Cult in culture?

[Shadowraix]

I came across this idea probably within the past few months. That culture is very cult-like and often arbitrary. For example, tradition. We do things and grow up being taught and accepting these things as being true and if you even dare oppose the way others live, it becomes offensive. Or take cultural appropriation for example. People feel some sort of entitlement to living/looking a certain way because they did it first. You aren't a part of their "culture" or "cult" and so you don't get to do it! And people celebrate and embrace culture. As if these ways of life are something special and not something they were born into. All of which is very arbitrary. 

After pondering on this I had wondered if anybody else came to this conclusion and I found this article: https://www.hgi.org.uk/resources/delve-our-extensive-library/society-and-culture/exploring-cult-culture

Which it cites 4 main qualities to cults. (I'll shorten the explanations, but you can read the article for in depth examples.

compliance with the group: This is the sheep idea. We are conditioned to act a certain way and join in in group behavior. This is of course a basic survival pattern though, but this can be manipulated VERY easily.

Dependence on a leader: We look up to people to lead our way of life. This can be anything from parents to political figures. They demand loyalty and suppress criticism.

Avoiding dissent: This is keeping people committed. This can be cherry picking evidence, distracting them from the real issues, essentially indoctrination. Even things like friendship can pin you down in keeping you from avoiding leaving it.

devaluation of outsiders: Those in their own culture see their way of life as correct and devalue other cultures as being weird or wrong. Anybody outside of it is evil or wrong. And they often get upset for those outside of their culture taking aspects from theirs. Much of the cruelty and intolerance comes from building and indoctrinating a group that they are the best and anybody outside of it must be eliminated.

 

Putting this into perspective, I had come to the realization that a lot of the things I held as just a true aspect of the way of life, I didn't decide or even think about. I thought of many topics from dress codes to customs on how to value the dead to how to show respect. People want me to abide by their way of living and if I question it I get attacked or shunned. This also sounds a lot like ideology which I believe correlates heavily with cult-like mentalities. You could say cults form from a group of very ideological people.

What do you think? Is there some truth to culture being cult-like? I imagine the more aware you become, the more you start to defy these norms and break free from the programming.