======== Subject: Amsterdam picket, 14 oct 1999 From: kspaink@xenu.org (Karin Spaink) Date: Mon, 18 Oct 1999 15:21:41 +0200 Message-ID: <3RgLOAXgg5M+OmiiT0cBMpib8x2t@news.xs4all.nl> On the evening of October 12, I discovered a series of separate postings in various Dutch newsgroups about an event to be held Thursday the 14th. It was a rally for human rights. A group of marathon runners that were running from Athens to Hamburg were to arrive in Amsterdam that day. The event was to be topped with a free concert, free drinks and free snacks, to be held in Hotel Krasnapolsky (opposite Dam Square) in Amsterdam. Organizers: CCHR (that is: its Dutch chapter, Nederlands Comite voor Mensenrechten, NCRM), " Friends of the UN", and Scientology. We decided to organize a small demonstration: just the Amsterdam section of the Dutch CoS critics, that is: Mike, Jeta, Zenon and me. I got us a demonstration permit from the city hall, Zenon came up with five slogans (*) which I translated into Dutch, we copied them and cut them into A5 slips, Jeta collected a pile of his letter to the Dutch Scientologists (for the Dutch orioginal, check (www.b-org.demon.nl/scn/dutch/pamflet.html). All paperwork was thus taken care of. And all our papers carried either a reference to www.xenu.net, www.enturbulate.nu or Jeta's B-Org site. We arrived at 18:45. The 'free concert' was to start at 19:30 and to last until 22:00. Krasnapolsky is opposite to Dam Square and is at the corner of a rather busy tourist street. The traffic is usually rather high; this evening even more, because a) shops were open and b) there was a fancy fair on Dam Square. When we arrived, there weren't many people outside the hotel itself: just the doorman, and one or two hotel guest quietly talking on the stairs leading to the entrance. We started leafletting. Within five minutes, a whole bunch of Scientology people emerged from the hotel and started leafletting as well. For twenty minutes, it was rather crowded there. Pedestrians passing, Scientologist trying to give them their yellow 'free concert' folder, us trying to give them our white slips. A typical situation was whereby we would approach somebody carrying one of the CoS folders and say: "You have just been given a pamphlet by Scientology. I am one of their critics. Can I give you some of _our_ information?", which worked lovely. Sometimes people would suddenly look with great distrust at the yellow folder that they were holding in their hand. Sometimes they would frown. And most of the time they would gladly accept one of ours. Note: all leaflets (theirs and ours) were in Dutch, and we never understood why many Scientologists insisted upon giving them to people that were obviously foreigners. One of them tried to leaflet a group of Japanese tourists. Heck, Manual Nugteren was bowing like crazy and making a fool of himself so the Japanese accepted them out of sheer mercy, it seemed. All the time, there were at least fifteen people outside busying themselves with the demo and the counter-demo. Four critics, the rest of them Scientologists. A few Scientologists were leafletting with great enthusiasm. One of them jumped up and down the pedestrian area, shouting: "Free concert! Free snacks! Free drinks!". Very tone 40. I tried to get him down the scale by getting at his motivation. "Swell. So you need to sell your church via _free drinks_? My." The Scientologist tried to get at our motivation, too. We had arrived bringing some 300 leaflets, and especially the A5's were running out fast. One of the Scientologists jumepd in a car, drove to the org (less than a five minute walk away from Hotel Krasnapolsky), and came back with big piles of their yellow folders, looking at me with a TR-0 stare as he gave them to his fellow Scientologists. Zenon took my car and went back to the copyshop, where he made another 400 of our A5 slips. The police showed up. They had been duly notified of our little demo via the town hall, and had given their permission. They spoke with some of the Scientologists, not with us, and after less than five minutes they left again, telling one of the CoS members that if there _were_ any problems, he could call them again. Bingo. So the police had been phoned by them, and couldn't find anything wrong with the situation. Of course they didn't. As I wrote on the application for the demo: we were all instructed on how to behave, and apart from that, all four of us are rather friendly and well-bred. They were trying to handle us. They would attempt to stand right in front of us and would try to block our way. One Scientology woman saw me moving towards a couple that had just been given the yellow CoS folder, put herself in between and blocked me, thereby trying to prevent me from giving them a leaflet. When I moved aside, she did so as well and meanwhile stepped back. She almost made me fall. We repeated this sidestepping, after which I moved her aside, gave the couple my folder, and went up to the woman (straight, light brown hair; protruding upper teeth; I'd recognize her anywhere after this), took her by the shoulder and told her, quietly but very determined that I had just as much as a right to leaflet as they had, and that willfully barging into somebody with a disability was unbelievably rude, and that if _this_ was the impression she wanted to give of her religion, she was quite welcome to do so. She claimed innocence yet paled. Within five minutes she went inside, not to be seen afterwards. There was a young man -- more a boy, actually -- who only spoke American. He was rude as well. He snatched our leaflets from Scientology members who had accepted them, he snatched a leaflet from Zenon's hands andsnatched a banch of them from mine. I took them back. He yelled at me that the OT-material on my page was stolen from the Kopenhagen Org. I told him that he didn't know his OTs, because what was taken in Kopenhagen were the NOTs, not the OTs. Jeta meanwhile had moved slightly more to the side. He invariably asked the people he gave an A5 leaflet to whether they were Scientology members, and if they were, he'd discuss the tech with them and gave them his letter. He managed to have quite long conversations with various members. The fact that our folders were often taken from these people as soon as they were inside the hotel lobby, didn't matter much: Jeta had by then sown his seeds. Mike ran around quite a lot. He found himself in a long discussion with Karel Jeelof, the one Scientology member that often posts on nl.scientology. He leafletted with great enthusiasm and often discussed tech with people. The same spoilt bragging Scieno boy that had snatched my papers, tried to get at Mike too. He came up to Mike and the first thing he said was: "You're low". Mike replied: "Low toned?". The brat: "No, lowlife". Alas, witness the famous communication skills of cult members. Zenon had his own handler: a guy who spoke English fluently, and who was more reasonable than most others. He tried to side-track Zenon into following his own logic, but Z didn't fall for that. From what I could hear, the discussion must have been rather interesting. Part of it concentrated on the fact that, apart from a few stupidities like the boy snatching our folders from us and being generally assholish, the Scientology members were actually behaving rather well as compared to their US colleagues. Zenon explained that it was actually through the critics, and via the use that the critics have been making of Scientology's misbehaviour, that Scientoplogy was slowly being taught manners. That, once Scientology would _actually_ have learned how to behave, the CoS would gain more acceptance -- and that they would have to thank the critics for that. Ah. The beauty of the mindfuck. Most people that entered the hotel, were either guests or Scientology members (greeting other members etc). Scientology didn't manage to bring much raw meat to the 'free concert'. And many of the people who _did_ go in, out of curiosity, or because they liked the free offers, emerged rather soon. One woman, upon doing so, yelled to us: "I decided that I am on _your_ side!" The runners arrived. Five or six of them, dressed in blue and white sportswear, carrying a torch that stank rather heavily of diesel. A camera team showed up. Two men. One of them came up to me and asked me whether I remembered him. He looked vaguely familiar, but I couldn't place him. Turns out that he was part of a group of teenagers for who I once lectured and with whom I struck up some kind of friendship while visiting the same concerts. By now he was an actor, having starred in one of Holland's best known soaps ("Goede Tijden, Slechte Tijden"), and was training to become a documentary maker. He wanted to interview me. Julia Rijnvis -- CoS PR-woman and OSA -- refused to allow him to interview me. If they would, she threatened, they couldn't film inside. The team argued. Then they agreed. And told me on the side that they would phone me later for a seperate interview ;-) At circa 20:30, we were getting cold. We decided to go to a nearby cafe and to return at about 21:45 to catch the outgoing crown, which we did. It was quiet when we arrived the second time. But within five minutes, the whole bunch came out again. This time we focussed far more on leafletting those that came _out_ of the hotel instead of going in. Some of them knew about us by then and completely ignored us; others _did_ indeed take or folders. The second leg of the demo was rather uneventful and very much like a toned down version of the first leg. The manager tried to get us away and threatened to phone the police. We told him that he should. We never heard from him, nor from the police... At 22:45 we decided to call it quits. There was hardly anybody leaving the hotel anymore, and by now we had spread something like 500 pamphlets. It seems that the event finished earlier than expected, because far fewer people came out when we were there, than had gone in. We went for a last drink and then decided that we were rather happy about this: with only four people and two hour's worth of preparation, we had managed to create quite an impression, made Scientology's evening a lot less smooth, and had informed quite a number of people about the cult. And one important lesson that we learned is that it is rather productive to leaflet on Scientology's public meetings -- far more productive than leafletting the Org itself. (*) The five slogans: 1. 5 mg of Ritalin per day can help a child to a normal life. Scientology is against it. 2. CCHR, Vrienden van de Verenigde Naties and the Nederlands Comité voor de Rechten van de Mens (NCRM) are front organizations of the "Church" of Scientology. 3. Little wonder Scientology hates psychiatrists. They cure its potential customers. 4. Scientology is against psychiatry. Did they tell you what their own alternative is? Check www.enturbulate.nu 5. According to Scientology/CCHR psychiatry is in itself an abuse. If you had to choose between the two, which would you trust the most? groet, Karin Spaink - I write, therefore I am: http://www.xs4all.nl/~kspaink ======== Subject: Re: Amsterdam picket, 14 oct 1999 From: Zenon Panoussis Date: Mon, 18 Oct 1999 17:55:57 +0200 Message-ID: <380B430D.3BC2753F@xs4all.nl> Karin Spaink skrev: > > Part of it concentrated on the fact that, apart from a > few stupidities like the boy snatching our folders from us > and being generally assholish, the Scientology members were > actually behaving rather well as compared to their US > colleagues. Zenon explained that it was actually through the > critics, and via the use that the critics have been making > of Scientology's misbehaviour, that Scientoplogy was slowly > being taught manners. That, once Scientology would > _actually_ have learned how to behave, the CoS would gain > more acceptance -- and that they would have to thank the > critics for that. Ah. The beauty of the mindfuck. It's mindfuck both ways. Indeed, even counting with the woman that pushed you and the young asshole, they behaved amazingly well in comparison to what we read from US pickets. Discounting the woman and the kid I would say that they behaved fully correct and civilized. They tried to handle us by making intelligent discussion, not by shouting on our faces. Now of course, that was hotel Krasnapolsky, posh and elegant and in the middle of their own event: they could hardly afford to show their worst side. But yet it's a rather absurd situation when I start to appreciate my handler - and even tell him so - because he is not misbehaving as we have learned to expect. I mean, after all, why should anyone appreciate the lack of misbehaviour? Isn't that what we are all entitled to expect? Scientology has conditioned the critics to say "thank you" just for not being screamed at and pushed and insulted. Isn't that mindfuck too? > Most people that entered the hotel, were either guests or > Scientology members (greeting other members etc). > Scientology didn't manage to bring much raw meat to the > 'free concert'. I'm not sure I agree. Yes, there were LOTS of scientologists; they must have brought in the troops from all over the country. But there was a quite heavy traffic in to the hotel of non-scientologists too for over 45 minutes; I estimate that at least 200 of the 300 fliers I handed out went to non-scienos. > (*) The five slogans: The (fully intended) beauty of them is that they are short, printed fairly bold in the middle of white paper with just the amount of space that makes reading easy. More than half of the people that did not take the fliers didn't need to take them either: in the split second they looked at what they were being given, they had already read the entire text. This is also a lesson: forget the dense text and fine print. Catch people's attention, and then talk to them if they want to talk or let them go to a website. I doubt that anybody bothers to read a full A4 if they are not already interested in the subject. And if they are, then they don't need the A4 in the first place. > 1. 5 mg of Ritalin per day can help a child to a normal > life. Scientology is against it. Appeal to emotions. > 2. CCHR, Vrienden van de Verenigde Naties and the > Nederlands Comité voor de Rechten van de Mens (NCRM) are > front organizations of the "Church" of Scientology. Rip off their cover. > 3. Little wonder Scientology hates psychiatrists. They cure > its potential customers. Use humour. > 4. Scientology is against psychiatry. Did they tell you > what their own alternative is? Check www.enturbulate.nu Invoke curiosity, reward it with a shock. > 5. According to Scientology/CCHR psychiatry is in itself > an abuse. If you had to choose between the two, which > would you trust the most? Use their bad reputation to make the reader take sides against them. I think that Hubbard would be proud of me :)) Z -- oracle@everywhere: The ephemeral source of the eternal truth...