Scientology demonstrates in Berlin, October 1997

Taken from A.r.s Week in Review, 11-2-97. Archived at:
http://www.xenu.net/archive/WIR/
http://wpxx02.toxi.uni-wuerzburg.de/~krasel/CoS/ars-summary.html
http://www.i1.net/~mallen/scn/arswr/ars-summary.html

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Scientology's planned 30,000-strong demonstration in Berlin fell short of expectations when 2,000-3,000 marchers attended the event. Before the march, anti-cult activists held a press conference at which Gerry Armstrong and others harmed by Scientology addressed the press.

"A Hamburg local TV station reported today shortly that anti Co$ task force head Ursula Caberta (SPD, social democrat) held a press conference this morning accompanied by 3 former Co$ members. One of them was a prominent and close managerial assistant of L. Ron Hubbard, Gerry Armstrong, who spoke vividly against the 'church's' claim being a religion. Instead of that he stressed that Co$ was nothing else than a camouflaged corporation to infiltrate societies and to obtain its members' money."

Tilman Hausherr reported on a talk by "Tanya", and described the actual march.

"Tanya is the girl who escaped from Saint Hill and she was one of the people who spoke on the podium. One of her jobs was to open mail and to check it for money or for relatives that are anti-scientology. She did recruit other children. She is very sad and feels guilty that she did that. Her schedule starts at 7:15 and goes to 24:00. This was first disputed, then confirmed by scientology. The schedule is the same for children then for adults. In practice the schedule was even longer, especially on Wednesday evening. She wanted to leave. She then had to do physical labor until she stopped wanting to leave. Tanya is living in Germany (Hamburg area). She gets telephone and mail terror. She is financially supported by a non-profit foundation and goes to school and has found new friends. Her dad filed a criminal complaint about 'child withdrawal'. She talked with her dad and he said that he would not talk to her because she left scientology."

"These people remind of the former communists - they spoke on the meeting place from 12:00 - 15:00, i.e. three hours. Nothing really meaningful, only slogans 'what do we want?' 'freedom!' 'where do we want it?' 'in Germany' / 'everywhere' 'When do we want it?' 'now!' then greetings, like 'Hello to 100 people from Greece'.

"The main mouth was (I was told) Andrik Schapers, a singer from The Netherlands. But here he was rather a shouter. Other people: Mike Rinder, Isaac Hayes, Anne Archer, The head of the celebrity center, Karen Hollander. I also saw Gotz Brase, the real estate shark, Gisela Hackenjos (spokeswoman) was demoted 'Ordner', i.e. security person.

"The horses, drummers and trumpeters were nowhere to be seen. The concert was at the Brandenburg gate, but at the 'wrong' side (the side where the gate looks like nothing). They did have power generators, and the sound level was much too high."

Reuters reported on the march.
"About 3,000 Scientologists from the United States, Germany and other European countries gathered in the city centre chanting the slogan 'religious freedom now,' in both English and German, and waving banners in protest at Germany's tough stance. Messages from celebrity Scientologists John Travolta and Kirstie Alley were to be relayed to protesters on a huge video screen, Scientology spokesman George Stoffel said. The two U.S. film stars were not able to attend the rally in person.

"A dozen members of a German lobby group that campaigns against sects and offers advice to parents who say their children have been 'taken over by extremist religious groups and sects' staged a counter-demonstration nearby. One U.S. Scientologist from Los Angeles said he had flown over with a group from the U.S. just to join the demonstration. 'What shocks me most is the religious intolerance. I have heard Scientologists are being driven out of business here and often do not say they are Scientologists because they are afraid of losing their jobs,' Dan Stradford, 50, told Reuters.

"German Labour Minister Norbert Bleum rejected the charge saying it played down the true gravity of Nazi crimes. 'This is not just an insult to our democracy, but also to all those victims of Nazi terror,' Bluem told German RUFA radio agency. Hans-Juergen Foerster, a spokesman for one of the regional watchdogs in the state of Brandenburg surrounding Berlin, told Berlin's InfoRadio his State Office for the Protection of the Constitution was monitoring the group for signs of violations against the constitution or threats to democratic order. 'We need to establish whether there is a genuine attempt to counter the free democratic order and whether Scientology's activities violate the constitution,' Foerster said.

"Scientology spokesman Stoffel rejected the accusations, saying the German authorities were trying to clamp down on the group because they were close to the established churches. 'The Protestant and Roman Catholic churches in Germany are losing members rapidly in Germany. But instead of looking at what they are doing wrong they are trying to attack competition and discriminate against other religions,' Stoffel said."

"'Scientology is our religion,' Travota said in a video message taped in Los Angeles where he is working on a new film. 'It has helped us a lot, as it has helped so many others around the world. 'There never is an excuse for a government discriminating against its citizens because they hold a particular religion,' Travolta told cheering protesters gathered in the city centre."

"German Labour Minister Norbert Bluem said in an interview with RUFA German radio agency that it was Germany's duty to protect those he said had suffered under the group's influence. 'Let those who have dropped out of the group speak out about how human beings are spiritually destroyed under Scientology's roof,' Bluem said in an interview."

From the New York Times article, entitled "Scientology Rally in Germany Sparsely Attended".
"But while the organizers had forecast a turnout of 10,000, fewer than 2,000 people gathered to march on a bright, chilly day and hear protest leaders urge Germany to acknowledge Scientology as a religion and permit it to enjoy the benefits of that status." Some commentators in Germany said the protest demonstration was aimed not so much at Germans as at the United States, with the organizers hoping that television footage would bolster the assertion in an annual State Department report this year that Germany's attitude toward Scientology infringes human rights.

"'We find ourselves confronting an efficient business enterprise that has taken as its maxim the unbridled lust for profit and that proceeds accordingly,' the Berlin Office for the Protection of the Constitution, a watchdog against extremism, said recently. 'All the religious embellishment and pseudo-spirituality serve only to disguise these maneuvers.'"

The march was timed to coincide with the decision of a German court on the status of Scientology as a religion. From the Associated Press:

"The Church of Scientology hoped to convince a German court today that it is a religion and entitled to corresponding benefits such as tax-exempt status and the freedom to recruit followers. The decision by Germany's highest administrative court could be precedent-setting for the group's legal status across the country, and give Scientology stronger grounds for opposing treatment of its members in all of Germany's 16 states."

"Scientology is sponsoring a conference on religious freedom that opens today at the Hotel Steglitz International in Berlin. The landmark Kempinski Hotel refused to allow the group to use its meeting hall."

"Federal judges considering Germany's fight with Scientology signaled today that they would not decide the central question of whether the Los Angeles-based church is a religion or a business. Scientologists went to court after the southwestern state of Baden-Wuerttemberg revoked the non-profit status of a local branch in Stuttgart in 1986. The state said the group was primarily concerned with making money by selling books and self-improvement courses, not the 'idealistic goals' generally associated with a non-profit organization."

"A Stuttgart court upheld the revocation, but a regional court overturned the ruling, saying it first must be determined whether Scientology is a religion and thus entitled to special privileges, such as tax-exempt status and the right to recruit members. The state appealed to the federal court in Berlin, raising expectations that the court might rule on Scientology's status. But presiding Judge Werner Meyer noted today that the court was charged only with deciding whether Scientology's status makes a difference in revoking the registration -- not gathering new facts."

Other reports on the attendance: (I have included only pieces of articles)
Here from a Scientology publication titled: IAS The Crusade For Total Freedom - Marching Forward, IAS Annual Report, 1997 - 1998, is a claim for ten thousand in attendance.

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Don't forget that 500 of these were the Raelians, who showed up "in support" of the scientologists (one UFO cult to another...). And that there was also a contingent of Jehovah's Witnesses there, too. If I understood Roger's post elsewhere, French television reported that the JW's had more people there than the Scienos. So doing a few calculations on the fly, I come up with a maximum of 749 Scienos in the march.
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According to the WWW page of the "Tagesschau" (which is comparable to ABC Prime Time News) (very rough translation):
Several thousand, mostly foreign, Scientology supporters demonstrated today in Berlin against the alleged discrimination of religious minorities in Germany. The police counted approximately 3000 participants, the organizers spoke of 12000.
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BERLIN, Oct. 27 (Reuters) - [snip] Police estimated the size of the demonstration at 3,000 while Scientology organizers said there 6,500.
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BERLIN, Oct. 27 (Reuters) - Berlin city officials said they expected a protest march on Monday by members of the U.S.-based Church of Scientology to go peacefully, despite a counter-demo planned by a parents' lobby group against religious sects. "We do not expect as many people as Scientology says will be coming," said Thomas Raabe, spokesman for Berlin's interior ministry. Scientology expects 10,000 protesters, half of them from abroad, to join the march.
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In the local paper, [US] a small clip with a photo of the Statue of Liberty lady demonstrator, the AP story states: "A woman dressed as the Statue of Liberty joins hundreds of other Church of Scientology followers at a protest Monday in Berlin."
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From the New York Times
Scientology Rally in Germany Sparsely Attended
October 28, 1997 By ALAN COWELL
BERLIN, Germany -- The Scientology movement, which German authorities call mercenary and undemocratic, staged a demonstration through the heart of Berlin Monday intended to depict modern Germany as being just as intolerant toward Scientology as Hitler was toward Jews.
But while the organizers had forecast a turnout of 10,000, fewer than 2,000 people gathered to march on a bright, chilly day and hear protest leaders urge Germany to acknowledge Scientology as a religion and permit it to enjoy the benefits of that status. By the time the march finished, police said the total number of demonstrators was 3,000. The organizers put the figure at 6,700.
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A clam spokeswoman (the same who lied to the Kempinski Hotel when she said that the conference is not related to scientology) claimed that 6.500 people had already confirmed their appearance at the demo, and that she expects 30,000.
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It took a while, but I _finally_ found a Swedish newspaper with a report from the demo. They state that hundreds of adherents to the scientology church held a demo in Berlin. Please note hundreds, not thousands.
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