do you ever whistle, just for the fun of it?
Whilst browsing around online a few days ago I happened to stumble across the BBC Panorama special on Scientology – with the now almost infamous scene of John Sweeny, after days of harassment by the group, finally losing his rag. From there I naturally went in search of the fantastic South Park episode ‘in the closet’ which led to the departure of ‘Chef’ from the program. Then a You-tube search gave me the official Scientology version of events depicted in Panorama. Interestingly the rest of the You-tube community in response went on to expose how the Scientologists ‘doctored’ the audio track at one part to make it appear that Sweeny injected some national rivalry into his investigations. Truly bizarre that they should do such a thing, although I suspect that by making Sweeny subtly make a comparison between the US and Europe they won over a large proportion of the hyper-nationalist American audience.Documentary or no documentary it has been clear for a long time that the Scientology craze has been a little bit – strange. I’d love to do some sort of cultural analysis and trace its roots to an American society built upon ancient European superstitions. But I wont.
Anyway, the point is that yesterday whilst meandering back towards home I stumbled across the Edinburgh office of Scientology – which were offering free personality tests that day! – Ha.
Cont…
posted by Benjamin Nakizo @ 11:50 am
1 Comments:
Walking through the office door one of the first people I met was a very young American lad dressed in a smart suit, with that gelled sideways hair that only religious ministers seem to adopt. Brilliant I thought, a missionary from the holy land here to convert the heathens. How American. In fact the entire building was buzzing with Americans, but to my disappointment I was given a young Scottish women to conduct my personality test and talk me through the results. She seemed nice enough and didn’t seem to try and sell the ‘faith’ to me. But after a little prompting I was able to get some sufficiently ludicrous responses out of her such as when she dreamily replied that ‘Dianectics was first discovered by L. Ron Hubbard, who then went on to reveal Scientology to the world…” (Said whilst sitting beside a grand fireplace over which a large portrait of the prophet himself had been hung). Although she was on the whole remarkable tactful in her responses and wouldn’t be drawn into saying anything truly stupid. Much to my disappointment.
What pleased me the most however was that the seemingly joke questions used in South Park’s version of the personality test are actually spot on. They really do ask you if you ever whistle, ‘just for the fun of it’ and towards the end of the 200 question survey they slip in the majestically timed; ‘does life ever seen vague and confusing to you?”. Now I may just be seeing things but I swear the actual test results had been greatly distorted by whatever system they use for plotting their graph. Remembering the fate of Stan on South Park I made a deliberate attempt to come across as upbeat and caring. Only for my results graph to indicate that I was emotionally unstable and showed a blatant disregard for friends and family.
Clearly I am in need of some life tutoring. Which can be helpfully provided for me here in Edinburgh - for just £16.50 a day – or so their catalogue of ‘life improvement’ courses informs me.
All in all they were not as overtly radical as I had hoped, indeed their passive delusion reminded of just about any other organised religion. And we all know how I feel about them. The only difference here being that the prophet of Scientology died little over twenty years ago rather than two millennia ago. And unfortunately, although rather predictably, I think the recent negative press coverage of Scientology in the British press will only lead to a boost in its numbers, at least in the short term.
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