Thoughts in a Skitoliv World

I have a new crisis in my life. I enjoy the television program "The Simpsons" immensely; it is the only TV program I make sure I watch during the week. My sisters and I quote lines from the show at each other all the time. I recently learned, thanks mark, that the woman who does the voice of Bart is a scientologist.

I, like many others, think that scientology is one of the biggest joke/scams ever perpetrated on the public. It does not help that most scientologists sound like absolute wackos when they talk about it. They actually believe that an alien emperor blew up a volcano many eons ago and that dead spirits are attached to you. True, this is no stranger than believing in transubstantiation, that God sent his only son to die, or that Mohammad moved the mountain. I suppose it is my Catholic background that makes me look askance at scientology.

Let me back up. Last year I reached the conclusion that I could no longer support anyone who followed scientology. This was based on the lunatic ramblings of Tom Cruise. The high muckedty-mucks of scientology should really put a gag order on him, as every time he opens his mouth he really makes them look worse in the public eye. Anyway, i figured that if I went and saw Tom Cruise’s movie that the money I spent would make its way to him and therefore make its way to support scientology, therefore I would be supporting a terrorist organization. I just can not support this so called "religion".

I then branched out my philosophy to not supporting any movie with a scientologist at the helm. Of course John Travolta can no longer be watched, which is a shame as I do like Pulp Fiction and Get Shorty. Giovanni Ribissi (who is one of the least talent people ever by the way) is as well, but based on my prior comment, you can guess that I already did not support him. Also, he is not good-looking.

My mother then informed me that Jason Lee (Mallrats, Dogma, My Name is Earl) is a rabid scientologist, so I can no longer watch him. However, Jason Lee provides the voice of Syndrome in "The Incredibles" which is a movie that I own and enjoy immensely. The question that comes up is the same as with that of my new problem with the Simpsons. Can I watch these two programs even though the scientologist themself is not on the screen but they are contributing by providing their voices? The characters that they are enabling are not scientologists, Bart actually recently converted to Catholicism, and Syndrome, well he is a megalomaniac so he may be a scientologist but that is never addressed in the film. Though would I then be hypocritical in not watching a Tom Cruise/John Travolta movie because I disagree with their beliefs, even though their characters are not scientologists, at least we are not told that they are.

So there we have it. Do I stick to my guns in not supporting scientologists, or do I continue to watch a program that I have enjoyed for years?

This entry was posted on Monday, June 5th, 2006 at 8:17 am and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.