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as i said, ive been around the block. Ive seen this sort of thing play out a few times. The main reason im bothering to send this at all is because youre clearly young. I believe you have good intentions, and are just naive and optimistic rather than actively malicious like a lot of others who have been in your role over the years. Unfortunately, good intentions dont improve what youre doing here.

i wont chew you out for desiring worship and attention. It’s normal, it’s natural, for divinekin and the young and lonely both. But you do not have the chops to start or run a religion. From what I’ve seen, I don’t think you have the leadership skills or community management skills to create + maintain a safe and healthy religious space. Especially since you clearly do not actually know what a cult is, or what makes them dangerous. I recommend you do research into the BITE model, what high-control groups are, and historical records of actual cults.

you will not find people who will create a safe and healthy religious space on here, like this. People who is interested in worshipping a stranger on the internet who claims divinity, regardless of how true that divinity is, are likely young and lonely and desperate. Or old and lonely and desperate. If you put yourself in a position of authority over others, if you make yourself into someone theyre supposed to look to for guidance and solace— that’s a lot of responsibility. Even as someone with genuine good intentions, you *will* fuck it up. You will disappoint and fail people at some point. And this puts you in active danger as well. People who are lonely and desperate, even with good intentions, can lash out and become dangerous when you dont live up to their expectations. When gods arent perfect like they want gods to be.

so please, for your own safety, and the safety of those i think you genuinely care for: please stop attempting to start a religion or run a religious space. Stop looking for worshippers. It’s always going to end up with people hurt. It never goes any other way. Take care of yourself, and try your best to form relationships with others as equals. It’s harder, but tends to work out better long term.

please keep yourself safe, kid.

I originally was not going to answer this ask since I had already quit before I could respond, but I am choosing to do so now because I believe I should.

While you make some excellent points about my leadership issues, you are incorrect about other things. When I first created Somnism, I was around 16-17 years old and I was 18 when I decided to temporarily cease it. Throughout my life, I have consistently suffered with barely any breaks, and my life had gotten even worse during the time I was looking over Somnism. I allowed my mental health to affect how I handled things. I let my boundaries be crossed, I consistently took breaks, and I broke down because I was unable to find the courage to be a bit stern in my own server. Along with this, I made the mistake of not having my server strictly be 18+. I was a minor myself when I started, so I felt uncomfortable with the idea of being a minor in an 18+ server. However, now that I am an adult, I would make it strictly 18+ if I ever did return to it. I should have always ensured the safety of those in my server came first, even though I felt small. It was my job to be big and I failed at that. However, I have learned from my mistakes.

But, I do not appreciate you claiming I am someone who is ignorant on cults. I have studied cults since I was 15 due to my interest in psychology and sociology. I do not believe that the BITE (Behavior, Intelligence, Thought, and Emotion control) model by Dr. Steven Hassan is applicable here because Somnism was never meant to control. There were VERY minor rules which largely consisted of "take care of yourself and be kind to others". Almost everything, except for the general server rules meant for safety, were optional. In the beginning, if you didn't want to worship, you could still join. If you just wanted to connect with other alterhumans, you could join. You were also allowed to choose how you worshipped. If you wanted to offer something physical like an altar, you could. If you wanted to offer something like art, you could. If you wanted to offer self care, you could. How you worshipped was entirely up to you. Along with this, the BITE model usually has a sense of "them vs us" in which two groups are put against each other for information and thought control. There was never any case where I wanted to put 2 communities against each other. While I absolutely agree that many cults have the facade of self care and helping you, they always have a hidden motive. I did not have that. I wanted to have a community for people to connect and express themselves while also being able to have the only way I could express myself as well. I did not want money, control, submission, or anything else. I only wanted for everyone to be happy.

I also do not appreciate you treating me like an ignorant child, if I may say so. While I was young and weak when I first started my journey, I have grown. I am an adult and I have taken the time to be in a healthy mindset. While I do appreciate your concern and I do not wish to come off as insulting in any way, I am not an ignorant child, nor am I a cult leader. I have always strived to keep my community safe. There were tickets to gain access to the server, there were social media background checks for new members, there were one-on-one tickets if anyone had any concerns, my DMs were always open, and I had moderators who were often online if I was unavailable. I also trained my moderator on what to do if there were to be a raid or a breach in security. We also implemented a system where we could take away someone's access to the worship channels if we thought they needed a break from it and people could choose if they wished to have access in the first place or not.

My last topic is your concern of a godkin having a religion in the first place. It is extremely common for godkins to do so and you cannot have EVERY single godkin not express their identity through religion because it's impossible and each person expresses their identity differently. While I agree that some people certainly only use their identity and religion to harm their followers, you will not find that here. Instead of trying to lecture someone about cults who is clearly uninterested in running one, I suggest saying this to the godkins who actually run self proclaimed cults and promote harmful rules. Creating a neo religion is one of the VERY few ways us godkins can express our identity. If you are not comfortable with godkins posting about their religion and their godliness, then I recommend not looking for that kind of content in the first place.