Since some of the materials which describe the $cientology cult could be
considered to be copywritten materials, I have censored myself and The
Skeptic Tank by deleting any and all possible text files which describes
the cult's hidden mythologies. I have elected to quote just a bit of the
questionable text according to the "Fair Use" legal findings afforded to
those who report. - Fredric L. Rice, The Skeptic Tank, 09/Sep/95
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From: rlvd_cif@uhura.cc.rochester.edu (Robert Levandowski)
Subject: Re: Why the clams are so mad? (Was Re: The Quite Mad Diane Richardson)
Message-ID: <1995Jul17.213522.14214@galileo.cc.rochester.edu>
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Organization: University of Rochester - Rochester, New York
References: <3udilt$nnq@lantana.singnet.com.sg> <3ue3ml$o5j@lear.cs.duke.edu>
Date: Mon, 17 Jul 95 21:35:22 GMT
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In <3ue3ml$o5j@lear.cs.duke.edu> gazit@lear.cs.duke.edu (Hillel) writes:
>4) Stupidity.
Well...
In my opinion, many of those who have posted here defending Scientology
in some fashion have made statements or used tactics which indicate that
their grasp on the obvious and common-sense is rather weak. In short,
I've seen lots of stupid things. Like what?
* Forging cancel messages that appear to violate Federal law in several
ways, including possibly violating the Electronic Communications Privacy
Act, and having libelous content;
* Forging said cancel messages so that they appear to have passed through
a computer owned by the United States Government;
* Forging said cancel messages with blatantly false paths and hostname;
* A lawyer who sent an unauthorized "rmgroup" message, which itself would
appear, in my opinion, to violate the ECPA;
* A lawyer who has sent messages to several people here, suggesting that
they have violated the Berne Convention and the Lanham Act, when it
would appear to people with no special legal training that neither
piece of law is applicable to the situation;
* A lawyer who has sent such messages in a fashion which could be
construed as intended to annoy or intimidate, which, if true, would
itself constitute a violation of California law;
* A poster who made what was clearly a death threat against a close
friend of Dennis Erlich; which would not only seem to be a violation of
the law in most states as either aggrivated assault, harassment, stalking,
and/or terrorism, but which also might constitute tampering with a
Federal case, if I understand that statute correctly;
* A poster who continually makes claims based on quotations from public
sources, which, when consulted, show that the quotations are wholly out
of context and in fact refute the poster's claims;
* A poster who continually violated instructions from their service
provider, informing them that "outing" anonymous posters was not acceptable,
to the point where their account was reportedly terminated;
* Several posters who do not seem to have read the Constitution of the
United States nor the United States Code, yet feel compelled to render
their interpretation of the laws with no evidence to collaborate their
viewpoint, which, when investigated, seems to be mistaken;
* A poster who claims to have access to a police report which should be
confidential between two people, although he claimed at one point that
he had contact with neither of those two people; and then posts details
from the report which not only don't match known facts, but which aren't
even consistent between postings, from appearances;
* Many posts which are devoid of content, except for vitriol and whining
about persecution, etc., but which seem to indicate that the poster(s)
are not actually reading and understanding the topics at hand;
* Several posters who have offered to answer any questions, but who then
fail to do so, either by ignoring the questions, or dodging them with
vague and dogmatic responses;
* References posted to other newsgroups purporting to be from citizen's
commissions which cite journal articles as supporting a claim that a
widely-tested, long-used drug which is generally regarded as among the
safer pediatric psychoactive medications can cause suicide, when in fact
the cited articles do no such thing, but rather point out a few abberations
in case histories, which point up the fact that any negative occurrances
are rare with the medicine in question, and which furthermore do not
chronicle any cases of suicide as claimed;
* Posts in which outright lies are told, and when confronted, the posters
claim that "it was an experiment," or "it was necessary to protect
myself," although they dismiss the notion that they lie;
* Posts which contort the English language beyond all belief, including
consistent and amazing spelling and grammatical errors which make
communication difficult if not impossible, and the use of a vocabulary
and terminology unique to the COS which is not only not proper English,
but which is redundant (as the concepts expressed already have proper
English representation with properly-formed and typically shorter terms)
as well as inhibitory to discourse and understanding.
* On top of all of this, claims that the "tech" of COS will, when properly
applied (as has presumably occurred in the case of most of these posters),
will increase one's apparent intelligence and make it possible for one to
communicate with utter clarity their ideas to other beings.
Now, given this evidence, in my opinion, "stupidity" is a good explanation
for many supposed pro-COS activities I've seen in this group.
--
--Rob Levandowski
Computer Interest Floor associate / University of Rochester
macwhiz@cif.rochester.edu [Opinions expressed are mine, not UR's.]
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