Nelson V-Blog: Driving Down A Treacherous Road

Wednesday night I was driving a friend of mine home form the recording studio. He's a guy that works at my favorite Mexican restaurant in town and always hooks a brother up . The least I could do was drive him home late at night. On the way, we started talking about religion and we landed on the topic of one religion (which shall remain nameless but heavily alluded to) which I have been researching online for the better part of a year in earnest and a few years off and on. It's name is commonly brought up when talking about celebrities and Hollywood .

I told him everything I had learned about the religion as an outsider and my feelings on it. When I started telling him about the basic premise/belief structure with the opening line of "Seventy-five million years ago...yes, 75 million years ago...", he was taken aback and said "Dude, is this for real???" I gave him a brief overview of what I understood regarding advancement in the religion, how much money is donated to the organization by an individual, and some of the past practices (good and bad) people have performed under the auspices of the religion. He was shocked and dismayed by what I told him. I did tell him that he needed to make his own decisions about it himself, and if he was interested in getting a more well-rounded perception of it, there was plenty of material on the internet he could research. I also told him there are two major buildings in the city he could go to if he wanted to see it for himself.

I enjoyed telling him about what I had discovered, but what I really hated was the fear I conjured up as soon as I started talking out loud to him about it. It wasn't the fear of the content of the discussion, but the fear that someone from their group would find out and make my life a living hell . There are documented cases of people being literally destroyed by these folks who have deep pockets and a lot of time on their hands. Even right now I'm hesitating communicating any kind of judgment on it and it makes me angry with myself for being such a coward about it . I may be seen as paranoid, dorky, stupid, or all the above by being aloof, but these are folks you don't want to fawk with unless you have the energy and resources to do so. So, I am avoiding fawking with them outright by being as balanced as possible in this blog.

I stayed up late last night listening to audio from a radio show in Texas where they had a vocal opponent to the organization on along with the chief public relations officer on talking about their differing viewpoints on the matter. For the first half hour, each person taking lead on different days got to have their say about they believe the religion is all about, and then the host brought on the opposing viewpoint. When they put both of these folks on, the conversation quickly dissolved into accusations and personal attacking. It was pretty uncomfortable to listen to because of the bickering. It was clear to me that if someone wanted to learn about it and have a complete view, they would have to go to multiple sources.

If you decide to comment, allow the religion to rename nameless. Don't want them coming to a show and heckling me.