How To Join a Cult From the Comfort of Your Own Home

All you have to do 

Is pick a leader (or leaders) 

From the comfort of your couch or recliner.

Have a cold drink on hand. 

Maybe Kool-Aid.

Settle in, take a sip. 

Find someone on a screen 

Who shouts a lot.

About fear. 

About anger. 

Watch (or listen) to them

All the time. 

Believe every single thing they tell you. 

Be sure it’s someone 

Who will confirm your worst suspicions

About the world

And all the people in it that you hate,

Who are, you will discover, 

All the people who aren’t like you.

The Other.

Never question your leader.

Never doubt. 

Submerge yourself in a pool of cool

Certainty. 

Trust your leader,

But doubt everyone else in the world.

Doubt them. Distrust them.

They are Other.

Never ask for evidence. 

Let your new-found god create the world for you,

Tell you how things really are.

Once you've firmly planted your butt

In your recliner and in your beliefs

Your mind cemented in the rightness of your cause,

Find other like minds - 

They are only a click away - 

Who will agree with everything you say.

You can live in a beautiful, 

Algorithmic bubble

Where voices bounce back from the outer edge,

Echoing your own certainties back to your waiting ears.

They reassure you that you are right

And everyone outside this bubble 

Is not only wrong, but evil.

That’s important.

Everyone else is part of a cult.

The Others are either sheep

Being led to the slaughter

Or they are the cult leaders: 

Satanic, evil, malicious, 

Sacrificing children beneath 

Pizza parlors and summoning

The powers of darkness 

To enslave the world

And make them wear masks.

They question these truths that 

You hold to be self-evident.

The Others ask for evidence. 

They ask for proof. 

Who needs proof when you have

Truth? With a capital T.

They will try to use logic. 

Shout them down. 

There is no reasoning

With reasonable people.

You’re not part of a cult. 

Everyone else is. 

Wrap yourself in your ideas

So tightly that they constrict blood flow 

To the brain.

You’ll discover that everything - 

Even evidence to the contrary - 

Is proof that you are right. 

You can be sure you are thinking for yourself

Because your leader tells you you are.

Once you are absolutely,

Positively positive, 

Deep in your soul, 

To the souls of your feet, 

That you hold the truth in your hands, 

Drinking the Kool-Aid is a moot point. 

You’ve been drinking it all along, 

Certain that it was wine,

And that this poem doesn’t apply to you.