ZoloftBlob

I'm enjoying it but I wish it was better. It hasn't topped Asylum at all, for me, but hasn't raced Roanoke to the bottom.

Let's not over praise "all other churches" - they're usually a bit more subtle about *how you have to pay* for their assistance. You don't get help for free, you have to toe their line. Not saying Scientology is "right", just that regular churches aren't necessarily shining beacons of hope.

Again, the modern setting really hurts this series. I did love Rick Springfield's Hell House. I just had no idea why Kai and Winter's youthful adventures in crazy were relevant. I did find the creepy incest angle and messiah ceremony hilarious and a nice dash of just how cray Kai it A city council meeting with ahem blue shirted storm troopers literally holding guns while the council is threatened into creating a private security army? Yeah that's going to get outside attention. Likewise a bunch of blue shirted Nazi styled thugs setting up their own little beer hall in the Butchery. Beverly not working as a reporter but hanging around a restaurant cooking for the boys? Doesn't she have a job? Generally Kai really doesn't seem so smart that I can believe he can mastermind a normal life let alone a rise to power and letting Ally into the cult after pointedly victimizing her is kind of a problem.

His dad got sick so he sold the place to help out money wise. I have to be honest, I kinda questioned the reality of the "we're living in a tent on a friend's land with nothing... and we're sending our daughter to public school..." - like I kinda felt like it was for the show.

I'm currently enjoying their ending their boycott against Starbucks because it just speaks to their shallow as fuck views and stances. And it doesn't even matter what their reasons for boycotting Starbucks is - although I assume it's either the "How dare Starbucks support LBGTQ things!" or the "How dare Starbucks not put JESUS SAVES CHRISTMAS IS ABOUT CHRIST FIRST! on their cups" issue. The issue doesn't really matter. I'm calling them shallow as fuck because of how they explain why they deign to give Starbucks their business again. When they started their boycott, they lived in Bend, which apparently has a zillion little coffee shops with character so they could easily skip Starbucks and still have fancy frothy coffee drinks. Basically they could sip a mocha latte and pat each other on the back for how noble they were without having to make any effort at all, or any sacrifice. Now that they live in the nightmare hellscape of Suburban Portland, ahem, they can no longer easily have their coffee drinks and proudly take their stand for whatever reason - and they've been pointedly asked, multiple times, by polite fans, why they boycott Starbucks and refuse to answer - now that there's a faint amount of *difficulty* or potential sacrifice attached to their boycott... well, we all know what is more important to these two - they prefer fancy coffee to taking a stand. They're such warriors for Jesus! :) It got hard so they quit - its basically the story of Jeremy's life, which makes me worry about his breeding. Also he's currently posting pictures of Audrey being followed by a camera crew, implying that they are being accosted by "paps" when its most likely the tlc crew.

Yup. I'm expecting this particular comeuppance.

Yeah, basically he's got to prove he can manage to not harass her for a few months and then it all can start again *if he hasn't learned a lesson*. Like Otherkate said, the courts do this as a wake up call. Hopefully he's learned what not to do as this point because again, sadly, this often works against the woman in question. If Bethenny says she is still afraid of Jason, much like how we're all allowed our opinions, so is Bethenny. There's nothing unusual or odd about a woman being frightened about what happens when the person who was harassing them is no longer in fear of repercussions. If this plea deal is real, Jason now has the opportunity to show that he's not a harasser.

You're certainly free to think that but whatever "strong chance" Jason may have had to beat the charges is null and void if he takes a plea deal. If "something doesn't add up" about the plea deal, then Jason is perfectly free to not take the deal. Sure, Bethenny is currently in the spotlight for doing some actual good - but at the end of the day, if it's true Jason took a plea deal (still haven't seen this confirmed in legitamite sources) then he did so because he wasn't willing to take the chance at trial.

I suppose it's not this mundane but... it looks like the trees have a gypsy moth infestation.... I suppose I am in the minority but while this is way more intellectual than American Horror Story Cult, it's also getting a little obvious where we are going. Andy is the current target but Tomas is the real focus of the demons. They've out right stated that the demons want to kill or intergrate the exorcists.

Well, I would have a problem with an elected official who in the past hadn't supported his children with child support - those agreements are legal orders after all.

Well, I could point out the societal issues on how women reporting men in domestic violence and stalking situations are routinely dismissed and blamed for the behavior of the men they are reporting.... Jason wouldn't be the first guy to get a nice plea deal because he cleans up well and has no prior record, and the woman involved is deemed "hysterical" or "lying". Unfortunately, guys tend to get a lot of second chances until they end up doing something that can't be hand waved away, like beating the shit out of their victim or murdering them. This is sadly not unique to Bethenny, there's a lot of women who are really that afraid of their ex's who have to deal with their abusers being given chance after chance to stop their behavior. I'd counter the why did he get such a sweet plea deal with "Why if he was as innocent as a baby, weren't the charges summarily dismissed with Jason walking out completely vindicated?" *Mind you, I still haven't found any mention of this on a non rumor mill gossip site so who knows?

OMG you mean Audrey is yet again horrified to discover that her every decision is not being praised and held up as perfect parenting? And of course the lesson here for Audrey is "All criticism of Audrey's parenting is wrong, and comes from people who are hateful". Personally, I didn't care for the brown tights but honestly, if she wants to dress the kid in fussy clothes that make diaper changes more difficult... whatever. I'm also amused that Audrey is ok with InTouch Weekly telling the public she's been diagnosed with post partum depression.

http://radaronline.com/celebrity-news/bethenny-frankel-ex-jason-hoppy-plea-bargain-stalking/ I don't consider radar online a super accurate source but this is what they are reporting.

Yup, I am aware that the show makes things up. And I did notice the silly serial killer parties in Hotel but since they were mostly silly and centered around being tutored by the ghost of a man that never actually existed, it was clearly fantasy. There was no supernatural silliness in the historically inaccurate flashbacks this season and this is a modern times set story so there's no reason for everyone to throw up their hands and accept the story. And I understand what you're saying, believe me. I'm just saying that I find it jarring and it takes me out of the story because he's getting so many things that are well known incorrect, I begin to watch for the errors and not the actual storyline - which in this case wasn't terribly clever. Part of it is that in earlier seasons, while allusions were made, J P Marsh was a fictional character and NOT actually H. H. Holmes, who he was obviously based on. The Black Dahlia murder was never solved so fictionalizing who really did it isn't a big deal especially when it's clearly a supernatural setting. Like you, I am interested in how Kai and Bibi met up but frankly I can't help but think it will be a let down. Point - I also can't believe, in a modern setting like this, that no one has caught Ivy and Winter together on camera and shown Ally what her wife has been up to - there are people who would consider Ally the hero in the home invasion killing of Pedro and who would admire her. Likewise camera footage should show Ally trying to stop Meadow, which also engenders some public good will.

Eh this episode is losing me. Evan Peters was great as Andy... I don't have any real feelings for Lena Dunham the person and I didn't find anything wrong with her performance. It's just... there's so many problems.... They're acting like this is all happening in a small city in the 1950s - all while dropping cool millennial references like getting tweeted by someone famous. I brought some of this up in the last episode discussion but it bears repeating. That Harrison and Meadow filmed the beat down on Kai and were interviewed on camera about it is a problem, when it's coupled with Harrison being the man with the dead boss, Harrison and Meadow immediately moving into the murdered city councilman's house, Harrison and Meadow working for the guy who is now running for city council, Harrison giving a gun to the "lesbian George Zimmerman" and now Meadow shooting Kai and others at the rally for Kai that Harrison also intended? That's suspicious as fuck. Add in the murdered opponent? National media would be totally in there. Dressing your new political allies who all are white clean cut young men in matching colored shirts would draw media attention. While I haven't been terribly impressed with Kai's leadership, I actually think, based on prior cleverness, that he's not actually so stupid as to piss off Beverly, one of the followers who actually has some power as a news reporter, and who is smart enough (normally, we'll talk about that too) to see how he's ham-handedly and openly cutting out all the women. So then we have Crazy Old Bitch telling her tale about actual historical figures and... Winter, Ivy and Beverly all have smart phones and all know what the internet is and it's very easy to find info on actual historical figures like Valerie Solanas and the Zodiac Killer. Valerie was schizophrenic, and she wasn't known for her leadership abilities. She also would have been in NYC for you know, shooting Andy Warhol and the subsequent trial and three year jail sentence. Oh, and as amusing as a good old fashioned stab party is, the Zodiac Killer tended to use a gun - several couples were shot, and while some stabbing occurring in some of the murders, the Zodiac Killer was mostly a shooter. This might seem like minor stuff but we're talking about actual victims of actual crimes here. Granted, I may have taken too much interest in murder as an adolescent but these are things easily found out. If the women are just following along without bothering to minimally fact check... that just too willfully dumb. And if the writers are just merrily making shit up, then I hope they understand that the Zodiac Killer murdered actual people who have family that is likely still alive. The factual inaccuracy took me out of the story, and the straight up gullibility of the women coupled with the sudden sausage fest of the blue shirts worries me. And I am finding it hard to believe that people aren't questioning the string of deaths in any real sense.

The billion year contract is only for sea org members. You can be a Scientologist without being in Sea Org. The advantage to Sea Org is that you don't pay for the many many expensive classes on the bridge and you're sort of clergy in the church. The disadvantages are that you're basically a slave to the church.

Just got a chance to catch up on Jer and Auj's instastories. Sure enough, Jer is man enough to bitch about Starbucks, make faces, and whine, but not actually man enough to tell us why he was boycotting Starbucks. And hmmm, Jer really hates being in Portland Suburbia and everything is "corporate" and how awful it is that someone is building another gas station when they *could* be building him a not Starbucks coffee shop. Christ Jeremy, you DIDN'T HAVE TO LEAVE BEND, and you don't have to work at all and have time to spend with your baby and prat about how you hate the corporate scene.... Auj's dramatic reveal? Despite evidence to the contrary, she's not into anything girly at all except her lovely fake eyelashes. Also drones on in several instatories about her "Always More" necklace that *isn't poor quality*

Yet when pressed for details, these two little bitches will be hard pressed to say anything other than "We're complaining and were boycotting to where we instragramed our displeasure but WHY were we boycotting? Why, how dare anyone ask us such a private question!" - I'd seriously respect their religious nonsense a lot more if they'd own it but since being pro-diversity pays more than "We boycotted Starbuckls because we decided if they don't say "Christmas IS ABOUT CHRIST! OH MY GOD WHY HAS STARBUCK'S FORSAKEN THEE!!" - basically they know it will turn off fans so they keep their little bitch mouths shut.

I hate to say this but.... There wasn't a whole lot going on at the child torture camp that... was illegal. That is why the therapeutic boarding school industry went on for so long. The Ranches, complete with eight year olds being washed with metal brushes? Isn't even half as bad as some that didn't get shut down forever. The problem is that a lot of times, brutal as the stories sound... there's not something actionable. I mean, with the metal brush story, the victim even conceded he was just scratched, physically. Or not being allowed to call their parents or being locked in a room or doing physical labor. None of these things are technically a crime and when it comes to minors, you also want to remember that the parents were choosing to put their children in these schools. So for example, if a teen ran away and complained about the school? The parent can legitimately say "this is a boarding school, I approve of their methods" and then would probably cite the teen's bad behavior as to why they are going there. These places always have awesome photos ... thet were probablypretty honest about the hard physical labor too...

Are they organic wipes? Is that it?

Yeah.... sadly no. Look up Tranquility Bay or Spring Creek Lodge Academy or Cross Creek or just WWASP. It's pretty much perfectly legal to have your children locked up in residential boarding schools for "treatment". The schools I am mentioning? Aren't Scientology related. Kids actually died at Tranquility Bay. There's been multiple lawsuits with very few wins for the victims because their parents paid for their schooling and 'therapy'. In the eyes of the law, a bunch of kids pushing boulders around with an adult supervising isn't "slave labor", it's "caring parents paying for a unique school experience". And sadly the statute of limitations probably doesn't help. And most of these kids don't come out of these places with real skills or with any support structure so they end up looking like unreliable complainers who maybe do drugs... not great witnesses.

Is it just me - and to be fair, I freely admit to not being a baby person - but is lil Ember kind of a small baby? I mean, she was two weeks late, and only 7.13 pounds or whatever - but the kid looks small. If Auj is really having difficulty feeding, I hope she reconsiders her devotion to breast feeding.

Libby 0 as long as you aren't calling those accommodations *unethical* I think we're fine. I take offense at the implication that a medical school UNETHICALLY passed along someone not competent to practice medicine. That Jen received unethical accommodations is a serious charge and it is publically suggesting she is not a real doctor, and should not be allowed to practice medicine. And this isn't an opinion thing - Jen Arnold has a license to practice medicine so in stating her training accommodations were unethical, it stands to reason people who think she got a leg up unethically don't think she's really a doctor at all. And its not just accusing Jen, its accusing the people who taught Jen of unethical behavior, and its accusing Jen's employers of endangering patients lives.

Well, I don't think Andy is currently possessed but that "Grace" is the demon who is worming into Andy. And I don't think Grace is a real child and here's my logical reasoning. The social worker was investigating Munchasen Mom because the child in question wasn't attending school. "Grace" hasn't been attending school but the social worker makes no mention of that at all, or at the reality that there's a child with a serious mental disturbance who hides from the other children, refuses to interact or leave the house and who wears a pillow case over her face.

Because an exorcism is physically taxing and people do die during them. If the kid isn't possessed, then it's putting a sick child thru a grueling physical marathon that can kill. There's a reason the church actually does investigate possession claims and doesn't just willy nilly perform exorcisms I totally think this is where it's heading - Andy seems like the obvious choice and the kids are just toys to be used to prod him down the path