At 6:15 PM 5/20/96, Rich Burroughs wrote:
At 01:08 AM 5/20/96 -0700, tcmay@got.net (Timothy C. May) wrote: [snip]
And the issue of CoS seeking legal actions against those they claim are violating their copyrights is separable from their religious status.
Not at all. Their actions are based on their religious doctrines, as passed down by Hubbard. "Always attack, never defend." Their claims of copyright violation are part of an ongoing effort to silence those who criticize their illegal and immoral practices. They should be examined in that context.
I don't care what their motivations, religious or other, are.
As I see it, some people here (including some good friends of mine, by the way) are caught up in a religious war. Those opposed to CoS are "outing" putative CoS secrets by aggressive use of remailers. The CoS is fighting back. Is anyone surprised?
I've been following alt.religion.scientology mostly for entertainment reasons, and occasionally to correct some of the false statements about psychiatry made by Scientologists. There's more to the story than you appear to be aware of. The extra-legal actions didn't originate with the alleged copyright violations, nor are the legal actions of the cult limited to protecting their copyrights. Now that the cypherpunks have been brought to their attention it's entirely possible that the major posters on this newsgroup will become the subject of Scientology's, or rather Religious Technology Center's legal actions. I believe the original legal action relates to the posting of court documents that contained cult scripture. And the cease and desist letters are sent for what are clearly fair use extracts. If someone were to be so unkind as to post a certain six sentences to this newsgroup we might see toad.com shut down. Yes, the cult does have a legitimate interest in protecting their copyrights. No, the cult does not have a valid reason for using the heavy-handed legal tactics of which they are so fond. -- if not me, then who? mailto:ethridge@onramp.net http://rampages.onramp.net/~ethridge/