re cults waco insanity in article c w c h srgenprp sr hp com patk sr hp com patrick kearney writes assuming for the sake of argument that the branch davidian people immolated themselves in the manner described by the federal authorities why does the general consensus appear to be that they the bd were insane is it the manner of their behaviour before they died or the fact they chose to kill themselves rather than submit to the government i ask this question because there is a tradition and one that is highly regarded by many people that several hundred jews elected to throw themselves off a cliff at masada rather than submit to roman rule the circumstances at masada and those at waco would seem in general terms quite similar and yet so far as i m aware nobody has seriously suggested that the jews were insane the point of this comparison is to question the use of the word cult in discussing the events at waco why were the davidians a cult and not the jews at masada what constitutes a cult is it the size of the membership or a matter of respectability or perhaps the length of time it s been in existence are the catholics a cult how about the mormons or the calvinists is a sect a respectible cult dictionary definitions aside since popular usage seems to carry more weight i suspect that the word cult is used in a perjorive sense when speaking of groups like the davidians it is rather like the word boss when used to describe someone unpopular or someone the government wishes to make unpopular like say castro the communist boss of cuba one doesn t hear clinton described as america s democratic or capitalist boss well for one thing most if not all the dividians depending on whether they could show they acted in self defense and there were no illegal weapons could have gone on with their life as they were living it no one was forcing them to give up their religion or even their legal weapons the dividians had survived a change in leadership before so even if koresch himself would have been convicted and sent to jail they still could have carried on i don t think the dividians were insane but i don t see a reason for mass suicide if the fire was intentional set by some of the dividians we also don t know that if the fire was intentionally set from inside was it a generally know plan or was this something only an inner circle knew about or was it something two or three felt they had to do with or without koresch s knowledge blessing etc i don t know much about masada were some people throwing others over did mothers jump over with their babies in their arms richard
