Always quick to act, the Church of Scientology has officially revamped their Youtube channel, mere months after the Internet collectively made wet fart noises at them.

Their tiny number of subscribers, huge number of channel views, and disabling of comments and ratings kind of gives you an idea of where the CoS’s net cred stands these days. I guess they aren’t equipped to handle the kind of soul-crushing and surgically-precise criticisms the Cracked Bloggers must grapple with every day (ie, “gayyyyyyyy”).

In any case, I for one will be scrupulously poring over all the videos they post, as I’m still intensely fascinated by the giant sideshow they call a religion. So far, the most interesting one I’ve come across (okay, redubbed) is the below vid outlining the basic precepts of the faith, and the magic powers generated therefrom.

Now at least if I fail in Hollywood, I can always blame it on ticking off the Scientologists.

When not blogging for Cracked, Michael gets retarded in here as head writer and co-founder of Those Aren’t Muskets!

When your organization consists of thousands of anonymous hackers, programmers, and Internet junkies, each working on their own authority towards a common goal, there’s bound to be the occasional stray. This rare address to Scientology from an unknown member of Anonymous serves as a case in point:

Author’s Note: Dear members of Anonymous, if you take offense at this video for any reason, I offer the following arguments against trying to hack, slash, or otherwise infiltrate my connectables:

1. Nothing in here is really aimed against you guys. In fact, I fully support anything that’s against Scientology. See this video as evidence.
2. My MySpace profile is already choked with gay pornography. I doubt it could take any more.
3. I am bereft of lulz, and any attempt to extract them from me will only end in my retreating into my room with a hot fudge sundae and listening to Alanis Morissette tapes. Please, don’t let that happen.

When not blogging for Cracked, Michael makes ANONYMOUS PLEASE DON’T HURT ME videos as head writer and co-founder of Those Aren’t Muskets!

Have you ever wanted to live in a cyberpunk movie? Well, now you can, save the bullet time and endless stream of European techno throbbing in the background. Just join rogue hacker groups like “Anonymous” and take up the fight against Scientology.

Then you too can release rad “underground” scare videos like this one:

I got chills. Of course, I get chills whenever I hear a digitized voice. Remember when Cher’s “Life After Love” was on the radio like every other song? Not a comfortable time for me.

Anonymous really sells the hacker image, complete with a threatening coda and blatant disregard for public safety. The only bit I really find hard to buy is the “we do not forget.” I mean, most programmer kids I know forgot about everything they were doing the second Portal came out.

And for all the appearance of being a massive, organized, Internet force, the comments at the end of this interview make it clear to me that Anonymous is more of a group in the spiritual sense. You join by saying you’ve joined, and then you just kind of do what you do in the name of the group. Like me: I collect and paint turn-of-the-century wooden train figurines. AND I DO NOT FORGIVE.

But, hey, let’s hope they get some people off of Cruise Control. It’s an admirable aim; I just don’t think I’d be too eager to quit my religion because this guy asked me to:

They’re kind words, but I’m kind of afraid the whole time that he’s going to lift up that visor and just be a skull. Again, it’s almost certainly the creepy music, which seems to be a recurring motif in anti-scientology work. The best example I could find is this thing about all the people Scientology has killed, which I could take a lot more seriously if it didn’t use the “Requiem for a Dream” song. When you have to push your beliefs with such obvious fear tactics as reminding me of the movie that ruined my taste for ass-to-ass, my conspiracy antennae tend to extend.

Which isn’t to say Scientologists aren’t still nuts:

It’s definitely going to be an interesting struggle to follow, at least until all the Anonymous members are distracted by a new LOLcat on 4Chan (this one has three cats, a computer, and corms!).

Now let’s hope some guys from Anonymous find this post, decide it insults them, and light up the comments section. Then maybe Cracked will give me a raise and I can afford a can of hairspray and a lighter to combat the nest of bats in my office.

I know. They spring for an office, but they leave the bats. It’s crazy.

When not blogging for Cracked, Michael makes underground cyberpunk videos as head writer and co-founder of Those Aren’t Muskets!

When he was awarded the medal of valor in the face of freedom (or something) four years ago at a secret underground Scientology convention, madman and handsome devil Tom Cruise presented a brief video interview in which he discussed his views on Scientology, his abiding passion for its teachings, and other crazy nonsense. Shockingly, it’s taken that long for the thing to leak to the Internet.

What you didn’t know (until now!) was that the liberal use of jump cuts in the interview was a largely successful attempt to gloss over some of Mr. Cruise’s more “off-balance” remarks. Well, let it never be said that I won’t face hordes of enraged attack dogs, thetans and Katie Holmeses to get to the bottom of a story.

Here, for the first time, I present to you the interview with the edited portions re-inserted. Mr. Cruise?

NOTE: This video was removed due to a complaint by the Church of Scientology. I have re-posted it in a (slightly) lower profile location. Enjoy it while it lasts, folks. And hey, while I’m at it, I’ll be a whore and say DIGGS PLEEZ, if only because I hate the Church of Scientology that much.

Besides blogging for CRACKED, Michael also makes slanderous videos as head writer and co-founder of Those Aren’t Muskets!