Slashdot Mirror
Internet Group Declares War on Scientology
Darkman, Walkin Dude writes "An internet group calling itself Anonymous has declared war on the Church of Scientology, in the form of an ominous posting to the YouTube site. 'In the statement, the group explained their goal as safeguarding the right to freedom of speech. "A spokesperson said that the group's goals include bringing an end to the financial exploitation of Church members and protecting the right to free speech, a right which they claim was consistently violated by the Church of Scientology in pursuit of its opponents." The press release also claimed that the Church of Scientology misused copyright and trademark law in order to remove criticism from websites including Digg and YouTube. The statement goes on to assert that the attacks from the group "will continue until the Church of Scientology reacts, at which point they will change strategy".' It should be noted that Slashdot users have had interactions with Scientology in the past as well."
Hopefully the RIAA will be next. Sure they seem to be shooting themselves in the foot a lot lately, but they still need to be wiped out.
Why, yes, I AM a Pagan Libertarian.
Cowards.
I had dealings with them about 10 years ago. I ended up paying GBP30 for a course just to get out of the hard sell and even though I never did the course the often phoned and wrote letters of about 5 years after.
See the Operation Clambake pages for more details to their activities. http://www.xenu.net/
Scientology and all its offshoot cults like The Landmark Forum are brainwashing users of people. Money money money.
There's no point in posting this story on Slashdot; Slashdot just caved last time Scientology told them to censor themselves, and there's no reason to believe that has changed.
And I tell them to shut the fuck up and get the fuck out of my face.
What if in like 50 years there weren't any more SPs? How cool would that be? Kids would be learning about them from textbooks as history.
Goddamned stupid petitioners.
Precisely. This "war" will amount to very little. The CoS is loaded with the cash of the gullible and foolish. Anonymous also fails to realize that most people don't give a crap about stuff on the internet outside of email and maybe some major news sites. It'll be amusing to watch, though.
4chan isn't mentioned in the Wikinews article at all. Wikinews, and every other outlet reporting this story, is a fucking joke.
Anonymous?? Moar liek 7chan...amirite?
It's a leather thing
Is this the same Anonymous that Joe Blow knows about thanks to Fox News? When asked to choose between a church and terrorists who want to blow up your van, which one do you think the public is going to go for?
I read the internet for the articles.
Tom Cruise declares war on the internet.
-
He's gotta do something until the mothership arrives...
The war on Scientology, led by the same people who said "Google Ron Paul"
/b/tards, on the other hand, listen intently and google bomb "Rob Paul" to link to a picture of shitting dick-nipples.
No, this is lead by 4chan.
Some people say "google Ron Paul."
From Wikinews: The "Message to Scientology" video was highlighted as the "YouTube Video of the Week" by The Michigan Daily. Commenting on the video, the piece states "if this video is any indication, it seems like the assailants mean business". Hehe. If that were a credible metric of "business", we'd have an emo President by now.
LRH's scam shows how easy it is to start a new religion that survives and gains passionate adherents after the death of its founders. Most people couldn't do it, but a few individuals have the kind of personality that can pull it off in the right social environment. In fact, we have enough recent historical data on cults that turn into competitive new religions (for example Mormonism and Baha'i, both founded in the 19th Century) that I don't think it's even all that mysterious how older religions like Christianity & Islam could have originated through normal social processes. (We don't have to postulate "supernatural" causes to explain their existence, in other words.)
...a group composed of members of several -chan sites (4chan, 7chan, 711chan), as well as several other related communities like YTMND and Ebaum's.
Really, this is a joke. Channers will raid/invade just about anything, and Scientology is just their latest target. This is the exact same group behind the 'hackers on steroids' thing that Fox News reported on. Any claims they have about righteousness are just a way to justify their 'lulz'.
You do realize that the people who are leading this war are the same people who consider trolling Slashdot a professional sport?
Anonymous never forgives... hackers on steroids will get them.
This is a great Internet event, as it's fun, it allows us to repeat Internet memes, it'll allow Fox News and other American retarded news sources to create more hilarious articles about it, and it's actually a good cause to fight.
I was about to say 13256278887989457651018865901401704640, but it appears this number is private property.
FTM's!! That sounds like something out of The Princess Bride.
Please forget i'm easily distracted and now and that scientology has been around forever and people are just starting to form "groups"
give me a break.
Why single out one specific 'religion'? I saw the Tom Cruise interview video last week - it really didn't seem all that fundamentally different from listening to an evangelical Christian. Different terms were used, but the mindset was mostly the same. Watch Jesus Camp if you haven't already. Not much difference between the main camp director's mindset and Tom Cruise's.
creation science book
No loonies in the Clinton camp?
I'm pretty sure all of the Clinton Campaign Funding is in US dollars, not Canadian ones.
Especially when you consider its offshoot, the Landmark Forum (formerly "EST"). They are scary, for-profit cults that employ techniques like fatigue, hunger, group compulsion, and newspeak. You would be surprised how many people from all walks of life have gotten pulled into them.
I wish Anonymous well, but Scientologists and their cousins in the Landmark Forum are beyond reason. And fighting cults rarely works unless they're small and focused around a single charismatic leader. Both Scientology and Landmark are too big and widespread for that, and fighting them will probably only make them stronger.
Do what you can, with what you have, where you are.
misused copyright law in any way. They are using it in its true prearranged fashion. This is what copyright is for. This is the supreme, ne, the only reason for its existence. This is not an unintended effect. Please, try to see and think beyond the spin.
What?
Anonymous also fails to realize that most people don't give a crap about stuff on the internet outside of email and maybe some major news sites
Double-edged sword. If the mainstream media doesn't pick up on this, less law enforcement attention is paid to his malfeasance. Similarly, more attention into this issue can only be beneficial for his cause as Scientology comes under more and more scrutiny.
It's also worth noting that there's a lot of mainstream hatred of Scientology. Technically, it's bigotry, but Anonymous has way more support than you think he does. Enemy of my enemy and all that...
Linux, you magnificent bastard, I read the fucking manual!
To arms! Man your battlestations! We must fight! We must WIN!
Send luke to the dagobah system to retrieve Master Yoda.
:(){
Which is to be expected. Anyone who actually supports individual freedom is sure to be popular among the unpopular and oppressed minority groups; they have the most interest at stake in protecting basic rights like free speech. Those who only hold and/or express popular opinions don't require such protection.
"The state is that great fiction by which everyone tries to live at the expense of everyone else." - Bastiat
Is it wrong that the story's title alone gave me wood? I mean really now, who doesn't want this 'church' to fall into darkness and die a miserable death? I pray for the souls of the poor people that have been hornswaggled by the 'church'. And not in anyway overly Judeo-Christian, just, you know - 'Dear Space Pope, help these lost morons come to their senses...seriously... Lord Xenu? What kind of evil overlord is that. Morgoth, Palpatine, and Voldemorte: those names have staying power, a little Tabasco in their shorts . Xenu sounds like a new brand of toilet scrubbers. Amen.'
Prediction: Slashdot will be sued by Scientology within 24 hours.
Funny that the Slashdot comment page (at time of writing, at +3) doesn't even mention 4chan. (Reminds me of Jay and Silent Bob. I am the Clit Commander!)
So, for whoever who has been living under a rock for the last N years:
http://www.encyclopediadramatica.com/B/
http://www.encyclopediadramatica.com/Anonymous
we discovered a new way to think.
LRH left this MEST world and went away for a while. Is he back yet?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/L._Ron_Hubbard
Going on means going far
Going far means returning
Ned:"Heya Ed, watcha doin?"
Ed: "See that cave full of bears? I am pokin' em with a stick!"
Ned:"OMG Ed, that's crazy!"
Ed: "No worries! See I build a remote poking robot device that I am controlling via wires attached to this here laptop computer."
Ned:"Uh Ed?"
Ed: "Yeah?"
Ned:"Can't they just follow the wire to where you are hiding?"
Seven Days with Ubuntu Unity
and all-around psychos who couldn't stop ranting about him in some way.
Um, isn't ranting about him what you just did? Oh, I know. You can quit any time. You don't have a problem. I mean, why would it be a problem when you have to rant about him in a thread dedicated to an anonymous internet group's attack on scientology? Seems like the perfect place to slam Ron Paul to me...NOT.
http://xkcd.com/386/
"All Religions are Bad!"
An organization wants to destroy a religion (i.e. preventing them from spreading their "faith") in the name of protecting free speech. Am I the only one seeing a problem with this logic?
I'm a fiscal conservative, it's a pity we don't have a political party anymore
Ron Hubbard - the founder of Scientology - has been quoted as saying that if you want to get rich, you start a religion. ( http://www.faqs.org/faqs/scientology/skeptic/start-a-religion-faq/ ) Well, that's what he did. You have to pay just to learn about it and the deeper you go, the more you spend. It's designed to dupe people into giving the Church of Scientology gobs of money. I truly feel sorry for anyone that's been sucked in by it. It's like believing that Star Wars is real (the movie, not the missile defense system...).
You are using English. Please learn the difference between loose and lose; they're, there, and their; your and you're.
Where, after all, is the media trail of his development? From the newspaper's perspective, Ron Paul is one big discontinuity.
Wikileaks, no DNS
[This comment is no longer available due to a copyright claim by Church of Scientology International.]
Don't lead me into temptation... I can find it myself.
Granted, this e-hissy from Anonymous is unlikely to take down the cult or even deal it serious damage, but it does serve to highlight how the traditional big media outlets have been legally hogtied.
Our usual media sources can't report on allegations of abuse because they've been very effectively muzzled by CSI hyper-litigation. They try to keep this fact close to the vest, but Anonymous' efforts are making it plain for all to see. This is a valuable service.
Also, any organization that exploits copyright law in order to silence critics should get a kick in the shins, even if that's all it amounts to. It's still a potent message: "We don't condone gag orders, and we'll fight back however we can, even if it is a David versus Goliath situation."
Glib as it may sound, raising awareness is key here. And an end unto itself.
Yours,
Cheeseburger Brown
Suppressive and Proud
These stories are free but worth money.
Nihil curo de ista tua stulta superstitione
They asked me to take the "test" and I said "No thank you Meat Puppet! I'm not interested in a cult started by a sci-fi writer..." and kept walking.
Ask not what you can do for your country. Ask what your country did to you
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ron_Paul#Newsletter_controversy
Paul disavowed the writings in a response to the New Republic article, saying that the quotations do not represent his beliefs, and that he has "never uttered such words and denounce[s] such small-minded thoughts." He again noted that he accepts "moral responsibility" for not paying closer attention to writings published under his name.[116] In a subsequent interview with CNN's Wolf Blitzer, he said he did not know who wrote the articles and stated he "[repudiates] everything that is written along those lines." Blitzer told Paul that he was "shocked" by the newsletters, because they did not seem to reflect "the Ron Paul that I've come to know, and the viewers have come to know" over the course of several interviews during the campaign.[117] David Gergen, CNN senior political analyst, commented "I don't think there's an excuse in politics to have something go out under your name and say, 'Oh by the way, I didn't write that'."[117][118]
In the interview with Blitzer, Paul asserted that racism is incompatible with his beliefs and that he sees people as individuals--not as part of collectives. He also dismissed the attack as an attempt to accuse him of racism by proxy, claiming that he has collected more money among African-Americans than any other Republican candidate.[117] Nelson Linder, president of the Austin chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), defended Paul, saying that he has known him for 20 years, saw him as a "free thinker", "very intelligent and very informed", talking about "real issues" that "invite attacks on him", who was "correct in what he's saying", and that knowing his intent, he believes Paul has been misconstrued and taken out of context.[119] Former LA Times editor Andrew Malcolm noted that Paul got second place in the January 19 Nevada Republican caucus despite the recent reports about the newsletters.
-- Give me ambiguity or give me something else!
for the Evangelicals! It's so obvious. They needed to make an extremely offensive and stupid religion to draw headlines away from Evangelical growth and power. What better name to offend science-minded intelligent people than Scientology? The use of most of the word "science" in the name is bound to offend everyone who knows Scientology is far from scientific.
Vital papers will demonstrate their vitality by moving to where you can't find them.
"In the statement, the group explained their goal as safeguarding the right to freedom of speech."
And they plan to accomplish this by suppressing the free speech that the Church of Scientology is entitled to?? How enlightened they are and what an embarrassment to people who REALLY fight for freedom.
Just because you don't agree with something, you don't have a right to suppress it. I hear sound bites all the time of Democrat politicians spouting this , but their actions are consistently in conflict with this message. Both parties are equally guilty of groupthink.
Suppressing Scientology is no different the the Chinese government suppressing and killing Christians. My guess is that this is a dry run and that Christianity is next on the list. Being an independent agnostic, I personally think there is no general difference between Scientology, Christianity, or Islam. I think it amusing how unabashedly anxious they are to suppress and/or conquer each other.
how about changing the sings from "Google Ron Paul" to, I dont know, "Vote Ron Paul".
Can I bum a sig?
"In its place we are putting non-copyrighted text: Links to websites about the church of Scientology, as well as links to how you can contact your congressman about the DMCA. Thanks a lot to Jamie for putting this together."
Sadly this little piece of Slashdot history appears not to be there any more...If to get about a million people to join all at once and then when the muckey mucks are not around you really mess up the place. I could see at a Scientology meeting you have 300 people 2/3 who are plants, when the rest want to do somethign evil like harass someone, you would then have 2/3rds stand up and say, HELL NO WE AINT GONNA BE ASSHOLES! You can join without paying just tell them that the other churches don't require you paty and demand that they let you into their churches because if you are dressed nicely I have yet to see a church kick you out if you go in, sit down and behave civily. Plus regular churches don't charge you for services, yes they pass around the collections plate but you don't have to put anything on it.
Basically, just kill their silly little cult with a nationwide flash mob of epic proportions.
Tsukasa: All I really want, is to be left alone...
The definition of a cult is quite simple. A cult hides it's core beliefs from it's members a religion does not.
---------
This space for rent. Call 1-800-SIGADVT to place your ad.
... lolcats around the world are rising against their Camera Wielding Overlords, demanding higher grade catnip at reasonable prices.
How can anyone take a bunch of young Interweb addicts who spend hours mashing their F5 key seriously? Not that I'm speaking from experience here, I'm just guessing that about that. Honestly.
I, for one, welcome our Anonymous overlords.
The Co$ gives me one more compelling reason to use "$" in a mocking fashion!
I also like to think of $cientology as a good example that illustrates the origins of religions. Whether you're talking about Christianity or Star Trek, it's just another example of a charismatic individual using his fantastic imagination to come up with an utterly baseless and bizarre explanation for the way things are. And then convincing the masses that he somehow knows what he's talking about, and deserves their money and allegiance for sharing the knowledge with them. All it takes is to follow the money to see what the real game is.
I don't care how hard their sell was.
Either you can simply ignore them, or they're actually doing something illegal, and you can stop them.
I don't see why you felt the need to fund them.
Don't thank God, thank a doctor!
Now you know why 4chan is simultaneously humanity's greatest achievement and its most epic failure.
I think, therefore I am an Atheist.
... now what? Is the next obvious step to make a facebook group about this? I think it would be about as effective.
They are not trying to suppress Scientology.
They are trying to keep Scientology from suppressing critics.
BIG difference.
Can't we wage war on bigger, longer-lasting threats? You know, like Christianity. As far as I can see, Scientologists just want to blatantly make money off of stupid celebrities. There's nothing wrong with that. Hell, I've been thinking of starting a cult myself. It'd be great supplemental income. As far as "destroying" free speech goes, I think the government is the one to fight on that front, not the group taking advantage of it.
"He who can destroy a thing, controls a thing." --Paul Atreides, Dune
First, Landmark doesn't sue people for exposing their "beliefs", if you must call them that. The courses act more like a BSD license -- the one thing you're not allowed to do is pretend you came up with it yourself, and start selling a course on the same stuff.
Second, "brainwashing"? Really? The Landmark Forum, in particular, is a weekend seminar. Yes, a seminar -- you go sit in a room with lots of people, and you learn. There's no sleep deprivation, no starvation, no torture, none of the other techniques that you'd need for it to qualify as "brainwashing".
Third, there actually aren't any beliefs. It's a set of tools, take 'em or leave 'em. And by "tools", I don't mean anything weird, like meditation techniques. I mean things like actually gaining an understanding that you don't know everything. (Pie chart. Tiny sliver: what you know that you know. Slightly larger sliver: what you know that you don't know. Rest of the pie (easily more than 75%): what you don't know that you don't know.)
The money part, I do have to disagree -- it's not all about money, or they'd be asking a hell of a lot more than they are. At the same time, they do a pretty hard sell at the end to get you to call everyone you know, and get them to sign up.
Don't thank God, thank a doctor!
On the (perhaps slightly off) topic of Scientology, why the hell does "Heath Ledger" translate to "Tom Cruise" for English->Spanish?
The question of whether a computer can think is no more interesting than the question of whether a submarine can swim.
No. This is clearly talking about the -chan sites and a few other assorted internet misfits. Somehow I don't think it will be very effective though because the Church of Scientology isn't an emo kid on Myspace. They aren't going to post a picture of L. Ron crying because people called him names on the internet or made harassing phone calls.
I read the internet for the articles.
For real. I was just talking about this with a friend the other day. For one example, check out the cover of Time magazine's issue of May 6, 1991.
Can you imagine a major national newsmagazine running this cover today?
Read my blog.
http://img183.imageshack.us/img183/460/1201116421097ig4.jpg
How do you stuff a rattlesnake in an email box?
I'd rather see the youtube videos of their HQs being blown to bits than cannibals eating them. Once I'm dead I don't care what happens to my carcass, but blow up my house and I'll be pissed.
Come on, folks, lets see some property damage! You have to die from something, so killing them isn't an answer. Just blow some shit up! And make sure the camera is turned on.
I haven't seen a good "blowing shit up" video since they blew up that whale carcass a few years back.
-mcgrew
(yes, I'm in a bad mood)
mcgrew's razor: Never attribute to stupidity that which can be explained by greedy self-interest
Libertarians who love being told what to do and how to do it can't get enough of Ron Paul.
The Salvation Army is actually a pretty mainstream protestant denomination with doctrine very similar to the Methodists. It was formed in the late 19th century when military-styled organizations and uniforms were not uncommon. There are also the Boy Scouts and LOTS of marching bands who wear uniforms. They even have salutes, stand at attention, march in step and fly flags. And the Salvation Army feeds people, rehabilitates drug addicts,and helps the battered and homeless. I may not "fall in step" (heh, couldn't resist) with their religious doctrine anymore, but I have a LOT of respect for they work they do.
I came across a set of 5 scientology(I won't give them the dignity of a capitalization) books which somebody left in a laundry room. I flipped the first one open and became horrified at how poorly the books were written. They were so insulting to my intelligence that I became stupid as I read them. I've seen 3 a.m. infomercials with better sales pitches. I ended up giving them to an ex as a joke while wondering why the hell the "secret teachings" were left for dead in a dorm laundry room.
FUCK SCIENTOLOGY.
No one of us is as cruel as all of us. fsck'n eBaum. Hang 'im. Cher D'wealth says to.
Of course they can violate freedom of speech. If you threaten of harrass someone because they criticise you, you have violated their rights.
If you don't say anything, you won't be called on to repeat it. -- Calvin Coolidge
Does anyone have a FAQ for removing the Hubbard rootkit trojan and botnet?
One line blog. I hear that they're called Twitters now.
He's dead, Jim.
mcgrew's razor: Never attribute to stupidity that which can be explained by greedy self-interest
You don't get rich writing science fiction. If you want to get rich, you start a religion. (1948)
THE ONLY WAY YOU CAN CONTROL PEOPLE IS TO LIE TO THEM. (1952)
Thanks to file sharing, I purchase more CDs
Thanks to the RIAA, I buy them used...
This is not to prevent distribution though. It is to protect the integrity of the work.
The scholars who do these translations don't want someone taking their hard work, changing a few words here or there, and putting it out under a new label.
Imagine "The New International CowboyNeal Bible" where Exodus 20 started out 1 And CowboyNeal spoke all these words:
2 "I am the LORD your God CowboyNeal, who brought you out of the pre-computer age, out of the land of slavery.
3 "You shall have no other gods before me. [based on the NIV - I claim fair use]
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
Oh hey, they were also first in line (standing beside the RIAA and MPAA) to extend the length of copyrights too. (Does the name Sonny Bono ring a bell, or tree?) Their court cases against ISPs were used as foundations for the DMCA, and they were the first to use the DMCA as an attack tool to down sites, remove them from search engines and expose the identity of anonymous posters.
Scientology has always been leaders in the abuse of the Internet, laws and the court system.
One line blog. I hear that they're called Twitters now.
Rules 1 and 2
EBAUM'S DID IT
Why hasn't Tom Cruise responded a-la Chris Crocker with a video called "Leave Xenu ALONE!"
Nothing wrong with these guys? You did see Tom Cruise in those videos, right?
One line blog. I hear that they're called Twitters now.
The version of Scientology celebrities receive is way different (and far easier) than the version the "raw meat" (non-celebs) get. And even though the Scn. celebs are the biggest Public Relations tools Scientology has to bring the "raw meat" through the doors and get their butts in the seats for the "free personality tests," they keep the celebs far, far away from them.
Knowledge is power. Knowledge shared is power multiplied.
I don't know that hatred of a pyramid scheme is bigotry...
~S
Why pick on Scientologists, yet allow Mormonism or Wicca? This is either an all or nothing proposition to me. Ban all religions, or allow any religion. In America, I side with "allow any religion", even though I have none myself, because this makes our society great.
side note: I wonder if this could be considered a hate crime?
Yes! Defend our freedom of free-speech by attacking their freedom of enterprise! Let them exploit the stupid/weak/miserable/bored. Just don't give them tax-exempt status.
...if they're not a church then howcum they got tax-exempt status?
Wait, that's a very good question -why DO they have that?
The Bible itself and many of the older translations were written way before copyright was even invented. It is only certain modern translations that are copyrighted. And even then it's not like the people who own those copyrights sue anyone for daring to quote their translation on the internet.
Hey, I don't like him either, but do you actually have a source to back up those allegations you are making or is it just something that you got in a chain letter e-mail?
Do you also believe that Obama is actually a secret Muslim who refuses to participate in the Pledge of Allegiance? If so, then I have a friend over in Nigeria who needs to move some money out of the country... he'll give you 15% for helping him out.
I want peace on earth and goodwill toward man.
We are the United States Government! We don't do that sort of thing.
When I read about the supposed upcoming downfall of beheamoths like the RIAA, MS or Scientology I can't help but feel like those poorly developed boss fights in some games in the 90s where it'd take what felt like hours to take it down. Don't expect any of those to go down any time soon especially when you consider these bosses have regenerative power (i.e. continues and diversified income streams to maintain their initiatives.) The contributions from the numerous Hollywood Scientologists alone would keep them going...
That's just my POV... no more, no less.
no, bigotry is a predudice held against a group of people not based on an adequate cause. The defing factor is that is directed at a group of people equally, based solely on them being part of that group. The Church of Scientology is not a group of people, it is a corporation which has committed countless criminal acts including conducting espionage against the US government and fabricating terrorist threats, and is hatrid against it for it's criminal and unethical actions as legitimate as hatrid against any other corporation.
What if Tetris was invented by Nazis?
Hell, they've even taken on whole COUNTRIES. During the Scooter Libby trial, it came out that Tom Cruise was personally meeting with Dick Chenney, Richard Armitage, etc. to get them to impose sanctions on Germany for daring to fight these Scientology thugs.
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
Has tendency to lock people up, either through social pressure or actual locked doors.
I understand and respect the perspective of people who don't find religion credible, but I find it very difficult to respect people who can't readily identify significant differences between social pressure and locked doors, or the Branch Davidians and the Baptists.
You might choose to believe all of it's coercive, but to miss the distinction between social pressure and force is to miss the distinction between a political party/idealogy and organized crime. And make no mistake, Scientology's machinations are much more like the later than the former.
This view is pithy and cute, and captures some degree of the truth that people are all too willing to apply pejoratives to unpopular things or groups they identify as external/other. But it's also functionally incorrect. The word cult is not merely a pejorative. There are real distinctions that can be made between "cult" and "religion", there are credible social scientists who make these distinctions not out of any desire to defend a particular faith but because the distinctions are useful to anyone genuinely studying the field.
Tweet, tweet.
The RIAA vs. the CoS! Titan vs. titan! Best matchup since Medusa looked at the Kracken!
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
It's not even "Anonymous", they're trying to scare people into thinking that's a group. /b/ who are getting banned left and right.
/b/.
It's idiots in 4chan's
They're trying to blame it on other sites (like they always do, but the source is 4chan's
Ignore the lies, it's 4chan, and a few boards that spun off from 4chan when their entire userbase was banned for breaking the rules (BY DOING SHIT JUST LIKE THIS).
I respond to your sigs
He blows himself up, ascends to heaven, and there are 72 slashdot users having a celestial lan party, playing netcraft and flaming Microsoft.
FairTax baby!
There are still new religions/cults forging ahead, even in the 21st century. How about the deviation from Christianity called "The Purpose Driven Life"? Rick Warren, the lead pastor, has presented his philosophy to companies, professional sports teams, and over 20 million copies of his book have been sold worldwide. There are even reports of it being distributed with aid packages to third-world countries instead of the Bible. Would Christianity be let in the front door of many of these places? Doubtful.
--Chag
peruse, learn, and accept.
Yes. Scientology is a highly lulzy target, and Anonymous will not rest until their pool is closed.
Real Daleks don't climb stairs - they level the building.
This isn't ominous... It's Steven Hawkings taking his revenge. Just don't ask what the cult did to piss him off.
Where's the Kaboom?
There's supposed to be an Earth-shattering Kaboom.
I would love to see Scientology's private detectives' report on the predilections of Anonymous. In fact I'd pay to see it. Given how they normally seize on any bit of dirt for character assassination and all, what the hell are they going to make of the people who brought the world Pedobear?
Real Daleks don't climb stairs - they level the building.
As a matter of fact, yes.
"This calls for a very special blend of psychology and extreme violence" - Vyvyan "The Young Ones"
I feel I should point out that ED is largely NSFW. I think the Anonymous article is OK, but fair warning.
It's better to vote for what you want and not get it than to vote for what you don't want and get it.
- E. Debs
Yes, absolutely Scientology leaders have been convicted in court. L. Ron's wife, among many other cult leaders, spent years in prison. Here's some more info:
Operation Snow White
Operation Freakout
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
Scientology and all its offshoot cults like The Landmark Forum are brainwashing users of people. Money money money.
How exactly does this warrant an Insightful moderation? What keen insights are we supposed to obtain from reading this sentence? How has this stimulated our thinking in new ways? The fact that this is given an Insightful mod and is currently at a score of 4 shows how horribly broken the moderation system here on slashdot really is.
I could see giving this an Informative moderation since there is a link to criticism of Landmark Education, although the sentence doesn't seem to really emphasize that this was the purpose. The "money money money" is a personal judgment made by the AC; personal judgments do not warrant Insightful moderations. If someone tells me "I like peanut butter", that's informative (assuming I gave a shit) but certainly not insightful.
But since the AC raised the topic of "money money money", let's think about this. Landmark Education has a program called the Self-Expression and Leadership Program (SELP). It costs $200 and runs for three months. They also feature the Introduction Leaders Program (ILP), a seven-month program that goes for $400. These cost about as much as a membership to a high-end gym. You would think that if Landmark was truly brainwashing people who take their courses, they ought to be able to get away with charging a hell of a lot more than that.
The problem with all the criticisms and exposes of Landmark that I see is that no honest attempt has been made to evaluate their programs in an unbiased format. The Skepdic's Dictionary entry on Landmark is pretty typical. The last paragraph lists the prices for the expensive courses but oddly seems to have forgotten to mention SELP and ILP. The write-up starts with "I have never attended a session of either est or Landmark but..." and then the author proceeds to write authoritatively about a topic he openly confesses he knows nothing about. It's not exactly hard to find a way to attend a Landmark session; these things are all over the friggin' place. The author cites a "Christian cult-watch group" as evidence that Landmark is bad, but neglects to mention a Harvard Business School study that had positive things to say about Landmark's management consulting arm.
If you don't like The Landmark Forum, that's fine. But a statement claiming that Landmark brainwashes people (BTW, the wikipedia entry on Brainwashing indicates that term and the theory are not supported by The American Psychological Association) to make money is just plain not deserving of an Insightful moderation.
GMD
watch this
I used to have a high level of respect for John Travolta and Tom Cruise. Then they joined the Cult of Scientology and became wack jobs. Worse is that they use their "Star Power" to sway more members to the cult movement.
Scientology could have a point. I mean it has just as much evidence and scientific backing as other wildly absurd, outdated theories. Like say, I don't know... Darwinism?
Darwin vs. Hubbard, hmmmmm.
At least Hubbard wrote science fiction. Oh wait, I forgot Darwin wrote The Origin of Man.
The R2-45 audit is an enormously effective procedure for externalizing someone's thetan.
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
2) be broken down to the point of exhaustion. Only take bathroom breaks when allowed. Be berated.
3) once you're remade in their image call all your friends and family up inviting them to your "graduation" (read: "sales pitch")
4) be told that this expensive weekend was only the beginning of your Enlightenment.
5) be sold on countless other expensive "courses" led by salespeople and marketers, not educators.
6) keep going or you're "not getting it" and "living stories"
1) Go to gym and hire personal trainer for a month
2) Be broken down to the point of exhaustion. Only eat foods that your trainer allows. Be berated by trainer when you don't give the workout your all.
3) Once you see some results and start to look a little like your fit trainer, show off your new body to friends and family and tell them about how much you've gotten out of your trainer.
4) Be told that this month was only the beginning of your odyssey to physical fitness.
5) Be sold on countless other fitness accessories by trainer (e.g., elastic bands, heart-rate monitor), who does not possess a Ph.D. in physiology.
6) Keep going to gym or you slip back to your old self.
GMD
P.S.: By the way, the "only take bathroom breaks when allowed" is not true; it's an urban myth. If you don't like Landmark, that's fine. But don't be spreading misinformation. You're depriving people of the opportunity to make a choice for themselves.
watch this
Why not just apply copyright as originally intended and only allow living, breathing individuals to hold copyrights? And start protecting the public interest again by putting works into the public domain where they belong when the author dies? Where do the immortal legal fictions of corporations get off thinking they are entitled to the rights of individuals (and more besides)?
This would take care of Scientology AND the RIAA and MPAA.
The City ought to revive the idea of charging fast-food restaurants for their garbage strewn all over the streets and apply it to those passing out the pink-paper "Are you bi-curious..." umm, I mean "Are you curious about yourself" tri-fold flyers. On any given day in Powell area, one can find locals and tourists just dropping the damned things once they realized what they've been proffered.
It's one thing to find chewing gum wrappers and fast-food containers and such on the streets, but ideas peddled and then rejected are a CLEAR sign that some one or some organization is going beyond free-speech guarantees. With TV, one can change channels or turn off the TV, and there is no immediate or sighted pollution. Even the ad sponsors can't (without digital connections) determine who is switching off their ads or just ignoring them and instead multi-tasking during commercial breaks or going to the bathroom between programs.
What that coarse-throat preacher and his megaphone gets up on his Powell Street pulpit condemning gays, heretics, non-Christians and so on, he's blabbing and making noise (apparently, he's within ordinance as SFPD never takes him down, since his Mr. Megaphone is not amplified via a generator or exceeding some decibel level, I guess...), he is making noise pollution, but at least one can walk away.
Flyers dropped or abandoned mean the message contained is simply not wanted. The content doesn't matter, unless it's pron, I guess, in which case we generally DON'T want the stuff face-up for kids and sensitive/easily-offended types to see. I guess I'm just sick and tired of seeing religious/belief paraphernalia on the street because its CONTENT is utterly rejected by 90% of those into whose hands it was stuck or taken out of sympathy for the pushers of it.
Previously: "Linux... Toward the Sunrise..." Now: "Linux... Toward the-- No, now, part of Every Sunrise"
From the video:
We are cognizant of the many who may decry our methods as parallel to the Church of Scientology. Those who espouse the obvious truth that your organization will use the actions of Anonymous as an example of the persecution of which you have for so long forewarned your followers. This is acceptable to Anonymous. In fact,it is encouraged.
Damn. Kind of wraps the Borg's "Resistance is Futile" and Bush Jr.'s "Bring It On" in an ominious, yet tidy little anti-scientology message doesn't it?
I've had a couple of friends who "converted" to scientology and they completely shun anyone and everyone they were ever associated with including their parents now. It's very sad to see how isolated and fearful they've become.
I for one hope that this isn't a hoax. I'd never participate in something like this, but when I think of what my friends used to be and what they are now - and how Scientology seems to be this insidious organization that has used and abused so many - I can't help but hope that Anonymous, if serious, will succeed.
Agreed, but have you have noticed that Mormons tend to be really nice people? I'm serious. It's like Romney -- no one can really find fault with him except to say his hair is too perfect, that he's just a successful businessman, or that he's Mormon.
:) But see, that's the thing. As a Mormon, I know lots of good Mormons who really, really shouldn't be president.
I'm a Mormon, and while I appreciate the kind generalization, I definitely find him lacking on a number of fronts, including his ability to say anything inspiring during faith-related discussion or respond coherently to attacks on that front. There's also the fact that his about-face on several issues seem so conveniently timed it seems likely he's being phony... plus there's his endorsement of (and being endorsed in return by) Ann Coulter, plus the "double guantanamo" statement he made that, and in general a willingness to engage in a kind of republican political rhetoric that was never really high to begin with but is really, really starting to show its wear. Then there's the point that we've already elected a single-term governor from a family dynasty with political connections who has experience in business and managing a sports franchise, and that didn't really didn't work out so well, now, did it? All in all, I'd have to be pretty desperate to vote for him.
He does seem like he's probably a good Mormon, though.
Mormons, at least in my experience, tend to be shiny happy people that don't really bother anyone. Even the ex-Mormons I've met seem to have few bad things to say and if they do, you can't help but notice there's a certain lingering nostalgia in their eyes. That's not to say their beliefs aren't loony, but if members of cults were as benign as the typical Mormon, I wonder if anyone would notice, or care.
There's two things that I think make Mormons like this. One is that the religion itself is seen very much by its members as a serious spiritual practice as much as anything else -- its cosmological aspects are tied up in that, and it has sociopolitical implications, but it's not a cosmology or sociopolitical blueprint first (there are times in its history when that has been less true, especially the first 60 years, but that's another point). My experience suggests to me that people who have a faith that they take seriously as a spiritual practice tend to also be as you describe -- nice, happy shiny people. This isn't to say I don't think Mormonism has anything particular to distinguish itself, but I think this is the most important element. Having a serious spiritual practice of some kind is grounding and can inspire a real tranquility knowing you have a strong idea about your place in the world and working to play that part as well as you can. Combine it with basic rules of common decency and you get good people.
The other thing -- Mormons have long been different enough (and indeed, for some portion of their history, genuinely persecuted and hated) that they really, really want to be accepted and legitimized by mainstream society. There's also a religious desire to be a "light of the world", "city on a hill" (Matthew 5:14-16) in their communities. It adds up to a desire to excel and succeed that's probably a tad beyond the protestant work ethic, and I think when that combines with the basic decency and spiritual grounding, it does produce people that are respected in their communities.
This is, however, a generalization, and as an insider, I see this community of mine as far from perfect. In particular, I've seen a lot of that desire to be legitimized and excel turn to elitism, materialism, and a misplaced sense of destiny that can border on a naive entitlement (interesting considering there are specific and serious warnings about this hazard in Mormon canon). And the collapsed quasi-Mormon cosmology that passes for political philosophy in staunch Republican Utah can be really, seriously crazy. I say all this partly to acknowledge it's not all shiny happy people
Tweet, tweet.
Warren's philosophy seems to buck the Buddhism trend in the West.
Slashdot was my last refuge from The Game! Now I'm gonna lose all the damn time because of you jokers!! Thanks.
I wouldn't underestimate Anonymous. Not that I have any idea what they could really do against scientology--like you said, it isn't some emo kid on MySpace.
However, while scientolgy has been somewhat effective against mainstream antagonists in the media, (I'm including Slashdot here) through legal threats and the like, they don't know what they're up against here.
The money-making portion of every religion seems almost the same.. except for the distribution methods each uses. It seems a bit like selling drugs.. Scientology brings a stash, shows you the goodies and asks for a ridiculous sum of money to get your hands on it.. Christianity on the other hand will distribute free books, dvd's etc. a.k.a 'A free hit' initially then surreptitiously slip in the message .. 'You like what you had, did you? well here's how you can get more.. Jesus camps, creation museums, church donations..'
Tell that to the people building the Jedi Church.
And a Happy Dead Hubbard Day to you too!
One line blog. I hear that they're called Twitters now.
I have but one thing to say about Scientology
.Off the Time Track,. lecture of June 1952, excerpted in JOURNAL OF SCIENTOLOGY, issue 18-G, reprinted in TECHNICAL VOLUMES OF DIANETICS & SCIENTOLOGY, vol. 1, p. 418.
"The only way you can control people is to lie to them."
-L. Ron Hubbard,
"Teach a man to build a fire, and he's warm for a day. Set a man on fire and he's warm for the rest of his life."
That these threads would make a brilliant XKCD?
Seven Days with Ubuntu Unity
That's a check.
Be relentless!
http://www.mediafire.com/?fzdznvbnlwu
Read and laugh away. You can't seriously get any bat-shit loonier than this, folks, unless you're a member of the Phelps clan.
Still waiting on Serviscope_minor to wake up to fucking reality and realize that Jessica Price isn't going to fuck him.
You have a point that a lot of what makes the rounds on the internet doesn't have a large effect on the "real world" at large. But I think it's pertinent to point out something that gives anonymous a distinct advantage compared to the more conventional opponents of Scientology: Anonymous is not a real organization by any means. As a matter of fact, Anonymous is a joke. It comes from some of the *Chan boards requirements of forced anonymity. It doesn't have an infrastructure, or leaders, or heirarchy or any kind of identity that can actually be attacked. It isn't tied to any particular website that can be taken down, and the effort to seek out individuals will amount to pretty much nothing in terms of hurting the group as a whole. And aside from that, we must never forget that Anonymous really doesn't play by the rules. After all we're talking about a website that responds to threats of school shootings with "Do it, Faggot." Does anybody expect DMCA notices to be frightening to these people?
My Greatest Heist - Muisc partly inspired by the unbeatable Qwantz
You don't have to respect the CoS - or any other religion. But going out of your way to attack it is just wrong.
I meant Nethack... In Family Guy they are playing WOW and I guess the "-craft" superimposed itself on my thoughts. Funny stuff though.
FairTax baby!
But The First Amendment does not define freedom of speech. It merely codifies the entitlement of the government to regulate speech.
Freedom of speech is more fundamental than that. It was one of the basic principles that resulted in that particular piece of law making it into the constitution, and Article 19 of the UN declaration of human rights.
yes, a large group of organized intellectually and emotionally subpar humans can outcompete, hunt down and destroy clear thinking mentally strong independent people
this is the history of all religion
dismissing something intellectually does not make it vanish in real life
it is a potent threat to your freedom. all organized religion is
the group is stronger than the individual. no matter how strong the individual and his ideas, no matter how feeble and dysfunctional and idiotic the ideas and the members of the group
learn and understand this unfortunate aspect of reality
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
The parent is an obvious troll, but since the moderators are apparently taking a vacation...
Public schools are clearly a state issue, not a matter for the federal government. Personally, I'm against compulsory attendance, much less compulsory participation in activities with religious overtones such as you describe, but this is not something a U.S. President has any actual authority over. Talk to your state government if you're so upset.
You are drastically over-simplifying the issue. There are two issues here: (a) there are at least two people involved in an abortion, the mother and the child, and there remains significant debate over whether the mother's right to control her body should trump the child's right to live. I'm not going to state my position one way or the other, but Ron Paul is hardly the only pro-life/anti-abortion candidate.
To the best of my knowledge Ron Paul does not support a ban on stem-cell research, only on government funding of such research, which he (correctly) points out is not something the federal government is permitted to do under the Constitution. This applies to many research areas, not just stem cells, but since that's a hot topic it's all you hear about.
Here you're grasping at straws. Point out a real-world case of provider-specific throttling sufficient to justify effectively nationalizing the Internet infrastructure and someone might just care, although it probably won't be me.
"The state is that great fiction by which everyone tries to live at the expense of everyone else." - Bastiat
To them, perhaps.
But I act according to me, not according to them.
Moral differences can and should lead to conflicts - you should fight for your morals, not others'.
Yeah, Ron Paul pretended he never wrote these articles and has no idea who wrote them. Even though he paid for the publication, and the articles were written in his own name, and specifically mentioned aspects of Ron's life, such as his wife, as though he were Ron Paul.
You have not contradicted my assertion that Ron lied about not writing racist trash.
I kiiinda like Obama and realize the "he's a muslim" chain emails are very dishonest, but I don't really think there's anything wrong with being a Muslim so long as you don't think Jihad=kill those you disagree with. I do not appreciate my truthful comments being lumped in with that sort of obvious smear, and you kinda owe me an apology for suggesting my claims are on that level.
But let's permit Ron Paul to explain his views on Obama, who we all can see is clearly a BLACK PERSON.
"[O]ur country is being destroyed by a group of actual and potential terrorists--and they can be identified by the color of their skin."
"I think we can safely assume that 95% of the black males in that city [Washington, D.C.] are semi-criminal or entirely criminal."
"We are constantly told that it is evil to be afraid of black men, but it is hardly irrational."
Chief, I understand your skepticism. After all, I accused a man of accepting donations from neo-nazis. That's so horrible it's tough to believe. Anyone who would accept support from nazis is totally unfit for anything good. I can't believe I almost forgot a link, since apparently this is first you've heard of it: http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2007/12/19/paul-to-keep-donation-from-white-supremacist/
And I also accuse Ron of writing racist hate-speech, and lying about it. That's pretty damn extreme, as far as accusations go. Anyone who wrote the things I refer to is a monster, and any of Ron's supporters who would actually attempt to hide the truth, as this fucker does: http://revolusion2008.blogspot.com/2008/01/conscience-of-ron-paul-supporter.html, is also a monster. Worse than most Scientologists, possibly. And anyone who knows about Lisa McPhereson knows that Scientologists are monsters too.
I'm a bit surprised that a slashdot reader is unaware of these well-worn, practically old facts. I don't watch TV news often or listen to talk radio, so maybe this stuff isn't as well known out there as it should be. I feel as though a demand to prove what is as obvious about Ron is akin to demanding proof of the moon landing or 9/11 being caused by terrorists. I don't think every assertion that slams a monster like Ron Paul must have citations. I'm just having a conversation, not building an indictment.
http://pajamasmedia.com/2008/01/ron_paul.php this is one expose that was pretty well written. The author was actually a fairly outspoken Ron Paul supporter. Gave him money, helped organize efforts, etc. But unlike some, this supporter stopped supporting Ron Paul when it became obvious Ron Paul is a monster. This is not someone who is biased against Ron Paul, this is someone who was biased in FAVOR of Ron Paul's presidential promises.
Some actually say Ron didn't write that stuff. But Ron's bank account paid for the publishing, and Ron signed the checks. Could a normal sane person pay hundreds of thousands of dollars to print racist stuff signed in the sane person's name? Also, why don't you actually read the newsletter: http://www.littlegreenfootballs.com/weblog/pdf/RonPaul-december1990.pdf
The author of the hate literature seems to believe he is married to Ron Paul's wife and grandparent to Ron Paul's grandkids and represents Texas's 14th congressional district (Paul's district). That's not hard to explain, because Ron Paul is the author of this newsletter and all the others that say:
"The riots, burning, looting, and murders are only a continuation of 30 years of racial politics."
"The criminals who terrorize our cities--in riots and on every non-riot day--are not exclusively young black males, but they largely are. As children, they are trained
This is actually true. Dr. Paul's stance on this is that he doesn't care who sends him money. He isn't going to change his viewpoint to theirs.
To go even further, he says that it works out for the better since now the money will be used to promote Dr. Paul's message of peace and freedom instead of Don Black's message of hate.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dcLSLGXypMY
donation record on Open Secrets
Anonymous also fails to realize that most people don't give a crap about stuff on the internet outside of email and maybe some major news sites. It'll be amusing to watch, though.
These are /b/tards - they don't care about changing things, they're doing it for lulz and carnage.
"We returned the General to El Salvador, or maybe Guatemala, it's difficult to tell from 10,000 feet"
The war on drugs is very destructive and probably isn't doing an aggregate good even if it is getting some drugs off the streets, which itself is debatable. I want to figure out how to keep fighting meth, heroin, all that crap, while not destroying the lives of people smoking pot. Frankly, I think we should just focus on prosecuting dealers of the hard substances, but we should be extremely severe to them. We should not even charge the users of drugs unless we need leverage to build cases against dealers. Using drugs really isn't a crime against society the way selling harder drugs is. Anyway, my point is that I probably don't have a problem with your view.
But if Hitler agreed with legalizing pot, would you be ok with Hitler as president (and that is not a Godwin since Ron Paul loves Hitler)?
You probably want black people to be allowed to smoke weed too. And note that many Neo-nazis think drugs are good because they are so much more harmful to minority communities. We don't know what's going on in ron paul's head besides aushwitz fantasies.
HAHA... and then I remember a few years back when the Salvation Army was staying at the same hotel which DragonCon was being held at in Atlanta.
Any group which can pretty much peacefully co-exist with the geekdom and counter-culture that is a huge mega convention is alright in my book.
(And I've heard numerous stories post-con of the Salvo people showing up in the hotel bars after-hours.... or even a few at room-parties)
No, it's not bigotry. It has a lot of basis. The CoS is the only religion that was built from the ground up to be a money making business. I would reference some of this but it's really hard to find anything to reference since the CoS legally suppresses any writing that is not approved and written by them, so you end up with books about Hubbard wrestling broncos to the ground at age four and taming wild animals with his eyes at age seven. I worked on a show with someone who did a lot of research on the subject so that is my only reference, and I won't even give his name for fear that the CoS would come down on him. There is some stuff on Wikipedia. The CoS harasses people that give them their address, comes to their home, calls them repeatedly, maxes out people's credit cards for their "seminars", and uses scientific psychological mind control techniques to make people think that they are messed up and Scientology can help them. At the same time they make people feel alienated from the rest of society so they can't leave the church. They even go so far as to physically restrain people from leaving. (if you can find it, look up any stories about Sea Org) They are a fucking cult that steals money from the weak minded to support the lavish lifestyle that the higher in command live. It's not bigotry to hate an organization that preys on the poor and unhappy.
Tolerance does not tolerate intolerance, or hypocrisy.
No free press, no free speech, no street trash. However, discarded tracts seem like a small price to pay.
damaged by dogma
This is the greatest slashdot comment ever. As one law student sitting in class talking to another, allow me to say, "Good job."
IAALS.
My nitpickey post was not so much intended to state my political agenda, nor to discredit Ron Paul. I was simply attempting, perhaps unsuccessfully, to rebut the parent commenter's statement that Ron Paul is a champion of individual rights. He is a moral conservative on many issues and if he had his way he would dictate the options Americans may choose (freely) between.
Unless they put a smiley face at the end... regardless how crazy things are they are indistinguishable from real beliefs.
I have actually overheard Scientologists talking about some specific thetans bothering them. I think they are on the level... which means I suppose that they are off their rockers.
It is no longer uncommon to be uncommon.
but ideas peddled and then rejected are a CLEAR sign that some one or some organization is going beyond free-speech guarantees.
No such thing. Free speech is free speech. Saying that going 'beyond' is placing a limit on it somewhere. Once a limit is in place, it's trivial to adjust it. I'd rather have someone yelling at me with a microphone and be annoyed then someone whispering quietly to me and remaining ignorant.
-- MrMud
I was merely trying to say that both sides have plenty of support at this time. If you want my personal opinion, I would say that life and humanity begin at conception, and that abortion is murder, but that the only ones with the right to avenge a murder is the murdered person and/or its appointed representative or guardian, in this case the mother. Since abortion is performed at the request of the one who would otherwise be the child's representative I consider abortion to be legally similar to suicide (particularly assisted suicide) and devoid of any justified coercive response from outsiders.
Roe vs. Wade cast abortion as a matter of privacy, not a question of whether the unborn fetus has the same rights as a child, which to me makes no sense at all. I don't uphold any right to privacy, just the right not to tell people things if you don't wish to, which completely undermines the foundation the decision was built upon.
"The state is that great fiction by which everyone tries to live at the expense of everyone else." - Bastiat
I guess what I'm getting at is that peddlers of pamphlets and flyers (ESPECIALLY of dogma, religion, etc.) should be required to have a "permit to distribute" or a "peddler's permit". Most cities require them, and many WILL enforce. But, SF sometimes is too damned liberal. I see the SAME people peddling these things, and I politely wave "no" to them, but I am sick of seeing their refuse lying on the ground.
The City should utilize some of those Powell-beat cops to tag these guy and fine them on the spot. And, any stuff of theirs collected should be sent to the Mayor's office until they become so sick of it they begin to enforce the law. I suppose that means the Downtown and Tendergroin street cleaning teams will have less to clean up, but if SF makes a big ol deal about people using street refuse bins to toss home-originated garbage, then the City can also crack down on these recruiters and anyone else peddling garbage-generating papers. It's not like they're offering "Street Sheet" in exchange for a buck (a program for homeless). These are religious types looking to recruit, convert or otherwise dupe people with movie-ticket-like cards. These, too, are another affront I see, littering the streets.
I do find fault with the litterbugs, but often they accept this paraphernalia out of politeness and then dump it in indignation that some Hubbard or Cruise or other outfit is handing these things out on a daily, factory-like basis. These are not just tourists, but locals.
SF had some plan (which seems to have died quietly) to go after DJs and promotional companies and clubs and bars because they would attach to cars all manner of and multiples of flyers, cards, strips and such and the vehicle owners either on the first or on subsequent visits to the area (or, they live there and were presumed to be a club-goer) get sick of it and just DUMP it to the ground.
To me, affixing ANY paper other than citations or kind "please don't block my driveway or you'll be towed next time" signs is a form of littering. SF WAS going to crack down, but there was a HUGE uproar by local businesses and things seemed to quiet down. Flyers still go onto cars, but maybe now SF just resorts to extra cleanup via use of the jobless in work programs.
Hell, it's not as if cracking down on Scientology or the like is the same as blaspheming the Pope. (The HS (Holy See) has at his command a private police force and I wouldn't be surprised if a few assassins or Popejas (ninjas....) work there too. Anyone know if there are "enforcers" for Scientology/et al?)
Previously: "Linux... Toward the Sunrise..." Now: "Linux... Toward the-- No, now, part of Every Sunrise"
Way back what seems like many years ago now I contacted the webmaster and designer of Urban 75 to inform him that the Scientologists had ripped off his design. I actually first thought that he must be working for them but had to ask him just in case.
Check out these stories from that debacle...
http://www.urban75.com/rip_off.html
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2001/01/22/scientologist_web_site_rips_off/
I hope that this case can be used to one day prove the ridiculous double standard the cult seems to promote.
First scary Tom Cruise revealing how damaged he has become from his involvement in the cult of Scientology.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2l6a8rvn1Ig&feature=related
Then funny Jerry O'Connell spoofing Tom:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_6s9OzSSeeo
Oh, yeah then there is Darth Vader, Sithentologist. Ultra funny.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GanPoPcyjLI
This was the last time Tom is on Oprah. Really funny. Gut splitting really.
http://www.lulu.tv/?p=52
Finally there is the making of war by the spooky Anonymous who has declared war against the cult of
Scientology. A video manifesto of sorts. Oh, this was already linked. Well, it's here just for completeness.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JCbKv9yiLiQ
... but have you have noticed that Mormons tend to be really nice people? ... unless you try to leave, then they treat you like you are the greatest evil on earth. Another hallmark of the *commonly* defined "cult".actually i think the response to virginia tech was "Harris and klebold are faggots who just got their record broken"
that was in fact how i learned there had been a shooting.
Hail Xenu!
Please don't sue.
It is no longer uncommon to be uncommon.
Within the Church of Scientology, you are taught that Scientology is the one and only solution to all mankind's problems, and during this narrow window of opportunity in mankind's history it is possible to "clear the planet" (ie give everybody auditing) and save humanity from itself. Most other goals pale in comparison and anything that detracts from Scientology, or its expansion is in essence a mortal sin against humanity. This belief is strong enough to get people sign up the Sea Organization (LRH's private navy) on a billion year contract (ie you are in for the long haul... and not just this lifetime)
Anyone who attacks the church is either a suppressive person (2.5% of the population who are evil - think Hitler), PTS due to a connection to an SP (Potential Trouble Source - 20% of the population), or has committed various other overts and withholds (ie sins and secrets) and it trying to justify their own actions by making the Scientology seem less (because if you admitted to yourself that Scientology was the "one and only solution" then your otherwise small crime would have to weigh fairly heavily on your conscience). Anyone who commits various sins and suppressive acts, will be subconsciously aware of this, and slowly do themselves in (ie get sick, have an accident) to prevent themselves from committing more crimes.
It is also taught that if someone encounters the OT3 materials before being ready for them, then as part of the psychological conditioning to create "prison-planet" earth, the person may get sick and die and this is the reason it is considered "confidential" and heavily protected, and only available to members of the church past a certain level. In the south park episode "trapped in the closet", they did a cartoon version of the OT3 materials labeled "This Is what Scientologists Actually Believe", if Matt and Trey has been members of the church, they would have been ex-communicated very quickly. The church would have almost definitely told Issac Hayes to "dissconnect" from them or otherwise become ineligible for any future Scientology services or auditing.
This "truth" or "reality tunnel" is slowly conditioned into you until you internalise it. There is a huge taboo against reading or discussing anything potentially negative or "entheta" against Scientology or the church, often the taboo will extend down to the point that you feel it is wrong to "think" about potentially negative things regarding Scientology. To do so would potentially detract from Scientology and is thus a mortal sin against humanity, or you might wind up making yourself sick. I know this, because I was brought up within the church, and through the process of leaving the church and the Scientology "reality tunnel", it took me around two years to fully confront this internal taboo to the point I could openly think and speak on the subject.
Part of the process for getting people into this state of mind, is that during Scientology auditing, if you have any undisclosed overts or withholds, or you have your attention stuck on something, the e-meter will pick up on this (that you have your attention stuck on something after you where asked a question - its the same principal behind the polygraph), Thus the auditor will be trained to uncover these issues, by continually asking questions on the subject, with the help of the e-meter, which may include turning part of the auditing session into a confessional. Auditing is essentially about being completely open and honest with yourself and your mind, and fully confronting (with the help of the auditor) any issues that where previously painful or unconscious about (this is actually the good bit about Scientology). Having out-ethics or keeping secrets is considered to be a barrier to your own spiritual growth.
SouthPark spoofs on Jews, Catholics, LDS, Islam, atheists, Scientologists, and everybody else. Guess which one group gets all pissy about it?
What other religion, or even cult, has led a massive, organized, campaign against a website that is critical to them?
Not only does Scientology try to sell their teachings, Scientoloy gets all pissy about outside who reveal their teachings.
CoS teachings may not be any crazier than the teachings of any other religion, but CoS is sure touchy about discussion of their beliefs.
cult (n): A small, unpopular religion.
religion (n): a large, popular cult.
Not true. A cult has many other characteristics.
Here is a checklist:
http://www.csj.org/infoserv_cult101/checklis.htm
A few examples of characteristics associated with cultic groups:
* Subservience to the leader or group requires members to cut ties with family and friends, and radically alter the personal goals and activities they had before joining the group.
* The group is preoccupied with bringing in new members.
* Members are expected to devote inordinate amounts of time to the group and group-related activities.
* Members are encouraged or required to live and/or socialize only with other group members.
* The most loyal members (the "true believers") feel there can be no life outside the context of the group. They believe there is no other way to be, and often fear reprisals to themselves or others if they leave (or even consider leaving) the group.
Can you honestly tell me that every large, established, religion require all that?
Smilentology is funny.
http://www.funnyordie.com/videos/041c85aa17
1. The e-meter thing on eBay (which I'm assuming was on the US server through the .com): why not list them on the .co.uk servers in a location within the UK? That would get around the DMCA (as that does NOT APPLY HERE!)
2. I agree with a post I saw as I was skimming. The CoS is EITHER a CHURCH, or it is a BUSINESS. If it is a church, then the content of its writings should be held in the PUBLIC DOMAIN as those of other recognised religions such as Catholicism, Christianity, Islam, etc., and therefore is NOT protected by copright, copyright extensions or the DMCA as other literature such as the works of Rowling. If it is a business, then its writings are protected by copyright and it may openly sell them for cashprofit and charge whatever exhorbitant fees it chooses for membership. IT MAY NOT, however, PRETEND TO BE A CHURCH. ALSO, it loses NPO status and becomes liable for corporate level taxation with due taxes backdated to the commencement of business operations (ie whenever Hubbard had the bright idea and set the wheels in motion).
Operation Guillotine is in effect.
It would have been more effective had the voice been GladOS.
this has been going on for some weeks now if i'm not mistaken. the irony is 4chan kinda knows they can get really fucked over this - pretty much no matter how much damage they do to the scientologists, their website has a reputation for being a haven for kiddy porn fanatics (even though there are rules against it). 4chan could get taken down if they're not careful, they even pretty much suspected that scientologists were already on there pasting CP to get them busted
"Especially when you consider its offshoot, the Landmark Forum"
:-)
I know this is slashdot, but I have to counter this misinformation
Landmark Education is completely distinct from $ci£ntology (yes, CoS is not just American unfortunately).
Landmark is an offshot of EST, which was created by Werner Erhard http://www.wernererhard.com/ - some aspects of EST were weird, but then that was back in the early 70's when everything was weird! LF is just a bunch of people in a room talking. It takes the form of a 3 or 4-day intensive "bootcamp" type experience so can be tiring and very direct - but then direct, no-nonsense communication is part of the training. The history and detail of Landmark Education are freely available - e.g. http://www.landmarkeducation.com/display_content.jsp?top=26&mid=654&bottom=665 - and no-one from Landmark will harass me for making this post. Neither of those can be said of COS.
Yes I've done the Landmark Forum, and trained to be a coach. It's a very cathartic experience and, for the first few months at least, you come out very evangelical (which is why some people think it's "weird") but after a while you calm down and realise it's just training in communication and how to deal with the "Slings and Arrows" of life. I'd recommend it for anyone who wonders why the same old problems keep cropping up in their life.
On the other hand, the key marker of CoS is that it's *anti* communication! Everything is secret, and you get severely harassed for talking about it. *That's* the key difference and description of a (paranoid) cult. Also the higher levels of CoS belief are *out* of this world rather than in it. E.g. the Thetan machine (or whatever it's caused) is just a glorified stress detector (based on skin resistance etc.) but you try saying that around a CoS high-priest!
And so on and so on. CoS is a self-exploitation evil that needs to be blown wide open.
Interesting post--I don't know why it only has +3. Ah well.
Free speech is free speech when it is a spoken 'opinion', however, free speech ain't free with it is the false statement of facts used to obtain money. That is generally considered as fraud and has some rather substantial costs associated with it, so not always free ;).
Chaos - everything, everywhere, everywhen
I wasn't the one who brought him up, assnugget. I don't go spamming anti-Paul crap on every message board I see, nor do I incessantly rant about how awful he is. While there are anti-Paulists like that, the Paulistinian fanatics far outnumber them.
A forum I am a member of organised a plane to fly past the premiere of Mission Impossible 3 towing a sign saying "Hail Xenu". The plane never came... "Due to bad conditions" and it has long been believed that the Church had pressured the company into not participating. Scary.
Religions in general are causing problems in this world. Most new movements are a concern to me. Scientology and Mormons seem to have constantly shifting and contradictory views (i.e. anti-black one year to accepting blacks the next year), which is crooked. From what I know about Bahai philosophy, Bahais seem to be the only new movement that has integrity and their people all seem rational and trying to do some genuine good.
The campaign isn't restricted to the Internet. Many methods can be used to disrupt the Church.
"hey can make you sign a contract that limits or restricts what someone can say, but the person has to agree and sign. And the contract can only have civil penalties (being fired, fines, etc.) and not criminal ones. And an easy way to avoid this is to not sign the contract. But people really seem to think that they are entitled to have their cake and eat it, too."
When people say that Scientology suppresses free speech, they're not talking about the current members. They're talking about the people who get harassed, subjected to DMCA takedown notices, subjected to barratry, and even killed in order to suppress them or what they say. The 'Church' of Scientology's actions present a chilling effect and have a de facto effect of suppressing free speech.
How does a group call itself "Anonymous" ?
And it's no different from any religion of this culture. There is one way to salvation. Belief, knowledge, or auditing or wevertf; it's all the same.
I'm tired.
Well, I have some anecdotal evidence. When my sister was a teenager, she was walking along Yonge Street in Toronto when she got pulled in for a free "personality" test from you know who. After she took the test, they put her in a small room, and played good cop/bad cop with her for almost two hours, with one dickhead telling her she was really a good person, and just needed some "communication" courses, while the other one said she was worthless, and they were just wasting their time on her. In the end, they got her to sign up for almost $3,000 worth of courses - and this was back in 70's, when $3G's could buy you a car. Luckily, she was only 17 at the time, so the contract wasn't binding. A friend's sister had a similar experience, but since she was in her 20's, she ended up on the hook for over $1,000.
What was once true, is no longer so
The Freezone http://www.freezone.de/ is "decentralized" organization of people practising LRH auditing techniques outside of the Church of Scientology. Some use "100% standard tech" and others using modified/extended versions of it.
The CoS considers anyone using the LRH tech outside the Church to be "squirrels" (you have to be nuts) and generally to be criminals (think of how the Catholic church considered the protestants during the reformation). Getting auditing within the Freezone will likely make you ineligible for any future services in the CoS.
I am not a member of the Freezone, but from reading their site it seems much closer to how Scientology should be. Their page on philosophy is good: http://www.freezone.de/english/e_philo.htm
http://www.xenu.net/
Earn a % of cash back from Newegg, Tiger Direct, Walmart.com, and more: http://www.mrrebates.com?refid=458505
It was a poor analogy anyway. The equivalent would be Linus Torvolds deciding to release an "updated" version of the GPL v2.0 after RMS's death, citing the fact that Bill Gates had influenced Eben Moglen to insert subversive clauses into the original behind RMS's back.
It is extremely hard for me to believe as a European that you have TV reports like that in the States.. only after I read about that report on wikipedia did I start accepting the possibility that this was NOT a joke. By no means do we have perfect journalism on this side of the Atlantic Ocean, but this.. this can not even be called "journalism". Amazing, simply amazing. I am in awe at the methods used in this "informational" program.
No wit here.
Umm... the bible is a collection of ancient literature, and the writings of hubbard are science fiction. The GPL is a legal license - it doesn't even have a plot line. How much more apples to oranges can you get?
Besides, search though I might, I could not find instructions for the holy hand grenade of antioch anywhere in the GPL. It clearly needs to be updated. And blessed some more by his holiness RMS.
"We are all geniuses when we dream"
- E.M. Cioran
Thanks for that personal comment on the cult. If you haven't already done so, you might consider visiting and contributing to the website 'Through the Door'
http://alley.ethercat.com/door/index.html
which explores the thoughts of people who have participated in the Church of Scientology in a structured interview format. There is also a message board for ex-members, but you may have already found that:
http://www.forum.exscn.net/index.php
Your post reminds me a lot of my experience as a Jehovah's Witness. I was raised in the church, and a lot of these elements of scientology are present in the JW religion as well.
"Within the Church of Scientology, you are taught that Scientology is the one and only solution to all mankind's problems, and during this narrow window of opportunity in mankind's history it is possible to "clear the planet" (ie give everybody auditing) and save humanity from itself. Most other goals pale in comparison and anything that detracts from Scientology, or its expansion is in essence a mortal sin against humanity. This belief is strong enough to get people sign up the Sea Organization (LRH's private navy) on a billion year contract (ie you are in for the long haul... and not just this lifetime)"
It's the same thing with Jehovah's Witnesses. As a witness, you are taught that the Watchtower society is the "faithful and discreet slave" (otherwise known as the "faithful and wise servant" in most Bibles), meaning that they are the sole channel to God. Any kind of salvation and favor with God are impossible without following the doctrinal interpretations of the society. They also teach that the only goal a Witness of Jehovah should have is to preach the message to others as much as possible. All other ambitions in life come secondary. This is why there are no Jehovah's Witness charities, scholarships, or homeless shelters. They believe the earth will all be destroyed and that the only thing that needs to be done is get people into the Watchtower fold so they can survive Armageddon.
"Anyone who attacks the church is either a suppressive person..."
Anyone who disagrees, even if only privately, to the most specific tenets of the Jehovah's Witness faith (including the weird bits like the 1914 eschatology) is labeled an apostate and under direct control of Satan and the demons. People who publicly attack the church are often viewed as sinning against the holy spirit, the Bible's only unforgivable sin.
"There is a huge taboo against reading or discussing anything potentially negative or "entheta" against Scientology or the church, often the taboo will extend down to the point that you feel it is wrong to "think" about potentially negative things regarding Scientology.
Right in line with Watchtower teachings. Books and authors that disagree with the society's conclusions are labeled as "worldly," meaning that they are a product of a world ruled by Satan. Essentially, anything that doesn't agree with doctrine is wholly Satanic, automatically, no questions asked. Witnesses are constantly told to stay away from the internet and from "apostate" reading material, because reading such things will corrupt the mind of even the most faithful Jehovah's Witness.
"it drills into you the fact that Scientology "works" and "gets results" and that the only reason it doesn't work is due to incorrect understood, applied or "squirreled"
Everything that is taught by the society is "the truth." If wonderful things don't happen to you as a result of being "in the truth," then it is always your fault. You might not be praying enough, or you might need to be going out door-knocking more often. If you're not happy, you're not doing enough, period. Until recently and even currently on some occasions, those with depression were/are told that the reason for their depression is that something is keeping them from God. The solutions are to pray and read the Bible more.
"he did a purge of anyone within the church who he considered was not 100% loyal to him by declaring them suppressive and excommunicating them (members of the church are required to "dis-connect" and never again speak to someone who has been excommunicated)."
The same thing happened with Joseph F. Rutherford took over the presidency of the Watchtower society from its founder, Charles T. Russel, in 1917. He instituted the doctrine of "disfellowshipping." Those who are disfellowshipped are shunned by everyo
Even after leaving Scientology, you still believe that the e-meter actually does something??
Did you ever notice that *nix doesn't even cover Linux?
"I'll yawn and ignore it like everyone else." Lets see... 850 comments on slashdot... 5 / 10 stories on digg. Countless other sites linking and talking about the war... Yea.. your right everyone is certainly ignoring it. NBC, news.com, wired.. they must have not bothered to read the memo to ignore it as well as they all seem to be covering it.
- Do not try to extort money from members by charging exorbitant amounts of money for religious services
- Do not blackmail members when they attempt to leave the organization
- Do not claim to have supernatural effects on reality
- Do not believe that all members of Other Religion X are doomed to damnation
To quote South Park:"Is it really any more retarded than Jesus rising from the dead? Or Buddha sitting under a tree for 2 years?"
"Yeah, dude, it's way, way more retarded."
Did you ever notice that *nix doesn't even cover Linux?
I will focus on Christianity since I know most about it.
Opinions differ on tithing, but we also have examples of monetary payment for sins.
People often pray for people to be healed and they will be healed. That is clearly belief in supernatural influence on reality.
Are you kidding? It is even worse than believing they are doomed, but that you must go and punish (kill) them yourself. See Deuteronomy 8-19, 13-6, 13-12, Jeremiah 1-16, and 16-10. And this nearly pales in comparison to Islam.
I am afraid many more religions offer this bunk than you seem to believe.
Why bother.
except that Ron Paul is a white supremacist, and his message of love doesn't exist.
By accepting teh support of neonazis, they are given a voice. Other candidates, namely 2nd amendment Republicans in general, refuse money from hate groups out of respect for the republic. It shows selflessness, even if it's just for show. Money is the lifeblood of politicians, and by refusing neo-nazi money, politicians show that some voices must not be heard. That they will not let racism give them an advantage.
The entire purpose of Stormfront is white supremacy. there is no reason for stormfront to support Ron Paul except for Ron's repeated white supremacist statements.
Don Black is being made much more famous by his association with Ron Paul. Gee thanks Ron! By refusing the money, he has a chance to marginalize the hate on the extreme right. The GOP deserves credit for doing so with Pat Buchanan. We need more of that, not less, and Ron's excuses ring hollow and cynical, especially now that his lies are becoming more and more well known.
To me your story sounded a lot like this one. He even introduces a new vocabulary with words like double think.
----
Go canucks, habs, and sens!
Either you're trolling or you're greatly misled if you feel this represents Christianity. Old-school Judaism, maybe (oh...right, mentioning that this is really from Judaism is likely anti-Semitism...my bad) but outside the world of Baptists people actually pay attention to the ministry of Christ. Example: Christ's example wrt adultery.
Stating on Slashdot that I like cheese since 1997.
Saying you know about Christianity and then providing links to the SAB is like saying "hey - I know quantum physics!" and then using a 10-year old's essay as source material.
--- Hot Shot City is particularly good.
Whatever. The only thing that is giving a voice to people like Don Black are comments like yours that keep bringing these smears up.
According to his campaign, Ron Paul had over 130,000 donors last quarter. Don Black's beliefs don't even register as noise.
Are you saying that Ron Paul should audit the beliefs of each donor to see if they meet your approval? If he did return Don Black's donation, should he have to return each donation from a donor that offends you?
i have a family member who is BEYOND involved in scientology. it nearly destroyed our relationship as this family member was more than just blood, but my sibling and my best friend. in support of her beliefs i went with her to learn more about the "religion" they prayed on my insecurities and promised me a better life, but in doing so i would need to rid myself of those who bring me down (ie non scientologists including my significant other). i must admit, their arguments are/were convincing. so much, in fact, i ended up signing up for my first course and officially became a member of scientology. now before you call me weak and say it would never happen to you, these people are programmed to understand the flaws and insecurities in a person. they were showing me around the church/building explaining to me auditing even had me test out the process. during this "introduction" they tapped into my vulnerabilities and exploited them. 9 hours later i caved. then i was forced to sit through the "orientation" video which stated "if you leave this room after seeing this film and never mention scientology again you are free to do so, it would be stupid but you can do it. you can also dive off a bridge or blow your brains out ... that is your choice". i started to feel unclean and confused as to what i was doing and why i was still there. they convince me to attend my first course lesson, since i had to wait for my sister to get done with her "purif" and she drove me there, i didnt have much of a choice so i watched videos read books and had a man quiz me on my "knowledge". i soon started to see clearly as i had 12 hours prior. the man started attacking my personal relationships and life. this man who was supposed to "teach" me was beginning to insult me. i wanted out. i finished as many exercises as i could then kept leaving to use the "restroom" because you aren't allowed to use cellphones. my sister was ecstatic i had joined the "church", but as soon as she was up i quickly brought her down and told her i never plan on attending another course/class nor do i plan on returning to the church. needless to say she was less than pleased. the man who taught the class was sending me letters every week stating i was an addict who was going to destroy her own life if i didnt return to the church (im an addict for drinking wine and using prescription meds). i informed my sister and showed her the letters, but she thought i was over reacting. our relationship was thrown into turmoil again. i have worked over the past year to win my sister back and have attempted to come to terms with her beliefs and tell myself "if it makes her happy that is all that matters". it was working and my blinders were in full effect till one day a piece of mail hadn't been forwarded to her new address. the letter was a hand written letter and it was from a local address, nothing suspicious, but my sister often received checks from work in the same manner. i noticed the envelope had been tampered with so i opened it to make sure that if it were a check it was still intact. upon opening the envelope i see a receipt for her latest auditing session. a payment of $15,000 was made toward her $30,000 balance for ONE SESSION. This is on top of what she has already paid to them for the purification, dozens and dozens of books/dvds, multiple courses, prior auditing sessions... etc. so you now might be thinking "its her money and her life no big deal". wrong, my sister is a college student making under $40,000 a year. she is putting herself in mounds of debt to be "clear". also, before i end this novel ... they prayed on her after she was diagnosed with a rare form of cancer. later they tell her the cancer is a product of the negative people in her life (non scientologists), there is no such thing as illness.
now tell me this is comparable to every other religion. if think you belong with them.
I think you are grossly uninformed if you think Christianity, among most other religions, DOESN'T prescribe every point on your list. But, a difference between a 'religion' and a 'cult' like Scientology, is that a religion doesn't keep essential secrets away from the public or even their members. Then again, a religion is just a cult, but with more members. Get ready for the religion of Scientology to be accepted near you, soon.
You clearly aren't from the south; you probably imagine that all Christians are similar to Unitarians or something.
--
WHO ATE MY BREAKFAST PANTS?
B..B..B..But Clinton!
*yawn*
Any "Church" that charges for its teachings and also has them copyrighted to prevent free distribution is not a church it's a scam at best and a dangerous cult at worst.
The New International Version Bible is one of the most popular religious texts of the last century.
The New International Version Bible is copyrighted and they charge for the text.
BTW, someone I used to work with made a "bible reader" program and checked with the NIV folks and sure enough they would not let him release the source without forcing him to charge for his formerly free Bible reader program, so that they could get their cut.
The NIV is waaaaaay copyrighted:
http://www.studylight.org/info/copyright/bible/niv.html
The e-meter works by sending a small electrical current through the body and detecting small amount of change in the electrical resistance of the body. Your mental thought processes, or your bodies reaction to these thought processes, can subtly affect this electrical resistance.
In essence the e-meter is an over-engineered ohmmeter. The e-meter does not detect "lies" or "thetan levels", it is simply a bio-feedback device. It has been noted that various patterns of change in a bodies electrical resistance, happen to correlate with the presence of some fairly basic thought patterns, such as having your attention on something, or stress associated with being slightly uncomfortable about a thought (which may be unrelated to the question asked, or even the fact that question itself was asked at all).
The so called "lie detector" polygraph test, has several different sensors, but works on a similar principal, of detecting physiological factors that are correlated with stress or anxiety, which may be in part caused by a persons fear of getting caught in a lie.
I have heard descriptions of a couple of methods of psychotherapy, which sound similar to the basic principals of Scientology auditing, the purpose of the e-meter is simply to guide the auditor to focus his questions on areas where you still have attention on, and not to stop addressing an area until the e-meter indicated that you no longer have any attention on the area,
So yes, I believe that the e-meter actually does "something", but on the other hand its does not simply confer magical powers to the person behind the dial. Somebody who is fairly experienced with giving psychotherapy, would probably be able to get similar indications through observing a persons body language, facial expressions and various other sub-conscious signals a person gives off. Its a simple tool, and if used by somebody competent it can potentially assist in psychotherapy.
I have already read the book, in fact I read it whilst still within the church (iirc it was actually the guthenburg ebook version). It didn't set of any alarm bells though, at the time.
The Church's reality tunnel is a fairly nice one to be in, you are rarely exposed to the contradictions that exist within it. But it is a fairly fragile one, as soon as you start questioning things and seeing the contradictions and trying to resolve them yourself, it all breaks down fairly quickly. That's one of the reasons the church tries very hard to cocoon its members from anything critical of the church. From its point of view, people who get exposed to critical meterial against the church, and if it doesn't get "handled" quickly, those people tend to end up leaving the church - its a matter of viewpoint if their leaving is due to their minds being corrupted with entheta, or them simply seeing the truth.
The two films that correlate with my emotional experiences, would be Equilibrium and in terms of having to rebuild your whole reality again from scratch: Fight Club.
which he (correctly) points out is not something the federal government is permitted to do under the Constitution
Say what now? Congress has the power to collect taxes to "promote the general welfare of the United States". I'd say that funding medical research surely qualifies as general welfare.
It seems that similar patterns tend to repeat themselves in various places. Fundamentalism is not intrinsic to any religion or political ideology, but if left unchecked could potentually grow anywhere.
I guess the most important question is how do you personally react when put in a situation like that, do you take the path of least resistance and simply toe the line and don't raise any inconvenient questions, or do you have the certainty in yourself to question those contradictions, and follow your own path, and keep your own council, regardless of what everyone else tells you is the right thing to do.
The real story isn't RPs amazing 10%, but that RP is so far outside the mainstream media's sense of reality that you get what looks like inept censorship.
The cute little "FAQ" contained in your first link would make perfect sense if RP had 1% of the vote, but media coverage as if he had 1% of the vote is not "The Voting Public".
I'm not saying that he'd be likely to win, even given proper coverage, nor am I saying that there's a conspiracy. I simply think that journalists don't take well to having their sense of reality jolted, indeed, to think of reality as a matter of consensus, rather than something physical, is part of the thinking of the typical individual who becomes a journalist.
Wikileaks, no DNS
The "general welfare" clause gives the reason why Congress is permitted under the Constitution to "collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises." In other words, the paragraph as a whole merely says Congress can collect taxes; it doesn't grant Congress the power to spend those taxes on anything in particular. Rather, the following paragraphs state exactly what Congress can do, and none of them mention research for its own sake.
"The state is that great fiction by which everyone tries to live at the expense of everyone else." - Bastiat
you used the phrase "reality tunnel" a number of times. Have the works of Robert Anton Wilson contributed to your development as well? His writings have initiated many the cognitive jailbreak, it seems.
I'm not defending Scientology, but I think if you are going to make such strong claims, a few credible links are in order. Otherwise, you're doing the same thing they are, publicly smearing them as being evil. I could have made the same claim against the Tongan Government and few people would have known without serious research whether I was just making it up.
"Just Google It" won't suffice; hardly anyone will seriously research the allegations of every unsubstantiated, inflammatory piece of writing they come across.
At minimum, when someone informed a candidate that a highly offensive murderous ideology.... let's say Al Qaida or Ron Paul Nazis or Scientology, is contributing thousands, then no investigation is necessary. It's time to give the money back.
Your straw man is burning, since Ron Paul was repeatedly told about this. No one asked him to investigate.
And I love the attack that I'm empowering Nazis by condemning them and helping publicize the candidate they love. Nazi's know that if anyone finds out who they like, that candidate is going down. Millions of people have taken a second to remember there are neo-nazis like Ron Paul and laughed at them. We need to always be vigilant in remembering the kind of hate that Ron Paul and his Tim McVeigh followers love to preach. We need to keep pointing it out and attacking it. Forever. Read up on some John Mill if you don't get the point.
Since this revelation came out, Ron's support has crumbled to a third of what it was. I'm proud to do my totally tiny bit to keep that going. Ron Paul MUST be marginalized and destroyed as a political force. And he has been. Yay! And libertarianism is once again proven to be the province of fucking idiots. Sad because I am sympathetic to some of their goals, but I'm thrilled to se ethe truth come out about them. Clean up your act. I have EVERY RIGHT to be outraged that you idiots would follow a monster like Ron. Read the quotes I put up north of here. That's not ok. This is America, and we ain't perfect, but that crap needs to stop infecting this nation.
No, you're wrong.
If you read it, the entire section is one long run-on sentence. All those semicolon-separated clauses are different powers. The power to collect taxes for the general welfare is [i]in addition[/i] to all those others, otherwise it doesn't make sense. The next clause after the bit about taxes and general welfare is "To borrow money on the credit of the United States". By your logic, Congress has the power to collect taxes... so it can borrow money?
Perhaps you should examine the text more closely. The entire part I quoted is a single section, without any internal semicolons. The tax and general welfare clauses are separated only by a comma, and thus describe a single power, whereas the taxation and money-borrowing clauses are separated by a semicolon, making them separate powers as you stated.
"The state is that great fiction by which everyone tries to live at the expense of everyone else." - Bastiat
I encountered Robert Anton Wilson only a couple of years after leaving the church. I am a fan of his works. Having had my reality tunnel collapse around me, and more than once since leaving the church, I would almost describe myself as a universal agnostic (I believe in what I believe now [my map], but know that at some point in the future I will see in a completely different way) - everything is permitted, nothing is true.
I wasn't the one who brought him up, assnugget.
And that has what to do with the price of tea in China? I never said you BROUGHT HIM UP, I said you RANTED ABOUT HIM in a thread completely unrelated to the candidates. Which you surely did. You may not have brought him up, but you also didn't have to respond, and yet you did. Almost like someone with a compulsion would. Hey, nice try, though, cockass.
http://xkcd.com/386/
And all of them are certain sects of Christianity. The one I belong to (Orthodox) offers none of them.
Did you ever notice that *nix doesn't even cover Linux?
I think you are grossly uninformed if you think that there aren't dozens of kinds of Christianity, and for every bullet on the list, you could pick one that prescribes it and one that doesn't.
Did you ever notice that *nix doesn't even cover Linux?
Ah, this obviously explains your presense here.
Jeruvy