I've been doing that for months now!

Lol mod on mod violence.

So did anyone take part in the protests today?

There was apparently a large turnout at some of the Australian protests and the one in Clearwater as well.

Here are the estimated numbers people are reporting:

Oceania:
200-300 in Sydney, Australia
100 in Perth, Australia
100 in Brisbane, Australia
150 in Adelaide, Australia
150 in Melbourne, Australia
17 in Auckland, New Zealand
10 in Christchurch, New Zealand
20 in Wellington, New Zealand
Total: 847

Asia:
1 in Tokyo, Japan
4 in Tel Aviv, Israel
Total: 5

Europe:
500 in London, United Kingdom
60 in Oslo, Norway
20 in York, United Kingdom
6 in Zürich, Switzerland
5 in Geneve, Switzerland
25 in Gothenburg, Sweden
80 in Dublin, Ireland
25 in Berlin, Germany
40-50 in Amsterdam, The Netherlands
35-40 in Birmingham, United Kingdom
20 in Plymouth, United Kingdom
130 in Edinburgh, United Kindom
150 in Manchester, United Kingdom
12 in Vienna (Wien), Austria
50 in Copehagen, Denmark
3 in Aarhus. Denmark
20-25 in Duesseldorf, Germany
30 in Brussels, Belgium
30 in Paris, France
15 in Sunderland, United Kindom
15-25 in Hamburg, Germany
50 in Stockholm, Sweden
5 in Brighton, United Kingdom
Total: 1356

North-America:
200 in Clearwater, Florida
200 in New York City, New York
80 in Colombus, Ohio
75 in Cincinnati, Ohio
15 in Cleveland, Ohio
150-200 in Portland, Oregon
200 in Toronto, Canada
5 in Brunswick, Maine
50 in Buffalo, New York
25-30 in Indianapolis, Indiana
100 in Detroit, Michigan
160 in Austin, Texas
100-150 in Houston, Texas
90 in Denver, Colorado
270 in Boston, Massachusetts
300 in Los Angeles, California
100 in Minneapolis, Minnesota
200 in Seattle, Washington
115 in Dallas, Texas
30-40 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
40-50 in Tucson, Arizona
40 in Edmonton, Canada
150-200 in Atlanta, Georgia
200-300 in San Francisco, California
100 in Sacramento, California
25 in Milwaukee, Wisconsin
45 in Nashville, Tennessee
80 in Montreal, Canada
65-70 in Kansas City, Missouri
25 in Wichita, Kansas
135 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
200 in Orlando, Florida
60 in Phoenix, Arizona
100-110 in Miami, Florida
200 in Washington, D.C.
65-150 in Chicago, Illinois
30 in Champaign, Illinois
40 in San Diego, CA
25 in Memphis, Tennessee
140-200 in Vancouver, Canada
50 in St. Louis, Missouri
35 in New Haven, Connecticut
50 in Charlotte, North Carolina
40 in Louisville, Kentucky
35 in Richmond, Virginia
70 in Salt Lake City, Utah
10-15 in Ontario, Canada
10-15 in Rochester, New York
40 in Albany, New York
20 in New Orleans, Louisiana
15 in Reno, Nevada
12-15 in Boulder, Colorado
30 in Halifax, Canada
8 in San Antonio, Texas
20 in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma
Total: 5073

Estimated maximum number is 7281 and 88 raids, so far.

Short video showing some of London's numbers: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FcRCjtoZNBs

There was a protest taking place literally less than a hundred feet outside my home, yet I wasn't able to go. Anyway, it appears as though the next wave of protests are scheduled for March 15, which I'll definitely be attending.
Here's some photos of the STL raid:

St. Louis protest

Scientology protests held worldwide. The biggest seem to be in London & the US East Coast with up to 800 people in places. Sydney protest was 150-200 people.

Link.

One of my good friends went to the Austin one - said that people were VERY into it.

It doesn`t seem to be getting any news coverage whatsoever, other than the few local stations that picked it up.

It wasn't very big by comparison. Also Mr James Packer - son of Kerry Packer is a scientologist. Here in Oz Sydney Morning Herald and a few other major media outlets are obviously ignoring the protests. This won't last, come March 15.

I was at the L.A one. More than 300, probably closer to 400 and all ready to troll Scientology. The very aura of the place invigorated everyone to chant, picket, and hand out papers to cops themselves.

I lol'd at their security.

These protests are fucking stupid. This is when it moves from trolling to bitching. This does not produce big cocks in my ass, people have done this to Scientology before. It was better at the beginning of the raid when people were blackfaxing Co$ offices with goatse and shit. Stupid, juvenile fun fucking with a bunch of idiots who can't ever relax.

People realised they can make a difference, but they have to do this legally. Hence the protests. Scientology is allowed to fester in balmy democratic conditions that allow them their lunatic ideas. It needs to stop because they are abusing this opportunity to get rich.

Any rational person who has ever done a little bit of research will join us. In part the protests are there to raise public awareness of what these people are doing. Read xenu.net.

I almost prefer Scientology to 4chan.

All Hail Xenu!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-7Hn9Qgqw9k

Both are quite exemplary examples of hive-mind, but I think 4chan is a wee bit less batshit insane.

These protests won't do anything in the long run. And I do think that saying that this is the beginning of the end of Scientology isn't just optimistic, it is naive. When you have a tonne of people latch onto a belief they won't want to let go of it, no matter how retarded it is. They're just going to use this opportunity to play the persecution card.

This is just funny, let them believe in whatever, I dont think it actually hurts anyone, so meh. Let them all follow Tom Cruise.

They already are playing the persecution card as well as their usual underhanded shit of following people home from protests, hiring private investigators and Sea Org personnel - their paramilitaries. There is reason to suspect that the bomb threat called in last week was their doig as well as the white powder mailed to sci offices. These people are behaving suspiciously enough to warrant what they are getting and more. The public needs to be aware.

Scientology claims millions of members worldwide, but in reality the number is much lower - several hundred thousand at best. How many people post on 4chan ? A million or something like that. They are already outnumbered.



Incorrect. They have unending legal trouble because of people actually dying or killing themselves at their facilities. Lisa McPherson is just one name in a list of dozens. Xenu.net, mate. Have a read, educate yourself.

The public needs to be aware, yes, but the possibility of the CoS being dismantled by this recent series of events (which are going to continue into the near future, no?) is practically nil. Saying that the Scientology higher-ups are marshaling their troops against the protestors in the fashion described by you is pure speculation and rumour (can you give me some documented, solid proof of this?), as is the theory that the white powder packages originate from the CoS. That they're not exactly a 100% legit and credible body is well-known, but neither is the userbase that makes up "Anon".

Also, you're woefully overestimating the number of people who post on 4chan. It doesn't see millions of posts a day - the first post on the front page of /b/ currently is only number 53,640,938 (that's the number of posts over the last 4 or so years too, just so you know), and we can assume that there is a large number of repeat posters - and in comparison, Wikipedia only has around ten thousand (probably an overestimate) regular contributors and is a much larger and more frequented site than 4chan is.

I cannot find hit statistics for 4chan right now. But ok, 50M posts on 4chan <> 50 million people and maybe not even a million - you have a point. But 4chan is just one of several huge boards that this idea originates from. 7chan & eBaum's world being other examples.

Next look at the results of the Australian sensus:

2507 Scientology members on the last one.

According to the raid boards the protest attendance in Australia was 850.
That's 1:3. These are people who could be bothered to go, or were able to do so. How many cheering them on?

http://forums.enturbulation.org/viewtopic.php?t=1737

The same board has the following thread on Scientology tactics (witness accounts):

http://forums.enturbulation.org/viewtopic.php?t=1673

Here's the white powder article:

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.c ... EUQ754.DTL

I have lost the bomb threat link, it may have been a witeness account from one of the test raids last week. It has been suggested that these were perpetrated by CoS to disrupt the protests. Why? 1. It's according to church policy of "Fair Game" 2. If you were them would you not try it seein that a prank like that is difficult to trace to the source, especially if there really is no bomb and the powder is chalk with draino. 3. There are many other examples such as the "Charity Drive" that brough many members of the church to the scene of the protests in Indianopolis. Pictures are on wikinews. As far as I can understand there has never been a previous charity drive.

There were at least 2 people on the ground in Sydney with cameras who identified themselves as Scientologists. This was in Hyde park. They were taking pictures of the gathering participants. Why? What legal use could these be 3 blocks away from their premises?

etc etc



The point is actually not to dismantle it. They used that word in the initial "Message to Scientology" because that's everyone's wish. But a set of realistic goals have been set and followed which are tax exemption and investigation of internal activities by authorities. Tax exemption is an achievable goal, all it has to do is appear in parlaiment.

Bad publicity will drive away the Tom Cruises and other hollywood rabble, who fear bad publicity and ridicule like nits fear fire.



Source please. Bad comparison anyway, as wikipedia is heavily moderated, membership is restricted by the fact that you have to know basic scripting as well as the fact that any monkey can post on 4chan.

Anyway. My point remains - read xenu.net, come to the next event if you feel this is worthwhile.

finally apologies for typos. I'm not spellchecking.

Reliable third party sources would be preferable, please. I'm sure that there's a fair amount of exaggeration and account-skewing on behalf of the participants of the raids due to general paranoia and dislike of Scientologists. There's also nothing illegal about attracting Scienos to the protest, though it is rather underhanded. That entire thread is speculation and "suspicious vans", too. Very weak.



Regardless, the impact that such demonstrations will have on the CoS in the long run will, most likely, be negligible as external influence provided by something that doesn't actually throw the Church in legal peril won't have any effect on those who follow that particular doctrine. A few thousand activists spread sparsely around the world aren't going to influence anyone into investigating the workings of the Church, no matter what games they play nowadays as long as they're merely 'grey area' e.g. allegedly filing dodgy DMCAs to suppress viewpoints of detractors. That is how the world works.



No, it isn't a bad comparison. All you have to do on wikipedia to change content at the very least is click the tab that says 'Edit' and type random rubbish - this is just as simple as 4chan's system for submitting content. Both communities are moderated, both have basic rules of conduct and guidelines, and both are very large online communities - excluding those who just visit without posting. The site format that they use doesn't matter. They're both top 300 websites amongst those who are afflicted by Alexa spyware, too (Wikipedia is in the top ten, 4chan is floating around 250 last time I checked).

So your point being that these protests are inconsequential?

We'll see soon enough I guess.

In the end somebody is actually doing something about it. They may not succeed, but if they do, they will be able to say "I was there". Humans are in the end selfish beings and do selfish things under the guise of public service and charity, or in this case "LVLZ."

xenu.net fucking.

edit:



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_chanology
http://en.wikinews.org/wiki/Wikinews_in ... _worldwide
http://partyvan.info.nyud.net/index.php ... ia_Archive

Eyewitness accounts are just as valuable. what else is the real news based on? So this board is invaluable:

http://forums.enturbulation.org/

Wikinews isn't exactly the pinnacle of reputable journalism, either . And, as I said, those accounts on those boards are probably skewed and speculative - mysterious vans, mysterious photographers, mysterious everything.

James Packer is a scientologist. What do you recon he thinks of all this? Note that the Sydney networks haven't picked the story up - they appear to think that this is not worth reporting. www.news.com.au has (they are very tabloid-like) have and so did www.livenews.com.au. Today tonight did a very condescending report which made the anonymous respondent look like a retard - maybe she was, maybe the interview was edited this way.

However what if the protests continue in every major city of the world? What then?

http://www.crisismagazine.com/october2003/madden.htm

http://www.crisismagazine.com/april2002/cover.htm

The Spanish Inquisition and the Crusades, both often cited arguments by people knowing very little about them.

I fail to see how this is relevant to the points I have been making. Those types of news media - I believe news.com.au has a lot of Herald Sun shit, and tabloids'll report anything from a litter of puppies being born to a feel-good story about some kid's first day at school - are pretty much the dregs.



They won't, because people will grow tired of turning up every month to protest the same thing over and over without making progress. Scientology doesn't even impact on or influence the day to day lives of the vast majority of the people who are protesting, so how passionate do you think they feel about the issue?

I think that you have already made your point: that these protests will not make a difference. My point is that they might because there is a lot more to it, which may seem like I'm not addressing your arguments directly.

[quote="DustyFox"]Scientology doesn't even impact on or influence the day to day lives of the vast majority of the people who are protesting, so how passionate do you think they feel about the issue?[quote]

One of the reasons a real world protest is held (whatever the outrage may be) is to draw wider public support. It is more effective than apathy.

Knowing the mob at Today tonight, they did probably skewed the report to make themselves seem like the heroes. The interviewer was smirking in some parts of the interview when Envy was replying to some of their questions

I was at the Seattle protest. Not Anon myself but my roommate posts on /b/. I'd estimate roughly 150-200, spreading out around a busy underpass with signs, flyers, a couple giant banners, etc. A little silly at times but the press coverage was surprisingly evenhanded, especially considering the main channel to carry the story was the Seattle FOX affiliate.

Been a few years since I did any kinda protest, and I feel pretty good about it. The ideal result is some kind of criminal investigation into the CoS, or at least a review of their tax-exempt status.

I would advise not to announce the fact that you attended particular events. Scientologists are known to have a big internet presence.

Bring 'em all down Scientology, Islam, Christianity, Judaism... bring em all down....

"Kill them all...Kill them all for slander...Kill them all..And mute their ways"

"Where is their God as the faithful meet their end."

I'm pretty sure there will be more and more people attending these protests, eventually outnumbering the counterprotesters (Scientology nutjobs).

I've heard mixed responses. Some people were so happy about the turn-out for the tenth that they're eager to go to the March protests. Then you have the people who couldn't make it to the tenth that want to go in March. On the other side, you have people who may have seen some typical channer behaviour at the protests who got fed up with it and claim they won't be coming back. Hopefully the turn-out will at least be around the same number as last time. Some cities are doing smaller protests between now and 3/15 to keep everyone involved, I guess.

It's way beyond that already. There were around two hundred protesters at the one I went to and maybe a dozen Scientologists.



There will be one on the 24th I believe. Given the age of a lot of people involved in this, I think it's a little bit optimistic to expect them to stay interested for an entire month when there's nothing going on.

I took it as him meaning members worldwide. Scientologists have roughly 55,000 members in the US alone, I believe, whereas Anonymous is closer to 7000 members worldwide.

I think we found Tank Man
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9klv9q19rTY

Well that was in China but still

I see a lot of other religions doing good in the world, while I see Scientology as everything that is wrong with organized religion. Even if the Catholic Church tells people in South Africa to stop using condoms and thus get AIDS, Scientology tells people who suffer from bipolar disorder to stop taking their medication and thus kill themselves. The difference is that Scientology launched the greatest infiltration of the U.S government to have ever occurred. Even the Soviets couldn't pull that off during the Cold War. Scientology is the real enemy and it would be so much cooler if metal bands replaced the word Satan in their lyrics with Xenu so tat the world would know of OT III and how Scientology is the greatest threat to freedom of speech in the world today.

Scientology banned two movies in the United States. I don't think that any other religion has that power. I can laugh along to Dogma or The Hebrew Hammer all I want and I can watch Muslims get villified in The Siege if I so choose, but make a movie that satirizes Scientology and you can't get your voice heard. Hail the dark lord Xenu and his DC-8s of doom!

Everybody, download The Bridge and The Profit and post them on Megaupload!

Has anyone seen the Scientology orientation video that the Scientologists show those about to join the religion? Weird shit.

I've always wanted to make a band that bashes Scientology.

It just seems like a big scam to make money to me.