Scientology and Vegetables: the Facts

Vegetables are vegetables, whatever it may say on the seed-packet. At last least that's what my best mate Nosher and me thought when we saw his new packet of carrot seeds especially imported from the US. Down at the allotment we'll try anything once, so a packet of seeds claiming to give us the biggest carrots we'd ever seen seemed worth a try.

At first all went well. Being more cautious than Nosher, I refused his kind offer to share the seeds with me, and he sowed them all on his plot. Good move on my part, as it turned out. Soon the green carrot heads were veritably leaping out of the soil, shaking their tops around and proclaiming to all the other vegetables how special they were.

Now, as every gardener will tell you, it's important to talk to your plants. Nosher and me, well, we go further and listen to what they say in return. And not long after the first carrot produced a bright orange crown above ground we heard whisperings of a disturbing nature. Nosher's turnips told him that the carrots were claiming that they were not carrots at all, but special alien vegetables called 'Betans', who held the secret of success for all vegetables, which could be bought at a price from them. But when Nosher went over to his carrot corner all the carrots immediately went quiet and wouldn't tell him anything. Nonetheless, the disturbing rumours persisted. Then, one day, the proverbial hit the fan.

A particular carrot, later named as Tomc Ruse, who had recently appeared in a BBC TV Gardener's World programme and therefore thought himself a cut above the others, had given an interview to the Allotment Weekly newsletter, claiming that his religion, Pieontology, was a 'blast', and that it good cure all known ailments in vegetables, including misbehaving marrows and sugar-beet with addiction problems.

As soon as that particular issue of Allotment Weekly hit the news-stands all Hell broke loose. I could hear the vegetables on Noshers allotment patch murmuring amongst themselves even from fifty yards away. The Nosher came to me and spilled the beans. 'The carrots have become very obstreperous', he said, 'they claim the article sheds an unfavourable light on their religion, and unless the article is withdrawn and a disclaimer issued, they say that no carrots will appear at any produce shows or Harvest Festivals, in fact they're threatening to infect the parsnips with their ideas now. This is terrible! What shall I do?'

In the world of allotment gardening, retribution is swift for those vegetables who get ideas above their station. We immediately pulled all the carrots and dumped them on the compost heap, then, after a heavy evening on the grog, gave them the benefit of our combined urinary excretions one dark night as the local church bells struck midnight. The carrots got the message, and the remaining vegetables returned to their happy state of compliance that existed prior to the arrival of the Pieontologist carrots.

So, you see, we in the allotment world are no strangers to the sort of thing now happening in the human world. History repeats itself, but not always in the way that we humans night imagine.

The Church of Scientology, has, it appears, behaved true to form by threatening law-suits against anyone publishing an interview given by one Tom Cruise in which he is reported to have said that scientology was a 'blast', and that the Church had the expertise to cure crime and drug addiction and bring peace and harmony to the world.

Since the means of acheiving this outcome appears to involve intimidation and bullying in the form of lawsuits against anyone they don't like, with the obvious implications of a cavalier attitude towards freedom of speech, the ordinary public can perhaps be forgiven for thinking that these people are arrogant, conceited, and insecure, and adopt bullyboy tactics as soon as their conceits and self-deceits are threatened in any way.

Here at overthegardenfence we couldn't possibly comment on such views, but nonetheless we wish all campaigners against bullying and intimidation every success. It's bad enough having to put up with such things going on down at the allotment - why should we have to put up with them in the human world as well?

More from overthegardenfence soon.