There's been a lot of hubbub surrounding Scientology lately, it seems that the average Digg user has finally caught on that it's a bit of a scam. I'm sure some other people have caught on as well but Digg has really been milking it. Of course there's nothing new to Scientology being a sleazy cult (in my opinion, Suey McSuepants) but for some reason people have all of a sudden decided to protest against it. That's fine with me, I like protests. They don't accomplish anything but they do give hippies a good excuse to dress up in costumes and preach to the choir. Plus it makes people feel oppressed, white people love to feel oppressed. Most importantly; protests offer good photo ops. I love me some photo ops.
I'm not saying Scientology isn't a sham or an evil cult, in my opinion it is both but it's also not unique in this. To demonstrate my point I've decided to pit Scientology against Mormonism. Both are relatively new religions, both groups feel they are persecuted and both are based on obvious lies. Let's see how they stack up.

Recruitment:

Mormies: Mormon Missionaries travel all over the world with 50,000+ missionaries operating at a time. They'll talk to you about their religion, sit down with you and even give you a free book of Mormon. That's nice, but they also show up at my door unexpectedly. That's -5 points for reminding me of Jehovah's Witnesses. I'm already all stocked up on The Watchtower, thanks.

Hollywood Cultists: Scientologists generally stalk out urban areas to give free personality tests. These tests will tell you you're unhappy, pretty much no matter what. Dianetics is not free, there are "free" introductory seminars but they're "free" much in the way that time share presentations are free.

Cost of Membership:

M: Mormons give 10% of everything they make or else they will not reach the highest level of salvation. Sure, 10% of a wage in Utah is lower than almost anywhere else in the U.S., great R.O.I. there LDS, but it's still a significant chunk of change.
The average citizen of Utah makes about $25,000 a year, 10% of that is $2,500 a year. Even though LDS members start tithing with their childhood allowance and pay until death let's say they only give $2,500 a year for 40 years (from 25-65). That's $100,000 for a lifetime of church dues and since I'm only considering a 40 year period and adding no interest I'm confident that this is definitely on the low end of the scale.
But wait, there's more; missionary work. Missionary work is 2 years of unpaid service, usually proselytizing. So, that's $50,000 in lost wages. Here we're at $150,000 just to serve the church. Not to do good work, not to help people out, just to line the churches pocket with silver and converts.
What does the church need all that money for? Well, there's all that great infrastructure in Utah and there's all those volunteer clergy (no paid clergy in LDS). The short answer is, I don't know but it's thought the "church" has about 30-50 billion in assets.

H.C.: Estimates to reach OT 8 vary between $275,000 to $350,000. This seems like quite a bit more than the $150,000 I quoted for Mormonism but not if the cost of living and wages in Utah vs. Hollywood are factored in.

Foundation of Beliefs:

M: Fantasy Fiction and lies of Joseph Smith

H.C.: Science Fiction and lies of L. Ron Hubbard.

Name:

M: The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Days Saints. The name tries to convince the casual observer that this is a Christian church whilst sneakily calling it's members Saints. Mormons are Christians the same way that Lutherans are Jewish. Sure, I may think that modern Christianity is just corrupted Judaism without the racist blood line but that's not a widespread belief, yet. I also get that in the past "Saints" meant something different than it does today but I'm still not calling Mormons Saints.

H.C.: Scientology. They manage to combine the words Science and ology. So their name literally means The Study of Science. Clever name, I'll give them that. Too bad their belief structure directly conflicts with science. Yeah, those volcanoes didn't exist 75 million years ago, so drop either the Science, the Ology or add Fiction in the middle. I mean really, I like Orson Scott Card but I'm not running around speaking for the dead.

Perception:

M: People like Mormies. They're generally thought of as hard working, polite, family oriented, open and friendly.

H.C.: Nobody likes Hollywood Cultists. They're generally thought of as weird, creepy, heavy handed, litigious, censoring cultists. If I get sued for expressing my opinion I'm pretty sure it won't be by the Mormons.

The difference in public opinion seemed pretty clear when I looked for pictures of both groups. I didn't search for Scientology + creepy nor did I search from Mormon + wholesome. It just so happened that the pictures of Scientologists were creepy and the pictures of Mormons were wholesome. To me that says more than this throwdown ever could.

Summation:

I believe that Scientology and Mormonism are both equally bullshit and both equally draining on the wallet. The main difference is that I don't hate Mormons. I believe that they believe in what they're doing, even at the top of the organization. I believe they are far less manipulative and their beliefs are less destructive to their members. While both "religions" take a lot of money to spend on suspect ends Mormons seem naive while Scientologists seem evil.
In short, people don't hate Scientology because it's a scammy cult. People hate Scientology because it's a dickish scammy cult. (Allegedly)

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