These people are anonymous

That's right, they're anonymous.

I knew I wanted to head up and try and get a blip of their demonstration today when I first heard about it. Apparently the campaign started, or at least gathered pace, after a video of a wide eyed crazy looking Tom Cruise rambling about Scientology. According to Tom if he passes a car crash he is the only one capable of doing anything about it, also his church, if it can be called that, are the leading authorities on getting paople of drugs and the leading authorities on the mind. Try watching the video and see if you can glean any sense or even rational thought out of what the man is saying.

I have to admit prior to this I didn't know much about Scientology. Sure, everyone knows the Cruise family and many of their celebrity friends are members. Other than that I remember hearing someone talk about undertaking one of their personality tests during a bored moment and about how their line of questioning seemed geared to prey on people who were unhappy and thought they were unusual due to the fact they weren't happy all of the time regardless of money or opportunities they have Seems perfect for a narcissistic bunch of celebrities when you put it like that. I also knew the whole thing was started by L Ron Hubbard as a way to gain influence and sell more books.

The other thing I knew about them was that, during their personality tests they hook you up to a device they call the E-meter or Hubbard Electrometer. This was the first really sinister thing I heard about them. The reason it is sinister is that, if you do a little research on the E-meter it is basically the same thing as a Wheatstone Bridge which is used for measuring Galvanic Skin Response. In science the measurement of galvanic skin response is primarily used to measure a subjects succeptibility to hypnotic suggestion at any given time. Now call me a cynic but there is something deeply wron with an organisation, claiming to be a religion, who's initial interviews and contact with potential members are carried out in a situation where they are monitorint whether their subjects are prone to hypnotic suggestion.

On hearing about this whole anonymous thing or Project Chanology to give it it's official name I found out far more about the background to Scientology. Since their inception there have been accusations of them killing, or being responsible for the death of, members (many banners today read " google Lisa McPherson") massive smear campaigns and even illegal activities in the form of Operation Freakout and Operation Snow White. The latter of these two was an attempt to eradicate information about the allegedly dubious past of their founder L Ron Hubbard. Added to this the fact that in the last twenty years they are alleged to have spent between one and two billion dollars on litigation alone and it makes for a very suspicious organisation.

Anyway by the time we made it into town today the whole thing was nearly over and there was probably more police there than protesters, but a friend had passed about three hours earlier and reckoned there were between two and three hundred demonstrators all with their faces covered. I wonder if they got similar turnouts at all Scientology centres worldwide.