When bad people are writing hit pieces about you, you know that you’re doing something right. Author Chaya Raichik of Libs of Tiktok fame knows exactly what that’s like.
Chaya is now a children’s book author, having just published No More Secrets: The Candy Cavern, available for purchase on Bravebooks.us.
As I’ve pointed out before, narrative is a valuable tool in communicating important moral lessons. This holds up whether the lesson is delivered to children or adults. While works of fiction have the notable fault of being fictional, and therefore one can make the moral anything they want, it’s still the case that these are valuable in making certain topics easier to approach.
As many of us are becoming increasingly aware, when people ask children to keep secrets, it often to the end of manipulating the child into doing or saying something that they may not otherwise do or say. And because they possess the naivete intrinsic to a child’s state of mind, children can be easily manipulated. Because of this, it’s important that we teach children to speak up when something doesn’t seem right.
While one may read this book and understandably see parallels with the current scandal involving teachers tricking children into going trans, the fact is, this book’s core lesson extends in principle to anyone who would attempt to use “keeping secrets” as part of the grooming process.
I recall from my college days that a sociology professor told the class that one of the ways that a predator can groom a child is by asking them to keep secrets. Oftentimes, it’s something subtle, like letting a naughty word slip, then asking the child not to tell their parents that they said it. If the child does tell their parents, then that’s a sign that that’s the kind of kid that the predator is better off not messing with. Sometimes, the process of grooming involves testing the waters in various ways to determine whether it’s safe to proceed. Predators are often more methodical than they are given credit for.
Similarly, we need to teach our children that if anyone tells them to keep secrets from us, it becomes really important that they share those secrets with us. Because even if that person seems like they might be fun or trusting, that person might be trying to take advantage of them in some way.
Also, big props to artist James Scrawl, whose art in this book is simply adorable.
The forces of depravity and perversity know that they’re going to lose the culture war if they were to only attempt to appeal to adults, who see their ideology for what it is. Because of this, they are pivoting to attempting to appeal to children, whose minds are still pliable, and are therefore easier to take advantage of. We need to teach our children to speak up when something doesn’t seem right.
We also have a duty to teach our children a love for the truth. After all, if our children don’t have a love of the truth in their minds, someone else can come along and fill them up with whatever they want.
Before wrapping this up, I’d like to point out a couple points of contention that leftists have concerning this book. Because, for some reason, it’s leftists who have a problem with a children’s book that encourages behavior that could keep children safe from dangerous predators. Go figure.
Pseudo-intellectuals love using the concept of projection as the “NO U” of psychology, to the point that they actually think it’s clever to point to wanting to keep children safe from predators as evidence that they are a predator.
While it’s no surprise to me that leftists have little respect for human rights, they usually keep their hands closer to themselves than to suggest that someone is subject to illegal search and seizure for raising a concern, just because that concern isn’t favorable to leftism.
I honestly cannot fathom what an ignoramus that a person would have to be to suggest that a person may be guilty of something just by saying that it’s bad to do it. To spell it out: You cannot further a thing by furthering something that is the negation of that thing.
I suspect that weshlovrcm doesn’t actually believe what he’s typing. After all, a person who forms such a stupid thought and internalizes it as a sincere conviction should lack the capacity to purchase a device and a subscription to a telecom company, in addition to whatever else he needed to do to send his message, unless a government-appointed handler set all this up for him.
Which, if that were the case, would only upset me even more, because that would mean that I indirectly paid for him to access the internet.
Not to worry, we know that those ones are a problem, too. However, pointing out that there are predators in different institutions does not mean that we are no longer concerned with the ones in the institution that we are currently discussing.
There is no need for the diversion. Or, there might be, considering that your ilk thinks that calling “projection” is clever, and that expressing concern indicates guilt.
Arbitrary second example, indicating that these people really seem to dislike churches. But here’s the thing: church attendance is not compulsory. People can decide not to attend a church, or any church. And they can decide not to bring their children with them. This contrasts with public education, which in many cases is compulsory.
If you hate churches so much, just don’t go. No one is making you. You may stand to benefit in a huge way if you were to pay attention to the sermon, but if you were to not go, churches would have slightly less problem with wishy-washy bench-warmers whose hearts are not really in it.
In a person’s search for a true religion, they may eschew what’s mainstream because they see that something is wrong. As they do so, they may consider an alternative that catches their attention because it happens to be more outspoken.
One such outspoken religious organization might be the Restored Church of God (RCG), which was founded and led by David Pack.
Some have risen the concern that Pack leads a cult, and that his church is one that a person is better off staying away from. It’s because of this that I’ve decided to evaluate the RCG to determine whether it’s a cult.
David Pack’s RCG is part of a greater movement colloquially referred to as Armstrongism. This movement is named for Herbert Armstrong, who departed from Adventism over doctrinal disagreements, then went on to form his own church. Armstrong’s church was controversial for its disagreement with mainstream orthodoxy, especially concerning Sabbath observance, and for favoring Biblical holy days over more mainstream holidays, which Armstrong pointed out were of pagan origin.
After Armstrong passed away, some members of his church broke away and formed their own sects, citing his successor’s departure from the church’s doctrine. David Pack belonged to a particularly large breakaway group which was insistent on maintaining Armstrongism’s teachings. However, Pack was fired from his pastoral position shortly after the group’s founding, citing the spiritual condition of those under his leadership.
I was already aware that, when it comes to cults, there’s something about them that inspires some strong feelings. It’s because of this that it’s hard to find someone willing to write about them with an impartial viewpoint. However, I’ve found that there’s something about Armstrongism in particular that especially upsets people, even if they can’t get an accusation against most Armstrongian groups to stick, besides that they disagree with them. I suspect that this has a lot to do with the fact that Armstrongism disagrees with their own church, and that the mere existence of Armstrongism as a movement is challenging to them. People really don’t like having their own religion challenged, even by the mere existence of people staying in their own lane. It’s because of this that researching David Pack has turned up some results that were interesting.
Before I begin the analysis, I want to point out that I’m not personally familiar with David Pack or with anyone in his church. While there may be a focus on some of his more concerning behavior, its not my intention to present the worst of David Pack to render an unfair verdict.
To perform my analysis, I’ll start with the general criteria that I use to determine whether a group is a cult. This criteria can serve a person well to form a skeptical viewpoint based on a first impression. While dangerous cults tend to be abusive, exploitative, manipulative, or deceptive, this is usually not evident upon the first impression. This list focuses mainly on what a person would likely take notice of upon first impression, or with a little research.
Also, I’d like to point out that an organization does not need to be religious in nature in order to be a cult. However, because the RCG is a religious organization, in this case that is a moot point.
Here is the five-factor criteria I use to find red flags that an organization may be a cult. Of course, there can be other signs that might make this evident to you, besides the ones listed here:
A cult tends to try to convince prospective members that they have a problem, then present themselves as the solution to that problem,
Cults tend to have an adversarial relationship with its host society, may appeal to tribalism, or has a tendency to split the world in two,
There is particular esteem placed on leadership, which is usually not held accountable,
Membership can appear exclusive or valuable, attention in marketing may be placed on prominent members,
There is an obvious mechanism with which to extract value.
With this criteria, let’s examine how David Pack’s RCG holds up.
A cult tends to try to convince prospective members that they have a problem, then present themselves as the solution to that problem,
To be fair, this is basic marketing, and most organizations exist to the end of solving at least one problem. What makes cults concerning is the amount of pressure that they place on prospective members to turn to them to solve the problem the cult convinces them that they have.
Most churches point out that humanity is in need of salvation. The RCG is not unusual in this regard. What is unusual about the RCG is David Pack’s insistence that a person is not in the true church unless they are in his church, which would be the RCG specifically. While Armstrongian churches believe that most of the Christian world has gone astray, few churches are as narrow as Pack’s RCG.
Cults tend to have an adversarial relationship with its host society, may appeal to tribalism, or has a tendency to split the world in two,
Most Christian churches believe that humanity is in a fallen state, and in need of restoration. Their general outlook when it comes to sin is “hate the sin, love the sinner”. The RCG tends to be consistent with most of the Christian world in this regard, to their credit. Of course, there may be more judgmental individuals who speak for themselves.
There is particular esteem placed on leadership, which is usually not held accountable,
The Pastor General of RCG, David Pack, is usually featured prominently in RCG’s materials. While this is interesting in itself, Pack also attempts to authenticate his authority with his claim to have known Herbert Armstrong personally. Pack refers to Armstrong as though he were a prophet, and refers to himself as an apostle.
This strong insistence on bringing attention to himself indicates that Pack has a high degree of insecurity, and desires attention. This would not be unusual for a cult leader, at all.
David Pack is famous, particularly among other Armstrongians, for his antics. More on this coming up.
Membership can appear exclusive or valuable, attention in marketing may be placed on prominent members,
Believe me: David Pack is, by far, the RCG’s most prominent member. But I get the idea that, if someone famous were to join the RCG, David Pack might not let them outshine him.
Also, prospectives should be warned that, once a person joins the RCG, they are expected to remain a part of it for as long as they live. This is due to a belief which was once popular among Armstrongians that it’s considered an unpardonable sin to leave the church. However, many Armstrongians seem to be backing away from this belief.
There is an obvious mechanism with which to extract value.
Most churches encourage tithing, which is usually just 10% of a person’s income. If that were all that the RCG were asking for, they would not be unusual in this regard. However, Armstrongian churches tend to hit their member’s incomes almost as hard as government, and the RCG is not an exception.
In addition to what’s called a “first tithe”, Armstrongians are encouraged to save up a “second tithe” throughout the year, to help them observe yearly festivals, particularly the weeklong Feast of Tabernacles, which is usually observed at hotels and resorts. I still don’t know how it’s considered religious to spend a tenth of a year’s income in a week, but Armstrongians seldom question it. Some members might keep a “third tithe”, but that’s not usually compulsory, due to the history that Armstrong’s church has with it.
In addition to all this, members are encouraged to make special offerings at festivals, in addition to other offerings that members may voluntarily make (usually in the form of money). Considering all the money that Armstrongian churches hit their members for, it’s vexing that they use the material they distribute to ask for more money. It must be expensive to run their office space while renting convention halls and other churches for services.
Sometimes, I suspect that Armstrongism is as unpopular as it is because normal people cannot afford to join.
Before I continue on, I’d like to point out that I have no animosity against Armstrongism. I bring this up because a lot of material that I found while researching was evidently written by people with an axe to grind. These people really need to get over the fact that there are some people who have religious viewpoints that are different from theirs.
Having said that, David Pack is a seriously interesting guy. While I can write an essay on some of his more concerning behavior, I think I can get the point across by briefly mentioning some select antics, which should be plenty to paint a picture of the kind of guy he’s like.
David Pack, as pictured on RCG.org
Why focus on Pack? Because he’s made himself such a central figure in his own church that examining him provides clues as to what kind of church he runs.
For one thing, Pack seems completely serious on the idea that these are the end times. Armstrong himself claimed as much, but Armstrong made the mistake of setting a date on which he believed that Jesus would return, by saying that the Great Tribulation would begin by the year 1975. While Armstrong did change his mind when it became clear to him that his prediction would not come to pass, the fact is, it was a prediction that he made based on his interpretation of Bible prophecy. What’s especially disappointing about this in Armstrong’s case is that Armstrong was a former Adventist. Adventism’s most famous failure was setting a specific date for Jesus’ return, but the date passed without this occurring. Being a former Adventist, Armstrong should have known better.
Nonetheless, Herbert Armstrong was the kind of guy that David Pack could look to and think, “prophet”. So, Pack would later attempt to establish a connection between himself and Armstrong in an effort to establish his own apostleship.
But remember, Pack believes that his small church (of perhaps 1000 members) is the only true church, so because he believes that this is the time of the end, he believes that the two witnesses of Revelation would be in his church. Pack has suggested that he may be one of the two, though he seems to go back and forth on this.
This is to say nothing of the 144,000 or the innumerable multitude, but perhaps Pack is enthusiastic about his church’s potential for growth.
While it may not be specific to David Pack, there is a popular opinion among Armstrongians that Herbert Armstrong was the “Elijah to come”. But Jesus said that John the Baptist was the fulfillment of that prophecy. Did all these people somehow miss this when they read the Gospels?
While this says a lot about Pack and his background, he also likes to combine his passion for false prophecy with his hatred for competing ministers. And boy, how passionately he hates them.
In the early-to-mid 2010s, David Pack made a prediction that three prominent figures from other Armstrongian congregations would all die, all on the same day. And he somehow arrived at this conclusion from some supposed hidden message that he somehow read from the book of Haggai.
Don’t feel intimidated about reading the book of Haggai for yourself to see what it says, as it’s only about 1 or 2 pages long in most Bibles.
David Pack should have lost whatever following he had the moment he made that prediction. But he didn’t. You probably won’t be surprised to hear that the date that Pack set came and went without any people of repute in other Armstrongian groups dying. It seems as though Pack didn’t learn from Armstrong’s mistakes concerning setting specific dates when making predictions that end up not coming to pass.
In any case, Pack should have lost whatever following he had left, but he didn’t. This can seem confounding, but not so much when you understand that when someone is in a cult, they tend to be less critical of the shortcomings of their leaders. In light of this, consider the fact that many Armstrongian sermons place a heavy emphasis on “being a good follower” and obedience to leadership.
Also in David Pack’s list of prophecies is his prediction about a reunification, which would supposedly see a few Armstrongian groups coming together. This must have sounded nice to most Armstrongians, considering that with all the divisions in their history, a reunification would be a change of pace. But because it was a David Pack prophecy, it would have a David Pack twist: they would be united under his leadership.
Of course. No surprise, there. What’s also not a surprise is that it was yet another David Pack prophecy that did not come true.
Another interesting fact about the RCG is that it purchases a high amount of advertising on social media. One might imagine that such outreach attempts would be strongly successful. Or, they would be, except most people don’t seem to respond to them. Perhaps it’s evident to many people who see these ads that something is wrong. Some of these ads contain the names of other Armstrongian groups, which makes it evident that Pack was trying to pluck away members of Armstrongian groups which aren’t as cultish.
Also, the RCG once celebrated the fact that their website has been accessed at least once from each country in the world (though I imagine that there were some exceptions). They took this to mean that the Gospel has effectively reached the whole world. That the Gospel would reach the whole world is accepted by Christianity as a precondition for the end of the current age. Apparently, the RCG only counted access to their own website, because apparently they think that other churches don’t count. Perhaps RCG is using the accessing of their website as the metric for their success because the RCG sees itself as an “online ministry”.
Considering all this, you might be able to predict my verdict as to whether David Pack’s RCG is a dangerous cult. If you were to join the RCG, it would be very dangerous to your pocketbook. Putting that aside, when one considers how narcissistic and out-of-touch with reality it’s leadership apparently is, it’s strongly likely that there is exploitation taking place, especially when considering much of Armstrongism’s heavy emphasis on submission to leadership.
The mechanism for the extraction of a high amount of financial value is abundantly obvious. What’s also obvious is that Pack uses the RCG as a mechanism for the extraction of admiration, which would be a dream come true for a narcissistic person, which David Pack evidently is.
There are obvious signs that David Pack’s RCG is a dangerous cult. It’s not acceptable that as much value is extracted from its members as the RCG extracts from them. While we don’t currently have more immediate evidence that it’s members are being exploited, if the RCG were to be more carefully investigated, it wouldn’t be surprising to discover some more serious abuses.
The left seems to have no problem with throwing money at problems, as long as the money is not their own. And they’ll happily do so, with little respect for the underlying causes of those problems.
Here’s yet another precious moment:
With the money the “He Gets Us” people spent on their right-wing Jesus ads, they could permanently house 1,563 people experiencing homelessness.
There’s a reason why the left tends to swing more for younger voters, and that’s because they don’t think younger voters have the insight needed to recognize the left’s platitudes as being as naive and vacuous as they are.
Oftentimes, you’ll hear one of them say that there are N number of homeless people and M number of houses (where N < M), and therefore solving the homelessness problem is as easy as putting one in the other. This sounds appealing if you don’t understand the nuances of the matter, which might be the ignorance that they are banking on.
The fact is, people who are homeless are usually homeless for some compelling reasons, and unless the underlying reasons for their homelessness are solved, the act of scooping them up from off the streets and dropping them off in a vacant home will probably only solve their problem for about a week.
For one thing, people become homeless because they struggle with drug addiction. That’s being generous, of course, as in many cases, it’s not so much a struggle as it is a full-on embrace, to the point that a person deems them more important than anything else, including having a roof over their head.
And that makes it more interesting that California is actually providing homeless drug addicts with the free drugs that they’d need to continue their addictions.
Another problem has to do with mental health. Some people have a difficult time holding down a home by reason of mental illness. While these people could be institutionalized and therefore treated, mental clinicians in the western world are largely dependent on voluntary committals. This is made unlikely in cases where one’s paranoid delusions result in them distrusting the professionals who could otherwise help them.
How does one go about solving this problem? I don’t know, but it’s one major underlying problem behind the homelessness crisis.
Perhaps it’s the case that Democratic strategist Sawyer Hackett is truly unaware of the nuances behind the homelessness problem. But it’s hard to dismiss the possibility that he’s aware that the problem is more difficult to solve than just dropping homeless people into empty houses, and he’s counting on you not having the insight to question him about it.
It’s great that we have an administration that cares about the climate. It’s also great that we have an information media that keeps us informed, so that when something goes wrong, we can make informed choices. What’s more, it’s great that we have such dependable infrastructure that can safely transport highly toxic materials.
Except when none of that is true.
If you live within 100 miles of East Palestine, Ohio, you might want to pay attention, because the story that’s being discussed might concern you. Give or take, depending on what the wind has been doing.
Last week, in the above mentioned town, a 50 car train carrying an assortment of toxic chemicals used in manufacturing had crashed. Fearing an explosion, officials preemptively set fire to the chemicals, causing them to disperse.
If we have as many politicians as we do who pretend to give a care about rising sea levels, one might think they’d have something to say about an enormous spill of toxic chemicals into the environment. But it turns out that they’re just driving down the cost of beachfront property so they can buy it right up when it’s time to retire. It’s hard to come to any other conclusion when they join the corporate press in saying a whole lot of nothing about it.
And speaking of, some in the press who have attempted to cover the event have been arrested.
A reporter was arrested during a news conference held by the Ohio governor about a train derailment that released toxic chemicals
If I were to pretend to know a few things about chemistry, I think people would be able to see right through me. But I think it’s safe to say that the chemical cocktail that was dispersed into the atmosphere has the potential to break someone dead. Among the chemicals released was phosgene, which was used as a chemical warfare agent in WWI.
Reportedly, animals have been dying near the blaze, in some cases as far as 100 miles away. Which is cause for concern, as humans are made of the same stuff as animals. But hey, the EPA gave the all-clear for citizens of East Palestine to return to their homes. And who wouldn’t trust a three-letter agency of a government that isn’t much concerned about feminizing chemicals in the drinking water, or the fact that seed oils are ubiquitous in food?
As weird as all this is, it gets weirder when you consider that the residents of East Palestine are now living the plot of a drama that they helped produce.
Yep, that’s Adam Driver. And yes, this drama is about a train wreck dispensing chemicals into the environment, prompting a family to attempt to escape. And yes, the setting is East Palestine, Ohio, the very place where the real wreck had just occurred.
I like to think that I’m a rational individual, whose perceptions are firmly grounded in reality, and who knows the difference between fantasy and reality. I know how to parse reality, and recognize that fictional constructs ideally play no role in that process. But seeing these events play out so closely to a work of fiction, I can appreciate that that’s quite a thought-provoking coincidence.
Having seen all this, I’m curious as to how the crash happened. And perhaps we’d know, if it weren’t for the apparent media blackout. But that’s probably not as important as anyone nearby knowing whether they might want to grab their bug-out bags and run.
While Jack Murphy is not as relevant today as he was a year ago, he does sometimes still come up as a prime example of a grifter. In light of this, I’ve decided that it might be fun to hold his little club, The Liminal Order, under a microscope to determine whether it is a cult.
The answer to this endeavor seems obvious, when you consider that Jack employs imagery that indicates that he’s doing absolutely nothing to run from the image of a cult leader. However, when his organization is examined, Jack Murphy’s peepee club is not merely the pillow fort that it might appear to be.
Before diving into the evidence, I’d first like to share the general criteria that I use to help determine whether an organization is a dangerous cult. Keep in mind that organizations don’t need to have a religious or spiritual element to classify as a cult. Also, please note that this list is non-exhaustive.
Here we go:
A cult tends to try to convince prospective members that they have a problem, then present themselves as the solution to that problem,
Cults tend to have an adversarial relationship with its host society, appeals to tribalism, or has a tendency to split the world in two,
There is particular esteem placed on leadership, which is usually not held accountable,
Membership can appear exclusive, with attention in marketing placed on prominent members,
There is an obvious mechanism with which to extract value.
Cults are dangerous because they tend to be exploitative, and they tend to employ deceptive or manipulative practices, such as control of information, to create or maintain a following. However, these practices tend to not be as obvious as what’s listed above. The above list works well at raising flags from the perspective of being on the outside looking in, when exploitation isn’t immediately evident.
Also, to answer those who may raise the suspicion that I’m presenting the worst of The Liminal Order in order to render an unfair verdict, please know that the information mainly compared against the points above will be what The Liminal Order says about itself, as revealed on its own website.
Now, let’s get started.
A cult tends to try to convince prospective members that they have a problem, then present themselves as the solution to that problem,
This is Marketing 101. And, to be fair, pretty much every organization exists towards the end of solving some problem. Cults tend to place a particular emphasis on self-improvement or living up to one’s own potential, and are sometimes strong in an insistence that that self-realization can only be achieved through them, or that it’s at least hard to come by.
Here is what The Liminal Order claims to offer on their site:
We are men who seek to improve ourselves so we may better serve our family, community, and the Nation.
We know that strong men make strong countries and we have committed ourselves to a collective action that emphasizes accountability, personal choice, and leadership.
The Liminal Order places a heavy emphasis on self-improvement, focusing on young to middle-aged men, to help them to develop leadership qualities and become societal difference-makers. To this end, online sessions are held, with Jack Murphy usually being involved, which often involves brainstorming and coaching.
Basically an expensive chat room where the economy revolves around Jack Murphy’s time.
Cults tend to have an adversarial relationship with its host society, appeals to tribalism, or has a tendency to split the world in two,
Tribalism tends to be a powerful motivator, and cult leaders exploit this by convincing prospectives to take a side. Or, they may point out all that’s wrong with society, and paint the group as being one of the few “fighting the good fight”. Or, more cynically, they may point to the existence of “enemies” in an effort to stir up fanaticism.
What path does The Liminal Order take?
In this postmodern, post-Truth era, people in your proximity may be your literal enemy. Today they frown at your public display of patriotism. Tomorrow they may turn you in to the re-education camps.
Your coworkers might blast your religion on social media and call for your church to be burned to the ground. If you’re a police officer, you’ve got to watch your back. Even while you’re mowing your lawn. Because anyone can find out where you live.
That escalated quick. It would seem like Jack Murphy is going down the paranoid delusion route in inspiring his members. Whether he believes what he’s writing, or sees something to gain in inspiring schizophrenics to action, it’s not a good look.
When a cult is convinced that they have literal enemies who are literally out to kill them, they tend towards extremes, quickly. Based on what we read above, I wouldn’t be surprised if a member of The Liminal Order made the news, for a very bad reason.
There is particular esteem placed on leadership, which is usually not held accountable,
Just about everything about The Liminal Order revolves around the character of Jack Murphy, who presents himself as an example of manliness to aspire to. Like many such people, he eventually became a disappointment. More on him later.
Jack Murphy
Membership can appear exclusive, with attention in marketing placed on prominent members,
Jack Murphy vets his prospective members through an interview process, which places an appearance of value on membership. Those who make it in are less likely to take their membership for granted. Because acquiring a membership requires an investment of time and finances, and not everyone overcomes the vetting process, it’s to be expected that members would avoid the risk of losing their membership, and perhaps even tend towards extremes in an effort to demonstrate their loyalty.
What’s more, Jack touts the positions of influence held by members of his club:
Some of our members are:
– Former Military Officers – Hedge Fund Operators – Tech Entrepreneurs – Medical Doctors – PhD Academics – Lawyers – Government Officials – Media Publishers and Personalities – Authors – Artists – Truckers – Riggers – Tech Specialists – and recent graduates finding their way.
I find amusement in that entries such as “PhD Academics” and “Lawyers” are mentioned in the plural sense, as though any lawyer or doctor would consider it a good idea to associate with Jack Murphy. But, as I’m well aware, there are many different kinds.
The obvious draw to listing all these different professions is to create the impression that, if you were to join Jack Murphy’s cult, you’d get to bump elbows with some highly influential people. Of course, that all these heavily-educated and influential people would see someone like Jack Murphy as someone to look up to requires quite a suspension of disbelief.
Because to me, he seems like a guy with a fetish.
There is an obvious mechanism with which to extract value.
Jack’s little chat room costs $99/month to access. Of course, there are other pricing tiers for those willing to commit to Jack Murphy’s brand of manliness. Last I heard, Jack Murphy has been raking in about $200,000/year, so he’s doing pretty well for himself with his little grift.
Now that we’ve analyzed his little group, let’s move on to the main feature of Jack Murphy’s cult: the man himself. For this analysis, we’ll be sticking to the public aspects of Jack Murphy’s character, as this is most relevant to his cult. It would seem that Jack himself would prefer this, considering that “Jack Murphy” is a pen name.
Jack Murphy was a lesser-known left-wing influencer who rose to prominence as part of the “walk away movement”, which saw left-wing personalities turn away from the left, and identify as conservative (or, at least, decide to vote for Trump after having previously voted for Obama). Jack Murphy even authored a book on the matter, titled, “Democrat to Deplorable”. During the height of Jack Murphy’s influence, he was a guest on various podcasts, including the one hosted by Tim Pool.
However, Jack Murphy’s past would come back to haunt him. In the year 2015, he had penned a blog post touting cuckolding, explaining an experience in which he allowed his own girlfriend to get intimately involved with a man the two met through Tinder.
Obviously, to act on a fetish for being cuckolded is not befitting a man who is prominent in the manosphere. Or for a man who would claim to coach other men on manliness. Or any man, for that matter. The reason why the term “cuck” is considered derogatory is because it implies that a man lacks the strength or confidence to protect or keep for himself what most men would be expected to.
Jack’s article, titled “Cultivating Erotic Energy From a Surprising Source”, was brought up during a podcast with a streamer named Sydney Watson. During the stream, host Sydney Watson read a superchat asking Jack to explain his article about cuckolding. Jack responded by lashing out at the host, in a manner which was disproportionate and uncalled for.
The following is a video from Sydney Watson, offering her take on the matter:
That was the moment in which Jack Murphy’s career began to collapse.
As men began to withdraw from The Liminal Order, Jack set out to attempt to fight back against his critics. In so doing, he made himself look worse. He set out to scrub his own article from the internet, even going as far as having it removed from The Wayback Machine.
Not that you’d have much trouble finding it if you were to go looking for it. After all, once something is on the internet, it’s on the internet forever.
He was so desperate to save face, that he even tried recruiting from his own super-expensive The Liminal Order chat room to create his own personal war room.
If you’re wondering why the photograph, Jack Murphy has measures to attempt to disable screengrab attempts in his chatroom, and notify him when screengrab attempts are made.
I wonder how many of his loyal followers experienced a moment of clarity and decided to nope out at that point. There’s something about spending $99/month for the dubious honor of doing damage control for a fetishist that merits a hard pass.
It is entirely possible for a person to recover from an embarrassing past. However, this usually takes handling the matter a certain way. Jack Murphy failed to do so spectacularly, and in so doing, became another victim of what’s called “the Streisand Effect”, where an attempt to hide something results in more attention for what one is attempting to hide.
If someone is presenting themselves as a pinnacle of manliness, odds are, they’re a narcissist. And if he’s trying to sell you his self-improvement plan, he’s likely running a cult. For a cult to be successful, it doesn’t need to convince the majority of people, it would only need to convince just enough to make the cult leader rich.
Is The Liminal Order a cult? Yes, I believe that The Liminal Order is undoubtedly a cult. But even if not, it’s apparent that Jack Murphy is selling a faulty product. And Jack Murphy himself is that product.
I grew up with the likes of Batman, so it kinda saddens me to see how things are going for the Dark Knight, and his compatriots in western comic books. But at the same time, I don’t want to see Batman succeed for the wrong reasons. And with DC and Marvel comics having become full-on woke rags, it’s pretty much necessary for those comic companies to tumble, if it means that they’ll learn a few things as it happens.
If you’ve been following along, you already know that manga has been killing the hell out of western comics. As I’ve already covered, manga sales in the year 2020 were three times that of DC and Marvel salescombined. As pointed out by Deb Aoki on Twitter, EuropeComics has posted a graph which visualizes just how much hell is being killed out of western comics:
more fun with data — @EuropeComics posted this graph showing the estimated revenue of the top 10 comics publishers in the world in 2020-2021. Top 4? All #manga publishers, w/ Korean #webtoons (Kakao/Tapas) and Naver (Webtoon) in the #5/#6 spots, passing Marvel & DC with ease. pic.twitter.com/Dzv3GL5kLV
The first four publishers on that list are manga publishers, and each one of them outsells both Marvel and DC combined, with Marvel and DC placing numbers 7 and 8 behind Korean webtoon publishers.
It looks like no one is buying western comic books anymore, and I wonder why?
Oh yeah, that’s right. It’s because Marvel and DC have gone full-on woke, with DC having started a yearly publication starring characters whose sexual preferences are the most front-facing aspects of their personalities.
Did DC really publish this with the expectation that anyone reading it would feel like they’re being taken seriously?
Now, I get it. Your boomer parents and grandparents grew up with Hanna Barbara bullshit like Hong Kong Phooey, and would therefore feel threatened by anything from across the ocean that might challenge them, which has a lot to do with why they’re among the few left who are currently providing Marvel and DC as much support as they have. I also get that they grew up in an age where it was rare for cartoons to be made for anyone besides children. Even so, the idea that children don’t deserve better products just because they’re children is just an excuse to produce inferior products, which in turn conditions children into becoming adults willing to settle for mediocrity.
Seriously.
I read manga because manga takes me seriously enough to present me with entertainment without beating me over the head with the blunt end of whatever misguided moral that the publisher wanted to push, as though they couldn’t trust me to think for myself.
If the story is about a golden-haired dude battling it out with a galactic tyrant on an exploding planet, the comic doesn’t need to do anything to further justify itself. If some cook is facing off against his dad because of some deep-seated grudge, we don’t need a PSA telling us not to pick on people who like buttsecks. If some deranged scientist performs horrific vivisections just to enhance his capacity to explore come caverns, he’s plainly the bad guy, it’s not necessary to make him a Nazi, as well.
If western comic book heroes are to succeed again at some point in the future, they’re going to have to go back to being, you know, heroes. It’s going to take a whole lot of swallowing to down all the pride needed for Batman and the Avengers to come back up from where they currently are.
But in the time it takes for them to do it, I’ve got plenty of other things to read.
Author: Akihito Tsukushi Status: Concluded (one installment) Genre: Drama, Fantasy, Psychological Localization: Seven Seas Entertainment Rating: Teen 13+
(This analysis discusses plot elements, and thus contains spoilers.)
I was browsing the Made In Abyss subreddit the other day, when I found a topic linking to other works by author Akihito Tsukushi. Among the stories that I found was a short story written by Tsukushi in the manga format, called From Star Strings (links to MangaDex).
From Star Strings is relatively short; it’s a one-off one chapter work, about 70 pages long, that I read through in about a half-hour. It told a compelling story about a girl who lived alone, having a planet to herself, who set off on a journey. Like many of Tsukushi’s works, the artistic style is like a combination of that of Tony DiTerlizzi and Precious Memories, but with something of a dark edge.
I suggest following the link above to read the story for yourself, and form your own first impressions before continuing on with this article. There are spoilers ahead.
The protagonist this time is a young girl who doesn’t know where she came from or anything about her life prior to having an entire planet to herself, which conveniently simplifies her motives. She also knows little besides her own name, which is Kuroru, and how to speak, which is conveniently just enough for her motivations to be communicated to the reader through monologue.
But let’s not fall into the trap of asking distracting questions.
On her little world, Kuroru had a sprawling, Earth-like environment to explore. She had plenty to eat, little to no danger, and did not want for anything. Except for one thing: she was alone. And having explored her own world, she deduced that there was no one else there.
One day, Kuroru happened upon a red, glowing string. One end was on the ground, and the string extended into the sky, beyond the girl’s ability to see the other end. She imagined that there had to be another world like hers on the other end.
She worked up the courage, and began tugging on the string. Then, minutes later, vibrations returned through the string that stretched into the sky. It seemed as though she finally made contact with another person!
Over the course of days, Kuroru would tug at the string, and await a response, which would come shortly afterward in the form of movement of the string. At one point, she thought to play music on the string. As before, she got a response.
One day, Kuroru decided that she’d meet the person on the other end of the string. But to do that, she’d have to climb the string to the other end. This would not be easy, as she had trouble gripping the string with her bare hands. What’s more, she did not know the distance she would have to climb to traverse the space between planets.
This page was selected to be representative of the artistic style of From Star Strings. Consistent with Tsukushi’s usual style, we see a cute character set in exquisitely-drawn environments.
So, she started preparing. She practiced going hungry to accustom herself to going without food, and dipping in water to accustom herself to holding her breath. She made herself a pair of gloves to help her grip the string. She packed food for the trip, carefully determining what she could preserve. And she even prepared a gift for the person she expected to meet.
And then, Kuroru began her climb. At first, the climb was difficult. As she ascended, she eventually saw the tops of the clouds. Then, her own world became a bright, round and shrinking light beneath her. With gravity relaxing it’s pull, the girl was able to make greater distance with her strength.
As one of the story’s fantastic elements, the girl didn’t have a problem with breathing in space, and her temperature wasn’t an issue. But as her equipment began to wear, and there was no end in sight, the girl was in a great position to appreciate the enormity of the distance between planets.
If you’re familiar with other works by Akihito Tsukushi, you’re likely aware that he’ll sometimes use dark elements in his storytelling, to convey a sense of danger, and the possibility that things can go wrong for the protagonists. Such is the case in From Star Strings, where simply dozing off or losing her grip could send the protagonist drifting through the unfathomable abyss of space, never to be found by anybody.
But, in time, a sphere of light appeared in the distance, growing in size as the girl drew near! So she pulled herself towards it, and as the light expanded, she began to make out the landscape!
However, she did not arrive gracefully to the new world, as she lost her grip and plummeted a short distance to the new world, being injured upon impact. Surveying the new world, the girl’s heart sank. She did not see the kind of greenery she saw on her own world. The ground beneath her feet didn’t seem dependable, and shifted in places. And, worst of all, there didn’t seem to be anyone else around.
The girl arrived tired and hungry to a world that was inhospitable. No food or potable water awaited her. And there was no company. The vibrations that returned to the girl through the string were apparently generated by the girl herself, having returned to her after making its course across the string. It seemed like a terrible end to a fantastic journey.
But it was not over yet.
In time, Kuroru learned to live on her new world. She was able to procure “food” to eat. Curiously, the stones were edible to her. The girl was even able to make a shelter for herself somewhere in the shifting landscape. And she recovered from her injury, though it initially seemed fatal.
It was different from her old home. But she was alive. She found her own way to survive and form a routine of sorts in the marginal world. And she made a doll for herself, a sad attempt to cope with her loneliness and disappointment. Each time a doll was broken, she’d make a new one. Interestingly, she gave any doll she made the same name as herself, as this would make it easier to cope if anything were to happen to them.
But then, one day, she found it.
A string. Not the same red string that connected the world Kuroru remembered to the one she was on, but a blue string intertwined with a thinner blue string. It was previously inaccessible due to the shifting landscape.
She made a determination to climb the string, to make it to the hypothetical world on the other side. She did not hesitate to make this trip in the same way as she did for the first one. It took her less time to prepare herself.
What’s interesting is that, if Kuroru could have made another, similar trip, she could have returned to the world she had come from. On her previous planet, all her basic needs have been met. All of them, that is, except one. She was all alone, and while her old world was hospitable, there wasn’t anyone waiting for her there.
To the end of fulfilling her strongest desire, she was willing to climb a different string, not knowing what awaited her, on the chance that a person would be on the other end.
The last few panels suggest the kind of world that might have awaited Kuroru on the other end. However, the manga concluded before her journey ended. Did she make it to the other end? Was the world that we saw in the last panels the one she would have arrived on?
I don’t know. To take one from Tsukushi himself, let’s imagine.
From Star Strings was obviously intended as an allegory for those who pursued a path with hope, only to be disappointed. Yet, hope still does not completely disappear, because as we continue on, we may find another opportunity to go where we want to go, and for our wish to come true. The world can be harsh and unaccommodating, but we are not the world that we live in. And, in a sense, our world is something we can decide on for ourselves.
From Star Strings is recommended reading. And I give it a score of 8.5 out of 10.
You’re on a journey, aren’t you? But it’s not over, is it?
The following cartoon was brought to us by Twitter user Fight the Patriarchy. The feminist apparently got the idea that she could take the language that men direct towards women, which feminists find annoying, and turn matters around by showing a cartoon with women directing similar compliments towards men:
Heard it,
Heard it, except just towards me,
Heard a variant thereof,
Heartwarming, but still makes me glad I’m no longer a cashier.
Sorry, I got distracted with some fond memories.
The above comic was posted to social media with the idea that it would pwn teh pAtRiArChY, but something different happened. The idea of being complimented like that was something that men loved.
And really, who wouldn’t?
It would seem as though the answer to that question would be feminists, whose distrust of other people is so extreme that they assume a subtle sexual proposition in mere small talk.
Even if such a proposition were present, where’s the controversy? Just like men, women have the capacity to express disinterest at any point in any interaction, and to do so is a trivial social inconvenience.
When one person complains about an experience as a person of one gender, it seems to be the tendency of people to assume that there must always be an equivalent experience for the other gender.
But that’s not always the case, because men and women are different. Many of those differences are obvious, such as the fact that women can get pregnant, and when that happens, they spend nine months giving of their energy and nutrients to help develop the life that’s growing inside them. This being the case, women have a tendency to proceed with more caution in the courtship process, considering that the outcome would be a significant investment of their time and energy.
Though, from what I’ve seen, women have a tendency to take initiative. But I understand that not everyone has had the same experiences as me.
Men and women are different. And those differences should be understood and embraced as beneficial for society, rather than a reason to complain about oppression and play the victim, as the tendency of certain people is.
But even with those differences, I think society would be better still if a certain subculture, feminists specifically, were to learn a few things about taking compliments without assuming ulterior motives. But considering that the typical feminist is characterized by a distrust of those they perceive to be in the outgroup, they’re well set up to surpass expectations.
WARNING:The story being discussed is enraging. If you have anger issues or are susceptible to committing acts such as vehicular homicide, you might want to give this one a skip.
Once again, I’m absolutely not kidding. If you continue, the story in question might ruin your day, maybe even your entire week.
Townhall’s Mia Cathell did an excellent job investigating this story, which got almost no media coverage from the legacy outlets. What story am I talking about? You might want to sit down for this.
An activist gay married couple decided to adopt two boys from a Christian adoption company that focused on special needs children, so that they could sexually abuse them, use them to produce explicit material, and pimp them out to other pedophiles in Georgia.
What a lot to unpack. If you’re interested in reading the story for yourself, here’s a link to part one of Townhall’s four-part series. I won’t comment much on details of Townhall’s findings here, because you can just read them yourself. But I do want to make some observations.
Obviously, the corporate mainstream information media would only grudgingly run this story, if they did so at all, considering that the idea that a gay couple could also be pedophiles and get away with abusing a couple children that they adopted for as long as the Zulocks did would not fit the narrative.
But for the rest of us, when we see someone loudly boast of their sexuality as being their most important and public-facing aspect, it would not be surprising in the least to see that person go on to commit an act of sexual misconduct. Obviously, we would not want our own children to spend any amount of time around them.
But in the case of the Zulocks, they were to the point that even other pedophiles thought that they were going too far, and one of them decided to turn them in.
What I’m curious about is how the two men got the money needed to quickly build a mansion for themselves right after adopting the two boys. And not only that, they took trips to places all over the country. One of the two was a bank teller, and the other was a low-level government employee, so just based on that alone, the two would have lacked the means to live so extravagantly. Somehow, I get the idea that the answer would piss me off.
I know that when it comes to matters like this, the term “allegedly” is useful, especially if it turns out the accused were innocent. But the Zulock men had already confessed. Even if they were to plead “not guilty” to the charges, their confessions might come back to bite them.
When it comes to criminals like the Zulocks, it’s fun to think of creative punishments. But in their case, they’re facing life sentences, so no Sparta kicking them off tall buildings. But I think it would be sufficient to put them in with genpop and allow nature to take its course.
You’re probably having a better day than Jordan Trishton Walker, the Pfizer director behind mRNA Scientific Planning. He was the guy who was the subject of a Project Veritas sting in which he was caught on camera saying that Pfizer was floating the idea of deliberately making COVID mutate so they could profit more off of their vaccines.
Here’s some fine entertainment:
One would almost feel bad for the guy. But not quite.
He’s evidently someone who never faced resistance in his entire life. But then, he realized that everything he built up was about to come crashing down.
Where most people would have realized that the best way to handle the situation would have been to clam up and say no more to incriminate themselves, Jordan instead attempted to take control of the situation, apparently unfamiliar with having no such control.
For one thing, he claimed that he was only lying about the possibility of participating in gain-of-function research in order to impress his date. I suspected as much, but that’s certainly better than him having told the truth, which is still a possibility. But even if he was just BSing, he still made his company look bad, and perhaps also violated some non-disclosure agreements. In either case, he loses.
But how insecure does a man have to be if, as a director for one of the wealthiest companies, he still feels the need to lie to impress a date? That’s really sad.
The way he attempted to take control of the situation says everything about where his mind was. He tried calling the police, because he was a victim in his own mind. He tried bringing race into it, which suggests that that’s the kind of thing he does to get what he wants.
Personally, I suspect that it was just before he seized James’ iPad and attempted to destroy it that he realized that his career was over. And not only was his career dead, it was just executed with the cruelest stroke.
At some point, the restaurant owner locked the door on the PV crew, as they were being pressured to by Jordan Walker. While that was a no-no, perhaps they could make the case that they were under duress by reason of Jordan’s behavior.
But hey, the cops did show up, just as Jordan wanted. However, they would have just arrested Jordan, if James hadn’t already left the scene. By the way, what was with Jordan running into traffic and trying to stop a car? I know that it was already established at that point that he was unhinged, but that was the thing of movies.
So, what does the future hold for Jordan Trishton Walker? I don’t know, but I suspect that Pfizer would fire him by reason of the bad publicity, then distance themselves from him as though he had a super-cancer that’s contagious. After that, an ordinary-person job would be the best he could hope for. And he doesn’t look like the kind of guy who would be happy with his work evident in his hands.
It’s rare for things to get so bad that they can’t be made worse by acting like a jackass. As bad as things were for Jordan Walker, he had more to lose, and he went for it.
Magnetricity 