
Cults Like Us
Why Doomsday Thinking Drives America
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Narrated by:
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Jane Borden
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By:
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Jane Borden
About this listen
For listeners of Fantasyland and Cultish, a colorful and enlightening pop history that explains why the eccentric doomsday beliefs of our Puritan founders are still driving American culture today, contextualizes the current rise in far-right extremism as a natural result of our latent indoctrination, and proposes that the United States is the largest cult of all.
Since the Mayflower sidled up to Plymouth Rock, cult ideology has been ingrained in the DNA of the United States. In this eye-opening book, journalist Jane Borden argues that Puritan doomsday belief never went away; it went secular and became American culture. From our fascination with cowboys and superheroes to our allegiance to influencers and self-help, susceptibility to advertising, and undying devotion to the self-made man, Americans remain particularly vulnerable to a specific brand of cult-like thinking.
With in-depth research and compelling insight, Borden uncovers the American history you didn’t learn in school, including how we are still being brainwashed, making us a nation of easy marks for con artists and strong men. Along the way, she also revisits some of the most fascinating cults in this country—including, the Mankind United and Love Has Won—presenting them as integral parts of our national psyche rather than aberrations.
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Overall
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Few matters produce more public interest and public anxiety than sex and religion. Much of the political contention and division in societies across the world centres on sexual topics, and one-third of the global population is Christian in background or outlook. The issue goes to the heart of present-day religion.
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Hellenismos
- Practicing Greek Polytheism Today
- By: Tony Mierzwicki, Stephen Skinner - foreword
- Narrated by: Paul Brion
- Length: 7 hrs and 25 mins
- Unabridged
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The religion of the ancient Greeks has lain dormant for too long. In Hellenismos, Tony Mierzwicki shows how to bring it back in all of its primal glory. Learn how to forge personal relationships with the ancient Greek deities. Recreate the practices of the Greeks and enjoy the richness of their spiritual practices.
By: Tony Mierzwicki, and others
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The Instability of Truth
- Brainwashing, Mind Control, and Hyper-Persuasion
- By: Rebecca Lemov
- Narrated by: Patty Nieman
- Length: 13 hrs and 17 mins
- Unabridged
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Because brainwashing affects both the world and our observation of the world, we often don’t recognize it while it’s happening—unless we know where to look. As Rebecca Lemov writes in The Instability of Truth, “Brainwashing erases itself.” What we call brainwashing is more common than we think; it is not so much what happens to other people as what can happen to anyone.
By: Rebecca Lemov
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The Mesopotamian Riddle
- An Archaeologist, a Soldier, a Clergyman and the Race to Decipher the World's Oldest Writing
- By: Joshua Hammer
- Narrated by: Matthew Lloyd Davies
- Length: 10 hrs and 32 mins
- Unabridged
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From the ruins of Persepolis to lawless outposts of the crumbling Ottoman Empire, The Mesopotamian Riddle whisks you on a wild adventure through the golden age of archaeology in an epic quest to understand our past.
By: Joshua Hammer
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The Fate of the Generals
- MacArthur, Wainwright, and the Epic Battle for the Philippines
- By: Jonathan Horn
- Narrated by: Sean Pratt
- Length: 13 hrs and 1 min
- Unabridged
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For the doomed stand American forces made in the Philippines at the start of World War II, two generals received their country’s highest military award, the Medal of Honor. One was the charismatic and controversial Douglas MacArthur, whose orders forced him to leave his soldiers on the islands to starvation and surrender but whose vow to return echoed around the globe. The other was the gritty Jonathan Mayhew Wainwright, who became a hero to the troops whose fate he insisted on sharing even when it meant becoming the highest-ranking American prisoner of the Japanese.
By: Jonathan Horn
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Medicine River
- A Story of Survival and the Legacy of Indian Boarding Schools
- By: Mary Annette Pember
- Narrated by: Erin Tripp
- Length: 9 hrs and 46 mins
- Unabridged
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A sweeping and deeply personal account of Native American boarding schools in the United States, and the legacy of abuse wrought by them in an attempt to destroy Native culture and life.
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great!
- By L. John on 05-01-25
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Earthly Materials
- Journeys Through Our Bodies' Emissions, Excretions, and Disintegrations
- By: Cutter Wood
- Narrated by: Josh Bloomberg
- Length: 10 hrs and 52 mins
- Unabridged
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Bill Bryson’s The Body meets Mary Roach’s Gulp (with a dash of What’s Your Poo Telling You?) in this delightfully weird, richly informative, and unexpectedly lyrical tour of our bodily emissions—revealing that the very parts of us that we seek to hide in embarrassment are actually an essential part of human health, with fascinating social history.
By: Cutter Wood
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A Devil Went Down to Georgia
- Race, Power, Privilege, and the Murder of Lita McClinton
- By: Deb Miller Landau
- Narrated by: Callie Beaulieu
- Length: 9 hrs and 40 mins
- Unabridged
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The 1987 murder of Lita McClinton Sullivan sent shock waves through the affluent Atlanta suburb of Buckhead, Georgia like few other crimes before it. The neighborhood, with its stately mansions and top-tier schools, was simply not the kind of place where women were gunned down in broad daylight. How many socialites had enemies so dangerous they would be murdered by a hit man pretending to deliver roses on an early winter morning?
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Great Book and story
- By Danyelle S. on 04-12-25
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The Decline and Fall of the Human Empire
- Why Our Species Is on the Edge of Extinction
- By: Henry Gee
- Narrated by: Henry Gee
- Length: 7 hrs and 27 mins
- Unabridged
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We are living through a period that is unique in human history. For the first time in more than ten thousand years, the rate of human population growth is slowing down. In the middle of this century population growth will stop, and the number of people on Earth will start to decline—fast. In this provocative book, award-winning science writer Henry Gee offers a concise, brilliantly told history of our species—and argues that we are on a rapid one-way trip to extinction.
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Too many facts..no wisdom
- By Anonymous User on 03-30-25
By: Henry Gee