Slashdot Mirror
'We the People' Petition To Revoke Scientology's Tax Exempt Status
An anonymous reader writes: There has been a lot of interest in the activities of the Church of Scientology recently, especially since the release of Alex Gibney's documentary Going Clear. A petition against tax-exempt status for Scientology has been started on the U.S. White House petition website. If it receives more than 100,000 signatures, it will qualify for an official White House response. Even Slashdot has had its own run-ins with Scientology in the past — one of many internet sites to face legal threats from the Church. Has the time come for Scientology go "clear?"
Okay, they got the Nazi thing wrong. But they definitely got the Scientology thing RIGHT.
SJW's don't eliminate discrimination. They just expropriate it for themselves.
How is scientology any less of a religion than christianity or islam or mormons or any other belief system? If its ok for christians, it should be ok for scientologists, or it should be not ok for anyone to have tax exempt status.
Nobody wants first post? Afraid of getting "audited"?
Scientologists Force Comment Off Slashdot
Forced.....right..
http://tonyortega.org/2015/04/13/if-you-want-the-irs-to-reexamine-scientologys-tax-exempt-status-its-time-to-get-real/
I totally support pulling CoSs tax exempt status but why does any church have tax exempt status?
Not just Scientologism. Shouldn't we be reexamining all tax exempt organizations that promote a religious belief as their sole claim to tax exempt? Run a soup kitchen, great, soup kitchen is tax exempt. Run an empire with a soup kitchen, the empire should not be tax exempt- true for scientologists and Christians.
First off, whether or not anyone thinks they are whacky or not, they are in fact a Religion, by all the criteria that count.
Second, elminating their tax exempt status will set loose unbridled lobbying efforts. Look at the history of what happened when the NRA was denied tax exempt status. An otherwise annoying bunch of gun nuts suddenly became a major political player.
Don't play with fire.
Don't take life too seriously; it isn't permanent.
Has the government - beyond just the white house - been inclined to revoke any tax exempt statuses in memory? I don't recall a single one. Just because Scientology has only a slightly higher public approval rate than ebola doesn't mean the government is likely to take a stand against them.
Besides, even if it was revoked, they would likely just find a really good accountant / lawyer team and end up paying the same amount (or less) in taxes. Last year Prudential insurance paid no corporate income tax and received a $106 million rebate. Time Warner cable paid no taxes on $4.3B in profit, CBS no taxes on $1.8B. Scientology could probably do better on their taxes by registering as a corporation anyways.
Damn_registrars has no butt-hole. Damn_registrars has no use for a butt-hole.
should lose tax except status for at least ten years. I've no idea about scientology in particular though...
Here is what the official White House response will be:
No comment.
I have a lot of experience with the We the People petitions. Specifically, how they don't work like people think they do.
How people think it works: You gather enough signatures and then somehow, you introduce bills to congress with your stated goal
How it actually works: A white house rep sends you a generically worded statement about how in this case, the IRS is the agency in control of determining tax exempt status of the church.
There have been dozens of petitions for Westburough baptist church and Scientology and they always get the same response. "I have no control over this".
Has the government - beyond just the white house - been inclined to revoke any tax exempt statuses in memory? I don't recall a single one. Just because Scientology has only a slightly higher public approval rate than ebola doesn't mean the government is likely to take a stand against them. Besides, even if it was revoked, they would likely just find a really good accountant / lawyer team and end up paying the same amount (or less) in taxes. Last year Prudential insurance paid no corporate income tax and received a $106 million rebate. Time Warner cable paid no taxes on $4.3B in profit, CBS no taxes on $1.8B. Scientology could probably do better on their taxes by registering as a corporation anyways.
Well, if the IRS re-examines them and decides they don't meet the definition of a religion, I don't see why they wouldn't revoke tax exempt status. They automatically revoke it if you fail to file the required reports: http://www.irs.gov/uac/IRS-Ide...
Still, the elephant in the room would be the (practical) tax exempt status of the Googles, Apples and Microsofts of this world. Not to mention all those finance wizards.
I'm a Christian, and I would prefer that there is no such thing as a 'religious' exemption from taxation. To me, that's contrary to the constitutional separation of church and state and is an example of the state's recognition of religion (if not the establishment of an official religion, of course).
No, simply churches should have to file as non-profits, and hew to the rules (including auditing, etc) therefor. If they do, great. If they don't, too bad.
-Styopa
As long as there is a tax exemption for religion -any religion- picking on one is unfair and bordering in bigotry. We the people are not (or should not) in the business of telling people what is or isn't a religion or what to believe or not as long as it aligns with the society accepted rules (i.e. the law)
That said, I would support removing the blanket tax exemption for ALL religions activities and instead give it to specific activities benefiting the community as long as it doesn't discriminate on others based on their faith.
They are a religion. They deserve tax free status as much as the Mormon church and the West Baptist church does.
That doesn't mean they shouldn't be arrested for the multiple crimes they are currently doing.
But I see no reason to single out the Scientologists tax free status and not go after the many other questionable churches.
excitingthingstodo.blogspot.com
Now just get rid of the tax-exempt status of all the other religions. Except of course for the charity work they do, for which they will have to make their finances public, like the real charities have to.
Thank you, Bradley Manning, Edward Snowden and so many others, for courageously defending humanity, my freedom and more!
My question here would be, how are we deciding what is or is not a religion? You have a bunch of people with a belief system organized together... I don't know how you distinguish between a social club, a cult, and a religion other than going by what they claim for themselves. However, whatever the legal method of determining the answer to that, it should be applied consistently.
The process here should not be, "We think that Scientology is crazy and therefore not a valid religion, so we will revoke their legal protection on that basis." If there's no legal criteria to refer to, then you're setting a precedent for revoking the legal protections for any religion that you don't like. Go by the law. If the law is inadequate, then revise the law, but make sure you're comfortable with the revised law being applied consistently to all groups, including the group you belong to.
Instead of revoking tax-exempt statuses lets make all people and organizations tax-exempt. What right does the government have to any of my earnings?
Hollywood will no doubt have some big hitters supporting Scientology. Not to mention the fear from other questionable religious groups who would also begin to fear a tax status change. I seriously doubt this will grow into anything as the US tends to never reverse itself on tax status exemptions. You can basically call yourselves anything related to religion and get tax exempt status. Of course the IRS took a lot of heat declining any conservative group which means a IRS much less willing to make any more unpopular decisions. I myself agree, I read L. Ron Hubbard book years ago, and came away with no hint of a religious kind on organization or belief. I was totally surprised they had tax exempt status in the first place. Gee, maybe I should conger up some sort of Zen crap and get my status changed?
If the church needs money, why isn't God flipping the bill? I think we should pull all religious funding and rely on the deity of that religion to provide it, if the deity doesn't, then clearly it doesn't care or can't.
I have many problems with the Scientologists and how they have conducted themselves, but there are many religious organizations from the Catholic church to televangalists to numerous unaffiliated organizations which have done horrible things to their communities and congregations at various times. Scientologists aren't even the only ones who have or currently put a price tag on better spiritual outcomes (e.g. tithing).
Scientology's religious status should not be in question. Just because it is new and it is based on a set of beliefs which you think are goofy doesn't make their spiritual or philisophical claims any less legally legitimate.
If the leadership of Scientology are involved in things which we generally find morally reprehensible we should certainly question why this state of affairs has been allowed to continue and seek reforms to address it. If they are in violation of our definitions of being a religious non-profit organization, that should also be pursued. To simply ask that an unpopular religious movement be stripped of legal recognition due to the misconduct of some of its leadership, however, is a political discrimination which we should be wary of. Americans' right to organize based on their shared belief regardless of what other people think of that belief is a protection we have traditionally valued and to erode it by selectively favouring some beliefs over others without clear, fair reasons is a dangerous precedent to adopt.
While we may not like this particular religion, that doesn't matter. They are a religious organization, and an organized religion. Especially in the United States, the government most certainly should not determine what is or is not a religion. It's stated pretty clearly here:
"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof..."
Any religion will have aspects that people agree with and don't agree with. If their activity is outright illegal, then punish that specific activity. Christians can worship Christ. Muslims can worship Allah. Pastafarians can worship the Flying Spaghetti Monster. Satanists can worship Lucifer. Eco fairies can worship Mother Earth. Atheists can worship nothing. Democrats can worship government. Republicans can worship capitalism. And Scientologists can worship whatever it is they worship.
The minute we allow government to dictate what is or isn't a religion is the instant we lose all religious freedom.
Yes it is rather routine. But the institutions who get their status revoked aren't close to being exempt. The Church of Scientology does so many things that qualify it as a church its hard to imagine anything more than a fine without blatant intentional discrimination. The intent here is to encourage the state to attack a religion because they don't like it.
I'm a Christian as well. The state recognizing other religions is fine with me and most conservative Christians I know. Their existence and lawful activity is a fact of American life. I have no problem with the state recognizing other religions equally in this capacity because religion is a major part of public life and ignoring it is in fact giving favoritism to atheism, not neutrality.
I also think Scientology should not be recognized as a religion because there is a documentation trail showing that it was deliberately created as a fraud by Hubbard. To my knowledge, no other religion in the US can be accused of that. That is a legitimate basis for the state not granting it protection under the first amendment.
This just goes to show the dangers of relying on your own perception when it comes to issues like this. You can download a list of entities which lost their tax exempt status from the IRS themselves, which I am doing now, and (for those who automatically lose their status) it's a 20MB ZIP file containing text, so you can imagine how many records it contains. If their servers weren't so slow from over here I'd give you a precise number.
Don't trust that you know everything - double check you've not fooled yourself or been fooled by someone else. That has two benefits: You learn, and you decrease the chances of looking foolish.
So what, the only white house response this is likely to get is that "they do not respond to requests for direct policy changes" the entire concept of those White House petitions has been a joke since the get go.
Ok it's a good start, but what about the rest, the other religions? What makes Scientology so special?
This should be the top comment in every Slashdot article on scientology, or free speech for that matter.
This site supposedly bleeds free-speech, but are lap dogs when it gets real.
They should classify them as religious terrorists for extortion and other threats that they constantly participate in. That would end it right there.
It would be nice to see a petition that instead makes a cogent, fact-based, reasoned argument against the COS's legal eligibility for tax-exempt status, rather than a rant consisting of a bunch of unproven allegations, unspecified accusations of government corruption that sound like they come from conspiracy nuts, some borderline libel, with a couple facts thrown in. It wouldn't be that difficult to do, and it might actually make it awkward for the White House to dismiss, rather than making it easy by inviting them to defend their tax status as an example of how the U.S. defends "oppressed" religions.
http://alternatives.rzero.com/
From the post, it appears that CoS was within their rights to demand the take-down - if the post was their copyrighted material, and Dice's lawyers thought it didn't constitute fair use, then it was legitimate take-down. A shitty move that only a fucking dodgy organisation like CoS would to, but a legal move none the less. Don't like it, then complain to your representative (holding your breath is not recommended).
The last time the U.S. government fought the Scientologists, the CoS literally sent in hundreds of moles to infiltrate the IRS, harassed them with thousands of FOIA requests and bogus lawsuits, hired an army of private investigators to harass individual IRS and FBI employees, and hired a team of lobbyists to swarm Congress and the Presidency:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/O...
http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~dst/Cow...
AND THE SCIENTOLOGISTS WON. The in 1993 the IRS finally backed down in absolute capitulation. The defeated U.S. government even added religious persecution of Scientologists to their list of human rights abuses as part of their surrender deal.
You think they're going to fight the CoS again after that? The U.S. government is scared shitless of the CoS. They would rather fight Russia than ever fight the CoS again.
Does anyone thing that the petition being at *exactly* 26,000 signatures seem odd?
I am Homer of Borg, resistance is - Ooo Donuts!
Watch the movie and read up on scientology. While this strikes at the heart of what scientology actually started as (An attempt by Hubbard to avoid taxes) they got their tax exempt status post-humously by harassing the ever loving hell out of the IRS through a massive lawsuit campaign, along with probably illegal tactics like conducting raids against the IRS (yup, that way around). At that point scientology was worth about 1/4 billion.
Today they're worth about 1.5 billion cash, and it's assumed they own about 3 billion in real estate. Taking away their tax exempt status will basically cause them to open their equivalent of a nuclear football against the US.
>Even Slashdot has had its own run-ins with Scientology in the past — one of many internet sites to face legal threats from the Church
Please put "Church" in double quotes.
In all fairness, the scientologists have beaten the *FUCKING U.S. GOVERNMENT* before. You think Taco ever stood a chance? If he had fought them, he would probably be bankrupt and living in a homeless shelter today, or maybe even in prison. The CoS doesn't fuck around.
...and pirate regalia, just remember where the faux-religion persecution started.
Is it just my observation, or are there way too many stupid people in the world?
At the time, fighting that suit would have been an existential threat to the site given the CoS's aptitude for using lawyers. That's fine and all, if your primary activity is fighting that stuff and you're ready to do so.
However, this is primarily a tech news aggregation site that has a free speech commitment, not a free speech at all costs site. I'm willing to give them a pass on it. The reality is that the way the site works would allow someone to post that material again, and until CoS finds it and they set the DMCA on it again, this site would be able to temporarily host it, and would continue to do so until the lawyers attacked. That's good enough for me because it gets the material out there. If you're sharp-eyed enough, you could then grab it and spread it via your other channels. Mission accomplished.
I think it's more important to note that Obama has done literally shit all to act on any of those "We the People" petitions. Any time they hit 100k, they just write some politically-correct bullshit... or with Snowden they literally wrote nothing at all.
I mean who honestly believes Obama really cares about your/our petitions?
Besides, even if it was revoked, they would likely just find a really good accountant / lawyer team and end up paying the same amount (or less) in taxes. Last year Prudential insurance paid no corporate income tax and received a $106 million rebate. Time Warner cable paid no taxes on $4.3B in profit, CBS no taxes on $1.8B. Scientology could probably do better on their taxes by registering as a corporation anyways.
Liberty Media is another company like those you mentioned. They actually pride themselves on not ever paying US taxes on their earnings and they have an entire accounting department dedicated to finding legal loopholes and deductions that allow them to pay no taxes. They became the owners of the Atlanta Braves baseball team through a complicated transaction with Time Warner that resulted in neither company paying any taxes on the deal. That deal happened in the previous decade so I don't remember if Liberty Media actually wanted the Braves or if they simply acquired them as the best way to avoid taxes on the deal with Time Warner but that deal raised a lot of eyebrows in the US sporting world and provided the first insights into how far Liberty Media will go to legally avoid paying taxes.
Bringer of the Thetans, and destroyer of BILLION year old volcanoes :P
And don't forget after you learn about Xenu, you start gaining super powers, you get telekinesis, clairvoyance, force someone with your mind to do your bidding, ability to cure by touching someone. See the future and the past. And eventually space travel with astral projection.
http://file.wikileaks.org/file...
Not only that, many churches then use that donated monies to provide services to the general public, especially the poor.
Corporate taxation is a separate issue. We should do away with the corporate income tax and replace it with a gross receipts tax.
If you just shot such people out of hand, even the CoS would give up. Or be dead.
What's it to you if the religious text is a trade secret, you have to fork over cash to read their texts, and as far as civil trials are concerned they are operating withing the law.
The only people who are "victimized" by Scientology are Scientologists. It's not my problem nor yours.
Now, if they break the law and really hurt someone - like institutionalizing the molesting small children - then that's for the cops to handle and they SHOULD be punished.
If Tom Cruise and other movie stars want to spend millions supporting the Scientolgists, that's their problem, not mine. The only problem I have with Tom Cruise is I wish he'd make more kick-ass science fiction movies.
But if we're gonna pick on kooky religions, I think we should start with the Mormons first. They actually have a history of murdering people.
Every religion's lies and bullshit are equally valid, including Scientology. Take away tax-free status from ALL of them. They're ALL just big money-grubbing BUSINESSES.
I do not fail; I succeed at finding out what does not work.
Now the government is to judge whether an organization is "religious" enough to be counted under the religious exemption.
There goes SOCAS down the toilet. Now the government will regulate your religion, and your opinions. 1st amendment is dead.
Singling out just one group because it gets the most publicity isn't good enough, and i don't think it would set a good precedent. signing petitions just to target one individual [organization] is little better than a lynch mob.
Instead, we should have a real discussion in this country about tax free status of all religions. In my opinion, none of them deserve it. They are all businesses bringing in money. They should participate in the system just like we expect Apple or Walmart to. Plenty of deductions and loopholes exist for charitable acts. I'm sure if an organization is leveraging those provisions, we would all be fine with them paying less taxes.
You're lying. Churches are 501(c)3 organizations.
A charitable organisation has to PROVE it is a charity under the definitions of the tax law rules. A *religious* charitable organisation does not have to give any proof.
This means that you don't have to be a charity at all if you're a religious organisation. You can just CLAIM you are.
So dump the non-proof requirement. Much of the "charitable" work done by the institutions would disqualify them for their work. Many still would, but others would not pass the test and lose tax free status or have to change their practices, either of which should happen now and is what the OP was on about.
Can I just make up any old crap and call it a religion?
Apparently yes.
Religions believe in the supernatural and everyone of them are fairy tales taken seriously by adults: Christianity, Judaism, Islam, Mormonism, Hinduism, and on we go ....
You know discriminating a religion because of it's beliefs.
Sorry, teleporters just kill you and then make a copy. A perfect, soul-less copy.
but that was before the Dice takeover.
as legitimate religion. Christians, Muslims, Pagans, etc, are all guilty of the same abandonment of logic, and the accompanying embrace of superstition. Differences about the exact way that should be done leads to schism, war, ostracism, and martyrdom. Scientology is little better or worse than any other religion in that regard. There are suckers born every minute, and no shortage of con persons willing to take advantage.
The USA is only 4X older than me...perspective
Lots of folks here saying the IRS was wrong to have granted the exemption in the first place.
I hope that you're not just trolling - if you feel it was wrong, then go sign the petition.
Religious institutions own business and property. They don't have to pay taxes on any of this, which means that while *my* business and property taxes go up, they're free to continue on their merry way, polluting the airwaves with drivel, owning prime real estate forever without fear of confiscation by the authorities due to unpaid taxes, and so on. Nice deal, that.
If a religious organizations want to start a fan club with a big building, it's their business, but let them pay their share for the surrounding infrastructure (i.e. roads, law enforcement, flood control, sewage, etc.).
Please do not read this sig. Thank you.
If you do this, you'll establish a precedent saying that picking which religions deserve tax-exempt status is acceptable, and then the nightmare begins. Some will say the Catholic church should be non-exempt due to its handling of the pedophile priest scandal. The half of the Presbyterian church that opposes gay marriage will try to non-exempt the half that accepts it, and vice versa. Every religious controversy will lead to a demand to effectively de-churchify a denomination, and the federal government will be the final arbiter of who gets to be a church, in clear violation of the Establishment clause.
So if the scientologists can't be tax-exempt, nobody gets to be exempt. I know Slashdot is full of atheists (I'm one), so maybe a lot of us like this idea. But any politician who proposes it will be demonized by every priest, minister, rabbi, and imam in the country. If you think they believe atheists are assholes now, wait till we try to tax their faiths.
You've got to pick your battles, and this is a bad one. You can't carve this one sect out of the herd of religions without culling the whole herd, and you do not want to be face-to-face with a horde of enraged cattle with pointy horns.
Revoke any church tax exemptions as well as corporate tax exemptions.
Really Scientology is tax exempt under being a church if you revoke it you must revoke other churches as well.
I am Bennett Haselton! I am Bennett Haselton!
I fail to see any objective basis to treat Scientology differently that say the Mormons or the Catholic Church for that matter. All these religious are based on literally fantastic theories without any evidence.
Bloody hell - 2001 - I didn't notice that part. So it wasn't Dice lawyers, it was some other lawyers. Surely the point still stands though?
How is scientology any less of a religion than christianity or islam or mormons or any other belief system? If its ok for christians, it should be ok for scientologists, or it should be not ok for anyone to have tax exempt status.
Why you shouldn't consider Scientology a religion and Christianity, Jews, etc. are religions.
Just look at names of the prophets..
* Jesus Christ - that's a real prophet's name.
* Moses - sounds like a real prophet to me, too.
* Buddha - Definitely a prophet.
* Mohammed - Yep, sounds good to me.
* L. Ron Hubbard - Nope.. No way that's a prophet's name.. Hubbard? Come on..
* Joe Smith - ok, now you're pushing it.. No prophet would ever be named Joe.
That's all you need to do.
Call it what it is: Mr. Miscavige's mind control business.
I would rather see the NFL lose it's non-profit tax-emempt status.
“Faith is something that you believe that nobody in his right mind would believe.” -- Archie Bunker
I'm not seeing a problem with the chruch, could easily be a chruch of Aphrodite.
Scientology is not a legitimate religion.
Do you need deities? Do you need churches?
What is the difference between religion, and other non-profits, as far as taxes go?
If you are an administrator, for a church, or non-profit, are you taxed on expenses? For example, if the organization gave you a hotel room for a night, and travel expenses, would those be taxed?
Leave the laws as they are so we can use them. The government cannot make something illegal for one church, and illegal for another.
1) Start a church, or other non-profit.
2) Make yourself the administrator
3) Pay yourself a very small salary, that will be taxable.
4) The house you live in, the cars/boats/airplanes you use, etc. will all belong to the non-profit, so no taxes on the money needed to buy those.
5) Give yourself an unlimited expense account for food, travel, lodging, health care, clothes, entertainment, etc. As long as it is considered church business, it's not taxable.
6) Aside from taking donations, you can run a business that gives all revenue to the non-profit. Then take the money back out in the form of whatever you want: for example buy a car for the non-profit that is yours to use. The non-profit will, of course, also pay for insurance, fuel, maintenance, and a driver.
Has the government - beyond just the white house - been inclined to revoke any tax exempt statuses in memory?
Seriously dude?
The IRS has been selectively targeting Tea Party groups for some time:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I...
Further, the so-called lost IRS emails scandal was the IRS claiming to have lost all emails about the IRS policy targeting the Tea Party groups.
And by "lost", they mean that many computer hard disks mysteriously stopped working losing all email, and there were no backups.
And by "no backups", they mean that they never looked if there were any backups.
Let's repeal the tax-exempt status of all religions! There isn't the slightest good reason that they should be tax exempt in the first place. For one thing, they are organizations devoted to coercing and conditioning the young to believe in absurdities. For another, they wield political power and influence and I don't want my own tax dollars making up the deductions taken by those individuals who are directly or indirectly supporting political positions I don't agree with. For a third, it is semantically and epistemologically impossible to differentiate a "religion" from a "cult". All religions began as cults and are cults still -- they both consists of a group of people who claim special and absurd knowledge of things that cannot be independently and objectively verified or observed and who want to convince others that accepting this "knowledge" as true will grant them equally special status promised, curiously enough, only as a part of the knowledge that must be accepted.
The two words refer to the same thing, at most separated by a scale factor. Either we make pastafarianism a tax-exempt religion or allow special tax concessions to any Subgenius preacher claiming to spread the word of J. R. "Bob" Dobbs, or Methodism and Judaism and Islam and Catholicism and Scientology and... (the list continues, and continues) should all have all forms of special status revoked. Religion can be a tax-paid-dollar supported club all it wants, but the idea that money paid into a kitty to be given to somebody to support a building and employee whose sole purpose is to promise people ludicrous rewards or tortures and to believe in magic should some how have the same status as money given to (say) UNICEF or Care is absolutely ridiculous.
So please, sign this petition. If we make Scientology financially untenable, maybe then we can tackle the next 100 cults on the same list.
rgb
Even when the experts all agree, they may well be mistaken. --- Bertrand Russell.
Ted Cruz doesn't know much about rockets. He's only half way through his first term, and he's already running for president.
Senators Bill Nelson and Kay Bailey Hutchison accused Mike Bolden of stalling work on a heavy lift rocket, and threatened to arrest him for insubordination. When you watch Bolden announcing the SLS, the body language is that they are holding a shotgun to Bolden's back. John McCain mentioned the possibility of prison for Air Force personel in a Senate hearing several months ago, over the refusal to use SpaceX rockets. In the nineties, there were a few experimental rockets, which were worked on, and cancelled. The x-34 went over weight. The x-33 went over budget. The DC-X worked, until it crashed. The Falcon-9R is sort of a successor to the work covered by the DC-X.
On the other hand, the Space Shuttle could have been cancelled in the 90s, and all the modules could have been delivered by Titan 4, Proton, or even shuttle derived rockets. Congressmen could have made it happen, but they didn't. Ted Cruz wouldn't do anything like that. He lacks the knowledge, and is to busy. Ted Cruz is still the head of the subcommittee, even though he shouldn't be.
Couldn't they have worded this petition a little better? It's a very serious issue and it's written a little like a drunken rant.
Like everything else ever submitted by that joke site.
"Sorry. But I'm never going to do this. So, politely, fuck off!"
Chas - The one, the only.
THANK GOD!!!
Couldn't resist the chance to be an "apostrophe-s Nazi" in a Godwin's Law chain.
It's a shame that these violently insane Scientology criminals aren't getting put in prison fast enough, and it's also a shame that not enough Americans give a damn about the homicides, financial frauds, and tax frauds that these criminals commit.
You'll find that Christian cultists will be opposed to signing the petition because Republicans are dumbfucks who think that Scientology is some how a religion, and eliminating this crime syndicate's parasite tax exemption would open the door to their own Christian cult's parasite exemption.
So the petition is going to fail. FBI agents need to kick in doors and order criminals to the ground at gunpoint, but that's not going to happen either.
That sounds like Food Babe logic. If you can't pronounce the chemicals that make your food it's bad for you and don't eat it!
If a prophets name doesn't sound "prophety" enough they are not a prophet.
Has the government - beyond just the white house - been inclined to revoke any tax exempt statuses in memory?
Ummm, a little dose of reality.
It happens ALL THE TIME!
Deduct the cost of running the soup kitchen, and the net is taxable income. Works for both scenarios, churches and private companies. A private individual can make a donation and write that donation off, why not make a church just like that? The greater issue seems to be a question of property taxes, where a 'church' can plow their 'profit' into land and perpetually own without property tax hits. This seems to be the real problem -- should churches pay property tax? This should be a function of the state, so that an optiomal arrangement could be found -- but in any case, why shouldn't a church pay at the very least property tax on any land as if it were undeveloped - at the same rate as an empty lot?
The blood thirst of the mob to petition government to steal from anyone is more disturbing than the fraud of Scientology.
those child raping criminals shouldnt be allowed to exist
grown men believing in fairytales should be bitch slapped
people really have to understand that Scientology is a thug mafia make believing it is a religion. it is no religion
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/O...
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
Is described here: http://tonyortega.org/2015/04/...
The rest of Tony Ortega's site is interesting too.
I do not really understand what makes a religion a religion. Does there need to be a believe in something that can't possibly be true? Aren't communism, libertarianism, anarchism, ... religions then? Or should the thing people believe in be something that can be compared with a person? But then there are many religions no religions any more...
I personally can not reason without looking into history when some organisation can be called a religion and when not, apart from the fact that the organization claims to be a religion.
Of course when you take history into account, then organisations that were once a murderous bunch of terrorists and that were too dangerous to put something in their way can be seen as religions (for example Judaism, Christianity and Islam). But Scientology never were a bunch of sadistic murderers, and they aren't a result of a schism of one of those religions, so why are they a religion then? But if they aren't worshipping the believe system of a bunch of murderers, isn't it better that people who are sensitive to start believing in fairy tales become part of the Scientology church instead of one of the big churches? Isn't it better to divide and rule over all those competing churches?
When you start to revoke some religions, there will be less competition, and you will slowly form a 'catholic', Greek for universal, church. This didn't really work well for a well known Empire that had freedom of religion at first, but started to persecute followers of some other religions. It even put an entire continent in a dark age that was only dark because most of the knowledge and written sources were destroyed, because they would contradict the 'truth' that has been forged together from the 11th to the 15th century. And we still live in the 'alternative' truth that was forged together by the leaders of the three main religions.
I would say, let all those sects just lure the believers away from each other, because the biggest enemy to a secular government is a too big church. That is especially the 'thing' that made the US a free nation vs. the rest of the world: there were too many competing religions to be a threat to the young republic. But that freedom is in danger. What I have learned about American politics, is that the Christian extremists all vote for the same party and that those Christian extremists are the most reproductive part of the population, so a high immigration rate seems the only way to counter the inevitable fall into a one party system supported by 'the only church'. But this high immigration rate also might destabilize the society when too many people with too little opportunities (who are not able to live the American dream) are imported and become an easy target to be converted to the religion they were once meant to stop.
It has happened before in history, but unfortunately all writings about it have been destroyed and a new history has been written just keep us making the same mistakes over and over again.
At the rate the signature collections are going, it looks like there will only be about 40% of the required number by the 22 April deadline. Better pick up the pace if you want this to go!
Oh, I'm sorry sir, I thought you were referring to me, Mr. Wensleydale.
Honestly, Scientology is a religion founded by a science fiction writer who famously said "You don't get rich writing science fiction. If you want to get rich, you start a religion."
Isn't this the crux of the debate though: is scientology a religion or just bad science fiction? Indeed perhaps this is a good way to look at it. If scientology is classed as a religion then why not Trekkies or Star Wars fans? There is just as much "religious" fervour in those groups, if not more, and the science fiction is better written.
I personally don't agree with or like Scientology. We should de-fund it. ....and what about those stupid christian cults who abuse snakes.. and also Mormons? anyone that beleives in getting bit and magic underwear is insane not religious....and Jews? They cover expansionist stealing of land from Palestinians as being OK according to God. Not something I want my tax $ to go to. lets defund synagogues.
I also don't think Islam should be funded because they are about terrorism and Jihad and killing people it says so right in the Qu'ran. We need to remove tax exemption for Islam.
What about patriotism and the government telling me what I should think? Isn't that just another belief system and therefore religion? shouldn't we defund democracy?
See where I'm going with this?
What makes Scientology all that much worse than any other religion? Let's just kill the tax-exempt status for all of them and be done with it.
I apologize to the moderators for taking any of your time...just testing the comment system for a class project.
how can people claim that a religion shouldnt be exempt from taxes while at the same time say that their own religion should? i have nothing against removing scientology's exempt status as long as they remove it from every religion.
Just dropping by to say that I signed the petition and shared it with some friends.
Carry on.
Scientology looks more like a tax free real estate scam then it does a religion. Watch Going Clear. David Miscarriage and Tom Cruise are amazing, running around saluting each other, hugging, saluting, more hugging. Epic train wreck.
Why should anyone's "social club" have tax exmpt status?
The amount of real charity done by any I can find is effectively 0, compared to the revenue.
god dammit ralph. just keep doubling down on the derp. You were cited. If you don't like the citation, it is up to you to disprove it. ball's in your court
Why only Scientology? It's no different than any other religion out there the only difference is it's a new age one made up by a science fiction writer while he was on mushrooms and peyote & we only know that because it's new age. It's no more far fetch than any other religion, stop being bias and ignorant.
What cult do you have faith in? Lets go after them, I'm sure they make billions and are into all sorts of evil.
Mr Hubbard was the most compassionate and caring person I ever met.
Elron seriously suggested shooting non-believers in the head. With compassion.
Does that sound like the doings of criminals?
No, but murder, slavery, brainwashing, threatening violence, treason, stalking, and spying sound like the doing of criminals.
Removing the tax exempt status for the cult of Scientology would
be a nice start, but their just an easy target, and only mildly absurd
and self contradictory compared to the really dangerously delusional
cults like the Mormons, the Muslims and most any of the "Christian"
cults you'd care to name.
Simple truth is that we shouldn't be forced to subsidize the hate
mongering, terrorism and inevitable fraud of any institutions of religion.
It seems cruel and random to force people to fund your imperialist wars. Why can't you leave crazy alone?
If you want to be effective, here's what else you can do.
http://tonyortega.org/2015/04/13/if-you-want-the-irs-to-reexamine-scientologys-tax-exempt-status-its-time-to-get-real/#more-21822
I say take away all tax exemption for ALL religions & cults. Let's be honest here a religion is just a successful cult that has been around a long long time.
Go get George Carlin's view on religion. I agree with him. I pray to Joe Pesci :)
https://petitions.whitehouse.g...
Casteism
What is it that we think makes Scientology so egregious when compared with other tax-exemptions? It seems to me that if this gets pushed hard enough we will conclude that "tax-exempt status" for religious groups leads to a violation of the amendment, "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion". Only by NOT granting tax exempt status do we get government out of the business of deciding what is a valid religion and what is not. Look how well it worked to let government define marriage. Be careful what you wish for.
"There is no god but allah" - well, they got it half right.