How to start a cult.

(a new fiction piece)

Step 1: To start a successful cult, you need a reason for the cult (hereon referred to as “cause”) to exist. Monetary gain is a good reason, but this needs to be veiled by reasons that will lure people in. Try, for example, citing made-up celestial beings or aliens. Messages received through direct contact with these beings are a good way to get people to believe in your cause. The messages come from a higher or more advanced power, are untraceable, and are relatively simple to create. Look at the Bible or any other major religious tract for examples. You need to make sure that the messages you say you received are equal parts tremendously hysterical nonsense and grounded notions of stereotypes and beliefs that your target audience believes in. The second part is key so that they do not write you off as another crazy person preaching from a soapbox (or, in this day and age, a weblog). This cause needs to offer possible converts something that their normal society does not offer them. An escape to somewhere is a good example, and used often. One other thing to consider is a name. It needs to be snappy, yet formal, really draw people in. A logo would help, too.

Step 2: Once you have a reason established, you will need a figurehead. This choice may seem easy—yourself—but think about the decision a little bit before finally determining the lord and savior (hereon L&S) of your operation. The first thing to think about is, what do you want the public to envision when they see your cause? If you want them to believe in a higher power, then you will need an artist’s interpretation. Find an artist that won’t ask too many questions, or, if you are skilled in Photoshop, use that. Use a picture of yourself and morph it so that, while it may not look like you at first glance, the more people stare, the more they will believe that you—the ordained speaker of this being—shares a similarity to the higher power. It will affect them on the subconscious. If you want a more concrete L&S, you will need a really good friend. It helps if they have long, stringy hair. A beard is a plus. This person will need to be willing to dress in an odd assortment of clothes predetermined by you. While this may seem fun remember, they are your L&S and they can turn on you if you cheat them. The L&S must also be comfortable walk about preaching the words you make up. This leads quite conveniently into the next step.

Step 3: Create a sacred text. You can also go one of two ways with this step. You can create one almighty sacred text that only the L&S is allowed to see and speak from. If you choose this, you are allowed a little more freedom in what is actually contained in the concrete text. You can design a book, have it bound, and put nothing in it—if you trust your L&S enough. This way, you do not have to come up with an entire sacred text at once. You can develop and tweak it over time in order to respond to your following’s needs and wants. If you are quick on your feet, this is probably the best way to go, as it will allow you to coax more belief in your cause quicker if the converts feel they are being spoken directly to. Having only one sacred text that followers are unable to handle also adds a little bit to the aura surrounding your cause. It gives everything a mystical feel—the converts do not know what is coming next and will keep coming back, hoping for more good news to guide them in their lives. Your other option is to create a sacred text that is disseminated throughout your target audience. With something concrete to hold fast to, converts may flock to you, once they realize the insight you have into life, granted to you by the aforementioned fictional higher power. The problem with this form of sacred text is that it must be completed at once. Yes, your L&S may be able to extrapolate on principles in homilies, but the text is set in stone. If you go back and edit your sacred text, weakness may (and probably will) be detected. You need to be able to draw your followers into a point of no return. This will lessen your chances of having a mass exodus away from your cause at any time. One thing you might also want to consider is using multiple media for your dissemination of knowledge. The Internet is a powerful entity, these days, and it could prove useful in the initial stages of you cause creation campaign.

Step 4: It has always been important to own land, and creating a cause is no different. In order to create a place to escape to, and where people cannot escape from, you need to find a large tract of land. This land can be anywhere, really, as long as you are willing to work with your environment in order to create the ultimate paradisiacal compound (or at least a compound that gives the illusion that it is everything a follower needs). It needs to be able to comfortably house as many people as you think your cause will have, as well as all buildings necessary to daily life: medical center, volunteer fire department, school, place of worship, town hall and food supply building or mess hall. Any other buildings, such as post offices, police departments, department stores, libraries, bars or shops that sell such frivolities as flowers or toys are not needed. I will discuss why in a moment. Before the buildings are constructed, though, it is absolutely necessary that you find and are able to maintain reliable a reliable source of power and water, but not Internet. You do not want any connection to the outside world. A large, impermeable-without-any-sort-of-concerted-effort fence will help you greatly in this endeavor. Barbed wire is also a plus. If you make sure your land is large enough that the fence is place far from view, except perhaps for the entrance gates (in order for the community to greet new converts to the cause), then your community will have a sense of freedom even if they are locked in for any given amount of time that they do not necessarily know. If they are brainwashed enough, they will not care that they are there indefinitely. Also, you will not need establishments such as police departments because of the rules of conduct you will set up once your cause has gained a large enough following to necessitate the move to your compound. As you have probably noticed, these steps are very interlocked, and it is no difference with this next step.

Step 5: People may wonder why there is no police department or other related necessities, unless you have created an effective protocol for daily living. Since there will be many in the community, a bond will be necessary. A good way to begin this is to make every member give all of his or her earthly possessions to the cause upon entering. This will help pay for the purchase of the land mentioned in step four. This is a tactic utilized by many cults and is quite successful in terms of monetary gain for those in charge, just as long as it is not perceived as monetary gain for the leader by the followers, this would ruin your cause and you will end up murdered in bed or, at the very least, in jail for a very, very long time. You need to assure your followers that everything will be provided for them upon entering. This means securing enough couches, beds, tables, chairs, mirrors, toilets, showers, bathtubs, and other household essentials for every follower. While not the target audience, children will also need toys to play with. Make sure each child has one or two toys. They shouldn’t be too stimulating or allow them to think too openly about the world. Computers, video games or anything that may have the ability to contact the outside world are not recommended. You need the children who are raised within the compound to believe that is their only world. All of the books they will read will be located within the school building and will be pre-determined by you. Again, try and find texts that do not go against what your beliefs are or texts that will allow for much thinking outside the box, as the term goes. This is fairly easy with very young children’s books, but will prove a little more difficult with books for older children and teens. As for a police force, this is where a sense of community is again built up and sustained. By creating a community watch, everyone takes part in the policing of crime, which, as creator of your cause, you abhor and see to it that everyone else in the community does, too. By working together, people will create bonds within the community, reinforcing the lack of need to leave the compound. Another area that will help establish a sense of community is in the field of food production. If you choose an area that is suitable for growing any sort of food whatsoever, do so. Even if it is not a staple food, grow it so that you can harvest and then sell portions of it to other places around your compound. It is important only you leave the compound to do this business. You do not want to allow your followers a chance to escape; this would not be good for the cause.

Step 6: This is the final step in creating a cause and, some may argue, the most important. You need to have an end point. When you have people convert to your cause, they will want a guarantee of something, anything really. For example, tell them that at a given date and time the supreme being will take every follower to his home planet (in the case of aliens) and bestow upon them a life of ultimate hedonism. This promise of a bacchanalian life makes the sacrifices of living in the compound worthwhile. Followers will look forward to meeting their supreme being. The problem with this final point is that, when the predestined date arrives, people will be disappointed if nothing happens. One way to circumvent this problem is to escape. With your money and earthly treasures, escape to an island or other sufficiently-hidden place where you will never, ever be found. Change your name and appearance. Once people realize they have been duped, they will make it their life’s goal to commit as many treasonous acts unto you as humanly possible. The other, less painful option is to convince the followers that something ingestible is needed in order to finally commune with the greater spirit. Saying that a trance or being asleep is a convenient way to do this. If they are true followers, they will not question you and take whatever you tell them, too. Kool-aid has been used, but why follow trends, especially when this is your cause. Why not try something that, in history books later on, the cause will be remembered for. Try lacing banana bread with something. Committing a mass murder like this will be tricky, but having a patsy is a great way around this. Here you see another benefit to not being the public head of the cause. You will be blamed for everything, making living after the cause is over very tough. People don’t tend to look too kindly on mass murderers, especially those that did it just for monetary gains. Riotous mobs don’t generally give thought to the idea that it is not your fault you gained so many followers, that so many people were disillusioned with life as they knew it to the point that they were willing to give up everything they had in order to start a whole new life. They simply know you did something wrong and want your blood for doing it. If you have a patsy, though, you can easily be free and clear. An effective way to establish a patsy is to make sure that no one really knows whom the head is. This is a little tough, if you have a very public figurehead, but if you manage to keep enough about your cause under wraps, then this will become much easier. While everyone is in the compound, select a scapegoat. Obviously, do no tell them, it will ruin everything. Up until the cause has run its course, you need to create an assortment of documents that all point to the selected person being in charge. This may be difficult, and you need to make enough of these and spread them around the compound so that they are easily found, but in the end it will be worth it. As long as there are no rolls on file and you seem to be just another member of the cause, you can slip away unseen, pocketing everything. When the police get wind of the mass suicide, they will see the “beloved leader” dead with the others, just another member of a lost cause.

Crank

This is a short fiction piece I wrote a while ago. Well, it isn’t done, but here is a draft. It is called ‘Crank,’ or, if you want to go all literary on my ass “falling in love with the idea of me.” I don’t remember why I decided to call it that. I like “Crank” better. 

 

Utah at 3AM. 

            We have to get to San Diego, we just have to.  We’re going from New Jersey to California. We can do it.

We have to.

The World Beer Cup starts in less than five hours and we still have another eight before we even get to the city. Somewhere around Toledo, Ohio we started taking speed and we haven’t come down yet.

Maybe it’s because we keep taking it.

We have so much speed hidden in the lining of the backseat that we could build a snowman. We pulled the lining and everything out and stuffed it. There’s a Velcro flap covering it all.

There are going to be 650 breweries there. There are going to be more than 2800 beers there.

We are one of them. We have three of those beers.

Jeremy reads this out of the brochure every few hours.  The paper shakes in his hands every time he holds it up to read.

 I can’t remember when I slept last. I think it was somewhere in Nebraska and only for twenty minutes.  There were cows and corn and the smell of shit coming through the air conditioning vents. Jeremy pulled over to the side of the road to piss and a trucker blasted his horn as he passed by. We were parked too close to the lane, I guess.   

I smacked my head on the window and have been up since.

I’ve crossed nine state lines that I’ve never crossed before. I’ve seen thirty-four different state plates that I’ve never seen before.

This is what happens when you live in a small town with your mother who gets to travel only because she screws any guy who is willing to buy her a drink at a bar. They buy her stuff, take her places.

Sometimes she takes you, too. But not really.

I had more babysitters than I did A’s in grammar school.

I could ignore it when I was younger, she’d either send me off to my father’s or I’d find a pair of earplugs and read all night under a blanket with my flashlight.

She’s not trying to find a new husband anymore, she’s trying to get her cock fix. I can’t wait until she gets to the age where the guys stop getting it up, she might try and act like a normal mom then, but I’m not holding my breath. With my dad dead, though, I guess holding my breath is all I can do to hope to have normal parents ever.

Routes 80. 90. 81. 70. 15. So many roads passing through so many towns. The two of us have never been past the Mississippi.

This is all new territory.

We’ve screamed “Highway to Hell.” We’ve screamed “Don’t Stop Believing.” We’ve screamed, windows down until we start coughing and hacking and slamming our fists against the dashboard, like it would matter. Jeremy and I slap high-five every time we pass a truck that blasts its horn for us.  We are like little kids out on the highway.

Little kids with driver’s licenses and lots of speed.

The Brewers Association holds the World Beer Cup every two years. The president slash founder says the mission is to spread awareness of quality beer in the world. On the weekends, we drink PBR. We don’t touch our own stuff; we just sell it in bottles we take out of the recycling bins at the college in our town.

The classy kids, the ones in college living off trust funds, they buy our shit up because of the fancy labels and the high alcohol content. We gouge the price for them so that we can buy groceries for another week.

Jeremy has got an account that he can access when he turns twenty-five. His great-uncle or someone left it for him. We’re going to really expand the operations then, instead of just doing it in the second bedroom in our basement apartment.

We just have to wait until then. Another year and we’ll be okay. Right now, though, we’re living off whatever we make from the beer and my night shift Target job and what Jeremy gets from selling speed.

Hooray for that added dollar on minimum wage for working overnight, it buys us ramen and electricity.

Jeremy is leaning into the backseat, trying to get more speed when he lets out this choke-cry-garbled mumble thing. We’re out of speed, he says.

Fuck.

!

The gas station has exactly four lights on. They’re in a square pattern, leaving the pumps in shadows. Plate glass windows are partially blocked by shelves with what look like chip bags on them. A cashier is sleeping behind the counter; he’s young and his hat is pulled down over his eyes.

The door’s locked when I go to pay. Guy looks like he might have shit himself when I bang on the door.

To me, I feel like I hit the door maybe four times and not that hard. But then again, everything feels slow to me, the world is liquid toffee. Vaguely, I’m aware that I’m on hyper speed, so I guess I hit the door seventeen or eighteen times.

Really fast.

I guess that’s why he’s scared, probably thinks he’s getting robbed.

He shouts through the door, it’s a little muffled,  “Yeah?”

“We’re paying for gas is all. We need some food, too. Have any coffee?” I say.

My hands are shaking in my pockets, my arms are vibrating like tuning forks.

The kid steps back and lets me in, shuffles around the counter again. I pay then buy some chips. Jeremy is yelling outside.

“Fuck. What the fuck, man.”

The shop boy follows me out—we’re the most fun he’s probably ever seen. Just think, two guys with shaggy hair and beards and bloodshot eyes arrive in the middle of the night and start freaking out in front of you.

I probably would shit myself too.

I walk up to the car and Jeremy is lifting and closing and lifting the hood.

“It isn’t working. It stopped working.”

Hiss, slam, click. Hiss, slam, click. That damn hood. I wish he would stop. It isn’t his car and he probably isn’t paying attention to his hands right now. Stop it, I want to say, but Jeremy is speaking again.

“You’re lying, your being stupid,” I say. I bump him out of the way and stand in front of the car.  I feel my eye twitching. I have this moment where in my head I am outside my head and I see my eye twitching.

“No, man, no I’m not. Check it out.”

I’m about to when the kid opens his mouth.

“So what are you guys doing out here?” he asks. He tells us his name is Tim.

“We’re going to the World Beer Cup, man. We’re presenting. We brew our own shit, man,” Jeremy says, he bangs on the trunk where we have all our stuff.

Cases of Slurred Words Pale Ale, That’s What She Said Lager, Why Don’t We Take Some Pilsner.

“Give me some, guys.”

“Aren’t you like, fifteen, dude?” I say. He doesn’t have facial hair. His face looks too new.

“I’m eighteen.”

“That’s still too young. I may be tweaking out but I know that’s illegal, plus we need the stuff to sell. Make money, you know like you’re doing here.”

Three semesters of business marketing classes and in my head I sound like a marketing genius.

My brain is slow and I realize I’m not marketing at all, I’m just yelling at some immature kid. An immature kid like I was a few years ago begging people to give me beer.

Begging people when my mother was going through one of her “sober” phases where she wouldn’t drink inside the house—she said she was trying to keep her vices away from me, so she would go out and drink. It was sort of nice, not having to sit at the breakfast table with some guy I didn’t know and wouldn’t see again, bottles of vodka and orange juice acting as a centerpiece.

I think I sort of like him. I think I am like him.

He’s my doppelganger. I am like this kid on the Utah state line in the middle of what looks like goddamn nowhere where they probably don’t even have liquor. I feel bad for him. If I were in his position, I’d be doing the same thing.

He looks a bit hurt, like I had kicked him in the face or something, but I didn’t.  I want to give him some.

I want him to grow up like me, even though I don’t know him. I know nothing about Tim, except that he is up at 3AM in Utah, too.

“Why are you here, Tim?” I say. I shake my head side to side to get the hair out of my face and I swear he gives me a look like I pulled a giraffe from my armpit. I guess I’m shaking too much again.

“I need the money.”

“Why,” I say.

“Why does it matter? Do you guys want me to call you a tow truck or something? No one can come for a while though, probably, there really isn’t anyone around. James doesn’t get into work here until six.”

“But we need to be there by eight,” Jeremy says.

“That’s not going to happen,” Tim says, staring at the trunk now, like he was trying to punch holes in the metal with his irises. He wants that beer so bad. I want to ask him if his parents drink, if his pastor drinks. I hope to God they do, that they’re not depriving him and making him go elsewhere to get drunk.

That just fucks people up.

“Call a truck,” I say. “Getting there at all is our priority right now.”

“Do you guys have Triple A?” Tim says.

What the fuck is Triple A? I barely have insurance.

“Okay, whatever, I’ll call into town and leave a message,” Tim says.

There’s a big Coca Cola clock over the door of the convenience store. It’s almost four.  It’s still as dark as it was before. I imagine somewhere far off back the way we came, past the horizon the sun is coming up. Back east there is orange light just starting to spill over mountains and trees. Over my mom’s house. I wonder if she’s got anyone there tonight, if he’s giving her money.

Jeremy is running laps around the gas station. Into darkness behind the store. Into light where we can see him. He’s a health freak, yet brews beer, sells and does speed. I don’t get it, unless it’s just all that speed in him. I think he’s taken more. I’m just waiting for his heart to stop, like our car.

Our car is still broken. Unless it isn’t, unless Jeremy is an idiot. I slide into the seat and turn the key. It turns on. Jeremy was wrong, it is working fine. I cut the engine. I want to leave. I want to talk to this kid some more. He’s all alone. I’d want people around if I were him, too.

Tim taps me on the shoulder through the open window.  “Truck should be here soon. Randy wasn’t happy, but he’s going to charge a lot to fix it, so I guess that makes things better in his book.”

“Cancel it, Tim.”

He nods, like he expected this. “Sure thing, Randy is old as fuck anyway, his hands are all shaky and it would take him forever to do anything.

This kid sounds like me at his age. What’s that going to mean for him in six years? Unless he moves out of here, he won’t even have three measly beers to show for his life.

What am I doing with myself? I want to call my mother and ask her that. See what she has to say. Would she tell me things will be all right? Or is she going to give me back the crap I’ve given her since I was little, a smart mouth and a cold shoulder. I probably deserve it at this point. What would my dad say at this point? Would I even be here if he was there at all? Would it have been different if my mother had just settled with one guy I could’ve gotten to know?

We still need to get there, though, so I can prove that I’m worth something, that I’ve done something productive in the two years since I got my generic communications degree. I need to show people that I can come up with stuff, too, that people will enjoy me. No, not that, that people will enjoy the idea of me when they drink our beer. They will think, well shit, those guys that made this must be cool as hell.

All I’m asking for is people to like the idea of me. I need to get to that festival. It will help, I swear it will. But that can wait, the idea of me isn’t going to change in the next twelve hours. The beers are already brewed and bottled, I have already poured myself into them.

I want to make Tim realize that he’s got so much going for him. That even though he may be in this Mormon place that his parents still love him.  That they’re trying their best, I hope. That he’ll be able to look back at some point and respect them, love them. I want to reassure him that he’ll get that beer he wants eventually, that he can get the hell out of Utah and do stuff.

 “Fuck it, Tim” I say. We’re walking back towards the store at this point. He said he wanted to get his jacket. He looks at me, his head cock to the side just a hint.

“What else are we going to do? We’re going to be late anyway. Want to get a beer or something?”

“Sure, man,” he says. He’s trying to be cool about it, like I was the first time I took a hit off a bong, until I started choking in front of the first girl who had let me touch her.

She didn’t let me anywhere near her after that. Not even during games in gym class.  He unlocks the door and we step inside. The lights in the back are on and the room glows a little, like when I put a blanket over a flashlight as a kid.

“Do you have any liquor in here?”

“If I did, don’t you think I’d be drunk, man? This place is dry.”

He’s pulling his jacket on while I try to open the door. It doesn’t budge. It shakes, it rattles, but doesn’t open. I start beating on it and this time I can feel for real how many times I’m hitting it. The bell above the door sounds like it should be on a runaway sleigh, hijacked by drunken elves. Damn locked doors.

Jeremy stops running to laugh, then continues his laps.

We walk to the car. I pop the trunk and toss our one bag of clothes to the ground. Selecting a couple of our ales, I take out a pocketknife and begin popping the tops.

We toast with Slurred Words.  Tim is delighted, taking deep draughts from the bottle, pausing to burp and then repeating.

I sit down on a bench near the store.  Tim joins me, his bottle empty. He’s eyes mine as casually as he can, so I give it to him. Whatever, I didn’t want it anyway.

My eyelids are drifting down. I want to sleep. I stand up ready to pop some more speed until I realize we don’t have any more. I sigh and sit down again.

“So what are you going to do in San Diego?”

Get vindicated from growing up. “Be able to show my mom what I’ve done.” Show myself what I’ve done.  “Feel a little bit better about living in a basement apartment with two other people and two cats.”

“Well, why?” Tim says. He looks genuinely confused.

“Why? Because look at me, Tim, I live a shitty fucking life and have accomplished nothing since college. I’m my parents all over again.”

“No you’re not,” He says. His voice is calm and level, “If they haven’t been here, you aren’t like them.”

This kid, this other version of me, he says this to me and it hits me hard. Its real simple, but I get it. He’s right. I see myself in him, but I’m wondering where my knowledge and insight like that is. Did I ever have it? When and where did I lose it? Was it somewhere on this trip, evaporating like sweat off my body?

Jeremy comes over. “What the hell? Why aren’t we going, man? We’re going to be late.”

I look up at him. He’s breathing heavy and has his hands clasped behind his head like he’s about to do some sit-ups. “We’re going to be late anyway, why do we have to rush now?”

We’re going to be late to the Cup. We’re not going to be allowed in today, probably, and we probably won’t get to sell our stuff. If we’re lucky, they’ll let us in for the second day.  We might sell it. I might get to meet a few people, make a few contacts. I might find a phone and call my mother and tell her where I am. I might keep a few extra bottles to drop off here on the way back for Tim.

Jeremy has stopped huffing and has taken one of the beers from me. He’s sipping, staring at my feet.

“You were so into this, Pete. What happened?”

I shrug.  It isn’t like we’re not going to get there.  Before we left we had dreams that this would be our big break, but who were we kidding?  How delusional were we? I want to tell Jeremy that none of it really matters, that even if we impress some people who say they know beer, that it won’t get us anything. We’ll continue to do speed, and drink and live in a tiny apartment. And even when he does get his money, we’ll still be the same people. We still won’t get the girls that we want and we’ll still have the same parents and cats.

“Man, I know we said we were going to be huge at this thing. And I know that we’re not. We’re just two fuckups who got some beer making kit and decided to take it further. But why are we stopping now? Don’t you want to go on?” He’s pointing at me with his beer, “We’ve driven, God, like three thousand miles already. We’re so close to just experiencing something and you want to give up now?”

I shake my head. “I’m not giving up, I’m just slowing down.”

I don’t tell him that I’m afraid that if I leave I’ll never see Tim again, I’ll never see myself again. I’ll never be able to look at myself long enough to see what’s going on, see what I should be doing instead of what I am doing. I want to keep this moment, this gas station.

I look at Tim, he’s staring into the mouth of the beer bottle.  He’s looking for something, and I guess I should be, too. I should be back in that car, on the way to San Diego. But no, not yet. Jeremy is swaying, staring at the wall above me. Waiting.  I pop open another beer, he can wait a little longer.