Morality and architecture

It is not often that this blog takes an interest in an item in the Business Section of the Herald but...but...but....

The Scientologists have bought Whitecliffe

Yes, Whitecliffe, the art college or, at least, its building: the big fake Hampton Court in Grafton; I would be speechless but that wouldn't make for a very interesting post. So I shall try to express my horror in words.

How could the owners sell the building to that bunch of fucktards? They weren't even selling it. The goons from outer space just turned up with a truckload-o-cash and the owners just assumed the position. So the college gets chucked out and the goons move in.

And how, you might ask, do the goons happen to come by a truckload-o-cash? Well, it's funny you should mention that. You see, New Zealand is one of the few countries in this little corner of the universe that gives them charitable status; yes, that's right, someone in the IRD believed the goons when they said they were a church and granted them a tax break.

It is bad enough that churches should be free from income tax, but this lot - a church? What about the 1969 report made right here in New Zealand? What about the masses of evidence that the Church of Scientology is an international crime syndicate that preys on the unwitting and the mentally ill to extract as much cash as the greedy bastards can get their hands on. What about the harm they do with their endless campaign against psychiatry? What about the damage they do to individuals who fall into their grasp, extracting huge amounts of money with their pay-as-you-go training schemes and persuading vulnerable psychiatric patients to stop their treatment?

And why, might you ask, do the goons want to spend ten million dollars on this building when they have perfectly nondescript premises in Panmure? I guess they are thinking that Whitecliffe is so much more convenient for the CBD, where the goons go about their work of drawing in the gullible with free personality tests. It will be so much easier to get the duped up to the new HQ so they can start paying real money.