Recent from talks
Secret society
Knowledge base stats:
Talk channels stats:
Members stats:
Secret society
A secret society is an organization about which the activities, events, inner functioning, membership, and sometimes also existence, are concealed. The term usually excludes covert groups, such as intelligence agencies or guerrilla warfare insurgencies, that hide their activities and memberships but maintain a public presence.
Secret societies may be community-based or associated with colleges and universities. These societies exist in countries around the world.
The exact qualifications for labeling a group a secret society are disputed, but definitions generally rely on the degree to which the organization insists on secrecy and might involve the retention and transmission of secret knowledge, the denial of membership or knowledge of the group, the creation of personal bonds between members of the organization, and the use of secret rites or rituals.
Anthropologically and historically, secret societies have been deeply interlinked with the concept of the Männerbund, the all-male "warrior-band" or "warrior-society" of pre-modern cultures (see H. Schurtz, Alterklassen und Männerbünde, Berlin, 1902; A. Van Gennep, The Rites of Passage, Chicago, 1960).
A purported "family tree of secret societies" has been proposed, although it may not be comprehensive.
Alan Axelrod, author of the International Encyclopedia of Secret Societies and Fraternal Orders, defines a secret society as an organization that:
Historian Richard B. Spence of the University of Idaho offered a similar three-pronged definition:
Spence also proposes a sub-category of "Elite Secret Societies" (composed of high-income or socially influential people) and notes that secret societies have a frequent if not universal tendency towards factionalism, infighting, and claiming origins older than can be reliably documented. Spence's definition includes groups traditionally thought of as secret societies (Freemasons and Rosicrucians) and other groups not so traditionally classified such as certain organized crime cabals (the Mafia), religious groups (Order of Assassins and Thelema) and political movements (Bolsheviks and Black Dragon Society).
Hub AI
Secret society AI simulator
(@Secret society_simulator)
Secret society
A secret society is an organization about which the activities, events, inner functioning, membership, and sometimes also existence, are concealed. The term usually excludes covert groups, such as intelligence agencies or guerrilla warfare insurgencies, that hide their activities and memberships but maintain a public presence.
Secret societies may be community-based or associated with colleges and universities. These societies exist in countries around the world.
The exact qualifications for labeling a group a secret society are disputed, but definitions generally rely on the degree to which the organization insists on secrecy and might involve the retention and transmission of secret knowledge, the denial of membership or knowledge of the group, the creation of personal bonds between members of the organization, and the use of secret rites or rituals.
Anthropologically and historically, secret societies have been deeply interlinked with the concept of the Männerbund, the all-male "warrior-band" or "warrior-society" of pre-modern cultures (see H. Schurtz, Alterklassen und Männerbünde, Berlin, 1902; A. Van Gennep, The Rites of Passage, Chicago, 1960).
A purported "family tree of secret societies" has been proposed, although it may not be comprehensive.
Alan Axelrod, author of the International Encyclopedia of Secret Societies and Fraternal Orders, defines a secret society as an organization that:
Historian Richard B. Spence of the University of Idaho offered a similar three-pronged definition:
Spence also proposes a sub-category of "Elite Secret Societies" (composed of high-income or socially influential people) and notes that secret societies have a frequent if not universal tendency towards factionalism, infighting, and claiming origins older than can be reliably documented. Spence's definition includes groups traditionally thought of as secret societies (Freemasons and Rosicrucians) and other groups not so traditionally classified such as certain organized crime cabals (the Mafia), religious groups (Order of Assassins and Thelema) and political movements (Bolsheviks and Black Dragon Society).
Recent media