this post was submitted on 23 May 2025
862 points (97.7% liked)
Microblog Memes
12013 readers
2463 users here now
A place to share screenshots of Microblog posts, whether from Mastodon, tumblr, ~~Twitter~~ X, KBin, Threads or elsewhere.
Created as an evolution of White People Twitter and other tweet-capture subreddits.
RULES:
- Your post must be a screen capture of a microblog-type post that includes the UI of the site it came from, preferably also including the avatar and username of the original poster. Including relevant comments made to the original post is encouraged.
- Your post, included comments, or your title/comment should include some kind of commentary or remark on the subject of the screen capture. Your title must include at least one word relevant to your post.
- You are encouraged to provide a link back to the source of your screen capture in the body of your post.
- Current politics and news are allowed, but discouraged. There MUST be some kind of human commentary/reaction included (either by the original poster or you). Just news articles or headlines will be deleted.
- Doctored posts/images and AI are allowed, but discouraged. You MUST indicate this in your post (even if you didn't originally know). If an image is found to be fabricated or edited in any way and it is not properly labeled, it will be deleted.
- Absolutely no NSFL content.
- Be nice. Don't take anything personally. Take political debates to the appropriate communities. Take personal disagreements & arguments to private messages.
- No advertising, brand promotion, or guerrilla marketing.
RELATED COMMUNITIES:
founded 3 years ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
Cult 101
Pretty much this. Cults isolate you as their first step. Anything that can be used to make you feel beholden to them, or "fresh/new". They make you think your parents are the enemy, and convince you that your real "family" is inside the cult.
Had a friend in college who wiped out repeatedly - stumbling down stairs, walking into trees while talking, stepping on his own feet - all through freshman year.
Everyone started calling him "Trip".
Which, I guess, implied he'd joined a Cult?
One guy gets a nickname? No problem. You have a guy claiming to be a holy man assigning people names? Then you got a cult
I don't actually believe Jesus ever claimed to be holy or did half the shit he is claimed to have done. I think he was an activist and kind person and the story got twisted over time.
Only the true messiah would deny being the messiah.
He was a doomsday prophet.
He claimed God was about to show up and judge everyone for their sins and then start a new world order. But then he got killed by the state and one or two of his followers had hallucinations of him a few days later (more common than you think). They essentially then rationalized WTF him coming back from the dead meant, and that morphed into Jesus being God. The first few decades after his death was a whirlwind of arguing about the "true" nature of Jesus and standardization within the baby church. Over the next few centuries there were more arguments that were less fundamental than turning Jesus into a God, though being a religion, the arguments were insane and fierce. Cue to today and we have a bunch of sub-versions of Christianity and even a whole spin-off religion.
Several thousand over different days and locations, not "one or two". If it were one or two then this thing would never have taken off. People back then weren't as dumb as we like to believe.
So it's fairly likely it really was only a couple, but they were already devout and already had teammates to go and start this new church, which explains their success and gumption in starting a new church. Within a few years the descriptions of Jesus post-crucification become more and more elaborate and more and more robust against doubt. Essentially, as the disciples encountered resistance to their word, their stories became harder and harder to refute. Afterall, what's a little embellishment when you're trying to save people's souls? In the earliest gospels we have, Jesus is only seen by a few people and he ascends almost immediately. It's not until the later gospels that we get Doubting Thomas and Jesus walking around for 40 days before ascending.
"Simon, you're the most reliable person I know. You're my rock. I'm going to refer to you as My Rock, because you are my most loyal and stalwart friend."
Huge red flag. Avoid this person at all costs. You are in a ~~profoundly deep, possibly romantic relationship~~ Cult.
Is the guy naming him also claiming to be the messiah? That seems to be the part of the quotation you're missing out on
All while performing bonafide miracles, sure. The pet name for a loved one isn't the problem.
If, two thousand years from now, the High Priestess of the Church of Getting Your Vaccines So You Don't Spread Illness was referred to as "Saint Cuddlebug" I'd consider that kinda sweet, not cultish.
I'm not abjectly religious but I don't believe Jesus ever called himself the Messiah.
No, but this is pretty culty.. Jesus answered, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.
Generally he referred to himself as the son of man, but there were instances of other references: "before Abraham was, I am" might not make a lot of sense to us but the Jews understood this to be a direct claim to divinity, and calling God his Father riled them up too because in their understanding that made him equal with God.
LOGICAL FALLACY - AFFIRMING THE CONSEQUENT.
If X, then Y does not imply if Y, then X.
Calling someone a pet name is not a matter of logic.
Of course not. It is your interpretation that having a nickname implies cult membership that is the logical fallacy.
The argument is:
Your interpretation seems to be:
Which is the logical fallacy of affirming the consequent.
That's OP's claim. My interpretation is that he gave Simon the nickname out of affection not domination
No it’s not.
OP’s claim is that cults give nicknames. Not that all entities that give nicknames are cults.
But your second statement makes me realize that you likely have an inherent bias that is preventing you from seeing the logic involved.
Post-Hoc Ergo Proper Hoc Fallacy. "Cults give nicknames, therefore if you give someone a nickname you're a cult" doesn't logically follow.
Casual Fallacy. The existence of individual bias does nothing to affirm or reject a claim
If we were weighting on bias, your extreme reaction to a casual anecdote would disqualify your observations immediately.