The following in no way reflects the attitudes or opinions of MarsDawn or the MarsDawn staff as a whole. All views expressed here are solely my own and are posted here under my own auspices as a private citizen.
Folks, I've been following the debate here about the media and the Heaven's Gate group and I agree with most of it. I only wish to point out one thing. Please, please, please, please, do NOT bandy the word "cult" around casually. As a member of a very small religious group (less than 3,000 worldwide) I am often accused of being a cultist. This is a difficult thing to deal with for the reason that the word "cult" carries a very strong emotional meaning in our language and, regardless of the actual values of a religious group, the label cult can be devestating to their public image. I am not supporting the Heaven's Gate suicide, I think it is deplorable, but I wanted to step in and make this point before this discussion moved on to other "cults". Consider for a moment the Branch Dividian/Waco disaster. Now, there are more Branch Dividians than just those at Waco and most of them are perfectly normal, friendly, reasonable individuals. However, thanks to the actions of one lunatic fringe group and our willingness to label any minority religious group a "cult", many Branch Dividians now have to deal with some degree of ostracism and suspicion from the rest of their communities. All because of a word. Now, the Heaven's Gate group may well be a cult, indeed it is one of the few groups that really comes fairly close to my definition of one, but it is wrong to immediately label them as such. I would like to clarify lastly that I am not against the word "cult" per se. I hate the idea of New-speak and I hate it when people tell me that I can't use a perfectly accepted word that has no connotation and instead must use a synthesized term (ex: "Blind" becomes "Visually challenged") but I feel you should be aware that cult, much like racial slurs I will not quote here, carries a powerful and damaging emotional message and should be used with caution. Thank you for your time, I apologize if I have offended anyone, but this is something I feel strongly about.
-Matt