We are sorry to inform you that you are in a cult

To draw an analogy, if a street gang gets big enough and controls enough territory, is it a government?

The obvious follow up question is that if these phenomena only differ in size of membership, what makes one "legitimate" and the other not? Is there such a thing as a legitimate government and a legitimate religion, or are they all just another level of street gangs and cults?

For governments anyway we have an answer. Sure at some level the organization of hard force in the form of police is subject to the same practical considerations and constraints as the organization of hard force in the form of a gang, and will thus take a superficially similar form, but a gang does not give you a day in court nor does it set up a system of fair and impartial trials nor does it let you vote on its rules. A gang is fundamentally self serving. It exists for the enrichment of itself at the expense of those outside of it. A democracy, in contrast, directly contradicts the premise "the leader is above the law." So there is such a thing as a "legitimate government".

Existence and uniqueness of "legitimate religion" is left as an exercise for the reader.

(btw Trumpism is absolutely a cult. Just look at it, they had to invent the word "Trumpism" to describe the phenomena because it did not fit any other defined political philosophy and the only constant non-contradictory belief it has is loyalty to Trump himself. Seriously, try defining Trumpism in some way other than "agreeing with what Trump says no matter what." Its impossible. That's a cult.)

Maybe not all the rugged individualists survived, but quite likely a few wandering souls travelled far away from their original homes, and got to see different places and experience different things.

I think that if you try to compress the information too much, it becomes too abstract and meaningless. Your local library also distinguishes between members and non-members, but it doesn't imply that they slander the former members, or are paranoid about people who buy their own books. Social control can be achieved by different ways; for some reason it seems important that cults use shame as a specific psychological tool. Many cults would strongly object against the words that "truth is a social construct", despite the fact that they use it exactly that way.

There is a social mechanism that seems unusually successful at hacking human brains. It has probably been reinvented many times independently by various abusive people, but some people also copy some behaviors from their previous groups. Lists like this are attempts to describe the mechanism. The individual points are not independent things, but parts of a complex whole, reinforcing each other. For example, it is easier for the group to shame you, after they have convinced you that all your achievements outside the group are worthless. And it is easier to convince you that everything outside the group is worthless, if they falsely exaggerate the value of the group, and then apply black-and-white thinking (our group is miraculous, the world outside is not, therefore the world outside is worthless). Black-and-white thinking comes easier if they convince you that the teachings are super important, so it is important to get them absolutely right. Etc.

> See it as a kind of philosophy embedded in a story (mythology)

This is tricky. You are sort of making an acknowledgement of the power of Christianity to shape culture without requiring a firm belief in its supernatural truth claims. I just don't think you can recover the one without the other. The fruits of a Christian culture were grown over many generations by people who knew that God is real and present in their lives. I for one find it quite difficult to sacrifice for a mere symbol or just a good long term cultural outcome.

> Now is there a ’God’ up there, I don’t know?

Why are you skeptical? As an atheist (or in between atheist) who can present such a clear eyed and charitable view of Christian communities, where do your current doubts stem from?

I discovered to my surprise the logic, usefulness and truth in our stories through Jordan Peterson biblical lectures. But now through the explanation of Jonathan Pageau and some reading of the bible it seem I can go a bit further.

I am trying to communicate what I now understand to other fellow atheist that there is value in our foundational stories, I see that it’s the foundation of our culture and that as christianity fade our culture is crumbling.

I don’t know exactly what I believe at this point, I am trying to move forward, use the bible as a guide, it’s hard to communicate my way of seeing to atheist or religious people. Saying that those are story is a reduction of the truth. I don’t have better words to communicate exactly how I think.

I can see the same pattern with scientific thinking, we have a model (plants use sun human eat things) and we confuse our mental model for reality until we discover that our pattern is reductive (we use UV to make vitamin D and infrared to keep inflammation under control (recent discovery))

So I think those who believe completely are also immunized against a kind of scientific totalitarianism, the idea that we know completely, it’s very seductive as it save us to expend mental energy.

I am also seeing more way to understand the bible, the catholic way: simplified, don’t read the bible, we will do it for you, protestant: communities with each their own flavor but against a central authority and now orthodox who seem to see it more as a patterns, as path to emulate, to become god ourself or at least try, than actual physical truth, truth on another level.

What do you think, what is your perspective?