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Wikipedia Bans Church of Scientology
El Reg writes "Showing a new-found resolve to crack down on self-serving edits, Wikipedia has banned contributions from all IP addresses owned or operated by the Church of Scientology. According to Wikipedia administrators, this marks the first time such a high-profile organization has been banished for allegedly pushing its own agenda on the 'free encyclopedia anyone can edit.'"
The Church of Scientology has a long history of censorship and general Internet fuckery.
http://www.factnet.org/Scientology/censorware.html
Two things:
1. Wikipedia should never lift the ban.
2. Jimbo should watch his back; Scientology *DOES NOT* play nice when it doesn't get what it wants.
TOR exit nodes are already notoriously difficult to edit from:
*You can't edit anonymously.
*If you have a new-ish account that is barely old enough to let you edit semi-protected articles, your account is treated as if it was new when you are connected via TOR.
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
For more really really fun and interesting info, go to Operation Clambake. Before you freak about the URL, the URL is real, and so is the guy (Andreas Heldal-Lund, who runs this out of Norway, which is why Scientology has not gotten any legal traction against him yet). I recommend a read, for what little that's worth.
http://www.xenu.net/
Vote monkeys into Congress. They are cheaper and more trustworthy.
To be fair, Conservapedia is fundamentalist, not just conservative.
when the conservatives felt that Wikipedia had too much of a liberal bias
"Reality has a well-known liberal bias." --Stephen Colbert
Don't blame me -- I voted for Roslin.
"We all know that xenu's followers will simply do their edits from home, from now on."
I thought Xenu was the bad guy, not the good guy.
As much as I despise Scientology, I don't see why their cult should be singled out for direct criticisms in the opening paragraphs of the article, (e.g "cult that financially defrauds and abuses its members"). While this may be true, other cults (oh ok "religions", whats the difference) that do the same thing are being described in completely different way, see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Church_of_Jesus_Christ_of_Latter-day_Saints This is supposed to be an encyclopedia article, not a newspaper editorial so I think the tone and content of the opening 4 paragraphs I think do need some changes. I am afraid to make them though cause I might get banned from the site.
The reason they are singled out for that type of description is there is an enormous amount of evidence to support the description. Church leaders have lied cheated and stolen to support their agenda. The organization has a longstanding harrassment policy against it's detractors. They are extremely good at abusing the legal system to their ends and mostly getting away with it. Other groups most certainly do not come anywhere near the level of abuse that the COS does. Besides that, I don't see the description you refer to in an article right now.
And it takes several rounds from a shotgun, three to the chest, one to the head. Take a look at the death of Mary Florence Barnett, the mother of David Miscavige, the current head of Scientology. (http://www.badcult.info/watd/flo_barnett/coroner.html) Suicide? With multiple shotgun rounds? And _two_ suicide notes? While the suicide of a cancer patient can be understandable, this does seem.... beyond the usual efforts of a cancer ridden person, threatening their church with lawsuits.
Scientology isn't a religion OR a cult, it's a criminal racket. Their "beliefs" may be "nutty", but you know that nobody in positions of power within the "Church" actually believe them. You'd be a pretty poor scammer if you believed your own lies!
There is actually a fairly well-defined formal boundary between "cult" in the technical sense and "religions". Some cults are religious, some aren't.
But bluntly, none of the others can really compete on Scientology's home turf of criminal action. I have griped at some length to Catholic friends about things the Catholic church does that I don't approve of. They have not poisoned my pets, and I haven't died under mysterious circumstances that a Scientologist-linked police force decided were "natural causes". (Such as a self-inflicted gunshot wound with no powder burns.) So that's a pretty big difference.
My blog: http://www.seebs.net/log/ --- My iPhone/iPad app: http://www.seebs.net/seebsfrac/
Well, Scientology (and other cults) do things I've never heard of religions doing (since the Middle Ages):
Also, Scientology seems to ignore many things real religions do: organize food drives and other charitable events, provide aid to members in need (emotional or economic), and other beneficent acts.
Your ad here. Ask me how!
Yes, they're using the extension TorBlock to do this.
Freedom of speech means you can say what you want without the government penalizing you. It does not mean that you have "rights" to insert your speech into private forums, nor does it mean that non-governmental organizations must tolerate your rants.
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.
Against stupidity, the Gods themselves contend in vain. --Friederich Schiller
The home-school Christians took their football and went to play at Conservapedia, which is JUST AS FUN and as important as Wikipedia.
I seriously think that Conervapedia is just satire. Some of the bullshit on there is just too unreal to be serious...
You don't hang out with too many conservatives, do you?
Seriously, I think you fooled the mods here too. Tor exit nodes are just computers running Tor that have been set up to also be an exit node. There are hundreds of nodes and they are run by volunteers, not by the Tor project. You can get a list of the exit nodes (here, for example), but Tor Hyams has nothing to do with them.
If you want a vision of the future, imagine a youtube comments section scrolling - forever.