Cruise and Goebbels: controversial comparison
Scientology categorically rejected the comparisons between Tom Cruise and Goebbels made in Germany, assuring that the actor's words that gave rise to the controversy had been "shamefully misinterpreted."
Tom Cruise is on the front page. And not just in show magazines. A video in which he is seen speaking clearly before a Scientology audience is now raising controversy in Germany. The reason: A passage from his speech led the Berlin-Brandenburg Evangelical Church expert on sects, Thomas Gandow, to compare him to Hitler's propaganda minister. "I stand by the saying: Cruise is the Goebbels of Scientologists," Gandow told the Sunday tabloid Bild am Sonntag.
Bad memories
The historian Guido Knopp, known in Germany for his programs on the second public television channel, ZDF, also expressed his opinion in Bild am Sonntag about the passage in which Cruise asks "should we clean this place up?" (the newspaper translated it as "shall we clean the world?"), to which people respond in chorus with a resounding "yes". "It may be that Cruise's way of speaking is common in many religious movements in the United States," Knopp told the newspaper, adding that, however, the scene "necessarily reminds, of any German who is interested in history, the sadly Goebbels' famous speech at the Berlin Sports Palace ”. In that place, the propaganda chief of the Third Reich had asked in February 1943 "Do you want total war?"
Scientology replied, in a statement released Monday in Los Angeles, that anyone who knows Cruise knows that he is free from prejudice and does not discriminate against anyone because of his religion or race. Along with calling the misinterpretation of the actor's words "shameful", the organization explained the context in which they were spoken: an act in which the Hollywood star thanked an award for his merits in literacy work. At the same time, the note emphasized his commitment to promoting human rights.
Objectives in question
Scientology has long been confronted with suspicions about its goals. Far from having recognized the status of the Church, as in the United States, in Germany it is the subject of investigations and the ministers of the interior of the Länder and the federation consider that it is not an organization in accordance with the Constitution.
Thus the things, also the image of Tom Cruise is affected, being the most outstanding disciple of Scientology. His portrayal of Count von Stauffenberg, the author of a failed attack on Hitler, in a film that will hit theaters in a few months, has only fueled discussion among Germans. Because some believe, like Thomas Gandow, that this film is aimed at "fulfilling for Scientologists the same objective as the 1936 Olympic Games for the Nazis: to awaken sympathy for a totalitarian movement."
