Sex and Tampa Bay

When I was a child I remember being fascinated by the khaki clad people that crowded the sidewalks down Ft. Harrison. “The Scientologists,” I’d hear them called in hushed whispers, while people carped about them taking over the town.

Honestly, as a kid, I thought Scientologists were the people who studied earthquakes.

Of course now I’m older and know better. They are people who believe that an evil alien named Xenu sent a bunch of souls to Earth and then put them in a Volcano. So, if you have physical or mental problems they are caused by the dead alien souls that are inhabiting your body.

No, really, that’s what they believe.

There’s nothing wrong with believing crazy shit. I believe that I’ve lived millions of past lives, mostly as an animal or insect. Some people believe that God knocked up a virgin. Some think that eating pork is a sin.

It’s isn’t the fact the believe something is crazy that makes the Scientologists dnagerous. It’s that they don’t tell people about the crazy stuff until they have already investing hundreds of thousands of dollars into “auditing”, a process that is nothing more than brainwashing and places people in highly suggestible states.

Real religions don’t hide their crazy shit until you’re too far in to turn back. We tell you the crazy stuff up front. Heck, we are proud of our crazy stuff because it is what we really and truly believe!

Being secretly crazy is one problem with Scientology. The fact that they charge so much money for their classes are another flaw. The fact that they take weak and highly suggestible people and force them to work, unpaid, for the church, is another. Their attempt to take over downtown Clearwater pisses me off. The fact that in the 1970’s they made an attempt to secretly take over the city council is a negative. Oh, let’s not forget the death of Lisa McPhereson.

Of course, the biggest criticism of Scientology is their policy of doing anything to silence their critics. This has included buying up the Cult Awareness Network after the non-profit group called Scientology a cult. They filed lawsuits to shut down people who spoke out against it. They hired PI’s to get dirt on its critics. It was understood that those who dared to cross the CoS would be decimated.

What happened?

On Thursday the CoS filed for a restraining order against 21 members of a group called Anonymous who has been staging protests outside the Clearwater HQ as part of the groups worldwide organized protests on Scientology.

Not only was the restraining order denied, it turned out that some of the people they named as members of Anonymous were not part of the group at all.

As if that wasn’t D’oh worthy enough, after the restraining order was denied a “bomb” was found at the CoS’ St. Pete offices. Of course it was a dud, probably because it was planted by Scientologists in an attempt to make Anonymous look bad. I don’t have proof they planted the fake bomb themselves, but it is my opinion. And I have the right to state it.

More Anonymous protests are planned tonight and Saturday at the Ft. Harrison Hotel. I won’t be able to make it because of family stuff. But I urge others to come out. Anonymous is suggesting that you wear masks to cover your identity so that the group doesn’t try to go after you with it’s “fair game” policy.

I’m not so sure. Maybe I would have wanted to hide my identity from the Church of Scientology I grew up around, but the current CoS seems pretty hapless. Can’t even get a fake bomb threat timed correctly!