MEDIA WATCH | COX ENTERPRISES

Remini/A&E TV Hate Should Not Be Your Company’s Meal Ticket

August 15, 2018

John M. Dyer,
CEO Cox Enterprises
Atlanta, GA

Dear Mr. Dyer,

In recent history, Americans have often decried nations across the world for philosophies or acts of religious discrimination: Nazi Germany and its influence that spread like a disease, Bosnia in the 1990s, North Korea or Saudi Arabia, for their treatment of Christians, to name but a few. But similar intolerance is proliferating on American soil right now. Witness Leah Remini: Scientology and the Aftermath. Like other hate-inspiring platforms, such as Alex Jones’s Infowars website (which, incidentally, has just been cancelled by Facebook, YouTube and Apple for its anti-Muslim rhetoric), A&E’s anti-Scientology show has already, after two seasons, incited dozens of documented threats of violence and death against Scientologists.

Such a climate of animosity is unacceptable for any citizen of any country. But, compounding this, I would also point out that thousands of Scientologists worldwide perform a plethora of philanthropic actions daily, on a voluntary basis: rehabilitation for drug addicts and convicts, disaster relief, educational support, human rights, etc.

Remini’s smear campaign makes mockery of one of the very principles upon which the United States of America was formed: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.” America has long been considered the most influential nation on the planet and yet, through this TV show it is throwing religious freedom and respect under the proverbial bus.

On January 31, 2018, International Holocaust Remembrance Day, the Secretary General of the UN wrote in a press release:

“The annual Day of Commemoration… is about Jews but also all others who find themselves scapegoated and vilified solely because of who they are.

“Today we have two fundamental duties. First, to remember the Holocaust and its victims. Second, to be vigilant about hatred today. Genocide does not happen in a vacuum. The Holocaust was the culmination of hostility towards Jews across the millennia. It was planned—a systematic campaign of extermination. And it was abetted by pseudoscience and propaganda that poisoned millions of minds.”

Today, more than ever, such hatred and bigotry about anyone, from any race or religion, can spread like wildfire through viral campaigns created whole cloth by ill-meaning individuals or groups.

I am asking you not to lend your support to A&E’s hate-propagating vehicle, driven by the venomous tandem of Remini and Rinder. Most people of this Earth are horrified by the atrocities perpetrated by Nazi Germany or during the Bosnian War. I’m sure you’re one of them. And, by the same token, I’m confident you will agree that the Scientology and the Aftermath show should be shunned, not supported.

Thank you in advance for your attention in this matter.

Yours truly,

Nicky Baker
Clearwater, Florida