Not only does the content about religion promote free speech, the controversy of this content perpetuates SP’s intent.  Stemming from my love of the show, I’ve decided to take an in depth look at how religion is represented in South Park, and show you how nothing is taboo when you’re an equal opportunity offender.  This week’s post will be on Scientology.

Part 1: Scientology

If there’s any religion (if you can even call it one) that SP has ripped apart piece by piece, it’s Scientology – better known as the Church Cult of Scientology (COS).  Two episodes of SP have dealt with debunking and mocking COS.  The first appearance of COS appeared in “Super Best Friends”.  In this episode, the magician David Blaine creates a cult following that is strikingly reminiscent of COS.  Unfortunately, the episode didn’t actually reference COS.  This didn’t happen until season 9 when Parker and Stone figured it was time to deal out the damage that COS deserved in the episode “Trapped in the Closet”.  To anyone who knows anything about COS, the story is completely absurd, a fact which Parker and Stone make vividly clear in this episode as they caption a visual interpretation of Scientology’s creation story with “This is what Scientologists actually believe.”

What’s funny about this is that the story itself is hilarious, so all SP had to do was show it to the viewers.

Many other parts of this episode completely lampooned this religious cult.  The start of the show has Stan looking for something free to do and comes across a Scientology church that is offering free e-meter tests.  Inside the church everything is ethereal and everyone is overly excited about life.  To say that SP doesn’t try to make Scientology look like a cult in this scene would be more patently absurd than Tom Cruise on Oprah’s couch.  After Stan takes the “free” test the tester tells him:

“… you are one messed-up kid… I’m afraid that you are completely miserable and totally depressed…there’s certainly no question that you are a perfect candidate for Scientology.”

Stan, a young and ignorant child, is helpless against these claims.

We all know that COS is in it for the Benjamins. SP makes this known by having Stan tell a crowd that “Scientology is just a big fat global scam” at the end of the episode.  SP goes one step further, by having the president of COS claim “You don’t actually believe this crap, do you?? Dummy! Brainwashed alien souls?? E-meters and thetan levels??.”

As sure as Parker and Stone were this episode would offend Scientologists, Isaac Hayes – the Scientology practicing voice of Chef – quit the show.  And that wasn’t the only negative outcome of the episode.  Viacom, who owns comedy central, had the original airing of the show pulled because of the portrayal of Tom Cruise.  Cruise threatened to back out of Mission Impossible 3 endorsements if Paramount, who is owned by Viacom, didn’t tell comedy central to pull it.  Cruise also threatened to sue SP.  Parker and Stone predicted this would happen and so added this little ditty to the end of the episode:

Stan: Look, everybody, we’re all looking for answer, you know. We all want to understand who we are and where we come from, but… sometimes we want to know the answers so badly that we… believe just about anything.
Man 2: Huh?
Woman: What?
Stan: [takes off his laurel] I’m not the reincarnation of L. Ron Hubbard. And… Scientology is just a big fat global scam.
Brian: Oh! We are gonna sue you!
Stan: What??
COS President: Yeah, you think you can say our religion is a lie?! We’ll sue you, buddy!
Stan: YOU told me it was a lie!
President: Ho, now you’re puttin’ words in MY mouth! You are sooo sued!
Man 3: You can’t make fun of Scientology, kid! We are gonna sue your ass AND your balls!
Crowd: Yeah, that’s right!
COS President: How dare you mock our faith, you little punk?! You’ll be hearing from our lawyers tomorrow!
Field Reporter: We’ve just had an incredible development here, Mitch. Tom Cruise, John Travolta, and R. Kelly, have all come out of the closet! [The three of them come out the front door and Cruise releases R. Kelly, who moves off and out of view.]
Cruise: [approaches Stan] So you’re NOT the prophet, huh?! You made me look stupid! I’m gonna sue you too!
Stan: Well fine! Go ahead and sue me!
Cruise: I will! I’ll sue you in England!
COS President: You are so sued, kid!
Stan: Well go on, then! Sue me!
COS President: We’re going to!
Stan: Okay, good! Do it! I’m not scared of you! Sue me!

This one episode caused the loss of a beloved character, almost ruined their contract with Comedy Central, and nearly catapulted them into a lawsuit with Tom Cruise, all of which SP predicted would happen, and yet they decided to forge along anyways in the name of free speech.  Kudos South Park, kudos.

Up next week is Part 2: Christianity

Despite looking like an orange microphone, Sai Baba was one persuasive SOB. Many followers actually cried in his presence. Stirring these kinds of emotions, it’s no wonder they referred to him as Godman. Not exactly the most imprecise nickname ever.

Why he thought, or others thought, he was an incarnation:

Sai Baba wasn’t so much a cult leader as he was a highly regarded guru. According to Sathya Sai Organization there are an estimated 1,200 Sathya Sai Baba Centers in 114 countries worldwide. He didn’t do much to entice crowds. He would sit for long periods of time in front of an eager crowd without saying a word and then perform a miracle magic trick. The crowd would go wild, people would cry, and Sai Baba would get whatever he wanted. And since humans have something called a “sex drive” it’s no wonder someone who could get whatever he wanted would…

Rape:

Yes, and he was a pedophile too. During his reign of popularity he allegedly raped dozens of people, but most were too afraid to come forward about it. He was in his 70s and still allegedly raping the shit out of people.  Rape is bad enough, but a grandpa with moth balls? (Don’t pardon the pun.)  Just watch around the 5:40 mark of this video.

Reporter: “Why would God want to put his penis in your mouth?”
Rapee: “Got me.”

Oh, he got you, all right. Poor guy.

#2. Glen Taylor Helzner

So you want to take over the Mormon Church and usher in an age of peace and joy. Cool, go for it. But training Brazilian orphans to assassinate the leaders of the Mormon Church and then blaming it on the government behind the government? You would think this could only happen in a 1970s “B” horror movie by a 9/11 truther, but of course, you’d be wrong. This was Glen Taylor Helzner’s diabolical plan. Fortunately for those of us who don’t believe in the fine art of Brazilian orphan assassination, Helzner was arrested before he could follow through with it. What was his charge? He settled for the measly slaughter of five innocent people. His wife and his brother – both of whom he completely mind-fracked – actually committed the murders on his planning. Kind of like sacrifice…if you still consider the sacrificed not wanting to be sacrificed sacrifice.

Why he thought, or others thought, he was an incarnation:

Helzner was a Mormon, and if you know anything about Mormons you’d know that they fancy far-fetched stories about Jesus. Following this proud Mormon tradition, Helzner thought he was the second coming of Christ. Why? No one is entirely sure. The psychologist that analyzed him came to the conclusion that he was charismatic enough to convince his brother and his wife…and even himself that he was the reincarnated Christ. All three of their delusions fed off of each other’s until they reached a point of complete disconnect from reality. Or in other words: completely frackin’ nutters.

Rape:

No rape, unless you consider calling telling a girl that you’re God to get her to sleep with you rape. Telling followers you’re God gets them on their knees faster than Jenna Jameson on Jupiter (Jupiter has 245% the gravity of Earth).

#3. Adi Da Samraj

Adi Da literally means “the radiant avatar, primordial giver, universal ruler.” In other words, his name is basically God. Because, as we all know, referring to yourself as God just isn’t awesome enough. Did you just sneeze? If so then “Adi Da bless you.” A simple “God bless you” won’t suffice among the ranks of the crazed Adi-Damites. So what is his claim to fame? A unique and complete offering of the total way and wisdom of the pre-cosmic Divine Light. He claims to be the most spiritualized being to ever exist. You’d think the most spiritualized being in history would have the ability to create a coherent and intelligent form of spirituality:

Nope. In 2007 the Encyclopedia of Cults referred to this as complete BS. Don’t believe me? Ok, don’t, it was a lie. But you could imagine that if such an encyclopedia did exist it’d say something along those lines.

Why he thought, or others thought, he was an incarnation:

On September 10, 1970 Adi Da says he had a reawakening in which he awoke as a divine incarnation. He told people he was God, they followed, and that’s about it. We can imagine it went something like this:

Adi: Yo.
Random: Oh, hey stranger.
Adi: I’m God.
Random: Totally. Here’s my money.

Rape:

Again there was no actual rape, but on the rape scale – yes, such a thing does exist – I’d place the sexual abuse he allegedly committed at around a 7 out of a maximum rapiness of 10. You can be the judge. Here are his allegations:

• lining female members up, making them strip, and then cutting their pubic hair
• lining girls up, making them strip, then taking his pick of the one he wanted to sleep with that night
• sexing up a 10-year-old at a naked party
• forcing a girl to act in a porno flick and subsequently giving her herpes

#4. Charles Manson

From jamming with the Beach Boys to killing Roman Polanksi’s pregnant wife, a Natural Born Killers-esque movie about Manson’s insanity practically writes itself. Need I say more?

Why he thought, or others thought, he was an incarnation:

During the age of free love, flower power, and the start of insanely reductionist postmodern thought, Charles Manson rose to fame as a guru in San Fran’s Haight-Ashbury district. He gathered a following, which was mostly made up of young girls in search of meaning in their lives – kinda like Girls Gone Wild, except they flashed their souls.  His charisma led his followers to think of him as the incarnation of Christ. The hair probably helped too. On top of that he called himself “The God of Fuck.” Which leads into:

Rape:

Before starting a cult Manson spent six years in prison on charges of theft and, you guessed it, rape.

Co-evolution is a regular part of any struggle. Each side vies to always be ready for what the other side is going to throw at them, while always staying one step ahead of the adversary so as to leave them in a state of defensive impotence. The result: a bi-directional game of cat and mouse where expedient and effective internal communication and external intelligence-collecting are of absolutely critical importance.

The war between the Cult of Scientology and its critics is primarily a war of information. The critics are working to inform as many people as possible of the very real dangers and abuses of this genuinely malevolent sinister cult which has apparently managed to hijack the minds of many well-meaning people. The cult is trying and usually failing to stop protests and to paint the protesters as a homogeneous cohesive body of bigotry, hate and terrorism. They have played the religion card and the Hitler/KKK card, largely unsuccessfully. They have avoided giving detailed interviews and where they have – i.e., Tommy Davis’ recent CNN appearance – they have engaged in blatant lying and platitudinal say-nothingisms. They have also engaged in their honed intimidation tactic of aggressive shutter-buggery of protesters, having Sci-plants masquerade as protesters in order to attempt to gather protester information and to incite illegal activities which could in turn be blamed on the entire protest movement, lurking and trolling on protest forums, websites and blogs, publishing the names of individual anonymous critics, pursuing frivolous legal and criminal action against protesters, and having YouTube and Google impede the online communication of protesters.

On the other hand, the protesters have engaged in setting up mass communication networks across the Internet, aggressively publishing/posting on the unethical practices of the cult, engaging in many protests with participation ranging from a handful to hundreds, distributing and posting fliers, flooding YouTube with critical and expository videos, alerting the media, letter-writing campaigns, occasionally clicking Scientology ads because they know it will cost the cult money, promoting leading critical sites (e.g., Xenu.Net, ExScientologyKids.Com, GlossLip.Com), and tightly binding on an international scale to rail against the cult’s aggressive and unwarranted legal/criminal action and harassment of protesters. This, of course, is in addition to more cunning methods like Google Bombing (i.e., exploiting the Google algorithms so as to make the first site return for “Scientology” Xenu.Net, and Scientology.Org for “cult”), and now out-right shunned methods like Scientology website-crashing, black faxing and prank phone calls. These latter methods were the norm back in the first 1-2 weeks of the Anonymous backlash, but were abandoned on the thoughtful advice of Mark “Wise Beard Man” Bunker in favour of grassroots online and street activism.

A YouTuber has released a video claiming to expose another Scientology attack strategy: manufacturing soundbites. In this video, it is claimed that Scientologists are looking to engage protesters in interviews in which leading questions are asked so as to elicit responses in which they call Scientology a religion, speak of negative behaviours committed by Anonymous protesters, and make other remarks which Scientology can use in its propaganda media. It is important to be aware of this subtle and cunning approach so that people can be wary and watch how they phrase their responses to questions regarding Scientology and not comply with the framing of leading questions. Put simply: do not let the questioner control the discussion. If they are framing the issue inappropriately, reframe and then respond.