In my breakdown of the academic book “Scientology,” I take on academics in the religious studies world who have defended or written “apologetics” for Scientology. J. Gordon Melton out of Santa Barbara is one of the very worst of these lazy academics who just act as mouthpieces for Scientology. Melton in particular has carried Scientology’s water for years, so I give him a well-deserved ribbing here. Enjoy!
Read More »Why J. Gordon Melton is a Bad Academic
The weekly show where I answer questions from viewers left on my Critical Q&A videos or sent to me by email at AskChrisShelton@gmail.com. This week, the questions I answer are:Read More »Critical Q&A #134
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Hey everyone. I’m back and this week, I really mean this when I say we have a fascinating chapter for you. In fact, never have I been so appropriately dressed for the occasion. As with every video in this series, we are taking on a new chapter of this book, Scientology, edited by James R. Lewis and featuring academics writing about Scientology. So far, whether they have been sociologists, psychologists or religious studies professors, Lewis managed to gather together a group of people who have favorable ideas about destructive cults like Scientology and whether he meant to or not, he put together a book of apologetics about it. However, this week we truly do have something so different and unique from what has come earlier, I honestly wonder if it somehow slipped into this book by accident.Read More »Let’s Talk Xenu (Deconstructing Scientology: Chapter 19)
Hello again and welcome to the next installment in my on-going series deconstructing this book, Scientology, edited by James R. Lewis and featuring essays and articles by religious scholars, academics and the like about, you guessed it, Scientology. So far, almost all of these have been purely Scientology apologetics as these scholars rush to defend Scientology from its critics, which is what attracted me to this in the first place.Read More »Deconstructing Scientology: Chapter 17
Hey everyone, we are back after a short break from this series, breaking down this book, Scientology, edited by James R. Lewis and featuring academic essays and articles written by religious scholars, sociologists and the like, mostly in praise of or apologizing for Scientology as a religous practice. Since I don’t happen to think that Scientology is a legitimate religious practice and have been an outspoken critic against it for the last three years, I can’t claim to be unbiased but as I’ve been showing in this series, neither are these folks.Read More »Deconstructing Scientology: Chapter 15
Hey everyone.
This week we continue on our slugfest of apologetics contained in this book, Scientology, edited by James R. Lewis and containing essays and articles written by sociologists, religious scholars, psychologists and the like, mostly slanted favorably towards Scientology and its status as a tax-exempt religious organization. I am deconstructing this nonsense so you don’t have to. This week’s puff piece about Scientology’s legal battles in various countries is unfortunately not an exception to most of what we have covered, so I’m going to skim lightly over this and spare you most of the obviously biased nonsense.Read More »Deconstructing Scientology: Chapter 14