Conspiracy Theory (part 2)

Perhaps the thing that annoys me the most is self-deception. People behaving badly, it's pretty clear to everyone that they are behaving badly, but they have these, you know, excuses. And somehow, that makes it OK for them to continue behaving badly.

Take the Church of Scientology.

Please.

(Sorry, old joke)

Take the Church of Scientology: As covered in the previous post, they have this wonderful excuse for everything bad they do. They are the target of a vast, super-powerful, immensely rich, evil, world-wide, trillions of years old conspiracy. A fictitious but very, very evil and powerful conspiracy, which the church must fight, with dirty tricks, lies, [the abusive practice formerly known as] fair game, lawyers, harassment and other crap.

The church is forced (I tell you forced) to use these criminal and illegal tactics because their fictional evil enemy does that all the time! Really! Trust me, the absolute proof of all this is in the mail.

Did I let slip that this super-powerful, super-evil, anti-Scientology conspiracy doesn't actually exist?

And, since it doesn't exist, there goes the Church of Scientology's only excuse for its very, very bad behavior.

I can hear the true believer Scientologists now, "If our beloved conspiracy theory is false, then why, oh why are we being attacked? And by whom?"

Ah! Where do the critics come from, if not from the Vast, Evil, Anti-Scientology Conspiracy?

They came into existence as a result of Church of Scientology footbullets.

If you trace any Scientology critic's history back to when and why they became angry at the Church of Scientology, you will find that the church shot itself in the foot, did something really, really stupid, hurt someone, refused to admit it or make it right--and the victim decided to do something about it.

Now, of course, Scientologists are not allowed to do that sort of investigation, but anyone else can easily track every single critic's history back to a point where the Church of Scientology did the exact wrong thing at the exact wrong time and really messed things up.

Example: GlossLip, the gossip blog. It was just happily posting celebrity gossip stuff in mid 2007, and there was news about Tom Cruise and Scientology. GlossLip reported what was out there and would have been happy as can be moving on to another celebrity, but ... wham! Vicious attacks by the Church of Scientology. Name calling. Ugly stuff.

What's a blog going to do? So GlossLip looked deeper into who and why it was getting attacked. The more investigation, and reporting, the more vicious the attacks. The more vicious the attacks, the angrier Dawn got. Wouldn't anyone? And the deeper the investigation went.

If the Church of Scientology hadn't done it's [abusive practice formerly known as] fair game, hadn't lied, hadn't over-reacted, GlossLip would quite probably have just moved on to the next celebrity gossip, making no further deal about Cruise and Scientology.

But because of the very, very stupid and vicious reaction of Church of Scientology, GlossLip is definitely angry. Sorry, Scientology, that's a footbullet, you created an enemy where none existed before.

And so it goes.

Anonymous wasn't the slightest bit interested in the Church of Scientology until the church used illegal and abusive tactics to attempt to suppress free speech on the Internet. Anonymous took that personally and just started to poke at the church's site. It got a bit rough, but it was in reaction to the church's stupid attacks.

Then the church really goofed. They pulled out their Great, Evil Conspiracy playbook and started really attacking Anonymous. Wild accusations, manufactured bomb threats, fake postings, all the usual "How to ensure that a minor annoyance becomes a dedicated enemy" footbullets.

Anonymous linked up with other victims of Scientology's abusive and illegal attacks and the recent protests were off and running. It never would have happened, not in a million years, if the Church of Scientology had simply respected the law and the rights of others. Another footbullet, another enemy of Scientology created by the Church of Scientology itself.

Do you see the pattern? Do you see cause and effect?

Pick any critic and trace their history back. There at the root of the problem was the Church of Scientology, doing something bad, something illegal, something unethical, and then refusing to admit it or fix it.

So, who is behind all the attacks on the Church of Scientology? Well, if you track it down, the original cause of all those attacks is, totally and completely, the Church of Scientology itself!

Gee, doesn't that make the Church of Scientology itself the Great, Evil, Secret, World-Wide, Super-Powerful, Anti-Scientology Conspiracy?

Oops!

UPDATE: I just recalled that Hubbard himself said at one time that every single attack on Scientology could be tracked down to a failure on the part of the church to deliver what was promised. Today's church has forgotten that concept entirely.

Even Hubbard agrees with me!