Sunday, January 13, 2008

New Book on my To-Read List

A new unauthorized biography of Tom Cruise called Tom Cruise: An Unauthorized Biography—catchy title—is set to be released on Tuesday by author Andrew Morton. From Amazon:

1992: Andrew Morton showed a Princess in a light we had never seen before--Diana: Her True Story became a #1 New York Times bestseller.1999: Andrew Morton revealed the young woman behind the blue dress--Monica's Story was a #1 New York Times bestseller.
Well, guess what? This new book is going to be number one, too. Want to know why I predict that? Scientology is suing to block the release of the book.
The book is seen by the powerful Church of Scientology, which has Cruise as of its most high profile and loyal members, as an attack on its teachings.

The extremely litigious religious group has already threatened legal action against Morton in the US under the country's celebrity defamation laws because Morton has shown a "reckless disregard" for the truth.

Under UK libel laws the book, expected to be a bestseller, will not be published and now it appears Australian readers will not get a chance to read it either.
And you know what we have to do to counteract this sort of action, right? Yes, of course you do. We must thwart their efforts by buying this book.

In fact, buy several copies and give them to friends in the UK or Australia. Eventually people will get the message that protesting books, TV shows, or movies—*ahem* Dogma—only makes them more popular. By protesting or censoring, you're putting a big flaming arrow in the sky letting people know where the good, juicy, titillating, interesting stuff is.

- Thanks to writerdd at Skepchick and John Wilkins at Evolving Thoughts. Also, thanks to Scientology for trying.

14 comments:

adam said...

will this be included in the biography?

Ben said...

I thought the same was going to happen the The Golden Compass, but I guess is was so bad that it all free the press wasn't enough.

Flavin said...

True, if the quality isn't there, all the unintended free press in the world won't save a product.

We can always hope.

Ben said...

That's not true. The Da Vinci Code did quite well.

Flavin said...

@adam: I can only hope this is.

Flavin said...

The Da Vinci Code: The only movie I've ever "walked out on" after renting it. As in, midway through the movie, we turned it off and took it back. I do believe we demanded, and got, another rental.

Ben said...

I have turned off a small number. The original Rollerball, Miike's MPD, and probably one other.

And that video you linked is amazing. He obviously has NOT done the research.

Prazzie said...

What with all the scientology stuff on here recently, I got back into reading about it (it's like the ultimate conspiracy theory, but real!) and read a very interesting account here.

It appears as though these loonies will stop at nothing to intimidate those who leave the cult.

I haven't read Morton, but from what little I know I thought that he was a respectable man who researched his work thoroughly and wouldn't publish falsities. After reading that he claims that Tom's child, Suri, is really Hubbard's baby, I have to stop and say "whoa!". That is a bit too much, surely? Why would Katie Holmes have agreed to that, before being married and before becoming a Scientologist? Top Gun wasn't that good.

I hope Morton has evidence for his claims. I also think that all the hype will very likely sell more books.

Prazzie said...

Juliet Lapidos reports on the "juicy bits" of the book.

Flavin said...

Whether or not the claims in the book are true—I hope to find out soon after the book is released—the actions of the Scientologists are reprehensible.

If the book contains demonstrable falsehoods, they should sue for libel. If it contains obvious confounding bias without any direct misuse of facts, they should speak out against it. Judging from the history of the group doubtlessly they will do both.

However, blocking the release of the book is exactly the wrong way to repudiate its claims.

And I think Top Gun sucked.

Ben said...

Ditto regarding Top Gun.

Prazzie said...

Top Gun sucked? But it had FIGHTER JETS! No movie can suck with fighter jets in it, sorry.

A Scientology clip got leaked and the church of $ went wild and had most of the clips removed, but is currently being hosted here.

More nutty Mr Cruise, telling us it's a privilege to call yourself a Scientologist and using the acronym "ksw", which I found out stands for "keep Scientology working" and appears to be a "policy letter" which establishes the infallibility of Hubbard's so-called "technology". Cruise says, in this clip, that Scientologists are "the authorities on getting people off drugs" as well as "the authorities on the mind". Regardless of the fact that they're about 60 years (I'm being very generous here) behind when it comes to matters of the mind.

I haven't been going out looking for this stuff, it's been in the news lately. This was on Atheist Media Blog.

Prazzie said...

Cruise also mentions "SP's" and laughs happily at the idea that SP's will one day only be in the history books.

SP's are "Suppressive Persons", they form about 2,5% of the population, according to Ron, and are considered enemies of the church.

Flavin said...

If you'd like more information on SPs, read about Fair Game.

Ah, hell, I'll just spoil the surprise. From the aforelinked article,

The [fair game] policy was further extended in an October 1967 Policy Letter (HCOPL 18 Oct 67 Issue IV, Penalties for Lower Conditions), where Hubbard defined the "penalties" for an individual deemed to be in a "Condition of Enemy":

"ENEMY — SP Order. Fair game. May be deprived of property or injured by any means by any Scientologist without any discipline of the Scientologist. May be tricked, sued or lied to or destroyed."