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Yes, I admit it. I was a founding charlatan of the Christian Crusade to Stamp Out Science Fiction. I'm sorry, but we were young, bored and holier-than-thou. We had heard the calling from On High (well, actually, each other). It had to be done. And it worked.
If I recall correctly, I believe some aspects of the hoax were initially conceived almost 20 years ago while attending Nolacon 2's 1988 World Science Fiction Convention, where we had grifted our $100+ each attendance memberships by claiming to be the "Video Team from Atlanta." Apparently, if you show up with a boatload of LaserDiscs and a LaserDisc player and propose you're on a list to host a video room to show movies for the SF fans, well it's hard to deny the investment in money and manpower the effort requires so there must be some truth to it. People will at least listen to your scam.
So, we were taken to the Con's HQ Center and a guy who didn't know what to do with us wrote our names down on a piece of paper he entitled "Video Team from Atlanta" and he told us to come back after the shift change to take it up with the People-in-Charge. We waited until the HQ shift change and told a nice looking gal our story and that our names were "on the List" and we were to be given comp passes to the Con for hosting a video room with our LaserDiscs. Lo and behold! the Moons of Yavin, she found the sheet of paper the guy before her had written our names on and it was hard to deny that we were indeed on a list, so it must be true, and out came the comped badges including a Con-provided all-expenses paid conference room to set-up our event to show the videos. We used it as our hotel room and watched a few movies as well with some random Con folk. Ah, sometimes, things just come together. Sah-weet and cheap.
Now as anyone that's attended a World Science Fiction Convention knows, absolutely everyone pays for their attendance badges including Honored Guests, Hugo Nominees, Committee Members, etc. Sounds and is fair, everyone contributes. But not "Video Team from Atlanta" members. No, sir, their badges are comped and said so right on the badge. Some gal writer who was up for a Hugo for Best Novelette cornered a few of us in an elevator after noticing the unusual "Comp" declaration on our badges and demanded to know why WE had comped passes and SHE, a Hugo nominee, had to pay! We could only laugh and declare "We're the Video Team from Atlanta." Not sure she bought it and as it turns out she didn't win her Hugo. Loser.
So you can see we were a little full of ourselves and I believe this is when we began to think it would be fun to pull a hoax of some sort over Condom. A couple of years and a dozen or more Cons later, the Christian Crusade to Stamp Out Science Fiction was signed, sealed and delivered at 1990's Chattacon. Boy did they react. Ironically enough, even the Scientologists were upset at the scam.
Besides the conceptualizing and discussion of the hoax, the major contribution by myself and another friend was the nom de plume of the Crusade's intrepid leader, Dr. P.R. LeNado. The name is based on Robert Anton Wilson's totally cool and groovy character from The Illuminatus! Trilogy, Simon Moon (a name Wilson himself lifted from Joyce's Simon Moonan character in The Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man), who in the novels identifies and promotes the "23 synchronicity principle" to the other characters. In reverse, our etymology for the moniker was
"LeNado" = Lenato = Lunatic = Luna = Moon
The title "Dr." was prescribed for added emphasis of authority and hilarity. So "Dr. P.R. LeNado" is "Simon Moon". As far as I'm aware, no one made the connection.
Read the full tale of arrogance, 80's desktop publishing, Kinko's copying technology, proto-viral marketing and sucker reaction of the Secret History of the Christian Crusade to Stamp Out Science Fiction on the bizarre yet entertaining Corn Pone Flicks site.
Also, remind me sometime and I'll tell you the story of attending the Chattacon at which the Christian Crusade flyers were first introduced and where we literally made badges out of the hotel room's toilet paper after a friend's suggestion to read "more Crowley." It worked just as well, if not better than, the flyer hoax.
80s | Christian | Cons | Conventions | Eighties | Hoaxes | Fandom
Science Fiction | SciFi | Viral Marketing | Grouchogandhi
| Delivered unto you by Grouchogandhi precisely at 7:48:00 PM |
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