{"id":398,"date":"2008-04-11T15:32:32","date_gmt":"2008-04-11T19:32:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/oddempire.org\/weblog\/?p=398"},"modified":"2008-04-11T15:32:32","modified_gmt":"2008-04-11T19:32:32","slug":"aliens-cults-and-pranksters","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/oddempire.com\/weblog\/2008\/04\/11\/aliens-cults-and-pranksters\/","title":{"rendered":"Aliens, cults and pranksters"},"content":{"rendered":"

By<\/span> Ben Caleca on<\/span> 4\/11\/08<\/p>\n

Celebrities can be weird people. There are always rumors about one celebrity or another floating around some blog, but for the most part, I tend not to follow such trivial “news.” However, I was intrigued by a leaked video of Tom Cruise ranting and raving about the Church of Scientology. He was babbling almost incoherently, suggesting a clean sweep of those who oppose Scientology and hinting that no other religion can help humanity like Scientology can. Like many, I was confused, but the video had a much more important effect: It revealed the dark side of an organization that relies on controlling information to survive and thrive.<\/p>\n

Scientology’s attempts to remove this video from the Internet led a group called Anonymous to make a video warning, saying that Scientology was now at war with them. The crimes they attributed to Scientology were severe, severe enough to catch my eye. What I found surprised me.<\/p>\n

Documents from dozens of sources – the New York Times, Time magazine, independent reports and reports from former Scientologists – tell stories of a cult-like group whose “technology” created by the group’s founder, L. Ron Hubbard, seemed tantamount to brainwashing. Its teachings are based on the now famous Xenu story, a tale of an alien nuclear holocaust kept confidential to all but high-level Scientologists until it was leaked to the public several decades ago. Even the German government has classified the group as a cult on the grounds that it is more of a pyramid scheme than a true religion. Apparently, to reach a higher spiritual plane requires that you pay exorbitant amounts of money, including in excess of $300,000 to become an “Operating Thetan,” a high state of being that apparently grants superpowers and success.<\/p>\n

[[[[MORE]]]]\u00a0<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Ben Caleca on 4\/11\/08 Celebrities can be weird people. There are always rumors about one celebrity or another floating around some blog, but for the most part, I tend not to follow such trivial “news.” However, I was intrigued … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","WB4WB4WP_MODE":"","WB4WP_PAGE_SCRIPTS":"","WB4WP_PAGE_STYLES":"","WB4WP_PAGE_FONTS":"","WB4WP_PAGE_HEADER":"","WB4WP_PAGE_FOOTER":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-398","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/oddempire.com\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/398","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/oddempire.com\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/oddempire.com\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/oddempire.com\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/oddempire.com\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=398"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/oddempire.com\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/398\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/oddempire.com\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=398"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/oddempire.com\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=398"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/oddempire.com\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=398"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}