--- In [email protected], "salyavin808" <fintlewoodlewix@...> wrote: > > *Cult: a religion without political influence. Tom Wolfe.
Love this. Tom always had a way with words. TM (unlike Catholicism, Judaism, and Hinduism in India) never had any political influence, so they went instead for "celebrity influence," courting famous people and trying to use *their* names and images to sell its products. As for cults, my definition tends more towards, "A cult is any organization in which its members perceive any criticism of the organization as criticism of them per- sonally, or even as an 'attack' against them personally, and then react angrily to that criticism." This would hold true IMO for spiritual organizations, corporations, political parties, whatever. It's the *behavior* that defines cultism, not the nature of the org. It's the overidentification with the group and the over- reaction to criticism that does it for me, and that defines a group as a cult and its members as cultists. That and certain classically cult behavioral patterns like playing "shoot the messenger" and attacking the critic while ignoring the criticisms. By that standard, there are a few people on FFL who are definitely cultists. There are also some TM practitioners on this forum who are not, but we rarely hear from them. Mainly it's the cultists who feel the need to follow up any criticism with samskaric attachment/aversion behavior and attack the critics. Whatever floats their boats, I guess. I just don't understand how they believe that they're presenting a positive view of the organization they're "protecting" or the technique it sells. If simple criticism can push their buttons this badly after 30-40 years of practicing it, then the technique really doesn't do much of anything useful at all, does it?
