I want to join your cult

The system is failing. Economic insecurity is rampant, the planet is burning and loneliness is at an all-time high. And frankly, in these conditions, I should be getting more erratic literature from modest, homespun polygamist cults capitalizing on the moment, enticing me with the rent-free, abandoned farmhouse its nude members get to share.

But despite the clear opportunity to recruit disaffected Americans of all political creeds, the only cults that seem to be thriving are the ones that require blood sacrifices for economic security. This means there’s a huge, untapped market for potential cults to reach millions of U.S. adults who would gladly worship any number of self-proclaimed alien god-kings, so long as their movement was a unified one, and members only had to self-flagelate weekly.

So, in an honest bid to help grassroots cults build their own ranks, I’ve put together some “blue sky” thinking points for today’s cult leaders to take back to their room full of mirrors, discuss with themselves and use to capitalize on the moment.

Turn America’s housing crisis into your cult’s land of opportunity. To folks like me who are used to forfeiting half their paycheck for an apartment with an ever-evolving list of Majorly Needed Repairs, living in a boarded-up farmhouse in the Oregon foothills is completely worth pledging fealty to any divine leader or being. (But if you want my advice, ditch the Jared Leto lookalike for a bisexual Black woman from the American heartland. If today’s so-called “progressive” institutions tell us anything, it’s that you don’t have to worry about the homogeneity of your members if the boss is even one step outside the norm.)

Nowadays, any pseudoscientific tinctures or broths are about as good as you can expect from the U.S. health care system. And once you join a cult, you don’t even have to worry about meeting your deductible.

It’s time to begin marketing cults as the people’s answer to corrupt corporate America’s faux-meritocracy. Think about it: Cult members are paid identical wages ($0), their leaders are refreshingly transparent about believing they’re the messiah and they staunchly support unions — specifically, sexual unions between members, but it’s not a far jump to make. Plus, a cult’s members never compete with one another for promotions. At the end of the day, everybody drinks the same Kool-Aid.

Sorry, but if you really want to seem radical, you can’t be aspiring to something Lauren Sánchez and the guy from those Priceline commercials haven’t already done. Tell recruits that your members are destined to one day venture somewhere even more otherworldly — like a world without private health care providers or Katy Perry.

This one’s a no-brainer, and in a fun twist doesn’t require an ounce of deception. Between the apocalyptic wildfires, brutalizing hurricanes and the president’s personal dedication to revamping Mel Gibson's film career, it’s plainly obvious we’re headed toward total annihilation. At the very least, remind folks that your members don’t get electricity — which means no connection to the outside world, sure. But maybe it’s better when you don’t know the hurricane’s headed straight for your compound?