Recently, the notorious Scientology company cobbled together yet
another attempt to defend their attacks against freedom of speech on
the Internet. This latest attempt has been motivated by the latest
exposures in the media of Scientology's baseless -- and very often
quite vague -- threats against both
http://www.Google.COM/ and
http://www.Archive.ORG/ This
time the notorious company is trying to claim that the Internet is
responsible for murders of Scientologists and further attempts to
equate free speech and human rights activists to Islamic terrorist
mass murderers.
For rights activists around the world, Scientology's endless claims
and bullying actions are nothing new and for the most part are simply
ignored outright. Scientology's actions are strongly opposed by human
rights activists and freedom of speech activists around the world and
activists have placed a wealth of information about Scientology on the
Internet consisting of court transcripts, witness affidavits, and
newspaper articles covering child abuse, monetary frauds, periodic law
enforcement raids, and endless felony indictments. All of this
information shows -- to anyone who cares to bring up a search engine
-- what it is that Scientology actually stands for.
It is the truth about Scientology that Scientology wants to put a
stop to. The company recognizes the Internet as the vehicle of its
eventual extermination. The overwhelming glut of information about
the company that's available on the Internet serves to inoculate
prospective business clients against purchasing any of Scientology's
bizarre products, and as revenues plummet, the company gets ever
more extreme in its efforts to squash all that public information to
keep prospective clients ignorant about what they're buying.
In the past, quite often when a media outlet published anything
truthful about Scientology, the company sued claiming libel. The
Washington Post, Reader's Digest, Time Magazine, and endless other
outlets were sued by legions of Scientology lawyers simply for the
audacity of exposing the truth.
*
http://www.skeptictank.org/hs/time-cos.htm
Scientology has never won any of their lawsuits yet -- according to
a once-secret in-house policy -- Scientology doesn't sue to win, only
to harass people into silence.
*
http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~dst/Secrets/Fishman/Declaration/exhibg.html
Media outlets that printed the truth about Scientology were -- and are
-- protected simply because what they print is the truth and, in
all cases, even if something were incomplete or inaccurate, there's no
intention of malice. But because Scientology needs to suppress and
halt public discussion about them, they use lawsuits alleging libel,
copyright violations (which they call "copyright terrorism,")
and other groundless claims to cause media outlets and individuals to
defend themselves, costing defendants tens of millions of dollars to
acquire the Judicial opinions that everyone -- defendants as well as
the company -- knew were preordained. Scientology's policy is that
the purpose of a lawsuit isn't to win but to harass and in the past
that policy has cost magazine and newspapers untold millions, and has
driven at least one free speech activist into exile.
*
http://www.operatingthetan.com/
With the advent of the Internet, much of that changed. Individuals
who were targeted, assaulted, harassed, and sued into oblivion by the
notorious company used to have to go down alone -- either quietly
without a squawk else screaming in vain to newspapers who were too
afraid to cover Scientology's abuse. In 1991, however, ex-followers
of the business cult created the alt.religion.scientology newsgroup
and victims started to network among themselves. More: victims talked
of what they saw and did inside of Scientology, talking about what the
"secrets" were that Scientology sells to followers only after
many years of expensive indoctrination is purchased. Many committed
crimes on orders for the corporation and some activists speak out to
expose Scientology to try to make up for their actions while they were
customers.
*
http://www.lermanet.com/
As the popularity of alt.religion.scientology grew and more and more
ex-customers, newspaper and television reporters, law enforcement
officers, and even politicians started reading and participating in
the newsgroup, web sites covering the discussions and disclosures
started springing up all over the Internet. The ringing Scientology
heard in its ears was the death toll of Scientology's secrecy and with
it, Scientology knew, would go its very existence. Few -- if any --
would purchase Scientology's bizarre products knowing in advance what
they were buying and the Internet was telling anyone who bothered to
bring up a search engine what Scientology is really all about.
And that's an important point: Scientology's owners didn't foresee
what was going to happen when the Internet became widely available to
the average citizen. As more and more verifiable facts about
Scientology and its core criminal basis were being reported on more
and more web sites, Scientology realized they had no web sites of
their own to try to spin and counter the truth. There was a growing
body of testable, verifiable evidence getting reported on the network
and none of it looked good for the company. The company's eventual
response was to launch a search engine spamming effort that's called
"cookie cutter spam pages." Scientology created tens of
thousands of content-null web pages that are almost identical, changing
only the names of individuals they claimed are customers.
Each of these tens of thousands of spam pages has claims that one can
send e-mail to individual Scientologists yet anyone who believes the
claims and tries to send e-mail winds up sending e-mail straight to
Scientology's owners.
*
http://dannyvidislavsky.oursites.org/
The cookie-cutter spam pages idea was quick, cheap, and simple... but
it didn't work: Search engines were equally as quick to recognize
what the company was doing and weighed their search results
accordingly. Scientology saw that search engines were still allowing
people to read the truth about their notorious company quickly with no
significant impediment.
Since they couldn't spam flood search engines to make them useless to
people researching Scientology, they started going after individual
web site owners to try to remove the web sites outright. They brought
out their usual claims of libel, copyright "terrorism," and
even more stupidly, claims of trademark violation. Any web site that
had the name "Scientology" in it were threatened and attacked.
(Even Cafe Express sites selling anti-Scientology T-shirts and coffee
cups were threatened and attacked by claims of trademark infringement.
The people at Cafe Express have always caved in to these baseless
threats.)
ISPs were flooded with groundless -- and often vague -- complaints
about web sites (the frequency of these complaints being sent to
endless Internet hosts prompted the phenomena to be titled "Ava
Grams" in honor of one of the company more notorious lawyers
whose job it was to mail them. A parody RFC with a well-known socket
number was proposed to help automate Scientology's endless fraudulent
DMCA complaints.) Many ISPs who knew about Scientology's history
simply saw "Scientology" at the top of the lawyer's
letterhead and capitulated in fear, pulling the web sites seemingly
without any qualms. ISPs that didn't know Scientology's history and
then bothered to check often discovered Scientology's "Fair
Game" and "Purpose of a lawsuit" written policies on
the very web sites they were ordered to remove thereby simultaneously
confirming that everything rights activists say about the company is
true while at the same time confirming the validity of the fraudulent
threat if they didn't capitulate to the company's demands.
*
http://www.fairgamed.org/
Because Scientology's bullying behavior was -- and continues to be --
widely exposed in the media, we end up observing what appears to be a
spiraling positive feedback loop, one that will eventually destroy the
notorious business yet which will likely take out a lot of innocent
people along with it: Scientology's criminal and abusive actions
result in web sites and media exposure. Routine and some times
massive public exposure drives the business's revenues ever downward.
Lost revenues cause the company's owners to issue threats, demands,
and ultimatums to its operators, the gist of which is to some how stop
the blood loss. Scientology's operators assault freedom of speech on
the Internet, in the print media and elsewhere to try to put a stop to
the exposures. Their actions result in even more public exposures,
criminal indictments, and lost revenues.
It's a spiral that Scientology can't break out of because the reason
they engage in the criminal and abusive behavior in the first place
is because they're "following the tech" -- written policies
that were cobbled together by the company's insane founder L. Ron
Hubbard when he was doped to the gills on illegal drugs which muddled
his mind to the point where his thought processes closely resembled
Jell-O pudding.
*
http://www.cosvm.org/pinks.htm
Since L. Ron Hubbard was never wrong, and since L. Ron Hubbard said to
always attack, never defend, Scientology's owners are left having to
wallow in the rut Hubbard carved for them.
*
http://www.xs4all.nl/~felipe/cos/translate.html
This brings us to Scientology's latest series of lies where
Scientology attempts to side-step their defense of their anti-free
speech actions by attacking people who employ free speech. Let's
pick through the company's latest claims one by one, offering
documents which debunk them as we come to them.
Claims:
Scientology likes to claim that it's some how a religion however the
company is considered to be organized crime by numerous nations
and by endless court Judges around the world. In the United States
Lt. Ray Emmons of the Clearwater Police Department summarized
Scientology as organized crime.
*
http://www.skeptictank.org/hs/cwfedmon.htm
Certainly the corporation's history shows it to be an organized
criminal enterprise which adopted the guise of religiosity to avoid
having to pay taxes on its ill-gotten gains. Scientology holds the
distinction of being the organization which engaged in the single
largest incident of domestic espionage against the United States
government in America's history, resulting in the indictments of
numerous ringleaders in what Scientology called "Operation Snow
White." Indeed many of the indicted and "un-indicted
co-conspirators" named in Snow White are still running the
criminal enterprise:
*
http://www.cosvm.org/stipofev.htm
No government agency in the United States "recognizes"
Scientology as a religion. The company likes to claim that the IRS
some how does yet the IRS isn't a government agency, and in any event
the IRS has the company fraudulently recognized as a tax-exempt
charity organization, not as a religion. Besides, the United
States government isn't Constitutionally allowed to dictate what
is a religion and what is not.
*
http://www.xenu.net/archive/IRS/
A preponderance of all available evidence is likely to yield the
undeniable opinion that Scientology is first and foremost organized
crime, certainly not some how a religion. Scientology could be
turned into something resembling a religion and that's already been
done: It's called "the Free Zone."
And, of course, Scientology likes to claim that it's hatred of free
speech is some how motivated by going after copyright infringers. In
fact Scientology's hatred of free speech on the Internet is motivated
by the corporation's recognition that the Internet is killing their
company. Some of the most freakishly bizarre claims the company has
made over the past 10 years have included the notion that free speech
activists are some how "copyright terrorists." Indeed, the
company has started to claim that the Islamic terrorist attacks in New
York were some how caused in part by Internet activists (the claims
are hard to follow; they attempt to link the New York terrorist
attacks to human rights and freedom of speech activists in
alt.religion.scientology using vague, disjointed rhetoric that
presumably makes sense to the profoundly insane.)
Claims:
Note the use of the logical fallacy known as "begging the
question." Here the company is claiming that some
anti-Scientology web sites contain copyrighted materials and that
they some how infringe upon said copyrights. The company doesn't
mention any specifics because they're lying. The entire Operation
Clambake web site was ordered removed by the company claiming that
the web site: contained copyright infringements, contained
trademark violations, incited hate speech, and incited violence
against Scientology's customers.
*
http://www.xenu.net/
Operation Clambake has become the most widely known web site that
addresses Scientology's notorious activities, past and present. It is
the most linked anti-Scientology web site on the Internet and is
almost always the first web site result offered by Google when people
research the word "Scientology." It's no wonder at all why
Scientology has a pressing need to try to remove
Xenu.NET from the network and from
Google's search engine. If you check the web site out, you'll find
that none of Scientology's claims are even remotely true.
Google caved in to the company's threats and removed
Xenu.NET from their search results
seemingly without even bothering to check into the validity of the
claims. (And who can blame them given the overwhelming number of web
pages that they would have to examine every time they receive a
complaint?) It wasn't until free speech activists around the world
wrote to Google that the search engine operators investigated the web
site, compared the contents against Scientology's claims, and then
reinstated Xenu.NET because they
found Scientology's claims were groundless.
Claims:
No, Scientologists who use the Internet are required to use a filter
that's been dubbed the "Scino Sitter" which keeps customers
from seeing anything remotely truthful about the company.
*
http://www.xenu.net/archive/events/censorship/
Additionally endless Internet web sites cover Scientology's relentless
assault against the Internet in all its forms. Companies that
actually support the Internet don't ban their clients from using
it and they certainly don't try to remove newsgroups from the Internet.
In fact, "Scientology Vs. The Internet" tells the whole story.
*
http://www.skeptic.com/03.3.jl-jj-scientology.html
Claims:
Actually no, they don't. The core products that the corporation
sells has to do with ways to scrape off invisible murdered space
aliens that Scientology calls "Body Thetans." These
"BTs," as the company calls them, are responsible for all
of humanity's woes, mental, emotional, and physical. It's only
after clients have subjected themselves to lengthy and expensive
"training routines" that they are eventually informed
that all the previous "training" and "auditing"
that they paid for was "not really" the problem.
It takes something like $160,000 or much higher before customers are
informed that the real reason they have problems is because a
Galactic Ruler named Xenu collected citizens of his over populated
galaxy, froze them, transported them to Teegeeack (which is now
called Earth) chained them to volcanoes, then blew them to bits with
fusion bombs. These invisible murdered aliens attach themselves to
people and cause most of -- if not all of -- their problems.
None of the core products sold to clients are covered by any of
the web sites that the Scientology company puts on the Internet. The
reason is obvious: Few -- if any -- would buy the company's products
if they knew what they were really buying before hand. Indeed, the
company used to deny outright that flying saucers, Xenu, BTs, fusion
bombs, and all the other drug-induced delusions L. Ron Hubbard came
up with were part of Scientology. It took numerous media exposures
before the corporation grudgingly started admitting to what the rest
of the world was reading and viewing in the popular press about what
Scientology really sells.
Not only does the corporation not "use the Internet in its
dissemination of the Scientology 'religion'" to cover the
core aspects of what they sell, try telephoning up one of
their business offices out in the meat world and asking them about
Xenu, Body Thetans, "clusters," "thetan hands,"
"wall of fire," "incidents 1 and 2..." Ask
and you'll be told either that the person doesn't know anything
about what you're talking about else you'll be told that these
things are "not discussed until parishioners are ready for
it." Hubbard claimed that people who found out about Xenu
(which is described in the document called "Operating Thetan
3" or "OT3") would get pneumonia. Curiously, after
media exposures of these core products the company sells were
exposed by the media, massive epidemics of pneumonia remained
mysteriously unreported.
Just a few years ago if you had called you would have been told that
Xenu was a hoax -- or a "forgery" -- being passed around on
the Internet to make Scientology look like a ridiculous flying saucer
cult. Curiously, now that the truth about Xenu and all is widely
available all over the world thanks to the Internet, Scientology
still persists in not "using the Internet in its
dissemination of the Scientology religion." They still haven't
given up trying to stifle free speech, seemingly clinging to the
notion that some how Xenu, court transcripts, once-secret in-house
documents, and all the rest will some how simply disappear from the
public domain if they just sue and threaten to sue everyone on the
Internet who covers what Scientology is really all about.
Claims:
Actually almost all are "cookie cutter spam pages." Of the
few that are not, just try finding testable, verifiable facts rather
than unevidenced claims. In many cases the notorious corporation
doesn't even admit that they own and run web sites; the company is
so notorious that they have to employ what they call "Suitable
Guises" to hide their true identity behind.
*
http://www.cosvm.org/guise.htm
Claims:
There you have it: The dissemination of factual,
truthful, and verifiable information about
Scientology and its criminal basis is some how "cyber
terrorism." Lately the company has been trying to jump
on to the terrorism bandwagon, claiming that peaceful pickets
and protests against Scientology's homicides and abuses is
some how "terrorism." Some how
http://www.xenu.net/
is "cyber terrorism" to the Scientology company. Bring
up Xenu.net and check it out:
do you see anything that can even remotely be considered
"terrorism" on the web site? Then ask yourself what the
probable sanity is of the individual within the Scientology company
that came up with the bizarre notion.
To be fair, Scientology isn't the only unscrupulous business out there
in the real world trying to make money off of the terrorist attacks
in New York, and trying to advance their money-driven agenda off of
the threat of terrorism. Scientology is just one of -- if not the
most -- disgusting businesses to so do. Scientology tried to
deliberately disrupt relief efforts in the aftermath of the terrorist
attacks in New York, facts of which were uncovered in intercepted
mailing list e-mails that are widely available on the Internet.
*
http://www.cosvm.org/disrupt.htm
Much of the embarrassing information available on the Internet has
been seized in Federal raids or -- like the deliberate disruption
attempts in New York -- were intercepted by human rights activists.
Most of the times the corporation claims it's copyrighted to try to
remove it from the public domain yet when they do so, they're
confirming for the media the validity of the damaging materials. So
Scientology is left with no choice but to claim the information is
forgeries or a hoax.
One such document recently was claimed to be a forgery in front
of a judge. It's a "training routine" which trains
Scientologists to lie.
*
http://www.holysmoke.org/cos/latey.htm
And there's also "Operating Thetan level 8" or
"OT8" which the company also claims is a forgery even
after they raided and sued an ex-customer claiming copyright
violations for having it. OT8 is extremely embarrassing because
it's anti-Christian. It's possibly a forgery or some kind of
hoax but that doesn't explain why the company at one time claimed
it belonged to them. Regardless, OT8 looks just as crazy, using
the same insane rhetoric L. Ron Hubbard was well known for, that
there's a good change that it is close to the version of OT8
Scientology eventually sells to its customers.
Claims:
Looks like Scientology, the Mormons, McDonnald's, Amway, State Farm,
and other businesses that have their criminal scams and frauds
exposed on the Internet are the only ones trying to "over
regulate" freedom of speech on the Internet. Record companies
and music makers are widely evidenced to be violated by people
trading music all over the Internet freely. Scientology, Mormons,
McDonnald's, Amway et al. are the ones going after speech on
the Internet; and it's always been speech that exposes the
crimes and abuses of these businesses.
Claims:
Scientology is one to talk about the rights of others, huh? Not
only did Scientology try to remove newsgroups from the Internet that
were -- and are -- read by tens of thousands of people around the
world, but the organization maintains a series of prisons for their
clients that they call their "Rehabilitation Project Force" or
"RPF" for short. Here we have a business that gets routinely
picketed and protested around the world for homicides and massive
abuses of Scientologists and non-Scientologists alike telling us
that they're some how victims of web sites that cover the truth
about Scientology.
*
http://www.skeptictank.org/hs/brainwas.htm
The whole point of civil rights activism, human rights activism, and
Constitutional rights activism is to put a stop to abuses being
conducted by governments, agencies, organizations, and businesses
like Scientology. Scientology's claims that activists are against
their own ideals is rather like vegetarians who eat meat -- it's a
contradiction in terms.
Claims:
Hardly. The organization doesn't subscribe to what they call
"wog law" which, according to U. S. Title 17, includes
"Fair Use" doctrine which provides for the partial
replication and dissemination of otherwise copyrighted materials.
More: The notorious company doesn't recognize the fact that all
prongs of the Fair Use doctrine allow for the non-commercial
disclosure of otherwise copyrighted materials. And for all that,
Scientology doesn't recognize the fact that court documents are in
the Public Domain.
*
http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.html
The organization threatens to sue any web site owner that uses the
name "Scientology" in it, claiming trademark violations.
The fact that anyone may use a trademark provided it is
non-commercial and is not done to deliberately confuse customers
is something that the Scientology company doesn't want to comply
with. On the Internet Scientology has lost domain name disputes.
*
http://www.freezone.org/news/media/wipo.htm
In their infamous attempt to remove the alt.religion.scientology
newsgroup from the Internet, the company claimed that they some how
had the right to cancel everyone's free speech rights because the name
of the newsgroup contained the trademarked name "Scientology."
Does that sound like they're "protecting Church intellectual
property rights?" The newsgroup has ex-victims of the business
participating in it, covering what they went through while customers
of the company. The newsgroup also had free speech and human rights
activists finding out what Scientology is all about. More: The
newsgroup has newspaper reporters, television reporters, law
enforcement officers, and the odd politician reading the newsgroup.
The need to suppress the free expression of what Scientology is really
all about culminated in the business "spam flooding" the
newsgroup with forgeries purporting to be from actual participants but
containing neo-Nazi text and then later random words. This attack was
dubbed "sporgery" and resulted in at least a million
sporgeries being injected into the newsgroup to try to make the
newsgroup unreadable.
The effort failed for two reasons: automatic sporgery detecting
software was employed to automatically remove it even as it was being
injected, and a public and open news server was donated by one of
the good guys to provide a database free from sporgery. The FBI also
interviewed an activist who turned over a pile of documentation three
inches thick which gave names, dates, and times of Scientologists who
were caught using calling party ID (CPID) and ANI logging at Internet
Service Providers sites.
Years later, a follower of Scientology escaped from the company --
quite literally jumping on a jet airplane while being followed by
corporate leaders -- after 30 years of being with the company. She
reported what she knew of the sporgery attacks and her web site
contains her reports.
*
http://www.skeptictank.org/hs/sporgart.htm
Claims:
Threatening speech or expressions calculated to incite hate
enjoy no protection under the Constitution. Robust critical
speech should always be sheltered by the First Amendment, as
long is it does not trample the boundaries created by law
and jurisprudence in an effort to protect the people from
improper verbal abuse and its adverse consequences.
We always note that the organization doesn't provide any testable
references to back up claims like these. Where is this mysterious
hate speech on the Internet? Where is anything on the Internet that
advocates violence against the notorious business? If the corporation
knows of any such hate speech that advocates violence against
Scientology's customers, why doesn't the company inform their local
police about it? Isn't it their civic duty to report such things to
the authorities?
And in fact one can't find any web site or newsgroup where there's
any hate speech covering Scientology -- and certainly none that calls
for or advocates violence against Scientology customers. It's just
not done and it's not done for a reason: most web sites that cover the
company's abuses are created by human rights activists, freedom of
speech rights activists, and ex-customers of the company. Their
motivates are to help keep others from being victimized, killed,
swindled, or otherwise abused by the company. Claiming that activists
advocate hatred against victims of Scientology is a logical
contradiction; activists are out there trying to help
Scientologists learn what it is they're actually buying, and
trying to keep other prospective customers from falling into
the same trap.
In fact in the entire history of Scientology's assaults against the
Internet there has only been one web site that contained an appeal
to violence against a Scientology business and that web site was
almost certainly posted by the Scientology organization itself to try
to use it to back up their unevidenced claim that there's hate speech
against their business on the Internet. The web site was dubbed the
"Dexter's Laboratory" web site and when activists found out
about it they flooded the "free web pages" Internet Service
Provider with numerous complaints and the web site was taken down
within days of its discovery.
[Note: No references to "Dexter's Lab" can be located on
the net, nor in any archive. Copies that were pulled by activists
for evaluation to see if the identity of the individual who posted
it have all apparently been erased by activists since none have
kept a copy.]
After that incident human rights and free speech rights activists
started to keep a vigilant eye open for any further attempts by the
Scientology organization to sneak such things back onto the Internet
-- whether Scientology posted Dexter's Laboratory or not, activists
make sure that any new attempt will be dealt with likewise.
Obviously the organization would like to pretend that the extensive
coverage of their criminal indictments, Xenu, bannings around the
world, and all the rest are some how "hate speech."
Scientology has a set of mock "laws" that they call
"high crimes" and among them are the "high crimes"
of mocking, ridiculing, or discussing the company in
"unfavorable light." The real world doesn't subscribe
to the company's mock "laws" and yet the company sure
does try very hard to make the real world comply with them.
In any event, Scientology, if you'll let us know where there's hate
speech advocating violence against your company anywhere on the
Internet, we'll take care of it for you, okay? Thanks in advance
for your cooperation.
And obviously the claim that "Church actions are confined
to two circumstances" is an easily demonstrated lie.
Scientology's actions against free speech activists out in
the meat world are notorious.
When long-time human rights activist Mr. Keith Henson was picketing
and protesting two homicides committed at the hands of Scientology,
the organization stalked, photographed, and harassed he and his family
for the audacity of pushing for criminal indictments in the two
homicides and for the audacity of pushing for criminal investigations.
When the activist exposed fragments of Scientology's quack medical
frauds on the Internet, the business sued him claiming that the
evidence Mr. Henson had included in an affidavit to a Judge was some
how a copyright infringement -- ignoring utterly Fair Use which
allows for the non-commercial dissemination, and ignoring the fact
that court documents are public record unless they've been sealed
by the courts.
*
http://www.keithhenson.org/
Scientology isn't a company with one of the higher body counts out
there in the real world (Union Carbide probably holds that record) yet
it's certainly the company with the most bizarre ways of killing its
customers. Scientology likes to claim that free speech and human
rights activists some how endanger its clients yet an examination of
Scientologist gruesom homicides find that it's always been at the
hands of fellow Scientologists.
*
http://www.whyaretheydead.net/
Claims:
Of course not. Scientology's history has been one of totalitarian
control over its customers, assaults upon governments, law enforcement
agencies, regulatory agencies, newspaper reporters, and anyone else
who exercises their rights. Scientology's history was covered in
the book "Bare-Faced Messiah" which details the notorious
business's nearly fascist control of its followers at the hands of
an insane megalomaniac -- L. Ron Hubbard.
After the publication of that book, the organization sued trying to
stop its dissemination. Ms. Paulette Cooper's book "The Scandal of
Scientology" resulted in the organization framing her for making
bomb threats to try to punish her for exercising her rights of free
speech. The evidence that Ms. Cooper had been framed was retrieved
by Federal agents when they systematically raided Scientology
business offices in the United States, uncovering documents that
described what Scientology called "Operation Freakout PC."
*
http://www.holysmoke.org/pc/pc.htm
Scientology's claim to "championed all forms of freedom"
is further evidenced to be a lie when one looks at the business's
use of the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA.) Scientology was one
of the biggest advocate of passing the FOIA so that they could
find out what the FBI and other law enforcement and intelligence
agencies knew of the company's criminal activities. (Federal
agents knew quite a bit and also labeled L. Ron Hubbard insane:
"Appears mental" being scribed on one of the FBI's
internal documents.)
*
http://www.nots.org/fbiindex.htm
Scientology also wanted the passage of the FOIA so that they could
try to confirm the blatant lies of their mad messiah L. Ron Hubbard
who claimed he was some kind of Navy war hero despite all the
available evidence to the contrary.
*
http://www.ronthewarhero.org/
With the passage of the FOIA, Scientology found out that the FBI did
in fact have all the goods on L. Ron Hubbard and the criminal
enterprise he created. Worse: Scientology retrieved Hubbard's Navy
records which utterly and profoundly contradicted everything the
insane messiah had ever told his followers about his Navy career.
In order to "champion all forms of freedom" Scientology
launched an internal operation they called "Operation Snow
White" which sought to infiltrate and break into government
buildings so that damaging and embarrassing evidence could be
stolen or altered, and so that Scientology could insert positive
documents into agency files to try to make Hubbard and his company
look like it was a legitimate business rather than organized crime
run by a mental case.
*
http://www.cosvm.org/stipofev.htm
Claim:
Scientology likes to make a lot of claims about things that people
have no way to verify. Scientology was soundly exposed in Time
Magazine's "Scientology: The Thriving Cult of Greed" --
which got Time sued by the company because everything Time exposed
was truthful. Scientology lost their lawsuit however they came out
with a "rebuttal" to the massive media exposure and
within that "rebuttal" Scientology claimed to have helped
to educate over a million African children.
A human rights activist read that claim and decided it was one of
the few claims Scientology makes that could be verified. He wrote
to an African official and received confirmation that the company had
lied again. The African official stated that Scientology's claim was
"... just another fabrication."
*
http://www.cosvm.org/africa.htm
Claims:
While it's true that the Scientology company helped pass the FOIA,
what the company "forgot" to mention is that after the FOIA
passed and they retrieved L. Ron Hubbard's actual Navy war record,
they immediately labeled the documents forgeries. Since they proved
beyond any doubt that their mad messiah L. Ron Hubbard was a
pathological liar who couldn't keep his lies straight, the company
labeled the documents they received "forgeries" and then
cobbled together the claim that the Navy must have given them some
kind of "cover story" since Hubbard was some kind of a
secret agent.
As for Scientology's claims to have "uncovered" secret
medical experiments being conducted against Americans by its
government, no, that's another lie. People who knew about these
actions -- which included the deliberate exposure of American
soldiers to differing dosages of radioactive elements -- wrote
books and told their stories to anyone who would listen.
Scientology wasn't unique in the fact that it acquired documents
confirming what was already being alleged out in the real world.
It's also important to point out that Scientology's "Operation
Snow White" program -- which was never ended and by all apparent
indications is still going on strong today -- was successfully
stealing government documents. Blackmail and extortion were among
the most likely uses of such embarrassing documents however it
seems almost certain that Scientology had -- and continues to have
-- documents covering the government's abuses of its citizens that
the company can't make public otherwise they would get raided and
indicted again. The passage of the FOIA allows Scientology to
legally acquire copies of documents they previously stole from the
agencies and buildings they broke into.
Claim:
<laughing> Scientology likes to give itself awards. What's not so
funny is the claims that Scientology some how protects the rights of
minorities. Scientology's mad messiah L. Ron Hubbard held some
ideals about Asians and Negroes that are widely reflected in the
actions of its current owners and operators. Hubbard complained
that China had too many "Chinks" in it and that they
"Smelled of all the baths they didn't take."
*
http://www.xs4all.nl/~kspaink/cos/LRH-bio/chinamen.htm
Scientology so "protects the rights of minorities" that
they altered L. Ron Hubbard's writings to remove Hubbard's racist
remarks. If you look at original versions of Hubbard's writings
you'll find out that Negroes "talk to hats" and that they
don't register on simple wheatstone bridges (that is, the Ohm meter
the company sells as an "e-meter") because they're too
unintelligent.
*
http://www.cosvm.org/emeter.htm
Claim:
Which of course only applies to customers in good standing. Which is
why the company imposes Internet censoring software to keep its
customers from reading anything remotely truthful about Scientology.
If the business really wanted its customers to think freely and for
themselves, they would welcome open and public discussions on all
subjects, not just Scientology. If Scientology was really interested
in free speech, why do they have the notorious history that they do
on and off of the Internet? Why do they have a lengthy and well-
deserved reputation for suing any newspaper or magazine which
publishes anything critical -- and factual -- about them?
Face it: If Scientology adhered to this latest claim, they would be
on the Internet addressing each criticism point-for-point, knocking
back false allegations one by one, doing so easily because Trvth is
on their side. That they don't is obvious. That they can't
is equally obvious.
As bad as Scientology's actions against free speech and freedom of
thought are outside of their company, it's worse for clients who are
still customers of the company. Scientology considers doubt about
the validity of what they sell to be a crime. Expressing doubt about
the effectiveness of Scientology's bizarre products is a "high
crime" in the company. Punishments are meted out for thinking
contrary to the dictates of "ethics officers" and L. Ron
Hubbard as described in the massively altered documents Hubbard
wrote that Scientology calls "technology" and
"bulletins."
Inside Scientology, if someone expresses an opinion that's contrary
to L. Ron Hubbard's writings, her friends are required to write up
what Scientology calls a "Knowledge Report" or
"KR" for short. These "Knowledge Reports" get
filed in a number of places, one of which goes into the paper files
of the person being accused, another in the files of the person
informing on her friend, and others which may end up in "case
supervisor's" files or "ethics officer's" files.
Punishment for "wrong thinking" can range from minor
to massive -- yet usually punishment always includes having to pay
the company yet more money to "clear" the "MU"
-- or "Misunderstood." Some of the minor punishments may
simply include having to pay for more endless "training"
courses which the individual may have already paid for and have
taken numerous times before. Some punishments for "wrong
thinking" take the form of being assigned to the RPF (which
has already been discussed.)
For lucky individuals who resist attempts by the company to
"correct" their "wrong thinking," expulsion
from the company is their "punishment." If someone
gets thrown out of Scientology for the audacity of thinking for
themself, if they leave family members behind their loved ones
may be ordered to "disconnect" from the ex-customer
which means they must never speak with or exchange mail with
their loved ones ever again. Scientology breaks up families.
*
http://www.cosvm.org/discon.htm
Scientology doesn't want people inside to think for
themselves because Scientology can't afford to have
people -- customers or prospective customers -- think for
themselves. Scientology's written policy is to "duplicate"
L. Ron Hubbard and follow his "technology" exactly. To not
do so is something the company calls "squirreling" and
"squirreling" Hubbard's "tech" is another High
Crime that's punishable in a number of different ways.
If Scientology really advocated that people have the right to think
for themselves, why do they refuse to inform prospective customers
about Xenu, Body Thetans, flying saucers, and all the other core
products that customers only find out about after they pay in tens
of thousands of dollars when it's too late to keep from being
swindled? If Scientology wasn't a bait-and-switch bunco scam that
doesn't inform prospective customers of what they're going to have
to purchase in the years to come, wouldn't they inform them
about "clusters," "magnetic ribbons," fusion
bombs, and all that insane nonsense?
Claim:
One wouldn't know it by looking at their history. There might be a
little bit of truth in the suggestion that religions -- real
religions, not just criminal enterprises that adopt religious
dressing to avoid paying taxes -- have some kind of right to keep
its followers from speaking freely. Were Scientology actually a
religion, while it would be abhorrent to non-cultists, it might be
a valid suggestion that religious leaders have some kind of right
to keep followers in line. The Catholic church does it, and so
does the Mormon church, after all. Scientology must not be excused
for not allowing its customers to think and speak freely. Worse:
the company demands that others must not, claiming that doing so
is some how "hate speech that advocates violence against
Scientologists."
Claim:
If Scientology knows of any crimes being committed, shouldn't they
report that to their local police? Isn't it their civic duty to
report their discoveries of crimes to the authorities?
Instead the organization tried to remove newsgroups that discuss the
criminal activities and internal workings of the notorious company.
Instead they file endless bogus DMCA complaints against web site
owners alleging copyright violations, trademark infringements, hate
speech that advocates violence against Scientologists -- things that
only Scientology's owners and operators can see. Things like
invisible "Body Thetan" infestations, in fact.
Claims:
"Protected works" are subject to Fair Use doctrine which
specifically allows for the partial or the complete replication of
otherwise copyrighted materials provided it's for non-commercial
purposes and is used in commentary or otherwise to expose or make a
point.
One may not point at court documents which contain damaging evidence
and then demand that the public documents must not be part of the
public record because they're some how copyrighted. If we were to
allow any criminal organization the right to claim that evidence is
some how copyrighted and as such can't be entered into the public
record, we'll have financial records being copyrighted by every
criminal organization out there. Scientology wouldn't be the only
criminal enterprise to advocate such an absurd notion.
Claims:
And of course nobody's doing that, on or off of the Internet. What
is allowed is that people may extract either whole or in part
the otherwise copyrighted works of others and disseminate them freely
according to Fair Use doctrine. Here the company is trying to claim
that somewhere on the Internet someone is selling or giving away
the company's expensive products.
The truth of the matter is that the company has sued people for
reproducing just six lines of text; text that exposed the company's
Xenu bait-and-switch scam; text that was posted by free speech
activists who have been thorns in the side of the company for many
years; text posted by activists who have picketed and protested
against Scientology's homicides and other human rights abuses.
The company also tries to label human rights and free speech rights
activists as holding some other extreme ideologies -- people working
toward "a shared-and-equal-wealth Utopia." What motivates
activists is putting an end to Scientology's abuses; abuses against
not only innocent people out in the real world, but also abuses that
the company heaps upon its own hapless followers. How so easily the
company could simply dismiss free speech and human rights activists
were they actually motivated by some lower ideal.
Claim:
Actually, the DMCA is universally recognized as very bad law. The
first massive media exposure of this bad law was -- you guessed it
-- when Scientology was the first recorded company to abuse it.
The DMCA was first used when Scientology filed a bogus DMCA
complaint about one of their most hated enemies -- an anonymous
individual that went by the name "Mr. Safe." Mr. Safe
was a fellow Scientologist who was on the Internet publicly
exposing and discussing the company's altering of what is supposed
to be L. Ron Hubbard's inviolate "technology." Mr. Safe
had been exposing Scientology's "squirreling" for a
number of years yet they had been unable to learn his identity
so that they could silence him.
With the passage of the now-infamous DMCA, Scientology was able to
force AT&T to divulge the identity of the Scientologist. It is
somewhat ironic that the Scientology company filed its bogus DMCA
complaint when Mr. Safe posted a copy of Scientology's "Enemies
List" which consists of hundreds of individual's names, churches,
and organizations that the Scientology company calls its enemies.
The act served to confirm that the criminal enterprise maintains
an "enemy list" -- something they had previously denied
ever since they started trying to pretend they're some how a
religion.
*
http://www.skeptictank.org/hs/bsafefid.htm
AT&T handed over the identity of their customer without
blinking, not caring one bit that they were putting the life
of their customer at risk. The day after AT&T handed the
Scientologist over to the company, Mr. Safe disappeared and
hasn't been seen in public since.
There was no counter notification, no copyright violation (the
"enemies list" contained no copyright notice and had been
disavowed previously) and no adherence to the dictates of the DMCA.
The DMCA was used solely to acquire the identity of the
Scientologist so that Scientology could silence him -- which
they did.
Claims:
Translation: Brought by Scientology. Scientology employs what they
call "suitable guises" and they adopt and discard names
and fake fronts as needed due to the notorious reputation of the
company. When Scientology informs people up front about who they
are, they meet with stiff opposition because most people, it seems,
know something about Scientology whether it's a vague "didn't
they kill that girl in Florida?" or a strong "yes, we
know all about Scientology." To combat their own notorious
reputation, Scientology creates "suitable guises" and
endless fake fronts to try to hide their identity behind.
*
http://www.cosvm.org/guise.htm
Claim:
What Scientology "forgot" to mention is the racketeering
activities that took place during this kangaroo court
"justice" where money is what decided the case. In one
of Scientology's more freakish operations conducted against people
who the company perceives to be its enemies, a Scientology
operative spread blood all over one of the defendant's hotel room.
The "miss bloody butt" incident has never made it into
the popular press but that's understandable: what Scientology does
some times is so bizarre that credulity is stretched beyond the
breaking point.
*
http://www.skeptictank.org/hs/mbb.htm
Scientology sued innocent people to try to stifle other's free speech
when said others made public court documents; public documents that
could be acquired by anyone visiting a documents division of the
Department of Justice in Los Angeles, California. Now the company
wants to claim responsibility for getting the notoriously bad DMCA law
enacted. Well, okay, if they want to take credit for another abuse of
people's free speech, okay.
Claim:
It also allows criminal enterprises who hate free speech to file bogus
complaints against their perceived enemies to learn their identities
so that they can be silenced. It also turns American law on its ear,
making people presumed guilty before a Judge ever hears about it.
It allows any notorious company -- not just Scientology -- to point
at anything on the Internet, claim it's some how copyrighted, and
get that information immediately pulled from the Internet without
the company being held liable for the filing of their bogus
complaints. It relieves ISPs of liability at the cost of turning ISPs
into Internet cops. More: The DMCA is un-enforceable since the
Internet is a world-wide community, much of which recognizes the DMCA
as the extremely bad law that it is.
The DMCA could conceivably be salvaged were lawmakers to add some
provisions for criminal and financial sanctions against companies who
file fraudulent and groundless complaints. Since Scientology doesn't
allow Fair Use doctrine, their endless bogus DMCA complaints would
result in the company being repeatedly punished until, quite
probably, a Judge issued an injunction against them or a Judge
recalled the bad law.
Claims:
No they didn't. The facts of the matter can be checked out on the
Chilling Effects web site simply by looking at the bogus DMCA
complaints that Scientology sent to Google. The company had issued
their usual claims of copyright violations, trademark infringements,
and hate speech fomenting violence and they listed web pages that
did no such thing -- including the main web page.
*
http://www.chillingeffects.org/
Claims:
Except that Google -- like many ISPs -- apparently didn't bother
checking into the allegations before doing so. It's suspected that
all Google saw was that the well known -- and extremely notorious --
Scientology company had sent them one of their equally notorious
threatening letters causing them to capitulate immediately to their
demands apparently without even a cursory examination to see if
Scientology's latest claims were true.
Claims:
No, what actually happened was that free speech activists from around
the world found out about the attempts to stop Operation Clambake's
freedom of speech so they flooded Google with timely, accurate,
and verifiable documentation covering Scientology's well known
history of lies and abuses both on the Internet as well as off. In
addition a special envoy of free speech advocates scheduled a meeting
with the Google people to discuss Scientology and its war against
the Internet.
Google took a close look at Scientology's bogus DMCA complaints
and without doubt they took a look at every web page on Operation
Clambake that Scientology claimed was some how in violation of
copyrights. Google saw that Scientology's claims of trademark
violations weren't even covered by the bad DMCA laws. Google also
found that there were web pages that the company claimed held
copyrighted materials -- such as the main web page -- that damn well
obviously didn't. On a few of the web pages there were -- and are --
text that covers L. Ron Hubbard's drug-induced writings covering his
flying saucer hallucinations -- something Hubbard called "very
space opera." These constituted Fair Use doctrine and have
been reproduced and discussed in countless magazine articles,
newspaper exposures, and even on television documentaries covering
the company.
After Google did their homework, they reinstated their links to the
web site and to the cached web pages, and they forwarded to the
Chilling Effects organization copies of the bogus DMCA complaints
-- presumably to show the world only only just how faulty the DMCA
is, but also to add further to the growing body of evidence that
shows what Scientology is really all about.
Claims:
Yeah. It's a wonder that the company didn't immediately sue Google
for copyright violations, claiming that their DMCA complaints were
some how copyrighted and that by sending them to Chilling Effects,
Google was violating their copyrights. It probably irritates the
living shit out of the company to see some of their bogus DMCA
complaints getting wide public dissemination.
Now the organization is aware of the fact that there's a central
depository for their endless complaints that are readily viewable by
the rest of the world. Will that curb their abuse of the bad DMCA
laws? <laughing> If you think it will, the Scientology
organization also has a Bridge to Total Freedom they would love
to sell to you.
Since the organization doesn't mind having their bogus DMCA complaints
being made public in yet another massive media exposure, do them a
favor and go check them out for yourself. They claim they don't mind,
after all.
Claims:
The logic fallacy known as "begging the question." Where,
exactly are any of their "intellectual properties" on
Operation Clambake's web site? There's a great deal of court
documents covering Scientology's felony indictments, affidavits
from eyewitnesses about Scientology's crimes and abuses, accounts
of Scientology child abuse, assaults against free speech, and a
bewildering variety of other information covering Scientology on
the Operation Clambake web site, but where are these mysteriously
invisible "intellectual properties?" Why did they feel
the need to lie, claim trademark violations, and talk about
"hate speech" that "advocates violence against
Scientologists" in their endless complaints if in fact there's
valid "intellectual properties" they're trying to
"protect?"
Interestingly enough, there are copies of Scientology's
once-secret in-house documents that are widely available on the
Internet which might conceivably still be considered
"intellectual properties" of this bizarre company.
Even ignoring the Fishman Affidavit which was made widely public
and which was apparently later sealed, one can find probably all
of the once-secret documents on the Internet thanks not only to
the Internet, but also thanks to courts and Judges all over the
world who have made documents seized by law enforcement agencies
part of the public record.
*
http://sf.irk.ru/www/ot3/otiii-gif.html
Conceivably these once-secret texts might be considered to be
"intellectual property" yet the cat's out of the bag.
Not only is this information widely available all over the world
thanks to a number of factors already mentioned, but much of it
covers quack medical fraud, written policies that call for
criminal actions against individuals, Judges, police officers,
government agents, and entire governments.
*
http://www.xenu.net/archive/go/
It's important to point ot that Scientology's "Guardian
Office" was later renamed to the "Office of Special
Affairs" and that many of the criminals who were indicted
and un-indicted are still running things. The GO/OSA is also
known as "Department 20" which continues its criminal
activities virtually unabated by all external indications.
Anyway, the Scientology company is trying to claim that it's some how
the same as a record industry that works to keep people from making
copies of their music. Isn't Scientology supposed to be a religion?
They like to claim it is and yet they try to claim they're a company
that's the equal to the music industry.
As an aside, the music industry often has a "try before you
buy" policy and, of course, the music that they sell is
offered on the radio and on MTV for free. Music companies also
have free giveaways of their company's products for advertising
and other reasons. Music companies don't sell music with covers
claiming they're from Metalica but -- when the customer gets it
home and opens them -- turns out to actually contain Barry Manilow.
Contrast that against what the Scientology company does. Not only
does Scientology not inform prospective customers what they're buying
-- Body Thetans and all that other bait-and-switch claptrap -- but
everything they sell is sold for money. There's no giveaways in the
Scientology company.
The music industry also doesn't break into government buildings and
steal or alter documents -- at least not to degree that Scientology
did -- and still appears to do.
*
http://www.cosvm.org/stipofev.htm
Scientology is utterly unlike any other company one could care to
point at. Scientology is certainly unlike any real religion one could
care to point at. Scientology does, however, closely resemble
organized crime and it is the coverage of Scientology's history and
its current activities is by all external indications what the company
seems to want removed from the Internet. Amusingly Scientology's
activities committed in pursuit of this agenda serve merely to
confirm and verify the public record that the company tries to
suppress.
Claims:
Presumably it's a conspiracy. But in fact it's because other
companies actually file valid complaints that are also specific rather
than vague; complaints that actually cover copyright violations, don't
hold bizarre rants about trademarks, hate speech, and violence. Valid
DMCA complaints may eventually be submitted and carried on the
Chilling Effects web site yet that seems unlikely since valid
DMCA complaints are of little to no interest to free speech advocates
and human rights activists.
There's not a little irony in the fact that Scientology points out
that its own actions almost stand alone as being abusive. While
Scientology would like to pretend it's some how being picked upon,
visit the Chilling Effects web site and take a look at the other
companies that file abusive complaints using the notorious DMCA laws
and see if Scientology is in good company.
Claims:
And yet Scientology can't point to a single web site which advocates
violence -- or which contains "hate speech" -- against
their company anywhere on the Internet. Nor can the company point
to any of the message postings in the alt.religion.scientology
newsgroup which supports their claims. Particularly the notorious
company can't point to a single web page on any of the web sites
that they lied to about to either Google or to Wayback which
contained a single comment advocating violence.
What all of the web sites that Scientology files bogus complaints
about contains is factual, testable, verifiable
documentation covering Scientology's criminal history and covering
its abuses of the courts today. Particular focus on many web sites
is the horrid anti-Human Rights conditions that Scientology customers
are subjected to by this company's owners and operators.
Free speech includes consumer advocacy, expression of ideologies
advocating free thought, civil rights, human rights, Constitutional
rights, and public exposures of organizations that hold such things
in utter contempt. Honest citizens of the world consider such ideals
to be positive ideologies which serve to protect the health and
safety of honest citizens. Scientology considers such ideals to be
hate speech which advocates violence. The fact that human rights
activists do what they do for Scientology's victims is completely
relevant to what motivates Scientology's claims.
Claims:
And yet nobody has ever advocated such actions on the Internet, not
on any of the web sites that Scientology attacks, not on any of the
newsgroups where Scientology is exposed.
Claims:
And in fact nobody in the media can ever find any claimed hate speech
or advocacy of violence. If Scientology's owners would point out
where these alleged hate speech web sites are, or where the alleged
violence-advocating web sites are, I'm sure the media would love to
carry such news.
But in actual fact the media understands Scientology. Reporters
are told in school that when they interview someone, or when they
work to get a story, the people they interact with are going to see
them -- the reporter -- as a resource for disseminating their own
-- the people they interview -- agendas. The media looks at the
Scientology company's history and its claims, notes that the owners
and operators exhibit a pathological inability to tell the truth
even when honesty would serve, and either discount the claims else
pass some of them along without comment.
In many media newspaper reports one can find unadulterated Scientology
claims that gets passed through without comment because the reporter
feels they should allow the company to express their twisted version
of the story -- knowing that their readers will compare Scientology's
claims against the rest of the story and see which version is backed
up by evidence.
When someone makes claims about hate speech and violence, however,
reporters want specifics, not vague, unevidenced claims. Reporters
who want to be responsible don't reprint irresponsible claims. That
is why the media focuses on Scientology's hatred of free speech and
doesn't decide to pass along Scientology's more bizarre conspiracy
theories involving hate speech, violence, mind control, Marcabian
invasions, and some of the other nutty claims they make.
Claims:
What Scientology doesn't tell you is that all acts of violence ever
conducted against Scientologists have always been at the hands of
fellow Scientologists. On the rare occasions where human rights
or freedom of speech rights activists have been physically assaulted
by Scientologists and defended themselves, the courts have looked at
the videotapes and have always ruled in favor of the activist.
The company doesn't seem to care that people catch their assaults
on free speech and human rights activists, in fact.
In the "vicious" Word document referenced below,
Scientology sent out one of their business operators to assault
Mr. Robert Minton, not caring that there were two video cameras
recording the assault. In fact in Clearwater, Florida it's
difficult to get the police to do anything about Scientology's
violence against activists. You can see this in the Scientologist
hammer assault against video journalist Mark Bunker referenced
below.
*
http://www.skeptictank.org/hs/vicious.doc
Horribly, when human rights activists were holding a memorial service
for Lisa McPherson (a Scientologist that was murdered by Scientology
because she was talking to her friends and family about escaping)
Scientology blew out the memorial candles in a re-enactment of what
they did to Lisa's life. What makes it relevant to the history of
assaults against activists is that these incidents of behavior from
Scientology's customers and owners reflect the mind set that clients
slowly adopt the longer they subject themselves to Scientology's
debilitative "training routines."
It's no mystery why Scientology has a long history of assaults
against human rights activists. It's an artifact of the mind-warping
"processing" that L. Ron Hubbard came up with while heavily
doped to the gills. Doctor Carl Sagan -- planetologist and
popularizer of modern science -- once said that L. Ron Hubbard
had managed to come up with written procedures for driving people
insane.
Take a look at some of the incidents the company claims some how
justifies their assault on the Internet. Every one of their claims
are either so vague as to be un-verifiable, else it's about fellow
Scientologists attacking Scientologists. This last is rather telling
since if you look at Scientology homicides, they're always committed
at the hands of fellow Scientologists. (That summation includes the
numerous "suicides" and freakish homicides that have taken
place inside of Scientology's Fort Harrison Hotel in Clearwater,
Florida. Indeed, the number of homicides Scientology has committed
in that building has resulted in activists calling it the "Fort
Homicide Hotel." Scientology "training routines" are
so debilitative to the mental health of its clients that suicides
and killings should be expected to result.)
*
http://www.lisamcpherson.org/
Claims:
Here's a vague claim that activists have been trying to pin down for
a number of years now. No police report seems to have been filed on
this... at least nobody can find any specifics about this claim to
substanciate it. If this actually happened, why won't Scientology
tell us specifics? The answer should be obvious: it most likely
never happened or, if it did, it was done by a Scientologist who was
trying to violently exact revenge against the company for being
swindled and defrauded for many years before Scientology's
debilitative "training routines" and "courses"
made him snap.
*
http://www.cosvm.org/oobe.htm
E-Mail Fredric L. Rice / The Skeptic Tank
http://www.linkline.com/personal/frice/bugger.htm
When these incidents are reported in the news, gallows humor among
activists often remark, "Another satisfied customer." It
may be an unkind remark yet it has always -- without exception --
been proven to be an accurate unkind remark.
In any event even if this actually did take place, why does the
Scientology company claim it's justified in attacking free speech on
the Internet?
It's also probably relevant that Scientology seems to have mysterious
fires whenever the rent and the bills for one of their offices is long
past due.
*
http://www.primenet.com/~cultxpt/fires.htm
Or maybe Scientology's history of having fires when the bills are
due aren't quite so mysterious after all. (The web page referenced
above is somewhat out of date since Scientology has held at least
two new fires since September of 1999, to my recollection.)
Claim:
Why was there no police report filed? If this actually happened,
wouldn't Scientology provide specifics to back up their allegations?
And wouldn't the media carry a story about this incident? Of course
Scientology's owners might like to claim there's a massive world-wide
conspiracy at work to keep such incidents out of the news, but if
that's their explanation, why didn't they offer it?
Claims:
These is one of the longer running Scientology lies. In fact this
was an incident that took place in Oregon where a Scientologist
came in to a Scientology business and started shooting the place up and
setting things on fire. "Another satisfied customer."
Why didn't Scientology mention the fact that this act -- and all
other acts of violence against Scientologists -- is committed by
fellow Scientologists?
Not only was the shooter a fellow Scientologist but the baby in
question didn't die and was reported in the news as having been
delivered just fine with no complications at all. The woman who
was shot lost the use of her legs yet horribly she's being used by
the company to market the company's public relations lies about
how they're some how a "church" that's subject to violent
assaults by "anti-religious" nut cases. And yet the
company consistently "forgets" to mention the fact that
the nut case in question was yet aother Scientologist who snapped
due to Scientology "processing."
*
http://www.cosvm.org/oregon.htm
Scientology owners and operators have uttered these lies under oath
in United States courts with no compunction against perjury. It's
not as if they didn't know that they were lying, that the shooter was
a Scientologist and that the baby didn't die, it's that Scientology
doesn't care about the truth of the matter. They get away with
lying under oath or -- if not sworn in -- lying to the Judge about it.
What Scientology lacks is real incidents of violence against its
customers by non-Scientologists. What Scientology lacks is real
murders of Scientologists by non-Scientologists. Because there are
none, Scientology makes up these stories building on actual incidents
committed at the hands of fellow Scientologists. And because these
"shore stories," as Scientology calls them, become part of
the pathology of the company's public relations mythology, ringleaders
even make these knowingly false claims under oath.
Where's the web site that motivated this Scientologist to walk into
the office where he was swindled and defrauded and then start shooting
the place up to exact his violent revenge? Scientology is trying to
claim that its clients -- and they don't mention the fact that they
are customers -- are being driven to violence because of things
they read on the Internet. Where's the web sites that were
responsible? Scientology is attacking the Internet claiming that
their followers are being driven to violence by what they read on
the Internet. How did this incidet take place before the Internet
web sites covering Scientology's abuses even existed if the Internet
is some how responsible?
Claim:
No specifics, again. Readers will probably have already guessed that
human rights and freedom of speech rights activists routinely scour
newspapers and other media outlets, and that they also keep their eyes
open for criminal complaints which include Scientology. Indeed, it
is that very fact that is one of the reasons why Scientology attacks
the Internet. Any time Scientology appears in the news or files a
complaint in any police department, activists usually find out about
it eventually thanks to the on-line databases of law enforcement
and thanks to the Freedom of Information Act which makes it possible
to write requests to police agencies requesting all documents filed
in any given time frame which involved Scientology.
Activists don't catch everything, of course, but something like
this would get into the news simply because Scientology would file
criminal charges and civil charges against anyone who ever really
did give their customers death threats -- unless they're fellow
Scientologists, of course, in which case they wouldn't want that
getting into the news.
Scientology can't point to any "venom spewed on-line."
They can't point to any "death threats." What they point
at are web sites that cover Scientology history and its
contemporary abuses, demanding that they be removed for vague
copyright violations, trademark infringements, and these vague
"venom spewed on-line." Where is it? They are apparently
invisible, just like Scientologys "Body Thetans."
Claim:
Another addition to the company's growing public relations mythology.
Human rights activist Mr. Keith Henson was picketing and protesting
against two of Scientology's latest homicides: Stacy Moxon and Ashlee
Shanner.
*
http://www.holysmoke.org/sm/stacy-moxon-meyer.htm
Not only wasn't Mr. Henson convicted for threats or intimidation --
because he never did so -- he didn't "flee the country to avoid
sentencing." Mr. Henson was actually convicted on the bogus claim
that he was some how "interfering with a religion" and the
conviction was possible only because the jury was not allowed to be
informed that he was outside the company's armed and fortified
compound protesting and picketing. Neither was the jury allowed to
be informed that he was protesting against the Scientology company.
And of course the Jury wasn't allowed to be informed that Mr. Henson
was protesting against Scientology's latest two very gruesom
homicides.
*
http://www.keithhenson.org/
Mr. Henson routinely picketed and protested the homicides of Stacy
Moxon and Ashlee Shanner outside of Scientology's heavily armed and
heavily fortified compound in Gilman Hot Springs, California. Stacy
Moxon was the daughter of noted racketeering kingpin Kendrick Moxon
who was named as one of the un-indicted co-conspirators in the single
most largest incident of domestic espionage and racketeering in
America's history.
*
http://www.cosvm.org/stipofev.htm
Ashlee Shanner was a young girl who was driving a vehicle along the
highway which passes the company's heavily armed compound and was
beheaded when she rounded a corner at night and drove into the shovel
of a tractor that was working on Scientology's property at night
without lights, without warning signs or flags. The driver of the
tractor was also driving the tractor without a license.
Mr. Henson's "interfering of a religion" was a conviction
that was only possible by not informing the jury that no religion
was involved, making sure that the jury was never told the notorious
name "Scientology." His "interference"
consisted of holding picket signs and protest signs denouncing
Scientology's homicides and also denouncing Scientology's endless
financial frauds. Scientology's attempts to stop this free speech
included shoving him out into the highway into traffic to try to
kill him, death threats against himself and his family, and endless
telephone calls to the Hemet, California police.
Every time the police were called out the local cops informed the
Scientology company that Mr. Henson was engaged in his
Constitutionally-guaranteed right to free speech. At some point the
Hemet police must have gotten tired of the endless complaints because
the cops simply stopped coming out every time Mr. Henson resumed
protesting Scientology's abuses.
Readers should investigate the death of Stacy Moxon closely since
it's highly relevant. Scientology tried to cover up that homicide by
first claiming there was an automotive accident on the highway, then
they called authorities and changed their story claiming that they
had a fire at their armed compound. Finally Scientology changed to
the story they would stick with, claiming that there was an
electrocution at their compound.
How is this relevant to free speech and Scientology's assault against
the Internet? Two other human rights activists were outside of the
barbed wire at the time that Scientology killed Stacy Moxon. The
company sent people out to the highway to try to get the activists to
leave before the authorities and the media showed up, inviting to
take them to lunch, in fact, to "discuss their problems" with
Scientology.
First off, Scientology claims that they're afraid of activists and yet
here the company is trying to take them out and buy them lunch. But
the most important piece of the equation is the fact that the company
tried to get the activists away from the area before the authorities
showed up. Given the changing stories Scientology phoned into local
authorities after the homicide, it seems entirely likely that the
company wanted to remove Moxon's remains from the underground
transformer vault where she was electrocuted, then stage a vehicle
accident out on the highway. The clock was ticking before the fire
department, police, and media arrived and yet two activists were
outside the barbed wire. Activists with cameras and cell telephones
-- and a willingness to immediately inform the authorities of what
they saw.
Having human rights and free speech rights activists picketing and
protesting outside of Scientology businesses adversely impacts the
company's revenues however the added attraction is the fact that the
homicides, suicides, attempted escapes, and abuses that routinely
take place are immediately reported and reportable. (Escapes are
an important aspect of incidents that can be caught on film out at
the Gilman Hot Springs compound. The compound is notable for the
fact that the barbed wire and spikes around the compound are
situated to keep people in the compound, not to keep people out.)
Claims:
This hasn't been reported in the news, either, for some mysterious
reason. The only possible incident that sounds close to this claim
may be an incident which took place in Los Angeles many years ago
when a Scientologist held a number of fellow Scientologists hostage
in a car and then blew the car up.
That incident, however, took place before the Internet became widely
available, and long before human rights and free speech rights
activists started covering Scientology's abuses on the Internet. The
attempt to justify attacking the Internet by pointing at
Scientologists blowing up fellow Scientologists before the Internet
was open is, well, remarkably insane.
If Scientology would like to provide a little background information
so that this claim of theirs can be verified, do please post a note
into alt.religion.scientology so that we may investigate. Thanks.
Claims:
Scientology has been making this claim for years, too, yet some how
never manages to provide any testable references. If they were to
actually describe who it was, it's certain that it would have been
yet another "satisfied customer" trying to get back at the
criminal enterprise after years of abuse and mentally debilitating
"training courses."
If Scientology could provide background information on this claim
as well, thanks.
Claims:
The world-wide grassroots effort by human rights, civil rights, and
free speech rights activists to expose Scientology and halt their
abuses is some how the equal to religious extremists that hijack
jet aircraft and fly them into high-rise buildings.
Is it any wonder why the media doesn't report these people's more
freakishly bizarre claims?
Claim:
And who will safeguard the rights of Scientologists and other victims
of Scientology? Who also will safeguard the free speech rights of
citizens of free countries when those rights are attacked by organized
criminal enterprises which are driven to suppress those rights solely
because of the lost revenues which result from consumer advocacy?
Currently technology guarantees those rights regardless of the bogus
misuse of the famously bad DMCA laws. Currently public outcries at
Scientology's attacks against the Internet are what's guaranteeing
the use of that technology.
Not so ironically, Scientology's abuses reinforce activists' goals
and motivations for putting a stop to those abuses. As previously
mentioned, it's a positive feedback loop which will hopefully make
the company spiral into self destruction and, given Scientology's
written policies which are supposed to be inviolate, the company is
stuck on rails they can't jump off of.
Claims:
The irony would compel humor were it not quite so serious. We got
a disjointed, incoherent rant about hate speech and violence against
Scientologists while not being told that other Scientologists have
always been the ones who have been committing that violence. We get
informed that free speech on the internet is akin to Islamic terrorist
mass murderers. We then get an equally bizarre "summary"
that jumps back to vague claims of copyright infringements again.
Claims:
As if any free speech organization would have them.
Claims:
And I agree completely with that suggestion. Note that you'll not
find anything about Xenu, Body Thetans, Clusters, or any of the
other endless bait-and-switch bunco frauds that this company
"forgets" to tell its customers before they mistakenly
sign up for "courses." Do check out the company's own
web sites and note the vague, unevidenced claims, the freakish
conspiracy notions, and bizarre rants like their latest
justifications for attacking the Internet... Then check out
http://www.xenu.net/ and all the
other web sites that the company tries so hard to remove from the
Internet. Judge for yourself by all means.
Claims:
Linda Simmons Hight
Don't forget to give this public relations person a phone call
or some e-mail asking her about the various newspaper articles
and other information referenced in this debunking. Be sure to
ask why she "forgot" to mention that the shooting in
Oregon and all other acts of violence against Scientologists have
been at the hands of other Scientologists, then ask what that has
to do with her company's assault against free speech and the
Internet.
You might also ask her why she felt she had to lie about Mr. Keith
Henson when the truth would have sufficed. You might also ask her
to provide some specific URLs to web pages that contain copyrighted
materials so that you can confirm her allegations for yourself --
making note of the fact that Scientology's very big on thinking for
oneself.
While you shouldn't expect any honest answers, if the PR person
doesn't hang up on you by then -- or add you to their murdering
terrorist list -- ask why the company doesn't inform its customers
that they're infested with invisible murdered space aliens. You
might also want to ask why you had to read about it in web sites that
aren't affiliated with their company.
Scientology's assault on free speech and its endless attacks against
web sites which engages in free speech aren't going to end until the
company itself ends.
-=- During research for this I've found a number of other web pages
that debunk the organized crime syndicate's latest lies and among the
best is:
*
http://www.politechbot.com/p-03929.html
Neither the owner of this web page nor any organization which hosts
or provides this web page is in any way connected with nor part of,
employees of, customers of, or clients of the Scientology company.
*
http://www.fairgamed.org/
*
http://www.keithhenson.org/
*
http://www.torymagoo.org/
*
http://deanblehert.our-home.org/knowmore.htm
*
http://paulceberano.oursites.org/myself.htm
*
http://karina.our-home.org/myself.htm
*
http://crimjob.tripod.com/
*
http://www.soundclick.com/enturbulator009
*
http://www.cosvm.org/psycho.htm
*
http://www.nots.org/fbiindex.htm
CHURCH OF SCIENTOLOGY INTERNATIONAL STATEMENT
REGARDING COPYRIGHT INFRINGERS AND GOOGLE
*
http://www.skeptictank.org/hs/cosfed2.htm
*
http://www.raids.org/
*
http://www.cosvm.org/
Media reports reflecting partisan opinions and incorrect
interpretations concerning Google's decision to remove
links to web pages containing copyright infringements
have largely obfuscated the real issues. Thus, we are
providing this clarification.
*
http://www.chillingeffects.org/
Scientology churches have always supported the Internet.
*
http://www.skeptictank.org/hs/rmgroup.htm
The Church uses the Internet in its dissemination of the
Scientology religion to the people of the world.
The Church has established a significant multimedia Internet
presence since its launch in 1996 of one of the largest and
most technically advanced web sites. Our sites comprise more
than 140,000 individual pages of material and include virtual
tours of our major churches, images, multimedia files, and text.
*
http://www.lisamcpherson.org/sp_times_4-20-01_brick_bad.htm
Unless certain rules are applied on the Internet, our desired
global freedom to communicate and exchange information will
be corrupted by cyber-terrorism that often masquerades as
free-speech activism.
*
http://www.cosvm.org/disruptc.htm
*
http://www.cosvm.org/disruptd.htm
*
http://www.cosvm.org/disrupt8.htm
*
http://www.cosvm.org/disrupt7.htm
*
http://www.cosvm.org/disrupt.htm
*
http://www.cosvm.org/disruptc.htm
*
http://www.cosvm.org/disruptd.htm
*
http://www.cosvm.org/magoovm.htm
*
http://www.cosvm.org/disrupt8.htm
*
http://www.cosvm.org/disrupt7.htm
*
http://www.cosvm.org/telavcr.htm
*
http://www.cosvm.org/jimmail1.htm
*
http://www.cosvm.org/mjonesad.htm
*
http://www.cosvm.org/looters.htm
Thus, limitless "tolerance" of abuse will inevitably
bring on overregulation if a few dishonest individuals are
allowed to flout the law and corrupt this communication medium
for everyone.
In any event, those who were victimized or saw their rights
violated will sooner or later rise to defend themselves and
lawfully restore their interests.
*
http://www.skeptictank.org/hs/brainwas.doc
Church actions are confined to two circumstances:
1. Violations of the Church's intellectual property rights
*
http://www.torymagoo.org/
*
http://www.skeptictank.org/scan.htm
*
http://www.skeptictank.org/forge.htm
*
http://www.skeptictank.org/sporge.htm
*
http://www.skeptictank.org/hs/compcrm1.htm
*
http://www.skeptictank.org/hs/sprgwng.htm
*
http://www.skeptictank.org/hs/trkmony.htm
2. Hate speech that advocates violence against the
Church or its members
*
http://www.operatingthetan.com/
*
http://www.bobminton.org/
*
http://www.lisamcpherson.com/
*
http://www.holysmoke.org/sm/stacy-moxon-meyer.htm
Since the founding of the first church of Scientology in 1954,
Scientology churches around the world have consistently
championed all forms of freedom.
*
http://www.skeptictank.org/hs/cosuics.htm
*
http://www.skeptictank.org/germnw.htm
This includes being one of the first to expose the existence
of South African psychiatric slave-labor camps during the
apartheid era, and the atrocities committed on the people of
Bosnia-Herzegovina in the name of "ethnic cleansing."
*
http://www.cosvm.org/africa2.htm
Scientology churches were pioneers in the development of the
U. S. Freedom of Information Act and used that law to uncover
secret U.S. government chemical and biological warfare
experiments that had been perpetrated on the American people.
The Church's human rights journal, Freedom Magazine, has won
numerous awards for its journalistic integrity and its
courageous work in protecting the rights of minorities.
*
http://www.lronhubbard.org/eng/journal/page46.htm
The Church's own creed states that "all men have inalienable
rights to think freely, to talk freely, to write freely their
own opinions and to counter or utter or write upon the
opinions of others."
*
http://www.cosvm.org/family.htm
*
http://www.cosvm.org/family2.htm
*
http://www.cosvm.org/famly3.htm
*
http://www.cosvm.org/famly4.htm
In addition, Scientologists honor free speech as a cherished
Constitutional right.
But free speech does not mean freedom to perpetrate a crime.
No matter how disingenuously copyright violations are postured
as an exercise of "free speech," the unlawful use of
protected works was, is, and will continue to be a crime.
If an individual walked into a book store and took away and
sold volumes of an author's writings, or simply gave them
away as part of a super-communist phantasm designed for a
shared-and-equal-wealth Utopia, would any rational person
defend this act of theft as "free speech"? Of course
not. They would call the police.
The Digital Millennium Copyright Act provides a mechanism
that helps this coexistence to be peaceful.
*
http://www.skeptictank.org/hs/dchat1.htm
*
http://www.skeptictank.org/hs/dchat2.htm
*
http://www.skeptictank.org/hs/dchat3.htm
*
http://www.skeptictank.org/hs/handbill.htm
*
http://www.skeptictank.org/fzcos1.htm
*
http://www.skeptictank.org/safe12o9.htm
*
http://www.skeptictank.org/safefrth.htm
In a landmark lawsuit brought by two Scientology-affiliated
organizations,
*
http://www.cosvm.org/cchr.htm
*
http://www.cosvm.org/cchr3.htm
*
http://www.xenutv.com/trust/jeff-brick.htm
*
http://www.lisamcpherson.org/sp_times_4-20-01_brick_bad.htm
*
http://www.slatkinfraud.com/slaughter.php
the US District Court for the Northern District of California
agreed with their contention that ISPs may be liable for
contributory copyright infringement once they are made aware
that infringements are maintained on their systems. The
judge's ruling resulted in a notice-and-takedown procedure to
remedy copyright infringements.
*
http://www.cli.org/sysopl/Netcom.html
This notice-and-takedown procedure became an important
aspect of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. It provides
the copyright owner with a remedy and absolves ISPs from
responsibility for content and liability if they remove
infringing materials, while depriving the violator of the
means to perpetrate his unlawful activity. The DMCA has
thus brought order to one area of the Internet that was
in utter turmoil prior to the Act.
In March 2002, acting according to the provisions of the
Digital Millennium Copyright Act, the Church asked Google
to remove their links to certain specific copyright
infringements.
*
http://www.xenu.net/
Google responded by eliminating the links. These actions on
both sides were routine and carried out pursuant to the DMCA.
However, this time the often unpredictable currents of
the Internet pushed Google out of the routine and into a
storm of protest. Taken aback by this reaction, Google
rapidly moved to put the Church's cease and desist letters
up on a public website. If the intent of this action was
to appear "politically correct" or to chill the Church's
dedication to defend the copyrighted works of the
Scientology religion, no adverse affect has been created.
In fact, the Church views it favorably that anyone who
is interested can see the letters for themselves,
uninfluenced by the hysterical rhetoric that was used
by some media to mischaracterize their content and import.
We are scarcely alone in utilizing the DMCA to protect our
intellectual properties.
Considering that hundreds of cease and desist letters are
generated by copyright owners every day, it is oddly
disproportionate that so much attention has been focused
on the handful sent out by Scientology churches.
V. FREE SPEECH VS. HATE SPEECH
It has long been an established legal principle that open
incitement to violence against another is not protected by
the First Amendment, neither on nor off the Internet.
If an individual shouted from his rooftop that he was going
to throw a bomb through his neighbor's window, no one would
accuse the intended victim of attempting to stifle free speech
when he called the police.
Hate speech is also a factor that often motivates the Church
in its actions. Unfortunately it usually remains unreported
by media, thus depriving the public of the full picture.
It has been necessary to take legal action on several
occasions due to threats and actual violence against our
churches. Hate speech and extremist propaganda on the
Internet have repeatedly driven unstable individuals to
commit felonious acts against Church members and Church
property, as in these examples:
*
http://www.skeptictank.org/hs/mbunke11.htm
*
http://www.skeptictank.org/hs/mbunke12.htm
*
http://www.skeptictank.org/hs/mbunke13.htm
*
http://www.skeptictank.org/hs/mbunke15.htm
*
http://www.skeptictank.org/hs/mbunke16.htm
*
http://www.skeptictank.org/hs/mbunke17.htm
*
http://www.bobminton.org/
*
http://www.whyaretheydead.net/
o A Scientology Church was fire-bombed twice with a
dozen molotov cocktails doing extensive damage to the
front of the church.
o A staff member was stalked and shot at.
o A crazed gunman went into a church and shot a pregnant
staff member whose unborn child suffered fatal birth defects
and later died. The woman is now paralyzed. He then set
fire to the building and took another female staff member
hostage.
o Individuals became inflamed by venom spewed online
and then sent out death threats.
o An individual was convicted for threatening and intimidating
Scientologists through the Internet. He then fled the country
to avoid sentencing.
*
http://www.xenu.net/archive/WIR/wir5-6.html
*
http://www.operatingthetan.com/
o Police intercepted a man with explosives in his van,
who, it was discovered by the officers, was enroute to
assassinate the president of a Church of Scientology.
o A man constructed a mail bomb and hid it in one of our
churches. It was detected and defused before it went off.
If these acts are carried out against U.S. citizens by Al
Qaeda, it is called terrorism. Within the microcosm of the
alternative newsgroups, Scientologists face a form of
unadulterated cyber-terrorism, no matter how loudly its
perpetrators try to disguise themselves as "free speech"
advocates.
Ultimately, the only guarantee of safeguarding the Internet's
potential resides with all who use it.
We share the responsibility of ensuring that abuses by a
largely lawless minority are not permitted to burden all
of us with over regulation. We submit that had it not been
for a few lawless individuals, online copyright regulation
would not even have been necessary; ample copyright law
already existed. It is up to the law-abiding majority to
ensure the Internet remains truly free.
We welcome the opportunity to work with any individuals and
organizations seeking the goal of a lawful, safe and vastly
beneficial Internet for all.
For more information, visit www.scientology.org
April 2002
Media Relations Director
Church of Scientology International
6331 Hollywood Blvd. Suite 1200
Los Angeles, CA 90028-6329
Phone (323) 960-3500
Fax (323) 960-3508
e-mail: mediarelationsdir@scientology.net
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