From: anima@xanadu.io.com (Anima)
Newsgroups: alt.religion.scientology
Subject: Re: Picketing downstat org in Poole UK
Date: 15 Oct 97 00:35:51 GMT
Message-ID: <anima.876875751@xanadu.io.com>
teddy@skylink.net (Ted Mayett (KoX)) writes:
On Sun, 12 Oct 1997 22:40:32 +0100, Dave Bird---St Hippo of Augustine <dave@xemu.demon.co.uk> wrote:> THEIR SMALL SHOP ROUND THE CORNER IN THE "OLD MARKET" MINI-PRECINCT
> HAS CLOSED, APPARENTLY WITH RENT OWING.Scientology is Expanding.
Could this really be the result of three previous pickets and a few Xemu flyers? And some balloons, and a stuffed dog, and a bullhorn, and a handful of talented people? It is easy to see now why some "good" critics were against the use of stage props for a demonstration.
So you're saying the use of Duke and Xenu props and a bit of a fun fair atmosphere drove the punters away from victimization and contributed to the on-going destruction of the Hubborg by laughing it to death -- to the point where the cult had another Big Win on its way out of Poole?
Excellent news, of course. Apparently picketing enturbulates them and restims all those supposedly flat buttons of theirs worse than a volcano going off. But-- did people really claim the lively British stealth pickets we've been hearing about are stupid and ineffective? Obviously whoever said that kind of horse shit had to be miles from the scene with a head full of swamp gas to be spouting off cosmic wisdom this far off the mark. And it was probably someone who has never engaged in a picket or any other kind of direct confrontation with a clam. How else could there be so much certainty so thoroughly wrong except from the adamantine mind of ...
I was going to say someone who makes up ideas about the world instead of investigating them directly, but it occurred to me that such a mindset is the pre-Newtonian or even Platonic one that proposes to think things through rather than check the actual data for themselves. Such an absolute reliance on authority (on El Wrong, for instance) seems to me to be as antithetical to a search for the truth on any issue as an absolute reliance on experience in defiance of authority.
It's like the Mind Control threads, where there seems to be more interest in proving that one's opponent is a scumbucket than in trying to find that nexus of personal experience (first-hand) and authority (second-hand experience) that would help combine techniques, approaches, understandings, to find out How people get roped into the 1984 mindset so brilliantly articulated by RV Young recently, kept in double-think, and how they can be liberated from the lies, snares, delusions, hypocrisy, and abject subjugation to the alien mindset and behavior these cults generate one way or another.
Those people who have been there (on the picket line, in this case -- typically either inside the cult or helping people out, in my tangent) have experiences, data, observations, suffering, that should be respected by those more suited for the business of modeling explanations, identifying techniques, and the like. The raw material cannot just be dismissed because some of it is inconvenient, doesn't match some previous model, or because the person bringing it in comes armed with their own fallible attempts to figure out what hit them (or hit other) and what freed themselves or others.
Lots can be accomplished in any field of endeavor if no one is concerned who gets the credit, but a scramble for credit sure can put a crimp in accomplishment. The closing of even part of the Poole cult crap setup is good news, and we can expect further stat crashes like that and the Burbank, California, mission closure ("it wasn't really closed -- it was moved and consolidated" was the general line, but however acceptable that "truth" may be, the great big building went empty).
And my guess is a lot more orgs, missions, storefronts, and the like are holding on pretty precariously and will follow suit before long -- especially with the continuing in-your-face pushing that they get from those who dare to picket rather than spend their time knitting the names of heroes into a list for tomorrow's trashing. Monday morning quarterbacks may never be wrong, but they also never win a football game -- or close a clammery.
Whoever was telling these picketers their strategy was full of holes would seem to have been rather thoroughly wrong. Kudos to those who muddled through to victory in the face of whatever opposition they faced here or elsewhere. May their committment continue to bring such good news.
--
anima@io.com When making public policy decisions about new technologies for the Government, I think one should ask oneself which technologies would best strengthen the hand of a police state. Then, do not allow the Government to deploy those technologies. -- Philip Zimmermann