Citing significant doctrinal differences over how the CBS television series CSI: Miami should be honored, fan club membership coordinator Marty Luder left with other disgruntled members to start the Reformed CSI: Miami Fan Club.
With the creation of the new organization and separate Facebook page, Luder and his followers stuck a significant blow to the long established CSI: Miami Fan Club by inciting an exodus of over 20 percent of the almost two million members.
According to Luder, among the causes of the schism was the strict requirement that any praise for show star David Caruso be offered through Fan Club President Leo Medici and his select group of administrators on the message boards.
Additionally, Luder and his followers grew increasingly angered over the group’s selling of show coffee mugs and t-shirts as indulgences to members seeking penance for message board violations. Luder charged that the funds were being misappropriated for the construction of an extravagant and unnecessary new fan web site.
This is not the first time the CSI: Miami Fan Club has been involved in controversy. For years, there have been accusations that the group has attempted to forcibly convert fans of the original CSI: Crime Scene Investigation series. The group’s leadership have long believed that while the original series should be held with highest regard as the source from which the other CSI’s have sprung, it has been superseded by the new messaging and storyline that CSI: Miami offers.
“David Caruso’s character Lt. Horatio Caine and the prophetic sayings he brings at the beginning of each show have established a new fan relationship with the CSI franchise,” Medici said. “Did not the great Gil Grissom foretell of Caine’s coming in the second season of the original series when he said ‘Behold, a new head of the crime lab in the Miami-Dade County area will be brought forth, and they shall call his name Horatio’?”
While Luder agrees with this core orthodoxy, his objections were about the group’s gradual departure from the show’s central message. He says he attempted to reform the CSI: Miami Fan Club from within and had no intention of confronting the club’s leadership. His protests comprising of 95 posts on the message boards were meant merely as an objection to organizational practices, but instead were interpreted as an affront to the show itself and Luder was stripped of his role as membership officer.
The purpose of his postings was meant to refocus the fan’s appreciation for actor David Caruso’s contribution to the show instead of the false idolatry of the fan club with all of its officers and sub-officers, administrators and sub-administrators; all demanding obedience to strict message board posting standards.
“Why should we put our ability to enjoy the show into the hands of just a few men?” asked Luder who believes that the fan club under Medici and past administrators had grown corrupt in its ways, losing sight of the central truths of the show.
“It is only through our own personal relationship with lead character Horatio Caine that we can truly experience CSI: Miami,” Luder said.
Luder and his followers also objected to the group’s toleration of traditions that fell outside the original intent of the show. They believe that CSI: Miami should be enjoyed as it was produced in its original form and should not be subject to changes and interpretation through the fan fiction stories posted on the message boards.
“These stories stray from the canonical foundations of the television series,” Luder said. “They were never sanctioned by the show’s creator Anthony Zuiker and we felt that these practices bordered on blasphemy.”
Medici was not pleased with the apparent insurrection and publicly condemned Luder and removed him of his administrator rights, prompting Ludor to flee with his supporters and start the Reformed CSI: Miami Fan Club.
“Good riddance to Marty,” Medici said. “This is a fan site, not your own moral sounding board. . . heretic.”
At the time of this article’s release, the newly created Reformed CSI: Miami Fan Club had already split into 30 separate and embattled sects. The various schisms were caused by disputes over whether Zuiker actually writes the episodes or merely inspires the writers, or whether apparent inaccuracies in the forensic science should still be taken as the truth or instead treated as allegory, or intense arguments over what will actually happen in the show’s final episode.
JB Goodbody frequently has thoughts in his head that makes him smile. Were they made public at the moment they poofed into existence, without some form of structured outlet such as satire, these thoughts would cause significant distress among his friends, family and coworkers. This is why he is here. 
