#(i haven't seen it happen yet but i know from reading wikipedia that it does!)

[misstarsss]

Theories about AVA's new teaser

Well as we have all seen and for those who do not leave the link here https://youtube.com/shorts/t_E6pHNfyB4?feature=share

Spoiler alert, if you haven't seen the teaser yet I recommend that you go watch it before reading this and beforehand I mention that English is not my mother language.

At the beginning, he gives us a brief summary of everything that has happened in the previous AvA, and since this was perhaps months ago, then we are given the integration of a character we know.

victim.

(screenshot by @chorda-tendinea this person also talks about the victim theory in the teaser)

I have read several speculations about this and how he can be absolutely a victim but we must remember this. Victim cannot be the bad guy, since when Alan eliminated him in the first AvA and since it was the same computer that was broken/destroyed by The Dark Lord and The Chosen One, we also don't know if this same character can recover his memory, Because practically as much as Chosen and Victim are of the same design and both have different retrospectives, so the victim is a character with a blank memory or maybe he does have memory and will remember what Alan did before.

In the second scene we have chosen in the OUTERNET for those who don't know what the OUTERNET is (I think it's official? It appears in Wikipedia about AvA and AvM and others.) is a subspace in the Internet, where Internet stick figures come from and their home. This was the same location where the events of The Flashback and The Showdown happened. The Outernet and the Internet are separated by a grid-like barrier, with each cell leading to a specific device connected to the Internet through its IP address. This is where the real place outside the internet is revealed, and it takes place completely outside of Minecraft. We can see how Chosen looks lost and running from something or rather from someone since bullet casings or shots can be seen towards him.

Trying to run away from who is chasing him or rather who. Since it seems an association for the CherryBlossoms short that is given.

Also in the next part we can realize how TSC (The second coming) grabs a pencil and draws a line between them as if they were dividing them or had different opinions on a certain topic, maybe second didn't like something and I drew that line giving it a 'warning' I feel like it is.

In addition, as Chosen, he draws fire from his mouth as if he wanted to scare away something that is not there (here it is in the sense that the victim theory is more valid due to the spectral powers that people place on the victim) or incinerating projectiles that go towards he.

 we can see how second appears, looking for chosen but in the first fragment he looks lying on the ground and then goes to another stage and is in the sights of one of the hunters who shoots. Could second also be another objective of that corporation? Let's also take into account that all the adventures of the color gang all the OUTERNET has seen it (it occurs in a flashback of AvM episode 30) that they are known and it may also be that to get to that place the video of The shoutdown was presented, where the brief fight between The Dark Lord and The Chosen is shown One where they travel through the internet and among them is YouTube with the already published video of them fighting.

Finally, we are even given The chosen one glitched, we are given to understand that he goes to Alan for help, as a theory that is mentioned that the chosen one goes to where Alan to fix his code due to the thorns of the virabot that did not affect him before and that now affects him which would be something strange, it should also affect second but somehow he has an antivirus for his powers that heal him even so maybe this is because of the hunters.

Maybe these hunters have certain bullets that can affect the Hollow stickman because let's remember that they are different from the OUTERNET ones since in the past, they were basically tyrants of the entire internet, they could have some prevention for any type of super powerful Hollow who wants to attack OUTERNET or stickcity again.

There are theories that The Dark Lord is not dead, it may be a yes and no, in the final chapter of AvA practically The second coming destroys TDL, dragging him with his green laser beam towards a mountain that explodes. We have no evidence that one Hollow can kill another and only the creator of said Hollow can eliminate it. If the chance is that he is not dead, THE DARK LORD would not forgive THE CHOSEN ONE, why?

Basically he betrayed him, TDL is evil and was created to destroy TCO are impregnated in his code to destroy TCO or everything good, in theory TDL is a villain and TCO can be an antihero because he was willing to kill TDL so that not continue with his plans, they are both good and bad by their code, so if he were alive, it would practically be for revenge against TCO for betraying him and joining (what he believes) their common enemy, Alan Becker.

Another theory that I want to give is that, it would be obvious that Purple and King (mango) would appear since both are mainly in stickcity, that is, OUTERNET, it could be that both are important in the margin that they know the city, being of help to chosen or the color gang .

Although the crazy theories they have in the Bingo Card make me laugh, some of them may be true without us realizing it.

There are many more deeper theories and variety but I wanted to give a bit of my theory on all of this.

bye-bye!!

[bearpillowmonster]

Metroid: Other M Review (Spoilers)

I'm going to keep the last bit here with a spoiler tag, this is where I won't just talk about spoilers in the game's story itself but a certain thing that I found could be both helpful and harmful to how you approach the game. Read at your own risk.

This game was developed by Team Ninja. The same people who made Ninja Gaiden and Dead or Alive, in fact at that point, that was all they've done, just different iterations of the same two series'. So this was not only their first outing with the Metroid franchise but their first outing to approach a new IP. While all developers start somewhere, some succeed with the property by either reinventing it to the fans liking or making a faithful adaptation as if it were their own. This happens to bit some of the former, the reinventing part. And because of their prior experience, it would make sense to compare this game to Ninja Gaiden in its play-style, the way the map is, the way the action shots are, the way you walk around, even some of the sounds. I haven't even played Ninja Gaiden, just seen footage so for me to feel this, someone who's played the games must really feel it.

Now, is this a question of experience, of choice, or a lack in Metroid's department?

Well, Nintendo reached out to them because of their work on Ninja Gaiden and were impressed with their latest engine for it. They took three designers, veterans of Metroid, as well as Sakamoto as producer (who directed a majority). Hayashi, who was director from Ninja, claimed he was a big fan and wanted to include as many creatures as possible so the thought of "lack of Metroid knowledge" is cancelled. Sakamoto proposed a simplistic control design, similar to the NES, hence the sideways thing (though the classic controller isn't compatible). But what's funny is that someone even asked if the game would be too similar to Ninja Gaiden before released to which Sakamoto responded "-while the new game will feature heavy action-based sequences, there will still be the exploration-based sequences characteristic of other Metroid games." which doesn't say a whole lot as an answer but I guess it's true.

His goal was to introduce this game to new players as well as give old fans something new. I suppose a lot of people already know Super's ending but honestly I don't see as many people picking this game up as a "new fan". I think what it boils down to is that Sakamoto wanted something new yet classic as well as really trying to dive in on Samus as a person. Just read this line (I'm pulling from Wikipedia, don't judge) "Kitaura tried to include more scenes with Samus outside her powered armor, to illustrate "the human, weak side of Samus, her expressions and gesture", but Sakamoto convinced him otherwise with a declaration that the Power Suit acts as a shield for both enemy attacks and the reveal of her emotions"

What emotion? You made Samus kind of dull.

This kind of reminds me of Toshihiro Nagoshi who created the Super Monkey Ball series. He really wanted to dive into Ai-Ai's as a character he created Super Monkey Ball 2…nah, I'm just kidding but for real, he left Monkey Ball because he wanted to tell a more in depth story and really experiment thus Yakuza was born. At this point, Sakamoto hadn't worked on any story-driven games and probably wanted to express himself so I imagine he just tried to take one of his tried and true franchises and combine it. And in the process, the gameplay idea was to make something similar but also different so when people submitted Ninja Gaiden mechanics, he probably accepted. I mean Samus does move a little like a ninja, I would assume that's part of where the hiatus came from. "What do we salvage? What do we get rid of?" mixed with Sakamoto's ambitions. Though Zelda had Wind Waker then did a 180 and released Twilight Princess due to what the fans had to say and that was only the span of a few years.

Conclusion: Probably choice.

Now was it the wrong choice? Personally, I think Metroid should have a 3D environment 3rd person shooter but maybe not as corridor ridden in the sense that you're looking at the side, rather than behind. That's more like a mainline game, I think even best kept to that while spinoffs can go and do what they want (Fed Force) Mostly. There are sections of this game where you do indeed do that but it's more for slow detective work than combat. I also think that the narrative should've been expanded upon, but you saw my thoughts on that in the actual review.

Sakamoto wasn't really involved with the Prime trilogy and it could be easily written out in this story so I imagine this was almost a soft-reboot in his eyes.

I think the Federation being the bad guys is fine and trying to reuse Mother Brain for their own purposes isn't new, we saw it in Prime 3 and this does it a bit differently but taking Metroids and Ridley too? Just what exactly is the point here? How many missions is she commissioned BY the Federation to wipe out the Metroids before hand? And then they threaten to reprimand her for originally trying to bring back a specimen? (She probably wasn't going to go back to the Feds I assume) Even though they wanted to use it to their advantage anyway. And Adam being head of the project only to say he was given that title and only "researched it". What was that? He warned them not to actually do it? Could he create this thing? Yes, he proved that. But should he? No. But he knew that and researched it anyway then submitted that research for review. How dumb can you be? What did you think they were going to do with that research?

It's very specific that a bad batch in the Federation is supposedly bad but we only really get to see a part of it, we have no idea where that leads or how far it goes, it's said almost in passing despite being very important.

Ridley controlling the Metroids is a new take I believe but doesn't Mother Brain do the same? Am I just confused on that?

As far as I know, the Deleter wasn't settled upon and is just theorized to be Pierce which is fine but it just takes away from the ending, especially know thing it doesn't get expanded upon. It would've been cooler if you questioned your teammates and even Ridley only for it to be MB but I guess that wasn't thought up. I think MB has a lot more potential as she has a human form. I think she should return and be the one that's reviving all these projects, an overarching villain.

[ineffablefool]

(1/4) hey uh ur bio says that u r demiromantic and if it's not too much trouble could i get some help? so i'm starting high school next year and so far, i haven't gotten a crush or anything. romantic attraction? don't know her. but whenever i thought or pictured myself "grown up" i imagined myself with a boyfriend. (i'm a woman) all the evidence is pointing towards me being aromantic, but a little slice of my brain is still, "oh, you're just super demiromantic and violently straight, all of your

(2/4) super close friends have been girls, you just have to become really close friends with a guy and there! instant boyfriend" but i know that won't happen. i won't have some man come and suddenly i'm head over heels. but i've always figured i'd have a boyfriend. i know i'm ace, and i am calling myself ace, but whenever i go to call myself aro, my brain goes "but what if ur actually demi and then all the people you told u were aro will think you were a liar" which i kNOW is stupid but i cant

(3/4) stop thinking it. i dunno why i can't fully accept the fact that i'm aro. is it society claiming that you need a partner to be happy? is it the fact that being in love sounds amazing and like floating on clouds and i want to feel like that? i have no fucking clue. and it's not something against aros, like, i know that if someone told me they were aro i'd have no problem with it. which makes it worse because why is it so hard to let go of the fantasy that i'll have a romantic partner one

(4/4) day? i know, in my heart, that there is a like a 1% chance i wont be aro. but i still cant call myself aro my brain won't let me >:( when did you get your first crush? when is it normal for a demi to first feel romantic attraction? did you think you were aro at first? also i sometimes feel like i shouldn't call myself ace bc im too young to know if i like sex yet? when did u start calling yourself ace? ugh sorry for the super long ask,,, also fun fact it's "how do u write kisses" anon hiii

Hi anon.  I cannot promise you excellent help, but I am still glad you wrote to me again, and I really hope you are about to have a straight 72-hour period of Good Days.  (It might take you that long to read this.  Oops.)

So, first of all: there is nothing wrong with calling yourself aro now and then later deciding you aren’t.  Or realizing you aren’t.  (Two different framings for the same thing -- both are good.)  Or deciding or realizing that you’re somewhere on the aromantic spectrum which you feel is better described with a more specific term.  Demiromantics are still part of the aro umbrella!  It’s not an exclusive club where You Must Be Pure Aro To Enter!  (Anyone who tells you otherwise is setting themselves up as Decider Of What It Really Means To Be Aro, and where are their credentials for that?  Hmm, hypothetical gatekeeping person?  Can I please see your certification from the Institute Of Defining Other People’s Identities For Them?  Oh.  Oh you don’t have one.  Because it doesn’t exist.)

Me saying that doesn’t magically make your brain accept the label, of course.  I am just trying to gently show your brain the door, and it’s the one that has to walk through it.

Assuming you want it to walk through it.  Maybe you decide you don’t.  That’s fine!  But “yes, I am indeed aro -- I am on the aro spectrum somewhere so I am using the label” is a perfectly fine thing to tell people, and if they are not carrying forged credentials from the Institute Of Defining Other People’s Identities For Them, then they will probably be okay with this.

I am not any kind of expert on being aro, or ace, or anything.  I am only an expert in being me.  But to somewhat exhaustively answer the questions from your last part...

I had my first crush when I was thirteen or fourteen.  When I was about ten, I was friends with two girls who both had a very public crush on the same boy, and I claimed to also have one on him in order to fit in, but I was completely lying.  Sorry, Drew.  I’m sure you were quite the catch, but I was not feelin’ it.

I don’t know if there’s a specific time when it’s “normal” for a demiromantic person to start feeling any particular way.  It just sort of happens if it’s gonna.  Maybe it never does.  People are complicated and different and that’s wonderful.

I didn’t know what being aro (or being ace!) was when I was your age, because they weren’t really identities yet.  “Asexual” was for amoebas, or maybe robots.  “Aromantic” was, like, dude, did you misspell “aromatic”?  (Keep in mind, there was technically an Internet in approx. 1995, but there was no Google, no Wikipedia, no YouTube, no social media, the concept of what is now called a “blog” didn’t even really exist yet, and often your parents would not let you on the Internet connection if they could even afford it themselves, not least because it was frequently billed by the amount of time you spent using it. It was incredibly hard to know what things existed in the world back then to even begin to learn about them! Now is so much better. I have all the treasures of the world in my pocket via my telephonic device.)  When I started to learn about asexuality, specifically that you could be ace but not be “an emotionless robot” (gosh has unlearning that kind of judgement been a journey), I jumped straight on that label and never looked back (this was roughly when I joined Tumblr, so I would have been about 32).  I thought I was alloromantic for a while after that, but I’ve come to realize that my feelings on romance probably put me somewhere on the aro spectrum.  And that’s where I am now.

I started calling myself ace, again, when I was about 32, but I didn’t have that label available to me when I was younger.  Ya boi was 13-14 years old, sitting in his bedroom writing letters-to-never-be-sent to his crush, which included long sections about how I had already decided I would never have sex so long as I lived, so once we obviously got married because how could we not when I had such Emotions, he would have to find some other way to get that if he wanted it.  I had no interest in it then.  I never developed an interest in it since.  If I had had the knowledge I have now, back when I was in junior high, I am absolutely convinced that I would have taken the ace label then.  Was I too young to know for sure?  I dunno, we don’t say that people are too young at that age to know they’re heterosexual, so why do other sexualities have to pass a higher bar?  (Because compulsory heterosexuality.  That is why.)

Regardless of your age, if the label of ace resonates with you, you can apply it to yourself.  If the label of aro resonates, you can apply it to yourself.  Or a more specific variant of either, or something else entirely.  And the day you realize “oh gosh, this is not, in this moment, actually me”, you can let the label go, because its only purpose for existing is to be useful to you.

Finally -- this is not something I can personally speak to, but I have seen people who identify as completely aro also state that they enjoy things that our (my? I do not know where you are from) culture frequently sees as romantic.  Like, if you want to have a person who you can snuggle up with, hold hands with, say “I love you” to and have them say it back and both of you mean it -- there are aro people who do all that with their partners, and enjoy it, and don’t see it as interfering with their aromantic identity at all.  I believe them, because they are the expert on being themselves, and I have nowhere near the ego required to decide that I know better.  So that’s something to keep in mind -- cloud-floating and an aromantic identity do not have to be completely separate, because there are lots of kinds of love and of affection, and people are complicated, and that is wonderful.

I hope you enjoy this novel, anon.  It is for you.

[couldnt-think-of-a-better-name]

Divine Comedy in TPN?

Apologies for the radio silence this week, I had to do a load of overtime at work unfortunately to meet a deadline, ugh 😑

So @just-to-comment-in-fanpages I had a bit more of a think about Dante's Divine Comedy, as well as @vobomon drew my attention to other parts of it as well that I was forgeting about.

The Divine Comedy by Dante has 3 parts:

Inferno or Hell where the souls of the damned stay in the greatest horrors. This one is a big hole in the ground on the lands of the Northern hemisphere with 9 circles of it, each deeper than the other.

Purgatorio or Purgatory where people who have sinned in life, but are not damned forever can take a spiritual journey of suffering to purge their sins and get to Paradise. This one is a mountain on the ocean of the Southern hemisphere, with 7 terraces, each higher to climb until you reach the Earthly Paradise at the top.

Paradiso or Heaven, where the souls of the pure and faithful reside. This is a series of planetary bodies (7 "planets" + 3 other types of places) in the sky, ending with a meeting with God at the Empyrean.

I still don't think that we have or will be seeing any of the deadly sins. However, if instead of looking at the details like the different levels of Hell etc, you look at the Divine Comedy on the whole: it is a journey of spiritual growth and suffering across a surreal and confusing landscape separate from a normal existance, leading to a meeting with God, in order to save a loved one (in Dante's case, this is his love Beatrice).

I think thematically speaking that is very similar to what Emma and Ray are goimg through and trying to achieve. So perhaps there is a parallel, but not just with one book, but all three.

Inferno is the most well-known and widely referenced work out of the three. There are a huge number of elements to it, and we haven't seen many things in TPN that could be related, but I find the following similarities interesting:

After being chased by monsters in a dark forest, Dante arrives at the gates of Hell, which bear an inscription that famously end in "Abandon all hope you who enter here".

Emma and Ray do also encounter a large gate in a forest setting with an inscription that warn them that they can't easily return if they cross it. There is some vague visual similarity to Rodin's famous scuplture of Dante's gate of Inferno, as you can see.

As Dante traverses Inferno, he encounters horrors beyond mortal comprehension, and some of those he meets he recognises from his life as souls of the dead.

Emma and Ray also find themselves in a place that must feel like hell to them. In a house where they were destined to die if they didn't fight, and they see faces of people they know or believe dead, making them experience horror.

Dante has to descend down deeper to reach through hell, but from the depths of Inferno, he will move to a new area: the mountain of Purgatory where he needs to climb each terrace.

I find the two opposite cones an interesting imagery, since we see Ray traverse a land with two unexplained cone shapes across the horizons. Could they signify the journey across Inferno and Purgatory as a whole? Rather than breaking them into levels.

Also, to get here, as you pointed out @just-to-comment-in-fanpages , Emma and Ray does climb DOWN. So perhaps the control room is the depths of Hell?

The other thing about Dante's Purgatory is that it is a place where you can only progress by facing your sins, and suffering to purge them with their opposite virtues. Actually this is the place where the Seven Deadly Sins (and the Seven Virtues to combat them) are properly defined, not Inferno. It is meant to be a long and difficult journey to Paradise at the top of mount Purgatory.

We don't know what exactly happened to Ray and Emma just yet, but it does seem like Ray has suffered a lot, and he is on a difficult and long journey.

I don't really know if these parallels are intentional or a coincidence, but if Shirai-san is really using the whole of the divine comedy, then I think we can expect a couple themes to make an appearance when we move into the Paradiso part:

Dante meets Beatrice at the top of Purgatory after believing her to be lost to him. This is in the Earthly Paradise where Adam and Eve was banished from.

They fly together into the sky and see various planetary bodies in the celestial heaven. It's interesting that TPN put an emphasis on the Moon (there is even a cover where Emma, Ray and the kids fly in front of the Moon...), since that is the first planetary body Dante encounters.

Later they fly by the Sun and stars as well, other symbols that we have seen in TPN.

Dante meets and converses with God at the Empyrean:

Before Dante is allowed to enter the Empyrean, he has to face the test of 3 divine figures: St. Peter, St. James and St. John. The 3 trials are faith (Peter), hope (James) and love John.

Now, what I find interesting from my anslysis of Biblical references in TPN is that we also have a Peter, James and Son-Ju... What is more, Dante has likened himself to St. Paul, and my Biblical analysis post concluded that Emma was an analogy to St. Paul.

It might all be just a coincidence, but if we suddenly see Peter, James and Son-ju test Emma before she encounters demon!God... Well, I would take that as confirmation that the Divine Comedy is being referenced. So I wonder what will happen.

Now, even if I am completely wrong on the Divine Comedy reference, I am pretty sure about the cupboard in that panel I put in of Ray traversing a desert. That is a reference to the The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe written by C. S. LEWIS (!). In case you missed, the previous chapter did have a lion plushie, as well as the extra page does this chapter...

Why do I say that it's a definite reference? I have actually read The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe (finally something that I didn't need to wikipedia!), and the story is that a group of kids go to a fantastical land where they grow up, die, and then they return home to their original world, life and age...

Well, since that wardrobe makes zero sense to use otherwise and would look really random, I am pretty sure that Shirai-san is giving us a hint that Ray and Emma may age, ane even die in this fantastical land, but they will be returning to their original bodies and ages afterwards, just like in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe.

You know how Ray has aged and become old in the same chapter we see the wardrobe?

This is why I am not worried at all about Ray aging.

[jadecoded]

Angel s3 e15: Loyalty

[doewept]

i was thinking about how particularly drawn to these two characters i've been lately and it must be the catharsis of how they just get emotionally battered over and over. a lot of us who have been through trauma need these types of characters, this sort of representation, because they emulate the way we feel.

to a great number of people who haven't lived through trauma, the stories of characters like snape and hedwig seem almost cartoonish and ridiculous with how often bad things happen to them. but it's perfectly realistic to trauma survivors because it's often the same for us: bad things seem to keep happening to us, even long after the initial trauma may have stopped.

i read the plot of "hedwig" on wikipedia the other day because the style of the 2001 film can make the story hard to follow at times, and it made the catharsis even stronger because what happens to her is fucking ungodly. akin to snape being horribly bullied by james while he only has one friend he can talk to, then he loses that friend, then he watches her marry james, then watches lily die.

i won't say anything because the film is kind of niche; i only know one other person who's seen it. but if anyone's interested, i have to mention a content warning for se/xual assault and c/s/a (child se/xual assault). it isn't shown on-screen except for in these very vague, mostly stick-figure doodles that hedwig draws. but i can honestly say it's the only piece of media i've ever seen that communicates that a se/xual violence happened to someone that didn't trigger me, yet still demonstrates the adverse effects it had on the character. (like, i wish more directors and such could take from that example that you don't have to show that on-screen and re-traumatize your audience, but that's a whole other conversation lmao)

another warning is that it does have these ptsd-like flashbacks that are at least somewhat disturbing. and hedwig is transgender so the background characters do unfortunately include the transphobic masses.

snape didn’t live long enough to see the existence of “hedwig & the angry inch” but if he did he’d be like “i want to be her”

[famehunting]

I haven't seen Going Clear yet, but I watched the series Leah Remini recently did on Scientology and oh my God. I knew it was a cult but had no idea how awful it was.

So you sent this anon six days ago and like yesterday’s WTF report I’ve been sitting on this (sorry!) until I got a chance to sit down and drop a proper report.

This comes up, for those just tuning in, on the reports that Tom’s long-time stylist Urbinati is a practicing Scientologist. Important note: Nowhere is there any indication that Tom himself has fallen in with the cult. So we’ll cling tight to that.

Scientology is, let’s underline, a dangerous cult still formally accepted by the IRS as a ‘legitimate’ religion despite numerous dodges, crimes, and other nations such as Germany denying them outright. 

L. Ron Hubbard started the cult in the 1950′s after previously writing ‘if a man really wants to make a million dollars, the best way would be to start his own religion.’ Scientology itself is an iteration of a self-improvement technique he ‘designed’ (bullshitted) called Dianetics. And on the surface a lot of it doesn’t seem too much more hamfisted than any other fringe religion.

The serious problems crept in as Hubbard grew older, more paranoid, and more influenced by other leadership figures in the organization, specifically a man named David Miscavige.

The beginnings of the paranoia preceded that figure, however. The first major headline scandal of the cult became known in the 1970′s, called Operation Snow White. It was an attempt to infiltrate a number of government offices in order to purge and reclaim the narrative about Scientology itself. They were ultimately caught in this, almost a dozen operatives including L. Ron’s wife Mary Sue prosecuted and imprisoned.

L. Ron Hubbard himself went into hiding, his paranoia increasing and his advancing age allowing Miscavige to formally take power in 1987, after having known the Hubbards for a decade at this point. Under Miscavige, the cultivation of celebrities to grant the organization a veneer of glitz and glamor and legitimacy reached a fever pitch. This allowed them to hide a number of other unsavory things, such as the way more ordinary members are treated - fleeced of thousands of dollars, pressed into the Sea Org where even their souls are intended to be in hock to this sham religion for thousands of years, or even die.

Members who begin to falter or fall too sick to serve have two fates - either they get away and are deemed Suppressive Persons and are harassed continuously (’fair game’ doctrine), all contact lost with loved ones still trapped within the cult, or they end up isolated and sometimes dead.

One of the most infamous cases of this is Lisa McPherson. Involved in a minor accident, she was released from the hospital into the care of her church. Because Scientology does not believe in mental health assistance, and because they have idiotic ‘spiritual’ practices in place of certain forms of medical help, Lisa spent a little over two weeks in an increasing physical hell, dying of an embolism after extreme dehydration and abuse.

Other fates can include being incarcerated at The Hole, a site at ‘Gold Base’ that is functionally a prison camp. There are rumors that Miscavige’s own wife, who has not been seen since 2007, may be held here or at another such isolated site like their ‘Church of Spiritual Technology.’

The antics of Scientology have been lampshaded in pop culture repeatedly, the most famous example being the THIS IS WHAT THEY REALLY BELIEVE episode of South Park (it is).

And yet the cult clings on. Reports indicate it is finally beginning to struggle somewhat under increasing public awareness and pressure, escapees feeling more open to discuss the madness despite the cult’s attack doctrines, such as the work of Leah Remini and Paul Haggis to expose the cult. Meanwhile, Miscavige still grooms celebrities - feeding on insecurity and the desire to feel special - to present that glittery facade. Tom Cruise remains the most active, visible, and alluring member of the cult, and is especially close to Miscavige, who was best man at his wedding to Katie Holmes. It is unknown how well he knows what’s truly going on. Travolta has, according to Going Clear, seen some hints, but yet remains.

I would like to see this cult, a tax cheat, a dangerous medical lie (Narcanon is their version of AA and a fucking fraud) and a destroyer of families, a seller of illusion, die in a fucking fire. It hasn’t happened yet.

I stress that while many of its public members are not aware of the darkness inside, they are still aiding and supporting a diseased structure. Cults feed off that sense of ‘us v. them,’ creating an insulated and compelling world for its members. It is worth remembering that cult members are victims, although I often find myself losing respect for celebrities that have willingly joined in - and I’ve realized I’ve done the same for Urbanati. This is a little unfair. It is an odd but frequent truism that intelligent people often fall under sway of cults, the seduction and charm of these organizations specifically designed to feed a victim’s sense intelligence despite their sense and also dig hooks into certain emotional and psychology needs.

Again, Tom is, by all accounts, not a member.

I genuinely hope and pray that remains true.

Sources for further study, because this is a very scant synopsis:

Going Clear: 

The HBO documentary is available via their streaming service.

The book by Lawrence Wright is essential supplemental reading and covers a broader swath of detail the docu couldn’t include due to legal necessities against the intensely litigious church.

Xenu.net is Operation Clambake, one of the oldest anti-Scientology websites on the internet and where the original OT documents were leaked.

The Tampa Bay Times ran a series of in depth articles exposing and attacking the cult beginning in 2009, particularly on the fleecing and the difficulty found in leaving the cult. The link above is their archive.

The LA Times has a similar archive, worth trawling.

Paul Haggis, a central figure in Going Clear, talked to the New Yorker in 2011, with the man who later wrote that book. I highly recommend this one.

The Wikipedia articles on Scientology are relatively strong, although I highly recommend following the footnotes and being circumspect. As it is a public archive, it is monitored by active members to ensure ‘neutrality,’ allowing the controversies and their treatment overseas to be downplayed just enough to make it seem more palatable.

And here is a recent AskHistorians thread on Reddit discussing some of the legal action behind Operation Snow White.

I leave you with one more note:

For FUCK’S SAKE, do not EVER watch Battlefield Earth, it will give you the brain rot and you will never recover.