Tom Turns Back Time

"he's not "lost a bit of weight" - he's looking gaunt and drawn. Makeup didn't do a great job hiding his paleness, and his sweater didn't do a great job of hiding his shrunken frame"

I quite disagree with this assessment. Of course, through the looking glass of hatred, anything will look ugly no matter how beautiful.

OK - some people sincerely dislike TC, Scientology or not, and that's perfectly legitimate.

But common! Even if you dislike him, you've got to admit that the before and after his slimming down is amazing. Stunning, even. Most people can never get back their youth shape after passing their 30's, and here you have this 46-years old guy almost looking younger and better than ever...

Both with his latest film and in real life, Tom turns back time indeed...

Here is a picture taken from his Valkyrie premiere (left), and one taken of him last year (right)!

Valkyrie - Mixed Reviews with a Positive Trend So Far

With a day or two from the release in theaters, reviews are starting to pour in. On the whole, the so-so initial assessment is confirmed so far, though there will of course be Scientology critics who are going to quote from the ultra negative reviews and claim it is a disaster.

The Metacritic web site now has five reviews, ranging from 63 to 75, making an average of 67% thus far. 75 is not very high but the fact that, so far, nobody gave it a really bad rating is again confirming that the film is not going to be a super hit, but that it is of a solid quality on its own.

IMDB still features the one initial review of Dec 11, giving the film an 8/10 and approved by 39 readers out of 62. All other users review on this site, except one, are overly positive to enthusiast so far. The forum, for its part, with arguments between Scientologists claiming the movie is going to rock, and Scientology critics asking people to boycott the movie (for no better reasons than the fact Tom Cruise is a Scientologist), can be safely ignored.

RottenTomatoes, however, has the most extensive number of professional reviews so far, 28, out of which 16 are positive and 12 are negative, giving a total of 57%. Not that high but also not that bad for such a controversial film and again confirming the trend so far.

From the look of it, thus, it seems that users may end up giving a higher rating than professional critics, even though the later have not really given a bad rating overall.

The big question is, of course, who the hell is going to go and see a war movie on Christmas day or even the following day? By all means, not me. I am going to spend it, as usual, with my family. I am going to see the film, though, but not during Christmas. If other people think like me, we may have to wait a while before making the final accessment on how the film was received by the public.

Tom Cruise: Human or Not?

From http://voices.washingtonpost.com :

We all know Scientology has made Tom Cruise a little weird (couch jumping, etc.), but who'd have thought that his crazy-eyed devotion to the belief system founded by sci-fi writer L. Ron Hubbard could lead to deep psychosis? According to some sources, the group's techniques include activities that increasingly cut adherents off from reality. This could be Tom's biggest role ever.

The author lists a series of wild behaviors on the part of different celebrities, but attributes Tom Cruise's excesses to Scientology. What about the other celebrities it reports about? And what proof does he have that it is linked to Scientology at all other than possibly being just a celebrity symptom? Not even that, it could be questioned whether jumping on a couch out of enthusiasm for having found one's true love is that crazy after all.

On top of this, the author also has to bring in the myth of Scientology creating psychosis.

Fail is fail, and bad journalism is what it is - but then it also is the reflection of a popular opinion artificially promoted by critics in guise of Scientology "criticism".

Note that in a typical double bind, the fact that Cruise is now acting "normal" and even apologizing for his past excess and for trying to push Scientology on to the public, is also, ironically, the sign of the evil of the CoS according to some critics.

Indeed, in this article, Jean-Luc Barbier writes (in French):

Pour un scientologue dire qu'il a eu tort ne signifie rien. C'est une technique pour que l'autre au final accepte votre point de vue de scientologue.

In other words, he claims that Cruise's apology is only an evil Scientology technique of the ever evil Church of Scientology to manipulate people.

It not only is a double bind, as in the case I reported here already, it also is a denial of right. Indeed, Jean-Luc Barbier does not simply say that he personally feels that Cruise apologies are not sincere, he is saying litterally "For a Scientologist, to say that he was wrong does not mean anything".

Scientology is made SO evil that the mere fact of belonging to such a group removes any right "normal" people enjoy.

This reminds me of the argument of Ted Patrick, saying that since cult members are "brainwashed", for them to claim that they joined voluntarily, and for them to protest being abducted and forcibly deprogrammed, does not mean anything. It is not a human right violation, since being brainwashed has removed his humanity and have made of him a robot.

In effect, Jean-Luc Barbier does the same thing. He denies the possibility of Cruise being just a human being like you and me, who maybe does make mistake sometimes.

Jumping on a couch or apologizing has little to do with Scientology at all, but more simply with being a human being.

Copyright, Fair Use, and Criticism

Some time ago I webbed Alice Bailey's book, "Ponder on This", which is a compilation from the 30 or so Bailey's books, grouped on selected themes. Each excerpt was linked to a full version of every book some guy had put on the net.

I then received a cease and desist letter from Lucis Trust, who owns the copyright, and I had to put my pages down. The other guy who webbed the full version had to put it down too. However, I did ask permission to use at least some excerpts in a fair use spirit. They never replied to my request, something I was not very happy about and which prompted me to put all my Bailey's page down with a notice stating the reason why.

It now turns out Lucis Trust is making a page of their own that is, basically, identical to the one I had, except that they link each excerpt to the advertise of each book in which the excerpt is contained. I am not sure they are not even copying/pasting from my ex-pages, though I think they probably re-scan everything themselves to make sure it's identical to the original.

Well, I don't mind. I am glad I could contribute at least with the idea, maybe, though it would have been more easy for them to ask me to just link to the advertise of the books rather than to the full version.

Anyway, good thing it's back on-line. I shall update my notice page sometimes too.

PS - To bring this post back on topic, I would say that it may be a good idea for the CoS to do something like this too. Maybe they do it already, I don't know. If they prevent critics from publishing their copyrighted work, even in a fair use manner, then at least they could publish some of it themselves. Such a compilation could be a good enticement and would promote their basic views into society.

The CoS could even address the many distortions critics engage into by publishing clarifications and context, a bit like I did recently with my medical claims page, and a bit like what Louanne is doing. In this manner, they would turn criticsism into opportunities to clarify their teaching and fine-tune them to better target their audience.

Of course, this is not in par with the L. Ron Hubbard's philosophy regarding criticism at all, which is to never defend, always attack; to tag all those who criticize Scientology as some sort of criminals; to engage only in "good news"; and to keep at prospering instead.

Well, it's a choice. Who knows which approach is the best eventually. It's true that by not addressing anything they can just dismiss all critics with the same brush. and since critics do engage, on top of valid criticism, in grotesque claims as well, it does work somehow. If the CoS was to address that part of the criticism that is false, they would be left with that part of it that is true, and they would have to reform. Guess they just don't want that, nor is it compatible with LRH's spirit that present it as an ultimate planet-saving revelation of which every criticism bring us nearer to the doom.

Becoming a Scientologist

Crystalfrost Jones recalls how she became a Scientologist.

Comments Shed Light on Low Numbers

Some interesting comments from StumbleUpon about Jeff Jacobsen's article on Project Chanology which I commented back in Dec 17.

These comments I think explain much about why the numbers of protesters crumbled down. They align quite neatly with what I thought about it so far, namely, that more informed onlookers do not share the belief of anti-Scientologists that Scientology is that bad, and the fact that the original Anonymous feels its spirit has been sort of betrayed.

Most of the comments fall in reason 1 above, with reason 2 being an important part as well.

Indeed, at the time of writing, there are 25 comments made during the last 5 days. Seven of these could be said to fall in reason 1, and four to fall under reason 2. Four are comments about the photo, tl;dr, or are non-sensical, living the ten remaining comments to be split between neutral, positive, and negative.

Here are some representative excerpts:

Reason 1:

• Scientology doesnt seem to be that big of a problem to me. It just appears to be about as bad as other religions. I really just wish these kids would channel this energy and creativity into better forms of protesting.

• There are far more important/interesting things in the world that they could have focussed their attention on. Can't help feeling that this is just a bit of attention-seeking by a bunch of geeks whose only achievement was to take someone's advice and get out more.

• Scientology is not worth your protesting.

• (From one Andizzle314:) Anonymous has to be the most self-righteous bunch of assholes on the internet next to 9/11 conspiracy theorists. Grow some balls and take on a real religion that actually has influence on world matters.

• Andizzle is right on the money.

• They cannot be serious , and they are not funny either . Bunch of clueless spoiled teens , having no other stuff to do in their life (like work for money , protest some REAL issues , or just do anything creative/intelligent ) throwing overused memes on a sci-fi club . Some people decided to use their herd (sheep) mentality for their own purposes and this is how "project failology" was formed . Anonymous might seem like a good idea , but they are doing it wrong . I wont even say cancer , because 4chan = Myspace . Get over it , and find better chans to lurk .
  
  
• Whatever... this is not my fight. Let them do what they want. It keeps em busy anyway.
  

Reason 2:

• Fucking moralfags ruin everything.

• Project Chronology, though it has roots in anonymous, is not anonymous. Someone wanted an army to combat Scientology, and they culled them through 4chan. It is an offshoot, they are "moralfags". Wearing V for Vendetta masks and rickrolling Scientology places does not make you anonymous. And while they are a diverged group from anonymous, I think that what they are going is pure win.

• Epic win for Project Chanology, but I can't help but think that an anthropological examination of anything related to /b/ is a wasted venture.

• i was there, the first day it started, the DDoS attacks that followed... then after a while the fags came in and ruined everything, there came millions of people who said "anonymous, the anti scientology group". wtf, that's not what anon is... this one is okay.. at least it's not a site about "anonymous" that's just about scientology.

Ten Million Members

Daniele Gounord, the spokeswoman for the CoS in France, has now made a blog entry about the result of Google's most researched terms for the "What is..." topic, about which I commented back in Dec 10. It's in French. Among others, she claims that :

La religion de Scientologie a été fondée par Ron Hubbard. La première église a été établie aux États-Unis en 1954. Depuis lors, le Scientologie s’est développée et compte plus de 7500 églises, missions et groupes et plus de 10 millions de membres dans 164 pays.

(More than 7,500 churches, missions, and groups, and more than 10 million members in 164 countries.)

Now the 10 million figure (growing from 8 million a while ago) is most probably an inflated one, but the 7,500 figure for the various type of Scientology organizations around the world should be something that could objectively be verified.

If true and if you count an average of 10 members by organization, that would make the total figure to 75,000. Let's be generous and say there really are 20 per organization on average, that would bring us to 150,000, which I think is a relatively fair representation. Make that 300,000 and you probably won't be far off from the truth.

Back in the 1970's, when I believe the number of people attending courses was higher than it is now, we indeed had maybe 20 to 40 persons regularly attending courses in the average-sized organization where I was staff. However, we did have a "central file" of more than 2,000 persons to whom we would mail promotional material from time to time. If now you multiply 7,500 by 2,000, of course you get a figure of 15 million.

The CoS probably takes its 10 million figure from something like the central file, but it really is not very representative. The central file is made of every person who ever gave their address to the CoS, either buying a book or even just taking the personality test. Their address would probably be pulled out from the file if they write back asking for it, but if they just throw the promotional literature they receive in the garbage, their address would still be there and counted among the 10 million.

Silly...

Diskeeper Story Picked Up by The Register

The register now picked up the Diskeeper story, previously reported on Slashdot.

Check also the two interesting legal analysis by would-be lawyers Tikk and henri, taken from the Diskeeper discussion thread in ARS.

Take into account, though, that the two are prominent anti-Scientologists, justifying arbitrary bans on their supposedly "free speech" pet IRC channel which they share with Dave Touretzky, and thus make room for massive bias and misinterpretations.

Bye Bye Bush Shoes

An hilarious article at http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/7796047.stm:

"The Syrians claim the shoes were made in Syria and the Turks say they made them. Some say he bought them in Egypt. But as far as I know, he bought them in Baghdad and they were made in Iraq, " the brother of shoe-throwing journalist Muntader al-Zaiditold the AFP news agency.

This does not prevents the Turkish firm, Istanbul-based Baydan Shoes, to be mostly recognized as the maker of the shoe, until then called "Model 271", but now renamed "Bush Shoe" or "Bye Bye Bush Shoes".

He is overwhelmed by orders and have had to hire 100 extra staff to face demands, including from the US (18,000 pairs) and Iraq (15,000), while a British distributor has asked to be the firm's exclusive European sales representative.


Related blog entries - R-Bushoe-

Anonymous Crashes CoS' Christmas Party

Anonymous made sure to be an uninvited guess at the CoS' Christmas party in Columbus, attended by Scientologists and their children. See how they brag about it here and here, with its usual cortege of approving and cheering anons and OGs.

I would say that, in addition to shrinking in numbers, Anonymous seems to have strayed very far away from its initial goal as well. When was the last time the CoS went to a Christmas party attended by critics and their children with signs branding them as criminals?

An Idea of Stats

It's hard to keep stats of the number in the monthly anti-Scientology protests those days, since they are not rounded up anymore, and they are not always reported for individual locations either. I guess it would be possible to draw a figure but it would take an awful lot of time. Not worth it.

To have an idea, though, I have taken a quick look at the Dec 13 entries for the London post game, as London was always by far the biggest player in the field.

If this post is true, and there are no other entries about numbers (really I did not wade in all details through the 9 full pages posted that far), then we are speaking of a maximum of 20!

This for a location that peaked at 725 in March and was still at 566 in July when all the rest of the world took the plunge, and was still at 120 back in September!

The LA Times Makes Amend

The other day I wrote that the LA Times ignored Anonymous in its yearly review. However, in its specific review on the impact of the Internet in 2008, it does acknowledge the movement:

Anonymous lives: In March, a video of Tom Cruise extolling the values of Scientology leaked onto YouTube. When Scientology officials tried to stamp it from the site, the church drew the ire of young Internet denizens around the world, spawning a wave of masked protest that put Scientology on the defensive.

PS - the LA Times is wrong, however, to claim that the video was leaked in March.

Diskeeper Suit on Slashdot

Slashdot picked up on Touretzky's article about two ex-employees suing Diskeeper (a company run by Scientologists) after being fired, alleging that the company makes Scientology training a mandatory condition of employment.

Diskeeper's surprising response to the lawsuit appears to be that religious instruction in a place of employment is protected by the First Amendment. The blogger at RealityBasedCommunity.net believes that the legal mechanism that Diskeeper is using to advance this argument is inappropriate and will be disallowed, but that the company will eventually be permitted to present its novel legal theory.

Give More than You Receive

One of the useful things I learned from Scientology was the notion of service. The most important thing you need to know for a business to succeed is to provide a service which people find useful. The way LRH develops this notion goes further than what may seems obvious.

I am traveling a lot and it always surprises me how people in developing countries try to make a profit by over-pricing their services. Well, it's human, but hardly the best approach. If they were pricing reasonably but concentrated on delivering a perfect service instead, they would ultimately reap considerably more than the petty gain they seek to make. They may even get rich. They don't know that, and that's of course one of the reasons why they struggle through life in the first place.

Bottom line, give rather than expect receiving. You may lose a little here and there, but ultimately you will find that things just come your way.

Of course, Scientology does not have a copyright on that notion, but I found a particular aspect of it quite nicely developed in an article rightly entitled "Why Give More than You Receive".


PS - when I was working in Saint Hill, U.K., I used some of my free time to hop on a motorbike and go to Brockwood Park nearby to hear Krishnamurti speak. When he was not speaking, he would sometimes mingle with the crowd in a humble way. For example, he would line-up for food just like everyone else. When someone would come to him to shake his hand and thank him, he would shake back and thank a hundred times more enthusiastically. This sometimes was funny because he was a small Indian type, and some of the Caucasians where strongly built types, but it remained in my memory as a perfect application of this principle, even onto small things.

Chris Guider

Scientology's little big man keen to 'assist' Dragons.

Summary:

An article on Chris Guider, known for being the one "who played in all three grand finals on the one day", an exceptional feat which he attributes to Scientology:

"Through the purification rundown, which I did mid-1985, I went from being extremely fatigued after just one game in late 1984 to a point where I played three championship games in one day, all grand finals."

Being one of the smallest men ever to play, he became a target for giants and so became very creative around the ruck, a skill which he transferred to Hollywood's Celebrity Center, where he worked as a full-time staffer and where he aided people overcome their self doubts and reach the highest levels of performance.

Guider has now returned to Australia after a near 20-year absence and hopes to create what he calls "an ideal Scientology organization here in Sydney". He also wants "to ignite the fire with my old football club, St George Illawarra, and get them back to the top of rugby league".

PS - The article makes a small mistake towards the end by claim Anonymous is a group of ex-Scientologists.