I wrote about loving MLM content last week, and it will probably surprise no one to learn that I also love culty content. MLM content is culty content! I don’t love culty stuff because I get off on human suffering, but because I’m endlessly curious about human desire. How does what we want (community, love, acceptance, purpose, spirituality) lead us to both the best and worst humanity has to offer? Which cultish stuff am I drawn to personally? What can culty stories reveal about psychology, cultural constructs, and the constraints of contemporary life? And yes, learning about the messy downfall of a group empowered by preying on folks at their most vulnerable . . . is narratively satisfying!
Some of this stuff is Culty with a capital C (The Vow!!!!) and some of this stuff is culty with a lowercase c (there’s no evil mastermind , for example, in Ghost Church, but there ARE scammy 19th century parlor tricks involving ghostly “ectoplasm” spewing forth from various bodily orifices).
Culty stuff I love and recommend: