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Sunday, Oct 02, 2011 - 23:02 SGT
Posted By: Gilbert
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Mr. Ham Founds A Cult
Me: "Mr. Ham, have you sorted out your personal difficulties yet? The mr.ham show is already two episodes behind schedule. Why are you sulking in a corner?"
Mr. Robo: "You're looking at a money-laundering hamster who has forgotten the password to his Swiss bank accounts."
Mr. Ham: *mutter* *grumble*
Me: "I can't say I'm too sympathetic."
Mr. Ham: "Some friend you are! You were the one who recommended random.org. No matter, this loss of access to the bulk of my funds won't get this ham down! While I was holidaying in the Seychelles, my acquaintance there attempted to sell me this book."
Me: (reading title) "Your Own Cult In A Week Or Your Money Back. You actually paid money for this?"
Mr. Ham: "Of course not. What sort of hamster do you take me for? Obviously I downloaded the torrent and printed it on his office printer. I always felt it was time to expand my horizons - and look at what I bought on my stopover from Libya!"
Rule Number One: Always look the part
Me: "It looks suspiciously like one of Gaddafi's used uniforms."
Mr. Ham: "Yep, thought it was a good way of getting back at him after he bombed my house. But say what you want about the man, his sense of style is second to none."
You must concede that it takes balls to turn up at international summits dressed this way
Mr. Ham: "But let's not get distracted, and start on the book proper."
Intro - Yes, You Can Be A Cult Leader Too!
Want the adulation of potentially millions of people? Lives to hang on your every whim? All your earthly desires fulfilled? Then, being a Cult Leader is for you!
Of course, you could be a sports or music superstar, head up a hedge fund, or even become a politician to achieve much the same ends, but all these options require actual talent or family connections. In contrast, anybody can be a Cult Leader with some very simple training! Although attributes like charisma will help, by following the universal principles set forth in this guide, you too will have your own personal Cult in no time!
Chapter I - Are Cults Bad?
The term "cult" is generally used as a pejorative by the mass media. Do not let that worry you, however. While you may prefer to employ euphemisms like brotherhood, communion, fellowship or study group to describe your own budding cult in public, you should always remember that it is, indeed, a cult.
This is nothing to be ashamed of! Almost every successful theology started out being branded as a "cult" by their competitors, and will continue to be called cults (and other, worse, names) by rivals long after they have established themselves. In fact, being known as a cult by at least some religions is a good measure of your success, since it is a sign that they are taking the threat you pose seriously.
Repeat after me: there is no better time to start a cult than the present. In ages past, the dominant religion in the region would often have no compunctions about massacring and torturing (often simultaneously) any credible upstarts under their sphere of control. However, if you base your cult in a developed country today, they will not be able to rely upon such violent anti-competitive measures any longer. You can then concentrate your efforts on carving out a niche for yourself. This does however mean that you will not be able to wipe others out when your cult gets big, so the choice of founding location is a tradeoff you will have to make.
Chapter II - Your First Followers
Like any organization, your cult needs people. Your objective, at the very beginning, is to obtain a small inner coterie of fiercely loyal followers. Luckily, this is not as hard as it may seem, even if you are starting from nothing. Do not be afraid to start up your enterprise in your garage, though the living room has been more popular historically in this field.
You will be seeking out particularly weak-willed and easily-led individuals to begin with. Do not think of it as preying upon them! It is altogether standard practice in this industry to approach when people are the most vulnerable emotionally, such as after the loss of a loved one, or when they are critically ill, and offer "support".
These candidates come in many shapes and forms. You can find them, for example, cheering along at multi-level marketing gatherings and acknowledging someone younger than them as their "Big Brother", sticking around in a group despite being clearly disrespected by everyone in it, and basically having a scared and beaten look in their eyes. You could of course try to poach such people from similar organizations as yours, but you may not be able to handle the fallout at the moment. Therefore, it is best to do your own recruitment initially.
These specimens will more often than not come from the lower echelons of society, partly as they have the least to lose, but mostly because the upper echelon didn't get there by being that spineless and dumb. Barring unexpected circumstances, your starter dogma should then be about how being poor and helpless is actually good and desirable, while being rich and strong is necessarily immoral.
Note: You do not have to practice what you preach at all. Feel free to flaunt your own soon-to-be-gotten wealth if it helps attracts new adherents. Lie low for awhile if you attract criticism, it then almost always blows over quickly.
Do not worry about the long-term consequences. Once your cult becomes significant enough, those in power will naturally approach you and offer a bargain, and you can retailor your message then. Most of the time, however, you will not be required to alter your teachings much, but merely command your underlings to obey the prevailing temporal order.
At every stage, you must remind yourself that you are actually doing these people a favour. You are offering such things as (incidental) friends, hope and the meaning of life, for such paltry trifles as their money and dignity. In addition, if you do make it big, they may even win their own small place in history as your original disciples, a distinction they would otherwise never have managed to achieve.
It is important to be brutally realistic about your position at all times. You can act nice like the big guys once your cult gets large enough, but not now. Internal discipline is paramount at this stage of your cult's development. Show no weakness and brook no dissent, lest you be usurped.
You should demand of your initial followers more than the industry standard, since they are by definition more gullible than the average cult member. For example, if the usual non-compulsory but highly-recommended subscription fee is ten to twenty percent of a member's earnings, you should insist on eighty percent or more. This will provide much-needed seed money for rapid expansion of your cult.
Do not however make the common mistake of exhorting members to sell all their belongings (usually in preparation for some end-of-world event), if you are in this business for the long haul. Quite apart from the loss of credibility, a dependable and recurring income stream is nowadays far superior than a one-time injection of funds, since growth momentum is harder to sustain in modern times.
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Me: "Stop, stop! Mr. Ham, this is simply horrible!"
Mr. Ham: "Says the oppressor of hamsters."
Me: "No, Mr. Ham. I am not joking. Don't even think about it. You may not be able to find your way back."
Mr. Ham: "Who do you think you are?"
Does this look like the face of a hamster who will care what you think?
Chapter III - Satisfying Basic Needs
It is often asked whether one can be an effective Cult Leader if one does not actually believe in what one says. Relax - all it takes is to be an actor, and not even a particularly good one.
Whether or not you as Cult Leader actually believe, what is actually important is that you retain at least an intuition about basic human psychology. Recall two of the most famous psychological experiments, the Stanford prison experiment and the Milgram experiment. In the first, well-adjusted and probably intelligent individuals became sadists within days of playing the role of prison guards, and in the second, two-thirds of everyday people administered fatal electric shocks to their fellow man if told to do so by (someone dressed as) a doctor.
Today, these experiments are considered unethical and may thus never be replicated, but to you as a Cult Leader, it should be obvious that they recur everyday, everywhere, and with far more inhumane treatment threatened.
Many, many people - perhaps the majority of mankind - are willing, and sometimes even eager, that everybody who does not belong to their in-group (or [usually reciprocal] affiliate groups) will burn forever and ever after they die (with even worse fates in store for those that actively question them). You might even be amazed to witness the percentage of people ready to state that the little old lady next door who never hurt a soul will be eternally fried for refusing to say certain magic words; at least she probably won't be accused of being a witch and proactively burnt at the stake nowadays.
Okay, actually the reality is not so dire. Possibly most of them don't actually believe that and get uneasy if asked directly, but nevertheless maintain their affiliation with organizations that hawk that as their official line. If one considers how they behave versus the actual requirements, it is hard to escape the conclusion that they don't really believe, or at most believe mostly what they want to believe (i.e. whatever sounds nice and is not too troublesome).
Why do they even bother updating their memberships without at least making an attempt to influence organizational policy, then? Quite a lot it may have to do with fear of the unknown and of being alone (and even eating alone), needs you as a Cult Leader will exploit.
Remember: People often don't actually want to be good, at least not as much as they want to be known to be good, and don't like thinking about what actually is good, especially if it goes against the opinion of their social circle. These are the subtle but critical observations that you will build your very own cult-empire upon.
Another common basic human need is to be the Chosen People. Put simply, about every culture that has ever existed has considered itself as the Really Special Ones for whom the rest of existence was created (with their deities often bearing an uncanny resemblance to themselves, and heavenly objects centered upon and rotating around them). They will seldom be disabused of this notion until a bigger and more powerful tribe comes along and beats the shit out of them before shoving a new set of gods down their throats.
As Cult Leader, even while exploiting the heck out of your followers, you shall keep their dreams alive. Whatever the reality, you must project the grandest of images! Never sell yourself short, and never pass up an opportunity to promote yourself. Follow the example of the old tribes - when one of their warchiefs managed to finally kill an "enemy" after ten minutes of frankly ugly and uninspired mud-wrestling, did you think that was what their scribes wrote?
"Atas, bastard second son of Kerigh our incontinent chief, struggled pitifully for a long time before Wuni, who was a really old man who just wanted Atas to keep off his lawn, finally dropped dead probably from overexertion?"
Nah, it would probably be recorded as:
"Atas, second-born of Kerigh Unconquered, Star of the North, Light of Lords, smote barbarian half-ogre Wunmanti the Evil, demon-worshipper, eater of babies, who stood ten feet tall, with one earth-shattering blow from his pinky finger, creating the River Glendale, from thence which all blessings flow."
And after a few more retellings, especially if one-upping neighbouring tribes, Atas would become born of a goddess and crap rainbows out of his ass. But hey, it's written down, why would they lie? Obviously it was all true! Remember, aspiring Cult Leader - if the ancients could do it, so can you!
Chapter IV - Law And Ritual
Every ambitious cult requires convincing divine texts, and yours is no exception. While creating a full holy canon may seem like a momentous task, it is, again, easier than most expect.
First off, you should recognize that most of your followers, even the most brainwashed ones, will never actually read the majority of the stuff you make up. Feel free to borrow bits and pieces, heck, whole passages, from whatever is available - they likely did the same themselves. Do not provide citations. There are only so many variations of the basic plotlines, after all. Some are almost even obligatory, such as the birth myths - virgins, gemstones, ordinary stones, foreheads, sea-foam, themselves... it has all been done before. Be creative!
The Form of the Writing is also of Great Importance. Strive to Provide the Impression of Age and the Weight of Years. Sprinkle Capital Letters LIBERALLY. Thou Doest Useth Of Archaic Expressions And Convoluted Pompous Style Wheneverest Possibleth. Apparenth Mistakeths Mayest Be Ascribed To Imperfect Translation And Areth Useful Whence Adjustments In Directionths Arest Advisable.
Don't worry about whether the stories you make up are too fanciful; long experience has shown that followers can be made to swallow and defend anything, no matter how implausible. Classics like flying demon swine and sneaky desert djinn are tame by today's standards. Do not let a failure of the imagination be the downfall of your cult! Come up with something completely randomly outlandish, like aliens transporting billions of people to volcanoes in DC-8 aeroplanes and then hydrogen bombing them. If you need help in brainstorming, approach the nearest preschool for old essays.
It was traditional for the central tenets to be received in physical form straight from the Higher Authority. This has however proven to be troublesome in recent centuries, and longhand on paper, or parchment if you can obtain it, is perfectly acceptable these days. Do not be concerned about lousy penmanship; sufficiently bad handwriting gives the impression of being mystical, and moreover is once again useful when you want to hedge your bets, and will provide ample material for future scholars of your cult to study.
If you are feeling especially productive and have the time to burn, consider scribbling everything down in some ancient and mostly-forgotten language, and then insist that the true meaning of what you wrote can only be understood in the original. This helps prevent pesky lower-level followers from accessing the source and trying to be clever.
Your cult should maintain at least some minimal moral standards, even if you don't care about that, because they will be helpful in cult management - an organization full of open assholes is very hard to steer. Therefore, be sure to feature principles like Don't Murder And Don't Steal From People (Unless We Say So) prominently, but you must frame them in a way that suggests that you were the first one to think of them in all of recorded history, and only those belonging to your cult may possess them. For example, reference them as such: "Humility is one of the most important Cultian virtues."
Along with the obvious moral values that are held even by the local fauna, feel free to mix in assorted proscriptions, as many of them as you can find. The idea is to have so many ridiculous rules that it is humanly (and when there are logical contradictions, even godly) impossible to obey all of them.
All cult members (possibly excluding yourself) will then always be in the wrong somewhere, and you can enforce punishments and pile on the guilt whenever it suits you (see also: Chinese Legalism, where it was at least possible to keep to the law with some effort). Whether or not you wish to stack their ancestors' real or imagined wrongs atop their own is a matter of preference. Do not be afraid to make up new rules on the spot and use "莫须有" charges, but only if strictly necessary. You should almost never have to resort to this as long as you have a quick mind - just reinterpret an existing vague verse.
Demand as much obedience as you can wheedle out of your followers. Recall their innermost needs. In the rare case where a follower shows signs of developing independent thought, encourage those closest to him within your cult to persuade him out of it. If that fails, make an example of him. Nowadays, it is risky to attempt physical punishments, unlike in the good old days, but feel free to exert massive psychological pressure - ostracization, shunning or even exile from your cult-community. Remind him that he will lose all his friends if that happens. Always make him feel that it was all his fault for daring to question to begin with.
The effectiveness of such tactics is multiplied if one of the conditions for cult membership is to renounce all other ties, including with his biological family if necessary, and recognize the cult as his new and only kin. This will make his isolation from the outside world total, and the follower will become absolutely dependent on the cult, and by extension, you.
If nobody does anything against your wishes, but you still feel a need to reassert your authority, find some weak minority to bully. Some groups who have often borne this burden are albinos, dark-skinned people, left-handed people, red-haired people, homosexuals... pick whatever is most convenient at the moment.
Basically, especially as a fledgling cult, you must never let your followers feel truly secure. Leave them perpetually off guard, not knowing what to expect. Praise them and promise them abiding love in one breath, then belittle them as less than the dust and unworthy sinners in the next. Provide them the emotional rollercoaster that they so crave.
In the beginning, you should strive to live with your followers and have them constantly under your thumb, but this will be impractical as your cult expands. When that happens, you will have to set up a hierarchy, and schedule meetings every so often, ideally at least once a week.
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Me: "Dang you, Mr. Ham! I can't let you do this!"
Mr. Ham: "Try to stop me."
You better be quick about it, or I will issue an edict against your ass
Chapter V - Music, Magic And Miracles
Standard practice, after the first early wave of quasi-mendicant sanctimony, is to ornament your cult so as to attract the next, slightly less gullible tier of followers. One route is through architecture, with your new structures clad with ever more exotic materials. You can't go wrong with marble, but feel free to experiment with space-age metals. It is rather more difficult to recruit the truly top artists and musicians to your service than yesteryear, since they can sell their work profitably to the general public now, and you should consider covering old hits if resources are tight.
In particular, you should resist attempting to expand your cult on the basis of homebrewed tunes. As mentioned in the introduction, if you truly had that talent, it would be far more straightforward to do well in a national singing contest and embark upon a musical career, instead of becoming a Cult Leader. Your original crop of loyalists might applaud you if you farted in rhythm, but if you're aiming for the big leagues, you have to attain a certain level of professionalism.
Pay for an inspiring logo - the simplest and most striking ones have unfortunately mostly long been trademarked. Display it, and the rest of your icons, high up in your gathering hall, which should be as large as possible to generate awe and host your growing following. Mocking competitors for bowing to inanimate objects as idols every now and then is a nice touch, though be careful not to be on the record when you say that.
You may be concerned at the irony of such a statement, often delivered after your own followers have prostrated themselves before similarly inanimate objects, often of a reasonably similar shape. Do not worry - if they have stuck with you thus far, it proves that their sense of objectivity is completely shot, and in any case, your inanimate objects are different - they are filled with the true divine essence and/or are used only as abstract representations of an ideal, totally unlike all other inanimate objects displayed by all other cults.
Buttress belief through judiciously-employed magic tricks, i.e. miracles. Read up on stage magic and have a trusted accomplice join the local magicians' chapter if possible. Very soon, you too will be able to produce holy ash from your bare hands on command! However, remember that less is often more, and don't go overboard with the flashy moves - you don't want to depend overly on them, and as any good professional magician will tell you, the presentation is often more important than the actual effect.
It is still useful to have a basic repertoire on hand just in case; you can spontaneously levitate a few inches off the ground before your most simple-minded followers with no gear and a bit of practice, and have them spread the word. If you prefer the dramatic, a hidden wire can be installed. It is incredible how you can appear to be walking on (planks submerged below) water when the water is murky enough, especially when surrounded by your own people who are fully expecting you to do just that!
You may use the techniques described at the end of Chapter IV if anyone spots anything out of the ordinary, but traditionally any dissenting voices are automatically beaten to death by the rest of your loyal followers without you saying anything; the slightly smarter ones who saw any slips tend to keep their silence after that, and well, memory is malleable.
But the most powerful demonstrations counterintuitively require no effort at all on your part. Never pass up an opportunity to suggest that a natural disaster happened because the victims were wicked (i.e. do not belong to your cult). As before, do not write it down, so you have plausible deniability - just say you were misquoted if the media arrives, unless you wish to adjust the composition of your followers. It goes without saying that if lightning or some other misfortune strikes and burns down one of your own buildings, it is Heaven's way of regaling your followers with proof of its majesty and the correctness of your ways, and requesting an even bigger and grander one to be rebuilt on the same site for the glory of the Almighty.
At no point be concerned with who the actual gods, if they even exist, may support - if they actually bothered about smiting heretics, given the profusion of faiths and creeds, the sky would never be clear, and the land be perpetually awash in lightning. Make the usual excuses, and to further compensate, you can invent more and more perverse tortures in the afterlife for unbelievers. Consider reading H.P. Lovecraft for additional ideas.
Keep up with modern science, but forbid or at the least strongly discourage your followers from educating themselves in these areas; subjects like business and finance are obviously welcome for them. Unfortunately, solar eclipses have become too much of common knowledge, so you will probably not be able to claim to have stopped the Sun. Despite that, be on the lookout for rare miracle opportunities, such as rivers suddenly flowing backwards (due to entirely natural and calculable causes) and even pretty butterflies emerging from cocoons all at the same time. The only limit is your imagination.
In general, ascribe everything good to the cult and yourself, and everything bad to others. As an example, if a follower gets sick, visits a doctor and is healed, it is purely because of the righteousness of the cult's beliefs. If he dies, it only shows his lack of faith and how worthless secular devil-science is. You will get the hang of this very quickly.
Chapter VI - Women
The fairer sex deserves a chapter all to themselves, if only because they have been observed to be especially suspectible to standard cult-building strategies. Also, it is time-honoured tradition for Cult Leaders to have plenty of wives, or at least girlfriends. If you are a guy, this is probably one of the major reasons why you were drawn to this endeavour in the first place.
The sort of girl you're looking for is the submissive sort. Restrict their rights, and most importantly forbid them from speaking up during gatherings. Make it clear that they are to defer to men whenever possible. If the media visits, spout some meaningless and illogical excuses and revert to the status quo immediately after. No worries.
Your (prettier) girls will be one of your most important resources. They will be able to attract and favourably dispose many suitors towards your cult. Even if you are unable to ensnare and keep all of them in the fold, this will still help boost your membership appreciably.
It is thus of utmost importance that you forbid female followers from marrying out of the cult. Their husbands will most probably be able to see through your bullshit, and have enough influence over her to turn her away from you, and in the worst case actually show up to beat you up, which can be bad for your reputation. Even dating outside the cult should be strongly discouraged - you want to give your male followers, who tend to be slightly more (if still not very) rational, some additional reward for toeing the line.
Conclusion - Success! Now What?
If you have followed the previous chapters faithfully, and not attracted too much negative attention, you should have built up a substantial membership within a relatively short span of time. If you are unable to gather at least three disciples within the first week to form the nucleus of your cult, we will supply you with a deeply disturbed starter individual while stocks last.
Good milestones to aim for are one hundred followers in a year, and a thousand in five years, although you can have a very enjoyable Cult Leader experience with far fewer. Once you have about a thousand souls under your wing and at least one building that can contain at least a quarter of them at one go, it is time to think very carefully about your future plans.
At this point, you effectively have a small but near-fanatical army, whom you can refer to their faces as livestock and get to agree that killing their own kids on divine command is at least possibly right, at your disposal.
You might wish to keep your cult small and cosy, and live a comfortable if not especially famous life. This is actually an extremely sensible path to take - many quite sustainable cults have crumbled after their leaders overextended themselves beyond their abilities. If this is so, you should be reasonably content with a few wives and a relaxed schedule, and spend your later years grooming a heir to take over the reins.
Of course, you might alternatively desire to stake your place in history. Be forewarned that this can be a treacherous road to take - you will be up against vicious opponents who have survived hundreds, sometimes thousands, of years, most of those far more unforgiving than the present day.
You can try to strike out on your own, but be aware that at your size, further expansion will inevitably encroach upon some incumbent, and you stand little chance if denounced en masse. It is usually safer to meld your cult's ideals with those of an existing doctrine, at least for now. Update your cult's name with your new affiliations and adopt some of their customs and festivals if required, but do not trust your new allies beyond what is absolutely necessary. All of you are after the same thing, which is absolute domination.
In practice, cults will splinter (and re-splinter) long before that stage, as sub-leaders at various levels in the hierarchy begin to consider their own interests. This tendency is theorized to be unavoidable, since cults of significant size must either employ a certain number of people in-the-know much like yourself to keep the machinery going, or collapse under its own density (in all senses of the word). The best that can be hoped for is for the faction you personally command to tie up with the state. This will ensure your organization longevity far beyond the norm, with your successors crowning royalty, and the nobility in return protecting and sustaining them.
How long can you expect to hold out for? Dictators and emperors have predicted their kingdoms to last for anywhere from a thousand to ten thousand years, but none have come close. Although you probably have a better chance, you are unlikely to make it either, even if everything goes perfectly. If you use a dynasty as an analogy to your cult, as is probably the proper comparism, a few hundred years would be a good run. You could of course define successive dynasties to have a common character and thereby claim an extremely long lineage, if that be your fancy. Whether that is accurate is another thing altogether. But fear not, your posterity is assured, for a couple of centuries at least.
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Me: "Can't you see? This is pure, unadulterated evil! How could you build an organization that treats others this way?"
Mr. Ham: "I never considered myself a good ham."
*turns and leaves*
[To be continued...]
Next: Text Without Words
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