It isn't fake from our perspective, and it's really insulting to say so. Shame on you.
As for the cult-like perception...
yes, so?
Look, some people have got "it." Whatever "it' is. And it may not be "it" to you--but to others that "it" seems to change their lives if not the world. Maybe this person really did change something important in fact and deserve the veneration, like an Einstein changing physics or an Elvis changing music. Or maybe they were just someone that changed that important thing for certain people, personally. Either way, it's human nature for us to gravitate to such people be they a yoga guru, Princess Diana, a basketball star or a true leader like Martin Luther King, jr. This is what creates cults, no question. But so what? The Beatles had their cult--far more than Steve did--with screaming, weeping fans--didn't mean they didn't make great music or that John Lennon didn't deserve to be lionized or mourned when he died.
If you don't get why anyone would feel this way about this or that person, you don't get it and that's fine. But I know that there is someone in your life, or will be, who you do or will feel the same about. A singer or artist or scientist or leader...or yoga teacher, who may not know you personally, but who speaks to you, has changed your life or just done something that made your life different or better. And if you think about how you feel about that person, and, presuming they're alive, how you'd feel if they died, then you'll understand what we're feeling, and you'll know that it's absolutely genuine.
You don't have to understand. You don't have to sympathize. You don't have to like it or approve of it. But I think you should respect it, if only because you will want others to respect--not mock or insult your genuine feeling when it happens to you. And it will. You're in a glass house there. Don't throw stones.
