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UK Teen Cited For Calling Scientology a "Cult"
An anonymous reader writes "A 15-year-old in the UK is facing prosecution for using the word 'cult' to describe the Church of Scientology at an anti-Scientology demonstration in London earlier this month. According to the City of London police at the scene, the teen was violating the Public Order Act, which 'prohibits signs which have representations or words which are threatening, abusive or insulting.' There's a video of the teen receiving the summons from the City of London police at the demonstration (starting about 1 minute in), and now he's asking for advice on how to handle the court case."
naming an act the "Public Order Act."
The next thing London will do is put up posters saying that you are secure beneath the watchful eyes.
Perhaps they thought Orwell was writing an instruction manual?
Once again, what would seem a basic 'right' is being brutally oppressed by an organization under the cloak of 'religion'. I wonder just how much longer this will continue? Until we are all 'clears' or cleared out of our money from the lawsuits?
Fighting over religion is like seeing whose imaginary friend is best.
Whats the difference between religions and cults? As far as I can tell they really are the same thing.
The boy will surely be let off, but not before the whole world hears--and SEES--the story. All that will do is draw attention to the protest.
I predict: Score 1 for the good guys.
The only way this could be worse for Scientology is if the boy turns up dead anytime soon.
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I think he was quite well-spoken, really.
Visit CryptoGnome in his home.
"The City of London police came under fire two years ago when it emerged that more than 20 officers, ranging from constable to chief superintendent, had accepted gifts worth thousands of pounds from the Church of Scientology."
That's comforting. I wonder how many American cops, politicians, etc. the cult has on its payroll? Might as well disband the FBI and enlist Scientology as our intelligence service -- they seem to be much more effective at getting away with domestic espionage and dirty tricks.
..of Human Rights.. I'm pretty sure the law is in violation of Articles 10 and/or 11 of the European Convention on Human Rights..
This court actually works and has authority to rule in these cases. Might have to exhaust the legal avenues in the UK first though.
It takes a man to suffer ignorance and smile
Be yourself no matter what they say
Not legal advice, not a lawyer, but an audit.
Can someone explain to me how this works. Someone can be summoned because they express a non-violent opinion about a group, yet religious groups who advocate the violent over throw of the government and the establishment of a theocracy falls under protected speech. From this side of the pond, Britain clearly needs to get it's priorities straight before the movie "Brazil" because a reality.
He may have been better off advocating the death of all Scientologists because the FSM needs their blood to build the greatest pirate ship of all time.
Burn Hollywood Burn
Just spread the word that Scientologists believe Allah is a pig-fucker.
Exhibit A:
...?
Why the heck is this tagged censorship?
Exhibit B:
There's a law against insulting signs.
This is why we need open source governance.
If you help get the Metagovernment established, then it will be up to the people to decide how the people are governed. Weird concept, I know.
Indymedia has a good article about this. The protester, ironically, was objecting to "Fair Play", which is essentially harassment of any and all perceived foes. The citation identifies him and now he faces the same retaliation he objected to.
I am a name troll of Westlake. Visit my homepage to learn why.
- a system of religious worship directed towards a particular figure or object.
- a small religious group regarded as strange or as imposing excessive control over members.
- something popular or fashionable among a particular section of society.
Wave that dictionary page in front of the judge and "I Rest My Case". All of those three descriptives apply specifically and directly to Scientology.Now if the Judge/prosecution want to base an arrest on "when you say that scientology is a cult, you mean it as an insult" it is near-impossible to prove intent in a court of law. (at least, until they work our how to read my mind from a distance in a scientifically verifiable manner)
Anyhow, any defence lawyer would simply declare this "law" irrelevant and illegal - how can it possibly be legal to declare that writing a statement of fact on a sign and waving it around in public is illegal.
Visit CryptoGnome in his home.
Germany even put them under surveillance by the "Verfassungsschutz". Usually, something like this is reserved for groups that threaten the state's integrity, safety or the state itself.
So calling the CoS a "cult" seems rather tame by comparison.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
It takes a man to suffer ignorance and smile
Be yourself no matter what they say
I think I have to stop calling Linux users a cult before I get prosecuted.
Because a law against "insulting" signs IS censorship, just as a law against "insulting" books or "insulting" speech would be.
Yes. Of course it would. It saddens me that you have to even ask this.
You have the right to stand on the corner with a sign saying "X is Y!" for any values of X and Y. Any values at all. (Dictatorial governments may, of course, not recognize that right; it exists nonetheless.)
"Scientology is a cult". "The Conservative Party is a cult." "The City of London police are a bunch of mindless jerks." "The Flying Spaghetti Monster is better than Jesus." "Tom Swiss is a dweeb."
Anyone who attempts to forcibly stop you from saying any of these things is engaging in censorship.
Tom Swiss | the infamous tms | my blog
You cannot wash away blood with blood
Scientologists have copies of the movie Battlefield Earth.
My money's on the Thetan-freaks...
Browsing at +1 - no ACs, I ignore their posts. So refreshing!
I want to add to what cynicsreport said earlier in this topic. The word "cult" has commonly accepted definitions, and if Scientology fits that definition, then the sign was a statement of fact.
In particular, part of my liberal arts studies at Westmont college included multiple classes on cults (it is/was a religious school, so knowing about many flavors of cults was mandatory). We had a lengthy course on the difference between cults & religion. The main difference was secrecy, not legitimacy. A religion -- whether you believed it to be true or fake -- was an institution that had open processes. You could gain access to the teachings freely, and likely audit the finances, too. This means the institutions of Catholics, Christians, Jews, and a handful of others were "religions." Then there were other institutions like Scientology, Moonies, and lots of others that had closed processes. You couldn't audit the finances, you couldn't freely gain access to the teachings, etc. Those were cults.
It's entirely possible that you could feel a particular cult held the truth while all religions of the world were shams. The word "cult" was not intended to imply who was right. If calling something a cult was an insult, it wasn't because the cult was crappy or false; it was because of secrecy, potential for deception regarding finances, and so on. And not surprisingly, when you fall back on the dispassionate definition, it gets really hard to refute it even if you DO take it as an insult. If someone says you're holding documents in secrecy and you say "That's an insult" well... ARE you holding documents in secrecy? If so, you're feeling insulted by the truth. In such a case, I don't really feel that a state should compel people to lie.
My Greasemonkey scripts for Digg &
I know this is a lot to ask, but please get the facts right.
He hasn't received a summons.
He's not being taken to court.
He was warned, by a somewhat overzealous police officer, that he might have been in breach of the law, and he had his sign confiscated.
The Crown Prosecution Service, who are the people who decide whether a prosecution will take place, have been told that these events happened. And will decide whether to proceed. If anyone wants to bet $10 to say they will, I'll gladly take your money here and now.
That's it.
Athletic Scholarships to universities make as much sense as academic scholarships to sports teams.
Yea, I hear about this cult who worship a 2000 year old zombie Jew and believe they can turn bread and wine into his flesh and blood that then then devour in a cannibalistic ritual. Nutters eh?
What if Tetris was invented by Nazis?
More bizarre and/or insane than what? FFS man, talking telepathically to an imaginary friend who is solely responsible for all that happens in the universe (including putting dinosaur bones in place as is to fool us) compares to evil galactic rulers and volcanoes in a better light in exactly what way?
I have often spoke when I shouldn't have, but I have to say that there are far too many people who 'know' about religion, or think they do when in fact they know about some parts of ONE religion.
Yes, the CoS is a cult, so is the CoE, by technical definition all religions are cults. That is what makes the entire censorship here totally ridiculous. It's rather like saying that there are dangerous humans at 1600 Pennsylvania avenue, or 10 Downing street.
Drinking blood and eating flesh? Is that bizarre enough for you? How about sacrificing your own children? Incest? Genocide? The Christian Bible is full of examples of things that would just not work in today's society.
I fail to see how CoS is any more bizarre than Christianity.
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How does bizarreness matter? The cult of scientology believes that evil space aliens murdered billions of other aliens by stuffing them into DC-10 like spaceships and blowing them up in earth's volcanoes with Hydrogen bombs. The cult of christianity believes that you can telepathically communicate with a dead god-fragment and tell him you love him and that he will accept you into his kingdom and cleanse you of a taint that was placed in all humanity by a rib-woman being tricked by a talking snake.
Scientology is insane, but so are pretty much all other religions.
Not a sentence!
You obviously have never played D&D.
Animate Dead is a 3rd level spell.
Raise Dead is a 5th level spell.
Resurrection is a 7th level spell.
And true res is a 9th level spell
Don't be insulting God by calling him a low level spellcaster, pls. K? Thx.
At the risk of being wildly un-PC
More like "wildly inaccurate." At least on the Mormon front.
a short list of religions that fit this description would include not only Scientology, but Mormonism and Islam. All three of these fundamentally disallow their members from choosing not to be members, up to and including outright murder.
The Mormon church not only allows people to leave, there is an established process for removing your name from the records. You *will* be hassled about this if you opt to try it -- most leaders will make you ask a few times, they'll ask you if you're sure, they'll try to talk you out of it -- but in the end, they will drop you.
There's also the easier option, which consists of simply not going anymore and avoiding the people who periodically come by to try to reactivate you. I've heard a few outlandish tales of machinations in member's lives, but for the most part, the only tool the Mormon church has is outright preaching and a bit of peer pressure. It is remarkably easy to do whatever the hell you want, especially if you have even the smallest idea of when to keep your mouth shut.
an ex-Mormon in Salt Lake City is going to have a very hard time buying anything, anywhere.
I'd be interested to hear how you came by this the idea that everyday purchases are affected by religious affiliation with any real frequency in Utah, because it's complete bullshit.
There are a variety of problems I think someone who publicly leaves/denounces the Mormon church in Utah is likely to encounter, but with a few exceptions, they're pretty much all going to be directly related to coloring of social interactions with former peers inside of the church. But not only is there a significant enough non-Mormon presence inside of Utah that this wouldn't matter from an economic perspective, I don't believe I've met the Mormon that would actually refuse to sell to an ex-member.
Tweet, tweet.
true res? well he only lasted 40 days, so that's not really very impressive.
What if Tetris was invented by Nazis?
I fail to see how CoS is any more bizarre than Christianity.
At a 'technical' level you are right, the bible is no less crackpot than the scientology 'technology'.
One difference is that a lot of the various testaments have a good historical basis. For Instance I have no doubt about the existence of Jesus, Mohammed, Buddha etc.. they really existed! - Whether they were the son of god/prophet of god/being of divine light/etc is another question.. I believe they were just charismatic good people who others naturally followed. None of them seem particularly evil; that comes from those who followed them and wanted to assume that power over others for their own.
The difference is in attitude, reputable religions want to spread the word. eg. I have a bible, a translation of the qur'an, and other texts; all of which were given to me for free by believers who genuinely believe that by reading the words I'll become converted.
Compare and Contrast that to how Scientology spreads it's word...
Even the nastiest promoters of mainstream religion (the religious right, jihadists, etc.) are very open about their beliefs. Unfortunately their methods are often similar in terms of infiltrating institutions and crushing dissent.
"Oops, I always forget the purpose of competition is to divide people into winners and losers." - Hobbes
At a protest outside a Scientology building, I saw a rather appropriate sign:
Ask a Christian about the Bible, and he'll tell you.
Ask a Jew about the Torah and he'll tell you.
Ask a Muslim about the Koran and he'll tell you.
Ask a Scientologist about HIS holy books and he'll tell you... after your check clears.
Say what you will about Christianity and other modern religions, (and I will) they're not, at their core, pyramid schemes for making profits. Scientology is.
For all they do wrong, at least Christians believe in something that was always meant to be a religion, while Scientology believes in a science fiction novel.
:)
Not meaning to be disrespectful, but how do you know the bible wasn't supposed to be a sci-fi novel?
http://blog.nexusuk.org
So "irony" isn't a synonym of "metallic", then? Hm.
Unless you're marrying a Weatherman.
http://www.freedomforum.org/templates/document.asp?documentID=15992
I think you should have said "I read a story about a guy..." because we read it too. And that way when you find out that his conviction was overturned on appeal, you won't look so silly.
"TRAVERSE CITY, Mich. -- The Michigan Court of Appeals yesterday struck down a 105-year-old law against using vulgar language in front of women and children, throwing out the conviction of a canoeist who let loose a stream of curses after falling into the water.
A three-judge panel ruled in favor of Timothy Joseph Boomer. An Arenac County jury had found him guilty in 1999 of swearing after tumbling into the Rifle River."
If you knew the guy like you implied, you'd know that too.
And the obscenity laws you talk about have repeatedly been ruled unconstitutional when challenged.
It seems that English speaking countries are in a race to see who can become "Oceania" first. Britain is winning, but then again Eric Arthur Blair was British. I'm starting to believe some of the wags at slashdot who say he was an optimist (I think someone's sig says it too).
The thing is, the fact that this kid was prosecuted says to me that any British subject can be thrown in jail at any time at all for saying anything at all. The dictionary puts no derogatory meaning at all to the word "cult".The only one of the eight definitions posted that can in any way be considered derogatory is fittingly #6, and Scientology is certainly unorthodox and extremist. Then again, so are Islam, Bhuddism, Hinduism, Shintoism, and Judism (not to mention Atheism) in Britain (afaik), and Christianity is unorthodox and extremist in Muslim countries.
It is now illegal to discuss religion in Britain. If you are British and you post a comment in this thread, your government can throw you in jail.
But we in the US don't have a lot of room to talk. As I wrote two years ago,As I argued in the linked story, the US bill of rights in "our" Constitution has become meaningless in the last two centuries.
Welcome to Oceana, formerly called "Earth", number six.
mcgrew's razor: Never attribute to stupidity that which can be explained by greedy self-interest
In today's world? +1, Insightful.
The "Open Source" government may be closer than you think.
The phenomenon of anonymous, whatever you may personally think of their current "war" on Scientology, is something rather unique in human history. We have a relatively well coordinated, well mannered, peaceful "organization" having no membership, no particular leaders, no apparent fund-raising mechanism, and no organizational structure. Rather than being coordinated by a chain of command with structured communication channels, it seems to be organized chaotically by "memes" - ideas that become something like a cliche.
Despite all these properties which, in times past, would have been severe limitations, anonymous has now coordinated an international protest at dozens of cities around the world involving many thousands of people. This is simply incredible!
I believe thisto be an artifact of the Internet age, and a sign of things to come. While anonymous "members" appears to mostly consist of the younger college age, remember that the college kids of today are the first generation to grow up with ubiquitous global telecommunications. Just like hippie movement of the 1960's was the first generation to grow up with ubiquitous global communications in the form of television, so does the current new generation of anonymous represent the first generation to grow up with the Internet.
As a self-proclaimed Internet addict, I've watched anonymous with interest - the "memes" that provide so much power within anonymous apparently comprise nothing more than an idea posed by someone that others enjoyed and repeated. Anybody can throw up an idea, and the classic value of "reputation" seems to be lost, here. Ideas are presented by anyone, and when repeated by others who like the idea, they become memes. And memes are, as much, a way of doing or presenting information as it is the information itself. For example, there's a common theme in Digg articles of repeating adjectives. EG: "The lame article is lame". Of course, there's Rick-rolling, variations of "LOL", and a few others.
Could this meme-based anonymous evolve into a world government? In a sense, it already has, because this structure of memes is already coordinating the behavior of thousands! Why couldn't this evolve into a new way of governing? My guess is that anonymous evolves into a sort of meta-government. Rather than directly become a government agency, it becomes a sort of unstructured political party that exerts considerable power at the voting booth, and is able to reinforce its power through real-life protests and events, much like those going on against Scientology today.
Fascinating times! Watch and see!
I have no problem with your religion until you decide it's reason to deprive others of the truth.