The Plainsman Press - South Plains College

Cody Flores, staff writer

I’m all for freedom of religion, but scientology has to go.

According to scientologists, millions of years ago, before the dinosaurs ruled Earth, or Teegeeack, as scientologists call it, an intergalactic war was going on involving a galaxy-wide federation that was being oppressed by an evil titan ruler named Xemu. Fearing overpopulation, Xemu gathered up all the evildoers from his empire and put them into volcanoes set to explode with nuclear bombs at a later time. Now, the spirits, or thetans, of those evil beings were later collected, put in frozen alcohol and implanted into us humans. Wow, sounds kind of like something out of a science fiction novel. Coincidenatly, the founder of scientology was L. Ron Hubbard, a famous science fiction writer. Kind of makes you think.

Aliens, volcanoes, and thetans. Come on what is wrong with people? This isn’t a religion; it’s a movie script. We already have Tom Cruise on board. Let’s sign up Spielberg and put this thing on the big screen where it belongs.

Ever wonder what causes human pain and suffering? Well, thetans, of course. Want to get rid of the thetans inside of you? Of course you do. All you have to do is go to a scientology location near you, and they’ll simply clear out the thetans from your body. Like the evening news that begins with “Good evening” and proceeds to tell you why it really isn’t, the scientology people will let you know that they are here to help you and make you a better person, then take you in a room and make you to relive all of the horrible, depressing, sad stuff that has happened in your life. After you share this with them, they take a reading of your thetans to see just how miserable you really are.

When they fill you in on how depressed you actually are, you naturally are going to want to go back for more testing and eventually get all the thetans out of you. A way to clear all the sadness and pain from your soul? You can’t put a price on that, right? Well, for around $250 for first-timers, you sure can. If the goal of Scientology is to help the world, then why is it so expensive that very few people in the world can actually afford to be helped by it? The bills will eventually add up to around $5,000. Scientology couldn’t possibly be a global scam, could it? No way. What kind of sick, twisted people would benefit from the stupidity of others?

It doesn’t matter if you’re black or white, the only color that matters is green. Money is all that scientologists care about. The more money they have, the better they feel about their conniving ways.

So you’ve forked over the dough and your thetans are all cleared out. You’re all done, right? Not so fast. There are various levels of thetan testing. And wouldn’t you know it, the higher the levels, the higher the price. But, don’t fret, because, the higher the level, the more you get cleansed. The more you get cleansed, the more cool stuff you can do. Superhuman type things. After a while, if your thetan level is high enough, you can eventually lift phones off the hook, read a book from five rooms away and even read minds. Sign me up.

Hey, and guess what? You’re in good company too. John Travolta and Tom Cruise, no way! Only the great L. Ron could bring together Vinnie Barbarino and the last samurai. These guys are great; they seem to have their lives in order, except for that whole Katie, Oprah, couch thing.

Scientology is a joke, and anybody who goes for this garbage is a complete fool. A thing as hard to believe as this gets made fun of a lot and criticized. That’s when the suing begins. You can offend some of the religions all of the time, and all of the religions some of the time, but if you don’t want to end up in court, leave scientology alone. If you tick scientologists off, then be prepared to get sued.

Scientology needs to grow up. This religion needs to stop being the little kid no one likes because he tattles whenever someone says something offensive. If you choose to believe in something like this, be prepared to accept some criticism along the way. Christians and Jews take a lot of guff for their beliefs but they don’t run to the courtroom every time they are made fun of. Well at least not as much. What’s made in the courtroom for scientologists? Justice? Equality? Neither. Money is made, lots and lots of money. A profit from the smoke being blown up our skirts.

Scientology isn’t a religion; it just plays one in real life. Don’t be fooled by it, and remember it is better to understand a little than to misunderstand a lot.