Sounds Like A Cult - BONUS: The Cults We ALL Follow

Episode Date: August 2, 2022

For the last week of Cult Girl Summer, another juicy bonus episode: This time, Isa and Amanda are listening and reacting to unaired voice messages from our loyalest listeners—our beloved “culties���—who called into the show to comment on our Season 2 cults of the week (from Disney Adults to theatre kids). We’ll be back with regularly slated episodes next week, but in the meantime, check out Isa’s live comedy show at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival (details on Instagram @isaamedinaa) and Amanda’s book CULTISH: The Language of Fanaticism (available in hardback, ebook, and audiobook wherever you buy books)!

Hi, Issa and Amanda. This is Lily from Buffalo, New York. Hey, Brian, calling from New Zealand. Hi, my name is Mika. I'm calling from Bangkok, Thailand. Hi, this is Sarah from Portland. Long time listener. Love you guys. Hi, my name is Kaylee. I live in Hawaii. Hey, my name's Sean, and I think Jared Leto's a douchebag. He's the poor man's Christian Bale. And yeah, from Seattle. Thanks. This is Sounds Like a Cult, a show about the modern day cults we all follow.

I'm Issa Medina, and I'm a comedian. And I'm Amanda Montell, author of the book Cultish the Language of Fanaticism. Every week on our show, we discuss a different fanatical fringe group from the zeitgeist, from Taylor Swift stands to youth groups to try and answer the big question. This group sounds like a cult, but is it really? To join our cult and see culty memes and BTS pics, follow us on Instagram at SoundsLikeACultPod. I'm on Instagram posting funny reels at Issa Medina, I-S-A-A-M-E-D-I-O-N-A. And I'm on Instagram posting cult shit Venn diagrams, you name it, at Amanda underscore Montell.

And feel free to check us out on YouTube. You can also hit us up on Patreon at patreon.com. Sounds like a cult, where all our episodes are at free, baby. We want to remind you listeners about one of our very, very favorite sponsors, HelloFresh. HelloFresh is a meal delivery service. Probably my favorite one I've ever used, they send these farm fresh, pre-portioned ingredients and seasonal recipes right to your doorstep. I am a terrible cook, and everything I've made from HelloFresh is delicious and easy.

Yeah, Amanda is like the kind of person who has like candy for lunch. And I don't know how you ever sleep, honestly, but with HelloFresh, she actually has cooked me the meals. And it's nice because, especially like, I don't know, you're a vegetarian, so it has like everything that you need. And I'm not a vegetarian, so I've had their like meat option portions and they're really good. They really like truly are so good. Yes, we encourage you to use our discount code and get HelloFresh because it is America's number one meal kit for a reason. Just go to hellofresh.com slash cult 16 and use cult 16 for up to 16 free meals and three free gifts. That's hellofresh.com slash cult 16 and make sure to use code cult 16 for up to 16 free meals and three free gifts.

HelloFresh is America's number one meal kit. People don't know that, they need to know. And yeah, I just want to like reemphasize, you know, we're doing these bonus episodes, but like if you go to use any products that you like that we mentioned because we love them. Yeah, make sure to use the code because that's how you support the show or else they're like, bye. Yeah. Welcome to another edition of Cult Girl Summer. These are five weeks of bonus episodes where we're sharing off the cock, off the cock.

Off the cock. That was off the cock. That was off the cock. Okay, off the cock. That's what you call a bisexual only dates women. Sorry. Whoa. Okay.

Cult Girl Summer is really NSFW. Sharing off the cuff, cult convos, Q&As, footage from the cutting room floor and much requested part two. So if you are new here, this is not what a normal episode is like. Normally more research goes into it, more editing, but we wanted to give you guys something while we prepped though binge our old episodes. I don't know, man. I'm really excited about it. Oh, no, I'm really excited about it too. I just want to make sure if they were, you know, you know, for the newbies.

Yeah, for the newbies. Just so you guys know, like we love to do research. We're big research people. It's been a day since it's summertime and it's the flirtiest time of the year. We decided to do a bonus episode and flirt with our followers, flirt with our listeners. Wow. This really is a very steamy intro. What has gotten into us?

And it's about the cults we all follow because we're going to be listening and reacting to all the listener call ins that we have not aired. Okay. Well, not all of them because there really are dozens and dozens of dozens, but for those who've been listening for a while, you might notice that we have little segments on some of our episodes where we put out a call on our Instagram to get listeners to call in or actually DM us voice memos, telling us what they think is the cultiest aspect of that topic of the week, whether it's Trader Joe's or celebrity stands. Now we're so lucky to get like dozens, if not hundreds of voice memos every time we put out a call to our listeners. And we love hearing your call ins. We get so tickled by them. Like you all are funny.

Yeah, you are funny. And also it's really important for us to like go through them before we start the research process. You guys tell us things that we didn't know and that we can look into further. Yeah, you send us down rabbit holes that we might not have stumbled across on our own. So it's true. We really appreciate you giving us tips and leads. And there are some call ins that are like three minutes long or way longer. Yeah. And I'm like, I literally appreciate this so much.

I'm so ecstatic that you sent us three minutes of voice memo, but we can't include it in the podcast because we're trying to put everything into like 45 minute episodes. I'm just like, it sounds like maybe you should start your own podcast. Yeah, which is dope. You should start a spin off, you know, be the Joey to our friends. If that makes sense. Joey get a spin off. Yeah, Joey, you had a spin off. Oh, it was short lived.

Well, hopefully yours will be a great success anyway. So today we wanted to air some of our unerred voice memos and listener Collins. And we also wanted to give a little bit of backstory. One of the reasons why we have listener Collins is because we want this to feel like a conversation between us and you as much as it can be. So these are the topics we're going to be talking about today. We're going to be listening to unerred Collins from Trader Joe's Elizabeth home Disney adults, which was super interesting. We got so many columns for that one passion. Theater kids and Elon Musk.

You'll notice that all of these topics are from our season two. And that's because when we were preparing our season one, we had no listeners. And so whenever we would put out a call for voice memos, we would get like one or two people who followed us early for some reason. Yeah, for no reason. For no reason. We had to beg our friends and family to record voice memos for us. And a lot of them would like make up false names. Yeah, like I had a couple of girls that were in my sorority call in with fake names from the fraternities and sororities.

Yeah, and also what we did because we weren't really like great at the tech is like in order to make it sound like it was a call in. We would play it on our phone and then record it with our other phone. So it was like a recording of a recording to make it sound like phony. We didn't know. Yes, phony both way authentically phony. Yes. We didn't know what we were doing and in a way we still don't, but we're learning. And I do, before we get into it, want to play an unerred listener call in from my dad.

Yeah, this is funny. From our celebrity stands episode, my dad submitted a listener call in and sorry, Dad, it ended up on the cutting room floor, but it is very cute. My dad's name is Craig, but his name was Gregory. He did an OG call in. So for those of you who don't know, we have a Google phone number you can call to leave a voicemail. It's 818-570-3353. So if you don't want to send us DMs, you could call this number and leave a voicemail and it's nice because it transcribes it for us. But before when we were first doing this, Amanda's dad, of course, like, I don't think he has Instagram.

No, he doesn't. So he called the number. Yeah, for most people, they don't want to call a phone number because that's a trauma and a trigger in 2022 to have to talk on the telephone. So everyone just leaves an Instagram DM. But long before we had any Instagram followers, my dad recorded a voice message and we want to react to it now. Hi, this is Gregory calling from Baltimore, Maryland. The celebrity that I think has the most culty super fans is Oprah. It's no surprise.

A lot of people admire how she's self-made. She's trusted and very charismatic. Bye-bye. My favorite part is the bye. My dad pronounces the word bye at the end of every phone call the same way. He just goes, bye-bye. It's funny the way that it's transcribed because it's like how self-made she is, trusted, very charismatic, period by period. It's so earnest and wholesome, you know, my dad supporting the pod from the start.

Yeah, this was April 2021. I also love this because there are people who fundamentally disagree with the pieces of our podcast because they don't believe that the word cult should be associated with groups other than Jonestown and Heaven's Gate, you know, the most destructive groups that you can think of. First of all, I don't personally agree with that point of view. Yeah, because language is a spectrum just like gender and sexuality. Bitch, you know it. Language is always changing and I think it's great that my dad supported this thesis from the beginning because he literally grew up in one of the most destructive cults of all time, Synanon, and he gets it. Like language is fluid. Language is incredibly context dependent and people have been using the word cult to describe other groups in a more metaphorical and hyperbolic way since the 70s after the Manson murders and the Jonestown massacre put cults on the map as something that everyone should know.

And fear quickly the word cult became associated with underground art movements, cult film, cult classic, Rocky Horror Picture Show, Grateful Dead, you know. And ever since then, the word cult has been used to describe this wide spectrum of groups from Jonestown to feeder kids. Yeah, it's important because we just are using the word cult as like an avenue to analyze these groups to it's like to see like, is it dangerous? Is it not dangerous? What are you getting out of it in good ways and in bad ways? 100%. Like our point is not to just throw around the word cult willy nilly. It is to illuminate the fact that cultishness shows up in our everyday lives, even in places you might not think to look, even in the lives of people who think they're too smart and too discerning and too cynical to wind up in a cult.

And now I'll descend from my soapbox. Yeah, I literally met someone. I'm mentioning this because your dad was in a cult. I met someone who was a just Jehovah's Witness the other day. Oh, yeah. We should have them on the phone. Who was a Jehovah's Witness? Yeah.

Whose mom was and then she got dragged into it and like she left her family because of her. My boyfriend, Casey, our fine theme music composer. Part of his family is still in a Jehovah's Witness. Because he's like, what? He's like translucent. He's so white. But the Jehovah's Witnesses go after everybody. Oh, yeah.

This was a black woman who was a Jehovah's Witness. Actually, I think they actively recruit from black communities and so did Synanon and Jonestown because anyway, this is another story for another day. But a lot of these religious and sociopolitical alternative groups since the 70s have preyed on the hopes and dreams of marginalized populations. Pretty fucked up. And you know who else goes after everyone? Who? Trader Joe. Which was our first episode of season two.

I'm getting so good at transitioning. But I feel like the reason that we chose Trader Joe's is like our first episode like coming back weekly was because we wanted to be like, this is the concept. Do you get it? And the people who got it, got it. That's a great point. To Gigi, the girls who get it, get it. Yeah, if you're down to talk about cultiness, cultishness as a concept, then you are down to talk about it in the context of Trader Joe's. And for those who've been with us since then, we stan you.

We love bomb you. Wait, and also a guest who we're going to have for the episode on the cult of the Kardashians coming up, she made a TikTok about Trader Joe's and it recently went viral and someone commented on it. You should submit this to the podcast sounds like cult. So we should play her TikTok. Full circle moment. Yeah. And I'm like, funny enough, she was already a guest. Yeah.

So before we get into these unerred listener call-ins, I want to react to Meg's video about Trader Joe's. If you have real problems, keep scrolling. This is not for you. Okay. So as everyone knows, I'm the number one consumer worldwide of Trader Joe's products according to Forest Magazine. Don't look it up. But today, they did me. They discontinued my favorite creamer.

The Trader Joe's sweet cream creamer is no longer available. They took something great, something unanimously beloved and discontinued it. Maybe they were inspired by Netflix or George Bush. I don't know. I don't know what happened. To put it lightly, I'm clinically depressed. A sweet cream creamer did what therapy couldn't do. It got me out of bed in the morning.

It gave me a purpose to live it, fixed my relationship with my father. I think we should all take a moment today and pause and think about that special creamer, that special condiment, that special frozen pizza in your life. Because before you know it, a major corporation could discontinue it tomorrow and leave you in the streets drinking coffee mate like some fucking plebeian. No one thinks it'll happen to them. I didn't think it would happen to me. I got cocky. I got reliant. And look at me now.

Don't wait till it happens to you. Horde that creamer in that special condiment today. The fucking music is so funny because it sounds like an actual ad for someone who got out of a cult. It does. It does. I love it and I love the moments in which it cuts out. It is a hilarious video, but I think it does speak to the fact that Trader Joe's the brand and the products mean so much more to people than just a grocery store. Yeah, it really does.

And it's like, she's so right. Like, like these corporations could leave us in the dust out of nowhere. They're playing with our spirits. They really are. On purpose. And our listeners know that, which is why they called in. Let's listen to more. Okay.

I am such a big Trader Joe's fan. I'm in the Facebook groups. I follow the influencers. I obsessively go. I know there's new product launches, et cetera. I think the way that Trader Joe's makes me a believer and a cult member is that their stuff isn't that healthy, but they have somehow tricked you into believing that they're a magical health food store that is super artsy and super cool. And so if they're this artsy and green and hand drawn, like everything there must be healthy and they've got some serious junk food there. That's so true.

Not only is it like not entirely healthy, but a lot of their food is just like repackaged rebrand like frozen food that you can buy in other grocery stores. Yeah. And even their actual produce, like their prepackaged produce is not really that fresh. Like I don't really like their vegetables. Oh, it's disgusting. I mean, I think this point speaks to their brilliant marketing that just hides a lot of deception. Yeah. I mean, we all on some level willingly participate in the delusion of Trader Joe's.

We know it's a national chain. That's why it is a cult because it's like we're like willing participants. Yeah. We like walk in there and we act like everything's fine. I remember during the pandemic, like the lines for Trader Joe's, I don't know about in other cities, but specifically in Los Angeles, all grocery store lines were long, but Trader Joe's lines were around the corner. Oh, I don't think that's just because people were trying to get their groceries. I think it's because the experience of being inside a Trader Joe's was this fantasy. Yeah.

This oasis, this comfort. You're absolutely right. Trader Joe's isn't scamming. They are offering the opportunity to participate in a delusion and people are more than down for that. I think Trader Joe's is one of the most successful examples of like a truly affordable brand that has created a level of prestige and exclusivity. Yeah. Now that people want to be a part of it, even though anybody can walk into a Trader Joe's and the food is affordable enough to be able to buy it, you still feel special when you're in there. Yeah.

And I think that's part of the cult following. Exactly. It's important to feel special. They know. They've got us. They've got us in their pockets. I will say they're not lying about their price points. Like, have you ever gotten to like a Trader Joe's and bought everything that you've bought at a Whole Foods and you're like, holy shit, only 24 bucks.

Yeah. I've got foods and I'm spending like $70 on like eggs and milk. It is late stage capitalism, baby. Yeah. And if you haven't listened to our Trader Joe's episode, we also talk about the aspects that are culty about working at Trader Joe's. But I think here we're just going to flesh out what it's culty about being a participant. Okay. Next listener, Colin.

I think the cultiest thing about Trader Joe's is that people swear by it and don't shop anywhere else, but their produce is like pretty bad and their bread is also pretty bad. Exactly. And their coffee is like terrible. Nobody really talks about that. Also, they only sell the Trader Joe's brand or associated brands. They don't sell anything external and you can't find their stuff anywhere else. So it's kind of like its own little microcosm. Dude, so true.

First of all, I love the word microcosm. Set me up with this guy, but I literally hate their bread. It's so bad. Yeah. We were just talking about how we hate their produce. I would never buy their coffee. And this in cult atmospheres, this is often called a closed system. This is like how an MLM works.

You're beholden to Trader Joe's and Trader Joe's only. I remember when I was younger and like Trader Joe's had just opened in my neighborhood and we thought it was like a mom and pop shop. They used to have really good chocolate croissants. Did you ever try their like OG chocolate croissants? Not the frozen ones. But that's what Trader Joe's does best is like those specialty products that make you feel like you're getting something bougie. Yeah, it felt like it was like baked in house. Like I honestly feel like it was, but they changed the model or something.

Could be. Could be. Yeah. That just reflects Trader Joe's exclusivity. Like you can't find this stuff anywhere else, even though you kind of can. Yeah. Time to move on to Elizabeth Holmes. Let's listen to what you all had to say about the cult of our Theranos girlie. Hi, my name is Mallory and I'm from Victoria, BC. And the cultiest thing about Elizabeth Holmes is a toss up between the insane amount of lawyers she had to hire to silence employees.

And the Yoda quote she had plastered in size 1000 font at the Theranos headquarters. That reminds me of how in every SoulCycle studio, they have their big SoulCycle mission statement embossed on the walls and giant font. Like you need the equivalent of a biblical proverb to like drive you forward. Yeah. Yeah. And she's not wrong about the lawyers like Scientology has so many lawyers. Oh my gosh. People have asked me before if the Scientologists have tried to sue me for talking about them in my book.

And of course we mentioned them here and there on the podcast. Yeah. And they are extremely litigious and have like a fucking army of lawyers. But the thing about talking about like that in public is that you're protected as long as you haven't said anything that hasn't been verified by a big publication already. Yeah. If the group gets like a documentary made on it, then it's like almost everything has already been said. And so other people have gone through the like legal loopholes that allows us to say these things. Yeah.

I mean, I went through a really intense legal vet of my book with a lawyer at my publisher. And there were a few things about Scientology that I either had to cut or couch in the phrase allegedly. Our favorite word. Yes, our favorite word on this cult podcast. In large part, like if you say something that has been corroborated by the New York Times and the Washington Post, etc. You just have to put your own original spin on it, but they won't come for you. Lawyers are so expensive. It's actually kind of insane.

The cult of lawyers. Oh, speaking of cult language, the legalese that they toss around is ridiculous. Yeah. Cause also like we really could be readings, contracts ourselves. Yeah. Yeah. But I think they keep it impenetrable on purpose. Yeah.

Another time. I did hear that that's a hard class in law school. Contracts? Yeah. Oh, it sounds really boring. Yeah. That's why it's probably hard. Okay.

Next listener, Colin. Hi, this is Emily and I am messaging you from my car in the hell that is the school pickup line. I think I'll talk about Elizabeth Holmes is the fact that she dresses like Steve Jobs and lowers her voice unnaturally to make some kind of weird vibe that isn't a vibe. It's just culty. Okay. Thanks. Bye. Okay.

I am obsessed with a listener, Colin, from the hell that is the school pickup line. Yeah, I mean, I think this point is just getting at her extremely contrived persona curation. It's so memifiable. Like everyone has done an impression. Yeah. Yeah. And that's partly because, you know, women do get more scrutiny. Yeah.

All notorious cult leaders from history have stolen their oratory stylings. They're aesthetic from leaders that came before them. It's just funny that the people that Elizabeth Holmes took inspiration from were Steve Jobs and Yoda. Yeah. I just love this listener, Colin, because it's like, girlie, you're living your life picking up your kids. Speaking of, we should do an episode on like the cult of PTA. PTA moms. Yes.

Oh my God. And to the woman that sent this listener, Colin, and please call back. Please call back. And in the future, we also really want to do an episode on the cult of Montessori. Oh, Montessori schools. Oh my God. Private schools in general, dude. So culty.

Yeah. Okay. Next listener, Colin. Hi. I'm from Houston where Elizabeth Holmes spent a good amount of time. And actually that's one of the things that kind of drew me to the whole book of bad blood about her. But anyway, the cultiest thing about her I really think is that kind of weird focus she has. That's what got all of these old white dudes to invest in her.

Dude, eye contact underrated, underrated. We don't have enough eye contact in our current society. And so even though her eye contact was so spooky, that direct attention and human connection went a really long way with her investors. Yeah. I also think that especially as a woman, like we're kind of taught to like look away or look down. It's like for her to make direct eye contact. I was like a power move for her to show like, look, I have the, I don't want to say balls, but like the fallopian tubes. Yeah.

The fallopian tubes to take this company to the next level. People are so stupid. People with money, unless they want to give it to me, investment companies, it's just like men with egos. And it's like, oh, literally what? I just have to like make eye contact with you. And that really gets you off. Honestly, it's harder than it sounds, though, making super direct eye contact with a very rich, scary man. I don't know if I could do it.

That's true. I did watch like a fucking could. Yeah, you could. I did watch a TikTok the other day of like a comedian just being like, huh, what's up? And then staring straight at the camera for literally 45 seconds. And I was like, oh my God, I can't look back. It stops you in your tracks. I think some of those investor dudes probably like creamed their pants a little bit.

Any male investor that's into that is like such a bottom because like they just want a woman to dom them. And so like she made eye contact with them. And then there are many like, holy shit, I'm coming. But a lot of people who are powerful in the streets are subs in the sheets. I'm a total bottom in the bedroom. That's why I feel like men never hit on me. They think that like I'm going to hit on them. And it's like, no, baby, you got to come to me.

That is the classic trope when you're super powerful in your daily life. You're such a little brat in your evening life. And that's why men like shy women. I'm like, I'm not shy. So no one's going to think I'm, I don't know. I'm just not shy. All right, moving on to Disney adults so that we don't keep talking about our sex lives because our parents do listen to this. Disney adults is one of our most listened to episodes.

People had strong feelings and hardcore thoughts about this topic. So let's hear some more of them. Hi Colts, this is Eric. I'd have to say the coldest thing about Disney adults is probably the length people go to for exclusivity. My partner went to club 55 or whatever it's called at Disneyland in Florida or no in California. And I was just so struck with how much money people pay to be a part of such a thing. Okay, love that you are outing your partner right now as in the cult of Disney adults. I know spoken with such disdain.

People get madder at Disney adults than literally anyone else. I know it's funny because it's like people's literal partners are Disney adults and like they will out them. But that's what you need in a relationship. You need accountability. Oh my God, my friend Abina and I call it having a hater at home. Oh, I love that. So they can get you ready for the outside world. Haters are truly my motivators.

I had like a whole therapy session about it yesterday. Well, I guess the haters in the context of Disney adults are then just empowering Disney adults to double down in their fandom. That's how extremism works. I mean, the more schism there is between different political parties, different belief systems, the harder you're going to double down on what you believe. So like the harder people hate on Disney adults, the more money Disney adults are going to spend on the cult. Totally. They're going to lean in because they're not feeling welcome in like the cult of like the general public. 100%.

What is the group, the club again? Club 33. Oh yeah, we got a bunch of listener Collins mentioning it. We had to look into it for the episode and I just like couldn't believe it, especially the way that it's just like hidden in the park. For sure. To me, it's giving like creepy gentlemen's club, you know, which still exists by the way. Speaking of my dad, my dad was like invited to go give a talk. He's a scientist at this creepy ass gentlemen's club in the Redwoods of California called Bohemian Grove,

where you're not allowed there if you're a woman. Isn't that fucked? Yeah. I was like dad. Don't. Yeah, that's all discrimination. Yeah, discrimination. All right, on to the next one.

Hi, I'm Glory from San Diego, California. And I think one of the cultiest things about the Disney fanaticism is that they even have like a college internship program for business majors. I have a friend who did it and they just essentially are glorified. Like they work at the park and they get so addicted and into it that I have a friend who has worked there for like 10 years. They like recruit and then the people I know who did this like Disney college program. It's been 10 years and they're still wearing the outfits because they have to wear certain outfits for each ride and each shift and each rotation that they're on. And it's their full on like lifestyle. They like live at the park.

Whoa. So I didn't know this until after our episode on Disney adults was already done. But our editor Kate was in the Disney college program. Oh, yeah. Yeah. And she said it was wild and very coercive and that Disney completely exploits the romance surrounding the brand to recruit people into what they think is an internship that will pay them well and benefit their life in the long run. But really they just get like young people with stars in their eyes to dedicate like excess time and emotional energy to the brand for little money. Yeah.

That kind of reminds me of like colleges in a way college pride because like they really you in with this idea that like you're part of a big family. Everyone wears the sweatshirts. Everyone wears their live there. You pay like a lot of money. But it's not just for the education. It's for like the idea that for sure. But I guess after you leave college your degree I mean less and less. But your degree does mean something.

Yeah, that's true. Graduate from the Disney college program. That means diddly damn squat unless you stay in Disney for the rest of your life. It's giving like Trump University. Which by the way is an MLM. Did you know this? Oh, I'm sure we talked about this in our MLM episode. I don't think we did.

Did we not? That Trump is more affiliated with the multi-level marketing industry than any prior president and that there are does not surprise me at all. He runs his campaign like an MLM. Completely. I mean he is the purveyor of the prosperity gospel. But there are MLMs who've paid him giant sums of money to brand themselves as Trump this Trump that even though he's lent nothing to the brand but his name. That's crazy. Isn't that gross.

Okay. One more listener Colin for Disney adults. Hi, my name is Katie and I think the most culty thing about Disney adults is their silence when Disney as a company does something bad. There are millions of examples. The one that comes to mind right now of course is Disney's if not explicit tacit support of the don't say gay bill in Florida. Especially straight Disney adults. They are silent and they are not standing up. Yeah, I think that's so true. It's like silence is violence.

Our guest on our Disney adults episode is a member of the LGBTQ plus community and is vocal about wanting to make Disney more inclusive. Disney means more to him than just the company and he feels like he can create grassroots change from the bottom up. But the call is coming from inside the house. Yeah. But but it is important to separate Disney the institution versus like Disney adults like they are individuals who like have their own beliefs. But it's just hard because it's like when you are buying their products you are endorsing all of these things. But as I always say there is no ethical consumption under capitalism. If you love the Disney brand for whatever reason and I'm not judging that just because it's not like 100% for me.

You should be able to hopefully optimistically should be able to create change from within. But it's true that when you know white straight cis folks who are in the cult don't speak out. Yeah, or like they are if they grew up going to Disney and they became Disney adults from their love for Disney then it's culty because the way that the community talks about it is like they're kind of indoctrinated into not thinking that LGBTQ rights mattered. So that's what's culty about it. Alright, let's go to a lighter note, a very jazzy note to talk or listen to the cult of theater kids. One of my favorite episodes very personal to me. Hey, sounds like a cult.

My name is Anna and I'm recording from New York and I would say the cultiest thing about theater kid culture is the very under looked role of the middle school, high school director. Because we're talking about adults who are supposed to be like teachers and have a position of power and some of them are great. But I've also heard a lot of horror stories of like the desperation to get roles and the like insecurity of these kids being manipulated by these adults. I mean, that's what our entire episode is about. Is that like my nightmare theater teacher and I loved that we did an episode on that because I've been meaning to air out my grievances about him for literally 15 years. So many people resonated with that. Like a lot of people got into our DM saying like I resonated with that so much like you don't know how much. I mean, some teachers do think God understand the influence that they have a lot of teachers.

But the really toxic ones like don't understand how we carry these moments with us for the rest of our lives. And I think there is a correlation between theater teachers specifically and power abuse because like we said on the episode, these were people who wanted to be famous and didn't become famous. I feel like lately I've been kind of in the cult of theater kids because one of my roommates who introduced us to our guest on the theater kids episode. She was a theater kid growing up. So a lot of her friends are theater kids. I love hanging out with theater kids because we're always like doing bits and it's so much fun. But sometimes you know how like when you are having small talk and you realize you're having small talk and like you have this like out of body moment and experience. I feel like sometimes I have that with theater kids where I'm like lol we're having so much fun.

This is such a bit like we're going back forth and then I'm like wait, are we still doing the bit? I'm like what's going on right now? The like simulation glitches and you're like who am I? Yes, exactly. Okay, next column. Hi, Esa and Amanda. My name is Jordan and I'm calling from Grand Rapids, Michigan. I think the cultiest thing about theater kids is how there's a special language that's used to communicate when you're backstage.

For example, if your stage manager comes and says five minutes till showtime, you're supposed to respond with thank you five. And everyone just kind of knows this and goes along with it automatically. Okay, I literally did not know about this until we started recording this episode. Okay, but I think that's culty for good. No, it's so culty for good and I've had so much fun since I learned about it. Now whenever Tyler and I like message each other on Instagram, I'm like thank you five. I know. I think this is how cultish language can be constructive when it builds that sense of community.

And okay, there's a bit of in-group, out-group. You were on the outside before, now you're in the inside. Yeah, but as long as you guys, you all come to me with open arms. A hundred percent. Like it does create a culture and a sense of family that I think is really honest. And it's so much fun. It's so much fun. I mean, I have a lot of fondness for that specific theater terminology.

The thank you five. Thank you ten. My grandfather was a scientist, but he did a lot of theater in his free time. He's from New Orleans and when he came to live with my family after Hurricane Katrina, my brother and I were 12 and 13 and he would help get us ready in the morning for school. And when he would be downstairs and we would be upstairs first waking up, in order to make that whole experience fun, he would call up to us, Amanda Brandon, 30 minutes to curtain when we had 30 minutes to get ready.

And then he'd be like, Amanda Brandon, 10 minutes to curtain. And when we had to be like downstairs ready to bound out the door, he'd be like, Amanda Brandon places. And it was just like really wholesome. And you guys were like, thank you five. Yeah, we'd be like, thank you five. Thank you ten. And thank you places.

And then we'd run downstairs. And I think like using cultish language to create that sense of joie de vivre and excitement is a really beautiful thing. It can be. Love joie de vivre. Okay. Last but not least, we're going to hear some leftover listener Collins from our Elon Musk episode. Which we had so many Collins up.

Our Elon Musk episode came out right after he bought Twitter. So people were. Yeah. People had pops. Yeah. And we have them here on on the record for the rest of eternity. Play the clip. Hi, I'm Lindsay from Boston, Massachusetts.

And I think that the cultiest thing about Elon Musk is that nobody can figure out how to pronounce his son's name. Didn't he have to change it like legally? Yes. What is it now? There were too many unrecognizable symbols in his son's name. This just speaks to the elitism. Like, did you either read or watch the documentary Freakonomics?

No. There's like a connection between naming conventions of the very, very rich and very, very poor. The very, very rich and the very, very poor are most likely to name their kids something unconventional. Yeah. Because the very rich don't care about convention and the very poor are like, fuck it, maybe I'll just name my kids something like celestial being in hopes that it will elevate them to a higher class. Yeah.

Wait, there are some like Latinos that name their, it's like Ustoyar or something. And like when you look at it, it's US dollar. They like name their kids like US dollar, but it's pronounced like Ustoyar. Is it because they're trying to ascend social class maybe? Probably. Yeah. Yeah. Ustoyar, I don't know.

Elon Musk essentially named his kid US dollar from the rich side of the socioeconomic spectrum. It's like he doesn't abide by the rules of this planet because he's so fucking out of touch. Yeah, he doesn't. And yeah, it's exactly like the Kardashians naming their kids like North. I remember I used to watch a like MTV and VH1 roundups of ridiculous baby names. This is like the pre-listical what before the internet. Yeah. I used to watch like VH1 roundups of ridiculous celebrity maybe names like audio science and

how it's going with Paltrow's daughter's name is like Apple or something. Should be Marshall Apple. What? Good one. I'm so quick. I know so much about cults. It's crazy. That's the leader of heaven's gate if you're new here.

Okay. Play the next clip. His embryo babies with Amber heard who knows how many more he has of random people. Tons of baby musks running around. Wait. He has. Why are you ready? What did I say?

We're saying at the same time. I know. We need to stop doing this. We were at a party the other day and we literally like said a whole sentence at the same time in sync. It's because we record this podcast too much. He has embryo babies with Amber heard. Wait.

What if I just kept going for like 10 minutes. What if we got caught in a loop and we couldn't get out of it. Just like the glitch. Yeah. Like everything everywhere all at once and you'd have to eat a chap stick in order to get us out of it. Yeah. I didn't know he had children with Amber heard.

We're going to need to fact check that. We do need to fact check that but also can we just fact check it really quickly. We do love rumors though. We did talk a little bit about this in the episode but he has so many kids. That is very culty. It's like Mormon vibes. He's trying to populate the earth with his seed. And then leave it.

All right. Let's roll the next clip. Hi. This is Ellen from Pasadena, California. And I think that Elon Musk is a cult leader because he basically wants to take over the world. He's not interested in boards or democracies or such things like that. And apparently his family money is from emeralds and slave labor.

So he's also into that. So yeah. I think he just wants to take over the world and have all the authority which is a cult leader. Very nicely said. Very intense things. Very nicely said. Yeah.

And yeah. I think that's it. Facts though, when you have this over-the-top larger-than-life thirst for power, that gets culty really fast, especially when you have fortune backing you up from childhood. People born rich are the scariest kind of people. So scary. Because they've never known anything else. Yeah.

And especially if they have parents who like shielded them. The Kardashians' kids are going to be really scary. We're going to see how that all shakes out. Yeah. Do you want to do one more Elon Musk listener, Colin? Sure. Hi. This is Gabby from Atlanta.

And I think the cultiest thing about Elon Musk is that his fans, even when a percentage would prove, will still vouch for him and defend him to the end. So true. Exactly. I mean, if someone woke me up in the middle of the night and was like, quick, quick, Amanda, what's the cultiest thing about Elon Musk? I would be like his stands. Yeah.

It's just the unquestioned loyalty for me. Yeah. I think I told the story in the episode we recorded, but I got stuck on a ski lift with an Elon Musk stand and I was like, should I jump? It was not fun. Because they're not willing to reconsider their viewpoints. It's these men who argue by way of so what? You know what I mean?

It's that like, and like they ask you questions about something that doesn't have to do with it. They're like escalating the argument without actually providing any concrete evidence to their point. Yeah. It's just a blanket discouragement of questioning wrapped in a really unpleasant male personality. Yeah. Okay.

Those are all of the leftover listener Collins, we're going to listen to today. There are so many more. Yeah. It's just that like a lot of the ones we didn't include are like super long. And then it's like, how do we include like a little portion of it? There are truly gazillions and gazillions and we love listening to them all. If people enjoyed this episode, maybe we'll do it again for a future bonus. Also quick plug.

If you like the show and are interested in diving deeper into cultishness, cult influence, all that good stuff, I recommend my book, the language of fanaticism. If you prefer to listen to this type of content, it's also available on audiobook on all major audiobook platforms from Audible to Scribd to Libro FM. So yeah. Thanks so much. And Issa here wanted to let you all know that I will be performing at Edinburgh Fringe Fest this year.

I will be doing standup comedy at the Gilded Balloon Teviot almost every night of August at a show called Laughing Stock. If you want more information and if you want to get tickets, go to the link in my bio on Instagram at Issa Medina, I-S-A-A-M-E-D-I-N-A-A. I will also be in New York City for two months in October and November doing a bunch of standup comedy shows there. But that is our show. Thanks so much for listening.

We'll be back with a new cult next week. And in the meantime, stay culty, but not too culty. Sounds Like a Cult is created, hosted and produced by Amanda Montell and Issa Medina. Kate Elizabeth is our editor. Our podcast studio is All Things Comedy and our theme music is by Casey Cole. Subscribe to Sounds Like a Cult wherever you listen to podcasts so you never miss an episode. And if you like our show, feel free to give us a rating and review on Spotify or Apple Podcasts and check us out on Patreon at patreon.com slash sounds like a cult.