Tell me you don't know what a cult is...

[Seethlaw]

... without telling me you don't know what a cult is.

I grew up in a cult-ish church. It had some very unpleasant aspects to it indeed. The very concept of the GC movement as a cult utterly baffles me, and irritates me quite a bit, I must admit.

Where is our Leader? Some say JKR is that, even though she obviously didn't create the movement, since she joined it after it already existed. Okay, but then where is the cult of personality? Where is the hanging onto her every word? Where is the compulsory study of her life? Where is the regular and compulsory show of support of her as our leader?

What are the specific beliefs that random people outside the movement don't believe? "Men can't become women and vice versa" is not such a belief, since loads of people who would never call themselves GC also believe it. So what are our specific beliefs?

What is the rite of entry into the movement? How does one know that they themselves or someone else is a member of the movement?

Where are the big gatherings where the leaders speak The Word? Where are the regular gatherings where the members reinforce each other's beliefs?

What are the demands made of the members? Where are the compulsory meetings? Where are the financial requirements? Where are the specific behaviours we have to adhere to?

Where are the punishments for leaving the group? How do you even know you've left at all? And where are the stories of abuse and control told by the former members?

I could go on forever.

Accusing GC people of belonging to a cult is just as ridiculous and offensive as claiming, for example, that there's a trans genocide going on. It's deliberately appropriating the real suffering of other people to make a completely false and unsupportable point because there's no actual valid point to make. It's utterly reprehensible and shameful.

Im going to start replying in limericks. I dont want to be accused of being predictable.

I’m always glad when the gaslighting is dropped though and posters are honest about their biases.

People who are on the board don't respond to all threads. Not a difficult concept for you to grasp, I wouldn't have thought.

(It's also probably worth repeating that the example given in the post to which you responded "well said" completely misrepresented the position of the poster who started the current thread regarding a boycott. Which is odd, considering there are apparently so many other examples of 'fanaticism' that could have been used)

Hahahahahaaaa very funny.

Yours, a slavish devotee of JKR

Not only that, but they use cliches popular words and phrases culled from pop psychology - no doubt beefed up by an AI on their behalf.

They're just such incredible truth tellers, these posters, courageously venturing into the feminist board of Mumsnet to lurk and seethe quietly until they can bear the reality-based opinions no longer and must bravely speak up. I’m sure when they’re not here their time is equally devoted to challenging TRA posters on Reddit or BlueSky for their extremism. Absolutely a dead cert.

"Y company's policy says trans people are welcome to use the bathroom they identify with" [...] This has fuck all to do with protecting women and girls

The nice and reasonable 'moderate' mask didn't take long to slip did it?
Or do you simply have no clue about the basic rules of safeguarding?
Let alone a respect for women's right to privacy and dignity (and when I say women I of course mean the biological female kind).

It can also be one or the other, a group of people deciding to boycott a company isn't the result of cult-like behaviour, not if they have clear and concise reasons for it.

This has fuck all to do with protecting women and girls and everything to do with a single member of the cult calling out something they know full well the cult will disagree with, then the cult directing its hatred accordingly. It's as pathetic as it is mentally unhealthy for the people engaging in it.

This part of your post, that came right after it, on the other hand has no rationality except to be seen as conflating consume activism with cult-like behaviour.

The company is refusing to abide by the law so has everything to do with protecting women and girls.

Yep. And certain cluster B personality disorders which are overrepresented in that cohort.

This'll be good.

That you're confused by my post is not in question.
That you descended very quickly from confusion to opposition then to outright condemnation says a great deal. Not only about the very thing I was referring to, but also - rather neatly - to the thread question of cultlike behaviour.

That you don't, even now, realise you're doing it only further illustrates my point.

I also think in their more unhinged supporters as well.

to place them in grave danger of violence by relentlessly vilifying them, are the reasons for the phrase trans genocide

Does this look like a genocide?

@KinderOfKinder

when presented with a lengthy post your response was to rigidly fixate on one fragment of one sentence and to take what was, I think, very clearly an expression as literal,

If the board is as full as you suggest with disparaging descriptions of transpeople and their supporters, why not use one of those descriptions, rather than making up one of your own?

To clear up the strawman right away, no one is saying that holding GC views automatically makes someone a cult member or that this forum specifically is Jonestown, but that there is a clear, vocal subset of online GC spaces that has devolved into textbook high control behavior

• Who is our leader? The test of HC thinking isn't whether you worship one person, but what happens if you criticize key figures or main stage influencers. If questioning the strategy, or actions of prominent movement figures leads to immediate dogpiling and accusations of betrayal, you are in a cult of personality ecosystem, just a distributed one.

• What are the specific beliefs outside people don't believe?

Many many people don't believe it's possible to change sex and there is where GC beliefs are based on reality. However people who haven't gone down a time suck of internet forums, twitter etc aren't dogmatic that every trans person is AGP, that rapid onset gender dysphoria is catching, or that online extremists or TRAs represent every single person who holds different views on gender.

-Doctrinal purity and black and white thinking. Reports aren't treated as nuanced, empirical papers to be debated they become treated like sacred scripture. Look no further than how the Cass Review was discussed on here. When a report supports the group narrative, it its infallible, sacred text that was going to change everything and its author as a literal savior which is then hard to rationalise with the puberty blocker trial because so much assumptions were made about Cass' intentions rather than reading her report with an open mind. I mean, the fact you yourself have to say "Because at this point, she's not leaving much mental room for any other option but the two extremes: either she's fully bought into the trans madness, and she's full on fighting against it in her own, unconventional way." Shows some really dogmatic thinking. why does it need to be either of these very black and white options?

• What Is the rite of entry? Well it doesn't help that people have started to describe peaking in the way of religious testimonials which combined with asking members to share these "peak" moments can act as a rite of entry into the group, proving ideological alignment and building immediate trauma bonding camaraderie.

• Where are the punishments for leaving or ex-member stories? I think you're asking this as though you're talking about a physical space but ideological online spaces have punishments too whether it's for leaving or being an outsider which could include dog piling, specific in-group language insults such as referring to women as handmaidens, dick panderers, captured or character assassination such as saying someone supports child abuse because they aren't publicly GC enough.

The Realitis most high-demand groups start with a premise that seems reasonable or mainstream. The "cult-like" shift happens when...
-The worldview becomes totalizing (every single social issue, news event, and interpersonal interaction is viewed strictly through one lens).
-The group adopts black-and-white thinking (you are either 100% with us, or you are an enemy/traitor. Language becomes weaponized through specific jargon, shibboleths, and thought terminating cliches designed to shut down internal debate.excommunication, dogpiling, and character assassination.

Your other questions are very specific to in person compound sort of cults which isn't what anyone is implying. Most high-demand groups start with a premise that seems reasonable or mainstream. The "cult-like" shift happens when the worldview becomes totalizing,every single social issue, news event, and interpersonal interaction is viewed strictly through one lens. The group adopts black-and-white thinking where you are either 100% with us, or you are an enemy/traitor and language becomes weaponized through specific jargon, shibboleths, and thought-terminating clichés designed to shut down internal debate.

That's not to say GC beliefs in themselves are cultish or that any forum or online space is 100% cultish. The behaviours can show up anywhere but there are some people on here and X who have fallen into the totalizing mindset described above where they cannot maintain relationships with loved ones, they view every news story with a suspicion of having a connection to trans, and feel extremely untrusting of anyone with a different belief to them to the point not sharing the belief overrides any other expertise or qualifications the person has. These are all common side effects of any radicalisation and if you're engaging on an issue predominantly online it's much easier to be radicalised and being completely totally focused on one issue. There is a massive blind spot of people acting as though it is fundamentally impossible for anyone in this movement to be radicalised when the reality is that anyone can fall down an internet rabbit hole whether it’s about fitness, politics, wellness, religion, or social issues. Believing that your core premise is grounded in reality doesn't make you magically immune to algorithmic outrage.

Finally, the outrage in this post speaks volumes. Making an entire second thread, declaring that pointing out group dynamics is "utterly reprehensible, shameful, and offensive," is an extreme emotional reaction for something you find so untrue it's absurd. In high control environments, systemic self-criticism is usually strictly forbidden. The fact that simply pointing out high control tendencies, which can occur in most movements, has gotten so deeply your skin is kind of proving the point.

Speaking for everyone here, as I am in a position of authority, of course - I can speak for the collective thought process

(I can't) (I don't)

No.

Also I hate the weaselly phrase "genuine question". And what do you mean by "behavioural models"? - (not a genuine question. I know what you mean and I don't like it)

Sophistry.
If you really think that transwomen should be allowed by law to use the female toilets, then be brave enough to own that view and state it.
Don't hide behind this being a thread discussing cultlike behaviour.

I am not confused about anything you say - your writing is clear and eloquent.
I know precisely why I believe what I believe, and reject your depiction of my post as cultlike.

It’s always sophistry. The point is that some people believe a group of men should be categorised as women on their say so, and most other people do not. The end.

We just believe there are 2 sexes and that men as a class are a risk to women as a class.

If we are wrong there are ample opportunities to explain why.

To the trans rights activists on this thread, without waffling on about nothing or deflecting, please explain exactly why I should share your view. Thanks.

@KinderOfKinder do you understand that the concern here is about men? As in, we want to protect women from a class that is identified as exceptionally dangerous to us?

This is only about tram to the extent that the men trying so hard to breach the law and the SC and the ‘guidance’ are trans?
The men accessing women’s spaces are trans, and that’s why trans appears to get heat.

The issue though, is men.

Where in my post did I say those beliefs were wrong? I even explicitly said the opposite. The fact that you automatically assumed a critique of online behavior meant a rejection of basic biology proves my entire point about reflexive, binary thinking and knee jerk reactions to critique, Thank you.

"The issue though, is men."

That isn't directly relevant to a thread about the cultlike behaviour (or lack thereof) of people who pride themselves on holding GC beliefs but, for the record, we're in complete agreement there.
I've lost count of the times I've heard the tired phrase "not all men"; of course not, dear, but it's always a man.

Yes people often “explicitly say the opposite” but shortly after their biases become clear.