townx - Scientology: "criminal racketeering"? - Comments

You think?

raleigh child support — Mon, 17 Aug 2009 22:28:30 -0500

I think I have read somewhere that Tom Cruise is a scientologist? That's wierd

Drug Test All Scientologists!

Greg — Fri, 12 Jun 2009 11:14:53 -0500

Cause something ain't right.

I however do believe scientology is a religon. Christianity and Judaism teach that it is possible to lift money to God status, thereby making the worship of money a religon. Scientologists seek secrets held by their higher ups. They pay out the butt for these secrets, but their passion constitutes defining Scientology as a religon in my book.

Thanks for sharing this!

CurtisV — Mon, 27 Apr 2009 04:59:58 -0500

Thanks for sharing this! Identity scam is one of the fastest growing crimes in America that even celebrities may become the suspect. That person can use your Social Security number to get other personal information about you. You might not believe that even celebrities can do that. One great example is Antwon Tanner who is known for his role on One Tree Hill. He has been busted for running a Social Security scam, selling fake social security numbers. Evidently, no installment loans could cover his needs but regardless, he was found out and arrested by Immigrations and Customs officers. He is set to begin trial at a later date, and he is currently free on bond. Antwon Tanner will need some installment loans now to afford a lawyer good enough to keep him out of Federal Prison.

unrealistic

Medical Consentee — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 13:40:00 -0500

Although I am a big fan of Tom Cruise and his movies, I have some doubts on Scientology. I figure its not a real religion and its ideals are unrealistic either.

There are a lot of religious

Le Bronne — Wed, 25 Mar 2009 17:21:35 -0500

There are a lot of religious sects coming out now a days and they are most often more crazier than the last if not just like it. But come to think of it, all of these religious organizations are one in saying that there is only one supreme being however the name varies depending on what organization you are talking with. In my opinion, religious affiliations are the product of man's quest for the meaning of life. Be it Christian, Muslims, Jews, Jehovah's, Mormons (all the others that I couldn't think of at this time) have only one goal and that is to understand the meaning and their purpose in life.

It is as bad as it sounds

AndrewO — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 15:17:36 -0500

Scientology is one of those things that continuously baffles me. How something so absurd and blatantly scammish can exist in modern day is beyond me. I spent some time a women's sober house with an ex-scientologist and heard some crazy things about the inner workings of the organization. Apparently they extract money out of you at every opportunity.

Scam Religion

Watch Free Movies — Thu, 05 Mar 2009 11:31:55 -0600

What i think Scientology is not a religion, its a scam and the person who invented it went to prison and that's true.

scientology is a scam

sunny — Mon, 02 Mar 2009 17:44:57 -0600

its a scam and the person who invented it went to prison and was a thief and killer

Not a Religion

Free Movies — Sat, 28 Feb 2009 10:08:20 -0600

In my opinion Scientology is not a religion. It's strictly a belief.

I also agree that Scientology has many believers that are extremists. Just look at Tom Cruise. He sure toned down his outbursts after his beliefs hit him in the wallet hard!

the founder was crook

dvdfreek — Tue, 20 Jan 2009 19:42:28 -0600

the founder of scientology was on the fbi most wanted list. he was a fraudsterwho set up a scam. its all evil from what i gather. on top of it all, they give ufo buffs a bad name too.

I do not know what i liked

David — Wed, 05 Nov 2008 06:48:44 -0600

I do not know what i liked more: the article itself or the insightful comments

Christopher Reeves and Scientology

Faces of The Nation — Tue, 03 Jun 2008 17:47:39 -0500

When Christopher Reeves was on his death bed, he decided to turn to religion. I have no Idea why he looked into scientology, but thats what he turned to. Later, he wrote that it was one big giant scam, and that the only reason so many celebrities are still in it is that they are so rich that they don't even realize that it is a scam. I don't believe it is a scam per se, but Scientology may very well be a waste of money. Either way, I think that everyone should choose for themselves what religion they want.

Why We Fight?

Diplas — Sat, 18 Aug 2007 08:24:24 -0500

I remember the 80's when there was some sort of speech about Africa's poverty and hunger. It looks like the case was closed. It's like nobody is dying from starvation in Africa anymore. I blame media for the most part of world's bad things. They are used to treat information like some sort of fashion. "If you're not talking about terrorists and Middle East policy these days you're "frelled", you can't get higher in your reporter career. The starving African children topic is so yesterday." I'm "frelling" sick of it. Media will eventually drive us all insane and addicted to prescription drugs for social migraines.

Well i am not religious

gordman — Thu, 28 Jun 2007 03:29:18 -0500

Well i am not religious nether, but i respect people's choices and beliefs. This is what makes me sad, i see every day conflicts in the world and it seems to me that people are fighting because they don't have better things to do. Perhaps if we were a little more careful we could see every day people suffer in drug treatment centers, hospitals, poverty and so on.

You're welcome. Are you the

elliot — Tue, 29 May 2007 07:33:06 -0500

You're welcome. Are you the same person that commented on the Animals poem?

Scientology: "criminal racketeering"?

elliot — Wed, 31 Jan 2007 17:36:09 -0600

Update: I've toned this down and made it as objective as possible, as I felt I was unfair and perhaps intolerant in the original version.

I remember watching a documentary a few years ago on Scientology, where they attempted to show it up as a money-making scam, and made some convincing arguments, backed-up by evidence. I've never been able to understand its popularity, as L. Ron Hubbard (its originator) was a second-rate science fiction writer at best. I remember reading some critique of his ficion (maybe in Trillion Year Spree by Brian Aldiss?) which pointed out that Mr. Hubbard was an old school sf writer, who got paid by the line: therefore he wrote lots of very short sentences. Bad ones, at that. (By the way, I have attempted reading some of his stuff, and it was so truly awful I gave up.)

Today, I was browsing wikipedia to find out about juche, which Nicola mentioned and we'd never heard of (it's not a religion, as such, but the state ideology of North Korea). While I was there, I looked up Scientology, which Nicola also mentioned. I found a few things which further confirmed my views of Scientology:

An article on Helatrobus, an interplanetary nation at the heart of Scientology.
A scientific rebuttal of the ideas of Scientology by Peter Forde (an ex-Scientologist who once worked for them).
A longer article by Peter Forde describing how he got out of Scientology.
Some audio of L. Ron Hubbard talking about his ideas.
Some unusual stuff about being Operating Theta.
More about being an Operating Thetan. Apparently summarised from L. Ron's work in the public interest, as the original is "poorly structured, tedious, repetitive, and generally unpleasant to read".

Looking objectively at it, maybe few of these ideas are any crazier than Christianity, those of Jehovah's Witnesses, etc.. I also feel uncomfortable criticising other people's beliefs: it would be nice to be better informed about Scientology. However, it's difficult to get at the core texts as they are copyrighted and actively protected; to get at the meat of their ideas you have to pay money; and I don't have the time or the inclination to visit one of their churches, as the ideas seem unbelievable to me (in the same way that those of Christianity, Islam, Judaism etc., in fact any organised religion, do). As Hubbard himself stated in a 1952 lecture: he's "trying to tell you a fairytale" (5203C04B, 1952 Phoenix lecture 2101).

I should qualify all this by saying that, while I am not religious, I defend the rights of anyone else to practice any religion they choose. The thing I'm struggling with at the moment is how far the rights of any religion should be supported when they start to infringe on the freedom of others. I think there is a strong case, supportable by evidence from ex-Scientologists, to show that Scientology (in general, and at its heart) goes too far in terms of extremism, exploitation and intolerance. (Having said that, see the comments for a response from a practicing Scientologist who is actually fairly reasonable.)