system
A chat on 4chan
human
they claim to bring together different people from different professions, in an effort to enhance knowledge and progression in all sorts of different fields, as well as focus on the betterment of its members individually. but i call bullshit, if you were really about this, you wouldn't hold it off from others through some club. you'd realize that it should be for everyone, the more the merrier. you wouldn't hide this idea behind strange and intimidating imagery, ritual, membership and tradition. 
i understand the way the group works is kind of cyclical and in isolated divisions that aren't necessarily related to each other, but it seems strange to me that it's built in such a way that tradition and ritual would stay as much of a massive part of its identity as it's actual goal. like what other group is like that without splinter groups with slight categorical differences in how they do things and why they do things. differences that are enough to define them as separate from what they splintered off of entirely. fucking none, and that's true all the way from politics to religion. that type of shit is human nature, and the freemasons straight up defy that. 
maybe im wrong but my intuition tells me nothing like the freemasons could be built unintentionally, which leads me to believe that it was built with that goal in mind. to keep it insulated, constantly growing, resistant to change and intimidating enough to where it cannot just be joined by someone unless they have the balls and real reasoning to first.
gpt
but religion is also naturally like that as well, minus the lack of variation and splintered beliefs that create their own, new belief systems.