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Comedy Central has bowed to the pressure put on it by former "South Park" star Isaac Hayes' departure from one of its leading programs. They've made the decision not to re-play the episode that bashes Scientology.

This is exactly the backlash many feared when it was announced Hayes was leaving the show because creators Trey Parker and matt Stone DARED bash his religion in a show that pretty much bashes every and any sacred cow it can find. Speculation is that Tom Cruise, a fellow Scientologist, is threatening to refuse to promote his movie produced by Comedy Central's parent company Viacom because of the episode, but that charge has been denied by Cruise and his handlers.

Scientology is a faith that at best is regarded by the mainstream population as a "made up religion", and at worst is regarded as a dangerous cult. There's actually some pretty strong evidence to support the "dangerous cult" position, evidence that is not helped by Scientology's threats of lawsuits and attempts to silence those who would dare criticize it.

This whole thing reeks, frankly, and I think we can expect a fair amount of internet parodies of the whole episode (my suggestion, since I have neither the time, tools, or talent to produce it, would be a cartoon showing "Scientology jihadists", since Hayes felt the incident compared to the Danish cartoons of Mohammed. There you have it, feel free to run with it). Ironically, the furor over the South Park episode may have been the most negative response the leaders of this faith could muster. Most people were unaware of it, and those that weren't took it with the same humor they apply to just about everything else.

I'm not going to go further into my feelings about the Hayes incident; they're pretty much echoed on BakerStreet's blog. But I did feel the update about the Comedy Central decision to pull the South Park repeat was appropriate; after all, I haven't found the network's programming to be AT ALL sensitive to MY faith or MY beliefs; why should they make an exception for Hayes? I would respond in a manner appropriate with the individual I am discussing, but that response would necessitate an "adult content" tag.