Shamwow Vince and his Scientology past

I came across this article which basically tells a story about the Shamwow guy and how the church of Scientology fucked him over. I don't know how much of it is true and i am not posting this as a slam on Scientology but merely as an interesting story to read, whether you believe it or not.
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Shamwow Vince

I'd like to talk to you about a man whom I've dubbed "Headset Vince". He's the guy from the ShamWow commercials. He wears a headset for reasons no one other than Vince can understand? maybe he's expecting a phone call? From his agent offering him a better gig? Maybe his mom is calling to tell him that Stella from Bingo saw him on the teevee? I don't know. What I do know is that this guy is someone who I, until now, felt the need to mock at any and every conceivable opportunity.

Turns out, Headset Vince is actually one of the good guys, a hero. We need to stop mocking him and start celebrating him. And we need to buy his towels and nut choppers and his DVDs.

Headset Vince is actually a guy named Vince Offer. It sounds like he should be a cartoon bear-dog hybrid drawn onto the corners of coupons you get in the mail, but he is not a cartoon. In real life, Vince was an aspiring filmmaker - not a very good one, but his lack of filmwriting, directing, and acting skills were not about to hold him back from a career making talkies for the big screen. And yet, you notice I'm using the past tense. He was an aspiring filmmaker? but now he wears a headset in TV commercials and makes you feel like a dick for not already owning German-made spongetowels. So what happened?

The Church of Scientology happened.

Vince is the writer/producer/director/star of the film Underground Comedy Movie. When he began making the movie, he was a relatively new convert to the Scientology. He used his connections within the CoS's "Celebrity Center International", a group within the church for artist networking, to cast his film. He managed to muscle up some big A-list names like Slash from Guns n Roses, Ant, a couple of budding soft-core porn stars and Joey Buttafucco. (Being new, I guess he didn't have access to the Xenu VIP Casting Suite where Travolta and Cruise hang out.)

The movie was intended to be hilarious and offensive. Unfortunately for Vince, the CoS (along with pretty much everyone who's ever logged on to RottenTomatoes.com) only found it to be the latter. The CoS was so embarrassed that one of their members made a movie so offensive (and awful), they went all 8th-grade popular girl on his ass - shaming, embarrassing and shunning him out of the cool clique of Scientology.

In a normal church your pastor or minister might pull you aside and say, "I think we need to talk about the content of your film. I'm a little concerned it's not in line with the teachings of our faith. I fear you're violating [our religion]ism's doctrine with some of the language and imagery in your film." And you may decide to chat about it or you may decide to spit in your pastor's face and head downstairs for pancakes. Either way, the church is expected to act with some amount of grown-up non-dickery.

In the Church of Scientology, the MO is passive-aggression, threats and coersion. Instead of taking the time to talk to Vince, and telling him that perhaps he needs to make a decision between the church and his terrible movie, they chose to push him out by turning the CoS community against him.

Vince says CoS officials stole clips from unedited film footage, added their own sass and passed it around the community as the first act in an elaborate smear campaign against him. They then coerced statements from other members of the church, threatening to "fair game" anyone who refused, declaring them them to be SPs (Suppressive Person, an apostate and enemy of the CoS) for not cooperating.



Statements and evidence were "collected" and the CoS charged Vince with 23 crimes against Scientology, and he was forced to stand trial in Scientology Court. Which is kind of like Night Court, but without the hilarious baliff, sexual innuendo, and the ability to walk away without fearing for your life? oh yeah, and at least one of the judges is still in junior high. Vince was found guilty on all charges without being able to mount a defense, mostly because he was never told what the charges were.

After being found guilty, Vince was considered a criminal. He was still "welcome" to be a member of the church - in the same way that you're still "welcome" to have cake at your best friend's wedding after you just mentioned in your drunken toast that you nailed the bride the night before they got engaged.

Unfortunately for Vince, as is the case with cults, by this time he had left behind his entire life for Scientology. Everyone in his life was a part of the Church. He was still in the process of making his movie, and he was funding it through a business he started - a business that relied on his Scientology connections. He had dozens of sales reps working for him, all of them Scientologists. His clients - Scientologists. His friends were Scientologists. He had nothing left.

He appealed his conviction, and CoS overturned it. They admitted that the entire case against him was nothing more than a smear campaign and that it was unfair he was never informed of the charges against him. But it was too late. The damage was done, and while the conviction was overturned, he never received an apology or reparations. In other words, they said, "Oh that conviction shouldn?t have happened. We totally lied about everything, used fake evidence against you and generally ran the proceedings in a manner that was the complete opposite of ethical. But we didn't do anything wrong. We're not sorry. And it?s not up to us to make amends to you. Quit crying and go take some vitamins or something."

Vince's business was still bust. His friends were still gone. His network was destroyed. He was still an outcast in his Church (though I have a feeling he wasn't interetested in returning at this point). He was on his own and completely broke. He finally f0und a job, not a great one, but a job nonetheless. He started selling vegetable choppers.

Turns out, he's really good at selling vegetable choppers. He got promoted and started selling them at flea markets. He grew a sales team underneath him, and he eventually made enough money to finish his movie and put together an infomercial for it, released it on basic cable and DVD, selling over 100,000 copies.

And his unique sales style landed him Billy Mays' job.

The next Deniro he's not, but he's certainly managed to turn things around for himself. If only other cult refugees could do as well.

But Vince isn't just accepting that this is what the universe had planned for him. He's not just moving on and leaving the whole CoS ugliness behind him. He?s fighting them. In fact, fighting the Church of Scientology is his new life's mission.

He filed suit against them in 2004 for ruining his movie, his life, his business, and being dickholes. I couldn't find any information on the outcome of this lawsuit, but according to ESPN, Vince is still fighting the good fight. And he is using every dime he makes from selling ShamWows and SlapChop as well as all the proceeds from Underground Comedy to fight them.

Taking on Scientology is one of the bravest things a former member can do. The Church doesn't take kindly to dissent. Though they claim that fair game is no longer a Scientologist policy, there are plenty of stories to indicate that fair game is still alive and well, if technically "unofficial".

My guess is that this probably is the last we'll ever hear of Headset Vince's fight against Scientology.

[georgetenfour]

fucking hell, thanks for digging that up!! i KNEW there was a reason i liked him better than billy mays!

[scampr]

not sure how much of this I believe because I had seen him selling that shit a long time ago:

Turns out, he's really good at selling vegetable choppers. He got promoted and started selling them at flea markets.

I remember when I first saw him on TV I "knew" that guy, his voice, his whole schtick, from when I bought one of those shammys several years ago at a fair in Oregon. So unless he made this movie before the turn of the century (atleast!) then this might be a clever story to make him seem a lot more interesting.

[marccrow]

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and Wiki doesn't lie!

Order this movie now, cuz we can't do this all day. Plus, if you order in the next five minutes, we'll send you two movies for the price of one! That's two hilarious comedy movies for $19.95! Plus S&H.

[Striker]

Here's a another news story about this that was used as a source in the wikipedia article: http://www.prnewswire.com/cgi-bin/st...2171569&EDATE=

LOS ANGELES, May 11 /PRNewswire/ -- Ever since late night infomercials ran
on national cable stations for "The Underground Comedy Movie," co-starring
Michael Clarke Duncan, Slash, Gena Lee Nolin and Joey Buttafuoco, the movie
has become a household name. LA Weekly crowned it as "The single most
offensive movie ever made!" And it definitely delivers the goods. So much
so, the filmmaker was kicked out and branded a "Criminal" by the Church of
Scientology.
In 1997, while in production on his movie, church officials allegedly
orchestrated a meticulously covert propaganda campaign against Offer. To help
galvanize church staff to get of rid Offer, illegally, selected shots of the
movie were taken from a rough cut copy, placed them in a report accompanied by
scarring comments and distributed within the church.
After setting the stage, the Scientology sub-organization that recruits
and caters to celebrities "Celebrity Center International," located in
Hollywood and whose motto is "To Create a Safe Space for Artists," according
to Offer recruited dozens of his Scientology friends, associates and actors
that worked on Underground Comedy, to write false and malicious reports
against him. If individuals refused to write these reports, they were
threatened with condemnation and punishment that could be lethal to their
careers. One person reported a statement informing, "They threatened that I
would also be Declared Suppressive if I didn't write up all the bad stuff I
knew on Vince." A Scientology term, "Declared Suppressive," means being
labeled as an "enemy" of Scientology, expelled from the organization, becoming
"fair game," and subject to "disconnection" by all family, friends and
associates who are Scientologists.
Celebrity Center staff executives summoned Offer to face a Scientology
court for the numerous charges that unbeknownst to Offer were recruited by
Scientology officials but were presented to Offer as having been written by
other members on their "own accord."
This court was run by four scientology church staff members, the youngest
being about 14 years of age, and in March of 1998, a ruling document entitled
"Findings and Recommendations," held Offer to be guilty of 23 charges, none of
which were ever presented to him in the "court." To add insult to injury, the
ruling document labeled him a "Declare Type B," a Scientology term which means
a person who is a "Criminal" and has "a criminal record." This was publicly
distributed or communicated to all associates, future associates of Offer and
general Scientology members, thereby sealing his fate as an outcast. Offer
suffered irreparable damage due to this, including a lucrative business
enterprise he owned that consisted of many Scientology sales representatives
who abandoned him upon hearing the "Criminal" charge. The enterprise folded
soon after.
In August 1999, a year and a half after Offer was labeled a "criminal," a
Scientology appeal board found that the original accusations in the court
ruling were all untrue and that Offer was never even presented with the
charges. Furthermore, they concluded the imposition of the "Criminal" label
on Offer was an injustice. But the appeal board never apologized, or
acknowledged the church's responsibility in the propaganda campaign or offered
reparations.
By January 2002, Offer's life was destroyed, as he was now broke, alone
and was left with an unfinished movie. To keep from going under, he undertook
his inherent marketing abilities and pitched kitchen vegetable choppers at
swap meets. In the span of 5 years, Offer went from owning an enterprise with
dozens of sales reps in 1997, to selling on his own in a swap meet. In April
of 2002, against all odds, he managed to generate enough money from swap meet
sales to launch a successful infomercial campaign for his movie. It is the
first movie ever to be marketed in this medium, which propelled DVD sales to
almost 100,000 units in the US.
Offer is using his proceeds from the sales of the movie to fight the
Church in court. Armed with evidence and the passion of obtaining redress for
injustice, he has pursued an unrelenting quest to expose the human cruelty and
destructive practices committed, still to this day, by the Church of
Scientology's leadership helmed by David Miscavage.
The preliminary case discussion starts in LA judicial court June 24, 2004.
Offer is represented by attorney Ford Greene of Marin County, California, a
recent finalist for the Trial Lawyers for Public Justice 2003 Trial Lawyer of
the Year for collecting almost $8.7 million from Scientology in a case they
swore "Not One Thin Dime for Wollersheim" the man they drove into insanity and
then punished with fair game.

[scampr]

ah see that's better. those dates make a big difference.

The chopper commercial where he goes "you're gonna love my nuts" kills me every time.







fuck I can't believe I posted twice in this thread - please all mighty scientologists - please don't destroy me, I've only come here for entertainment. I have no knowledge of your belief system nor hierarchy and I'm sure Hubbard was pure genius and I just am not smart enough to understand his books yet.

[Striker]

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BRING IT BITCHES.

Just kidding. I don't want my life ruined because I dared speak out against the almighty L Ron Hubbard and his cult... er I mean church.

[MillyMc]

Im scared to even post in this thread.