“There is a cult of ignorance in the United States, and there has always been. The strain of anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means my ignorance is just as good as your knowledge.” —Isaac Asimov

ROLLING FORK — I used to think it took a special kind of person — frankly, not a particularly bright one — to become a member of a cult but I have since been forcibly disavowed of what I now recognize was that most naive misconception. Fact is, I know too many otherwise smart folks who are.

They, of course, are oblivious to this, as it is pretty much a constant that folks who are in cults not only fail to realize that fact but are highly resistant to any suggestion to the contrary.

Depending upon one’s dictionary of choice, he or she is apt to find some varying but thematically consistent language in definitions of the word “cult,” but most tend to identify two types. One, is of the Jim Jones/drink the Kool-Aid unorthodox religious variety with which most folks appear to be most familiar, and the other is characterized by “great devotion to a person or idea.”

Of course, not only can the two types merge, one into another, they are actually more likely to than not, as adherence to either requires devotion to and faith in people and things not always firmly grounded in objective reality.

But while both are fascinating in their own ways, it is the latter with which I will herein opine, primarily because if folks want to be Christian Scientists or Scientologists I care remarkably little, provided they don’t try to force their quaint notions upon the rest of us.

There are not very many positive connotations to the word “cult,” and there are some perfectly splendid reasons for that, not the least of which is that they tend to rapidly ascend, reach various heights, then crash and burn, largely due to the individually excessive characteristics (being bat guano crazy, as example) of their leaders, resulting in not only debilitating disillusion, but often quite dire consequences for their members.

As we shall see momentarily, cults of all ilk tend to share a great deal in common, but all of them must have one key element to even form, much less last long and prosper, and that is a larger than life, charismatic, frequently narcissistic leader, who regrettably almost always seems to harbor delusions of grandeur or persecution, or both.

From the time I was a child, I have always been a fan of good science fiction works (much of what now seems downright prophetic) and whether the brilliant gent quoted above or Ray Bradbury or Robert Heinlein, in retrospect, I can now see that perhaps better than the rest of us, they understood the cult phenomenon and the danger it represents.

“It is a truism,” Heinlein once wrote, “that almost any sect, cult or religion will legislate its creed into law if it acquires the political power to do so.”

And we no longer have to view that truism through either historical or theoretical prisms. Just glance at a good daily paper or tune in to the nightly news. And having become more than a bit alarmed by what’s happening today, I’ve been doing some research.

Back in the 1980s a psychiatrist and Harvard Med School professor named Robert Jay Lifton wrote a scholarly paper on cult formation in which he set out the most commonly shared characteristics of the leaders of destructive cults. See if any ring a bell:

• Absolute authoritarianism absent meaningful accountability.

• No tolerance for questions or critical inquiry.

• No meaningful financial disclosure of either income or expenses.

• There is no acceptable reason for leaving the group and should one, he or she becomes trashed.

• Former members, in word and deed, tend to relate the same sorts of stories of abuse, instability and reflect similar patterns of grievances.

• Progressively, there begin to appear records, books, news articles or broadcast news reports that document the negative character traits of the leader.

• Group members tend to publicly share their own shortcomings while praising the leader, excessively.

• The group leader is always right, even in the presence of evidence to the contrary.

• The group leader is the sole and exclusive source of knowing “truth” or receiving validation, and no other process of discovery, especially the press and other media outlets are either acceptable or credible.

Remind you of anybody? Good, that means your mind is still your own and not captive to the “group think” always present within cults.

No, you say? This is just propaganda or political dogma, you say? Well, you are certainly not alone — which is not, of course, to say that you are not really rather hopelessly lost.

Ray Mosby is editor and publisher of the Deer Creek Pilot in Rolling Fork.