A new book explores “cultish” language
Amanda Montell argues that a shared vocabulary can give members of an organisation a powerful sense of belonging
“DRINKING THE Kool-Aid”, meaning to unquestioningly adhere to a belief or system, is often used jokingly by people unaware of its awful origin in Peoples Temple, a 20th-century religious community. (Jim Jones’s followers in Guyana in fact committed suicide by putting cyanide into Flavor Aid, a different drink.) The cult had its own internal lexicon, too. The Temple’s acolytes celebrated the birthday of one man, Jones himself, on “Father’s Day”. “Churchianity” was a term for the Christianity observed by America’s middle class. “Revolutionary suicide” was the group’s final act. Heaven’s Gate, another cult that ended with a mass suicide in 1997, used similarly bizarre jargon.
This article appeared in the Culture section of the print edition under the headline “The terms that bind”
From the August 7th 2021 edition
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