changing hearts and minds + heaven’s gate: the cult of cults
Strange Fixations, Vol. 11 — thinking about belief and grieving for strangers
Just a warning up front, I’ll be discussing suicide a bit in this post in connection with the documentary on the Heaven’s Gate cult.
Hello friends.
It’s been a bit of a strange week as we head into December and the usual calls for holiday shopping are coupled with local and state shutdowns in California. Vaccines for COVID-19 have been developed and are beginning to be deployed around the world, but in the meantime here in the U.S. new cases and deaths continue to skyrocket. Whether you attribute our coronavirus disaster to a failure of government to guide the country and provide aid, or the stubbornness of everyday citizens who refuse to be told what to do, many of us are left to wonder how things could have been different. I’ve found myself thinking a lot lately about the crisis of communication the U.S. finds itself in today and just how deeply divided as a nation we have become. As I pondered these things, I also happened to discover and subsequently devour the four-part documentary series on HBO Max, Heaven’s Gate: The Cult of Cults.
I’ve been consuming a lot of cult content lately. Previously it was another four-part documentary series, , on Starz, about the NXIVM cult which began as a kind of self-help leadership program and eventually enabled the abuse and sexual assault of many members, especially women. Part of my interest in these stories is similar to the general fascination with true crime: a kind of morbid curiosity about the worst things people can do, a need to understand evil so as to better avoid it. In most of the current coverage about people in cults, there is an emphasis on the fact that anyone can be recruited, no one is too smart or too savvy to not succumb to isolation and brainwashing under the right circumstances. And yet, I have to admit having the very thought the sociologists and psychiatrists on the screen tell me is proven false over and over again: I can’t see myself ever believing in this stuff. It’s not that I think I’m too smart to fall for it, maybe it’s just that I’ve never really been one for clubs. But I keep watching, identifying mainly with the family members and friends who saw a loved one slipping away, wondering how I might have tried to get through to them were I in their position.
A lot of people have described the most devoted Trump supporters as a kind of cult. They praise him as a great leader, the best president this country has ever had, a man who stands for traditional American values, and either downplay or outright deny any negative word about him. In the case of the most extreme of these supporters, believers in the modern cult of QAnon, it feels like they are living in an alternate reality. What could one even say to them that they would believe or hear? I thought the same thing while watching the accounts of members of the Heaven’s Gate cult, who believed that through rigorous mental training and living a monk-like existence, they would one day be transformed into aliens and picked up by a spaceship to enter the “Next Level,” an existence in the stars above and beyond life on Earth.
I had heard of Heaven’s Gate but I didn’t really know anything about the group beyond their infamous mass suicide in 1997. Watching the documentary gave me more insight into the members and their beliefs, and left me feeling deeply mournful for all those people who gave up their lives because of an apocalyptic doctrine taught to them by a very lonely and misguided man. The family members and friends left behind speak sadly about their loved ones, wondering what they would have been like today if things had been different. It brought to mind the people I had known who died unexpectedly young, either by suicide, accidental overdose, or violence. Some friends and some only acquaintances, but the sorrow of the loss hits me just the same. I think of what I could have done, wish they could be here now, wonder what kind of person they would be in this constantly changing world. I’m angry at them for leaving, sorry for my own shortcomings, and sad that I’ll never get to see them again.
One of the interviewees in the Heaven’s Gate doc is Kelly Cooke, the daughter of two members of Heaven’s Gate who both ultimately committed suicide. I found her to be one of the most compelling subjects of the series because she was a child when her parents joined the group, and described how she often felt completely helpless and depressed watching her family fall apart because of a belief system she didn’t understand. She reminded me of all the people who share stories of parents and relatives becoming addicted to conspiracy theories, spending all their time on Facebook and YouTube, eventually losing all their friends and family because they’ve simply become consumed by an alternate reality.
I’m still not sure what the answer is, other than to just keep trying. Experts in cults and coercive control agree that extricating a person from a cult mindset takes time, patience, and understanding. It absolutely cannot be forced. As maddening as conspiracy theory logic can be, simply telling someone who believes it “that’s not true,” isn’t going to suddenly break the spell. The 39 members of Heaven’s Gate who took their own lives left behind family and friends who mourn them still, and who struggled while they were alive to get through to them and bring them home. In the same way, believers in QAnon and other conspiracies have loved ones who grieve for them and want them to come back. I try to do what I can in my own small circles and I hope that you do too, to listen to people, treat them with care, and hopefully bring as many as we can back from the brink. There will always be another rabbit hole; rather than washing our hands of those who fall into it, we must consider it our responsibility to help them climb out.
Honorable Mentions for Fixation of the Week
- I continue to play Hades, although James has overtaken me on progress because he is better at games than me.
- I finally watched the latest season of It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia and was pleasantly surprised at how solid it was. Being something of a connoisseur of Sunny, I’m happy to keep watching but am always wary of the show’s potential to jump the shark. Thankfully, the Gang continues to change just enough to keep things fresh, but not so much they actually grow as people and undermine the bizarre behavior that fuels the comedy.
- I got a free deck of tarot cards with a pack of underwear recently and now I’m a tarot person, but like a very chill one. Watch this space for my upcoming Instagram account where I do random card pulls and say things like, “This one is supposed to represent like, ambition, but if that doesn’t make any sense to you, that’s cool too. Whatever man, they’re just cards.”
Have a good weekend and take care of yourselves, friends.
❤ Elyse
Originally published December 11th, 2020 at https://elyse.substack.com.
