If you were drowning and someone reached out their hand to help you, would you accept it? If your answer is yes, there’s a strong possibility you’re likely to join a cult. At least, that’s according to J.W. Ocker in his new book Cult Following: The Extreme Sects That Capture Our Imaginations – and Take Over Our Lives (Quirk Books, 2024). Ocker is the Edgar Award-winning author of Cursed Objects (2020) and The United States of Cryptids (2022), both of which take a lighthearted but highly informative look at a pair of well-known paranormal phenomena, from a folkloric perspective.
Cult Following also demonstrates the depth of Ocker’s knowledge of the more outré aspects of human belief, but despite bearing superficial similarities in cover design and formatting to Ocker’s previous two books, the reality of the subject matter makes Cult Following distinct. Curses and cryptids are phenomena that, most likely, only occur in the minds of those who believe in them. And while much of what transpires inside cults is also only in the minds of their devotees, the rest is all too real. This is a book that deals with real organizations, made up of real people, who often suffer real emotional, mental, and physical harm, and, in the worst case scenarios, end up losing their lives.
Because of the gravity of the topic, Cult Following is a much more sober (and sobering) read. Gone are Derek Quinlan’s creepily cute illustrations and the tongue-in-cheek info graphics in Cursed Objects and Cryptids. Rather, Cult Following is 267 pages of solid text, in which Ocker examines 30 different cults, the majority of which have seen their followers manipulated, exploited, abused, and murdered.
All of which necessitates that Ocker walk a pretty narrow tightrope, balancing his usual conversational style and sardonic sense of humor with the real-life cases of human trauma and tragedy that constitute so much of this book. A good rule of thumb is that the more benign the cult under examination – like the French free-love UFO cult the Raelians – the more of Ocker’s humor is likely to come through. Such organizations are few and far between here, though, and those lacking a strong constitution or possessing a weak stomach may want to avoid this book. If the true crime genre and descriptions of torture aren’t for you, then Cult Following is definitely something to skip.
Which is not to criticize Cult Following as a work of cheap sensationalism. Ocker’s sincere desire to write a serious yet accessible book about a difficult topic begins on the first page, with a critique of his own title. After all, religious studies scholars and journalists who report on these topics abandoned the word “cult” long ago, considering it overly vague, arbitrarily applied, and clearly pejorative. Scholars have instead taken to calling such groups “New Religious Movements,” while sympathetic reporters prefer terms like “minority religions.”
Ocker acknowledges both the correctness of this language and adopts it himself throughout much of Cult Following, but he also still makes use of the “C-word,” for two reasons. One is that a book called “New Religious Movements” would never sell. Secondly, Ocker worries about predatory organizations – like the ones he’s interested in – hiding behind such benign labels. Some groups, Ocker argues, rightfully deserve the ominous appellation of “cult.”
At the same time, Ocker continually reminds readers that cults are often just fledgling religions. Mainstream religions like Islam have killed thousands of people in holy wars, and august bodies like the Catholic Church have been implicated in multiple sexual abuse cases. Such scandals would spell the end of any cult, but for major religions constitute only a brief public relations mishap, or the work of a few wayward “extremists.” In other words, sometimes the only thing that distinguishes mainstream religions from cults is that the former have become too big to fail.
There are a few cults where even this rule is not as ironclad as you might think. Take for example the Branch Davidians, the Seventh Day Adventist splinter sect headed up by self-proclaimed messiah David Koresh. Though most people only know of the Branch Davidians from their dramatic 51-day standoff with the ATF and FBI in 1993, which resulted in the deaths of 75 acolytes, the movement persists to this day and is now divided between members who still believe that Koresh was the messiah, and those who’ve attempted to distance themselves from Koresh while still adhering to the group’s core teachings.
Or consider the Japanese doomsday cult-turned-terrorist organization Aum Shinrikyo. They were granted tax exempt status in 1988, making it an official religion in the eyes of the Japanese government, the same year that its members assassinated a lawyer who was planning to bring a civil liability suit against them. Like the Branch Davidians, Aum Shinrikyo is still around, even after carrying out a 1995 domestic terrorist attack in Tokyo that killed 13 and injured 5,000. That probably says something about the role of “cognitive dissonance” in cults, an idea developed by psychologist Leon Festinger while studying The Seekers, another largely benign UFO cult.
Ocker also works to debunk some persistent misconceptions, including the idea there are surreptitious Satanic cults lurking about. In reality, the closest one gets to this fantasy is Aleister Crowley’s Ordo Templi Orientist, which promised its members esoteric secrets but seemed to mostly just fleece them for cash to fuel Crowley’s debilitating drug habit. Or the Mexican drug cartel Los Narcosatánicos, whose members were inspired by the 1987 movie The Believers to incorporate human sacrifices into their gang initiations.
Perhaps the most important misconception tackled in Cult Following is that those who join cults tend to be “brainwashed,” an idea for which, Ocker says, no “medical or psychological evidence” exists. Rather than being more naïve or less rational than other people, the common denominator which united cultists is the desire for community – the same impulse which leads people to join mainstream religions, or become sports fanatics, or Swifties – coupled with a feeling of helplessness.
Which brings us back to Ocker’s hypothetical about drowning. Most people who become ensnared by a cult end up that way because in a moment of need, it was the cult that was there to lend a hand. It’s this basic human need for help, Ocker concludes, which simultaneously makes “joining a cult one of the most human things a person can do” and “probably the scariest thing about them.”
Every February, to help celebrate Darwin Day, the Science section of AIPT cranks up the critical thinking for SKEPTICISM MONTH! Skepticism is an approach to evaluating claims that emphasizes evidence and applies the tools of science. All month we’ll be highlighting skepticism in pop culture, and skepticism *OF* pop culture.
AIPT Science is co-presented by AIPT and the New York City Skeptics.
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