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Good morning sir, I'm doing pretty good.

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It's a bit of an agitated day with all of the Christmas preparations around here in the
city and kind of running around with shopping, but it's good, everything's alright.

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How are you doing?

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Great, I'm doing okay,

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So I had something happen this morning and uh I'm hoping you can participate in this
fully, you know, and because you're part of this group too.

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You know, we're both in this what's up group called the Culsa Society.

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And I'll put on the screen a link that you can join it if you wish, you know, but you have
to be led into it.

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And we saw a very interesting post there this morning, OK?

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We probably have different experiences of this in our lifetime just by the fact that I've
been in this lifestyle for 50 years.

10
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I'm 73 years old.

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you're around 30, right?

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So you're younger man and we're brought up in a little bit different world than I was, but
we're still sharing space in this world, so to speak.

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So there was a person, a woman who shared a personal story that

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a friend or somebody she knew had concerns or was asking her if she was in a cult or
excuse me if my memory of this post is a little off, but it really doesn't matter because

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it's kind of talking about the same issue or that this other person expressed

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personal opinion that or as said an opinion or concern that Sikhism or the way she was
practicing it was a cult using the word cult and that and that this person was saddened by

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this.

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Maybe she was also a little angry.

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I don't know, but she definitely reacted to it.

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And I thought that, I really appreciated that post, by the way, because it's something
that, you know, I've had to deal with myself over the years.

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People around me have had to deal with it.

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People I've known, people I don't know, people in the group I'm in, people in other
groups, you know, that's out there.

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And although I don't think she explicitly said it,

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I think the unasked question is how do you deal with.

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because obviously you're feeling something about it.

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how do you, you know, how do you quite deal with it that you're in a position where people
are either questioning what you got yourself involved with, or they have an opinion about

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it and they're giving a word to it.

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And how exactly do you react to this knowing that this is going to be a common thing?

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So that kind of really got my interest.

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I have all kinds of thoughts about that.

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But I was interested in, had you read that?

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what kind of thinking did it provoke on your part?

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Well, I would say the following, you know, because...

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The concerns from this person who came to this lady and said like, I'm worried that you're
joining a cult or something along those lines.

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usually that sort of concern comes in my experience from a legitimate place of caring for
the other person and being worried about them, which is understandable for people who are

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close to you, right?

37
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And I also think that...

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On some level, on some level.

39
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someone makes, let's say, any kind of radical lifestyle change.

40
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It doesn't necessarily have to be tied to religion, but someone makes some kind of massive
overhaul of their lifestyle.

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They stop doing certain things, they begin doing other things.

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And that kind of very strong change, which can look like a sort of 180 degrees change of
direction for a lot of people.

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that is naturally going to raise some concerns for at least some of the people around you.

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Now, whether you are actually joining a cult or not, that is, I think, know, a different
question.

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And this is something that I have read about a little bit because, you know, I'm a big
reader.

46
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I like reading about all sorts of things.

47
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And sometime in the past, I spent a little bit of time reading about the how, like, how
could you possibly qualify any kind of organization as a cult?

48
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And apparently there are, you know, criteria that are used to define that.

49
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I don't believe that the Sikh religion as a whole fits this criteria because we're talking
about this

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international organism of people.

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And of course, you know, if you go to the Sikhs who are living in Amritsar right now,
they're probably going to be living fairly differently, even if it's the same religion to

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the Sikhs who currently live in Los Angeles, or if you find a Sikh community in Europe,
wherever like, it's not like Sikhism as a whole, it's

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massive to be a monolithic organization, I believe.

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And cults are defined by being monolithic.

55
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There is other stuff that is involved as well, but sorry, I'm rambling bit here about
this.

56
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No, not at all.

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I love it.

58
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And, you know, like, for example, I'm going to give you some examples because I mentioned
these criteria for actually identifying cult activity.

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And there is a number of things that are mentioned.

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One of them is absolute authoritarianism without accountability.

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And currently the only leader that officially exists of the Sikh religion is the
Siddiqun-Ugransa, the sacred word.

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And I don't know about you, but I have never gotten any orders from the city of Gurdwara,
at least in the sense of authoritarian oppression.

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Then there are other things, things like intolerance for criticism or questioning of any
kind.

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There are things like...

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financial manipulation being involved, know, people controlling your money, telling you
what to do with it.

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If we go a little bit deeper, we could be talking about planting ideas of fear about the
outside world into the followers, so they will not intermingle with anyone outside the

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cult.

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And, you know, like,

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From what I know and what I understand of the Sikh religion as a whole, it doesn't really
fit these criteria.

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But I can understand why somebody who sees, you know, their friend, their brother, their
sister, whoever they know, converting to Sikhism and making a lot of perhaps sudden

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lifestyle changes might be worried.

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in that way for that person.

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Well, I actually would...

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I agree with everything you say.

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and

76
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And I think a lot of people would.

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I think it's very reasonable.

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But having kind of been in a way targeted in the eyes of some people, as somebody who's
actually in a cult.

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Okay.

80
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I have a different way of, I've kind of got a different way of looking at this, that I
think it's important for people like this person who posted this morning.

81
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Okay.

82
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and...

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I have experience with dealing with this.

84
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So, so it's like in the end, I think the real issue is how, how does a wise and honorable
person deal with that communication?

85
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Okay.

86
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So, so to me, you know, me, I'm like, uh, somebody who's obsessed, fascinated, whatever
you call the word, focused on,

87
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communication, linguistics, the origin of words.

88
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And you know that I listen to every single word and I chop it up into pieces because
that's what I was trained to do even as a lawyer.

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Right.

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And then I'm surrounded in a world where people are, to me, very loose with their
language.

91
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And actually,

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far looser with their language than they can actually imagine.

93
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And that how much misunderstanding there is around words and how much problems it causes.

94
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so that's, oddly enough, that was kind of my angle on this, is that there's words in the
culture that have lost.

95
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their meaning and lost any semblance of any valuable meaning.

96
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So it's hard to understand what people are even talking about.

97
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I'll you an example.

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It's a little off the subject, but the other day I was in Starbucks, right?

99
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Where I can be found, you know?

100
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And I go to the counter and the lady working behind the counter says, okay, sir, what
would you like to have?

101
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I said, whatever I'd like to have a cappuccino, extra shot, extra hot.

102
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whatever and and her response, which I hear a lot now from younger people a lot.

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This is very I mean, I'm talking in English, United States.

104
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Maybe it's different other cultures, other languages.

105
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But I got a response from her taking my order.

106
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That I actually have heard for the last 10 or 15 years and I never heard before and

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The response was, with a look on her face to match, she goes, amazing.

108
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Now, actually, and of course my response, being the difficult person I am, was to say to
her, even a little half humorous, half annoyed.

109
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And I was going, do you really find that amazing?

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You

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And she's like looking at me like not understanding where I'm coming from.

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And then I say, what about my cappuccino order was amazing to you?

113
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And she's, and there's nobody else in the source.

114
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So she has no choice but to engage with this very difficult customer who's putting her
very uncomfortable position.

115
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Cause I'm asking her to qualify.

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Okay.

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Because

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Because my understanding is that the word amazing, and there's no word that's exactly the
same.

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There's words that are similar in the family.

120
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But amazing normally refers to something that's almost miraculous.

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It's not quite a miracle.

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Otherwise it would be called a miracle.

123
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But amazing is in the miracle family, is that something's amazing in that it doesn't
normally happen.

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So I'm thinking,

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I'm thinking, is it really amazing that somebody's ordered a cappuccino?

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that like amazing?

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What would really amazing be?

128
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But they don't actually have a word for that anymore because they've been, they basically
have decided that amazing means nothing.

129
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Okay.

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They basically neutered the word.

131
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And now you'll see in the society, if you use the word amazing, it's actually has no
power.

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It's been neutered.

133
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And now you have to find other words because now you no longer use amazing because amazing
means nothing.

134
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Okay.

135
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So I'm just using that as an example.

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So now what's interesting to me is we have this word, or even, even, even, cancer.

137
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Okay.

138
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Cancer basically means you're going to die.

139
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That's what it means.

140
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Okay.

141
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It's not what it is.

142
00:14:11,691 --> 00:14:15,938
It may mean what it is for somebody who's a researcher, right?

143
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But for the average person, means, my God, you have cancer.

144
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You're going to die.

145
00:14:20,451 --> 00:14:23,833
so the cancer means cancer doesn't mean it's a disease.

146
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Cancer means you're like playing with death.

147
00:14:26,534 --> 00:14:30,156
OK, so words start meaning other things.

148
00:14:30,156 --> 00:14:34,757
OK, and then that gets dangerous because then there's a lot of miscommunication.

149
00:14:34,757 --> 00:14:39,209
So you take the word cult, which is a really good example.

150
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So I'm talking about communication now, right?

151
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So.

152
00:14:42,910 --> 00:14:49,151
The word, if you look it up, the word cult comes from Latin.

153
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That's a fact.

154
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Okay.

155
00:14:53,072 --> 00:14:57,433
And what it means is basically it means to care.

156
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Okay.

157
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I mean, it does.

158
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It was originally meant to care, to cultivate and to worship.

159
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I'm not making this up.

160
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That's actually a fact.

161
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Okay.

162
00:15:10,026 --> 00:15:12,297
And that is how the word

163
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cult was understood for generations that it meant to care, to cultivate, to worship, to
take care of, like that.

164
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Okay.

165
00:15:23,757 --> 00:15:41,469
And I think that's how it was commonly used until probably, and this is just from my
personal interaction with it, is that in the 1800s in the United States,

166
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there were these like split off religions like Mormonism.

167
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Okay.

168
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Okay.

169
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That were considered by the mainstream to be these breakaway like rebel groups.

170
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They weren't in the majority community.

171
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They broke off and did their thing often with creating their own practices, having their
own charismatic leader and

172
00:16:09,089 --> 00:16:17,977
And there were allegations about these groups, whether they were true or untrue, that were
salacious.

173
00:16:17,977 --> 00:16:23,800
okay, and they were referred to in the media, okay, as cults.

174
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And they were referred to as cults, not from the original menia cults, okay?

175
00:16:30,046 --> 00:16:34,685
They were referred as cults, kind of inferring they were a cult.

176
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They were dark.

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00:16:37,354 --> 00:16:50,380
Okay, so it's almost like people reinvented the word in the United States in the 1800s to
suit their own purposes because obviously they weren't using the original meaning.

178
00:16:50,420 --> 00:16:58,362
They were using this meaning that they actually associated with the occult, which are dark
practices.

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00:16:58,362 --> 00:17:04,428
So this kind of ties into, because it's reminding me of something else related.

180
00:17:04,428 --> 00:17:16,665
If we go a little bit later in history, because you're talking the 1800s, we go a little
bit later, this kind of also ties into things like the satanic panic during the 80s, for

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example.

182
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Right?

183
00:17:19,556 --> 00:17:24,706
So like all of these worry about these subversive

184
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organizations of essentially occultist madmen doing things in the shadows, right?

185
00:17:31,882 --> 00:17:40,290
Which makes for a very compelling narrative, but it's very questionable once you look into
it a little bit closer.

186
00:17:40,290 --> 00:17:44,222
Like the Satanic panic was essentially just mass hysteria.

187
00:17:44,222 --> 00:17:49,926
There was very little that could be empirically proved about it from my understanding.

188
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Right?

189
00:17:50,852 --> 00:17:53,894
And they hijacked the word.

190
00:17:54,495 --> 00:18:02,240
They hijacked and manipulated the original meaning of the word to almost be its opposite
original meaning.

191
00:18:03,261 --> 00:18:04,021
Okay.

192
00:18:04,021 --> 00:18:18,021
So, so, so the average person could understand that cult in their own mind is related to
the occult, which are like secret dark practices.

193
00:18:19,885 --> 00:18:29,028
I actually took the time to look up the etymology of the word cult as you said and you're
pretty much perfectly correct about it.

194
00:18:29,028 --> 00:18:43,904
says the word cult comes from the Latin cultus meaning worship, care or cultivation,
sharing roots with culture and cultivate, stemming from colere which means to till or to

195
00:18:43,904 --> 00:18:44,874
tend.

196
00:18:45,230 --> 00:18:57,561
It originally meant any form of devotion or a specific religious practice, but by the 19th
century it developed negative connotations, referring to unorthodox, sometimes controlling

197
00:18:57,561 --> 00:18:59,944
groups with excessive devotion.

198
00:18:59,944 --> 00:19:00,915
So yeah, absolutely.

199
00:19:00,915 --> 00:19:01,844
Yeah.

200
00:19:02,181 --> 00:19:04,123
And that's what happened.

201
00:19:04,123 --> 00:19:15,911
But what's interesting, so the word kind of got hijacked and given a meaning that was
convenient to the people who had a particular agenda.

202
00:19:15,911 --> 00:19:22,328
And that may have been even the established religious institutions or the media or
whatever.

203
00:19:22,328 --> 00:19:26,003
you had these groups in Europe and the United States.

204
00:19:26,003 --> 00:19:37,740
And now any break off group, and it's always some small group, it's a new small group, are
being basically assigned the C word.

205
00:19:37,740 --> 00:19:40,060
Okay, not cancer.

206
00:19:40,060 --> 00:19:41,534
word, right.

207
00:19:41,689 --> 00:19:49,085
The C word is cult and they don't, they don't assign themselves that word.

208
00:19:49,085 --> 00:19:51,847
It's being assigned from the outside.

209
00:19:51,848 --> 00:19:52,268
Okay.

210
00:19:52,268 --> 00:20:04,890
For whatever purpose the people do, but it gets to the point that the people now hearing
this either from the head of their large institutionalized religion, or they are hearing

211
00:20:04,890 --> 00:20:08,863
it in the newspapers about this cult in this place and this.

212
00:20:08,863 --> 00:20:09,263
Okay.

213
00:20:09,263 --> 00:20:10,444
So now.

214
00:20:11,135 --> 00:20:25,138
the people are becoming like zombies, not the people in the cult, the larger society is
that the largest society is being basically manipulated by how a word is being used.

215
00:20:25,138 --> 00:20:25,879
Okay.

216
00:20:25,879 --> 00:20:30,503
And so it's, it's not even just negative connotations.

217
00:20:30,503 --> 00:20:33,645
It's almost like it just means bad.

218
00:20:33,686 --> 00:20:34,146
Okay.

219
00:20:34,146 --> 00:20:38,037
So if you're in a cult, okay, that group is bad.

220
00:20:38,037 --> 00:20:44,261
Okay, if you end the same thing in the political thing that people, the politicians are
saying, they're a communist.

221
00:20:44,261 --> 00:20:47,363
Yeah, people don't even know what a communist is.

222
00:20:47,363 --> 00:20:54,267
The average person couldn't even give you a good definition of what communism is, but
people get to see another C word.

223
00:20:54,267 --> 00:20:55,289
You're a communist.

224
00:20:55,289 --> 00:20:56,510
You're a communist.

225
00:20:56,510 --> 00:20:57,650
You're a cultist.

226
00:20:57,650 --> 00:20:59,672
You have cancer, you know.

227
00:20:59,672 --> 00:21:05,816
So the thing is, is that you get these labels slapped on you from the outside.

228
00:21:05,816 --> 00:21:08,007
Now, like you said,

229
00:21:08,977 --> 00:21:12,459
Some of it I think is out of genuine concern.

230
00:21:12,600 --> 00:21:22,708
But what's really happened is people, in my own opinion, in general society have lost the
ability for discriminating thinking.

231
00:21:22,708 --> 00:21:24,969
They don't think, they're not thoughtful.

232
00:21:24,969 --> 00:21:31,553
They hear like a word and they emotionally react, but they're not like thinking what's
actually going on here.

233
00:21:31,553 --> 00:21:37,165
Okay, so then of course in the 60s and 70s and when you're moving in,

234
00:21:37,165 --> 00:21:46,651
there were new new religion groups, especially in the West, uh new religious movements,
new religious movements.

235
00:21:46,651 --> 00:21:56,677
You know, people and we think of groups naturally that are in the news, the Jonestown
thing in South America, the the Hare Krishna movement and so forth.

236
00:21:56,677 --> 00:22:02,949
OK, so of course now they're going to immediately get labeled as a

237
00:22:02,949 --> 00:22:14,606
a cult and they seem to have certain things in common, the things in common that you
mentioned, there's authoritarian, that there's a, I'm not saying it's true or not, I'm

238
00:22:14,606 --> 00:22:22,680
just saying that there is this thought that they're authoritarian, that there's a
charismatic leader, that they're manipulating people, they're stealing their money,

239
00:22:22,680 --> 00:22:25,481
they're basically using them for, you know, all the...

240
00:22:25,481 --> 00:22:29,012
There's all strange practices that are not even real and made up.

241
00:22:29,012 --> 00:22:34,193
I mean, there's all these things that come out and then people read enough of this.

242
00:22:34,193 --> 00:22:40,025
And then what's happened is that the original meaning of cult is long gone.

243
00:22:40,025 --> 00:22:41,085
Okay.

244
00:22:41,185 --> 00:22:55,039
And now it's kind of understood not what it's really meant to say, but it's, it's, it's
meant to label something that is being socially understood as being bad.

245
00:22:55,533 --> 00:23:03,477
that has some common characteristics, but nobody has actually gone out there and defined,
yes, this is what that word means.

246
00:23:03,477 --> 00:23:16,747
But people have like, just kind of unconsciously adopted this word and assigned it to a
certain kind of thing that they could probably have a difficult time actually defining,

247
00:23:16,868 --> 00:23:17,628
okay?

248
00:23:17,628 --> 00:23:23,992
But one thing they all agree with is that it involves bad people doing bad things.

249
00:23:24,179 --> 00:23:24,554
Right.

250
00:23:24,554 --> 00:23:28,586
Okay, okay, and that if you're involved in this, you're in trouble.

251
00:23:28,827 --> 00:23:42,695
Okay, so, but, and they're deciding, okay, some unspoken agreement that, okay, this group
qualifies as a cult, and that person is in a cult, that person left a cult, this person's

252
00:23:42,695 --> 00:23:49,118
leaving a cult, but at the end of the day, it's bullshit, because it doesn't mean
anything.

253
00:23:49,258 --> 00:23:52,617
It doesn't mean anything, okay, because there's no,

254
00:23:52,617 --> 00:24:01,643
commonly, okay, there's no real agreement on what that word means because that's actually
not what the word was meant to mean.

255
00:24:01,643 --> 00:24:08,549
So it's been kind of owned and manipulated to the point that there's just this general
thought about it.

256
00:24:08,549 --> 00:24:13,352
And all people have to do is to say that group is a cult and that's it.

257
00:24:13,352 --> 00:24:16,534
Okay, because I decided they're a cult.

258
00:24:16,534 --> 00:24:21,597
So now it's not even about the group, it's about the word.

259
00:24:22,469 --> 00:24:31,168
Now, if I may say something about this, because I fully agree with your point about the
manipulation of the word itself.

260
00:24:31,168 --> 00:24:35,632
I was not actually aware of the origin of the word cult before today.

261
00:24:35,632 --> 00:24:46,099
And as someone who is also a huge fan of linguistics, I do have to say that it's a bit sad
to see it mutate.

262
00:24:46,240 --> 00:24:52,403
into this kind of, you know, tool for mass hysteria, as you say.

263
00:24:52,403 --> 00:25:08,007
But at the same time, at the same time, this does not really remove the fact that
cult-like organizations are a thing and that they do exist, you know.

264
00:25:08,107 --> 00:25:10,509
Like, I'm going to give you an example.

265
00:25:10,509 --> 00:25:14,729
I'm very like a personal example of this.

266
00:25:15,009 --> 00:25:28,889
Some years ago, some years ago, I was contacted by an acquaintance who told me like, hey,
you know, I have a job proposal for you.

267
00:25:28,889 --> 00:25:30,269
You know how these things start.

268
00:25:30,269 --> 00:25:34,409
Usually she was like, yeah, you know, I got a job I would like to offer you.

269
00:25:34,409 --> 00:25:37,909
We're going to get together with some friends to talk about this whole thing.

270
00:25:37,909 --> 00:25:40,524
I would like you to come in to talk about it.

271
00:25:40,524 --> 00:25:41,644
if you want.

272
00:25:42,364 --> 00:25:50,064
And admittedly I was a bit short on cash so the offer sounded fairly tempting.

273
00:25:50,784 --> 00:26:04,864
So I went to this place and what I encountered was a group of people listening to someone
giving a kind of a PowerPoint presentation.

274
00:26:06,059 --> 00:26:13,556
about this very peculiar sales model that I had never heard about before, which was all
about...

275
00:26:13,556 --> 00:26:23,793
It wasn't really so much about selling a product, but it was about getting more people
involved into selling the product and making money from the people you would involve.

276
00:26:23,793 --> 00:26:25,434
So it was a pyramid scheme, really.

277
00:26:25,434 --> 00:26:27,705
Like, that's what it was, right?

278
00:26:28,206 --> 00:26:33,279
Now, the fact that it was a pyramid scheme is not what's interesting to me.

279
00:26:33,796 --> 00:26:44,641
What was interesting to me was how people were talking about it and the general attitudes
of people in the room.

280
00:26:44,841 --> 00:26:47,844
Everyone had this sort of like...

281
00:26:47,844 --> 00:26:53,246
I don't want to be mean about this but it's like everyone was kind of high in a way.

282
00:26:53,246 --> 00:26:57,171
Everyone was just high listening to this person.

283
00:26:57,171 --> 00:27:05,844
talking about the sales model and everyone was encouraging each other and hugging each
other and talking about how much money they were going to make and that they were going to

284
00:27:05,844 --> 00:27:19,783
reach success together and personally, me personally, I found it a bit unsettling, you
know, because there were all of these strangers suddenly being very buddy-buddy with me.

285
00:27:20,125 --> 00:27:24,097
talking about how much they wanted me to succeed in this work.

286
00:27:24,097 --> 00:27:33,259
And later, I looked up the corporation that was in charge of this whole thing, which I'm
not going to mention just because I don't want to get in trouble here.

287
00:27:33,340 --> 00:27:42,344
But I looked them up and I found out that apparently a lot of the tactics that are
employed in

288
00:27:42,344 --> 00:27:53,318
You know, international pyramid schemes like this are very similar to the tactics used by
high control groups, like cults, right?

289
00:27:53,318 --> 00:28:01,744
So this is like, it's a thing that exists, it's out there and it gets like, it worms its
way into people's lives.

290
00:28:01,744 --> 00:28:05,316
I don't think it's a silly concern per se.

291
00:28:05,455 --> 00:28:07,496
No, I think it's a legitimate.

292
00:28:07,496 --> 00:28:13,718
I, I get, I, I think that everything you're saying is indisputable and I actually agree
with it.

293
00:28:13,718 --> 00:28:14,238
Okay.

294
00:28:14,238 --> 00:28:30,125
So, but, actually to me, what you're saying kind of in a way supports what I've been
trying to say is that you see this kind of behavior and sort of like psychological control

295
00:28:30,125 --> 00:28:32,637
in religion, in business.

296
00:28:32,947 --> 00:28:35,159
in politics and all the way down.

297
00:28:35,159 --> 00:28:39,361
Okay, so it's kind of the way that human beings interact with each other.

298
00:28:39,361 --> 00:28:40,040
Right.

299
00:28:40,040 --> 00:28:51,850
So, but the thing is, that, but the word cults is something that has been specifically
used as a label for one example of that.

300
00:28:52,271 --> 00:28:53,091
Right.

301
00:28:53,091 --> 00:28:56,053
It's not, but, the behavior is the same.

302
00:28:56,053 --> 00:29:00,775
And this is the lawyer in me talking and really kind of gets back to

303
00:29:01,621 --> 00:29:09,917
how this woman in my eyes will have to learn how to deal with this because it's going to
be there.

304
00:29:09,917 --> 00:29:13,899
And as you say, people have legitimate concerns.

305
00:29:14,460 --> 00:29:15,280
Okay?

306
00:29:15,280 --> 00:29:15,721
Okay.

307
00:29:15,721 --> 00:29:16,731
They just don't know.

308
00:29:16,731 --> 00:29:17,602
They don't know.

309
00:29:17,602 --> 00:29:20,847
And they have legitimate reason for being concerned.

310
00:29:20,847 --> 00:29:22,154
All right?

311
00:29:23,692 --> 00:29:28,175
But I'm a lawyer by training.

312
00:29:28,276 --> 00:29:35,121
And so I'm trained to not kind of be distracted by labels.

313
00:29:35,982 --> 00:29:38,725
Because labels are not evidence.

314
00:29:38,725 --> 00:29:48,913
Labels are something that somebody from the outside is stamping on you and you don't have
actually even a in it.

315
00:29:48,913 --> 00:29:50,814
They're putting a label on you.

316
00:29:51,502 --> 00:29:58,382
And it may not even be clear what that label even means except that you're a bad human
being.

317
00:29:58,582 --> 00:29:59,082
Okay.

318
00:29:59,082 --> 00:30:01,482
So it labels you as bad.

319
00:30:01,482 --> 00:30:02,342
Okay.

320
00:30:02,342 --> 00:30:08,642
But it's not even clear, but no group labels itself a cult.

321
00:30:09,402 --> 00:30:09,682
Okay.

322
00:30:09,682 --> 00:30:10,742
They're all right.

323
00:30:10,742 --> 00:30:10,942
Right.

324
00:30:10,942 --> 00:30:11,182
Right.

325
00:30:11,182 --> 00:30:12,162
Exactly.

326
00:30:12,162 --> 00:30:19,522
And, but, but get back to the original meaning is that actually any religious organization
would

327
00:30:19,628 --> 00:30:25,443
would want to be defined as the word was originally defined in Latin.

328
00:30:26,664 --> 00:30:29,967
Everyone would because that actually is their job.

329
00:30:30,107 --> 00:30:30,908
Okay.

330
00:30:30,908 --> 00:30:38,414
But now the word's been completely distorted to mean the opposite of what it originally
meant.

331
00:30:38,455 --> 00:30:45,661
Now it means instead of taking care, it basically means exploiting innocent people.

332
00:30:46,082 --> 00:30:46,749
Okay.

333
00:30:46,749 --> 00:31:00,866
this is why, I'm sorry to interrupt you there, but this is why in the literature referring
to this type of group, like talking legitimate cult activity, I found that there is

334
00:31:00,866 --> 00:31:08,972
another term that is commonly used, which I think is a lot more useful, which is a high
control group.

335
00:31:09,862 --> 00:31:14,828
which is not the same as saying a cult, in my opinion.

336
00:31:14,829 --> 00:31:16,120
Right, I agree.

337
00:31:16,120 --> 00:31:17,631
that's hell, okay.

338
00:31:17,631 --> 00:31:18,911
So that's on the way.

339
00:31:18,911 --> 00:31:25,075
I think what you're describing is on the way to where I'm going, okay?

340
00:31:25,075 --> 00:31:37,221
Is that that in itself is not actually, it's almost leaving the word, it's almost leaving
a label to you're starting to actually explain what's happening.

341
00:31:37,381 --> 00:31:39,963
A cult does not explain what's happening.

342
00:31:39,963 --> 00:31:44,247
You're saying a high controlled group, at least if it's not the whole story,

343
00:31:44,247 --> 00:31:47,419
At least you're starting to explain something.

344
00:31:47,800 --> 00:31:49,722
Just saying cult doesn't say anything.

345
00:31:49,722 --> 00:31:53,617
It's just your attempt to just label somebody with something.

346
00:31:53,617 --> 00:31:54,685
so.

347
00:31:57,062 --> 00:32:10,507
For instance, getting back to like this woman, so if she's got a friend who's concerned,
she's in a cult or has decided that this thing is a cult, whatever it means to this

348
00:32:10,507 --> 00:32:12,278
person, that word.

349
00:32:14,369 --> 00:32:30,924
And she knows the person well, actually, instead of being like offended by the term, okay,
which is a senseless fight, actually, and is actually letting the other person take

350
00:32:30,924 --> 00:32:32,906
control of the narrative.

351
00:32:32,926 --> 00:32:40,843
Because as long as the narrative is about a word, the person who's assigning the word is
in control of the narration.

352
00:32:41,141 --> 00:32:41,995
Mm-hmm.

353
00:32:41,995 --> 00:32:43,846
The other person's playing defense.

354
00:32:43,846 --> 00:32:46,166
The person using the words playing offense.

355
00:32:46,166 --> 00:32:54,881
The person who's saying you're in this, they're playing defense, but it's not a fair fight
and it's a ridiculous fight.

356
00:32:54,881 --> 00:32:59,552
It's over a word about what somebody is labeling something or somebody.

357
00:33:00,052 --> 00:33:07,054
If I'm her, I'm saying, thanks for your concern, what exactly do you mean?

358
00:33:07,054 --> 00:33:10,445
What exactly is happening that's concerning you?

359
00:33:11,421 --> 00:33:16,165
Okay, well, you're going to probably hear a lot less information because they don't know.

360
00:33:16,165 --> 00:33:21,290
Okay, they have some general fear, but you're being very fair.

361
00:33:21,290 --> 00:33:25,093
See, I never let the people run the narrative on me.

362
00:33:25,093 --> 00:33:29,687
It's like if they have a legitimate concern, I appreciate that concern.

363
00:33:29,687 --> 00:33:32,649
What specifically are you concerned about?

364
00:33:32,750 --> 00:33:34,191
Well, I'm concerned you're in a cult.

365
00:33:34,191 --> 00:33:39,515
So I'm not interested in your, you're being concerned about a word.

366
00:33:39,579 --> 00:33:45,642
I'm concerned about what you think is happening that shouldn't be happening.

367
00:33:46,723 --> 00:33:48,724
Okay, and be specific about it.

368
00:33:48,724 --> 00:33:53,336
And usually they can't because usually they don't have any personal information.

369
00:33:55,036 --> 00:34:07,533
Like, for instance, even in the group I'm in, and you probably are aware of this, that
many of the people who are my contemporaries, not many, but quite a few people my

370
00:34:07,533 --> 00:34:14,736
contemporaries, who are back in the original people who were Westerners who took on
Sikhism, right?

371
00:34:14,736 --> 00:34:15,047
yeah.

372
00:34:15,047 --> 00:34:17,510
and we had a charismatic teacher.

373
00:34:17,510 --> 00:34:23,477
And then there were allegations made against the charismatic teacher decades later.

374
00:34:23,478 --> 00:34:31,017
So now there are people around me, okay, who I've known for 40 or 50 years who are going,
my God, I gotta get out of here.

375
00:34:31,017 --> 00:34:31,819
I didn't realize it.

376
00:34:31,819 --> 00:34:33,991
I've been in a cult for 40 years.

377
00:34:34,743 --> 00:34:35,536
Right.

378
00:34:36,889 --> 00:34:39,811
And I'm going, really?

379
00:34:39,811 --> 00:34:41,175
I know you for 40 years.

380
00:34:41,175 --> 00:34:44,690
This is the first time you've ever said, you know, but, now I've seen the light.

381
00:34:44,690 --> 00:34:47,169
I've been controlled and I've been in a cult.

382
00:34:49,385 --> 00:34:53,165
Well, seemed like you were perfectly happy the last 40 years.

383
00:34:53,165 --> 00:34:55,985
What exactly do you say?

384
00:34:55,985 --> 00:34:58,385
Well, they're going this, this, and this.

385
00:34:59,425 --> 00:35:02,545
Do you actually know that's true, personally?

386
00:35:03,085 --> 00:35:06,017
Well, no, no, but I believe something to be true.

387
00:35:08,784 --> 00:35:23,556
Okay, but them saying that now they believe they are in a cult gives them permission to
leave.

388
00:35:24,697 --> 00:35:26,818
And maybe they want to leave anyhow.

389
00:35:27,579 --> 00:35:31,682
But the thing is, it's like, they're making it about a word.

390
00:35:32,103 --> 00:35:34,404
But what actually happened?

391
00:35:35,105 --> 00:35:38,748
What happened is they actually, in most cases,

392
00:35:39,196 --> 00:35:41,379
had very happy, productive lives.

393
00:35:42,041 --> 00:35:46,447
Okay, and now they're just gonna wrap their heads around a word.

394
00:35:48,049 --> 00:35:54,581
And now people are saying, I'm in a cult, but it's all about a word.

395
00:35:54,701 --> 00:35:57,022
It's like, what actually is happening?

396
00:35:57,022 --> 00:35:57,822
Okay.

397
00:35:57,822 --> 00:36:07,025
And what's happening this second that you did not find offensive for 45 years, but today
you find offensive.

398
00:36:07,765 --> 00:36:13,520
And so I try to stay away from these labels and just get into what's happening.

399
00:36:13,520 --> 00:36:28,574
And so you brought up a very good point in the beginning of this conversation, which I
think people don't want to go there really, is that actually any religion could be called

400
00:36:28,574 --> 00:36:29,075
a cult.

401
00:36:29,075 --> 00:36:30,435
Any religion.

402
00:36:30,675 --> 00:36:31,135
Okay?

403
00:36:31,135 --> 00:36:36,178
Because religion is by definition authoritarian.

404
00:36:36,358 --> 00:36:39,859
If it's not by a person, it's by a representation.

405
00:36:39,859 --> 00:36:40,719
So...

406
00:36:41,083 --> 00:36:54,897
you know, basically, you know, whether you talk about Buddha, Mohammed, you know, Moses or
whoever, Jesus Christ, there was a person, Guru uh Nanak, Guru Gobind Singh, there was a

407
00:36:54,897 --> 00:37:00,070
person at some point who had an authoritarian message.

408
00:37:00,070 --> 00:37:07,882
And in some cases, they left something behind, whether that's the Bible, Sri Guru Granth
Sahib,

409
00:37:08,204 --> 00:37:08,644
Whatever.

410
00:37:08,644 --> 00:37:10,665
That's now the authority.

411
00:37:11,706 --> 00:37:12,726
Okay?

412
00:37:12,927 --> 00:37:16,008
And so it's not even up for debate.

413
00:37:16,488 --> 00:37:17,069
Okay?

414
00:37:17,069 --> 00:37:18,029
So...

415
00:37:19,270 --> 00:37:23,792
And then there's an institution built around it, and things happen and don't happen.

416
00:37:25,424 --> 00:37:29,246
Uh, I'm not here giving you opinion whether it's good or bad.

417
00:37:29,246 --> 00:37:31,747
I'm engaging.

418
00:37:31,747 --> 00:37:36,028
That's a longer conversation, whether it's right or wrong, good or bad.

419
00:37:36,188 --> 00:37:44,934
But really the difference between most cults as they are known and institutionalized
religion is science.

420
00:37:45,414 --> 00:37:45,844
Okay.

421
00:37:45,844 --> 00:37:53,407
So you can easily make these, these accusations against a small group of vulnerable people
in a minority.

422
00:37:53,411 --> 00:37:59,972
but you can't say the same thing against a group that has 100 million members.

423
00:37:59,972 --> 00:38:03,013
You know, this reminds me of...

424
00:38:03,394 --> 00:38:05,456
There is this kind of silly joke.

425
00:38:05,456 --> 00:38:15,369
It might be a bit mean-spirited, I don't know, but it's a silly joke that says, what's the
difference between an institutionalized religion and a cult?

426
00:38:15,369 --> 00:38:21,092
And it says the difference is that the guy who founded the religion has been dead for
centuries.

427
00:38:21,092 --> 00:38:25,319
And I agree with you, but I'm not an anti-religion person.

428
00:38:25,319 --> 00:38:27,322
You know, I'm a minister myself.

429
00:38:27,322 --> 00:38:34,723
But I mean, I keep driving back to this point, this base point.

430
00:38:36,403 --> 00:38:45,948
that there's a hysteria over a word, a word that now is not that helpful and is even
manipulative.

431
00:38:47,884 --> 00:38:55,887
and can be used basically to put people down by just the mention of that word.

432
00:38:56,468 --> 00:39:01,600
But the real issue is what's actually happening.

433
00:39:01,600 --> 00:39:09,633
I mean, factually what's happening because groups can look similar, but that doesn't mean
that everything about them is similar.

434
00:39:09,633 --> 00:39:15,448
It's much easier just cast one word about a group, but there's a...

435
00:39:15,570 --> 00:39:18,137
many variations of this.

436
00:39:18,137 --> 00:39:29,812
And also like this, going from this angle where you're going, this is an excellent way to
demonize minority religions, right?

437
00:39:29,955 --> 00:39:31,236
Absolutely.

438
00:39:31,236 --> 00:39:38,181
And even minority religions that are sex or sub-sex of larger religions.

439
00:39:38,962 --> 00:39:44,445
And in fact, even you could say that about any group, even Christianity.

440
00:39:44,445 --> 00:39:49,208
You've got Catholics and Protestants and Evangelicals and Mormons.

441
00:39:49,828 --> 00:39:52,329
They're all basically Christians.

442
00:39:53,250 --> 00:39:55,441
But they demonize each other even.

443
00:39:55,701 --> 00:39:57,473
Yes, that's true.

444
00:39:57,473 --> 00:39:57,954
Yes.

445
00:39:57,954 --> 00:40:03,139
And you know, I think that because we talked a little bit about the factors that go into
this.

446
00:40:03,139 --> 00:40:17,829
I think that Hollywood shares a lot of blame for this thing we are talking about right now
because, you know, there are countless examples of high budget films where

447
00:40:17,829 --> 00:40:34,720
Cults are the villains, you know, where small religious communities are essentially
portrayed as a bunch of sinister weirdos who do strange, immoral things and who are trying

448
00:40:34,720 --> 00:40:38,343
to somehow con you into joining them.

449
00:40:38,343 --> 00:40:45,127
Like there was a movie that came out a couple years ago, you know that I like horror films
and

450
00:40:45,370 --> 00:40:53,566
There is one called Midsommar by Ari Aster, which is about the main characters who are a
group of university guys.

451
00:40:53,566 --> 00:41:03,534
They go and they spend some days with this, basically it's like a small community of
Norwegian pagans, right?

452
00:41:03,534 --> 00:41:11,246
And the film portrays them as essentially a bunch of inbred

453
00:41:11,246 --> 00:41:23,968
white supremacist murderers, which is like, wow, it's like a very harsh look at, you know,
a group of people that I don't know if they're with based on a real pagan community in

454
00:41:23,968 --> 00:41:25,640
Norway or any place like that.

455
00:41:25,640 --> 00:41:33,225
But if I were a member of a community like that and I saw that movie, I would probably be
very offended.

456
00:41:33,225 --> 00:41:34,147
know what I mean?

457
00:41:34,147 --> 00:41:35,021
It's like

458
00:41:35,021 --> 00:41:42,180
It's an ongoing thing and it's very much a part of mass media as well, which doesn't help,
of course.

459
00:41:43,384 --> 00:41:48,316
Yeah, but it's I think we're at that place with society and mass media.

460
00:41:48,316 --> 00:41:48,938
It's all the thing.

461
00:41:48,938 --> 00:41:50,499
And ultimately.

462
00:41:50,499 --> 00:41:53,691
Again.

463
00:41:54,172 --> 00:42:04,321
In our conversations, I don't think our objective is to lecture people or to to even try
to force our thinking on people.

464
00:42:04,321 --> 00:42:06,412
think, you know, I speak for myself.

465
00:42:06,412 --> 00:42:09,114
I think you probably agree that.

466
00:42:09,648 --> 00:42:14,909
what we're hoping for is at least the themes that we talk about that are like an
uncomfortable subject.

467
00:42:14,909 --> 00:42:18,931
Like this is probably an uncomfortable subject for a lot of people.

468
00:42:18,931 --> 00:42:23,373
And we're, don't think we're like suggesting something is right or wrong.

469
00:42:23,373 --> 00:42:35,516
We're just like hoping to provoke people to think about it because instead of being on
automatic pilot and whether they're the person who feels very comfortable,

470
00:42:36,232 --> 00:42:46,680
putting a cult tag on somebody else, or it's somebody like this morning, somebody who
feels like they're having the cult tag stamped on them.

471
00:42:47,141 --> 00:43:01,513
OK, that people or the woman at Starbucks who's who's insisting that my cappuccino is an
amazing experience in the in annals of human history that that you know, people.

472
00:43:02,077 --> 00:43:14,897
can have a discerning mind and be careful with the words that they're throwing out and be
careful about how they're digesting the words being thrown at them and take responsibility

473
00:43:14,897 --> 00:43:22,757
for actually thinking this thing through instead of being a willing member of a zombie
land.

474
00:43:23,857 --> 00:43:31,057
I think that if you get where I'm going with this,

475
00:43:31,101 --> 00:43:33,563
problem is not cults.

476
00:43:34,666 --> 00:43:42,134
The problem is the kind of behavior that people have reasonable concern about.

477
00:43:42,876 --> 00:43:43,757
Okay?

478
00:43:43,757 --> 00:43:47,791
Okay, so that people are not being...

479
00:43:49,320 --> 00:43:52,432
harmed in some way that they shouldn't be harmed.

480
00:43:52,432 --> 00:44:09,094
Okay, so those issues can be more maturely addressed without the labels being put on them,
which actually are not particularly informative and actually creates more

481
00:44:09,094 --> 00:44:10,825
misunderstanding.

482
00:44:11,546 --> 00:44:12,827
yeah, I'm in this group.

483
00:44:12,827 --> 00:44:13,697
I'm not a cult.

484
00:44:13,697 --> 00:44:14,238
You're a cult.

485
00:44:14,238 --> 00:44:14,958
You're in that group.

486
00:44:14,958 --> 00:44:16,089
You're a cult.

487
00:44:16,089 --> 00:44:17,896
Okay, so it's about who

488
00:44:17,896 --> 00:44:20,729
Who gets the boogie, who gets the boogie man tag?

489
00:44:20,729 --> 00:44:23,500
And again, keep going back to what I read this morning.

490
00:44:23,500 --> 00:44:40,200
think that the other piece of this is that the people who really, I think, have the
biggest investment in this kind of conversation are people who are targets, okay?

491
00:44:40,200 --> 00:44:42,265
And unjustly targets.

492
00:44:42,265 --> 00:44:49,761
Like this woman this morning, she's just doing something she considers to be very divine
and very lovely, okay?

493
00:44:49,761 --> 00:44:55,465
She doesn't see how she's being manipulated and she's sure she's not manipulating anybody
else.

494
00:44:55,465 --> 00:44:57,456
And I think that's probably true.

495
00:44:57,456 --> 00:44:59,988
She seems like a perfectly fine person to me.

496
00:44:59,988 --> 00:45:09,403
And now somebody has put in the boogie man tag on her and she's feeling defensive or
offended or sad or however she's feeling.

497
00:45:09,403 --> 00:45:14,583
And really doesn't have the experience of how do you deal with that situation?

498
00:45:14,583 --> 00:45:17,943
Because that situation is not ending anytime soon.

499
00:45:17,943 --> 00:45:30,163
I've learned that myself over the years, you know, because I found when I was younger that
I'd be defensive and I try to debate people about things.

500
00:45:30,163 --> 00:45:34,503
So now you think what is the best way to handle that?

501
00:45:34,763 --> 00:45:38,343
OK, if I was talking to this person, I probably would be smiling.

502
00:45:38,343 --> 00:45:39,243
I said, look,

503
00:45:40,090 --> 00:45:44,670
To me, you got one of two things you could do, or you could do a number of things.

504
00:45:45,890 --> 00:46:02,890
You could totally ignore it, but I think then you're allowing the person having free
punches at your faith without not standing up for yourself, which by the way is a very

505
00:46:02,890 --> 00:46:09,978
good way for a person to frame it, is that if a person is putting that tag on them,

506
00:46:09,978 --> 00:46:12,018
They're really not insulting them.

507
00:46:12,018 --> 00:46:13,858
They're insulting their faith.

508
00:46:14,158 --> 00:46:15,798
It's not personal.

509
00:46:15,838 --> 00:46:16,718
Okay?

510
00:46:16,718 --> 00:46:19,258
It's not like me against you.

511
00:46:19,258 --> 00:46:28,798
It's kind of like I am going to offend your faith and you don't have any right to defend
your faith.

512
00:46:29,338 --> 00:46:31,938
You have a right to defend yourself personally.

513
00:46:31,938 --> 00:46:35,218
Okay, but actually I think it's the other way around.

514
00:46:35,218 --> 00:46:39,338
If somebody is insulting my appearance, for instance,

515
00:46:39,862 --> 00:46:41,293
I don't take it personally.

516
00:46:41,293 --> 00:46:42,983
They don't know what they're talking about.

517
00:46:42,983 --> 00:46:48,486
But on the other hand, it's not okay that they're insulting my faith.

518
00:46:49,067 --> 00:46:50,347
That's not fair.

519
00:46:50,347 --> 00:46:50,887
Okay.

520
00:46:50,887 --> 00:46:51,828
Okay.

521
00:46:51,828 --> 00:46:54,090
And that is outrageous behavior.

522
00:46:54,090 --> 00:46:57,412
Especially since they don't even know what my faith is.

523
00:46:57,412 --> 00:46:59,534
And that's not okay with me.

524
00:46:59,534 --> 00:47:04,576
So I'll defend my faith, but not myself, not myself personally.

525
00:47:04,616 --> 00:47:08,298
Okay, so if it's not personal, you can do that better.

526
00:47:08,298 --> 00:47:15,440
The other thing is, I'm just giving ways that I would deal with it, okay, that I've
learned.

527
00:47:15,440 --> 00:47:23,722
Okay, another way of learning it, and because I've gotten good at this, is like, I call
them conversation stoppers.

528
00:47:23,902 --> 00:47:32,324
It's like a person, when I say conversation stopper is that we've all experienced this, is
that somebody

529
00:47:33,182 --> 00:47:36,374
wants to basically give you the deep six.

530
00:47:36,374 --> 00:47:49,503
Okay, so they they're going to talk to you in a way to the spirit to the spirit you
they're going to they're going to say things to demoralize you whether it's offensive or

531
00:47:49,503 --> 00:47:52,986
something that they're going to try to push you down in some way.

532
00:47:52,986 --> 00:48:02,172
Okay, so you can you have a choice you can engage with them or you can disengage with
them.

533
00:48:03,200 --> 00:48:08,163
but not in a way that you're not paying attention to what's going on.

534
00:48:08,163 --> 00:48:17,849
So for instance, let's say this person is saying these things to this woman that really
are offensive to her faith.

535
00:48:17,849 --> 00:48:20,930
And they're going, well, you know what?

536
00:48:20,930 --> 00:48:23,773
I've done some research here and I think you're in a cult.

537
00:48:23,773 --> 00:48:26,576
Whatever that means, you know?

538
00:48:26,576 --> 00:48:29,608
And you know what one response is actually?

539
00:48:30,190 --> 00:48:30,720
You know what?

540
00:48:30,720 --> 00:48:31,320
I think you're right.

541
00:48:31,320 --> 00:48:32,591
I am in a cult.

542
00:48:33,111 --> 00:48:34,251
Okay, next.

543
00:48:34,251 --> 00:48:35,692
And I'm enjoying it.

544
00:48:36,792 --> 00:48:38,553
Yeah, I'm not only in a cult.

545
00:48:38,553 --> 00:48:39,003
Thanks.

546
00:48:39,003 --> 00:48:41,153
Thanks for recognizing I'm in a cult.

547
00:48:41,153 --> 00:48:42,904
I never been happier in my life.

548
00:48:42,904 --> 00:48:43,895
Okay, next.

549
00:48:43,895 --> 00:48:55,908
Okay, because if you basically, you're like what she's really doing is showing the person
that they're not capable of putting them down.

550
00:48:56,584 --> 00:49:00,488
Like you're, you're, it's basically saying to somebody without saying it.

551
00:49:00,488 --> 00:49:00,938
okay.

552
00:49:00,938 --> 00:49:01,489
I get it.

553
00:49:01,489 --> 00:49:07,203
You're trying to like actually put me down in some way and actually, you know what?

554
00:49:07,203 --> 00:49:08,786
I'm going to take it as a compliment.

555
00:49:08,786 --> 00:49:09,777
I'm going to take this compliment.

556
00:49:09,777 --> 00:49:10,628
You're not putting me down.

557
00:49:10,628 --> 00:49:11,558
You say I'm on a cult.

558
00:49:11,558 --> 00:49:12,011
You're right.

559
00:49:12,011 --> 00:49:13,230
I love being in a cult.

560
00:49:13,230 --> 00:49:16,492
It's been the best, best thing I ever decided was to join this cult.

561
00:49:16,492 --> 00:49:17,193
Okay.

562
00:49:17,193 --> 00:49:19,895
Then where does the other person go?

563
00:49:20,356 --> 00:49:21,016
Nowhere.

564
00:49:21,016 --> 00:49:22,717
It's the end of the conversation.

565
00:49:23,683 --> 00:49:27,776
Okay, that person wants to kind of keep putting you down.

566
00:49:27,776 --> 00:49:31,969
They keep wanting to take this in the weeds and you're basically saying, you're right.

567
00:49:31,969 --> 00:49:33,801
And, and I love every minute of it.

568
00:49:33,801 --> 00:49:35,161
Okay, next.

569
00:49:36,122 --> 00:49:36,492
Okay.

570
00:49:36,492 --> 00:49:40,706
So they basically been, they've been neutered.

571
00:49:40,706 --> 00:49:47,894
They've been neutered because they're coming with their sword swinging and you're
basically saving to them.

572
00:49:47,894 --> 00:49:48,434
okay.

573
00:49:48,434 --> 00:49:50,035
Chop my head off next.

574
00:49:50,365 --> 00:49:50,943
Right.

575
00:49:50,943 --> 00:49:51,704
You're very strong.

576
00:49:51,704 --> 00:49:52,484
Good for you.

577
00:49:52,484 --> 00:49:53,185
Good for you.

578
00:49:53,185 --> 00:49:54,316
You just took my head off.

579
00:49:54,316 --> 00:49:54,596
Next.

580
00:49:54,596 --> 00:49:55,707
Okay.

581
00:49:55,707 --> 00:50:09,960
So you can basically just agree with them and, uh, and just not go, not go where they're
wanting to take you, which is they're trying to convince you they're right.

582
00:50:09,960 --> 00:50:10,821
You're wrong.

583
00:50:10,821 --> 00:50:13,593
And they're going to save you from yourself.

584
00:50:15,455 --> 00:50:19,958
Okay, and you're basically telling them, thanks for trying to save me.

585
00:50:19,958 --> 00:50:24,755
I'm already saved or I'm, I'm, I'm too lost for me to forget about it.

586
00:50:24,755 --> 00:50:30,343
You know, so you're basically not going where they're trying to take you with the dog
leash.

587
00:50:30,503 --> 00:50:31,224
Okay.

588
00:50:31,224 --> 00:50:33,915
So you're happy right where you're at.

589
00:50:33,915 --> 00:50:34,315
Okay.

590
00:50:34,315 --> 00:50:38,357
So that's one way to handle it is basically going, thanks for thinking of me.

591
00:50:38,357 --> 00:50:38,867
You know what?

592
00:50:38,867 --> 00:50:39,378
You're right.

593
00:50:39,378 --> 00:50:39,928
But you know what?

594
00:50:39,928 --> 00:50:41,375
I really enjoyed this call.

595
00:50:41,375 --> 00:50:41,935
All right.

596
00:50:41,935 --> 00:50:42,262
Okay.

597
00:50:42,262 --> 00:50:43,610
That's the end of the conversation.

598
00:50:43,610 --> 00:50:44,322
All right.

599
00:50:44,322 --> 00:50:46,402
That's a conversation stopper.

600
00:50:46,402 --> 00:50:47,702
All right.

601
00:50:47,822 --> 00:51:01,022
And the other thing is, or if you're not that kind of person and you want to take it in
another direction, another direction to take this is, understand you think I'm in a cult.

602
00:51:01,122 --> 00:51:02,382
That's very interesting.

603
00:51:02,382 --> 00:51:03,542
Thanks for your concern.

604
00:51:03,542 --> 00:51:06,102
What actually are you concerned about?

605
00:51:06,102 --> 00:51:11,762
Other than the word cult, what behavior are you actually concerned about?

606
00:51:11,762 --> 00:51:13,594
And do you have evidence of

607
00:51:16,714 --> 00:51:18,455
Now you're playing the lawyer.

608
00:51:18,476 --> 00:51:21,296
Okay, that's also very effective.

609
00:51:22,179 --> 00:51:31,699
Yeah, you go the empirical way and go the sense of humor way, And maybe if you go the
empirical way, maybe they're right.

610
00:51:31,699 --> 00:51:40,396
Actually, I mean, not that the word means anything, but maybe they're concerned as well
placed and maybe they know something you don't.

611
00:51:41,217 --> 00:51:44,079
But from my personal experience, it is

612
00:51:44,079 --> 00:51:48,183
unbelievably rare that they actually know more than I do.

613
00:51:48,183 --> 00:51:50,967
Because I have to deal with it day to day.

614
00:51:50,967 --> 00:51:55,672
They just read something or heard something or want to believe something in the air.

615
00:51:55,672 --> 00:52:00,126
And they could be right, but if they're right, prove it to me.

616
00:52:00,169 --> 00:52:11,497
And you know, this actually leads me to another possible recommendation for our listeners,
especially the people in the culture society group who might be listening to this later.

617
00:52:11,497 --> 00:52:20,426
I would say that it's good to inform oneself on what actual cult

618
00:52:20,426 --> 00:52:33,485
activity looks like or I'm gonna I'm gonna use the other term which I prefer what actual
high control group activity looks like because as you say you know as you say most people

619
00:52:33,485 --> 00:52:44,487
don't actually know very much about it and most people are not equipped to identify it
right you know just the same I could get

620
00:52:44,487 --> 00:52:55,247
worried because a friend of mine joined, I don't know, an evangelical church, for example,
and they started going there all of a sudden and they're reading the Bible more often and

621
00:52:55,247 --> 00:53:04,407
because I know them as a non-religious person, I might become worried and go like, you
know, I'm not worried that you might be joining a cult here, but I actually don't know

622
00:53:04,407 --> 00:53:05,547
their life situation.

623
00:53:05,547 --> 00:53:07,275
I'm not really aware of that.

624
00:53:07,275 --> 00:53:09,617
that is a really good example though.

625
00:53:09,617 --> 00:53:21,508
That's a really good example using more of a mainstream group is that there may be people
who can see that ever since they've been in this new group, that their behavior has

626
00:53:21,508 --> 00:53:28,385
changed, their communication has changed, and they're concerned that actually they're
going to lose a friend.

627
00:53:28,385 --> 00:53:32,000
There's personal interest involved here too.

628
00:53:32,000 --> 00:53:43,922
Okay, but the thing is, is that it's not helpful to decide which group deserves the tag of
cult.

629
00:53:44,003 --> 00:53:47,426
What's important is what's actually going on.

630
00:53:49,484 --> 00:53:54,809
I mean, what exactly is going on and what can I learn from it?

631
00:53:54,809 --> 00:54:02,977
And as you said, you know, we've been uh using this as a platform to expose people to the
Kalsa ideal.

632
00:54:02,977 --> 00:54:04,349
Okay.

633
00:54:04,349 --> 00:54:13,337
And if you read the book I wrote, I I didn't mention it last episode, but you know, I
wrote a book called Kalsa Consciousness, and I'll try to put the links in here, but it

634
00:54:13,337 --> 00:54:14,538
explains

635
00:54:14,693 --> 00:54:22,073
like this ideal that was passed down by this individual 300 years ago.

636
00:54:22,073 --> 00:54:33,933
I mean, if Guru Gobind Singh was here in 2025, forget that, that happened 300 years ago,
okay?

637
00:54:34,353 --> 00:54:43,773
If he's here 300 years later, which he is through what he formed, just as

638
00:54:43,887 --> 00:54:55,993
Christ is here for a Christian as much as he was 2000 years ago, which most followers
actually feel and I'm very sympathetic to that point of view.

639
00:54:55,993 --> 00:55:00,366
I'm very sympathetic that Christ still lives, that Gurugobind Singh still lives.

640
00:55:00,366 --> 00:55:03,627
And they lived through what they left behind, okay?

641
00:55:03,627 --> 00:55:06,068
Nobody could deny that, okay?

642
00:55:06,229 --> 00:55:09,010
At the very least, okay?

643
00:55:09,010 --> 00:55:10,210
And so...

644
00:55:10,434 --> 00:55:11,794
I'll just talk about my own group.

645
00:55:11,794 --> 00:55:13,434
I won't get into other groups.

646
00:55:13,434 --> 00:55:14,734
That's not fair.

647
00:55:15,354 --> 00:55:27,854
But if Guru Gobind Singh was here in 2025, it would be all over the newspapers and all
over the news on TV that there's this horrible cult leader in India who has these

648
00:55:27,854 --> 00:55:37,834
cult-like following of people who basically are now dressing the way he wants them to
dress, eating the way that he wants them to eat, doing this, doing that.

649
00:55:37,834 --> 00:55:39,222
And you know what's even worse?

650
00:55:39,222 --> 00:55:40,796
They're actually warriors.

651
00:55:40,796 --> 00:55:45,418
He's actually training them to be able to fight on the battlefield.

652
00:55:45,418 --> 00:55:47,095
We've got a real problem here.

653
00:55:47,095 --> 00:55:54,444
Yeah, you'll be getting headlines going like, Madman in India creating death cult and
things like that, yeah.

654
00:55:54,444 --> 00:56:04,316
yeah, but the thing is, is that his enemies back 300 years ago did describe him that way
because in his eyes they were a danger.

655
00:56:04,316 --> 00:56:07,997
He was a danger to their thing.

656
00:56:07,997 --> 00:56:13,038
So they portrayed him as this basically very evil person.

657
00:56:13,579 --> 00:56:18,861
His followers thought him very differently, obviously 300 years later.

658
00:56:18,861 --> 00:56:21,001
getting back to the word cult,

659
00:56:21,059 --> 00:56:32,974
the person, the friend of this woman who may have gone on the internet, may have even read
my book, read about the life of Guru Gobind Singh, and he's now freaked out because it's

660
00:56:32,974 --> 00:56:36,695
so much different than his current worldview.

661
00:56:37,135 --> 00:56:42,397
And now he's calling up his friend and going, I don't think you know what you're getting
into.

662
00:56:42,397 --> 00:56:46,478
This whole kalsa thing, this whole Sikh thing, it's a cult.

663
00:56:46,538 --> 00:56:47,378
But

664
00:56:48,210 --> 00:56:53,772
thing is he's right under his understanding of that word.

665
00:56:54,273 --> 00:56:57,854
Okay, that that can't like the C word.

666
00:56:57,874 --> 00:57:00,076
You could definitely of course you can.

667
00:57:00,076 --> 00:57:05,439
I would agree with him if that is how you're defining it and you're okay.

668
00:57:05,439 --> 00:57:13,482
If you're defining the cults as a cult according to that definition that you're holding on
to.

669
00:57:13,522 --> 00:57:15,983
Okay, I actually agree with you.

670
00:57:16,896 --> 00:57:18,897
It's indisputable.

671
00:57:18,897 --> 00:57:20,898
It checks every box.

672
00:57:21,441 --> 00:57:23,401
I contribute money to it.

673
00:57:23,802 --> 00:57:25,253
I dress like it's asking to.

674
00:57:25,253 --> 00:57:27,704
I go to bed when it tells me to go to bed.

675
00:57:27,724 --> 00:57:32,526
You know, I basically give my allegiance to it.

676
00:57:32,867 --> 00:57:35,788
OK, so yeah, I'm in the cult of cult.

677
00:57:35,788 --> 00:57:36,709
I agree with you.

678
00:57:36,709 --> 00:57:44,766
OK, but the thing is, that's not the issue is that if you are successfully labeling me,
incorrectly by the

679
00:57:44,766 --> 00:57:53,449
using a word incorrectly to label me to basically put me down and put down the faith that
I've given my life to.

680
00:57:53,449 --> 00:57:56,249
that, okay, I see what you're doing.

681
00:57:56,249 --> 00:58:00,650
I agree that I check all the boxes.

682
00:58:00,650 --> 00:58:04,191
The faith checks all your boxes, but what's your point?

683
00:58:04,191 --> 00:58:07,833
What actually did Guru Gobind Singh do that was wrong here?

684
00:58:07,833 --> 00:58:10,574
How is my association with him?

685
00:58:10,936 --> 00:58:14,687
and what he taught, how is this diminishing my life?

686
00:58:14,687 --> 00:58:16,267
You show me that.

687
00:58:16,668 --> 00:58:24,890
Okay, I'm not interested in the fact that you can successfully label me with a
contemporary term, term that scares the shit out of you.

688
00:58:25,290 --> 00:58:30,412
Okay, what I'm concerned about is if I'm doing something I shouldn't be doing.

689
00:58:30,412 --> 00:58:37,994
If Gudegobin Singh did something that was wrong, okay, show me that he did something that
was wrong.

690
00:58:37,994 --> 00:58:39,634
Show me that

691
00:58:39,770 --> 00:58:44,493
by taking on the lifestyle he gave, diminished my life in any way.

692
00:58:44,493 --> 00:58:47,454
If you can do that, that's going to be helpful.

693
00:58:47,454 --> 00:58:58,661
But to just throw a label on me because it scares, the label scares the shit out of you
and that I check all the boxes for that label that you're buying into.

694
00:58:58,661 --> 00:58:59,501
Okay.

695
00:58:59,501 --> 00:59:06,186
And so that's kind of where I wanted this to go is it's, the whole thing is ridiculous.

696
00:59:06,186 --> 00:59:07,727
But what you're saying,

697
00:59:07,727 --> 00:59:15,869
is legitimate is that this stuff going on that has always gone on, it's not a new thing.

698
00:59:16,009 --> 00:59:26,311
This mind control, okay, of people is a concern and they're not on the planet that many
years.

699
00:59:26,311 --> 00:59:36,314
And if they basically lose their direction in life in a bad way, they losing the entire
human life, that is a bad thing.

700
00:59:36,314 --> 00:59:37,614
I actually

701
00:59:37,614 --> 00:59:38,774
Agree.

702
00:59:39,155 --> 00:59:49,041
I think what is good for people to learn, including this woman, is like, how would a
conscious person deal with this?

703
00:59:49,692 --> 00:59:52,532
because in the end we know one thing.

704
00:59:53,192 --> 00:59:54,732
We're all going to disappear.

705
00:59:54,732 --> 00:59:56,232
We're all going to leave this planet.

706
00:59:56,232 --> 01:00:00,592
And so while we here, we want to learn something.

707
01:00:00,772 --> 01:00:01,492
Okay.

708
01:00:01,492 --> 01:00:06,353
And so to me, this is just a win-win situation for her.

709
01:00:06,353 --> 01:00:11,419
whoever this person was did her a big favor in my world because

710
01:00:11,419 --> 01:00:15,930
Now she's gotta deal with something she didn't have to deal with yesterday.

711
01:00:16,251 --> 01:00:18,652
And so maybe from this,

712
01:00:19,240 --> 01:00:26,132
If she does everything the way that I think that she can, she'll never have to deal with
this the rest of her life.

713
01:00:28,947 --> 01:00:29,586
Right.

714
01:00:29,586 --> 01:00:41,631
I think it's important to know that every single person who is currently walking on this
planet has the potential

715
01:00:42,323 --> 01:00:45,807
abuse the authority they have over others.

716
01:00:45,807 --> 01:00:50,070
know, that is something anyone could do.

717
01:00:50,070 --> 01:00:55,854
The most well-intentioned person could fall into that trap.

718
01:00:55,854 --> 01:00:57,555
um

719
01:00:57,866 --> 01:01:00,601
the most well-intentioned person.

720
01:01:00,601 --> 01:01:02,132
the most well-intentioned person.

721
01:01:02,132 --> 01:01:04,524
Yes, yes, yes, I agree.

722
01:01:04,524 --> 01:01:16,971
And I think that, you know, I don't blame people for being guarded about this sort of
thing because as we say, there is a lot of mass hysteria related to this.

723
01:01:16,971 --> 01:01:23,915
Like mass media certainly doesn't help when it comes to sort of airing people's fears
about this.

724
01:01:23,707 --> 01:01:35,799
something that I would recommend to all of our listeners, our watchers is to actually
inform yourselves about the tactics of high control groups.

725
01:01:35,799 --> 01:01:40,231
That is, as I said, what I believe to be a more useful term than cult.

726
01:01:40,231 --> 01:01:44,271
Because as you said, cult is a very diluted term.

727
01:01:44,311 --> 01:01:49,171
It doesn't really mean much in our current context.

728
01:01:49,811 --> 01:02:01,331
But informing yourself about this subject, know, about things like, I don't know, the
Johnstown massacre and what kind of social engineering went into creating a situation like

729
01:02:01,331 --> 01:02:02,271
that.

730
01:02:02,391 --> 01:02:09,950
Knowing about this will not only help you in the sense that it will

731
01:02:10,158 --> 01:02:17,311
protect you from actually falling into any high control group if you ever happen to come
across such a thing.

732
01:02:17,311 --> 01:02:29,256
But if you, like it's happening with this lady that we've been talking about the entire
meeting, if you just happen to be someone who is discovering a path of faith, who is

733
01:02:29,256 --> 01:02:36,538
trying to engage in some kind of spiritual exploration and you are informed about this,

734
01:02:36,808 --> 01:02:50,806
and you can clearly see that whatever it is you're doing is just not aligned with these
ideas of coercion that we're talking about, then that should certainly be a positive

735
01:02:50,806 --> 01:02:52,667
signal for whatever it is you're doing.

736
01:02:52,667 --> 01:02:56,571
It should bring you some self-assurance, I would say.

737
01:02:57,372 --> 01:02:58,172
it...

738
01:02:58,366 --> 01:03:10,992
I think it comes down to, how do you at the same time have such a strong sense of
individuality that's unbreakable, that nobody can manipulate, and at the same time allow

739
01:03:10,992 --> 01:03:21,335
yourself to merge into something that's bigger than yourself, that you lose your
individuality and merge into something that's infinite?

740
01:03:21,335 --> 01:03:23,415
How do you do that at the same time?

741
01:03:23,534 --> 01:03:26,897
anyhow, thanks so much for this conversation.

742
01:03:26,897 --> 01:03:35,673
maybe you have a better suggestion, but I think a good title for this episode is Oh My
God, I'm in a Cult.

743
01:03:36,784 --> 01:03:38,164
No, I like that one.

744
01:03:38,164 --> 01:03:39,624
That one is fine.