I think the answer is mostly - “He’s a scientologist - that’s crazy!”
I don’t understand why someone would hate scientologists. Yeah, it’s wacky - no dispute there - but it’s also pretty harmless, no?
There’s lots of wacky people out there, but it seems like Mr. Cruise gets more than his fair share of (unwarranted) hate.
By all accounts, he’s a friendly, driven, thoughtful, private guy. Why would someone hate somebody like that?
Whether it’s more harmful than mainstream religion I won’t say, but it’s definitely not harmless. Not to its brainwashed members nor to its opposition.
Scientology needs to be exterpated - wiped from the face of the Earth. All Scientologists need to be sent to Coventry.
Because he hurt our Nicole.
They may be among the looniest of the loons, but I will defend their right to be fucking nutjobs up to the extent that they are not hurting anyone outside their little nutjob world.
If you can marginalize a religion and have it legally exterminated, the same method can be used against almost any religion.
emphasis added. That’s my problem right there. They use coersion, force, manipulation, and emotional abuse to hurt quite a lot of people who begin by being curious, and end up stuck inside a dangerous cult with no easy escape.
Be nutty all you damn well want, but I get a little freaked out by the combination of nutty, persuasive, emotionally abusive, and outright hunting for members in the ranks of the rich and famous.
I think the hate really started when he started dating Katie Holmes and was seen as indoctrinating a naive young lady into his (seen as a ) cult-religion. I don’t remember as much venom towards him pre-Holmes.
I think people not liking Tom Cruise predates his Scientology beliefs or divorce. Maybe he just happened to appear on the scene as a young star around the time MTV appeared. A lot of older people just hated MTV and its emphasis on shallowness and appearance. His early big hit movies “Top Gun” and “Risky Business” had lots of MTV video promotion.
I think the NASCAR community has mixed feelings about “Days of Thunder”. Certainly its appearance helped it surpass Indy Car as America’s favorite motorsport (and Sly Stallone-Renny Harlin’s “Driven” was such a mishmash that it sunk IndyCar). But it was cartoonish (not in a good way like “Talledega Nights” was).
I hated him long before he became (known as, anyway) a Scientologist. My main reasons are:
And those are just my reasons. Plenty of other people have devoted precious internet storage space to cataloging their own reasons:
http://blogcritics.org/culture/article/ten-things-i-hate-about-tom/
http://www.dowse.com/movies/boneidleidol.html
http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=207436&perpage=50&pagenumber=1
Didn’t he tell his wife no more kissing on camera? Yet it’s OK for him to do it?
Not sure if that’s true or not. But since I hate the guy, I’m going to think that it is unless someone tells me otherwise.
I also don’t like how he can just hand wave an entire medical community away and say that “Drugs are evil.” And psychiatry is “pseudo science.”
He’s a self important Jackass.
I don’t hate him–and I think within his range he is a good actor–I just find him *creepy *and get a “more than a little nuts” vibe from him.
You say this like it’s a Bad Thing. 
He cant act to save his life. He plays the same character in every movie
Cocky Boy
Script
Cocky Boy is Mr Popular
Cocky Boy is Mr Confident
Cocky Boy eyes woman, treats her like a sex object, and she falls in love with him
Cocky Boy experiences a life altering ego kick to the gonads.
Cocky Boy loses confidence
Cocky Boy is now Somber Boy
Somber Boy loses girl but she still loves him
Somber Boy is put in a situation where he has to overcome his doubt in a life or death situation, and COCKY BOY PREVAILS!
Cocky Boy is now a Good Guy, Not so Cocky.
He cant act
I don’t think that’s true at all. For my own part, at my first job I was the only one who was not an active participant in Scientology. My sister’s One Great Love was a Scientologist, and I lived with them (and with him, after she left him) as a teenager - and he remains someone I hold in very high esteem, although I consider it unfortunate that he got consumed by Scientology. I have read all of L. Ron Hubbard’s fiction (even the entire Mission Earth series,) and a good deal of his “non-fiction.”
I have favourable impressions of many Scientologists, such as Beck, John Travolta, Jason Lee, Ethan Suplee, Giovani Ribisi, Richard Elfman, and Kirstie Alley, and have absolutely no inclination to let my feelings about how they choose to squander their disposable income colour my perception of their work.
Yet, I still hate Tom Cruise and avoid his work wherever I can*, because he is a) a talentless hack and b) a gigantic douchebag.
Scientology is pure idiocy, but I don’t think it has much to do with the reason that people hate Tom Cruise. People would hate Tom Cruise if he was Buddhist, because Tom Cruise is a cunt.
*The last time I saw something he was in was 2005’s War of the Worlds, which I don’t regret - mostly because Spielberg had the good sense to cast Cruise as a smug, unlikable prick.
I don’t know if people hate him, but the kinds of people who really follow celebrity ebbs and flow are essentially a mob anyway, kissing up to someone one day and trashing them the next. So the kinds of people who hate him may just act that way in general (jumping on bandwagons, etc).
However I think when Cruise hooked up with Katie Holmes, it didn’t come across as an equal partnership. It seemed a bit like he used his overarching fame (Katie Holmes said she used to fantasize about him when she was a kid, so it wasn’t an equal partnership) to convert her into his lifestyle, and I don’t know how much she consented to that or was just cowed by him.
Plus he seems to sue people with little provocation.
I agree with almost everything said. Plus, he can’t act.
Moving to Cafe Society.
And (almost) ruined our Katie.
If you didn’t hate him before watching the above interview with Matt Lauer, you will after. Perfect mix of condescending and crazy.
It’s not just that he’s a scientologist*. After all, there are plenty of scientologists in Hollywood: John Travolta and Jason Lee are both members of that “church”, but people like them. It’s that Tom Cruise just seems so irrational when it comes to, well, anything outside of his work. He released a bit of propaganda** awhile back that said that scientologists are the only ones who know what to do when they come across a car accident, fer Christ’s sakes. Travolta’s not going to say irrational self aggrandizing shit like that, and Jason Lee isn’t going to jump up and down on Oprah’s couch screaming about love. Cruise just seems unhinged even without the scientology.
*I refuse to capitalize that word
** College humor did not edit that video. That really is the original