by Michael Bluejay • Last update: April 2022
Mind-control cults are pretty amazingly similar. The doctrines are different, but they way they practice their mind control is the same. For example, they all typically cut members off from their families, because family might convince the members to leave. Here are some comparisons between two well-known cults and Aesthetic Realism.
| Cult groups compared | |||
| Scientology |
Heaven’s
Gate |
Aesthetic
Realism |
|
| Belief in the
supremacy of their founder |
Yes (L. Ron
Hubbard) |
Yes
(Marshall Applewhite) |
Yes (Eli
Siegel. Members think Siegel was "the most important
person ever to live.") |
| Belief that
they had/have the most important knowledge in the world |
Yes
(Members think the leader's writings are "the most important
breakthroughs in Man's history".) (source) |
Yes
(Heavens Gate thought they knew "the only chance to survive"
for humanity.) (source) |
Yes
("Aesthetic Realism is the birthright of every human being and
studying it is the best thing that can happen to anyone." ) (source) |
| Suicides |
Yes (samples) |
Yes
(The entire group killed themselves in 1997.) |
Yes
The founder and at least three
others took their lives. |
| Leaders left
the group and admitted it's a cult |
Yes (samples) |
(They all killed themselves before they could get large enough or last long enough for any leaders to leave.) |
Yes
(see accounts here and here) |
| Group tries to
discredit former members who now say the group is a cult |
Yes
(From the Village
Voice: "Predictably, Scientology is hitting back by
trying to smear the two [former members, now critics]. If they
were once the most trusted, most powerful members of the
church, now suddenly they are lunatic losers who can't be
trusted." And see "The Ramifications of Leaving
Scientology" video
from CNN.) |
Yes
(From one of the group's websites: "So much for the stupid
lying of Mali, Bluejay and the other liars.... Why is he doing
this? Feeling himself to be a failure in his own life, and
joining with others also seeking revenge for essentially the
same reason--notably Adam Mali--Michael Bluejay seeks the
triumph of making himself important by looking down upon
others. He is attempting to assuage his feeling of
unimportance by attacking the persons and philosophy he very
well realizes best represent truth and beauty.")
(source) |
|
| Paranoid
feelings of persecution |
Yes
(From a former member: "L. Ron Hubbard was quite
paranoid. He believed that pretty much everyone was
working against him. This belief is built into the core
of Scientology...From the very early 1950's Hubbard told
stories about this conspiracy.") source
|
(unknown) |
Yes
(From the NY
Times magazine: "Siegel and his followers believe that
only a conspiracy of silence by the press has kept Aesthetic
Realism from sweeping the world." From an AR
ad: "In keeping Aesthetic Realism from you, the American
press has committed a crime against humanity as much as if it
deliberately kept from starving people the news that the food
they needed was available for them.") |
| Members cut off from
family |
Yes (A former
member quoted by ABC
News: "I was even about to get on a plane [to go see my
parents], and I just got pulled into a room [by the cult
leaders] and screamed at.") |
Yes ("To be eligible for membership in the Next Level, humans would have to shred every attachment to the planet. These included things Bonnie and herff had given up: friends, families, jobs, possessions, and sex.") (Cults: Religion & Violence) | Yes ("I didn't see my parents for 15 years, and I thought nothing of it. I used to plan trips to go home, and all the cult members would get around you and talk you out of it. My parents would be so heartbroken when I canceled at the 11th hour.") (former member quoted in Jewish Times) |
| Former members shunned |
Yes ("If you leave
without permission, they declare you a suppressive person and
they make your family and anyone who knows you in Scientology
disconnect from you.") (source) |
(unknown) |
Yes "My parents had told me that, if I left, it would be the end of our relationship. They remained true to their word." (source) • "it is almost impossible to describe how filthy, disgusting, degenerate, and depraved we saw anyone who left Aesthetic Realism as being. Take all the worst people throughout history you can think of, roll them into one, and you have what we were conditioned to think of people who left." (source) |
| Denounces psychiatry |
Yes ("The Church of Scientology's war on psychiatry is no joke. For decades, Scientologists have maintained that the very notion of mental illness is a fraud. They base this belief on the views of Scientology founder L. Ron Hubbard, who proclaimed that psychiatry was an evil enterprise, a form of terrorism, and the cause of crime. Now, they're attempting to enshrine their contempt for psychiatry in laws across the country.") (Salon) | (probably didn't have a
position on it) |
Yes (The group's
current leader, talking about the group's alleged cure for
homosexuality: "We are not psychiatrists; psychiatry has
essentially failed. People who go to psychiatrists don’t
change. They don’t get better.") (source) |
| Widely branded
as a cult |
Yes
(As though you need examples, TIME magazine called them "A
cult of greed.") |
Yes (e.g.,
by CNN) |
Yes
(NY Magazine called them "a cult of messianic nothingness" and
Harpers called them "the Moonies of poetry". Steve
Hassan, one of the best-known experts on cult mind control"I
think that [Siegel] was a cult leader, and that like many
other cult leaders, he had a narcissistic personality and was
a control freak.") (source) |