The common leader and his followers work mainly off of the desire to end isolation but the fanatical leader and his disciples incorporate the second primal fear, the fear of death, into the equation. And by death I mean annihilation the utter obliteration of any and every bit of a persons earthly existence and legacy. The leader who promises his people that adherence to his laws and teachings will not only relieve the pain of their isolation but also allow them to defy death, to achieve some kind of spiritual immortality through worthy deeds, that type of leader achieves a supreme control that the first type cant match and creates an entirely different kind of follower in the process. Such a follower is likely to disregard such generally accepted rules of social behavior, for the simple reason that, to him or her, there is no obscenity save what the leader labels obscene. And such a leaders definition of obscene is likely to be very specific, because he doesnt want to limit the range of possible actions to which he can order his followers.
~ Caleb Carr in Killing Time
What do you think of that?
Edited by - Wolfgirl on 29 January 2003 5:52:47