The real reason you see dd specified for this sort of thing is that most people posting such instructions are just copy/pasting from some older doc, or from a cheat sheet they came up with years ago, or maybe from memory from stuff they learned 25 years ago.

I wouldn’t call that a cult. More of a “this one off command I run once every five years isn’t something I need to learn or understand because any ‘better’ alternative won’t stick with me anyway.”