Eligio Bishop, often called NatureBoy, constructed a ‘Black Utopia’ cult by means of social media, exploiting youth searching for goal and neighborhood.
The cult advanced from another way of life to a intercourse cult of violence, coercion and management, ending in Bishop’s trial and life sentence.
The docuseries gives an unfiltered have a look at how trendy cults leverage social media to achieve followers and orchestrate their very own actuality.
If you happen to suppose the influencer-to-cult-leader pipeline is one thing out of a film, Hulu’s newest docuseries is about to shake you to your core. The Cult of NatureBoy is streaming now, and it’s a kind of collection you merely can’t look away from, regardless of how uncomfortable it will get. Learn extra and test it out inside.
This isn’t fiction. Cult of NatureBoy is impressed by one thing that occurred in actual time — in entrance of tens of millions of followers scrolling their feeds. Most individuals had completely no thought how darkish it actually was behind the display screen.
As Hulu describes it, the collection traces the rise of Eligio Bishop — also referred to as NatureBoy — chief of Carbon Nation. Starting in 2016, he used social media to draw younger individuals to a self-described “Black Utopia.” What started instead way of life within the tropics grew to become a intercourse cult of violence, manipulation and coercion, ending together with his 2024 trial and life sentence.
As ABC 7 Information reported, the four-part docuseries options director Benjamin Zand and investigator Chantelle Coleman as they break down precisely how Bishop operated and why so many individuals fell for it. Zand defined that, “[Bishop] was form of preaching a solution to lots of the issues that younger People, particularly younger Black People, are dealing with at that time, with a easy message of return to nature.”
It was messaging that resonated deeply with a era actively looking for goal, neighborhood and one thing actual in a world that felt more and more hole.
And Bishop knew precisely find out how to bundle that message. Tall, handsome and magnetic, Zand described him as “like the final word influencer.” However investigator Coleman made clear that the allure was nothing greater than a calculated weapon.
“He has an ego the dimensions of Earth,” Coleman mentioned. “He’s somebody that believes that he has a solution for all the things and that every one information ought to come by means of him. He’s charismatic. He’s additionally manipulative. He’s additionally egotistical. He’s a grasp manipulator. He’s very divisive. He might be very merciless. Vile. Evil virtually.”
What makes this story particularly chilling is how seen all of it was in plain sight. As Bishop gained increasingly more management, Zand additionally shared how far he was prepared to go to extend consciousness.
“He’s purposely making an attempt to push individuals additional and additional and additional to get increasingly more curiosity on-line,” Zand added. “To get extra consideration, donations. In some ways this was like a actuality TV present. They had been filming all the things themselves. You had been seeing a lot motion, a lot drama. They had been form of orchestrating a variety of this insanity.”
The four-part docuseries gives a uncommon and unfiltered look inside a contemporary cult working in plain sight, instructed by means of the firsthand testimony of former members and victims. There have been additionally insights shared from on-line investigators who tracked them in actual time. By means of the group’s personal self-recorded footage, viewers watch Carbon Nation remodel from a communal dream right into a nightmare constructed on coercion and escalating violence.
Zand mirrored on what the collection in the end represents, saying, “It felt like a extremely vital instance of how cults have advanced. Social media has made a brand new sort of cult.”
The Cult of NatureBoy is streaming now on Hulu and Hulu on Disney+. Watch it, share it, and keep conscious of who you belief on-line.
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