Should Scientology Be Banned?

The proposal has been raised in Germany to ban Scientology.

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Now a good many people out there think, and probably quite righty, that Scientology is a crazy religion. But aren't all religions crazy? Why is Scientology any stranger than believing an all powerful, all knowing being that no one has seen or can prove to exist, is controlling everything in the universe? Why's it any more mental than believing in multi-armed elephants or bearded men who can turn five fish into five thousand? What makes one religion more legitimate or more 'sensible' or less a con for the vulnerable than another? If Germany bans Scientology, should it not ban religion altogether?

 

Wait, i thought it WAS banned?
And yes it fucking should. it's a cult. Even more of a scam than christianity.

 

Scam would imply falsity. How is Christianity empiricially less false than Scientology? More people might follow Christianity, but doesn't that just make it a more successful scam? And Scientology takes vast sums from the rich in exchange for false promises. Christian churches take money and give false hope to the deprived. Which has a more detrimental effect at the end of the day?

 

I wish I had kept the letter that some disgruntled scientologist sent to a friend of mine when he ordered a scientology book.It was enclosed in the book he received from them and it was a copy of a letter from Hubbard (on his sailboat in the Carribean) to a friend in the states,bragging about how this new deal,scientology was working like he planned and was reaping great rewards for him.(just called Hawaii to talk to the friend--will see if he kept it.It was quite revealing of Hubbard's self aggrandising mindset)

 

Self aggrandizement...That bell sounds familiar.

 

It doesn't sound to me that they are wishing to ban it on the grounds that it is not a religion, rather on the grounds that they abuse human rights, perhaps one can agree with that argument whatever ones thoughts are regarding religion.

 

I had a friend kicked out of scientology because she wouldn't quit doing people's numerology.Only one fantasy allowed ,I guess.

 

i don't know about this. scientology is really kooky. it is different, in many regards from Christianity. not that i'm a proponent of that either mind you; but in scientology they only way you can advance is if you can pay for these really expensive courses. this is why there are so many rich and famous that are high level scientologists.

last person in Christianity I can recall that tried to pull something like that was Jim Bakker, and i'm pretty sure he and Tammy Faye Bakker were arrested for it, as they had squandered hundreds of thousands of dollars that were supposed to go towards helping people and not building waterparks in their backyard.


I can honestly say I don't know enough about Scientology to make a fair argument for or against it. Thankfully, I might add. But what I do know is that at it's core it's a dollars game trying to get people to literally 'buy into' the cause. At most Christianity only asks you tithe 10% of what you earn to help ministries, and all 'decent' ministers say you should only do this if you can take care of your family first, as that is what God would want. (though not all ministers are decent).


Scientology scares me though, in a creepy alien-invasion sort of way, and the people that are celebrities that practice it (as i've yet to meet an actual scientologist in day to day life) rather freak me out too.

 

No it's not banned. We see them every Saturday in Brighton's Churchill Square doing that stupid "stress test" where they make people hold two tin cans. They tend to call themselves Dianetics these days though.

 

This monetarist aspect of scientology is fundamentally similar to christian practices throughout the centuries, from the sale of indulgences in the time of Martin Luther to the televangelists of today. Scientology may be more brazen about it but there has always been a strong financial motive to the christian church and its practitioners. If you make the case that scientology exploits the weak and vulnerable you could say the same about many aspects of christianity.

I'm fundamentally opposed to telling people what they can and can't believe, but there perhaps is a case to be made to limit the financial activities of churches - whether christian or scientologist. I agree with Peace Phoenix that both belief systems are equally absurd. People are free to believe whatever trash they like whether it's beardy sandal-wearers with bdsm overtones or volcanic aliens, but we can limit these organisations fiscal operations as businesses (or charities, or whatever they call themselves), when they are clearly just fraudulent snake-oil vendors. We have rules regarding gambling; donating to religions should be equally controlled, curbed, discouraged and taxed, because religion is equally harmful, addictive, and exploitative.

 

One of the earliest Christian cults demanded that adherents hand over all of their possessions. A married couple secretly tried to hold some of their belongings back, and the cult leader struck them dead with his magical powers. You can read about this in Chapter 5 of Acts of the Apostles, verses 1 - 10 - the cult leader was "Saint" Peter.

 

Lovely, you have such a knack for being rude sometimes.

I don't think it should be banned, as said, it's no more crazy then any other religion, and as for it being a cult, there are extremists in every group/ every religion, there always will be, but it doesn't mean we've banned all other religions becuase of it. Leave it alone.

 

Why do we assume spiritual beliefs should be immune from strong criticism? If a belief seems ludicrous and absurd to me, be it political, cultural or religious, I will say so, while at the same time defending absolutely anyone's right to think and say whatever the hell they like. It's at the point that beliefs have the potential to exploit and cause harm to others that we need to intervene, and that's what this case in Germany is all about. If we don't have the freedom to robustly challenge empirical claims of whatever nature we are in danger of allowing harmful things to go on on the basis of not causing offence.

There are two distinct forms of harm - 'offence' which is pseudo-harmful, and real-world material harm to vulnerable people. I think it's important to risk the first in order to defend against the second.

 

I look with amazement at the thousands of people packed in monstous auditoriums playing games with Benny Hinn and other televangelists.$$$$$$$$$$$$$ galore.What the hell is wrong with people?

 

It scares me, well the leader does, i saw that programme on BBC One about it (panorama?) and well it really freaked me out. If the Head of Scientology were to come up to me preaching scientology to me i would run as fast as i could away because i have heard and read about what it does to people and i would not want to be near that man. If the Pope came up to me and started preaching to me about Christianity i would ASK him to please leave me alone and carry on with what i was doing etc.

I think it was mainly that Programme which actually made me decide to find out about it cos otherwise i still wouldnt know about it.

I never ever want anything to do with any cult of any sort.



Its the lesser of two evils and i say Christianity is the lesser because yeah ok they're about money too etc etc but you dont HAVE to pay money and they well i think OK i dont agree with christians but they wont hurt you...


And this probably wont make any sense to you...

 

Religion is big business. They're flogging ideas, thoughts which have little or no real-world value.
EVERY religion that demands you donate something, be it money (tithes etc) or time ("go to Church every Sunday or go to hell!") is merely a sophisticated extortion operation.
And if that offends people, well, tough.

 

Funds are also distributed to the needy, and why the false hope to the deprived ?

 

sorry for chopping you so much (in the quote) ... but this statement is really untrue. MOST Christians (or people who call themselves Christians) will not hurt you, yes. But there are definitely some that will.

As example, Mormons consider themselves to be Christians; but they are known to strap electrodes to gay people and shock them in order to help them 'not be gay'.

There are Christian groups that do terrible emotional harm to people as well.

From my own background, when I was about your age, I had a friend at the Protestant church I went to, that was very active in the church himself. He used to always help out wherever he could, though he was only about 16 himself. He would frequently help keep the nursery (which is someplace they never had enough volunteers to help with), and he even dressed up for Vacation Bible School as a great big bear for some activity they were doing. He was really active in the youth group, along with myself; and honestly he did more to help the church than I did at the time.

However, then he admitted to the youth pastor that he was gay, when he was about 17. There was a big church meeting called to discuss this (when it has been mentioned in confidence), and the church passed rules that stated any openly gay person could not help or volunteer at the church in any capacity and certainly couldn't work with children.

This pretty much killed my friend inside. First he felt completely betrayed as all of this was in confidence, and secondly he was taken away from doing things that he loved to do and help out with. He'd been a big assest to the church, and not only did they push him away (though he was told he was welcome to stay at the church he just couldn't help out) but it jaded basically all his friends against the church and religion in general.

I myself, tried to continue with Chrisitainity at that point, but then I went on and spent a year at a Christian College, and I just saw the same continued hypocrisy and saw people be hurt (maybe not physically but certainly emotionally) all the time. And that for me, created my official turning point of faith; and my continued revoking of the Christian faith, constantly puts stress on the relationships I have with my family as they are all very religious, and unfortunately they tend to hold many of the same beliefs that I saw were so entirely hypocritical and caused so much pain for so many people.

 

Do we know what percentage of tithes are actually redistributed to the poor and what percentage goes to the upkeep of those expensive buildings, opulent collections of shiny things, wages and priests' and vicars' expensive tastes in frocks, fine wines and wafers? Presumably churches have to publish accounts like any other financial organisation... if they don't, they should

 

I will agree with you Dapablo about this. I do not know what your church is like and I have found some churches that will distribute to the needy without a sermon attached or a pretext of 'you must believe this to get something you need'.

However, in the years I have been involved in churches (I was born into a church so to speak, and didn't make my departure until i was about 21) and in the years after that I listen to my mother go on incessently about the work her church does (she is both actively involved in a church and is also a secretary at another church), there are very few times that they will give something to someone who needs it without strings attached.

Back home, there was even a men's homeless shelter run by a Priest. Sounds good, nice warm place to sleep in the winter where the temps dip below -21C, food, etc. But in order to stay there, you had to first attend mass. If you did not come for mass, you could not stay.

There were several churches around the city that offered free meals to people that could not afford food, but you always had to sit through a Bible lesson first before they would feed you.

I've also encountered places that would give out free boxes of food to people in need, but it was only to the people in need that came to the ministry, and they didn't do anything for the people that weren't involved in the ministry.


There is one program my mom is involved in at this time of year that I do applaud, as she told me about it, and they don't require anyone to have ever come to a church or be involved in a ministry. They don't preach to someone before giving them something, or anything else like that. Quite simply it's like a free toy store for parents to get a few gifts for their kids. All they have to do is come down, and show proof of some sort that they are on welfare or have a low income and they are given a voucher to walk around the store (apparently it is like a 3 story shop with toys from baby to teens) and pick out a gift for each of their children. They don't even include a Bible with it or a pamphlet to preach to the people. It is simply done just to make someone's life a bit better; and without all the strings attached.

In my 30 years, it's one of the few programs I have heard of, run by a church/ministry that is like that.