Warning signs!
Anyone could attack a group they disagree with by unfairly labeling it a destructive cult. How would you know whether it really were such a cult or not? Isn't there an objective method to evaluate groups for cultic tendencies? Yes. The following early warning signs can help you reasonably determine whether or not a group is likely to be a destructive cult, and if you should be concerned about a friend, coworker, or loved one being involved with it.
The main reason that the following destructive cult tactics are so damaging to both the individual and society is because they debilitate rationality and reduce empathy. Rationality and empathy are indispensable in making good personal and social decisions. History is littered with personal and social catastrophes where a lack of rationality and lack of empathy were its core causes.
Ask yourself if the following criteria apply to the group you are concerned about.
A destructive cult tends to be totalitarian in its control of its members' behavior. Cults are likely to dictate in great detail not only what members believe, but also what members wear and eat, when and where members work, sleep, and bathe, and how members think, speak, and conduct familial, marital, or sexual relationships.
A destructive cult tends to have an ethical double standard. Members are urged to be obedient to the cult, to carefully follow cult rules. They are also encouraged to be revealing and open in the group, confessing all to the leaders. On the other hand, outside the group they are encouraged to act unethically, manipulating outsiders or nonmembers, and either deceiving them or simply revealing very little about themselves or the group. In contrast to destructive cults, honorable groups teach members to abide by one set of ethics and act ethically and truthfully to all people in all situations.
A destructive cult has only two basic purposes: recruiting new members and fund-raising. Altruistic movements, established religions, and other honorable groups also recruit and raise funds. However, these actions are incidental to an honorable group's main purpose of improving the lives of its members and of humankind in general. Destructive cults may claim to make social contributions, but in actuality such claims are superficial and only serve as gestures or fronts for recruiting and fund-raising. A cult's real goal is to increase the prestige and often the wealth of the leader.
A destructive cult appears to be innovative and exclusive. The leader claims to be breaking with tradition, offering something novel, and instituting the ONLY viable system for change that will solve life's problems or the world's ills. But these claims are empty and only used to recruit members who are then surreptitiously subjected to mind control to inhibit their ability to examine the a