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[KickThatBathProf]

Guys, guys, seriously.  Stop with the arguing.  What Would Flying Spaghetti Monster Do?

[Storm Rider]

I am a stupid man but I find it surprisingly easy to not become a Scientologist.

In fact, if not becoming a Scientologist was an Olympic event, I would be prepared to represent Great Britain.

Fantastic.

[MusicScribbles]

You see, now Tommy has to challenge Xenu to a race around the world.

[Storm Rider]

Guys, because of the title of this thread, I am now starting the First United Church of Jackie Chan.

I'll be giving a lengthy sermon about the trials he faced alongside his apostle Chris Tucker at a later date.

[Rizzo]

The point Khar made I think is the most important.
If you opt out of Islam, Christianity, Judeaism etc you won't be sued, you might be called a heretic, people may treat you badly and you may be made to feel like human waste but you will not be sued for copyright infringement.
Certainly other religions will excommunicate you and treat you like shit but CoS will excommunicate you, treat you like shit, threaten you and probably attempt to take you to court if you speak out against them...

[est]

I was going to make a detailed post in here, but then I read Ozy and Khar's posts and saw that they already had basically everything I wanted to say covered.

My summation: freedom of religion is great.  People should be free to practise whatever religion they want.  Organisations, however, should never be free to extort their members, brainwash them, encourage them to do awful things and in some cases imprison them against their will.  They are not the actions of a religion or organisation that is to be respected.

Also: please don't give me any of this bullshit about them being a "young religion".  Religions got away with that kind of shit when they were "young" because we were back in ye olde ages, not simply because they were religions.  I would like to think that civilisation has evolved a little since those times.

[MusicScribbles]

I have to agree with every bit against the organization. You can practive whatever you want to otherwise.

This made my day. After reading this blog entry, I smiled a lot.

Also, from the protest:

[calenlass]

So good.

[MusicScribbles]

Also, here is a video of the London sector getting rickrolled by protestors. Apparently more than 300 showed up at London's protest. There are reports of 100's showing up to many of them, around the world. I have to say, a better thing to talk about in this thread is the sheer awesome that these protests are exhuding. I'm sure that more videos will be put up in no time, as the protests were only yesterday, which, from where I am right now, was only two hours ago.

[Patrick]

I'm mostly annoyed at Scientology 'cause they tried to bullshit me personally. I don't take kindly to being bullshitted.

Also, MusicScribbles, I kindof want to find out who that "LONGCAT" person is expressly so I can bitchslap them. It really doesn't help the cause and just confuses people. Fuck, every site I've been to that has been organizing stuff for this IRL raid has gone well out of their way to say "Listen guys. Don't reference memes. Nobody's going to get it but you."

[est]

"DOWN WITH THIS SORT OF THING"

awesome.

[Rizzo]

How do you, ideologically speaking, defeat a crowd that is enthusiastically demanding that you "DO A BARREL ROLL! DO A BARREL ROLL!!" ?

[calenlass]

Guys when is the next protest? Has anyone thought that far ahead yet?



(I want to take a video camera and film it. You guys know the 4chan dude lives in my city, right?)

[Alex C]

I wanted to say something about irregardless earlier, but I remain unsure whether it's some kind of elaborate prank, so I kept my mouth shut.

[calenlass]

Tommydski is the subtlest of trolls.

[Ozymandias]

Man I have been at riots and other places of illegal activity where there were fewer people masked up. I think we can safely say anonymous are wusses huh?

Yeah, the point is kind of, uh, "Anonymous." Also, I don't think they're scared of the cops. I think they're a little bit scared of the Church. I would be.

Katie, the next protest is March 15, I think, according to the 4chan.

[jhocking]

I remain unsure whether it's some kind of elaborate prank

Great, now he'll pretend he made those mistakes on purpose and I'll look like a dumbass. THANKS A LOT DUDE

[DonInKansas]

Bear in mind, the protests are aimed at the CoS, not the actual religion itself. The protestors claim that the CoS is actually a cult that extorts its members for money and brainwashes them. They claim that it has many of the hallmarks of a cult, especially:

   1. It uses psychological coercion to recruit, indoctrinate and retain its members.
   2. It forms an elitist totalitarian society.
   3. Its founder/leader is self-appointed, dogmatic, messianic, not accountable and has charisma.
   4. It believes 'the end justifies the means' in order to solicit funds and recruit people.
   5. Its wealth does not benefit its members or society. 

How is this different from any other religion out there?  This argument could be made against any religion.

[ruyi]

that has been said already. i think khar brought up the real issue, though:

It's ironic that people would make this about freedom of religion, since freedom of religion is something the Co$ hates. They own copyright on all their religious symbols, as well as holding patents on dianetics and the auditing process and so forth, and will ruthlessly prosecute anyone who attempts to follow the precepts of scientology outside of the Co$. Not brand them as heretics, you understand, but sue them, for copyright infringement.

Have a little read:

http://www.rotten.com/library/bio/religion/cult/l-ron-hubbard/

http://www.rotten.com/library/religion/scientology/

[Patrick]

How is this different from any other religion out there?  This argument could be made against any religion.

Aside from the fact that Roo is completely right, have you ever heard of a lady named Agnes Gonxha Bojaxhiu? No? How about if I use her better-known name of Mother Teresa? What about that dude Gandhi?

[KharBevNor]

Dude I would not be so uncritical about Mother Teresa.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Missionary_Position_%28book%29

and Ghandi? Ghandi was the utter antithesis of organised religion.

[Switchblade]

Yeah, the point is kind of, uh, "Anonymous." Also, I don't think they're scared of the cops. I think they're a little bit scared of the Church. I would be.

By all accounts, the cops in most if not all of the protest locations wereequal parts amused and accepting of the protestors.

One of the core points behind the protest arrangements was that everyone should keep it civil, keep it legal, and respect the police. Something which the cops appreciated, no doubt.

[öde]

I don't even know what Gandhi's religion was (just that he was totally rad).



HOORAY!

[mooface]

so, uh, my two cents:

1 cent:  i don't understand what people mean when they say "hey Scientology is just a religion just like any other evil religion".  i don't get that.  does it mean that people shouldn't be able to protest it just because there aren't people protesting the Catholic Church?  because i think it is definitely okay to protest Scientology just as i think it was totally okay for me to get pissed off about my Catholic high school being forced to give all the money that was supposed to go towards building an auditorium to the Church's fund for defending the priests who molested children.  i think that it is good that people are speaking out against all the bad things that Scientology is doing and i think that more people should be speaking out against all the bad things that other older religions are doing. 
brainwashing people and taking their money is bad.  just because an organization calls itself a religion doesn't make it right.  and so these practices should be stopped because although people have the right to believe whatever they want, they shouldn't have the right to trick people and take their money.

2 cent:   also, i would like to say that i think scientology, although i don't know much about it, is pretty different from Christianity, Islam, Hinduism or Buddhism.  although all these religions may have their flaws and may have been used as tools for doing evil, they all have the fundamental golden rule of "love your neighbor as you love yourself", just with different wording.  Jesus, Mohammad, Buddha... they all had the best intentions when they set out their moral codes (which mainly revolved around tolerance and understanding). despite how their words may have eventually been misinterpreted or covered up by other trivial rules and manipulations, i don't think any of them are really comparable to L. Ron Hubbard.

[Spinless]

This raises a big issue. Prove that the church of Scientology is tricking people. Infact, prove that the Catholic Church is not tricking people. Prove the existence of a god, and I'll go and fetch Xenu, he's probably hiding behind my couch. The argument of faith still applies to the CoS. Even if they do use brainwashing techniques and scare tactics. Infact, most organised religions do. Nobody wants to burn in hell for eternity, do they?

Once people start using legal action against the CoS, the doors should open to use it against any organised religion.

[redglasscurls]

I saw a flier about the protest in my building when I came in this morning and I thought it was a joke. It's fucking cold out, I don't care enough about people moronic enough to get wrapped up in scientology to ponce around waving signs in 20 degree weather.

[KharBevNor]

This raises a big issue. Prove that the church of Scientology is tricking people. Infact, prove that the Catholic Church is not tricking people.

The catholic church has an open doctrine and theology. Anyone can read the bible, the apocrypha, papal bulls and countless works of Catholic and anti-catholic theology, philosophy etc. Anyone can go and talk about the churches doctrines with a priest.

The doctrine of Xenu, however, is supposed to be classified. Although scientology documents have leaked, you're not supposed to actually be told about Xenu, or thetans, or any of that shit till you reach OT III, by which time you have already sunk a significant quantity of time and money into the church, not to mention gone through the crucial 'clearing' stages of auditing, which basically consist of repeating untruths until you believe them enough to fool a lie detector. The Co$, in fact, doesn't even admit to this stuff. Scientology is sold initially as a sort of new-age self-help thing to help people with personal problems like depression or addiction. Then suddenly you find your mind is infested with alien ghosts and someones asking you to sign away your soul to the Sea Org for a billion years. It's like if the Catholic church presented itself as a social club, then after a couple of years of paying subscriptions they told you about original sin. It's not a question of whether the doctrines of either belief system represent ultimate truth, it's the fact that scientology lies about itself, and attempts to keep its doctrines and rituals secret. Talking from a purely moral perspective, would you be inclined to trust people who claimed to have found the solution to human happiness, and then expended massive effort to keep it secret, whilst charging people extortionate quantities of money for it?

[Patrick]

Dudes, any other organized religion is protested just as easily. Protestantism is protested because of anti-gay sentiment. Catholicism has been protested for the same, and it's been protested for other things for literally hundreds of years (that old boy Martin Luther would be boring as hell to read about otherwise). Point = moot (no pun intended).

The thing about the Scientologists is that you have to pay OUT THE ASS to learn anything worthwhile about your religion. That combined with their tax-exempt status are the reason the *chans are protesting, not because of anything else. It has to be a willing donation, not a "If you don't do it we won't pay you and probably will fuck your whole life up more than we have already".

[The extra letter]

I'm normally one for letting people believe what they want, but any "religion" that uses trademarks, copyrighting and the like as much as Scientology is a money making venture, not a belief system.

[Jimmy the Squid]

I was actually going to go to the Sydney protest (I wasn't able to) however my reasons, though yes I am an atheist and yes I do believe that all religions should be abandoned, are a little more personal (I'm a psych. student. I plan to be a clinical psychologist once I get out of uni. The Co$ has several psychology/psychiatry hate groups which I have come into personal contact with. This is not a religion. This is a dangerous cult, dangerous in the way that Christianity hasn't been for decades. Saying that we should just ignore it because it is a "young religion" is incredibly naiive. Saying that we should be tolerant of it simply because it is a belief system that we don't ourselves share is, in my mind, fucking ridiculous. No idea is above criticism yet this is exactly what the Co$ try to do - squash any word of criticism.

I cannot honestly and candidly tell you guys how I feel because it would get this thread locked. Instead here is a link. Read it as well as the Rotten.com links that Khar posted.

http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,972865-1,00.html

You can say I am being intolerant if you like and you'd be right. I am at peace with that.

[Spinless]

I'm normally one for letting people believe what they want, but any "religion" that uses trademarks, copyrighting and the like as much as Scientology is a money making venture, not a belief system.

Why not? Nobody is forcing you to become a Scientologist. Infact, while I'm sure they use despicable means to hold onto their member, I'm pretty sure that nobody has been held at gunpoint and forced to make the first payment. Scientology is still a choice, just like most other religions.

[schimmy]

Gunpoint, no. Blackmailed? Yes.
There was a fantastic Louis Theroux documentary a while back about Scientology where he interviewed former members, attempted to interview current members (they showed up, but pretty much refused to answer any of his questions.)
Anyway, onto the blackmail. What the 'church' does is, they persuade you to let them measure your stress levels using primitive lie detectors.
They then persuade you (at this stage they are very friendly) to talk to them about yourself, and, as I assume you know already, talking about your problems can relieve stress.
What's the problem with this? They record everything you say so they can blackmail you in the future. And now, if you don't have the courage to back out, you basically have to keep paying them an increasingly large subscription to not tell the world your secrets.
Now, I assume most of you don't have secrets that huge that would destroy you if people found out.
But, I'm also willing to assume you're not an actor or businessman to whom a scandal would destroy your career.

That (along with what others such as Khar have said) is what is wrong with Scientology. Maybe it is a religion. Religions can break the law, and scam people just as well any other organization, and I don't see why professing supernatural beliefs should make them immune to criticism and, more importantly, persecution for breaking whatever laws they've broken.

[Spinless]

On top form as usual, schimmy. If the Church of Scientology has indeed broken the law, and legal action is taken against the church, then what's stopping us from taking legal action against all churches?

[Jimmy the Squid]

A misguided sense of religious tolerance tells us that some things, like a person's right to believe stupid, erroneous, primitive and backward things, are untouchable. You can argue politics, you can argue your opinion of a ruling of a soccer referee but as soon as someone says "I refuse to give my schizophrenic son medication that will allow him to live a relatively normal life because this book, which I will not let you look at, says so" we have to back off and respect it?

Fuck that noise.

[0bsessions]

My only real contirbution to this is that I'm glad to know why the fuck there was a dude with a V For Vendetta mask at South Station yesterday.

[a pack of wolves]

After reading this thread, and the links posted, my initial reservations about these protests have gone. The CoS seems like a good target, not a soft one.

[Patrick]

On top form as usual, schimmy. If the Church of Scientology has indeed broken the law, and legal action is taken against the church, then what's stopping us from taking legal action against all churches?

Do you see Catholic priests taking people's confession secrets and going public unless you pay them off? I've never heard of that happening, and I know people who go to confession weekly.

[a pack of wolves]

And if they did it would be extortion and people would be perfectly within their rights to report them to the police and have them arrested.

[ledhendrix]

This is from the protest in London, Made me laugh



My views on the matter... What Khar said.

[Patrick]

They're already in the news every week because of Tom Cruise, Katie Holmes, Will Smith, and many others.

[Johnny C]

It's a dangerous line to walk between criticism and intolerance.

Scientology is one of those things that as a religion is incredibly harmless. It's frivolous at best to mock their beliefs. However, the Church Of Scientology itself is an enterprise not only based on fear, intimidation, profit and power, it's an extremely corrupt example of it. I don't pretend to defend the organized structure of any religion as immune from error, but in the latter half of the twentieth century the Church Of Scientology has embarked on a campaign of harassment, legal bullying, psychotic behaviour against critics that is endorsed by high-level Church administrators and quite possibly murder by torture, which may have actually occurred on multiple occasions.

As an additional corollary, there are organizations like Free Zone who are essentially in the process of a modern schism from the main Church of Scientology. The difference is that where such things were often settled with years of physical conflict and cries of "heresy," it's now being settled with expensive lawyers and cries of "heresy."

And to confound my argument even further, any criticism is good, by the way. Criticism of a religion is no different from criticism of, say, a government. Certainly, there are some people out there who believe in the current American administration, but that doesn't mean that George W. Bush and co. are somehow beyond protest just because some people happen to support them. To suggest that Scientology shouldn't be singled out for protest not only negates previous public protests against the machinations of other religions, but it sets a dangerous precedent. Especially when, although because of their particular self-referential brand of humour the proceedings were a bit bizarre and occasionally cruel, a protest against a religious organization's practices is carried out in as peaceful a manner as this.

I guess what I'm trying to say is this is a complex thing. No point in reducing it to an inaccurate situation of "It's a religion and this is intolerance" vs. "It's a cult and it's dangerous."

[a pack of wolves]

If the people who are staging these protests have definitely given all of this due consideration, good luck to them. Protest away. Maybe next week we can protest the right-wing Christian administration that has essentially hijacked American politics. Maybe the week after that we can protest the treatment of women by Muslim extremists on basically every continent. Maybe afterwards we can protest the wars our governments have started abroad. In the current climate, protesting Scientology is akin to a man in a burning building complaining about having an itchy leg.

To an extent I'd agree, but nobody ever starts with the toughest things wrong with this world, the things which force you to question your own way of life. It's a first step, and I'm usually happy to see people willing to take to the streets over something. Once they've done it for once it becomes more natural to do it again, so maybe in a few years there'll be people outside oil refineries or army recruitment centres chatting about how their first protest was this. In fact, I'll be very surprised if that isn't the case.

[Ozymandias]

Tommy, you keep saying "if them why not them?" which is basically an erroneous argument and you know it. If someone wants to protest one wrong, they should be allowed to, despite the existence of others. Otherwise, what's the point? What's the point of fighting any evil if  other evil continues to exist? Anonymous can't take down the Catholic Church. Anonymous can't take down Muslim extremists. Anonymous can't take down the government. Those entities exist outside of the modern construction of society, the internet, the businesses, the corporations. Anonymous and Scientology both feed off the modern construction of society. They grew in it and use it to their advantage. It's something that Anonymous can actually, at least, feel like they're doing something about.

And, yeah, Anonymous is malicious themselves. No one is arguing that they're the white knights coming to save us from the vicious dragon of Scientology. They're a bunch of nerds, script kiddies, /b/tards, and other assorted internet bottom dwellers who do stupid shit because it's funny. If they want to feel like they're doing something because it's right for once, though, I'm okay with that.

[AnotherQCaddict]

While anon is making some good arguements (paying for salvation?), they aren't exactly the most orthodox of protesters.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eoA0mnISlyQ

Might this constitute harrassment?  I don't particularly like either group, but it's more a matter of "who is worse?"




At least anon has done a few good things, wheras the few good things one might be able to be said about Scientology are shrouded in a cloud of doubt and legal nonsense.

[Spinless]

That video was horrible. The youtube comments say she is the one who approached them on a "rampage". That's not to say they protesters were justified in their following actions either. Both the protesters and the woman in the video were in the wrong.

[KharBevNor]

Anonymous aren't protesting this because of moral objections. Their main issue is freedom of information, which is something anonymous is definitely not hypocritical about. Scientologys attempts to suppress criticism and free distribution of scientology docs are genuinely a serious threat to online freedom of speech. There's no double standards at play.

And Tommy, I think you will find that there are plenty of groups protesting other religions, though often ineffectively, and often from rather questionable stances of their own. Nevertheless, it happens. I remember reading only last month of Italian students protesting a speech by the pope because of his retrograde attitude to science. There are major figures and global and national organisations constantly speaking out against radical islam, catholicism, fundamentalist christianity, hindu nationalism, countless other groups. Maybe they don't make the press as much, but they're there. In a lot of cases this has to do with the fact that the battlegrounds are different, as are the people doing the protesting. In the case of a lot of this stuff most of the protest comes, naturally, from within the same culture. Also, there are all sorts of issues with white, christian backgrounded westerners protesting aspects of Islam, whereas Scientology is undeniably a distinctive product of the west.

[IronOxide]

I am not critical of this movement because they are protesting the CoS. On the contrary, I feel that people need to raise awareness about the things that are happening in this church, but I feel that the protesters are mixed into three groups.

The first is the group that wants people to see what may be going on in this organization and feel that their actions are unacceptable. These are the people that you will see out and about with "Google Lisa McPherson" and "Salvation Should Be Free" signs. They are genuinely concerned about the actions of the church, and feel like they are wronging people, which I personally agree with.

The second group are the people who are "In it for the Lulz", these are the people that show up to the protests mindlessly quoting memes. These are the people carrying "Longcat is Loooooong" signs and carrying boomboxes to "Rickroll" the streets. They are just interested in generating chaos because they are not content with their lives and do not feel like contributing positively.

The final people are those who are intolerant of the core beliefs of the society and feel that it should be open to ridicule through that route. At a protest they are the ones shouting at entering and exiting members and are the people who will carry the "Lol Xenu" signs. They want to make fun of people because they find their beliefs too silly to be allowed in our society.

The first group is the only group that are in it for the betterment of society, they are actually trying to shed light on a situation that may be criminal or at least amoral. They are working to shed light on an organization that they feel are doing bad things. I find this respectable, and I would find it respectable even if I agreed with the actions of the CoS.

The second and third groups, however, are hurting their own cause more than they are helping it. They have found an organization that is easy to make fun of (like all religions). They are the ones who are just looking to attack a young religion. They want to hurt people just to hurt people. This is the activity of the group that I do not think is acceptable. Now, from the coverage of the "raids", I don't know which people are the most numerous. The news seems to revolve more around the first group, while the internet community is spending more time glorifying the second and third groups. I don't know which are better represented there because I was not at every protest in the world. Some people here want to better the world, some people don't want to change the world at all, and some people want to hurt the world. All three of these groups have banded together against one common enemy, and they are hurting their own cause.

[calenlass]

We all like to pretend there is an imminent and real danger, a bogey-man that we can project our own problems and insecurities upon.

Dude zombies are a real and imminent danger, but we are already talking about that other places.

[a pack of wolves]

The second group are the people who are "In it for the Lulz", these are the people that show up to the protests mindlessly quoting memes. These are the people carrying "Longcat is Loooooong" signs and carrying boomboxes to "Rickroll" the streets. They are just interested in generating chaos because they are not content with their lives and do not feel like contributing positively.

I think you could well be completely wrong about these people. The role of the clown in protests is very well established, at any large demo you'll undoubtedly see groups of people who're either members of or adopting the general tactics of CIRCA. I'm actually quite taken with the tactic of rick rolling, it'd be enjoyable and the whole point of tactics like that are to create confusion and disorder, not necessarily to be easily understood.

[Patrick]

The thing about the repetition of the 4chan memes? It's a morale boost for the people standing in the picket lines. Sure, it isn't a political proclamation, but that's what the signs are for. It gets real boring standing outside for several hours unless you've got something everybody can laugh about.

Also, in b4 somebody posts the "INTERNET SUPERHEROES" poster which describes 4chan's /b/ ("we are mindless 'me too'-ism"). Seriously? A 4chan-based protest without memes is like a tanning salon without skin cancer.