Cults like this generally target and recruit damaged or otherwise vulnerable people. Also, they generally keep the crazy dialed down to a minimum in the beginning, then slow boil people over the course of several years. It often starts with "love bombing"; the cult heaps positive attention and praise on somebody who is unaccustomed to receiving anything like that.

Though a bit tongue in cheek this classic video covers the basics: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EBK5aKOr2Fw

This is brilliant. I thought I can't be manipulated easily. But after watching the video, I think I could have joined such a cult at some point. It basically boils down to giving love and attention to people who didn't get any and made to feel like a looser in their life before, specially by parents.

this video is a work of art

Have raised kids and teens. They can be dumb as absolute shit.

One daughter at 18 asked who she should vote for. So I tried explaining both sides of issues so she could make up her own mind.

She got pissed and just told me tell her who to vote for. She had zero interest in thinking for herself from about 17 until 23 when she started to ask questions and wanted to understand things.

Which was weird as she had been a highly independent thinker until hormones went crazy.

>She got pissed and just told me tell her who to vote for.

This sounds like so many zoomers I've encountered on the internet. "Just tell me what to do". There's just so much information in their world they don't cope well with the uncertainty.

I remember voting for the NDP at about age 18. I really believed that investing tax money in people who were in need was the most important investment we could make. I really thought that perverse incentives and corruption would be negligible. The Liberals won in our riding. We do FPTP in Canada, so my vote didn't really change anything. Then I voted Libertarian a couple years later, to send a heartfelt message that "I like freedom". Of course they were even less likely to win than the NDP.

Both times it was like a roller coaster, or a lottery, to form my underdeveloped opinion, wait in line, identify myself, give my papers, and later find out my chosen party didn't win. Your daughter missed out.

Lack of self esteem, family pressures, cultural "norms", a desire for belonging etc. etc.

It's the exploitation that's as old as time itself.

https://youtu.be/FghSUttp6Lc&t=10m35s says: a compatible pitch followed by a gradual resocialization process.

I don’t know the answer to your question, but according to Wikipedia, 85% of the world population is religious. So really it’s a small minority that don’t believe in obvious lies.