I had read the great book by Dave Cullen on the subject and knew the boys were not in fact bullied or sad losers. They had been in fact arrested and with that they conned their Parents, the Authorities that they were not a problem. But the myths remain. The same way a Teacher called that trigger by the drawings by one of them, the same was true in Michigan and yet the Parents there did know and in turn took off running. Denial is the same as complicity in many of these young men who are enabled to get guns, to hide the second life in the same way a Man hides a Mistress. Talk about Cults again and its relationship to reality TV take a look at Scandoval. What a farce that took up hours of rage and mob mentality to denigrate an idiot on a “reality” show and his affair. Do you actually know these people? Why do you care? Apply that rationale to the angry white men/boys who for some reason seen others as enemy’s and wish to do them harm. And when I got into an online argument with someone who was convinced that Columbine was a standard school shooting (again are any?) I pointed to the facts behind their reasoning, how they were perceived in legal filings as “good young promising men” by Therapists and Law Enforcement. Their parents relieved and meanwhile they planned on. Their killing of most of the victims was in the School Library and they took pleasure while shooting them. It is not a pretty story but again we have a gun problem, we have a massive mental health problem and we have no way of stopping or circumventing any of it. Time and time again we have failed to see signs, ignore flags and in turn we are so afraid we in fact contribute to it by buying more guns. And I will write a post about the history of how guns became the most significant issue in America today, a type of de facto defense mechanism that has little to do with the 2nd Amendment but more about money and strategy by the NRA and Gun Manufacturers. As all things in life there is always history and a back story.

But without a leader, a type of person, either dead or alive, in which to draw members there is no cult. Think Jesus and that is the starring member of that cult. When one looks at many “cult” fanatics there are usually patterns of behavior and failed businesses that often push one to form a type of community and in turn prove the naysayers wrong. The intent may be benign, but usually it evolves and becomes grander in both scope and scale. They almost always do. But as Americans we are illiterate, we like to emote, we like to believe what we believe and refuse to spend anytime doing the homework, taking the time to ask questions, and expect that our “instincts” are right. Really? Your instincts? We have two: Fight or flight. And with that we have some with higher order thinking skills motivated largely by the biggest motivator – Money. Money is the only thing that matters regardless of Class, Race, Gender etc, etc etc. And anyone who tells you different is either a Charlatan aka a Cult Leader or a Pathological liar aka a Cult Leader. Some are better than others at manipulating people to BELIEVE and not all of it is about a belief but it is about money. See Elizabeth Holmes and Theranos on that one.

It all falls to those who are Believers, Followers and those who are Leaders. And they are distinctly different. It is the Cult of Personality.

The Doomsday Cult

I have been obsessed with true crime and cults since the onset of the pandemic which seems rather fitting given the state of the world with regards to the rise of the autocrat across the globe who seem determined to do their best to wreak havoc on Democracy and the return of the new and improved Taliban seemed destined to prove that we are truly in deep shit when it comes to seeing the world as one embracing independence and freedom, the markers of what forms the concept of Democracy. We sure had a good run of it these last 250 years, no? Well not in the sense of pure equality and parity across race, gender and sexuality, but we were close, so close then we started to go fuck that shit and attempt to really test that document everyone seems to quote and love unless it does something that upsets them and then fuck that shit, it’s toilet paper.

As I watch the Taliban resume their ancient tribal bullshit in Afghanistan I cannot fail to remind myself that 20 years ago they were supporters of a lunatic with a desperate need for American attention and after numerous attacks on American symbols and one on the WTC before 9/11 it seemed as if nothing was enough but killing over 3000 people finally got the attention they needed. Which of course in true political fashion, deny deny deny, that it was they or anyone they were associated with led to 9/11. Really? Well why we wasted billions fighting a war apparently we did not need to and frankly went on long after the asshole who did plan the attack was killed, we invented this thing that all the kids do – Social Media – and that may be the best thing ever as suddenly the same cretins who avoid modern thought have zero problems using it to recruit and spread the message of ancient logic and thought created by men under some false flag of religion and faith in an invisible being who seems to have numerous names and identities for some other man who was placed on the planet to spread the word and thoughts of this invisible being. How they communicated and in what language and method is unclear but I vote for telepathy. Call him Gabriel, Mohammed, Jesus, Buddha, whatthefuckever, it is all just BULLSHIT.

We have the equivalent here and they are called Evangelicals, particularly the sect of Fundamentalists who put the bat into shit crazy. And they are coddled and patronized and the irony is that these are the same fuckwits who were so Anti Muslim that they wanted them out of the country. Why are they too conservative for you? I mean really?

The Republican Party of America is a cult. A true cult at this point, a doomsday one with a figurehead like Marshall Applewhite of Heaven’s Gate and his acolytes with their bowl cut haircuts, the desire to emasculate men short of castration who don’t agree with the philosophy of anti vaxx, covid denying, chest thumping racism and misogyny, to beat the shit out of anyone who dares to not believe. Scientology is a passive aggressive version as they have no desire to kill followers but they do make any naysayers lives a living hell with dogged pursuit, hiring detectives, going through garbage and doing whatever it takes to cast doubt on the critics. Harvey Weinstein did that as reporters began to chase down his behavior and we have story after story of how companies will go to any length to save their corporate secrets. Watch the movie, No Sudden Move, which is an amusing take on espionage in the business world.

Right now we have a crippled man in a wheelchair who runs Texas fighting Covid as he rages against anyone who well doesn’t want to contract Covid! Go figure. Then we have the doppleganger in Florida, a Yale grad no less (again Bush went there so go figure) determined to be the biggest dick in the dick off contest. This from the Washington Post has DiSantis concluding:

In a Wednesday interview with Fox News, DeSantis defended his response, saying Florida is seeing “great success” in treating covid patients with monoclonal antibodies — an effective, widely available therapy that few people are receiving. The governor, considered a potential contender against Biden in the 2024 presidential election, saidthe treatment should have been “a bigger part of this whole response throughout the country from the beginning.”

“You know, he said he was going to end covid. He hasn’t done that,” DeSantis told Fox News host Jesse Watters. “At the end of the day, he is trying to find a way to distract from the failures of his presidency.”

Let me explain this: A treatment is NOT a cure, it is just that a treatment and not everyone responds to this same experimental treatment in the same way. So to the anti vaxx crowd who have some resistance to the vaccines as they were rolled out too soon and seem experimental, what do you think this is?

And lastly the idea that a political party is a cult look at the Trumptards. Even David Brooks is beginning to realize that while he made fun of liberal elite, the Bobos, he now has seen the second coming of the new anti-elite, the call and response cohort that descending into QAnon madness and came to the Capital to hang Mike Pence and break stuff up and shit. This makes me miss the Technocrat class just a little but then again we have the 60s retro cool Biden so its all good.

But the fact that grown adults, well educated and in public policy actually govern under the notion that public health is a nuisance, that differing opinions and democratic rule is a problem then we got a lot of problems with the Doomsday cult. It did not end well with the Heaven’s Gate or Jim Jones so this doesn’t seem to be on a track to change that record or the song that is playing.

The clown car has crashed into the wall that Trump never built, his Lawyers are being sanctioned, the crazy vote counter nutfucks have Covid so their Arizona recount is on pause, ah the irony, and the Proud Boys are playing laser tag with real guns in Portland and this is the world that Trump wrought. He did not bring it he tapped into it and now that keg is spouting flood waters. No wonder Mother Nature is tearing up the planet.

And those who determined to remain unvaxxed, who challenge the authority that no one actually cares about with spouting false dogma and history to excuse, explain and justify their refusal are walking into the eye of the storm. The woman who works at our front desk has come up with more bullshit and lies that has made me question her relationship with her partner to believe that they have a co-dependent one that skirts domestic violence. Control and power are the issues that many of the cult members must submit to when being dominated, all of it a type of sexual preference being also sublimated in a way to deny and in turn prove control. The anti vaxx crowd remind me of the pray the gay away crazies who are deeply in denial and angry about being who they are. Try therapy or just get Covid and that will end it. Ah suicide by virus.

I do think that there is that element the challenge moment that says I can do this, outlast, outwit and survive Covid. No folks that is a Reality Show and there is no million dollar check at the end but a million dollar bill in hospital and medical costs there will be.

Maybe we all need a vacation. Have you been to the White Lotus I hear its a killer resort.

Cult Wars

It is like Storage Wars where a bunch of skeptics, scholars and former members stand outside of a conventional church and decide which is a worse cult, one of the hybrid kind that evoke elements of faith and self healing, the other a sex slave kink cult and the the last the organized kind centuries old that have all of those and more thrown in to allow for a bigger draw.

When I look to organized Religion they all have the same components, a male figurehead, a sense of superiority, healing and prayer are co-joined at the hip and of course some sexual depravity thrown in there for good measure. The Catholics have that one covered, Evangelicals have a branch that includes Fundamentalism which has speaking in tongues and faith healing to add to the prayer as a cure for all ails, literally snakes and oils, if you look at their history. The differences between cults from Scientology to NXVIM seem to be religion as business with multi level marketing and a type of extortion or blackmail in which to further secure your loyalty and your checkbook.

During the pandemic I was listening to many podcasts regarding true crime and cults and with this I found a striking parallel, the idea that a need to be represented, to be seen, to be smarter than the average bear are traits found in both. Moral superiority often leads to serial criminality. And with that I have now finished the series on HBO Max, Generation Hustle, about some infamous Grifter’s to took it too new heights when it came to stealing from the poor to make themselves rich. Not all ended up in Jail and we are seeing the trial of Elizabeth Holmes coming up and she was not in that series as she had one of her own as Theranos broke that glass ceiling when it came to cons. But could Adam Neumann of We Work be counted in that category, he was profiled as was the company, he is a subject of a book and a podcast about how the glass walls came tumbling down around him but he walked away from it all the richer. So even those living in glass houses can come out without too many stones thrown back in their direction.

But one podcast stood out and that was the one with Glenn Close on Marc Maron’s podcast where she discussed her youth growing up in a cult. She had never discussed it publicly before that day where she opened up regarding her family, their lives in a cult and how she finally broke out and away. I often think that if you predisposed to this through either faux therapy, which often is cult based bullshit, or raised in one, you seek out alternatives that are equally as destructive but less damaging. I have personally seen individuals do this with regards to Yoga and have written about those cults that fall into the healing/wellness versions. I think this is like a stamp on your head a Scarlet Letter if must which often places the V for Victim and then once that moniker is affixed it enables those predators to find you easily and manipulate you in the same way. Ask serial rapists about this. No they won’t as no one wants to know why men rape but when they shoot guns in a crowd, that they want to profile. Same thing really, spreading your jizz every where is a form of genocidal rape, just with bullets.

While Men seem to be the largest founders and leaders of cults it seems that largely women are the ones who are the ones most victimized. The few men who have come out of NXIVM are interesting as one was in a cult before and the other is married to one of the more vociferous of critics who left the cult. The rest seem, well fine with that? I have no clue. We never do focus on the male aspect of these stories, as in the case of the Golden State Killer whose male victims were witnesses to his rapes and abuse and unable to help or save their female partners from his terror, even long after he left. We clearly have work to do on all levels with regards to sexual predatory behavior.

And with this I share another story of a woman who also left a cult and the scars they leave behind. If you have not watched Leah Remini’s story of Scientology you should as victim after victim share their stories and the parallels between those and R.Kelly’s are too similar than should. But this is where the fucking of the mind begins, and with that it opens up a universe of shit that Pandora should have burned to the ground and put only ashes in that box.

Guardian journalist helped me see a way out, ex-cult member recalls

Former Children of God member says simple question put to her by Walter Schwarz was life-changing

Bexy Cameron with Walter Schwarz. ‘I was intrigued by him,’ she said of first meeting the former Guardian journalist, who died in 2018, when she was 11. Photograph: Manilla Press

Harriet Sherwood The Guardian 7 Jul 2021

It was a simple question to a child, one routinely asked by adults: what do you want to be when you grow up? But for 11-year-old Bexy Cameron, who had never known anything but the strict religious cult she was born into, it was life-changing

Her brief encounter with the Guardian journalist Walter Schwarz in the 1990s led to her escaping the Children of God cult at the age of 15, leaving behind her parents and siblings. Now she has written a memoir, Cult Following, about growing up in a movement founded by a controlling sexual predator. The last line of her acknowledgments reads: “Eternal gratitude to Walter Schwarz (RIP). Who knows what would have happened without that ‘one simple question’?”

Cameron, 38, and her 11 siblings knew only a life dominated by Bible readings, exorcisms, physical and psychological punishments when Schwarz became the first journalist to be permitted access to the cult. Children of God had been founded in California in 1968 by the self-proclaimed prophet David Berg, who was known as Moses.

At its peak, Children of God had 10,000 adherents across the world who followed Berg’s strict instructions. It was a highly sexualised and abusive environment; women were sent out to entice men into the cult and daughters were sometimes forced to “marry” their fathers. By the time Berg died in 1994, he was wanted for questioning by the FBI and Interpol over allegations of rape, incest, incarceration and kidnapping.

Cameron as a child. Photograph: Manilla Press

Cameron remembers Schwarz’s arrival at the commune in Leicestershire where the family lived at the time as “a really big moment”. The cult had decided to “open our doors, to reveal ourselves a little more. But unknown to Walter, we [children] were trained for his visit to say certain things and not say other things.”

Cameron and her siblings and peers had no access to television or newspapers and never went to school. “We had no idea what was going on in the outside world, but we were told that the media was evil and people were out to get us.”

Schwarz’s stay at the commune came just after Cameron had ended a year of “silence restriction” when she was forbidden from speaking to anyone except her assigned leader.Advertisement

“I was excited that I’d been chosen to speak to Walter. I was completely intrigued by him – he was tall and had white hair and a gentle manner. He looked us in the eye. He didn’t ask any of the questions I’d been prepped for, just this mundane ‘What do you want to be when you grow up?’

“It was the first time I’d ever thought about the concept of being grown up or becoming something. We were raised to believe that we were going to die in the ‘End Time’ wars, that we were going to be martyrs. So when he asked me that, it was an epiphany – that’s the best way that I can describe it. All of a sudden, there was a crack in the wall, potentially an escape route.”

A few years later, Cameron took that route, but it was more than a decade before she reached “the point where I needed to confront my past – and the first thing I wanted to do was to track down the man who had started the change in me”.

She had no idea of the journalist’s name, but knew he had worked for the Guardian. After digging around she concluded that Schwarz, the Guardian’s then retired religious affairs correspondent, was likely to be her interviewer.

In an extraordinary twist, it turned out that a friend of hers was Schwarz’s son. Cameron emailed Schwarz to say thank you for “opening a door to another world”. Within an hour he had replied, inviting her to visit.

“It was a really wonderful experience to meet him again, but there were complicated emotions on both sides.” Schwarz pressed her to write about her childhood, and showed her his original article about the Children of God. “He was a bit upset as he’d written quite a positive piece based on what he’d seen during his visit.”

She kept in contact with Schwarz until his death aged 88 in 2018. “I spent many weekends at his home. They made me feel like part of the family. He was such an insightful, beautiful man, and he has a wonderful place in my heart.”

Psych Much

I loath the armchair Psychiatrists be ones that play on TV, hello Dr. Phil, or those people you know who took a psych class and have decided they have figured it all out.  Wow that is fucking amazing as we know that the human brain is one of the most complex organs we possess and it is the one significant challenge that the tech sect is doing their best at conquering.  The thought of this is not only disturbing it is frightening.    I don’t think there are enough zeros or ones that could be imprinted to understand the way the brain functions in each human, there is little commonality and ability to distinguish, determine or know how anyone would react and respond in every single situation over a lifetime.

Shit happens. Period it does and when it does it can affect the function and formation of the brain, from traumatic brain injury which covers a wide spectrum of issues be it external or internal (aka a bomb going off, a traumatic event versus a stroke or other embolism) that even many in the TBI community have a difficult time distinguishing.  Add external elements such as drugs, alcohol, or even polluted water or air which can affect the organs and in turn the brain that process said organs to function all play in a part in the developmental process and in turn the destructive one.

I am not a neuroscientist nor neurologist but even they would admit the limitations of their science and of course the quackery that aligns their field with many medical professionals that seem to study the brain or the emotional receptors of that organ and in turn can diagnose and treat any malady with anything be it drug cocktails to talk therapy.  To each his own and each is the operative word when it comes to actually each individual as they ride the waves of life in this deep ocean.

Now we have nature versus nurture argument and there is no doubt that the lottery card of life can aid in how one “turns out” or well not.  But we have this odd belief that well if you are born to the higher cards in the deck you will be fine. That means you will end up going to the right schools, meet the right people, have the right job and have the perfect family in which to complement all that is right about you.   Why am I thinking of Robert Durst right now?

Anyway when I read this story in The Washington Post I vomited in my mouth as it comes right on the asshole tale (and I mean tale as in story) of Harvey Weinstein.  Today is a break in the courts but back to closing arguments tomorrow and to the Jury and the not guilty verdict by Friday so that the weekend is clear for the three day break.  White male privilege bitches!

I went to the original article in New York Magazine to understand the history of this psychopath and wow just wow, when anyone says, “Were any adults in the room?”  should look back on the history of predators and go, “Oh yeah Michael Jackson.”  Then change adults to parents and read this story and go what the flying fuck?

What we have here are neglectful parents and schools despite all the Title IX bullshit of late that just don’t seem to think that they have any role in supervising children who have serious mental health issues and other significant problems that include dealing with being alone and independent, finding out their sexuality, drugs and health problems and lastly just providing an education that people can walk out with a diploma and not a six figure lifetime of debt.    I am so happy not to be in college nor work in one with the endless whining and demanding safe spaces I suggest they look inward and fix themselves before demanding it of others.

This has become a culture of laying blame, pointing fingers, mindfucking and gaslighting as a way of avoiding responsibility, taking ownership and admitting one’s personal failings.  I have zero problems with that as I look at my own the last decade dating men too young for me, ending up nearly dead as a result and having no network of support to help me navigate;  Landing in Nashville to find myself taking on a boy with problems too big of scope and scale to truly help and then further isolating myself as I trust rarely and infrequently, the  likelihood of that changing is not something I feel I need to address or deal with but will independently and in my own way,  as I have ZERO faith in those one trust to do as such.  Let’s get real the medical field is a hot mess of bullshit but it also leave a gaping hole for the mock Doctors… Oz, Phil and the Bachelor to fill in that hole with scripted bullshit.   We used to just leave it to talk show hosts and they were a cross between a Journalist and best friend on whom you can confide.   I think that was a great balance between an afternoon of Phil Donahue and Oprah it covered the spectrum.  Can you imagine what they would do with this story of the elite college with the ex inmate taking over student housing and turning it into the Nexium cult sans branding? Jeffrey Epstein anyone?

How did this adult man, an ex con and clearly with no work, no legal reasons to be on campus live in this arrangement with, yes, legal adults but not one parent of any of these young people bringing this to the attention of Adminstration and when they did know did  nothing?  Now you see why the documentary The Hunting Ground is actually quite appropriate in more ways than one.

I urge you to read the article and if you do not recognize the stories of these young people you clearly need to get out more.  I saw Ethan the boy I tried to help and in turn his peer, Darian,  perhaps the most deeply troubled young woman I have ever met in my entire life. And I have been with kids for decades and had quite a few but this woman is 27 and the phrase “hot mess” is insufficient.  Why she has never been indoctrinated or recruited to cult is surprising as she is very much like Claudia in this story.  

Understanding predators is understanding the mind and again that complex organ that seems to be controlled by the penis as I have yet to find one story about a woman cult leader or serial rapist.  How is that?  And by that I mean how can I do it?  Seriously let’s start with recruiting Brad Pitt and Keanu Reeves then I send them out to get Ryan Gosling.  I am fine with just three – Brother Husbands.  But again this has to have something to do with the hormone of testosterone as there is no other explanation.  Well Scientists studying this are largely men so again go figure but Eugenics and other  junk science like waterboarding and torture will be at the forefront.   Quack quack says the duck.

The story is frightening from so many aspects and it goes to show with all the helicopter parenting, stranger danger, yet the overwhelming need for over sharing it has done little to stop these crazy ass fucks from sexual exploitation and financial gain.   Note that most of the cults either preyed on rich folks who had access and availability of what the primary focus was – no not mental growth – MONEY.   Epstein knew that the other was SEX and he found he perfect prey in girls with families that were poor and dysfunctional the same way R. Kelly did.  Predators know their prey and the tragedy is that the use other damaged women to aid them in their quest.  Look at Nexium, Harvey Weinstein, Epstein, and this Larry person.    And yet this one took place at a College where the white and the privileged thrive.  They had access and availability to all kinds of knowledge.  Clearly they need a class for that.  Oh they do have it, its in the Sociology Department and the Psychology one, the classes you take and they make you feel smart just not apparently act that way.

Understanding crazy is well the key to understanding crazy. There are many cults and other fringe groups that prey and attract all kinds of people and in turn get people to do all kinds of crazy things.  We had Charlie Manson who used sex, drugs and fame.  We had the Rajneesh cult in Oregon now featured on Netflix, I can recall the Love Israel Family (another fine Northwest project) and of course the Yogi ones that veer on just plain sexual obsession/harassment to cult.  Namaste! Add to that Heaven’s Gate or Jim Jones People’s Temple that were not rich white people engaged in some pursuit of a space alien or is that Scientology?  Well all religion is a cult so what have we learned?

Wherever there is a charismatic man who uses his mindfucking power to overcome and overwhelm lost individuals with beliefs of power, wealth, success and happiness you will always have believers.  They flock to ashrams, to camps, to islands or just to houses to find a place to belong.  The reality is that we don’t understand the mind’s ability to process information we just know how to fuck it over really well.

The Enquirer vs The Bible

I loved reading the rags in my day.  Our home was full of every newspaper, magazine or journal we could subscribe or buy and that includes the National Enquirer and Star Magazine.  Much like Professional Wrestling that dominated our television on Sunday’s, my family knew it was “fake” but we had the willingness to suspend disbelief when it came to entertainment and the ability to discern the truth and the tellers of a story being that fact vs fiction.  Hence why in our home The Bible was just that – a work of fiction.

So perhaps that may explain why another group that adheres to the said “book” believes that conventional news and writers of non-fiction are fake.  They have to find someway to suspend disbelief that they hold a book that has no clear authorship, no confirmation, fact checking or valid reasoning behind a book that seemingly for centuries has stories that again cannot be substantiated.  So instead of using it as a guide in the same manner one reads other self help mantra books, they cling to it as a factual document akin to the same way I do with regards to The New York Times.  I don’t always agree with and they too have had issues with those who tell stories that at times have been found lies (Judith Miller thinking of you specifically) but they are willing to admit it, they have names, faces and are grounded in both history and the present.

I took a Bible as Literature class in College and as Literature it holds up in the same way many of the garbage books written by Ayn Rand are held up in the same way by many in our Congress.  She was a hack, not an Economist and yet her thoughts on the subject have valid teachings about the Economy called Objectivism.  Really I just call it selfish. But for the record a great deal of Economic teaching veer on Philosophy as well as Mathematics.    Read some of the great Economists of their day.  Theory into practice is what we call it and our economy reflects much of that.

So what has that got to do with the article I found in the Guardian about what does it take for us to stop going to a Celebrity’s movies?  Well the same bullshit that centers around current boycotts or attempts to generate attention to a Corporations misdeeds or philosophy that affects how customers perceive their professional versus the personal.  We have the Airlines and the abusing of customers, that crosses all lines and can bring change for all clients regardless. We have the ones Hobby Lobby and Chick-fil-A that may have affected their bottom line for a month but does anyone remember why? There are boycotts from both the right and the left over one perceived insult over another. This week it is Target’s line with the Gaines family of Fixer Upper. The Gaines are Evangelical Christians and they are selling furniture under their Magnolia line with Target who has an open bathroom philosophy regarding gender.   Do I care? No.  I watch Fixer Upper knowing that they are both right wing Christians and unless they start spouting that shit and speaking in tongues I can get through an hour at the gym quite nicely.  Hey I watch Property Brothers and think there is some real estate bullshit there but then I am not hiring them to do anything so again I can suspend disbelief for an hour.   And I suspect Neil deGrasse Tyson can during The Martian or Interstellar (okay maybe not that one as it was just not good).

But the reality is that I can turn to reality anytime, fact check, ask for multiple opinions and make my own decision.  I can do that with The Bible too as why do you think we have so many faiths? You find what works for an hour a week and then you go about your business maybe less wiser but happier or maybe both.  But again its about you and your own connection to the source material and your own ability to suspend disbelief and reconcile facts and fictions.

I have been utterly transfixed with Leah Remini and her show The Aftermath.  I never gave this woman one thought then I read her book on her years in Scientology.  I had watched the varying documentaries on the subject and I had my own perceptions and belief about Scientology long before I watched the series, read the books or the shows.  I actually now feel quite comfortable calling it a religion and see many parallels to that of conventional religion which may or may not be a good thing.  That said I do love their ability to restore aging buildings using child labor, the Sailor uniforms and of course any references to aliens.

Now I have not seen a Tom Cruise movie in decades for no other reason that they are not good. I have watched Woody Allen movies and I do so when they are on HBO as going to the theater seems money ill spent as I end up half liking half hating them. Not because of Woody’s own weird personal history but because they are well often weird too.  I have always been a 50/50 person with him and that is normal with any film director or actor.   We love who we love and there are those who can just read the Dictionary and you would go regardless.  I am talking to your Ryan Gosling!

 And we have the same dynamics with sports. Right after going to one Church many will hustle to the other Church of Sunday, the football stadium.   That draws more eyes than Pastor does in many cities other than the South where here a Coach is akin to the Pastor, a Godlike individual that will restore honor and dignity to the followers! It is a bizarre thing here and I thought Seattle had a strange fanaticism with the Seahawks but alas this is nothing like it.

With that comes a sense of responsibility that the NFL has with the community to somehow justify or excuse their exploitation of the tax paying base that without their tax breaks and excessive fees and costs for tickets and in turn licensing that causes cable to be so expensive, they pretend to care by sending varying team members into the town’s hospitals and schools to show they care. What.ever.  Celebrity worship is not my thing.  Well other than you Ryan Gosling!

But those efforts demonstrate a connection and again you may not agree or care about what Colin Kapernick does or Stephen Curry thinks about Donald Trump or you may.  I simply respect their right to express them in ways that bring our concept of Democracy to be just that – Democratic.  The President of the United States does not agree but then again he is part of the process to destroy Democracy so his response not surprising.  His endless Tweeting is doing more to harm it than a player taking to a knee. 

Funny the NFL supposedly supports that but that idea of protection and caring doesn’t extend to their players when they allow and enable them to literally kill each other in a slow fashion week after week for the entertainment of others. Bring back the Roman Coliseum as this is the same just without lions.

Again that is my opinion based on this thing called fact.  Look to the story about Hernandez and his brain damage that led him to lose control commit murder and in turn led to his suicide. The NFL hid those scans from the family and when released showed the extensive damage to this young man’s mind that at age 27 was horrific.   Again this could be like other celebrities and their claims that vaccines cause Autism, and there is a reference to Jim Carrey in the article as well, and I cannot forget his bizarre relationship with Jenny McCarthy the Godmother of Anti-Vaxxers.  See what I mean when Celebrity worship is taken to far?  Do you really love these people that much that you are willing to put your child and other children at risk?

How weird does a celebrity have to be before we stop watching their films?
Hadley Freeman
UK Guardian
September 23 2017

All celebrities are a bit weird, so when one is known for being Weird Even For A Celebrity, you know they are probably crossing over to ‘actually quite scary’

Of the many deeply uncool things I am obsessed with – The Golden Girls, the oeuvre of Roxette, Princess Anne’s hair – the uncoolest is also the one that has been with me the longest. Tom Cruise has been a part of my mental landscape ever since I was old enough to read in a magazine that I was supposed to fancy him. I was alive in the 80s and, as strange as this is now to think about, what with his deeply unsexy obsession since with thetans, back then he was very much pitched as Mr Sexxxxxy. Which is even stranger when you think that Cruise didn’t even grow into his face for another decade: back in Risky Business and The Outsiders, he looked vague and doughy next to his co-stars, particularly the Adonis that was the young Rob Lowe.

Cruise was never really my type, but I will argue until closing time and beyond that he is one of the most watchable actors of all time: a proper Hollywood star who proved in one decade he could do top notch schlock (Top Gun), mediocre schlock (Cocktail) and proper acting (Born On The Fourth Of July and Rain Man, for which he should have won the Oscar instead of Dustin Hoffman).

It’s been fascinating to watch Cruise’s career since then, partly because of what his choice of roles says about him. There was his dramatic period in the 90s when he made relentless Oscar bids, peaking with Magnolia, and then, when that failed, his huffy retreat into decreasingly memorable action movies. He also stopped ageing – or rather, his ageing process took the shape of not actually growing older but increasingly resembling Sandi Toksvig. And that, too, has been fascinating in its way to watch.

But I’m also interested in Cruise because of what he reveals about what audiences will accept in their stars. Now, all celebrities are a bit weird, so when one is known for being Weird Even For A Celebrity, you know they are probably crossing over from “adorably eccentric” to “actually quite scary”. It’s been known for a while that Cruise crossed that line when he started wanging on about Scientology. But it is genuinely interesting how people just shrug off stories of his troubling relationships with women.

Last week it emerged that Cruise’s ex-wife Katie Holmes and Jamie Foxx are in a relationship, after having kept this a secret for at least four years. This would be hard to do under normal circumstances, but is frankly Oscar-worthy in the case of two celebrities. It is also so contrary to modern celebrity ethos, which treats romance as a branding opportunity, that it seems downright alien. By contrast, Holmes and Foxx waited to reveal their relationship until almost five years to the day that she got divorced from Cruise, and it is being widely reported that this is because, in order to secure a quick divorce, Holmes had to agree to not date anyone “publicly” for half a decade.

Whether this is true or not is one of the many things about Cruise we will probably never know for sure. But the point is, after years of his increasingly freaky behaviour and the rumours about his relationships with actress Nazanin Boniadi, then Holmes, it sounds sufficiently plausible for no one to question it. “Sure!” the public shrugs. “Controlling your ex-wife’s life for five years – that sounds like our Tom! When’s Mission Impossible 22 out anyway?” If people don’t see his movies now it’s because he makes lame movies, not because of his relationships.

Male celebrities are still given an enormous amount of rope when it comes to their treatment of women, despite multiple lessons from the past. Last week another actor who is notoriously Weird Even For A Celebrity, Jim Carrey, gave a completely creepy red carpet interview, in which he sharkishly, Trumpishly, walked in circles around the female reporter and indulged in teenage-level musings on metaphysics. Two days earlier it was announced that Netflix has bought Carrey’s documentary, Jim and Andy: The Great Beyond, which had just got universally glowing reviews – without anyone mentioning Carrey is about to face a wrongful death trial over the suicide of his ex-girlfriend, Cathriona White. Carrey has denied all the allegations and has tried to stop the trial, by initially insisting White’s bereaved mother pay a $372,000 bond. Ace Ventura was a long time ago, people.

Actors are now regularly criticised if they sign on to a Woody Allen movie, because accusations of child molestation, even if deemed inconclusive by a judge 25 years ago, are too much. But suggestions of creepy controlling behaviour around women are, apparently, still fine. From Howard Hughes onwards, this has always been the celebrity way. Maybe Tom Cruise really is the full Hollywood package.

Church or Cult?

This could be a drinking game where one recites varying dogma, rituals and beliefs and tries to guess where it applies and frankly there is little to distinguish cults from established Religions.  Can you tell the difference?

I just finished watching Leah Rimini’s Aftermath after having a discussion with a local Barista about Scientology and the odd dynamics that it seems to have on its members and more importantly on those who decide to leave the “faith.”

We laughed and said that there are parts of it we could embrace – Aliens, Naval style uniforms, and of course odd cruises be they of the travel or celebrity kind.  There is a type of mania that is only found it truly Evangelical and extreme faiths that require a dedication to belief and that includes Mormonism, Amish, Jehovah and Christian Science.  But in all honesty there is little variation between that and most mainstream faiths.  Each have sects and branches that veer on the extreme to the crazy.  Faith does that as it is suspension of disbelief that requires one to embrace any number of dogmas that transcend reality.

I have always had belief in God but my belief comes from the idea that it cannot hurt and I am not sure he came first or we did and in turn needed something outside of ourselves in which to believe and in turn embrace to avoid total narcissism.  But that is about it.  My Father took one look at Christian Jesus in the 60’s and said, “That guy is a pot smoking Hippie and so not going there!” And so from now on in our home Jesus was always called The Baby Jesus as what can you say bad about a baby?

I went to dozens of Church’s when I was young, the longest the Catholic one.  I never have been Baptized or officially joined any Religion as while I find it interesting it is not something I felt compelled to join.  A Gypsy from birth I suspect.

For the same reasons I find fascination with Scientology I could say the same about the Catholic Church. The idea of one man being the leader of the faith, the writings revered and the varying members/aposoles/cardinals/sea orgs or whatever you want to call them to ensure that the teachings are adhered and duly spread onward.   Missionaries or Scientology recruiters can you tell a difference?    And if you have never seen the Book of Mormon perhaps you should it will rock you to your special underwear.

To pledge undying fealty to a faith and tithe your income, your children and confess all your sins, to be excommunicated if you fail to follow the teachings and laws/dogmas/bullshit means giving up everyone and everything you have ever believed in sounds good.  Brings the question – Scientology or Catholicism?

Forced marriages, arranged marriages?  Scientology or Hinduism or Islam?

Bizarre outfits, repression of women, caste system – Hinduism or Scientology?

Worship an Alien or a mythical being?  Whatever as you can see the parallels exist.

But when Scientology and Catholicism seem to merge is about children in ways that sickened me.  After last night’s episode where the women who were molested and abused as children shared their stories I woke up to another revelation about the Children of Priests.  The same Spotlight crew that uncovered and investigated the Church’s abuse for decades in Boston now has a series about the children of the Priests from largely consensual relationships that have led many to question their paternity and in turn the Church’s obligation to acknowledge these children.

And this comes after I finished watching The Keepers;  A Netflix documentary about the investigation into a the unsolved murder of the nun Sister Cathy Cesnik.  Sister Cesnik taught English and drama at Baltimore’s Archbishop Keough High School and former students believe that this murder was an attempt to  stop her from revealing her belief that one of the Priests,  A. Joseph Maskell, was guilty of sexual abuse of many of the female students at the school.  

The harrowing stories of survival by the victims of this Maskell sickened me and they oddly parallel those I heard last night on Aftermath.  The same desperate pleas and in turn rejection by the authorities of the “church” cannot be denied.  And even L. Ron Hubbard’s own words that vilify children to somehow excuse or support this are quoted in Biblical like references throughout the series.   A “religion” that requires Children to sign their lives and rights away for BILLIONS of years is not only absurd it is insane and yes illegal.  And yet families allowed this as they believed.  Ah yes the ability to believe is the ability to deny.

I live in the Bible Belt and I have ventured into the Church’s here on occasion out of curiousity. And you know what they say – curiousity killed the cat.  I have a few lives left and I have decided it is not worth the risk.

The first question you are often asked here is, “What Church do you go to?” With 91% of the residents here being Christian it is surprising how Nashville claims diversity when so few people here are not of the norm. There is nothing but God here and frankly I don’t think it matters what you call your God as long as you call him. The pressure to belong to an organized faith is distressing and again what I see here does little to inspire me to join. They are smug, judgmental, paranoid, racist, sexist, homophobic and boring as hell. Whoops I said a bad word! Aside from the Jesus love they are incredibly poorly educated and in turn their world is one of abject poverty. Irony considering the Churches here rival malls for scale. But there are many many storefront Churches and dilapidated buildings that function as Churches that align every block within every block.

When I wandered into the smaller and blacker Church I was deeply uncomfortable. Not because the Congregation made me feel as such, as I had greeted the Pastor and said I moved in across the street and thought I would meet all of my neighbors and that they were my first, but it was the lecture, the scold, the admonishment of which I am now familiar.   The service was long, very long and emphasized discipline be it personal and in turn patriarchical. In other words, spare the rod, spoil the child. The Amens and Uh huhs, dominated and punctuated the Pastor’s pauses and in turn I saw nodding of heads and acknowledgments that spanking, beating and challenging children to behave was the way to the Lord. I smiled and then left after the Service immediately.

Then the next in the town of Franklin was a Mega Church and in turn white. There I heard the prosperity pulpit and how those will take what they want and they have not earned that and those who have must know when they are to hold onto their purse and in turn decide whom they will provide and that it begins with those whom matter. In other words, charity begins at home. I was bored after 20 minutes and then when the Musical portion started I quietly excused myself to myself and left. No one spoke to me or acknowledged me so missing me was not going to happen.

I plan on going to more in the next few years being here. I need to try to seek a balance and in turn perspective about a place until now I had a benign relationship with. But of late I have never seen any institution so willing to seek collateral damage in order to stay relevant. They want believers and they want them anyway they get them. They want to institute all their rage, their fears and their beliefs onto everyone to alieviate their own guilt and shame. Conformity breeds contempt and I have nothing but contempt for these who profess to have a higher connection.

I see very little difference between Scientology or Christianity and down to hate, the phobia and the control can you?