Mormonism, QAnon, religious fundies, and other extremist groups are all selling the same things.

Answers.
Belonging.
Purpose.
Justification.
Refuge.
Family.
Simplicity.
Hope.

If you're afraid, anxious, or desperate, they’re looking for you.

Remember "Jihad Jane?" She was seeking answers online and became radicalized. How did an American white woman with no ties to Islam become a fundamentalist terrorist?

Why would a seemingly sane, rational person believe that celebrities and other prominent people are alien shape-shifting reptiles that "control" everybody and everything?

Why think that the Earth is "flat" or "hollow?"

Why would you think that you are being "erased" or "replaced?"

The hook or gimmick doesn't matter.

The cults may have different aims, but the means they use are the same.

https://www.bustle.com/p/if-you-exhibit-these-9-personality-traits-youre-more-likely-to-join-a-cult-9432374

If you are wondering who joins cults and why, the short, but creepy answer is that pretty much anyone can get sucked into them. "That is the insidiousness of mind-manipulation," Lisa Kohn, a cult survivor and author of the upcoming memoir To the Moon and Back, tells Bustle. "Nearly anyone can be manipulated by the promise of a better tomorrow or the answers to their questions or a sense of their inherent rightness (or sinfulness)." But there do seem to be a few personality traits that can make someone more likely to join a cult, that these organizations (for lack of a better word) often play into.

Depending on someone's personality and what they're seeking in life, they may be a bit more susceptible to what a cult promises. "Cults prey on vulnerability ... to facilitate their cause," psychologist Dr. Michele Barton, director of Psychology Life Well, tells Bustle. "Cults seek out the disenfranchised and outcasts. People most in need of support are lured in by the prospect of belonging somewhere or to something meaningful."

And that's why cults can seem so great, at first, as well as why it can be difficult for people to realize they're even joining one. As Kohn says, "Every right-minded person would most likely say, 'I am not susceptible to a cult.' And every person I know and knew who was in a cult would tell you that they were not in a cult." But again, this is all part of the brain-washing. "Once you’re in, you know it’s right, and therefore it’s not a cult," Kohn says.

While it's certainly possible for a person to leave a cult, it can be tough for them see it for what it is. So recognizing which personality traits cults are looking for can be the best course of action, in order to avoid getting sucked in in the first place. Here are a a few personality types cults tend to look for, when they're out recruiting new members.

https://www.bustle.com/p/if-you-exhibit-these-9-personality-traits-youre-more-likely-to-join-a-cult-9432374

anybody Wrote:
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> Mormonism, QAnon, religious fundies, and other
> extremist groups are all selling the same things.

That is the key, isn't it. That's why there's so much overlap between various cults, religious and political.

Why are cults necessarily a bad thing? The Apple and Google cults aren’t too bad. Cult classic movies aren’t so bad. If Mormons want to fetishize their religion, that’s their thing. Being in a cult is kind of the point.

Where it really went wrong is when Trump courted evangelicals in his bid for the Presidency. Somehow the separation of Church and State didn’t apply there. We ended up with a cult leader President. So the establishment clause might actually be useful.

bradley Wrote:
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> Why are cults necessarily a bad thing? The Apple
> and Google cults aren’t too bad. Cult classic
> movies aren’t so bad. If Mormons want to
> fetishize their religion, that’s their thing.
> Being in a cult is kind of the point.

I'm not sure if you're being facetious here, but if you're not, one need only look at what happened to those who followed Jim Jones to South America and what happened to U.S. Representative Leo Ryan from California when he tried to investigate it. When you give over everything, including decisions about your personal life, to a group or group leader who knows very little about you and cares even less, then you will have to pay, sometimes with your very life, when those decisions about you turn out not to be in your own best interest.
>
> Where it really went wrong is when Trump courted
> evangelicals in his bid for the Presidency.
> Somehow the separation of Church and State
> didn’t apply there. We ended up with a cult
> leader President. So the establishment clause
> might actually be useful.

The irony about the soon-to-be former U.S. president is that he never really was a religious believer. He began attending church after he became president because it made him look good in the eyes of the public, but he never was a supporter of, say, the BeAttitudes found in Matthew Chapter 5.

Nobody on this Board should be surprised by this belief in someone whose behaviors do not match what he told other people to do. Joseph Smith and Brigham Young acted very much in the same way, yet people from all over the U.S. and England continued to call both of them "prophets" and to believe that everything they said was true, often to their detriment, including the loss of many lives.

still am kind of a loner, well, I am a loner so I guess I am susceptible to the cult people roaming the streets. Only if they can find me though. I will deliver a cult injury to their ego if they approach.

P.S. to the cults also, I already beat Jesus in a thumb war. Got tired of all his handshake nonsense so I said let's settle this like men with an old fashioned thumb war. And I beat him and he said "alright Adam you are the best and I now acknowledge your existence Adam over the cults existence". And I said "thank you my good man", and then, I drank my pepsi.

Thats how it went down with my encounter with Mr. Jesus when I ran into him in a forest where he likes to chill most of the time.

I hope you didn't really beat Jesus at a thumb war. Saucie has a full schedule and lacks the time to soothe his wounded ego.