Single word that describes a group of people that irrationally support a lost cause?

Is there a single word, or a phrase, that can describe a group of people that mindlessly support someone/something regardless of the many obvious flaws they exhibit?

I suppose some context is necessary here.
I've come to personally know a rather unsavoury character over the past few months, so for the sake of the question, I'll refer to her as "N".

N is an online blogger who has somehow gained a massive fan following, despite the fact that she is evidently narcissistic, and also rather ostentatious. On top of that, N often asks her followers to provide her with criticism on her online presence, and their honest opinion of her. If the viewpoints provided even happens to be slightly negative (despite honest), the follower in question receives severe backlash from her fan following, if not from N herself.

What would be a single word that could describe N's fan following? Note that I've heard of the term "circlejerk" but I'd prefer something less vulgar, and more appropriate.

Solution 1:

Zealot: "One who is zealous, esp. one who is overzealous; a fanatical partisan" Webster's New Collegiate. Zeal: "Ardor in the pursuit of anything; ardent and active interest; enthusiasm; fervor". Same reference)

I don't think, by itself, zealot captures what you are looking for. How about wacko zealot? Wacko "a person who is crazy or very strange and unusual" Merriam Webster. or demented zealot Demented: "insane, mad" Webster's New Collegiate

Sentence: N's fans are a bunch of wacko zealots; they'd be funny if the existence of people like that weren't so scary.

Solution 2:

You could say she has a cult. Cults, and cultists, usually have a negative connotation.

Cult - obsession with, fixation on, mania for, passion for, idolization of, devotion to, worship of, veneration of

Some other terms could be:

Forlorn - Pitifully sad and abandoned or lonely, unlikely to succeed or be fulfilled; hopeless

Abject - extremely bad, unpleasant, and degrading

Nugatory - Of no value or importance, Useless; futile

Solution 3:

You could call them lemmings. A lemming has a secondary definition regarding being a member of a group that mindlessly follow each other over a cliff:

a member of any large group following an unthinking course towards mass destruction
_{The Free Dictionary by Farlex}

Solution 4:

A person who irrationally supports a lost cause is a "dead ender." From Beyond the Iraq War: The Promises, Pitfalls and Perils of External Intervention:

He was supposed to be the classic archetype of a 'dead ender' insurgent, Ba'athist to the core, desiring the return of an elite Sunni Ba'athist rule.

In spite of your title, you seem to want a word to describe people dedicated to a person, not a cause. And ardent follower is a "devotee": an ardent worshipper is an "acolyte." Both could be applied to members of a cult of personality, but neither necessarily implies the willingness to accept abuse.