From: fjc@thingy.apana.org.au (Frank Copeland) Newsgroups: alt.religion.scientology Subject: Re: #2, Lies of Scientology Supersedes: Date: 1 Jun 1997 16:02:15 +1000 Organization: Australian Public Access Network Association Lines: 138 Message-ID: <19970601160202.fjc@thingy.apana.org.au> References: <338D6953.9244C70B@hol.fr> <19970530114014.fjc@thingy.apana.org.au> <33911865.3520@starwon.nospam.com.au> NNTP-Posting-Host: thingy.apana.org.au X-Newsreader: slrn (0.9.3.2 UNIX) -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Richard wrote: : Frank Copeland wrote: : > In any case, it wasn't governments who re-established $cientology here, it : > was the High Court, and I agree 100% with that decision. Banning $cientology : > was an affront to the right of freedom of association (note: that's : > association, not religion). It was also a complete waste of time, since they : > merely changed the name and carried on as before. : > Keep it in Usenet. E-mail replies and 'courtesy' copies are not welcome. : : Sorry Frank, I didn't notice the above line :( : : I opted for email because it was more of a personal interest thing, : rather than something of relevance to the group. That's cool. I don't object to getting e-mail as such, and I do read it. What I object to is unnecessarily taking open discussions and turning them into private ones. That's not what Usenet is about. ARS being what it is, I'm a bit more flexible about it than in other groups, but I like to stick to the general principle if I can. 'courtesy' copies are a different matter, they are just a bloody nuisance. : Basically, my e-mail to you was asking if you knew what part (if any) : Lionel Murphy, who I believe was Attorney General, played in the repeal : of the ban. I was under the impression that it was significant one : since he was publicly thanked and acknowledged at least one Scio event : at the time. : : If you could summarise briefly for me, or suggest where I can find out : more about this, I would be grateful. I have to correct myself, actually. It was governments who unbanned $cientology, but it was the High Court who established its religious status. Firstly, $cientology was never banned in Australia as a whole. The *practice* of $cientology was banned in Victoria in 1965 in response to the Anderson Report. I believe it was also banned in South Australia, and possibly in Western Australia. $cientology's response was simply to refound itself as The Church of the New Faith and carry on as before. The ban in Victoria was lifted in 1982. The Commonwealth Government recognised it as a religion for the purposes of the Marriage Act in 1973, and at the time of the High Court case in 1983 New South Wales, South Australia and the Australian Capital Territory recognised it as a religion for tax purposes. The Australian Constitution has a religious freedom and anti-establishment clause (s. 116) that guarantees freedom of religion to individuals. In addition to that, Commonwealth and State laws extend various priviliges and exemptions to religious institutions. The Victorian law banned the practice of $cientology as a form of psychotherapy, but specifically exempted its practice in the context of religious observance, as it was obliged to do by the constitutional guarantee. The real damage was done by the Victorian government refusing to recognise The Church of $cientology, in its incarnation as The Church of the New Faith, as a religious institution and so denying it the tax breaks and other perks that churches get. This was what the High Court case was about. The High Court decision addressed the definition of religion for the purposes of the Constitution, which had not previously been settled. The Court reasoned that the definition must be as broad as possible, as a guarantee of religious freedom that effectively applied only to mainstream religions was meaningless. It therefore defined religion as a belief in the supernatural, combined with some form of conduct associated with that belief. You not only have to believe, but your belief has to be expressed in some concrete way. In the case of $cientologists, the belief in reincarnation, combined with the act of auditing, is considered to be enough to meet the test, and so $cientology is a religion under Australian law. If $cientology is a religion, then The Church of $cientology, aka The Church of the New Faith, must therefore be a religious institution. The court considered the claims that $cientology is a scam, but held that "charlatanism is a necessary price of religious freedom, and if a self-proclaimed teacher persuades others to believe in a religion which he propounds, lack of sincerity or integrity on his part is not incompatible with the religious character of the beliefs, practices and observances accepted by his followers." Similarly, the obvious commercial nature of $cientology was held to be no different to the commercial activities of other churches, many of which had grown extremely wealthy with the aid of tax exemptions and other priviliges such as free land for building churches. Personally, I can find nothing wrong with the High Court's decision. As an atheist I consider all religions to be bogus, but I recognise everyone's right to believe whatever they wish, no matter how absurd. As an ex-Catholic in a country with a history of anti-papist discrimination I recognise that the protection of religious freedom is a vital civil right. $cientology's commercialism is much more blatant than that of other churches, but the fault lies with the laws that grant tax breaks to religions. They are an open invitation to abuse, and should be repealed, but that is simply not going to happen. Lionel Murphy was one of the five High Court judges who sat on the case. He was a controversial figure due to his association with corrupt judges and other shady figures, but I personally admire him for having the bollocks to raid ASIO (the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation) when he was Attorney General in the Labour government. It's a pity his colleagues didn't have the bollocks to shut down the whole worthless 'intelligence' apparatus. I suppose they thought it would look like sour grapes, since ASIO's main job was red-baiting and spying on the Labour Party when it was in opposition. It would not surprise me to find that he had accepted some consideration from $cientology, but it would not surprise me either if it turned out to be a smear by the spooks in revenge for the raid. The High Court decision stands on its own, but if there *was* corruption then there were four other judges involved in it with him. The full text of the decision is on the AustLII site at: One interesting 'fact' in the decision is that $cientology claimed to have 150,000 members in Australia in 1983, with 6,000 in Victoria. This is 1% of the Australian population at the time. But since Victoria had 26% of the population, you would expect the figure for the state to be 39,000. Of course the 1991 census only turned up 1091 people in the whole country prepared to admit anonymously that thay were $cientologists, so the whole figure is obviously completely bogus. - -- Home Page: Not the Scientology Home Page: Keep it in Usenet. E-mail replies and 'courtesy' copies are not welcome. If you're selling, I ain't buying. -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.6.3i Charset: noconv iQCVAwUBM5EQYoBOXdsElwbdAQF0wgP+OlwajnBBg908Kv+FNZXBBq/4hRpZinHQ jn2qLa6lS5RYcO6GCqGxQh+1CpSkd0eDBrKygSP9YDUSdzMrtb8Dl/OGCoCiZTTz tlNM+b4kFrgiZFTl2ejHUIvZ/iba8vOiUFFgck2AUWeztfJSHov05UqnMWvCBFsX +fNRbld1w04= =y/oD -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----