There are a number of cults in the US with a strong leader, living in a rural area where information about the world outside is limited. There are Hasidic dynasties and Christian groups like this. To a lesser but wider degree there are fundamental Protestant groups like this - not exactly cults, but with some of this behavior.

We see a celebration of this kind of thinking here. People want to be kept ignorant of the outside world and to keep others ignorant as well. It's a natural way to think, in the context of the road the US has been heading down for decades.

People here are excited the US will be censoring seditious content just like China does. It reminds me less of China and more of post-1905, pre-1914 Russia and the ministry of internal affairs Bureau of Censorship.

Not that it's the only factor, but I watch the US Congress sanctioning the UN and International Criminal Court for investigating the genocide in Gaza, and how many expressed their unhappiness about how Tiktok was a fissure in the US media bubble regarding that. Now Americans can be in their bubble a little longer, unaware of what the rest of the world thinks.