Church of the SubGenius

From TinWiki.org

The Church of the SubGenius is a satirical pseudo-religious organization founded in 1980, currently based in Cleveland, Ohio. It is known for deliberately mocking many aspects of New Age culture, including religious cults, fringe theories and pseudo-sciences, and conspiracy theories (and their authors).

1 Church Icon
2 Doctrine
3 Founders
4 External Links
5 Relevant Discussion Threads

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Church Icon

The Churches icon

The icon of the Church of the SubGenius is a clip-art image known as J.R. "Bob" Dobbs. His pipe-smoking face has become an icon of many skeptical Internet sites, ranking alongside the Invisible Pink Unicorn and the Flying Spaghetti Monster.

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Doctrine

SubGenius literature can be seen as a spoof of many of the most well-known and popular conspiracy theories (and some of the lesser-known ones as well). The Church even bases its dogma on the idea that a vast, worldwide "Conspiracy" is seeking to persecute members of the Church of the SubGenius. According to Church lore, all beings are born in a Nirvana-like state called "Slack," but this Slack has been stolen away by the worldwide Conspiracy. Getting Slack from the Conspiracy is a crucial goal in life for SubGeniuses, in a manner that can be equated in several different ways from "taking advantage of the System" to "fighting the Man" to simply "something for nothing" and "slacking off."

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Founders

The Church is managed by Rev. Ivan Stang, who is known among a number of well-known conspiracy theorists. In addition to being a friend and collaborator with the late Robert Anton Wilson, Stang was the compiler and editor of the 1988 book High Weirdness By Mail, a catalogue of fringe groups that looked at many conspiracy-oriented groups, from religious to political. (He also wrote the introduction to Doug Moench's The Big Book of Conspiracies.)

Notable members of the Church of the SubGenius include comic book artists Robert Crumb and Paul Mavrides.

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