The Atlantic's Scientology Advertorial

magic maverick writes "The Atlantic recently ran an 'advertorial' for the 'Church of Scientology'. During this time, they filtered comments and removed negative comments. While they have since apologized, incisive.nu has an interesting run down of what they did wrong, from both a moral and business perspective." It turns out these sponsored stories are commonplace, and a serious source of revenue: "Native ads are critical to The Atlantic’s livelihood. They are one element of digital advertising revenue, which in 2012 accounted for a striking 59 percent of the brand’s overall advertising revenue haul. Unclear just how much of the digital advertising revenue stems from sponsor content. We’re working on that."

Comments

If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[crazyjj]

The only question here is "Which one is the dog?"

Is it the Church of Scientology--whose batshit-crazy cult bullshit, strongarm tactics, litigious bullying, etc. are quite well-known by now? Is it these poor souls, who have fallen so far out of favor in recent years that they're losing members even in their traditional gullible himbo/bimbo bastion of Hollywood?

Or is it the Atlantic, who gave up any pretense of integrity long ago, and whore themselves out like a $5 hooker to any advertiser still dumb enough to think that anyone under the age of ancient still reads The Atlantic? Is it these poor souls, who still bother to publish a magazine that hasn't been relevant since The Great War?

I think a better analogy might be two dying dogs, lying down together in a last feeble attempt to fend off the cold.

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[h4rr4r]

Poor souls? At least a prostitute provides a valuable service, unlike that cult.

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[Black Parrot]

I think a better analogy might be two dying dogs, lying down together in a last feeble attempt to fend off the cold.

Hey, they're both just chasing the Almighty Buck. You should show a little patriotic respect.

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[Jeremiah Cornelius]

SPONSOR CONTENT

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[durrr]

I dont' think opressive scientology ads are important to the livelihood of the atlantic. I think it's important to the expanded profit margins of the upper echelons.

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[Anonymous Coward]

It really is sad that we are so degraded that the difference between organized, criminal, conspiracies and legal businesses is very hard to define. Just as the so-called Church of Scientology is essentially a criminal enterprise how could we claim that Microsoft is not also a criminal enterprise. When you violate the rights of others and the laws of nations and are fined over and over again how is it that Microsoft is not classified as organized crime. Or we could discuss Wall Street and investment banks in the same light. We no longer really try to enforce justice.

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[Nemyst]

Not a good analogy, because one may feel pity for two dying dogs.

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't know which one is the wrong dog but hopefully they have people that are a bit better at the English language and who's not foolish enough to subscribe to a wanna-be tech site with a heavy socio-political bias.

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[fustakrakich]

"Which one is the dog?"

The one being wagged...

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[tripleevenfall]

Excuse me sir, We at the CoS have trademarked the term "cult" and your use of it is forbidden by copyright. You'll be hearing from our legal team.

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[gstoddart]

Well, they've managed to demonstrate that Tom Cruise is an insufferable idiot.

That counts for something.

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[tripleevenfall]

they also gave us Battlefield Earth, which is one of the most gloriously bad, campy, unintentionally funny films ever made.

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[cfulton]

When was it that America tried to enforce justice?
Starting with slavery and moving on to the railroad monopolies, tammany hall, the Chicago political machine, union busting in the 1930's, the company towns of the coal mines, separate but equal and on and on and on. We do try in fits and starts to fix these things, but always the rich and privileged find ways to give themselves privileges and immunity that the average Joe is not entitled to. It is not just American history but world history that teaches us this. So, maybe we should stop being sad about a time that didn't exist and do something about it. Whether we vote with our money or in the ballot box or through protest it is up to us to change things and looking back on a better time that did not really exist will not get it done.

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[YodasEvilTwin]

He's a good actor. Watch his movies if you like them, stop giving a shit about his personal life. The world would be a much better place if no one was obsessed with random people the see on screen on hear singing.

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[YodasEvilTwin]

they see on screen or hear singing, ugh. Proofreading fail.

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[gstoddart]

Did 'they' do that? Hubbard had written that bit of fiction before he moved onto his really lucrative fiction.

Seriously, would you trust a religion started by a science fiction writer who said "You don't get rich writing science fiction. If you want to get rich, you start a religion."?

Really? Aliens? That can only be detected with your voodoo device? Is that the best he could come up with?

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[geekoid]

I'm not going to support people who, as part of their personal lie, take action and make up lies that harm others. I don't care how fucking good his movie may, or may not, be.

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[s.petry]

I believe one should check the chronology of book writings by LRH. While long, Battlefield Earth was a decent book. Published well before the time of the cult and Dianetics (sp? I'm in no mood to go make sure I spelt it correctly)

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[Anonymous Coward]

Really? Aliens? That can only be detected with your voodoo device? Is that the best he could come up with?

That it worked so well and suckered so many ... that may have been his point.

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[s.petry]

Hot damn! Spot on! I will however point out that most people lack the critical thinking abilities to see the truth in what your post. Really, that guy on the TV News station told them that it used to be fair, and politicians tell them that they matter so it has to be true!

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[Anonymous Coward]

There's nothing dishonest or dishonorable about being a hooker. And prostitution should not be disreputable.

I cannot say the same for Scientology.

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[gstoddart]

He's a good actor.

He's a middling actor at best, and lately has been stuck in the same tired re-hash of his hero fantasy.

Watch his movies if you like them, stop giving a shit about his personal life.

I'm sorry, but having seen him jumping on Oprah's sofa, and talking about how modern medical science is wrong about anti-depressants and the like ... he's a crackpot idiot.

You want to make extraordinary claims? Back 'em up or STFU. He sure as heck can't back them up.

I don't give a shit what he does in his personal life ... but I'm sure as hell not going to watch his movies and give the impression he deserves more of a public forum.

By all means, feel free to watch what he's making if you're into that -- but to me he's moved into the realm of actors I dislike and won't watch his stuff.

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[Admiral Valdemar]

The problem with that is, somewhere, you are supporting someone of equal or greater drain on society. It's hard to be fully ethical about things 100% of the time, so while not supporting a film actor is one thing, you could be supporting Big Oil or an eeevil tech firm doing far worse. That said, the sooner this cult dies, the better.

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[jason.sweet]

I disagree. Mr Cruise accomplished that by himself.

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[whitroth]

If you think that was funny - I've never seen it - you should read the book.

As a lifelong SF fan, let me tell you what it was: a pulp writer's parody? homage? to every single pulp magazine genre that was extant in the late forties and early fifties, when Hubbard was writing. The section of Air Adventures, Detective Stories, Jungle Adventure Stories. Seagoing Adventure, SF, and on, and on. They were perfect... hackneyed pulp writing.

And btw, to Battlefield Earth was published about 4 years before he died. Dianetics, his first foray, is from the late forties, while Dianetics is from the fifties; by the seventies, he was already calling it a "church", and spent something like the last 10 years of his life on his yacht, wanted by the authorities in the UK for tax evasion, as they didn't consider The Church of Scienterifficology a church or religion.

What "really lucrative fiction" were you referring to, followuper?

        mark

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[MightyMartian]

Plan 9 From Outer Space and This Island Earth are gloriously bad, campy and unintentionally funny films. Battlefield Earth was pretty much unwatchable. It was the film equivalent of a guy so bad you wouldn't piss on him if he was on fire. It's so awful it isn't even worthy of MST3K treatment.

I remember my wife and I rented it, and while I knew perfectly well who Hubbard was, was willing to view the movie on its own merits. After about 20 minutes, we gladly turned it off. A few years later it was on cable so I decided to give it another go. After the first scene with Forest Whitaker and John Travolta I changed the channel.

The Human Centipede 2 is a work of art compared to Battlefield Earth.

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[Anonymous Coward]

This nicely sums up the fantasy economics used by Republicans and the Tea Party -- as if some unfettered free market is going to fix everything, and cutting taxes for the rich would suddenly make us prosperous.

All of the "let's go back to this" stuff is a lie or a fantasy which didn't exist, has never existed, and which can't be pulled into existence.

People get deluded about the things they believe, even when there's no evidence to support them.

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[Kozar_The_Malignant]

Well, they've managed to demonstrate that Tom Cruise is an insufferable idiot.

That counts for something.

That falls into the category of self-evident. No third-party demonstration is needed.

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[SuricouRaven]

The camp really translates well to the movie then.

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[xevioso]

Now now, it's not that bad. I rewatched it again recently, or at least part of it. While horrible, it's not insufferable.

For me the one thing that did repeatedly get on my nerves were the skewed camera angles. Every single frame is skewed 45 degrees in one way or the other.

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[StuartHankins]

Does he good? Or does he evil? It matters not you say. Watch him anyway you say.

That path, to the dark side it leads. Consider all when making a decision you should.

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[xevioso]

Shut up, tea-tard. The rest of civilized society has had it with you and the rest of you gun-fetishists.

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[Anonymous Coward]

The Atlantic has declined in quality over the years, but so has online journalism in general.

I ask you to name another site that has *more* integrity than the Atlantic. I don't mean that to suggest that the Atlantic is somehow a paragon of integrity, just that online journalism in general is not spotless.

Every website that's not run off of donations makes money from advertisements, and most sites other than the Atlantic are even worse, in that they aren't up-front about their glaring biases (Gizmodo anyone?). At least the Atlantic marks their sponsored articles as "sponsored content."

Frankly, I don't really see the big deal. It's really clear to me what's sponsored and what isn't, because it's labeled as such. With Adblock, I don't see most of it anyway.

I hate the CoS as an organization and see it as a criminal enterprise, but that's what this is about. It's not about the Atlantic, and it's not about sponsored content, it's about this particular sponsored content. They made a bad decision about what ads to include vis-a-vis their demographic, but who cares? If they kept doing it I might be more upset, but they pull an ad, they learn a lesson.

At least we're having this conversation--that's more than can be said about most of the bullshit extremist gossip-columns that passes as legitimate journalism today.

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[gstoddart]

Does he good? Or does he evil? It matters not you say. Watch him anyway you say.

Burma Shave? :-P

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[Bodhammer]

"tea-tard" and "civilized" on the same sentence!

Hey lib-tard, don't be a hypocritical douche...

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[Hatta]

talking about how modern medical science is wrong about anti-depressants and the like

A broken clock is right twice a day, and crazy ass Tom Cruise is right about this too. A 2008 meta analysis of all studies, published and unpublished, on SSRI antidepressants found that the effects are clinically insignificant in the great majority of patients. Only those ranked as very severely depressed experience any significant benefit over placebo.

It's been 6 years since that study, and none have overturned its conclusions. Yet SSRIs are prescribed to the moderately depressed every day. I've asked psychiatrists how they can justify this in light of the data, they've responded with their own confirmation biases. I don't see any way to interpret this but to conclude that psychiatry for depression is almost entirely a scam.

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[PhxBlue]

Pfft. If you were really with the CoS, you'd have made Slashdot remove the post.

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[Anonymous Coward]

While long, Battlefield Earth was a decent book.

I read the first half of that book, and I laughed long and hard at this comment. Battlefield Earth is a contender for one of the worst sci-fi books ever written.

Fleet of semi trucks, meet gaping plot holes.

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[Dragonslicer]

Poor souls? At least a prostitute provides a valuable service, unlike that cult.

Providing hours upon hours of laughter for us sane people isn't a valuable service?

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[Anonymous Coward]

Hubbard had written that bit of fiction before he moved onto his really lucrative fiction.

Actually Battlefield Earth was published in 1982, while Scientology was started in 1952 or 1953, depending on your definition of "started." Your other points, however, are quite accurate.

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[wonkey_monkey]

I'm not going to support people who, as part of their personal li[f]e, take action and make up lies that harm others.

Has Tom Cruise done that himself, though? Or is he just as deluded as the other poor fools who've been suckered into Scientology - moreso, in his case perhaps, since it would be even more in Scientology's interests to continue buffing his ego, given the considerable interest his name can generate. They gave him a freakin' medal, for Xenu's sake. I wouldn't be surprised if Cruise had been told and genuinely believed that all of the negative press about Scientology was part of an establishment (or alien) conspiracy.

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[Runaway1956]

So, in short, you approve of those advertising packages promoted by the entertainment industry, and you don't give a damn about the fools who live inside those packages?

I could make a list of individuals, if they were on fire, I wouldn't urinate on them. Heading the list would probably be that dead drug addict kiddie diddler, Michael Jackson. That boy was a freak, by almost any definition. The fact that he was filthy freaking RICH was good enough for most people to forgive him of all his sins, crimes, eccentricities, or whatever you might want to call it.

Tom Cruise would make the list, quite far down from Michael. But, he's definitely on the list.

Some of us have standards.

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[Anonymous Coward]

Well that depends....

If we could get the CoS to lock horns(a fitting term) with the WBC, a great many LoLs would be had, they would both weaken each other, and sooner or later one of them would fall.

It's win/win/win/win.

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[Runaway1956]

"I don't see any way to interpret this but to conclude that psychiatry for depression is almost entirely a scam."

Bingo. They've been collecting their office fees, and subscribing drugs to enrich the pharmaceuticals for at least fifty years now. It's amazing how many psychiatric patients are "cured" when there is no more money to squeeze out of them. Hyperactivity is just as much a scam as depression.

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[Jawnn]

What "really lucrative fiction" were you referring to, followuper?

mark

Scientology, of course.

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[Runaway1956]

You claim to be sane? I don't see Cruise as funny. Is it possible that you are a product of conditioning by the mass media? When the canned laughter sounds, you laugh? Something to think about, huh?

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[Digital Vomit]

C'mon, guy-tards. Let's try to keep it civil here. Thanks.

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[Anonymous Coward]

Why are you watching someone you dislike on day time TV? Got nothing better to do, or are you seeking more reasons to dislike this particularly famous cult member?

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[Jawnn]

I don't see any way to interpret this but to conclude that psychiatry for depression is almost entirely a scam.

That conclusion is not supported by your premises. On the contrary...
Pharmacological treatment of severe depression is effective. If we lump such treatment into "psychiatry", your conclusion is patently false.
You have presented no evidence documenting the efficacy of psychiatry in general (without regard to specific treatment modalities), hence your conclusion is unsupported. Furthermore, I'll hazard to guess that there are treatments used by psychiatrists for their moderately depressed patients which are effective, and for which long-standing clinical research results exist.
Bottom line, calling psychiatry "a scam" is the kind of irresponsible, bat-shit crazy talk that Mr. Cruise is now famous for. Welcome to his club.

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[Bardez]

It's so awful it isn't even worthy of MST3K treatment.

How about a RiffTrax? They're the same MST3K guys, BTW.

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[Anonymous Coward]

Really? Aliens? That can only be detected with your voodoo device? Is that the best he could come up with?

Worse: Alien souls. And those souls possessing your body can limit your actions by acting like a conscience. After you've gone through the "thetan removal process", you're promised that you'll be a superman, capable of anything. No remorse, no pity, no fear. Scientology is a sociopath farm, whether by their stated goals, or by their visible fruits.

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[s.petry]

This is a partial list of L. Ron Hubbard’s published classic works of fiction. Included are Battlefield Earth, Fear, To the Stars, Final Blackout and Typewriter in the Sky, which were published in 1940 and reprinted numerous times.

The above is from Wiki. Later in the article it extrapolates Battlefield Earth: A Saga of the Year 3000 is a 1982 science fiction novel written by L. Ron Hubbard. He composed a soundtrack to the book called Space Jazz. Initially titled "Man, the Endangered Species"

Honest mistake.

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[Alien54]

Part of this is that everyone who participated in the 2008 protests thought that Scientology was dead and buried.
Suddenly here they are, bigger than ever, and vying for space in main stream media publications.
Most of the controversy is because it's THEM.
The statements that they make in the advertorial seem to be conservative positive reports about facilities they have opened, etc. This sort of thing is all verifiable, as well as the conclusion that this means something for their leadership.
Because it's THEM, this upsets everyone who thought they had killed Scientology.
It's like being in a bad horror movie, and the boss of the movie that you think you kicked butt on shows up again with only minor scratches.

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[Bacon Bits]

Having suffered from moderate dysthymia for the past 20 years with bouts of severe depression, I can safely state three things:

1. Psychologist == psychotherapist. I saw my psychologist 1 hour a week for about 5 years straight when I needed the help.

2. Psychiatrist == pharmacologist. I see my psychologist for 30 minutes every six to twelve months to get a prescription refill. The demand on psychiatrists is high, because very few people are crazy enough to get a PhD and the turn around and get an MD. 12-16 years of school tends to make them only slightly less insane than their patients.

3. Antidepressants allow me to function in society. My condition is an exception, however, because it actually is a chemical imbalance. Without medication I stop going to work/school, then stop spending time with friends, then stop talking to people in any way, then stop cleaning the house, then stop bathing, then stop eating.

Fuck Tom Cruise and fuck the Church of Scientology.

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes you _are_ a special snowflake little Jimmy, yes you are!

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[Hatta]

Pharmacological treatment of severe depression is effective. If we lump such treatment into "psychiatry", your conclusion is patently false.

Note how I said "almost entirely". SSRI's work for the severely depressed. That's a small fraction of the population though, so that's not very profitable.

You have presented no evidence documenting the efficacy of psychiatry in general (without regard to specific treatment modalities), hence your conclusion is unsupported. Furthermore

Why would the efficacy of psychiatry in general be more than the weighted sum of the efficacies of the specific treatments they use? SSRIs are by far the major treatment for depression, the fact that they don't work should tell you something about the rest of their treatments.

Furthermore, I'll hazard to guess that there are treatments used by psychiatrists for their moderately depressed patients which are effective, and for which long-standing clinical research results exist.

Not really. They offer you medication, which is known to be ineffective, first. If they had something better, they would offer it first, unless they're trying to milk you for cash. If you refuse, they give you the hard sell on the drugs. If you still refuse, they refer you to a therapist who is nothing but a glorified bullshit artist. Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, currently the best supported method, regularly fails to outperform placebo therapy for depression. It does have some benefit for anxiety disorders though.

In light of all of this, it's hard to see how psychiatry for depression is anything but a scam. We know they're being dishonest, because they continue to prescribe ineffective medicine to desperate people. We know they don't really care about the welfare of their patients, because that ineffective medication has significant side effects. Why would you trust anything coming from a psychiatrist in light of these facts?

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[Dragonslicer]

I didn't mean Tom Cruise specifically, but the entire organization. See, e.g., nearly every Scientology discussion on Slashdot.

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[Anonymous Coward]

Thank you for that piece of inaccurate crap, Mr./Ms. Scientology Shill.

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[Anonymous Coward]

How long have you been a Scientologist?

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[mdielmann]

GPP said "almost entirely a scam". This is not the same as "entirely a scam". Note the adverb. This also means exceptions don't disprove his statement. So, except for treating severe depression, what have the Romans, uh, the psychiatrists done for us?

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[couchslug]

It worked.

It takes a selectively blind person to WANT religion, but that sort of person is incapable of critical thinking on that specific subject however brillian or stupid they might otherwise be. Hit the sweet spot and they'll be your bitch.

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[Anonymous Coward]

Worse: Alien souls. And those souls possessing your body can limit your actions by acting like a conscience. After you've gone through the "thetan removal process", you're promised that you'll be a superman, capable of anything. No remorse, no pity, no fear. Scientology is a sociopath farm, whether by their stated goals, or by their visible fruits.

(Emphasis added)

And they absolutely will not stop, until we are dead?

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[interkin3tic]

to any advertiser still dumb enough to think that anyone under the age of ancient still reads The Atlantic?

I find myself reading atlantic articles every once in a while: their stuff shows up on at least flipboard. That to me seems like they're adapting to newer format a little better than, say, newsweek.

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[Hatta]

Rather than resorting to ad hominem, how about you counter some of my arguments? If I'm wrong, that's the only way I'll learn. And if I'm not, you'll learn something by trying to refute me.

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[Anonymous Coward]

And any other religion is fundamentaly different how?

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[MrHanky]

You want to see the church of scientololgy in boxing matches?

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[Maritz]

Come with me if you want to live

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[Maritz]

It's been 6 years since that study, and none have overturned its conclusions. Yet SSRIs are prescribed to the moderately depressed every day. I've asked psychiatrists how they can justify this in light of the data, they've responded with their own confirmation biases. I don't see any way to interpret this but to conclude that psychiatry for depression is almost entirely a scam.

Quite a stretch. You may be putting too much on this study. I'd read at least this before concluding "it's a scam".

for example... "The study has numerous weaknesses, however. Because the study only looked at pre-approval clinical trials it did not account for all available data. Also, once a drug is approved study designs are more variable as they are no longer specifically designed to meet the criteria for FDA approval and may be more relevant to clinical practice. The analysis only considered a single measure of depression (Hamilton Rating Scale of Depression – HAM-D), and it is possible that other measures of depression may have yielded a different result. The study also included data mainly for severe depression, with only one study of moderate depression and now studies of mild depression. Finally it should be noted that meta-analyses in general are not highly predictive of the outcomes of later large definitive trials. The process of performing a meta-analysis itself has the potential to introduce bias and error."

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[perceptual.cyclotron]

The trouble, or part of the trouble, is that the finding that there's no significant difference between the drug and the placebo doesn't mean there's no effect – it's just that the effect is mostly placebo. This is problematic, because placebos don't work as well when people know they're placebos, and likewise placebos don't work as well when they're cheap. So the conclusion we have to arrive at is that the best treatment we have is placebo, but it has to be expensive, and people have to believe it's actually doing something. In this context, given that SSRIs actually do have some kind of an effect, at least some of the time, it's not unreasonable to continue to prescribe them. It becomes a problem because the associated business models are profoundly lucrative – leading inexorably to unscrupulous behaviour. It's a dilema.

It should also be remembered that drugs are always part of a treatment program, which also involves considerable therapy – which is absolutely known to be effective, within reason (e.g., CBT). So it's a bit of an overstatement to disparage the entire field in one stroke, though it's certainly equally naive to consider it faultless...

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[MightyMartian]

ROTFL! I may actually pay for that. The part where the voice over proclaims "It's become a Noel Coward play!" is priceless.

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[PhxBlue]

How about answering the fucking question? (Not the original anonymous coward, btw.)

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[iluvcapra]

In light of all of this, it's hard to see how psychiatry for depression is anything but a scam.

Your argument is that psychiatry is affirmative fraud, that psychiatrists know that their drugs don't work, and that this information is suppressed for the sake of profits -- and you base this all off of one paper, a paper that says nothing about fraud, profits, or suppressed knowledge. Find the paper that proves psychiatrists systematically misreport outcomes, or that they believe drugs don't work, or that they routinely lie in order to sell patients on drugs and services. This is the evidence required to prove a "scam." All you've got now is a reason to go back and check the original studies.

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[obtuse]

Nonsense. Assuming your quoted study is valid, there is much more to psychiatry that works, and well.

You've pointed out one limited mistake, but the fact is that even granting that, we know for certain that other antidepressants save lives in severely depressed people. The referenced study is very limited (only addresses moderately depressed people, only SSRIs.) That's not where antidepressants are most important. Severly depressed people tend to kill themselves, and antidepressants help prevent this. Calling all of psychiatry a scam because some popular methods are flawed, is a far worse error than your accusation against psychiatry.

Like a lot of medicine, it doesn't work as well as we'd like, but it's much better than anything else out there. Psychiatry includes other methods of treatment besides drugs as well. Scientology doesn't. You aren't allowed to use any treatment they don't approve of, including proven psychiatric drugs.

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[Hatta]

I have never been a scientologist. They are a scam and a cult, just like every other religion.

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[Anonymous Coward]

You are wrong about the first two.

A psychiatrist is not a pharmacologist, the two are completely different. Psychiatrists do not need a PhD to practice psychotherapy. The years of training (excluding the under graduate degree) for psychiatrists and psychologists is generally the same, 8 years plus specialties. Pharmacology training is mostly the same for pharmacists, but a pharmacologist deals with drug research. You forgot the Psy.D, which focuses on clinical and counseling psychology vs the research focused PhD.

And fuck stupid people, like yourself.

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[flyneye]

More like two bad things that taste bad together.
El Rons legacy is a bit too frayed at the edges. Years of bad publicity like $cientology has gotten and you could be the best used car salesman in the world working at McDonalds, to analogize. No one who has picked up a newspaper and saw his legacys local antics or watched his empire crumble abroad via cable tv news is likely to give their practitioner/recruiters more than amused looks followed by a look 'round the room for the cameras because it seems like it's all a big practical joke.
And NEWSPAPERS,for that matter the entire News Media world fucking wide, don't even get me started on the inaccurate, spun blather oozing onto paper, out of screens and speakers everywhere in the world, like festering plague, don't damn touch the stuff without a full body condom and beer goggles.All for the benefit of the sponsors,competition to be a newssource has devolved practical, necessary information that could be handy to everyday life for everyman into addictive propaganda for anyone with enough money and an agenda to put their seed directly up our butts. Disinformation is control.
So upon analyses we can see that Cults , Newsclowns and the politicians that enable them and others all drink from the same intellectual toilet and are deserving of the same considerations.

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[Anonymous Coward]

It's hard to be fully ethical about things 100% of the time

It is difficult, but that doesn't mean one shouldn't try, especially if it is easy in some cases.

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[chrismcb]

So... You don't support anyone?

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[chrismcb]

...

I don't give a shit what he does in his personal life ...... but to me he's moved into the realm of actors I dislike and won't watch his stuff.

So, you give a shit about his personal life? (Otherwise why do you care about Oprah's sofa?)
Or do you just not like him as an actor? I'm guessing it is more the former than the later, otherwise why even bother to mention his personal life?
I don't think he is the best actor, but I do like some of his movies.

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[Arker]

Never watched Opras sofa and dont give a crap what you saw there.

He's an actor, I liked some of his movies, and whether he is a loon or not isnt going to affect my appreciation of his acting, either for good or ill.

And I have seen him rant on a morning news show some time ago about psychiatry. He's not entirely wrong. Psychiatry amounts to little more than a state-supported cult, armed with police powers to enforce compliance. He is not wrong in what he is saying, but the irony is heavy, since his own cult is so similar in practice and subject to most of the same criticisms. He focuses mostly on worthless prescriptions (a problem scientology doesnt have, since they arent allowed to prescribe) but that is just a surface symptom.

Rather than listen to a scientologist who is compromised by his own cult trying to attack psychiatry, I would recommend the more robust criticism that has come from competent psychologists, starting with the link above.

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[TheGratefulNet]

look, he's not saying its aliens.

(but its aliens).

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[Anonymous Coward]

"tea-tard" and "civilized" on the same sentence!

Actually, they were in two distinct sentences.

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[Hognoxious]

they've managed to demonstrate that Tom Cruise is an insufferable idiot.

Didn't the movie Cocktail already do that?

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[RivenAleem]

Well, they've managed to demonstrate that Tom Cruise is an insufferable idiot.

That counts for something.

I recently 'met' Tom Cruise. He stayed for hours after a local movie premier meeting fans and signing autographs. He's far from insufferable, and most certainly not an idiot. He may have an over large ego but, given what he does for a living, that's not a major flaw. He has always been genuine to his fans and does a lot of charitable work. That counts for something too.

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[Hatta]

If you fool yourself into believing your scam is real, it's still a scam. See also, religion. And my "one paper" is one paper that analyses the entirety of all existing data on the topic. SSRIs don't work, and if psychiatrists don't know this, then they're still committing fraud by claiming to be experts.

For the record, the psychiatrist I saw knew about this paper, had no scientific objections to the paper or its conclusions, and still tried to give me SSRIs for an HRSD of 14. I asked her how she could justify that, and she said 95% of patients in her clinic that took SSRIs improved. As if the placebo effect, confirmation bias, self selection by the patients, etc. simply didn't exist. It's possible I got an incompetent one, but the university hospital here is pretty good so I doubt it.

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[Hatta]

The referenced study is very limited (only addresses moderately depressed people, only SSRIs.) That's not where antidepressants are most important.

But that is where most antidepressants are prescribed.

Calling all of psychiatry a scam because some popular methods are flawed, is a far worse error than your accusation against psychiatry.

I didn't. I said psychiatry for depression is almost entirely a scam. Most depressive patients take antidepressants and experience almost no benefit from them.

Like a lot of medicine, it doesn't work as well as we'd like, but it's much better than anything else out there.

Placebo controlled studies show that it doesn't actually work at all in the vast majority of cases.

My criticisms of psychiatry are in no way intended to be construed as support for Scientology.

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[ConceptJunkie]

See, and this is what people forget. Just because these meds are over-prescribed doesn't mean that they aren't effective, nor that there aren't many people who genuinely benefit from them. I'm glad to hear your life has been improved. I know a bit about depression, but I can't imagine what "severe" depression must be like. Don't let the cynics get to you.

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[Jawnn]

Rather than resorting to ad hominem, how about you counter some of my arguments? If I'm wrong, that's the only way I'll learn. And if I'm not, you'll learn something by trying to refute me.

Did that. Pointed out the broken logic in your original post. You've ignored that, so I'll join the ad hominem... You're an ignorant tool who knows nothing about that which he rants.

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[Jawnn]

If you fool yourself into believing your scam is real, it's still a scam.

The implication being that psychiatrists do this. Please cite you sources supporting this remarkable assertion or STFU.

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[Anonymous Coward]

Tom Cruise is also a short unibrow pussy!

Re:If you sleep with a dog, you get fleas

[seebs]

So what you're saying is, even the most carefully cherry-picked of hostile readings confirm absolute and undeniable real benefits for a non-zero number of patients, and this is proof that there is no benefit whatsoever and the whole thing is a scam.

See, the claim Cruise is making isn't "these only help some people". It's "these are absolutely never of use to anyone".

It's all rooted in L. Ron Hubbard's rage against the psychiatrists of the world after they refused to continue prescribing him antidepressants.

Principals

[Anonymous Coward]

High Brow Magazine abandons principals in pursuit of the almighty dollar, news at 11.

Slashvertisement

[Anonymous Coward]

This article is something, coming from a tech site that has blatantly posted advertisements disguised as stories, intentionally or not.

The only reason the atlantic caught shit was that it was that CoS is easy an hated target, product placement articles are nothing new or interesting.

Re:Slashvertisement

[h4rr4r]

You don't see the difference between product placement and a cult using a newspaper to ruin more lives?

When does slashdot run ads for crack cocaine? That would be similar to what we are talking about here.

Re:Slashvertisement

[Black Parrot]

You don't see the difference between product placement and a cult using a newspaper to ruin more lives?

When does slashdot run ads for crack cocaine? That would be similar to what we are talking about here.

Well, Slashdot is always pushing bitcoin. If that won't ruin your life, nothing will.

Re:Slashvertisement

[Anonymous Coward]

The point is that in both cases people are willing to put moral and ethical principles out the window when dollars are waved at them. Yeah, Scientology is much more evil than some tech company being allowed to use the Slashdot frontpage to shill, but it's just matters of degree.

Re:Slashvertisement

[h4rr4r]

Matters of degree are a big deal though.

The question is where to draw that line, at any shilling or for bad enough product. Slashdot seems to have chosen the latter, the Atlantic seems to want to get rid of the line altogether.

Re:Slashvertisement

[thePowerOfGrayskull]

When does slashdot run ads for crack cocaine?

My god man - how can you say that so callously? I just ordered my twenty-seventh Raspberry Pi board - this month!

Insensitive clod.

Re:Slashvertisement

[Hatta]

the Atlantic seems to want to get rid of the line altogether.

An ad that looks just like reporting is in reality just shitty reporting. If the Atlantic wants to publish shitty reporting, their readers will move elsewhere. Problem solved.

Re:Slashvertisement

[vlm]

Its pretty easy to see where they are active, typical slashdot stories have around 200 posts, where they are active, it is much greater.

I donno about that... a typical "book report" might only score 10 comments, usually one of them is me asking why/how the book is better than "google for it"

I see small comment numbers on "tech" and large comment numbers on "politics". If it sounds like something you'd see screencasted on Hak5 or audio podcasted on hacker public radio theres like 50 comments, if it sounds like something you'd see on fox news or dr phil its got about 200 comments. If its the kind of thing the lamestream media would interrupt dancing with the stars or a football game to report live, you'll get about 500 comments.

The shills are pretty hard to separate from the trolls, even if you follow the money. The "I love e-ink" and "I can't read text on a LCD" (hello, unless you're using text2speech what are you doing here?) crowd, wtf are they trolls or shills or ? Or who's seriously paying the "I'll never buy an electric car until I can fill it with gas and drive for 18 continuous hours and my electric car needs a trailer hitch to hang my fake pickuptruck nuts" crowd?

Re:Slashvertisement

[YodasEvilTwin]

Some papers seem to get more successful the shittier their reporting. See tabloids.

Re:Slashvertisement

[Anonymous Coward]

You don't see the difference between product placement and a cult using a newspaper to ruin more lives?

While I agree that both the cult and crack ruin lives, the cult is legal and I see ads for lots of legal stuff that ruins lives (alcohol, sugar, fast food, cigarettes, etc). I think the important point you missed is The Atlantic at least labels these (poorly) as advertisements. Slashdot often has things listed as stories that are clearly not journalism, but advertisements.

Re:Slashvertisement

[tlhIngan]

I see small comment numbers on "tech" and large comment numbers on "politics". If it sounds like something you'd see screencasted on Hak5 or audio podcasted on hacker public radio theres like 50 comments, if it sounds like something you'd see on fox news or dr phil its got about 200 comments. If its the kind of thing the lamestream media would interrupt dancing with the stars or a football game to report live, you'll get about 500 comments.

Well, tech generally falls into one of two categories - "cool" and "uncool".

Political stories are, by their very nature, very polarized. This site attracts people from a variety of political viewpoints - libertarian, anarchists, socialist, communist, capitalist, free market, etc. It's natural they all have conflicting viewpoints because that's what differentiates one political view from another.

And then there's politics in tech as well - Google, Apple, Microsoft - they all have their fair share of haters, fanboys, and will always attract a bunch of trolls to bait both sides.

Heck, one common irony I see is how everyone complains when "non tech people" refuse to "learn about the technology they use" and ask others to help fix it (usually the /. poster about helping friends and family). On the other hand, the same tired old arguments get brought up over and over again because said posters fail to actually learn stuff that's not tech related (e.g., IP law is a good one - how many times do people have to confuse trademarks, patents (design and utility), and copyright?), or repeat the same old crap that's been debunked for years (e.g., "Will never buy from iTunes - Amazon only because it's DRM free" despite iTunes being DRM-free for many years now as well).

Heck, I'm sure we can compare the /. popultaion with the general population and similarities - mechanics complaining about "walled gardens" of modern cars, mechanics complaining about drivers not knowing anything about their cars, etc.

Re:Slashvertisement

[s.petry]

The post you responded too presented a valid point. Your response is an argument from Fallacy. No, there is no similarity as you describe. Further, you can not say that a person is more or less guilty of a crime depending on what the substance is. A guy found guilty of selling Crack is not "less guilty" than the person who was selling Heroin. Both are criminal acts and both are illegal.

I dislike CoS as much as the next person that dislikes the CoS, so don't confuse what I'm saying in any way with defending them.

Re:Slashvertisement

[Anonymous Coward]

Or who's seriously paying the "I'll never buy an electric car until I can fill it with gas and drive for 18 continuous hours and my electric car needs a trailer hitch to hang my fake pickuptruck nuts" crowd?

Hey, now, don't hate on us midwestern nerds. We have to drive a lot and we need the trailer hitch for when our cars get stuck in the snow or when we need to haul firewood and stuff. I have a trailer hitch on my 4 cyl Integra and it's quite useful. Thanks for reminding me that I need to buy a ballbag for it, though.

Re:Slashvertisement

[sjames]

The difference is the paid nature of the content. As far as I know, the slashvertisements are not paid ads disguised as stories and the comments are not covertly censored to eliminate criticism and create the illusion of grass roots support..

Re:Slashvertisement

[PhxBlue]

This article is something, coming from a tech site that has blatantly posted advertisements disguised as stories, intentionally or not.

Point, but part of the story here is that New Atlantic was actively deleting negative comments about Scientology while allowing positive comments to remain (albeit with a metric fuckton of downvotes). There's no such process of selective moderation at SlashDot because moderators are assigned at random.

Re:Slashvertisement

[Bob the Super Hamste]

Some papers seem to get more successful the shittier their reporting. See tabloids.

Or the USA TODAY that I get free at the hotel when I travel. I have heard that the international version isn't so bad but the domestic one is garbage.

Re:Slashvertisement

[Hentes]

When does slashdot run ads for crack cocaine?

There's a weed story every other week.

Re:Slashvertisement

[vlm]

I have a trailer hitch on my 4 cyl Integra and it's quite useful. Thanks for reminding me that I need to buy a ballbag for it, though.

Yeah that big turnoff for me isn't the bag hanging underneath, its the bag hanging under the cavernous gaping stretched out hole of a hitch receiver. Always brings up bad memories of goatse and the funniest part is the bag hanging guys on their manly pickup truck are supposed to be all Mr Homophobia, but here they are driving a goatse mobile instead. Maybe they're actually the brokeback mountain cowboys instead. I donno its all very weird. This all came from a discussion claiming a hitch without the ball bag is a "female hitch" and I'm all like there's something anatomically wrong about one with the bag, but now that you mention it there's something eerily familiar about those hitches with the ball bag swinging underneath it... oh no, ugh, now I get grossed out every time I see one, my brain needs bleach to expunge that hideous image.

Re:Slashvertisement

[chrismcb]

I think it wasn't so much that it was paid content, that look similar to unpaid content (I've personally always hated that) but it was the deletion of some of the critical comments.

Re:Slashvertisement

[Briareos]

When does slashdot run ads for crack cocaine?

My god man - how can you say that so callously? I just ordered my twenty-seventh Raspberry Pi board - this month!

Insensitive clod.

I know those boards are small and tasty and all, but... did nobody tell you that you're not supposed to eat them?

Re:Slashvertisement

[thePowerOfGrayskull]

I know those boards are small and tasty and all, but... did nobody tell you that you're not supposed to eat them?

If you know they're tasty, I daresay you are hardly in a position to give such advice.

The Onion's take on it

[John3]

The Onion skewered the "sponsored content" concept nicely yesterday. Even sponsored content needs to meet editorial standards, maybe even more so since you are accepting compensation for allowing them to use your brand name to promote theirs.

Re:The Onion's take on it

[davydagger]

mod points when I need one, +1

the onion rocks.

Re:The Onion's take on it

[Anonymous Coward]

"Sponsored content" without informing the reader is fraud, pure and simple. The people facilitating it should be in jail.

If they don't state on the spot that it's sponsored then that's all the evidence you need to know they are engaging in fraud. They are fraudulently misrepresenting an article as second party opinion, rather than first party propaganda.

After all, if it made no difference to inform the reader of the true affiliation then there should be no problem informing the reader, should there? Since there is a difference and they are willing to pay sometimes serious money for it then that difference is important and that means it's fraud. The Atlantic editor who approved it and the advertiser who paid for it should both at a minimum pay fines for seriously and deliberately misinforming thousands of readers and ideally should spend time in jail for their sins.

Re:The Onion's take on it

[fustakrakich]

The Onion is the new 'wikileaks'. That was actually stolen minutes from a CIA conference.

Re:The Onion's take on it

[s.petry]

There is a slight problem with your request for punishment. In order for the fraud to be punishable there must be intent to cause harm. Proving that this advert caused any harm, or was intended to cause harm, would be impossible (and without merit ).

Is it worthy of people boycotting the magazine forever? Most surely yes. Is it punishable? Not in a criminal sense, but consumers should punish them by boycotting. Further, other organizations in a similar line of work should publicly shun them and learn from their mistake.

Re:The Onion's take on it

[Anonymous Coward]

The people facilitating it should be in jail.

While I agree that the practice is egregiously unethical, and I wouldn't mind it being illegal, even if it was illegal, why should any non-violent criminal be put in jail?

Read this and think about how your attitude contributes to the problem. People who have a knee-jerk, "put 'em in jail" reaction to non-violent transgressions that may or may not be illegal ought to be in jail.

Re:The Onion's take on it

[Anonymous Coward]

Good link. however, (1) tons of nonviolent crimes are fatal to their victims. Think of the wars that have been started over fraud, for example. Or how about fraudulently withholding a poor laborer's wage? There's a reason that the Bible counts that one as murder, guilty of blood. (2) Not to mention, if we DID put nonviolent criminals in prison, most of our political leadership and much of our corporate leadership would be in jail.

But in fascism, you put the POOR in jail, on the pretext of nonviolent and violent crimes, many of which should be jailable offenses. The wealthy have alternative provisions for the same crimes, and that is where the problem lies, for it increases the rate for ALL the crimes. Thus your high incarceration rate.

Re:The Onion's take on it

[theArtificial]

(2) Not to mention, if we DID put nonviolent criminals in prison, most of our political leadership and much of our corporate leadership would be in jail.

I'm pretty sure you didn't think this all the way through, what do you think drug offenses and white collar crime are?

But in fascism, you put the POOR in jail, on the pretext of nonviolent and violent crimes, many of which should be jailable offenses.

Fascism aside, poor people don't get a fair shake in general anyway.

Re:The Onion's take on it

[Raenex]

"Sponsored content" without informing the reader is fraud, pure and simple. The people facilitating it should be in jail.

Check the article. It was labeled as "SPONSOR CONTENT", highlighted in bright yellow even, with a link to "What's this?" that explained it was from advertisers.

Re:The Onion's take on it

[Anonymous Coward]

In order for the fraud to be punishable there must be intent to cause harm.

Harm is a frequent side effect of fraud but isn't usually the intent.

Proving that this advert caused any harm, or was intended to cause harm, would be impossible (and without merit ).

The harm is the misinformation that causes people to make harmful choices e.g. Spending good money on snake oil or joining a harmful organization in part because a trusted and supposedly independent news source tells them it is a worthwhile organization. And this can cause problems for huge numbers of readers.

Is it worthy of people boycotting the magazine forever? Most surely yes. Is it punishable? Not in a criminal sense, but consumers should punish them by boycotting. Further, other organizations in a similar line of work should publicly shun them and learn from their mistake.

All true (though "forever" is a long time and organizations and labels/names/employment change) however I'm addressing the specific issue of fraudulent misrepresentation. You're right that it isn't legally pursued as much as, in my opinion, it should be however I believe the world would be a slightly better place if fraud laws were applied more consistently. At the moment these are applied more-or-less solely for direct monetary losses however losses come in many other forms.

Re:The Onion's take on it

[Anonymous Coward]

"Sponsored content" without informing the reader is fraud, pure and simple. The people facilitating it should be in jail.

Check the article. It was labeled as "SPONSOR CONTENT", highlighted in bright yellow even, with a link to "What's this?" that explained it was from advertisers.

Fair enough. However, I was speaking to the more general case (note other examples people have been mentioning here) and even on The Atlantic it is (probably deliberately) not clear that the link you describe applies to the following article. Google search does similar with their marginally-different-to-the-point-of-invisibility colored "sponsored links." In that case it is quite clear the vast majority of people don't understand the difference and that makes it a scam despite the fact that they are probably legally in the clear otherwise they wouldn't do it. Google has made and cost the world billions on that deception.

The Taliban and Cthulhu

[Anonymous Coward]

This was recently mocked by both the Onion and Boing Boing. I think this is one of the first times that I'm less afraid of Cthulhu than the alternative. Actually, Cthulhu looks pretty damn reasonable when he wears a suit and a tie.

Just a thought

[Anonymous Coward]

Just a question, but if the Catholic church or Baptist church put in a stealth advertisement would there be the same outcry? I'm agnostic so I'm not trying to push an agenda by asking this question.

Re:Just a thought

[jason.sweet]

so I'm not trying to push an agenda by asking this question.

Bullshit! Asking a question is always pushing an agenda. Even if you are only asking where to find a toilet, you are pushing an agenda.

Re:Just a thought

[Jerry Atrick]

All 3 so called 'churches' are diseases, all that differs is how virulent they are. The Catholics&Baptists are old and have evolved to not kill their hosts. The newbie scammers haven't and with luck will be eradicated before they adapt.

Re:Just a thought

[Anonymous Coward]

I think the issue is 'sponsored content' and its ethical implications in general. The Scientology ad is just the extreme example. It's kind of like the slippery slope argument, but we've already fallen down the slope. The argument is: "If we continue to allow the media to blur the lines between advertising and journalism, we'll end up with crazy cults attempting to lure in potential victims by portraying themselves as legitimate, socially acceptable, sane, non-cult religions that objective journalists shower with praise and deem worthy of publishing in reputable publications. Oh, wait, it just happened."

Re:Just a thought

[Anonymous Coward]

Even if you are only asking where to find a toilet, you are pushing an agenda.

No, then you're trying to hold off on "pushing an agenda" until you find one.

Way to have some integrity The atlantic....

[Anonymous Coward]

Dealing with the nutbags at the church of scientology... Whats up for next month? In bed with fred phelps?

"Serious Source of Revenue"

[CanHasDIY]

You know what the most serious source of revenue for a publication is? Readership.

Piss off your readers, they'll go somewhere else for news.

If your readers go somewhere else, so will your advertisers.

If The Atlantic takes a major fiscal hit over this (which I certainly hope they do), they've got no one to blame but themselves.

Re:"Serious Source of Revenue"

[Capt.Albatross]

You know what the most serious source of revenue for a publication is? Readership.

The heart of the problem is that readership is no longer an adequate source of revenue. The Atlantic's actions should be seen as an act of desperation, not a sell-out.

We are all losers if it becomes unfeasible to perform the quality of journalism that the Atlantic built its reputation on.

Re:"Serious Source of Revenue"

[CanHasDIY]

You know what the most serious source of revenue for a publication is? Readership.

The heart of the problem is that readership is no longer an adequate source of revenue. The Atlantic's actions should be seen as an act of desperation, not a sell-out.

Readership is still the key determining factor in the survivability of a publication, because advertisers base their decisions regarding where to place their adverts based on readership (or hits, or visits, or whatever term for "people who see this material" you want to use). No readers (site visitors) == no advertisements == no money.

We are all losers if it becomes unfeasible to perform the quality of journalism that the Atlantic built its reputation on.

I take it you don't watch any of the 24-hour-cycle media networks, do you? Low quality journalism coupled with near-constant advertisement is pretty much the name of the game these days, and you're right - human social progression loses as a result.

Re:"Serious Source of Revenue"

[Anonymous Coward]

You know what the most serious source of revenue for a publication is? Readership.

The heart of the problem is that readership is no longer an adequate source of revenue. The Atlantic's actions should be seen as an act of desperation, not a sell-out.

Readership is still the key determining factor in the survivability of a publication, because advertisers base their decisions regarding where to place their adverts based on readership (or hits, or visits, or whatever term for "people who see this material" you want to use). No readers (site visitors) == no advertisements == no money.

Well, exactly. My point is that this relationship is no longer generating sufficient revenue to keep good journalism going. The fact that it is the key source of revenue is what makes the situation so serious.

It is my understanding that the decline in revenue preceded the decline in quality, and so cannot be attributed to it. It seems to be a general problem, not just a matter of bad decisions at the Atlantic.

Of course, now that the decline has started, it is very likely to exacerbate the problem in the future. I don't suppose this is unknown to the management and editorial staff of the Atlantic, which is why I think this event is an act of desperation. It is easy to be critical, but the action should be considered in context.

I take it you don't watch any of the 24-hour-cycle media networks, do you?

Hardly ever.

BoingBoing did as well...

[Anonymous Coward]

Dread Cthulhu leads his cult to a banner year. Its amazing how good the sponsorship opportunities have been.

Re:BoingBoing did as well...

[John3]

Very amusing, thanks for pointing this one out.

Don't be so quick dismiss a Fox News article

[roccomaglio]

Our media is constantly showing their biases. I would not be surprised if someone at the Atlantic was a devote Scientologist. Just this week CBS told CNET that they could not give a best in show to Dish's SlingBox. It is up to you the consumer of media to decide what is accurate or not. Fox News sometimes reports on things that other media chooses not to cover. They also choose to give a voice to some people that other media chooses to ignore. I read a large variety of sources and then use my own judgement as to what is believable or not.

Re:Don't be so quick dismiss a Fox News article

[Anonymous Coward]

Except Fox News has actually gone to court to preserve their right to lie to their viewers.

Re:Don't be so quick dismiss a Fox News article

[Bill_the_Engineer]

Except in CNET's case, the decision was driven by the parent's company litigation with Dish network. I can understand CBS' aversion to having one of its subsidiaries endorsing a product that its trying to stop in court. I'm not commenting on the merits of their case, but I can understand the situation they found themselves in. I always found CNET's "Best in Show" arbitrary and in fact one of their "Best in Show" was awarded twice (2012 & 2013) to the same product that has yet seen the light of day (The Razor Game Pad).

Also in CBS' case they didn't write an editorial against "The Hopper". They asked their subsidiary not to award it best in show. Whereas the Atlantic was actually presenting advertising as news.

Re:Don't be so quick dismiss a Fox News article

[Anonymous Coward]

Fox News sometimes reports on things that other media chooses not to cover. They also choose to give a voice to some people that other media chooses to ignore.

[citations needed]

Re:Don't be so quick dismiss a Fox News article

[admdrew]

I think this CNET situation shows a significant issue with the more 'popular' journalism - corporate bias. While we can all understand CBS's motivations, I feel that there needs to be far more journalistic integrity in situations like these; CNET's job was to provide awards based on merit, independent from what their parent company may be involved in (although, like you said, some of their reporting is questionable at best, even when parent company conflict of interest isn't involved).

So, basically, fuck you CBS - they should know better than most companies what journalistic integrity is, and what it means to staunchly follow it. Ultimately, this is really no different from all of the other major news outlets, which are for-profit and are organized like other standard corporations (highly-paid executive staff, ultimate motivation is the company's fiscal bottom line).

Re:Don't be so quick dismiss a Fox News article

[guttentag]

Our media is constantly showing their biases.

Every person has his own biases. A journalist's job is to minimize those biases as much as possible to present a fair and balanced perspective. Some groups of journalists (The New York Times, for example) are better at this than others (The Washington Times).

That being said, in every media organization there is a struggle between the people who produce the content (the editor and his team of editors and reporters) and the people who find ways to pay salaries and keep the lights on (the publisher and his team of accountants and salespeople). If the publisher had his way, they'd be selling "The Atlantic: The Breakfast Cereal" in every supermarket and prostituting the brand to push anything people are willing to pay them to push. If the editor had his way, there would be no ads, twice as much space for stories and three times as many reporters on staff. Ultimately they have to find a balance.

I've watched this play out at a major newspaper. I remember the publisher pleasantly announcing that the newspaper's home page would be replaced by a "portal" of advertising, with a small box readers could click on if they wanted to read news (a mutiny resulted and he left a few months later). And I remember hearing the top editor screaming "What the fuck is a pop-up ad doing on my home page?!" so loud we could hear it across the newsroom even though his door was closed (years later, they had to give in and allow pop-ups).

In the last 10-15 years, that balance has been shifting in favor of the publishers, because they're under pressure to find new sources of revenue to keep the lights on and pay everyone's salaries. Occasionally this results in the editor having to beat his head against the negotiating table because his choices are (a) allow sponsored content that is bullshit designed to look like facts written by his team, and hope it's a temporary band-aid as opposed to the "new normal," or (b) go out to the newsroom and tell his team they're out of a job.

"Advertorials" and "sponsored content" that masquerade as real news stories are a line that should not be crossed. There are no standards that make them OK. If your readers can't trust what you publish, you're done.

Re:Don't be so quick dismiss a Fox News article

[Bill_the_Engineer]

CNET jumped the shark when they started "reviewing" refrigerators, toast ovens, and other assorted kitchen appliances.

Re:Don't be so quick dismiss a Fox News article

[Anonymous Coward]

They also choose to give a voice to some people that other media chooses to ignore.

Is that in the small segment of time remaining after they finish interviewing each other?

How about selling out an entire country?

[Anonymous Coward]

Globe and Mail's Oil Sands Advertorial Blurs Lines. Public Editor Won't Discuss

http://thetyee.ca/Mediacheck/2012/10/22/Globe-Oil-Sands-Advertorial/

The Globe and Mail is not a Scandal Sheet.

It is English Canada's Newspaper of Record!

This happens all the time.

[Dyinobal]

This happens all the time, why do you think we don't have any serious discussion about money in politics. Because the media gets paid because of all the money in politics via ad time etc. Why would the media want to have a discussion about money in politics? They profit from it like crazy.

I don't see what's new here...

[Woogiemonger]

What's the difference between this advertisement and all those Dianetics commercials I grew up with? I still see Scientology paying for advertising in all sorts of commonplace venues, including cable TV commercials, the "stress testing" in the middle of malls, and various newspapers and magazines. Is the Atlantic held to a higher standard for whatever reason?

Re:I don't see what's new here...

[Bob the Super Hamste]

The difference is that in the situations you mentioned everyone knew it was advertising where in this case it was advertising passed off as news. Billboards and TV commercials are not news, and neither is a kiosk setup in the mall for "stress testing".

Re:I don't see what's new here...

[chrismcb]

Is the Atlantic held to a higher standard for whatever reason?

Yes.
There are two differences. One is that the ad was made to look like a normal, unbiased news article. But at the same time, someone was removing critical comments. The latter is bad, the former is pretty much unforgivable for a news site.

The Atlantic isn't alone

[Loosifur]

Foreign Policy, which was bought by the Washington Post a few years ago, started running these type of things around the time (shortly before or after, don't recall) of the change in ownership. Now that I think about it, it was probably shortly after, because the Post itself began running a bunch of "Chinawatch" segments on its site, which were basically advertorials from China Daily, one of China's state-run newspapers. At any rate, around the time I noticed that FP started to be over half full of ads by volume, and that easily 3/4 of that was some marketing drivel about how awesome China is, or how Dubai is doing such wonderful things in the world, is when I dropped my subscription. I'm not paying for a bimonthly travel brochure, and I'm sure as hell not reading a magazine about international relations that sells ad space to propagandists.

"Advertisement" header

[davidwr]

Newspapers used to put "advertorial" content in a box and label it "advertisement." Some still do, at least in the "non-advertising-only" sections of the printed paper.

It's about time TV, radio, and online media did the same.

Pretty nice magazine you once had

[Zawahiri]

Well, so much for credibility.

Scientology is fading

[anagama]

I cam across this very long, very interesting story about Scientology last night which details how with diminishing membership, it is trying to squeeze the very last dime out of those remaining and accelerating its die-off.

http://www.buzzfeed.com/alexklein/is-scientology-self-destructing

But inside the church, the Ideal Orgs are sparking insurrection. Across the country, donors and high-ranking executives say that the aggressive fundraising and construction scheme is used to enrich the central church at the expense of the rank and file, helping to grow the Scientology war chest to over a billion dollars. Two former members, Mike Rinder and Mark Elliott, went so far as to call the project a "real estate scam." To some of these defectors, the structures are metaphors for the religion itself: garish on the outside, empty on the inside. The irony is that the very expansion that Scientology lauds as its renaissance is actually a symbol of internal dissent and decline.

***

  And the ranks of the faithful are dropping. In 2008, there were 25,000 self-identifying American Scientologists, down by over a half from 55,000 in 2001, according to the American Religious Identification Survey. (Over the same time period, the number of Wiccans more than doubled from 134,000 to 342,000.) The 2011 British census showed a total of 2,418 Scientologists across England and Wales; about 73 times as many Brits identified themselves as "Jedi."

Re:Scientology is fading

[briancox2]

I LOVE that story. I'd already read it before coming on here. Both of these stories are the current feature on Mark Rathbun's WordPress site right now. The real question of importance to me (because I am a former member of the Co$ and currently practicing outside of the corrupt organization) is WHY did the Co$ feel a need to justify spending about a billion dollars on these buildings when they're empty. And the answer that question is reported on AT LENGTH in Alex Klein's article. As a disillusioned (and now Independent) Scientologist I am very happy to see that someone is telling our story. Not a hate filled rant from a wild-eyed anti-religious zealot. But a very REAL story of the continuing struggle of the Scientologists who can see what's going on ... against the corrupt and manipulative management that (until the internet) was able to silence all former member/critics.

Re:Scientology is fading

[Anonymous Coward]

the corrupt and manipulative management that (until the internet) was able to silence all former member/critics.

Not quite all, in fact they've never really stopped the entheta, before the internet they were just able to stop people in one part of the globe from seeing entheta in another part.
Now people can not only see it all, they can see it all gathered on one webpage.

Re:Scientology is fading

[briancox2]

Before the internet, it was also difficult for people who were Scientologists to learn about the corruption going on. Not anymore.

New York Times

[ThatsNotPudding]

I can recall a fair amount of sponsored ads pretending to be reporting in the New York Times. During the run-up to invading Iraq.

One of the cops always yells 'he's got a gun!' as the broken door gives way.

Your an idiot and spreading lies

[SmallFurryCreature]

There are to crimes, degrees. Not all murder is equal, not all theft is equal and not all corruption is equal. It is one thing to take money for advertising a stupid product and quite another for advertising a murderous criminal organization preying on the weak minded.

That you don't get this shows you to be a poor human being, no doubt you would view the theft of a loaf of bread the same as the theft of a diamond.

Re:Your an idiot and spreading lies

[s.petry]

The rate you refer to is what society uses as a measurefor the punishment, not the state of guilt or innocence. If I take property that does not belong to me I am guilty of theft. Whether the theft was a diamond or loaf of bread is not relevant as to my guilt of crime.

Claiming that I'm more guilty based on what I stole is ludicrous.

Re:Your an idiot and spreading lies

[tragedy]

Claiming that I'm more guilty based on what I stole is ludicrous.

Errr grand theft vs. petty theft?

Re:Your an idiot and spreading lies

[s.petry]

Which relates to "punishment", not "guilt" Being guilty of Murder is being guilty of Murder. If it's 2nd degree the punishment will differ from 1st degree, but the state of "guilt" does not change. A person can not be "more guilty" of murder because of the degree. A person is either guilty or innocent.

Re:Your an idiot and spreading lies

[tragedy]

Guilt viewed as a simple binary state for each potential infraction sure. That does not tend to be the way most people, including most lawyers seem to think of guilt. Guilt there seems to be generally seen on a scale. Consider homicide. Someone can be guilty or not guilty of homicide. Either they caused the death of another human being or they didn't, but there's an entire scale of homicide (even if we ignore self-defence) all the way from indirectly causing a death through negligence to entirely premeditated murder. There are a lot of individual named crimes on that scale, and you're claiming that each of those is a separate act that someone is either guilty or not guilty of, so guilt is binary. Except you're forgetting that the punishments often vary even for these individual named crimes specifically because the legal system recognizes that people who have committed these crimes may have different degrees of guilt. The individual, named forms of homicide, after all, are only a way to pigeonhole acts from an entire spectrum of human behaviour.

Re:Your an idiot and spreading lies

[s.petry]

Your logic is rather flawed. I'm not surprised, hell this is why we have such an imbalance of justice in the US. You exactly state that you agree with me here: Except you're forgetting that the punishments often vary even for these individual named crimes specifically because the legal system recognizes that people who have committed these crimes may have different degrees of guilt. The individual, named forms of homicide, after all, are only a way to pigeonhole acts from an entire spectrum of human behaviour.. Yet you are claiming that I'm wrong because you want someone to be "more guilty" or "less guilty" of a crime based on what ever criteria you toss out there.

Staying on the murder theme, because it's simple, ask why we have so many types of murder in the laws? It's not because of how guilty someone is, that is for sure. We have varying levels because when we punish someone the circumstances surrounding guilt matter. The legal system is properly looking at "why" you killed someone in order to determine your punishment. Self defense? You walk away free. Premeditated murder? Life or Capital punishment. Involuntary manslaughter? Depends on circumstances pretty heavily. None of those things have to do with how guilty someone is, but rather how they are punished (or not) for the crime.

Committing a crime is a binary decision. You either commit a crime, or don't commit a crime. (Don't confuse that statement with things like "well if a bank robber murders a teller" because that would be an additional crime and an additional binary operation.>/p>

Of course people in power want you to believe otherwise. Fuck, you think that nobody has gone to jail over operation fast and furious means that nobody did anything wrong? Sorry, that's not what is happening. You have been conditioned in to believing a false reality. That reality is that I may only be partially guilty of theft depending on who I stole from or what I stole. If I steal your money from a bank, as long as I'm a banker it's legal. Who has been put in jail for Real estate Fraud in the US? Who has been put in jail for bribery, collusion, conspiracy, etc.. (related to OWS being crushed by the FBI, TSA, and Big Businesses cash). These things are all provable, but they won't go to court because people are imbeciles and/or gutless. Like you, many people believe that guilt and innocence are grey areas.

Re:Your an idiot and spreading lies

[tragedy]

Yet you are claiming that I'm wrong because you want someone to be "more guilty" or "less guilty" of a crime based on what ever criteria you toss out there.

You're putting words in my mouth. I want no such thing. I'm simply recognizing that categorization, while often necessary, is only a way of modeling the real world. Models are always imperfect. Consider the simple binary question of whether an object is black or white. How simple is it really?

We actually seem to agree on the reality of the situation, but disagree on the semantics. To me, there are binary facts such as "did the defendant kill the deceased" and then a range of what I call guilt (based on other facts, of course) when the the answer is "yes". To you, the binary facts of the case are the boolean "guilt" value, then there's another unnamed range (we could call it culpability) to determine how much fault the defendant has. You can break that up into lots of little binary guilt values, but you're obviously a computer professional, so you know that you can describe a point on a range with any precision you want with enough binary values. So, I say we're just arguing semantics. I happen to thing the popular usage of the terminology among legal professionals is closer to the way I see it than you, but it's not really worth too much strife.

You have been conditioned in to believing a false reality.

You're really reading way too much into what I said. I was just replying to your statement that:

Claiming that I'm more guilty based on what I stole is ludicrous.

By my definition of guilt, that statement doesn't hold up. By your definition of guilt, it just might. The problem is that your definition of guilt in that case seems to be a simple binary question of "did the defendant do it" with no consideration of what "it" is. Most people in the world think that it matters whether "it" is a grain of salt or a transplant organ. I think you also think it matters, but you're defining "guilty" far too narrowly.

Re:Your an idiot and spreading lies

[s.petry]

Honestly I don't believe I am reading anything other than what you wrote. If you note the whole paragraph I quoted, you will see that you contradict yourself. This backs what I pointed out, in that people believe in something rather delusional.

Lets go a bit further: How can you believe in a different definition of guilt other than what is in the dictionary? Think about that question very hard. There is only one definition of guilt, and only one definition of innocent (don't pull out the semantics card and say 1.) 2) etc..). If you need to change the definition of a word to make your logic work, then your logic can't be very good. There is no broad definition of "guilt" like there would be with "red". Defining guilt is as straight forward as defining "One" or "Ten".

That last point is the delusion that many people believe in (or perhaps a better way of defining the delusion). If I have one block of stone, or one feather, I still have exactly "one" item. No matter how big the stone or how small the feather, the definition of "One" can not be changed. It's the same with being guilty of something. It would be the same as being innocent of something. There is no scale of committing an act. You either "did" or "did not" do something.

Re:Your an idiot and spreading lies

[tragedy]

Honestly I don't believe I am reading anything other than what you wrote. If you note the whole paragraph I quoted, you will see that you contradict yourself. This backs what I pointed out, in that people believe in something rather delusional.

The "paragraph" you quoted was:

Except you're forgetting that the punishments often vary even for these individual named crimes specifically because the legal system recognizes that people who have committed these crimes may have different degrees of guilt. The individual, named forms of homicide, after all, are only a way to pigeonhole acts from an entire spectrum of human behaviour.

It contains no contradiction that I can see. You certainly didn't point one out, you just claimed that I was "exactly stat[ing] that [I] agree with [you]" and that I "want someone to be 'more guilty' or 'less guilty' of a crime based on what ever criteria you toss out there." Your argument may be very obvious to you based on your personal understanding of the meaning of the term "guilt", but you never actually presented your analysis, just repeated my words as if your claimed contradiction should be self-evident. If you have a contradiction to show, please illustrate more clearly. All I see is myself saying that there are individual named crimes that represent different areas in a spectrum of actual human activities. The named crimes narrow things down, but still can't precisely characterize the precise nature of the actual event.

Lets go a bit further: How can you believe in a different definition of guilt other than what is in the dictionary?

There are a lot of dictionaries. One definition I can find is:

That quality which renders criminal and liable to punishment; or it is that disposition to violate the law, which has manifested itself by some act already done. The opposite of innocence

That definition defines guilt as a "quality" which certainly does not need to be a binary statement of fact. The Merriam-Webster definition you provide says:

1 : the fact of having committed a breach of conduct especially violating law and involving a penalty; broadly : guilty conduct
2 a : the state of one who has committed an offense especially consciously
    b : feelings of culpability especially for imagined offenses or from a sense of inadequacy : self-reproach
3 : a feeling of culpability for offenses

Those definitions cover guilt as simple fact, as emotion, and as a state one may be considered to be in as a result of criminal activity. Still not as cut and dried as you make it out to be. A state certainly doesn't have to be just on or off. I'm not pulling out the semantics card here, it's inherent in the discussion.

That last point is the delusion that many people believe in (or perhaps a better way of defining the delusion). If I have one block of stone, or one feather, I still have exactly "one" item. No matter how big the stone or how small the feather, the definition of "One" can not be changed. It's the same with being guilty of something. It would be the same as being innocent of something. There is no scale of committing an act. You either "did" or "did not" do something.

And yet, if you have two feathers, despite each one being exactly "one" item, they are both still unique items, qualitatively different. One feather may be longer or wider or have more barbs, have a different color and pattern and texture, etc. In precisely the same way, one "guilty of murder in the second degree" is going to be qualitatively different than any other "guilty of murder in the second degree" (barring double jeopardy). Each individual criminal act stands alone. It's true that the defendant either did it or didn't do it, but no two crimes were done in exactly the same way under exactly the same circumstances with exactly the same emotions, intentions, motives, etc.

Anyway, look at it this way, if the legal system saw guilt the way you insist they must, why does it have "not guilty by reason of ____" verdicts for people who definitely committed the act?

Re:Your an idiot and spreading lies

[s.petry]

Actually it does contain the contradiction I mentioned.

Except you're forgetting that the punishments often vary even for these individual named crimes

That statement backs what I said, which is that the "class" of crime is dictating the punishment. Not "how guilty" someone is, because being more or less guilty is not logically possible.

specifically because the legal system recognizes that people who have committed these crimes may have different degrees of guilt.

Here you claim such a level of being more or less guilty exists and is in those same laws.

There is no such thing as being more or less guilty, and pulling at a poorly worded definition to back your point is really grasping at straws. Did you even notice that the definition you provided states very clearly "The opposite of innocent". If what you said was true, it would say something like "maybe not innocent" or something foolish like that. It does not, it shows very clearly a binary operation.

Your logic is broken still, but does not seem like you care to admit it.

Anyway, look at it this way, if the legal system saw guilt the way you insist they must, why does it have "not guilty by reason of ____" verdicts for people who definitely committed the act?

That has NOTHING to do with a varying level of Guilt! Read it again! It does not even imply that someone could be more guilty of a crime, or less guilty of a crime "because". It states that given a certain situation, like insanity, a person can not be held "guilty" for a crime.

Re:Your an idiot and spreading lies

[tragedy]

Actually it does contain the contradiction I mentioned.

You've never actually specified the contradiction, only claimed it was there and offered a quotation of what I said as if it were self-evident. It does not seem to be as obvious as you think it is.

That statement backs what I said, which is that the "class" of crime is dictating the punishment. Not "how guilty" someone is, because being more or less guilty is not logically possible.

But the "class" of crime almost always dictates a range of possible punishment with discretion over that punishment being given to judges, juries and prosecutors depending on the situation. Then, after the trial, how much punishment is also often subject to parole boards and other actors who take into consideration such factors as remorse, which is just a synonym for guilt (in the personal sense). 'Being more or less guilty" is only "not logically possible" when you are precisely defining guilt as a binary state. That depends on the precise definition of guilt. You don't seem to deny that, aside from the simple yes/no of "did the defendant do it" there is a quality which can be expressed as a point on a range which determines culpability. So we're really just arguing over whether or not we can call that quality degree of guilt, or if it has a different name. Semantics.

There is no such thing as being more or less guilty, and pulling at a poorly worded definition to back your point is really grasping at straws. Did you even notice that the definition you provided states very clearly "The opposite of innocent". If what you said was true, it would say something like "maybe not innocent" or something foolish like that. It does not, it shows very clearly a binary operation.

I should have cited the definition better. It was from: _A Law Dictionary, Adapted to the Constitution and Laws of the United States_. By John Bouvier. Published 1856. Considering that your definition came from Webster's, you really shouldn't be throwing stones. You also don't quite seem to understand how definitions or language itself work. Definitions are never ironclad. One part of a definition is not meant to override the other parts, merely to give a broader sense of the connotations of the word. Also, as hot is the opposite of cold, and vice versa, does that then mean that temperature is a binary condition? Binary opposition is a useful structuralist tool but, outside the SAT's, it's important to be able to look beyond it to underlying reality which is seldom that simple. In any case, the source I was citing essentially defines "innocence" as "an absence of guilt", so taking "the opposite of innocent" as the important part of the first definition would define both terms circularly.

Your logic is broken still, but does not seem like you care to admit it.

My logic is not broken. Once again, we are both being logical, we're just starting with very slightly different axioms based on our understanding of the term "guilt".

That has NOTHING to do with a varying level of Guilt! Read it again! It does not even imply that someone could be more guilty of a crime, or less guilty of a crime "because". It states that given a certain situation, like insanity, a person can not be held "guilty" for a crime.

It holds that they cannot be held "guilty" of the crime because they lack mens rea. Meaning that they are technically guilty, but that their psychological state and/or the psychological state and/or actions of the victim reduces their guilt. Look additionally at people being let off easy due to age or lack of priors, or people being sent away for life due to three strikes laws. The law certainly seems to view guilt as a quality a person can possess in greater or lesser degree regardless of the facts of the particular case before the court. Look at the history of the concept of guilt in culture. Look at _The Story of the Children who Play

Re:Your an idiot and spreading lies

[s.petry]

See, you say it yourself again: you agree with my statement that "Punishment" is what is scaling. But the "class" of crime almost always dictates a range of possible punishment with discretion over that punishment being given to judges

I agree with this statement absolutely. I have said this from the start. The punishment for a crime is variable.

You also don't quite seem to understand how definitions or language itself work. Definitions are never ironclad.

That is absolutely false. The whole point of a definition and debate is for clarity. One is absolutely One (using my previous example). I can not have more "One" than you, or less "One" than you. If we both have "One", we both have "One". Guilt is exactly the same classification of term. If we are both guilty of theft, we have both committed thievery. If you stole a diamond and I stole an apple, the fact that we are "Guilty" does not change and can not be metered or scaled. There is no fuzzy definition for it, no matter how bad you want there to be. And if you don't like "One" and "Guilt", lets say "Running" or "Died" or "Born" or perhaps "Late" or "Early". All of those things are clearly defined and binary. You are either late, or you are not late. You are dead, or not dead. You are either running, or not running.

If you are late for a date with your significant other, you are late. If you are 5 minutes late, you will be scolded. If you are an hour late, you won't be getting any tonight. See how that works? This is basic rhetoric and basic philosophy. Go ahead and tell your partner "it's fuzzy, I was only 30 minutes late so it does not count the same as an hour" and see if that changes things. And yes, you would be "Guilty" of being late.

I stand by what I said at the beginning of this discussion. Stealing food from a starving child just to watch them suffer and stealing food from a supermarket to feed a starving child are both guilt, but they are qualitatively different.

Not possible and completely illogical.

Same with stealing gum vs. stealing a car. What you steal, and the circumstances under which you steal it, do make a difference in how guilty you are.

This statement is not rational. See my example of being late. You either "are" or "are not" late. There is no grey area there, and there is no grey area with guilt. The scale for punishment relates to "what" you stole. The fact that "you stole" can not possibly be scaling.

Re:Your an idiot and spreading lies

[s.petry]

Another quick point: You really need to read up on mens rea. The fact that a person can or can not be held accountable for a crime is not the same as saying "guilt" is variable. Mens rea states that a person must have the state of mind required to commit a crime in order to be held accountable for the crime. You do realize that being held "accountable" is the punishment for a crime right? So an insane person, who had no idea they were holding a hammer and smashing someone's brains in can not be held accountable for murder. A person knowing they are holding a hammer, angry at the victim, while smashing their brains in would be held accountable. Go read the definition of "Accountable" if you have doubts.

Re:Your an idiot and spreading lies

[tragedy]

I agree with this statement absolutely. I have said this from the start. The punishment for a crime is variable.

Yes, the punishment is variable. It's relative to the degree of guilt. If you're not using the word "guilt" for the quality that punishment is relative to, you must be using some other word. What word do you use?

That is absolutely false. The whole point of a definition and debate is for clarity.

The point of definitions is for clarity, to be sure. But not only does language drift and fork and converge, fork and reconverge, it also predates dictionaries. English certainly pre-dates any English dictionaries. Dictionaries are developed by people hoping to rationalize language. The definitions in the earliest dictionaries come from scholars who examined the usage of words in context and attempted to define them. Later dictionaries use older dictionaries as sources, but also do their own research into historical and contemporary usage.

One is absolutely One (using my previous example). I can not have more "One" than you, or less "One" than you. If we both have "One", we both have "One".

But we don't. If we're talking about real world things, the "One" that you have is different from the "One" I have. If it's feathers or rocks, it doesn't matter. Pigeon-holing the objects is a way to rationalize the universe, but the map is not the terrain. For example, one liter of real-world gasoline is not equivalent to another gallon of gasoline. The chemical composition, quality, temperature, precise quantity, etc. are different. We have standards enforced to ensure that one is enough like another that we can treat them as identical for purposes of trade and usage in engines, etc. Technically speaking, even with those standards, neither liter actually needs to have a single chemical in common for them to still be considered equivalent liters of gasoline.

As another example, let's say that I have "One" child and you have "One" child. We both take them to the playground and we each take home "One" child. Are our co-parents at home going to be very happy when the "One" we arrive home with isn't the "One" we left with?

Guilt is exactly the same classification of term. If we are both guilty of theft, we have both committed thievery. If you stole a diamond and I stole an apple, the fact that we are "Guilty" does not change and can not be metered or scaled. There is no fuzzy definition for it, no matter how bad you want there to be. And if you don't like "One" and "Guilt", lets say "Running" or "Died" or "Born" or perhaps "Late" or "Early". All of those things are clearly defined and binary. You are either late, or you are not late. You are dead, or not dead. You are either running, or not running.

This is still all only if there is only one possible definition of guilt which must be binary. That just doesn't agree with real-world common usage. Heck, even if you were correct that it's the only acceptable usage of the term guilty, you'd be wrong to use it that way. Even if it's a boolean and we call "stole a diamond" A and "stole an apple" B, A and B both being true wouldn't create a relationship between them. You have multiple guilty/innocent values that each stand alone. You keep saying that I want this or that. Please stop projecting desires and motivations onto me. I have no desire for fuzzy definitions but I do recognize that, when they model the real world, they are necessarily fuzzy.

As for "Running", "Died", "Late" and "Early", perhaps even "Born", those are all, in fact, not as clearly defined as you imply, and not necessarily binary. I've met numerous people who say that they have died, and try discussing with a physician sometime the vagaries of determining an exact time of death. Then consider medical advances. If we ever develop a way to revive people an hour after their heart stops and they stop breathing, what does that say about the bright line between

Re:Your an idiot and spreading lies

[tragedy]

But mens rea doesn't refer only to people who have absolutely no grasp on reality as you're implying. The principle of mens rea does introduce variability to guilt. It actually adds an extra dimension of guilt for someone to be guilty on, and it does have a range. It can include the completely demented individual who doesn't even recognize object's they're holding or motions they're making or an individual who does know they have a hammer, and is angry at the victim who the court decides has been subjected to sufficient anguish at the hands of the victim that it was justifiable. That's not as common these days as it used to be, but it still happens from time to time.

Go read the definition of "Accountable" if you have doubts.

A you may have finally said it there. That may be the word I was looking for. The one that you use to describe a range where I would simply use the word guilt. That could be where we have this little semantic issue.

Re:Your an idiot and spreading lies

[s.petry]

As for "Running", "Died", "Late" and "Early", perhaps even "Born", those are all, in fact, not as clearly defined as you imply, and not necessarily binary. I've met numerous people who say that they have died, and try discussing with a physician sometime the vagaries of determining an exact time of death.

Sorry, but I can't help but wonder what makes someone believe in a such a large delusion (perhaps you don't, and are just debating for kicks). If I am running, and you are running, then we are both running. There is no mention of "how fast" or "how slow" one is running needed in that statement of fact. The fact that we are both running is not changed by either of those things.

If a person is clinically dead, they have met the criteria for being dead. If the person was lucky enough to be revived, the fact that they were revived does not change the fact that they were clinically dead. There is no scaling to say "well, he was mostly dead". The person was either dead, or not dead.

All of these things are called facts, and facts are not variable. As with above, the fact that I was 10 minutes late or 60 minutes late does not change the fact that I was late. Your punishment for being late will of course very on "why" you were late, and "how late you were", but the state of being late is never magically changed based on those criteria.

The "not possible" has me baffled. Are you suggesting that it's not possible to steal food from a starving child, or that it's not possible to steal food from a supermarket, or both?

The "not possible" relates to your statement that one or both of those situations changes the state of guilt. The state of guilt can not be changed, any more than the state of lateness can changed, or the state of being dead can be changed. The state of guilt can not be "more" or "less", the state is either "yes" or "no". That state never changes. The only thing that _can_ change is the circumstances that lead us to be in the state.

You can be either late or not late, but you can also indisputably be late to varying degrees and even by precise, measured amounts. The "fact" that you stole as a simple binary is, as you say, not scaling, but it's also not very useful in terms of information packing. Most people roll in more information and include it in the concept known as "guilt".

You start correctly, then get illogical. Are you late? The answer is "yes" or "no", not "well I'm fuzzy". I never asked "how late were you?", I asked "Are you late?". Adding in "well, it was only by x minutes" never changes the state of lateness, it can only be used to mitigate punishment.

Guilt is not a concept, guilt is a state of being. Just as "running" or "dead" is a state of being. Claiming it's a concept is what is wrong with our justice system currently. Believing such a delusion is rather frightening. As mentioned above, perhaps you really don't believe it and are just debating for fun.

Either way, I can not try and clarify any more on this. If you truly believe guilt is a concept or that I'm musing spend a lot of time studying Socrates. The dialogues of Plato and The Republic are both great studies for critical thinking and rational thought.

Re:Your an idiot and spreading lies

[s.petry]

The principle of mens rea does introduce variability to guilt. It actually adds an extra dimension of guilt for someone to be guilty on, and it does have a range.

Absolutely wrong. Mens rea states that in order to be guilty of a crime, the person must have been in a specific state of mind which fits the crime. It is not adding a scale to guilt as you are implying. See below

The concept of mens rea developed in England during the latter part of the common-law era (about the year 1600) when judges began to hold that an act alone could not create criminal liability unless it was accompanied by a guilty state of mind. The degree of mens rea required for a particular common-law crime varied. Murder, for example, required a malicious state of mind, whereas Larceny required a felonious state of mind.

I agree that it does not just relate to having a grasp on reality, however that is the easiest example to explain mens rea. In English and US Law, we have specific mens rea questions associated with the proceedings. Such as, "Did the person knowingly take the diamond ring from the Jeweler?". This prevented a jeweler from, of course, slipping a diamond ring into an unsuspecting noble woman's purse in order to get her into legal trouble.

The mens rea clause above does not change the fact that the noble woman took the diamond ring from the store. That act is a statement of fact: The police found her outside with the ring in her purse. What it changes, is that she can not be tried for grand larceny "if" she did not knowingly commit the crime. In which case she could not be guilty of larceny (a logical and correct conclusion), and would not be "less guilty" of Larceny.

Re:Your an idiot and spreading lies

[tragedy]

Sorry, but I can't help but wonder what makes someone believe in a such a large delusion (perhaps you don't, and are just debating for kicks). If I am running, and you are running, then we are both running. There is no mention of "how fast" or "how slow" one is running needed in that statement of fact. The fact that we are both running is not changed by either of those things.

Ugh. I can't believe this is expanding. It's getting past ridiculous. If you're running and a Jesse Owens in his prime is also running, then yes, you can certainly say that you're both running. Unless you happen to be a world-class athlete, to suggest that the running you are doing and the running he is doing are equivalent would be nonsense.

If a person is clinically dead, they have met the criteria for being dead. If the person was lucky enough to be revived, the fact that they were revived does not change the fact that they were clinically dead. There is no scaling to say "well, he was mostly dead". The person was either dead, or not dead.

But the fact that the dead/alive cutoff point is a moving target and the fact that even medical professionals can't always determine the state definitely (people still wake up in the morgue from time to time) suggests that it's not so cut and dried any more.

All of these things are called facts, and facts are not variable.

Neither is a perfect mathematical circle variable. Trouble is, we don't live in a Platonic universe. We live in one where, to the best of our knowledge (and even this isn't a cold, hard fact that we know for certain), we can never know both the exact position and speed of a particle. All of our facts are approximations and statistics. We have very high certainty for some of them, but the true "facts" you're talking about are unknown and perhaps unknowable (although whether they're truly unknowable may be unknowable).

As with above, the fact that I was 10 minutes late or 60 minutes late does not change the fact that I was late. Your punishment for being late will of course very on "why" you were late, and "how late you were", but the state of being late is never magically changed based on those criteria.

But you apply a quantity and units to how late you are. It's right there in your own examples. I don't understand how you can argue that one.

The "not possible" relates to your statement that one or both of those situations changes the state of guilt. The state of guilt can not be changed, any more than the state of lateness can changed, or the state of being dead can be changed. The state of guilt can not be "more" or "less", the state is either "yes" or "no". That state never changes. The only thing that _can_ change is the circumstances that lead us to be in the state.

But the part you quoted didn't say that one or both of those situations changes the state of guilt, it said that both situations represent guilt, but they are qualitatively different. I suppose it hinges on semantics again, whether it is the situation or the guilt that is qualitatively different. I personally hold that it's hold that it's both that are qualitatively different with one being dependent on the other, so your objection is actually consistent with your broader argument, and with your rigid to the point of near uselessness binary definition of "guilt". I still hold that, if the definition of guilt truly is binary, then it is a unique property for every instance and can't be compared at all. In other words, if your rigid definition is the only possible one, and person A is guilty of crime X and person B is guilty of crime Y, you can't really say that A and B are both guilty, you can only say that A is guilty of X and B is guilty of Y.

You start correctly, then get illogical. Are you late? The answer is "yes" or "no", not "well I'm fuzzy". I never asked "how late were you?", I asked "Are you la

Re:Your an idiot and spreading lies

[s.petry]

Ah, I knew you had to be a fan of Plato. As much as the ancient Greek philosophers were intelligent and laid many of the foundations of western philosophy, blind adherence to their sophistry has frequently hindered progress rather than helped it.

Blind adherence to their sophistry? Wow I guess you don't know much about Socrates and Plato. Go read their works and stop taking people's word for things. In fact, study them since they can teach a tremendous amount of critical thinking.

While I agree that none of them were infallible, what we have with Socrates is an uncanny ability to see the truth and simplify logic. It was his gift. Socrates never sought fame or fortune, though he could have. In fact he despised people that charged money for teaching sophistry. Several examples are in Plato's works, one very famous debate where Socrates trounces the most famous Sophist of the time.

I disagreed with you because your logic skips all over. Look at your reply to my example of mens rea. How does your example differ from mine when proving that she had to have a frame of mind in order to be guilty? Except for the cause of her incapacity, there is no difference. You seem to believe there is a difference when none is there. Either way, mens rea does not magically mean "almost guilty" or "not quite guilty". Mens rea always determines "guilt" or the opposite "innocent".

From your perspective, absolutely everything is gray area. That perspective is not rational. There are at least as many absolutes as there are gray areas. I have studied numerous Philosophers and Philosophies, and when I notice symptom of "everything is gray" the easiest solution is to point to Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle. Those minds have been followed up on by numerous others, go read Einstein for an excellent example. I don't recommend Einstein without studying the ancient Greeks since he's following up on logic and not inventing something new. Having no base would be like learning Calculus without understanding basic Math.

Personally, I'm a realist. That's another good search topic for Philosophy. The optimist says "the glass is half full", the pessimist says "the glass is half empty" and the realist says "the glass is twice as large as it needs to be". The basis for that way of thinking is in Socrates, but as I mentioned he has been followed up on through out history. Though nobody has been able to do as much as him.

Don't be so quick dismiss NPR/PBS/BBC/Etc Either

[EXTomar]

You don't need to justify watching Fox then when NPR, PBS, and foreign sources like BBC or Times of India. BBC in particular has the unique perspective that often rings more true than many domestic sources.

Fox does not deserve attention because they suck at journalism (sourcing in particular). Fox should not get praise for covering "other stuff" because multiple sources do journalism so much better without the taint. On the entertainment side, I would take one episode of "This American Life" or "Frontline" over the entire programming week as well.

Appropriate

[Anonymous Coward]

I think it is appropriate the quote at the bottom of the page is "Hokey religions and ancient weapons are no substitute for a good blaster at your side. - Han Solo". Hokey and ancient fit nicely with CoS and newsprint.

As someone who works in publishing I think there is an important line to be drawn between blindly publishing any crap and accepting sponsored content. One of our publications does accept sponsored stories, but we run them by an editor to make sure the content is true or (in the case of opinion) at least not harmful to our readership. We try to maintain a level of quality and we leave our website open to comments from the readership. if they want to give a rebuttal to the content we publish, they are welcome to, we're not going to filter out comments that differ.

I notice Nature has "sponsored papers"

[peter303]

Nature is supposedly on of the most respected science journals around (even if you deconstruct the liberal bias in its comments section). Even once in a while they run theme sections of either assembled or invited papers. And I noticed in two such recent sections there is a sponsored article from an industrial source. The paper is clearly labeled as sponsored. An example is a special section on COPD. A drug company published a study about a drug to deal with this. (Was that the one with elephant tv commercial?). I assume the sponsored paper has the same editorial scrutiny as the other articles. But I wonder.

How is Scientology worse than any other religion?

[Anonymous Coward]

It's not better and it's no worse. They're all the same. Many of those most down on Scientology are devout Christians. They're all fucking nutjobs living in a fantasy world.

Re:How is Scientology worse than any other religio

[seebs]

This is a really stupid rhetorical question, but it's a pretty good actual question. In case someone comes along who is interested in answers:

* Coercing members to have abortions so they won't waste money raising kids; instead, the money can go to the organization.
* Complete ban on mental health care.
* Major and sustained efforts to undermine health care for other people too, as part of their general war on anything related to psychiatry.
* Systematic destruction of family relationships and friendships which in any way endanger someone's loyalty to the organization.
* Systematic attacks on critics, including anyone who says anything just a bit negative.
* Various lawsuits, legal hassles, and so on; they use these to get things like preferential tax treatment (they get better tax breaks than any religion does).
* According to their founder, they are in fact not a religion at all, and are in no way religious; they adopted the "religion" thing only for legal benefits, while not actually being a religious organization in any way.
* Paulette Cooper and "operation Freakout", in which they forged bomb threats from someone who'd said things they didn't like.
* Lisa McPherson, who was tied to a bed and denied any sort of care until she was nearly-dead, then dropped off at a hospital (where she died because she was already too far gone), on the grounds that she had been thinking about seeking medical care. Anything where your autopsy reveals "cockroach feeding sites" should not be considered a viable medical treatment.

Christians can be really annoying (trust me on this; I am one, I should know), but the vast, vast, majority of them do not have a policy that says that they are obliged to take any and all possible measures to prevent me from disagreeing with them or telling other people I think they're wrong. Yes, some of the specific organizations have, over the last couple thousand years, gotten way out of line. But it's never been the official policy of the entire thing. The "Fair Game" policy is a whole new category compared to the policies that religions generally have.

In short, they are on the lunatic fringe compared even to the lunatic fringes of the world's religions. (And I don't say "any other religion" because L. Ron Hubbard said Scientology was not a religion, and he's presumably authoritative.)

When the Catholic Church tells its members to absolutely cut off all communciation with anyone who badmouths them, at all, ever, then we can talk about how Scientology is in any way similar to religions. Without that, you're just demonstrating severe ignorance of what it is that people dislike about Scientology.

So christians are better than scientology?

[Anonymous Coward]

And no doubt all other religions?

B U L L S H I T

You're all a bunch of childish hypocrites.

A cult is an unpopular religion / a religion is a popular cult = same difference.

It's all about controlling people via fairytales.

Re:So christians are better than scientology?

[seebs]

I like how you actually provided any kind of argumentation, or responded to the actual specific data and examples.

Oh, wait. You didn't, because you can't, because you're wrong.

I advanced a claim and provided evidence. You provided no rebuttal. You have conceeded. Thank you.

slashvertisement

[Fnord666]

So given the current rate of slashvertisements, is this what we can expect here in a year or two?

All religions and cults are the same.

[Anonymous Coward]

They are all founded and function on the same fallacies and frauds.

Yes, I like the letter f. Fuck you.

Re:All religions and cults are the same.

[seebs]

Even if we concede this point, this just further establishes that Scientology isn't a religion, as it is not founded on the same fallacies that religions are. Thanks for making that useful point! :)

Re:How is Scientology worse than any other religio

[Anonymous Coward]

Coercing members to have abortions so they won't waste money raising kids; instead, the money can go to the organization.

Sounds like they're doing it wrong. You want the followers of your religion to raise kids, as many as possible. First of all, because they'll also tithe when they grow up. And second, because they will vote.

At least, that's what Christians do in my country. And, sadly, it's working.

Re:How is Scientology worse than any other religio

[VortexCortex]

When the Catholic Church tells its members to absolutely cut off all communciation with anyone who badmouths them, at all, ever, then we can talk about how Scientology is in any way similar to religions.

So, basically unless they're exactly like Scientology then we can't discuss the similarities? Fuck you, that false dichotomy, and any other apologist for any organization that has anything like "excommunication". I won't even go into how similar the infiltration and intimidation tactics are, even if one is a bit worse than the other... I'll just pose the question: Do you really think a US presidential candidate could claim to be anything but Christian and still win the election?

When you point a finger at someone else remember that there are three pointing right back at you.

"one nation under god" indeed.

Re:How is Scientology worse than any other religio

[INowRegretThesePosts]

Sounds like they're doing it wrong. You want the followers of your religion to raise kids, as many as possible. First of all, because they'll also tithe when they grow up. And second, because they will vote.

At least, that's what Christians do in my country. And, sadly, it's working.

How would that work? These children would only start tithing and voting by age 18, when you (the priest/pastor) would be dead or retired.
So you would not benefit.

Also, Christianity says that *everyone* should be generous in child-rearing, not just Christians.
If Christians were only trying to grow themselves, they wouldn't try to legally restrict abortion. They would just prohibit abortion among their members.

But then again, I am probably responding to another Dawkins parrot.

Evidence?

[INowRegretThesePosts]

This article is something, coming from a tech site that has blatantly posted advertisements disguised as stories, intentionally or not.
The only reason the atlantic caught shit was that it was that CoS is easy an hated target, product placement articles are nothing new or interesting.

I have never seen evidence (apart from cynicism) that Slashdot actually does that.

Did not understand

[INowRegretThesePosts]

I am a former member of the Co$ and currently practicing outside of the corrupt organization

I do not understand. Do you still believe in Xenu?

Re:Did not understand

[briancox2]

I think what you don't understand is Scientology. The practice of the religion has nothing to do with what you believe. L. Ron Hubbard said, "If it is true to you, then it is true." But he encouraged people to not accept anything just because HE said it. Scientology does not require any belief in any precept. You just apply it to your life to help. If it helps, then that's it. Ron said a lot of things that I am not sure whether or not I believe. But I certainly don't believe it because he said it. What I am absolutely certain of, is that the subject of Scientology (of which you are focusing on one microgram out of tons of material) has worked to help me improve my own life. Do I still believe in Xenu? What makes you think I ever did? It has no importance.

Re:Did not understand

[INowRegretThesePosts]

I think what you don't understand is Scientology. The practice of the religion has nothing to do with what you believe. L. Ron Hubbard said, "If it is true to you, then it is true."

This sounds a lot like relativism, which I think is a logical absurdity. And I have never seen a relativist that does not contradict himself. By the way, where do you apply relativism? To philosophy? To morality?

What I am absolutely certain of, is that the subject of Scientology (of which you are focusing on one microgram out of tons of material) has worked to help me improve my own life. Do I still believe in Xenu? What makes you think I ever did? It has no importance.

But isn't Dianetics focused on getting rid of body thetans? How is Xenu irrelevant?

By the way, I hope I am not impolite. Also, if you feel irritated by this discussion, then please tell me and I will stop replying.

Re: Did not understand

[briancox2]

I really appreciate the sentiment that you don't intend to be rude. Let me assure you, you're not coming across that way to me. Let me try to address what Scientology is and how I think it gets mis-portrayed. It's the complete study of the mind and human soul by L. Ron Hubbard. It is intended to be an applied technology; meaning you use it to improve your life.
But Ron was very concerned about the subject becoming dictatorial and dogmatic. He didn't want a group of robots (which is what David Miscavige had created) getting moralistic about the subject. He just wanted people to try these techniques to address to improve their lives.
I agree that moral relativism is wrong when trying to decide what is right and wrong. But deciding whether Scientology works for you can only be decided by you. I'm not going to be one of these Tom Cruise types and tell you, "I have the only way," out some such non-sense. And neither would LRH. That is only a phenomenon of the modern David Miscavige cult.
So, regarding Xenu, Ron presented it as, "Well it seems that, when I dig deep into the human psyche, addressing this seems to get a result that people respond to." He believes that it must therefore be true. But no one applying that one technique (out of hundreds of thousands of techniques) is told or persuaded to believe it. It's up to the individual to form beliefs. Not LRH or anyone else. Just you.

Re: Did not understand

[INowRegretThesePosts]

He just wanted people to try these techniques to address to improve their lives.

I would want to know if these techniques are effective before investing time in them. And in fact, I would fear that a possibly false technique could make things worse instead of better. What attracts people to scientology? Is it word-of-mouth ("it worked for my cousin"), like homeopathy? Are you not worried that it hasn't been scientifically validated?

Re: Did not understand

[briancox2]

There are books on the subject you can read to understand the subject so as to make an evaluation of whether you think it will be an answer that has value to you. I first read Dianetics: The Modern Science of Mental Health before having anything to do with the subject. I bought it off the shelf of a supermarket because I was looking for a solution to certain problems I was having with communication and feeling certain. I was in school...thinking I was going to be majoring in Psychology. But I'd just given up on that because I realized it simply had a million different theories and had a very low standard for "scientific validation". And the reason for that is very simple. You can't measure experience. It is what it is to the person who experiences it. I can really relate to the concern that some false technique may cause more problems than harm. One principle (and here is a big one that David Miscavige has thrown out the window!) of Scientology, that L. Ron Hubbard stressed, is that you never run a process that someone isn't interested in. But since DM wants to use the technology of Scientology as a weapon to silence any potential critic, he uses forced confessionals and all sorts of manipulation with the technology.

Re: Did not understand

[Anonymous Coward]

(Posting as Anon so that this does not show up in my comment history)

I agree that it is hard to scientifically study the human mind, and I have the impression that psychology has more bad professionals than, say, eletronic engineering. Still, I would put slightly more trust in some theory that has been criticized and analized and developed by the international psychologist community than in Dianetics, which AFAIK is mostly the brainchild of one single man.

I have attended several psychologists in the past and I think it was useless. But currently I am practicing Freudian Analysis coupled with Catholic spiritual direction (the priest is not the same person as the psychologist), and I think it is slowly producing good effects.

Re: Did not understand

[Anonymous Coward]

Fair enough. I think too many cooks spoil the pot. And for me, having studied Scientology, I am more convinced of its effectiveness than of anything else. May your path bring you spiritual fulfillment my friend.

The love of money...

[Nostromo21]

Advertising will go down in history as one of the greatest evils of the 20th century that man perpetrated on himself.

Pschiatry for depression saves lives

[obtuse]

Still nonsense. Psychiatry for depression saves lives. Not a scam. This matters.

Psychiatrists are not frauds (which is exactly what the word "scam" implies.) Tom Cruise is "not right about this too." Psychiatric treadment for major depression saves lives.

Tom Cruise is Jenny McCarthy to depressives. Tom Cruise claims his religion works better that medicine. Medicine that helps people with major depression (which you ignore) to not commit suicide. Suicide: 10th leading cause of death worldwide.

It is unfortunate that SSRIs appear to be overprescribed. Having personally known people for whom they seem to have worked, I certainly can see how psychiatrists (whom you have characterized as scammers) might sincerely disagree with you.

If you don't mean do support Scientology, stop mischaracterizing a treatment that saves lives as a scam. Stop claiming that "Tom Cruise is right".

Re:How is Scientology worse than any other religio

[seebs]

Nice shifting of the goal posts!

I never said anyone couldn't discuss similarities. What I said was that the existence of some similarities does not mean we have to ignore all the very real differences. I mean, heck. There are similarities between all sorts of things. Doesn't mean that anything that has any similarities to a religion is just like all the religions and no different from them.

But please, do go into how similar the infiltration and intimidation tactics are. Impress us by actually providing a shred of evidence. Oh, you won't, because you don't have any, because they just plain aren't that similar.

And no, I don't think anyone could win a presidential election in the US without claiming to be Christian, and I think that's really fucked up. I also think it's disgusting that we have that "in God we trust" crap on money, and "under God" in the pledge. Offensive and frankly blasphemous; it stuns me that there are religious people who aren't offended by that. But you know what? Those are all what we call red herrings. They are emotionally-laden topics you can use to distract people from the actual points under discussion.

The actual point is the claims that scientology is "just like" religions. It's not. It's very, very, different in its basic structure and intent. I pointed out how and why, with examples and references. You handwaved about how you aren't going to produce evidence, then brought up red herrings to try to derail the conversation. Nice work!