Scientology is the worst popular religion in existence.

The CoS is slowly being eliminated by Anonymous, but no one seems to take notice on the news too much. So I wanted to take this chance to debate someone about it.

My claims.

1.They exploit people, making them work for 70$ a week.
2.They steal peoples money to advance them in the church.
3.They are not a religion. They are a corporation. A religion revolves around belief, they revolve around money.
4.They sue anyone who disagrees with them. Which is against the 1st amendment. Freedom of speech is a RIGHT in this country.

FOR GREAT JUSTICE!

Scientology is not the worst popular religion in existence.

This is for two very critical reasons.
1) Scientology is not a religion. "3.They are not a religion. They are a corporation." You concede this point and thus the debate.
2) Scientology is not popular. Despite the claims of Scientology that they are the fastest growing religion and have millions of adherents they have ~50,000 members and have been in decline for two and a half decades.

Due to these problems Scientology does not qualify as a popular religion and therefore cannot be the worst in the set of popular religions.

1.Ask the United States government. They have tax exempt status as a religious institution. That's as official as you can get.

2.IT may not have numbers, but the ranks are made of famous people, and rich people. Money is power in our society. Granted they are falling, but the premise I'm trying to prove here is that they 1. Are not a religion. and 2.The people who get lured into it destroy their lives.

1) The US government is not the end all of what is and isn't a religion. In fact, for the very reason that the first amendment keeps them neutral on the issue they should be the last place to go to determine what is and isn't a religion. The tax exempt status of churches, in general, is a complete farce. Scientology does have tax exempt status as a religious organization, however, this is due to a massive illegal operation on their part.

http://www.cs.cmu.edu...

"Scientology's lawyers hired private investigators to dig into the private lives of IRS officials and to conduct surveillance operations to uncover potential vulnerabilities, according to interviews and documents. One investigator said he had interviewed tenants in buildings owned by three IRS officials, looking for housing code violations. He also said he had taken documents from an IRS conference and sent them to church officials and created a phony news bureau in Washington to gather information on church critics. The church also financed an organization of IRS whistle-blowers that attacked the agency publicly."

Scientology had something in the range of 200 suits against the IRS and personnel. Many believe that the impromptu meeting between the leader of Scientology and the head of the IRS to drop the suits (which probably would have cost a lot to deal with) in exchange for tax exempt status was the pivotal reason they have tax exempt status today; not because they are a religion.

So we see, not only is the government a bad arbiter. Their decision on the issue had more to do with not wanting to be constantly attacked by Scientologists than it did with the merits.

2. Just having a bevy of B actors doesn't make a religion popular. Scientology treats the actors differently than the standard minions, so in a fairly technical sense, the famous people have a different religion where everybody treats them like deities as they lure in others. The actors are exposed more gingerly to the activities, beliefs, programs, and treated far better.

>>"the premise I'm trying to prove here is that they 1. Are not a religion. and 2.The people who get lured into it destroy their lives."

I concede the first point, which contradicts the topic and clearly concedes the argument. The second point is a little more nuanced. Most people leave within a year after one or two sessions and thousands more don't actually have their lives destroyed and live happily as Scientologists. Certainly they have managed to kill people like Lisa McPherson, but how are you judging the impact? Christianity has lead to the death of millions. Islam has lead to a fair number of deaths as well. Catholic priests get juggled about by the Church when they get a bit too touchy with the kids (ruining thousands of lives in the process).

You need to establish that they are a religion, they are popular, and not simple "bad", but the "worst".*

* I concede that they exist so "existence" is not required.

I concede this debate, I wrote the entire premise at 4 am while hopped up on Oxycodone (legal, just had surgery)

My logic is terrible and I shouldn't of even pursued. All we can agree on is that Scientology is a cult and not a religion.

Oh yes. Hella bad. Not that all cults are bad just small odd religious groups some of them, but the typically horrible bits are certainly there in Scientology.