The video was disturbing. The mad ramblings of a person insulated from the world. It seems to happen to celebrities of all kinds. Madonna. Babs. George Bush. Pervez Musharraf. Once they reach a pinnacle of success and surround themselves with enablers, they begin to believe the lies to power. It’s very troubling.
Sorry to use this method of messaging, but I was hoping you might be willing to participate in The SDMB Mock election and you have the Email & PM functions off.
Ah, thank you.
As I said at another board, he makes Caitlin Upton sound like Noam Chomsky
Let alone Bing Crosby-wasn’t he a devote Catholic? And Jimmy Stewart was pretty religious, although IIRC, he was a Protestant.
(Sorry, edit time expired)
dutifully reads yet another Scientology thread to keep tabs on the rich and delusional
I’m beginning to wonder what it would take to “crack” the cult? How big of a disruption or investigation would it take to really put them under scrutiny and expose them for what they are?
Well, considering all the exposure they’ve gotten lately, perhaps it’s just a matter of time before it gets harder and harder to recruit?
(I know, wishful thinking…)
They HAVE been put under scrutiny, several times, and they HAVE been exposed for what they are, several times, but they keep on getting away with their crap. Hundreds of former members have spoken out, given depositions, testified in court. Books have been written, articles have been written, anti-$cn websites abound. Doesn’t matter. Even the biggest scandal doesn’t phase them. The $cienos just put out some damage control, lay low for a while, then carry on as usual.
Maybe, if either of their top two members, Tom Cruise or John Travolta, were to revolt and speak out, that might make a difference, but that’ll never happen. They’re too entrenched, too brainwashed, too blackmailed, too sheltered, too surrounded by other $cienos, too pampered, too spoiled, it just won’t happen.
However, and I love this, what also won’t happen is $cieno membership growing at an alarming rate. Potential dupes are more clued-in than they used to be, or can educate themselves easily. Thanks to the people who have spoken out, and the power of the internet, their words will not and can never be supressed by $cientology. The word about the cult is out, and can be found with easy searches. Any thread started anywhere on any site, unless it’s a $cn-controlled site, will automatically attract detractors, complete with links to those brave enough to maintain anti-CoS web sites. If someone wants, they can even find info that’s forbidden to $cientologists unless they’ve been a member for years and have spent several thousands or even hundreds of thousands of dollars. Most anti-$cientologists know a LOT more about $cientology than your average, everyday, lower-level $cientologist. It’s a wonderful new day, thanks to the internet.
Exactly!
In the great cosmic battle between $cientology’s “Clears” and “Operating Thetans” and Xenu, one must chose a side.
Sooo,
ALL HAIL XENU!
CMC +fnord!
Your never lonely when ya got body thetans!
Also, Cruise and Travolta are roundly ridiculed for their beliefs, which probably makes it harder for the Scientologists to recruit more celebrities, since movie stars generally crave being taken seriously and dislike being laughed at (in real life, not necessarily their films).
Hopefully South Park will do something on this, and will give them the proper reaming they deserve- last time they were fairly tame with the slam on them, but at least they had the balls to bash them at all. I’m thinking TC digging up the corpse of LRH and sucking his balls, something like that.
And why is there so little bashing of them in comedy- SNL for example has never done a skit on them, Simpsons, Family Guy, none have slammed them IIRC.
I’ve followed (as in “watched closely”, not “participated in”) the cult for the past 25 years, and despite the advances of the internet and more freely available information it still seems like the information out there falls into three buckets:
-
“They are dangerous, well-funded, and will go to great lengths (including criminal activity) to protect themselves and keep members from leaving the fold.”
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“Join us. We will help you to improve your life. Look at how many celebrities we have in our ranks!”
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“Not much is known about the inner workings of the controversial Church of Scientology. More from our investigative reporter after this word from our sponsors…”
It seems like this organization has spent an incredibly long time with public perception remaining in this state where there is still insufficient hard investigative data about this group to satisfy/silence the skeptics (of which I certainly am one). Those speaking out against the cult remain marginalized, and any discussions about the cult seem to end up relegated to the same fate as UFO sightings and conspiracy theorists.
Is their spin-machine that bullet-proof?
A combination of the church’s litigiousness and the smallness of the cult, I guess. And frankly, at this point it’s become trite.
Remember the Simpsons episode with the Movementarians? (“The Joy of Sect,” season 9.) There were some Scientology echoes in there.
That one struck me more as a take on Jim Jones type cults, as they lived together on a commune, had to give up their worldly possessions, etc.
There are references to a number of different cults, for sure. If I can borrow from Wikipedia here…
I’m moving this from Cafe Society to the Pit. There’s not much a debate here to move it to GD; the focus on Scientology-bashing made it slightly out of place in Cafe Society; and I figured that since Scientology usually gets roasted on the SDMB, the Pit would be the best home for this thread. So, here it be.
Just in case any of the previous links are down that hysterical piece of video can also be viewed here . Was Cruise recovering from an anaesthetic when he recorded that? He sounds delirious (I half expected him to start speaking in tongues).
Whenever Scientology has ever come up with someone it has always been in the context of them being madder than a whole bakery full of fruitcakes, so whether or not hard evidence on exactly what the Church believes is easy to come by it seems that everyone except its members thinks its batshit crazy.
And I would love to know just how a billion people have had the message of Scientology carried to them - please spin me a fable on that one as it couldn’t fail to be entertaining.
If I recall, that stands for “Keep Scientology Working.” It’s a “policy letter” that’s part of the newbie’s introduction to Scientology.
I liked Tom Cruise back when he did Risky Business. Real shame.
There’s a part where he says, kind of whistfully, that sometimes he wishes he could go on vacation, and “romp. . . and play. . .” but he can’t because of the huge burden he carries of altering reality through Scientology mojo. Makes me wonder what’s going on in there – if Tom’s really gay, and part of him wishes he could come out and just live a gay life. What’s their official line on homosexuality?
Meant to add: I notice that Tom apparently has been awarded the “IAS Freedom Medal of Valor”. It’s a Freedom Medal, and also a Medal of Valor. Freedom Medal of Valor. Must be very proud.
Equipoise, Scientology is horrible and deserves mock and ridicule, but I think you may do more harm than good when you use instead of S's and use derogatory abbreviations. I know I'm not alone in glazing over or even dismissing people who refer to Microsoft as "M." If they’re able to produce glossy pamphlets while their opponents appear to be resorting to name calling, they may be able to gain ground with the uninformed. So please, show them more respect than they deserve, at least on this point.
I saw a clip of the video on Yahoo’s news links. Paramount was right to let him go. From his goofy haircut to his wacky religion, his glory days are behind him.