Oh, Snap

I'm going to say, up front: I have no idea what Aesthetic Realism is about. I am obviously suspicious of anything whose mission statement is this garbled:

3. All beauty is a making one of opposites, and the making one of opposites is what we are going after in ourselves.

But maybe it's not a cult. Maybe it's just... I don't know, something that's not a cult. Like if you thought Transcendental Meditation was not a cult, this would probably fall in the same non-cultish category for you.

If they wanted to be a cult though, they would have a head start. First, they have the obligatory sinister-smile founder:



And second, they discredit their enemies:

The method of those attacking[aesthetic realism] is to create lies so numerous and massive that a reader would feel, “There must be something to this.” It’s the “Big Lie” approach, which has been around often in history.

Most of the web pages are those of a Michael Bluejay. He is someone who, on his personal website, has published naked pictures of himself—including photos of himself in full frontal nudity, and riding a tricycle naked. He also points as a source of pride to his having worn "a dress to a strip club" without having gotten "beat up."

Mr. Bluejay? I don't want to say that you're in the wrong here. Maybe Aesthetic Realism is an evil cult. I don't know. But I gotta say, they make a good case.