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Why Scientology Jokes Fall Flat
The comedian is a rare and powerful breed. He can point out what’s wrong with the world through the use of humor and be poignant while doing it, more powerful than any blithering panel of pundits shouting canned criticisms.
As a comedian who’s been at this for 15 years, I look at what’s wrong with the world around me and joke about it. However, desperate for material, some comedians will search for anything “controversial” and try to use it as a jumping-off point. That’s where jokes about Scientology come in.
I have heard my religion incorporated into all kinds of contexts in many forms of “comedy.” Here’s why the jokes fall flat: there’s nothing wrong with Scientology. The jokes made have nothing to do with the religion. They’re more rumors that have been passed down from degraded mouth breather to degraded mouth breather, the comedian being the last of them.
I recently did a show with a comedian in Connecticut, though both of us are from Los Angeles. He mentioned he lived near Celebrity Centre, a Scientology organization devoted to artists, and he immediately threw out some false, clichéd digs. Once I proved to him I was an example of the falsity of those digs, he confessed that he’d had a tour of Celebrity Centre. It sounded like he was mostly looking for punch lines.
Scientology jokes fail because they are based on lies. Audiences laugh about agreed-upon truths.
As someone who tried to do that after my first seminar there over 10 years ago, I can attest that it’s a fruitless endeavor.
Scientology jokes fail because they are based on lies. Audiences laugh about agreed-upon truths. Why would you, a non-Scientologist, make an untruthful joke about a religion to an audience full of people who know nothing about it in the first place?
Scientology tells you to look at the world, not guess or lie about it. You would do much better talking about airplane food or traffic than messing with a workable religion. Unless you're the type of comedian who likes to be stared at.
Photo by: stock_photo_world / Shutterstock.com
