Talk:Cult

Category for discussion

 You are invited to join the discussion at Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2025 January 25 § Cults.   ▶ I am Grorp ◀ 00:58, 27 January 2025 (UTC)

Cults and safe spaces

Leijurv reverted my edit to Cult and my edit to Safe space where I included added links to the See also sections of the two articles.

@Leijurv: Could you please elaborate why you believe that the connection between cults and safe spaces is unsupported? Zero Contradictions (talk) 05:26, 6 August 2025 (UTC)

I believe the connection is unsupported because I do not see any support for the connection. WP:V? Also don't think it passes the common sense test of WP:SEEALSO Leijurv (talk) 05:36, 6 August 2025 (UTC)

There are multiple obvious similarities between cults and safe spaces, so the connection between cults and safe spaces passes the common sense test of WP:SEEALSO. Zero Contradictions (talk) 05:47, 6 August 2025 (UTC)

I think it's clear from common sense, but maybe it's not, so I'll explain it anyway.

Cults are defined as follows:

Cults are social groups which have unusual, and often extreme, religious, spiritual, or philosophical beliefs and rituals. Extreme devotion to a particular person, object, or goal is another characteristic often ascribed to cults. The term has different, and sometimes divergent or pejorative, definitions both in popular culture and academia and has been an ongoing source of contention among scholars across several fields of study.

Safe spaces are defined as follows:

The term safe space refers to places "intended to be free of bias, conflict, criticism, or potentially threatening actions, ideas, or conversations", according to Merriam-Webster.[2] It is a place where marginalized groups can discuss issues pertinent to them without having to address questions or remarks that might be directed at them from majority groups in society who are not familiar with certain issues.

Safe space#Criticism also says:

Opponents of safe spaces argue that the idea stifles freedom of speech,[32][33] or blurs the line between security against physical harm and giving offense.[34] In response, advocates for safe spaces assert that people subject to hate speech are directly affected by it.[35]

Cults and safe spaces both:

• Have shared philosophical beliefs (and rituals) among their members.
• Oppose (free) speech from outside groups.
• Have been used as pejorative terms.

The differences are:

• Cults often have cult leaders, but not always. See: wikt:cult.
• Safe spaces tend to be associated with marginalized groups, like LGBTQ culture. However, cults also tend to characterize themselves as "marginalized".
• Cults have negative connotations. Safe spaces usually have more positive connotations, but they can also have negative connotations among right-wingers and centrists.

I believe that safe spaces and cults have enough similarities to each other to warrant linking the other article in their See also sections. Zero Contradictions (talk) 13:56, 6 August 2025 (UTC)

I think the similarities you list are a bit weak. There is significant disparity in how intense those qualities are on the two subjects (e.g. "safe space" is occasionally used as a pejorative by some individuals, but "cult" almost always is). The qualities listed are vague enough that you could probably apply them to most groups of individuals to some degree (why do you consider these two "similar" and not, say, "political party", or "book club"). WelpThatWorked (talk) 14:49, 6 August 2025 (UTC)

The similarities are not weak. The reason why most of these qualities can be applied to most groups of individuals to some degree is because almost any group of people could be described as a cult or safe space. It all depends on what perspective you're viewing them from.

On Wikipedia, there is a general consensus on which groups are cults and which are not, but that perspective is not universal. Most people who are inside cults don't realize or believe that they're part of a cult, so they would label more dominant cultures as being "cults", according to their perspective.

Every cult or social group seeks to propagate its values however it can. That usually entails having a shared set of beliefs (and rituals) and opposing speech from outsiders.

I agree that there is a disparity in how laudative or pejorative the two concepts each are, but I don't believe that this disqualifies linking between the two pages. That is the most important difference, but I pointed out how Safe space#Criticism shows that safe spaces aren't always viewed positively.

I also wrote that the other two properties aren't always associated with cults or safe spaces. There is a family resemblance for examples of cults and a family resemblance for examples of safe spaces. Once again, I think that the two concepts have enough similarities between each other to justify linking between the two articles. Zero Contradictions (talk) 15:37, 6 August 2025 (UTC)

My two cents on this matter is that while there may be some inkling of a link (although I really don't agree), the average reader wouldn't benefit from the linking anyway. MallardTV ^{Talk to me!} 16:13, 6 August 2025 (UTC)

Eh, I guess you're right. There's more important things to do, so this discussion is not worth continuing. I'm going to move on. Zero Contradictions (talk) 17:08, 6 August 2025 (UTC)

"Oppose (free) speech from outside groups." Not much different than other cases of an in-group and out-group mentality in practice. As pointed by the main article: "people tend to evaluate actions of their own group or team members much more favorably than those of outgroup members." People tend to justify and defend the ideas and actions of their in-group and specific members of it, while viewing out-groups with distrust or hostility. The so-called free speech from out-groups will probably be perceived as a verbal attack on the in-group and its ideas, and the most likely result is the group's equivalent of the rally 'round the flag effect. The perceived attack will only boost the loyalty of members to their cause and its leaders. Dimadick (talk) 18:05, 8 August 2025 (UTC)

Wiki Education assignment: Religion 100 Introduction to Religion

This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 16 March 2026 and 6 May 2026. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Wht1229 (article contribs). Peer reviewers: Aebalbu, OsmanthusTea07, Aayanatandon.

— Assignment last updated by Astra801 (talk) 23:44, 20 April 2026 (UTC)

Anti-cult movements

This section is about anti-cult movements in general, not anti-cult movements in America (and even if it were, that should be specified). The section also contains information about Australia. That subsection is specified as being about Australia in its title. It stands to reason that the same logic should be applied to both sections. Either the section about Australia should not mention Australia in its title, or the sections about America should mention America in their title. Nothing is being made worse by making the subsection title more specific. Endlesspumpkin (talk) 12:36, 25 June 2026 (UTC)

@Endlesspumpkin The countercult and the anti-cult movement are different things. They have different motives, ideologies, and circumstances, and are discussed separately. The counter-cult movement is Christian and are against cults for being heretical and only exists in the United States, while the anti-cult movement is largely secular and opposed to cults for being harmful. There are several books about this. PARAKANYAA (talk) 13:09, 25 June 2026 (UTC)

I'm not sure how this addresses my point. The counter-cult movement is currently in the anti-cult movements section, which includes subsections on countries other than America. I.e. it has country specific subsections. If a subsection is specific to America there is no harm in including the fact that it is specific to America in the title on a page that is about a global issue – just as the section specific to Australia mentions Australia in its title.

Another option would be to integrate the information about Australia into the anti-cult movement subsection. However, if the subsection on anti-cult movements is supposed to be general and the information presented applicable to all anti-cult movements regardless of country, then perhaps the section on Australia should simply be removed. It is, after all, already listed on the counter-cult movement page. If we had info on every country in that section it would probably be too long, so perhaps this is the best solution. Then we could have 'American counter-cult movement' and 'global anti-cult movement'.

We could even go so far as to move the counter-cult movement out of the anti-cult movement section given that they are separate things. As it stands now the section implies that the counter-cult movement is simply part of the anti-cult movement, and that things that are specific to America do not need to specify that they are specific to America in the title, whereas things about other countries do need to specify that they are about those countries in the title.

I am not disputing the information. Endlesspumpkin (talk) 13:37, 25 June 2026 (UTC)

@PARAKANYAA I'm assuming your lack of reply means that there's no real objection here to some of my suggestions. I'll remove the part on Australia, and I am going to make it obvious in the titles that the section about America is about America, and that the global section is global. Endlesspumpkin (talk) 11:04, 5 July 2026 (UTC)

@Endlesspumpkin I honestly didn't see this, but I'm fine with your suggestions, yeah. PARAKANYAA (talk) 19:44, 5 July 2026 (UTC)