Are you susceptible to cult-like thinking? According to author Jane Borden, everyone might be, especially Americans.
In today’s episode, Borden talks with EWG President and co-Founder Ken Cook about how the Pilgrims and Puritans essentially founded America as a “high-control doomsday group” and that those patterns never went away.
In her book, “Cults Like Us: Why Doomsday Thinking Drives America,” Borden identifies the warning signs: worship of a charismatic leader who can't be criticized, apocalyptic crisis narratives, conspiratorial thinking that explains away inconvenient facts, and promises to return to a “pure” past. Sound familiar?
The “Make America Great Again” and “Make America Healthy Again” movements check many of these boxes even while acknowledging that the health threats many Americans face are very real. Are we addressing those threats through evidence and accountability, or through cult-like devotion to leaders who promise easy answers?
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Disclaimer: This transcript was compiled using software and may include typographical errors.
Ken: Hi there, Ken Cook here, and I'm having another episode. Today's episode is a little bit different. I typically invite authors who write about the environment or nutrition and health, but today we're going to branch out and delve into culture. Why do we think and act the way we do? Today I'm speaking with Jane Borden, author of Cults Like Us, why Doomsday Thinking Drives America.
Jane is a cultural journalist and editor who contributes regularly to Vanity Fair. She's written for the New York Times Magazine and the Washington Post among other outlets. She's a beautiful writer. I have to tell you, this book has completely changed how I think about what so many of us are experiencing right now with maga.
Maha Q Anon, political polarization, alt-right thinking, conspiracy theories. Jane makes this fascinating argument that cult-like thinking isn't some fringe phenomena in America or something recent. It's baked into our DNA, starting with the pilgrims who came here in 1620 because they literally thought they were outrunning the apocalypse.
They later staged the moon landing. Jane traces seven Puritan beliefs that have shaped American culture for four centuries. Things like our desire for strong man leaders, our sense of being chosen, our anti-authoritarianism, and our apocalyptic thinking. Sound familiar? At EWG? We're all about evidence-based advocacy, exposing corporate malfeasance, pushing for safer products, holding big food and big pharma accountable.
We also know that many people are interested and invested in the MAHA movement, and they come to EWG for resources on toxic chemicals, food, pesticides, and other topics. So today we're going to explore what's the difference between healthy skepticism of institutions, the challenges to authority that. EWG wakes up every day practicing.
What's the difference between that and cult-like thinking, when does our justifiable distrust of corporations tip into something else? And how do we maintain our critical thinking without falling into the very traps that have repeated throughout American history?
Jane Borden: Mm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Jane, thank
Ken: you so much for being here.
Let's start with the basics. What's your working definition of a cult?
Jane Borden: Sure. Um, and thank you for that intro. So I lean on, uh, the work of Robert j Lifton, a psychologist who developed this definition in the nineties, which has been very helpful because cult is a slippery word and people toss it around a lot to the degree that it can become meaningless.
So Lifton said a destructive cult has three characteristics. There's a leader who's worshiped. Typically that leader is charismatic, but not always. Uh, the worship part is important. Mm-hmm. There is undue influence at play, thought reform, mind control, what we used to call brainwashing.
Ken: Mm-hmm.
Jane Borden: And there's actual harm done typically to people within the group.
Typically financial, and often eventually sexual exploitation. This is helpful because you can look at, you know, uh, communes for example, have a lot of cult-like aspects, but. Communes don't typically have a leader who's worshiped. Right. So, well then we won't call them a cult. Right. People talk about Alcoholics Anonymous as being culty.
It has a lot of commonalities. People talk about the Marines that way. Mm-hmm. But again, those groups don't fit this definition, uh, laid out by lifton. Everyone kind of, when you say the word cult, they have an idea, an image that pops into their head, right? Yeah. And those are the kinds of groups that Lifton is characterizing.
Ken: So I was finding myself wanting to draw distinctions exactly along those lines between, for example, the term that's thrown about these days often and particularly in politics, is tribalism. A cult is not the same as a tribe, right? A tribe is a group you associate yourself with and helps define your identity.
But it's not the same as a cult, right?
Jane Borden: Definitely there are commonalities when we start falling into tribal thinking, when we become swayed by the people around us and we all start kind of saying and thinking the same thing. That's some cultish behavior happening. But if there's not someone at the head of your group who's manipulating you specifically, so that that person can gain power and resources and take advantage of you, then you're not looking at a cult.
Ken: Right. And so if we overlay that definition into our, our current politics, how does MAGA line up in your estimation? As I was reading your book, I kept thinking, well, you know, there's, there's sort of a preclinical signs perhaps that you're in a cult that aren't fully expressed yet. The potential is there.
That right the, the subclinical. Tendencies might be there. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. How do you assess MAGA in the context of, of your work on cults?
Jane Borden: So in, in my book, I explore both participation in actual cults isolated groups. And then I also look at cult-like thinking at the societal level. There have been mass movements in history that historians and sociologists have categorized as cult-like.
Marxism Nazim, big movements that had charismatic leaders. So when you're looking at American history, we see cult-like thinking flare from time to time, and it's certainly flaring right now. Cult-like thinking flares on the left and on the right. Typically it flares in extremist groups or extreme movements.
I do see a lot of cult-like thinking currently flaring. Within the MAGA movement, in particular anti-intellectualism, the sort of desire for a strong man to come and rescue us from our problems rather than working through them together. This idea of like purity and perfection and that there's some outside group that's ruining that or taking that from us, and there is a way to reeve it if we punish them.
These are all cult-like. Ideologies and they were all present in the puritans and pilgrims and I I, at the beginning of the book, I identify a certain number of their cult ideologies and then I trace them through secular American history. It's not a political book. I didn't intend to write a political book.
Right. And it's not my area of expertise. Nevertheless, I'm following these certain train lines of ideology and they've all ended at the alt-right depot in 2025. And so here we are. But to be clear, quote like thinking does not have a, a political persuasion. Uh, but yes, I do see quite a bit of it currently in maga.
Ken: Yeah. And you mentioned at several points that cult-like thinking often. Skews toward authoritarianism and a strong man, uh, existential stakes that this is, you know. Mm-hmm. We're at a, a moment that's, uh, going to change the world a, a mythologized past that we're gonna make America great again. Mm-hmm. We used to be great.
The template does again. Make me think, okay, well maybe if there was a biomarker for cultism that they could take a blood sample. Um, I, I might not be presenting all the symptoms, but there's evidence that I've been infected.
Jane Borden: Well, I think we've all been infected. I think by virtue of, yeah, being in America and certainly cult-like thinking is a human phenomenon.
I in fact, traced the evolutionary origins of us versus them thinking toward the end of the book. I do believe that we are more prone in America to it, uh, for a few reasons, because we were founded by high control doomsday groups. Most people today, if they looked at the Pilgrims and Puritans, they would say, oh, that's a cult.
That looks like a cult because of the first Amendment, which protects. The right, uh, for anyone to start a church, whether that's a legitimate spiritual leader or a con artist. Um, and again, I, I've got no problem with the First Amendment, but what that allows for is a certain amount of scam artists to operate within the system.
Yeah. Protected. Right. And then of course we don't, we don't ask these groups to pay taxes, which allows them to amass wealth, which makes them harder to target once we do root out the ones that have bad intentions.
Ken: So many of the examples that you go through in the book illustrate these, these elements. I wanted to find some way to ask myself, what, what are my cult leanings?
What are my cult and how do I think about that conspiratorial thinking, and a sense that the answer can be found not with existing authorities, but with whatever the cult is presenting as the, the actual truth about how the world. Is working or who is on our side or against us at the cultural level.
Mm-hmm. It's, it really is, um, being able to define an external enemy and being able to explain a way inconvenient facts to the cult of framing as conspiracies. Mm-hmm. We've been spending a lot of time talking about the Make America healthy again, element of the Make America Great again, broader movement.
Lots of elements that fit the conspiratorial thinking about the, the control of our health from drug companies and the, the collaboration deep within the Centers for Disease control, the corruption, the sense that there's a, a mythological past where we were healthy. Mm-hmm. And now we're not healthy.
Jane Borden: Yeah.
I mean, well, well, how does
Ken: that fit in your frame?
Jane Borden: First of all, what you were just saying about the conspiratorial thinking, you know, if, if you're someone who wants to build authority. You can do that by getting a following of people and the way to get people, this is all part of your path to power, right?
The way to get people is to pull them from wherever their current allegiances lie. And you do that by attacking the existing power structures, right? That's how you take power. Yeah. It's a coup. And so I think that's behind the attack on science and that's behind vaccine misinformation. That's. Behind the attacks on the government because it's a way to take power ultimately.
And I think that's, I think that's what's happening with Maha and with MAGA is it's a coup. So you know, specifically with Maha. The threat is real. Right? Our health system is in shambles. Yeah. And the environment is full of toxins and forever chemicals. We are experiencing an epidemic in obesity and diabetes and heart disease.
People are, are dying younger. Our life expectancy is dropping in America at the moment. The threats are real. And so yeah, the claims fell on fertile ears. Now. I don't believe the power institutions being attacked are the right ones to attack. I think. Corporate interests mm-hmm. Are behind all of those problems.
Well, the problem is greed, not science. Right?
Ken: Yeah.
Jane Borden: But that's not gonna help them get power and money and influence.
Ken: Yeah.
Jane Borden: Because they want power and money from these corporate interests. Yeah. What you were saying about the looking back on the past and trying to return to that, that's a perfectionist movement.
So when you hear that kind of thinking, you're looking at a perfectionist movement. America has a rich history of perfectionist movements. This idea that on doomsday we're going to be taken up to heaven will be pure, and everyone else who's not pure will perish or, or will be taken up on a UFO and become light beings on the astral plane.
It's a purity thing. Yeah. Yeah. Even the social gospel movement in the late 18 hundreds, abolition movement, temperance movement, those were perfectionist movements. They thought that if they could purify America of its sins. The Civil War was an effort to purify America of its biggest sin. Slavery to the socialists.
Mm-hmm. Yeah. Then they thought Jesus would return. I mean, it's, it was quite literal. And the eugenics is a perfectionist movement. Tism is a perfectionist movement, so we see this again and again because we believe we're a chosen nation. We believe we're perfect, and that's what's happening with Maha because it's all about purity.
Right. Yeah. Why can't you just make your body healthy enough that you don't need a vaccine?
Ken: Right?
Jane Borden: The vaccine is, is this gross chemical foreign agent? Don't put that in your pure body, right?
Ken: Yeah. That someone profits from
Jane Borden: mm-hmm.
Ken: Putting in your body. Mm-hmm. Yeah.
Jane Borden: And in other word for, for purity is virtue, right?
Uh, and we see a lot of virtuousness in this movement and righteousness. And I think that's not a surprise.
Ken: Yeah. As I was reading the book, I was, I was struck a couple of times by the importance of conspiracy as a tool to keep information at bay that would otherwise dissolve the cult or undermine it.
And that if that can't be suppressed with an expansion of the conspiracy. Then that can really help undo the cult so that there's a sense in which a conspiracy is not really much use to a cult if it can't constantly be expanded to envelop inconvenient facts and contrary information that that undermines the teachings of the leader or the
Jane Borden: power of the leader.
The
Ken: power of the leader. Yeah, and and I also noted. How important failings of, uh, healthcare were. Mm-hmm. The anxiety, which is a big theme in your book as a, a motivator for cults generally and cult activity, no matter where it is on the political spectrum. It's sort of moments of deep cultural anxiety, an on me sense of, you know, being disenfranchised, sense of hopelessness.
Adherence to a cult is comforting. Mm-hmm. But healthcare was something you talked about as a source of anxiety, as a source of having been left out failed. Hopelessness, because our healthcare system leaves so many people out.
Jane Borden: I mean, first of all, one of the biggest attractions to cults has always been historically throughout the world, rescue from death.
So. I, I think when people feel their health is at stake, uh, yes, they're very interested and, and look a snake oil salesman, it's, it's always about health to some degree. And specifically with love has won. She was, she painted herself as a healer. So Amy Carlson basically was an unhappy single mom, working dead end jobs.
She fled her life. She much like a cult follower, became indoctrinated online into conspiracy theories and esoteric beliefs, and she just disappeared. She left her family and went to live with this guy. Uh, they started calling themselves Mother God and Father God, and offering healings. And then she decided that, uh, she was actually.
More God than he was God. And she left him and started her own group and people wanted to be there. They had a huge online following. And then a bunch of people came out to live with her, and a lot of former followers have said that they came because they were. Searching online for their health issues.
And she came up, yeah, because she was selling these healings online, digital healings, and because mm-hmm. Social media and the algorithms feed us this kind of extreme content. Right? Yeah. And she started to spiral into addiction and anorexia. It was a big party scene. All the time. Um, some former followers described her as just being wasted constantly day and night.
Not just alcohol, but a lot of, um, psilocybin mushrooms and, and some other, uh, controlled substances. And the group was especially interesting to me because it didn't follow the typical path of, uh, occult destruction where the leader harms everyone else. Right. Amy Carlson was ultimately harming herself, and it was her followers who ended up taking the reins because they, I think, needed her more than she needed them.
I think, uh, at the end of the day, she was still just trying to disappear from an unsatisfying life now through alcohol abuse, but her leaders saw her as this healer who was going to. You know, she comes once every so many billion years and she was going to rescue the whole world from its karma. Everyone would be released and ascended they thought.
Robin Williams's Spirit was going to pick her up on a u ffo. And you know, these groups always have extreme beliefs, which are honestly neither here nor there. The foundational pattern is always the same, but it was, as I said, slightly different in this group. And so she, um, uh, eventually, uh, wanted to go to the hospital.
She had been ingesting colloidal silver. Which she yes, thought was a cure all a panacea of sorts. And she was telling everyone else to ingest this stuff, don't do it. It's little bits of silver suspended in liquid. It's, it's poison for your body. She was ingesting it regularly along again with a lot of alcohol and she was slowly killing herself.
And there came a point where she wanted to go to the hospital and her followers said, Nope, nope. We're not gonna let you 'cause you said hospitals were evil. You said if, if we go to a hospital, some of these, um, evil beings could get into the body of a nurse and kill you. Right. That's what they thought was going to happen.
Uh, so we're not doing that. And it was a very tragic story. And she died at 43, 45, I can't remember exactly. She weighed like 93 pounds, something like that at the time of her death and her skin was. Purplish grayish as a result of the colloidal silver ingestion. The police who found her
Ken: unbelievable. Yeah.
Jane Borden: What you can hear on their body cams, one of them saying, oh, I think they painted the corpse. Yeah. 'cause she was kind of purplish.
Ken: Oof. Yeah. You know, and the notion that that health is central to these. Ideologies is, I think, a, a really important insight of, of your book. That really made a lot of sense to me.
And you know, you have to, you have to have a robust. Ability to generate conspiracies, to deal with inconvenient information that might come along or whistleblowers. Mm-hmm. The most inconvenient information of all In
Jane Borden: Washington they call it spin.
Ken: Yeah, exactly. You know, most people would not be amongst the 30,000 who are listening to this podcast.
At least I hope not, wouldn't, would maybe think it's kind of silly to be worried about anything that remotely resembles that kind of cult. Behavior. But that's where again, I go to the, well, the, you know, if, if you're maybe not fully symptomatic yet. Mm-hmm But you are looking, you are longing. For solutions to preserve longevity, to have a healthier child.
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Whatever it might be.
Jane Borden: Well, bi biohacking is a perfectionist movement.
Ken: Yeah. Of course. The billionaires who are biohacking themselves. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Of course.
Jane Borden: And that's not to say that we should throw out these movements. No. But I do think it's healthy to investigate the degree to which we are prone to some cult-like thinking.
And that's one of the goals of my book is I, I wanna point it out. Let's acknowledge this. Yeah. Let's recognize it. So that we can see it coming so that we don't fall prey to it, so that we don't fall for the magic trick that scam artists rely on to manipulate us to serve themselves. You touched on this earlier, and maybe now's a good time to talk about when cult-like thinking does Flare.
When we are most susceptible to it, when we're talking about specific groups, uh, sociologists say, uh, first of all, anyone can join a cult. It really can't happen to anyone because it's not about the psychological profile, it's about the context. People join cults when they are unmoored, so, uh, they've just lost a loved one or gone through a divorce.
Uh, they've just gotten laid off. They've just moved to a new town. They don't know anyone yet. This is why cults recruit on college campuses. So when we're looking for community, this is why California has such a rich tradition of cult participation. It's not because we're all crazy. It's because the mainline churches didn't get a foothold in California for quite some time.
And so people were out there looking for community, looking for spiritual allegiance. And so it was very easy for a scam artist to show up and say, Hey, follow me. Yeah. So when we're talking about cult-like thinking at the societal level, when is a society unmoored? Sociologists point to technological revolution, which of course we're seeing right now in spades, um, with AI and, and the way social media has shattered communication, they point to social upheaval.
Major social upheaval at the moment. Recently, of course, me too. The quote unquote woke movement. We're gonna be minority majority by 2040. White people will comprise less than 50%. So this is major social upheaval. And then of course, uh, sociologists point to general times of crisis and experiencing one of its biggest crises in history at the moment, I believe.
In the economic instability, so, mm-hmm. 90% of Americans are chronically under-resourced. Since 1975, an estimated $60 trillion has moved from the bottom 90% of Americans to the top. Really 1%. So that's a major and intentional redistribution of wealth. And when Americans. Have to take on extra jobs when they've blown through their savings, when they're taking on debt.
This is an existential crisis. Yeah. Health as we've discussed. And resources, right? Yeah. I mean, that's as primal as it gets. And so these are people desperate for help. And when you are that unmoored, when you're that desperate, you'll listen to people who promise what you want, and it's very convenient if that person is saying.
In fact, what you want is owed to you, and in fact, what you want was taken from you, and I am going to get it back for you, and I'm going to punish the people who took it for you. And then all you have to do is invent a straw man and burn it down and people will do whatever you want.
Ken: Yeah. Actually, uh, even in my own work, and I'll, I would put it sort of this way, one of the main elements of a successful cult, it seems to me is the ability of the, the leaders or the ideology of the cult to get its followers, to reject authority and reject standards, reject traditional power centers and so forth, and burn it down.
'cause those, those are often the ones that took things away from you and that have to be punished now or, or resurrected. And yet I've spent most of my career challenging authority. We, you know, we, we go after companies, we sue companies, we, you know, raise concerns about the chemicals they're putting into the environment, into your food, your air, your water.
But the difference is for us, we do our own research. Just because a lot of my colleagues have PhDs doesn't mean their research is necessarily better. They're just thoughtful about the sources. And you spend a lot of time in the book talking about the impact of a, of algorithms and the, and the availability of information online Now as a, uh, as an atomizing influence, as a fragmenting influence, that that allows people to make up their own world.
Facts and theories. And then the other element for us is, you know, we, we don't wanna get rid of authority. We wanna make it responsible and, and responsive to human needs. That seems to be something that cults, generally speaking, aren't interested in doing. They wanna parallel authority, structure, and a parallel set of facts because their facts don't mix well with.
Science, for example, or medicine or what have you. Does that make sense to you? Yeah. 'cause that's how it's really affected me. Yeah. And
Jane Borden: because they don't want another authority structure, because they want authority, they want. All of the authority. So we, I, I mentioned earlier that the beliefs of any group are, are kind of beside the point.
They're the most interesting. They're the ones that make for good documentaries, are the Yeah. Out there things these people believe. But the foundational patterns are what's important because exactly what we're seeing almost always in oc cult leader's behavior is the path of power. So once a person begins to seek power, the power is what's in charge.
Power wants more of itself. Power is like a parasite on a human, and the path of power is always the same. It wants more of itself and it can never get enough. And so there can be no other authority. There can be only one. And it's the cult leader. What the cult leader wants when on the powertrain is complete and total control.
Over everything.
Ken: Yeah.
Jane Borden: And ultimately, the ultimate end of power's path is control over life and death. That's the ultimate power. Right? And that's why we see groups end in tragedy. That's what happened in Jonestown. That's what happened in uh, heavens Gate. That's what happened in Waco Now. Most cults don't end that way.
In fact, very few do, which is really just a testament to exactly how many cults there are an estimated 10,000 in America currently. But when a group isolates itself in particular, that path becomes harder to interrupt. And uh, we see cults begin careening toward. A violent end
Ken: and I was struck also, uh, again and again in the culture looked at, at one point or another, they often come into conflict with, with science, and I think for a cult leader to have an independent scientific framework out there that's generating facts and evidence contrary to what is convenient.
To maintain the cult is, is one of the main areas. This is another thing that really struck me about your book. This is one of the main areas where it makes all the sense in the world to assault science and diminish people's connection to it. Their, their, their faith in it. The mission of. MAGA now, not just to specifically undo certain regulations, but to undo the ability of government to function specifically with respect to science, collecting data, collecting information.
That dysregulation, uh, agenda is really what's going to cost us in the long term, but that is definitely in the service of maintaining authority and eliminating. Rivals sources. Mm-hmm. Or centers of power like Vaccinologist or, you know, scientists at the CDC, they're just being, they're not being debated with by the administration.
They're just being let go.
Jane Borden: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. I mean, yeah, it's, it's eradicating rivals. Because that's the only way to get power and authority if you can't get it on merit.
Ken: Yeah. You can't win the debate. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Get rid of the other debater.
Jane Borden: Exactly. And it's very easy to rile up your followers to do the dirty work for you if you can convince them again that something was taken from them.
So it's, it's the grievance narrative again, right? You were owed something and you didn't get it, and it was robbed. Of you and uh, there's someone to blame and this is the person to blame. Yeah. Go get 'em.
Ken: Yeah, exactly. So at the end of the book, you come away with a sense that trying to extract the positives about what you've learned about cults and why there are aspects of the American.
Character, if you will, that are related to the same things that make us prone to developing cults or adhering to them. But there were things that, um, encouraged you. Can you talk a little bit about that?
Jane Borden: Well, you know, apocalyptic thinking itself is very interesting to me because. We focus almost exclusively on the ill effects of apocalyptic thinking 'cause they are profound.
This idea that one group is better than another and the other group's gonna be punished is central, of course, to apocalyptic thinking. But the reason apocalyptic thinking developed in the first place. Which goes back to Zoroastrianism from where, uh, Judaism picked it up. And the Jesus cult was an apocalyptic movement, uh, et cetera, et cetera.
But it developed among groups who were experiencing extreme persecution, life-threatening to them and their entire communities. And this idea started to bubble up. Well, maybe we're going to be rescued, right? Maybe the people so cruelly punishing us will be punished when we're rescued. And even though that's false, what it did was spread hope and it brought people in the community together.
So I think there are ways we can spread hope and come together as a community without requiring. Some kind of quote unquote other to be punished in order for us to have hope in community. And of course there are a variety of ways we have hope in community that we know about that don't involve the existential eradication of some perceived threat.
So I think it's important to think about what we get out of that kind of thinking. So that we can try to deliver that to ourselves in healthier ways. Also, you know, a, a lot of cult-like thinking in itself has positive elements like the, the anti-intellectualism. The anti-elitism. That's all part of our rebellious nature as Americans.
Like you said, sometimes institutions need to be taken down, so how can we, how can we approach that tendency of ours in a healthy way? I'm not saying we shouldn't have knee-jerk skepticism. I'm a pretty skeptical person myself, but think about the ways that serves us and identify the ways it hamstrings us and let's focus on one over the other.
You know, the, the kind of. Acquisitiveness that led to, for example, a cult like Amway. I mean, hundreds of thousands of Americans have been taken advantage by MLMs and Amway especially, and for decades now. And that's a whole other topic. The government has colluded in that exploitation. But at any rate, it took advantage of, or greed, essentially.
But the American dream and, and this idea of. Free market capitalism like that in itself isn't evil. So how can we have healthy ambition to build wealth for our families without it necessarily coming at the expense of other people who are being taken advantage of? Like there, there are ways to keep the baby and not throw out the bath bathwater.
And again, that's part of why I wanted to identify exactly how cult-like thinking works and how people are manipulated. So that we don't have to throw out the baby with the bath water.
Ken: Yeah, that's a, a great way to summarize what I took away from your book. I mean, I, I found myself again and again thinking, okay, if, if it's the case that it's not going to be the facts that persuade someone to think differently because they, they've socialized, they've brought themselves into a cult-like thinking or tribal thinking so powerfully that they will reject those facts.
Then I think you step back and you say, okay, well. If you find yourself in need of a strong leader, if you find yourself in need of a conspiratorial worldview, that explains absolutely everything. If you find yourself thinking that there, there was a time when things were, were great and perfect, and we need to return to that, if you find yourself on those intellectual paths, then you know you might find yourself.
Wondering if you've got the right framework or if you need to step back. And as you just said, think about just connecting to people, thinking about your basic values, thinking about how I can answer these questions about myself without having to rely on those relief structures.
Jane Borden: Mm. Turning to one another is going to be our way out of this because cult-like thinking.
Is fueled by division and it in turn fuels division. And so because the divided people are easier to conquer, right? We know that. Uh, and so the more we can turn toward one another, have conversations with people who are different than you, we can really diffuse a lot of the cult-like thinking that's blowing up America at the moment.
I think the biggest way to quell this, the fervor of this movement. Is, uh, to resource those experiencing economic crisis. When people are no longer in crisis, they will no longer turn to this. And you know, I would like to point out that I do believe wealth was taken from people. Yes. The reason that this isn't a grievance narrative is because I'm not sure anyone was owed wealth.
I think we as a community can choose to pay people a living wage. We can choose to care for one another. That way it doesn't mean anyone's owed money. Although someone could do a math equation pointing out exactly how money was taken from people of wage suppression. Maybe it is owed, but my point is the people in power took it.
It's a coup. And the reason they've, um, been given the ability to do so is because people are in crisis.
Ken: Yeah.
Jane Borden: That's what they're taking advantage of. Yeah.
Ken: I also loved your observation, uh, and I'll just read the, the sentence that, uh, the radical Protestants believed as apocalyptic thinkers always have.
That the world contained good and evil forces and nothing else. If you have to take sides and one is all good and one is all evil, and you write about how at the end of your work on this book, you had a different thought about good and evil. And I think it relates to this quote. It's not just either or.
It's not just one or the other. There's, they're
Jane Borden: kind of the same thing. There's
Ken: a a, a useful, a useful ambiguity there, huh?
Jane Borden: Yes. Yes, I explore some chemical reactions that happen in the brain when we want to attack others, and it's, uh, very much related to the same kind of chemical reactions in the brain that occur when we want to hug and love one another.
And so I wonder, I pose a little, a little bit of a question if maybe good and evil are just two sides of the same coin, if they're intrinsically related. And, um, if that's the case. Then you can't eradicate so-called evil. It's a missed mission from the jump. And so what if instead, we can accept that we have this tendency within ourselves?
To express harm and try to investigate what that means and what triggers it.
Ken: Yeah. And deal with it as a society and as individuals in a way that's not, not black and white. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. I think of chemicals in our food or pollution or whatever. There's no redeeming quality to any of that, but the actors behind it, I have a hard time just characterizing them.
I always have as evil doers. Mm-hmm. Because I think it's wrapped up in a. Economic system incentives, the same kind of motivations to accumulate wealth that you talk about it with multi-level marketing, organ, you know, organizations. I came away from your book really thinking hard also about how I approach adversaries, uh, as a way of trying to understand, well, you know, there's the, there's that subclinical cult.
Strain there, and I need, that needs to be taken seriously. We wanna make sure we keep an eye on that. Mm-hmm. It gets outta control. Mm-hmm.
Jane Borden: It's hard. Dialogue is the answer, right?
Ken: Yeah. Dialogue's the answer. And speaking of dialogue, Jane Borden, thank you so much. Your book is Cults Like Us, why Doomsday Thinking Drives America, and I just really encourage people to pick that up as an invaluable resource to understand the times we're in now.
The world we're in now. And I'm so grateful for your, your scholarship and your beautiful and often funny writing. Mm-hmm. Thank you. I love the humorous moments, the asides. Thanks. Uh, they're peppered throughout the book, so thank you for that gift.
Jane Borden: Well, thanks for your interest and I appreciate your, uh, podcast.
I'm very happy to chat with you today.
Ken: Thank you to Jane Borden for joining us today, and thank you for listening. If you'd like to learn more, be sure to check out our show notes for additional links. To take a deeper dive into today's discussion, make sure you follow our show on Instagram at Ken Cooks podcast, and if you're interested in learning more about EWG, head over to ewg.org or check out the ewg Instagram account at Environmental Working Group.
If this episode resonated with you or you think someone you know would benefit from it, send it along. The best way to make positive change is to start as a community with your community. Never been more important than it is now. Today's episode was produced by the extraordinary Beth Row and Mary Kelly.
Our show's theme music is by Moby. Thank you Moby, and thanks again to all of you for listening.
