13 Nov 2000

Birgitta <adm.service@sverige.net>

Thanks Catarina for a very good report of what we were doing yesterday.

I have some points I want to add after reflecting on yesterday's activities.

For me it was a fun game to play hide and seek with the OSA / AO people, but the fun stopped for me when I was thinking about how wrong and unsensitive it is to ridicule people regarding something they choose to believe in. People should have the right to believe in whatever they want, and if they want to worship the Xenu story it is their right to do so. I agree that people should know what they are paying for but I think it could be done in a different way.

This ridiculing nature of the Xenu fliers is nothing but a way to degrade people, in the same way scientologists are doing when they are degrading the whole psychiatric establishment.

I think it is much more important to give out more relevant information. Like information about the lawyers of CST who are the real wog-owners of all copyrights, like Meade Emory who worked in the IRS when the GO broke in who is one of the incorporators of CST. Information about the niacin (vitamin B3) which is harmful in the dosages taken in the Purification programme, information about the abusive sec.checks at Flag, the terrible conditions on the RPF ..... etc.

There is a whole ocean of abuses to inform scientologists and the public about, and I at least would prefer to do so in a non-ridiculing way.

Scientologists are usually people who wants to help other people. To understand this, and to try to inform them about what the non scientology public concerns are and how the management misleads them about internal abuses and disasters is to my belief the right way to go.

Bid

On Mon, 13 Nov 2000 11:26:35 GMT, catarina@pamnell.com (Catarina Pamnell) wrote:

Time: 12th of November, 2000
Place: Advanced Organization of Copenhagen, Denmark
Protesters: Ake, Birgitta, Catarina
Handlers: Anette, Erik
Leaflets: mostly Xenu, some Beware!, leaflet count unknown
Form: Dining-and-leafletting
Event:

- The Bridge to Total Freedom

I'm happy the constructors of our shiny new Oeresund Bridge, connecting Sweden and Denmark, were Wogs(TM):

- it exists in the physical universe, rather than an imaginary one
- it's safe, comfortable and even nice looking
- the passage takes less than half an hour, not years
- although car tickets have been criticized for being expensive at $30 (for a single crossing, there are discounts for frequent travellers), the train ticket is extremely affordable
- at the end of the bridge, people are openhearted, cheerful and hospitable

Birgitta, Ake and yours truly had found a good excuse to inspect the Bridge on this beautiful Sunday morning. We opted for the train. It's almost as fast as driving, no headaches about finding a parking spot in downtown Copenhagen, and we could spend the trip chatting and immersing ourselves in an old copy of the "Advance" magazine (the one with OT Phenomena success stories).

- Business

Birgitta had some completely non-picket-related business to attend to first, as had me and Ake. (OK, most of *my* business had something to do with drinking a nice cappucino and appreciating old Danish architecture...)

- Xenu invaders

We had brought a bunch of leaflets just in case, mostly bright yellow A5-sized Xenu. We decided to combine dinner with a little public warning service. After all, we were going to eat in a location that was within a stone's throw of the Advanced Org in Copenhagen. So close that we could actually see the org through the windows from there.

Starting before 16.00, we spent about 15-20 minutes handing out our Xenu leaflets to passerbys in the areas surrounding the org. This is a district with plenty of restaurants and cinemas, lots of foot traffic.

Then we retreated to our dinner appointment, just in time to watch half a dozen Sea Orgers frantically but fruitlessly try to zoom in on the source of the Xenu revelations suddenly appearing in people's hands. That failing, they resorted to trying to clean the area of entheta, including the litter cans in the street.

- The return of Xenu

When we had finished the main course of our tasty dinner, me and Ake returned to the streets for a quick round of Xenu promotion. Then back inside for coffee and viewing the performance of the Sea Orger street show. Some familiar faces of the security staff were seen in plain clothes, rather than their usual spiffy uniforms. Our old friend Erik "the video man" also turned up. It was starting to get dark outside, which made their task of locating SPs even more ardous.

- Xenu revealed

All good things come to an end - we had to start to think about returning home. But first, a farewell round of the org. Ake and Birgitta went out in time for the 18.00 org break. I stayed behind for a while to finish off what I was doing, and have a second cup of coffee (you can add that to my DA pack - caffeine addict). As I spotted Erik "the video man" and Anette OSA PR Denmark in search of prey, I called Ake up on the mobile phone and asked him to have pity on the poor staffers and allow them to catch up.

- PR vs. PR

By the time I joined them probably 20 minutes later, Birgitta (ex PR officer for the CoS in Malmoe, Sweden and once awarded "PR officer of the year" for getting Hubbard quotes printed on all the milk cartons for a month in her region of Sweden) , and Anette (current PR officer for the CoS in Denmark, who knows what awards she has received if any) were having a conversation. They were discussing the major critical tv show on scientology that was aired on Danish television in June 1999, where Birgitta had been one of the people interviewed (Jesse Prince was another). It seemed Anette had a little trouble fully grasping the fact that it was her own inept handling that made Birgitta participate in the show, after initially having pulled out of it for personal reasons. So let's repeat the story once more:

Birgitta had made the taped tv interview, but was having second thoughts about participating, and told the tv company she was pulling out.

Anette as the editor of the Danish Freedom magazine ("Frihed") published a special edition before the airing of the tv show - it's the one with the headline "Sporgsmalet besvares", do you remember it now, Anette? It was obviously printed *before* the program, not after as you said, since at the bottom of page 3 you discuss what will happen if the Danish tv will go ahead and air the program. Future tense.

In the editorial, Anette claimed Birgitta is "hostile to new religious movements" (ROTFL!), and that she had decided to withdraw from the tv program because "she knew that the program was going to attack individual persons, and did not want to participate in that" (a misrepresentation of a conversation Birgitta had had with Anette, where Bid had talked about the way *the CoS* attacks individuals).

I got hold of a copy of this Freedom magazine, and let Birgitta know what had been printed about her. She quickly decided to tell the tv company to put her interview back on.

Yes, Anette, you caused it.

- OT 7 leaving vs. freezoners

A part of the conversation that I did not overhear but Birgitta related afterwards concerned the OT7s leaving the CoS. Birgitta had asked "do you consider it ok that the OT 7's have to go to Flag every 6 month for doing a sec check ... wouldn't an OT 7 be able to keep his own ethics in?" to which Anette had not come up with any good answer. Birgitta had said that 7 OT7s have left the CoS in the last month, to which Anette replied that there are only 5 people in the freezone in Denmark. That may or may not have had some logical connection in Anette's universe, who knows.

- Ethical level of scientologists

For some inexplicable reason, the org staff who are in charge of handling evil protesters seem to think it's a good idea to send scientologists outside to pick up leaflets, pretending not to be scientologists. Ake asked several people "are you a scientology member?" to which they said no, grabbed a leaflet and went inside the org. Perhaps they actually do believe that lying will improve their public image...?

Friendly hint to OSA: we almost always have leaflets left when we end off a picket, even though we may keep them in our bags and don't show them to you. Trying to get us to give the org a lot of leaflets does not make us go away any quicker. But you could speak to the Danish railway authorities and make them change the train schedules to Sweden, that could work.

- The unexpected appearance of Mr Nice Guy

Just as we were about to leave, a friendly scientologist turned up and tried to invite Ake inside the org. He seemed to be a public member (and I bet he was Italian, I like the Italians best!). It would have been nice to accept his invitation, we were truly tempted. However, we did have a train to catch and regretfully had to say no. (I doubt that Anette would ever have allowed us into the org, she didn't look overly pleased at the prospect. But still...)

- New adventures of Xenu

The final Xenu leaflets were handed to people outside the central railway station. Who knows what parts of the world they ended up in...

Catarina

http://xenu.just.nu - Scientologi till vardags