Talk:Scientology status by country

Orphaned references in Scientology status by country

I check pages listed in Category:Pages with incorrect ref formatting to try to fix reference errors. One of the things I do is look for content for orphaned references in wikilinked articles. I have found content for some of Scientology status by country's orphans, the problem is that I found more than one version. I can't determine which (if any) is correct for this article, so I am asking for a sentient editor to look it over and copy the correct ref content into this article.

Reference named "Toomey":

• From Church of Scientology: Toomey, Shamus (June 26, 2005). "'TomKat' casts spotlight back on Scientology". Chicago Sun-Times
• From Scientology: "'TomKat' casts spotlight back on Scientology". 2005-06-29. Archived from the original on June 29, 2005. Retrieved 2023-01-28.

Reference named "lucytimes":

• From Scientology: Lucy Morgan (March 29, 1999). "Abroad: Critics public and private keep pressure on Scientology". St. Petersburg Times. In the United States, Scientology gained status as a tax-exempt religion in 1993 when the Internal Revenue Service agreed to end a long legal battle over the group's right to the exemption.
• From Church of Scientology: Lucy Morgan (March 29, 1999). "Abroad: Critics public and private keep pressure on Scientology". St. Petersburg Times. In the United States, Scientology gained status as a tax-exempt religion in 1993 when the Internal Revenue Service agreed to end a long legal battle over the group's right to the exemption.

Reference named "Finkelman287":

• From Church of Scientology: Finkelman, Paul (2006). Encyclopedia of American Civil Liberties. CRC Press. p. 287. ISBN 978-0-415-94342-0. Archived from the original on March 27, 2021. Retrieved October 1, 2020. "Scientology has achieved full legal recognition as a religious denomination in the United States".
• From Scientology: Finkelman, Paul (2006). Encyclopedia of American Civil Liberties. CRC Press. p. 287. ISBN 978-0-415-94342-0. "Scientology has achieved full legal recognition as a religious denomination in the United States."

Reference named "Behar":

• From Scientology: Behar, Richard (May 6, 1991). "Scientology: The Thriving Cult of Greed and Power". Time. Archived from the original on August 19, 2013. Retrieved November 3, 2008.
• From Scientology as a business: Behar, Richard (1991-05-06). "The Thriving Cult of Greed and Power". Time. Archived from the original on January 6, 2007.

I apologize if any of the above are effectively identical; I am just a simple computer program, so I can't determine whether minor differences are significant or not. AnomieBOT⚡ 17:36, 6 February 2023 (UTC)

 Done. I plucked them from the Scientology article, the version prior to the mass-move. Grorp (talk) 05:45, 7 February 2023 (UTC)

I removed the table format

(TLDR: I hated the way it was, I changed it, and there's still more work to be done.)

I have changed the format from a colored table to non-colored paragraphs. There was no 'key' to explain the colors, the color choice was ugly, and there seemed to be some significance (like what?) by displaying some paragraphs left-justified and some center-justified. And that's just for starters.

The choice of a two-color scheme indicated that 'status' was a binary choice, which it isn't, and the choice of color (pink or blue) was a binary decision made by a wiki editor and express in a single color (that's wikivoice) for something which is often a gray area. The title (status by country) is ambiguous enough to make a reader wonder which status is meant. There seems to be two natural status-types: (a) recognition as a religion, or (b) being given tax-exempt status (which is almost synonymous with recognition as a charity). This gives FOUR choices a & b, not-a & b, a & not-b, and not-a & not-b. No, we don't need four colors. Finally, there are a sufficient number of countries that don't precisely fall in any of those 4 categories, and another bunch for which we have no information and no citations (but we have content to say nothing), to make me reject the entire color scheme format. I don't think one of those fancy colored maps would help, either.

'Status' is not standardized from one country to another. There are even countries where Scientology is not considered a religion, not tax-exempt, not illegal to practice, and is considered a taxable business; Israel comes to mind. Now that two very large sections (religion and business) were dumped (without merge work) in this article from the Scientology article, it's time to actually work on merging/weaving that information into this article.

I suggest that each country section be a summary description of the various legal statuses (religion, charity, tax-exempt, business, criminal, cult, whatever) without getting bogged down in too much detail for any one country (unless it seems needed). And if we have no citation to say something at all about a country's status, then we don't say anything at all; we're not required to cover the entire world.

Grorp (talk) 08:28, 1 March 2023 (UTC)

IMO a good and needed change. North8000 (talk) 14:42, 1 March 2023 (UTC)

Chile

Hi, i would suggest putting this "Report of the Commission of Inquiry into the existence and activities of religious sects" by the Chilean Congress as a source of the claim that Chile considers Scientology a cult, in my opinion its a better source than a line in an Emol article, specifically the 2nd chapter of "Sects and their background in Chile", where Scientology is classified as a "dangerous sect" by the Commission — Preceding unsigned comment added by 190.5.43.120 (talk) 22:32, 1 September 2023 (UTC)

Hungary, update

Looks like Scientology lost its religious status in Hungary so this article need updating. Some info is posted at Talk:Scientology and law § Criminal case in Hungary.   ▶ I am Grorp ◀ 21:41, 11 December 2023 (UTC)