R.I.P. Shawn Lonsdale

In case anyone's living under a rock lately, Scientology critic Shawn Lonsdale died recently in what is being called an 'apparent suicide.' It is unclear whether there was room for Co$ involvement, but the circumstances were sketchy -- he died in his home after a hose had been pushed into a window and attached to his car exhaust, similar to how Quentin Hubbard, L. Ron's homosexual son, died. This is, to say the least, an unusual and inefficient way to commit suicide.

If indeed this was technically suicide, it is fair to say that the harassment he suffered at the hands of Scientology likely contributed to the state of mind he was in at the time of his death. Also, given that he lived in Clearwater, whether or not the police department is capable of an investigation not colored by the interests of the Co$ is up for debate, and many posters on enturbulation have been working on the Tampa area media and their FBI branch office.

At any rate, Shawn made many excellent contributions to our cause, and it is a shame that he is gone now, when progress is finally picking up speed. My condolences go out to his surviving friends and relatives.

Whether or not it was intended as such by the Co$, let this be a wake up call concerning what can happen to critics who devote themselves to exposing the Church. If you become prominent and non-Anonymous, you are subject to Fair Game.

Personally, just in case of the rare and absolutely terrifying consequence of dying under suspicious circumstances, I am writing an anti-suicide note and saving it to my desktop and leaving copies in various other places and in the hands of loved ones, so that anything that happens to me will not be presumed a suicide. After all, I appeared on the news in only sunglasses, was quoted in the paper, and my name is known by a few who are aware of my involvement. Though it is very unlikely, I just want my bases covered.

All my love, to Anonymous and to Shawn,

Miss Anonymous.

Flyers?

Spotted on the CMU campus on a pole near Hunt Library. Anyone want to take credit? Any other flyer sightings in Pittsburgh?

I think the time has come for some kind of larger-scale flyer campaign on campuses, etc. Comment with feedback and plans.

Also, while I applaud the effort here, this flyer misspelled "Government," so be careful to proofread any future signage. Also, as a given, do not post things where you are not allowed to post them, such as to other people's private property.

Update on Message to Scientology Video

Apparently it was put back up on YouTube.

Project Chanology on Wikipedia

So, the Pittsburgh protest made the Wikipedia page on Project Chanology protests...they noted the cold weather and the people who traveled from Penn State to attend.

I'm sure one of you probably wrote it, but in case anyone hasn't seen it yet, I'm leaving it up here.

And, in other not so good news, for anyone who hasn't heard yet: YouTube has pulled the Anonymous "Message to Scientology" video for some form of terms of service violation.


Love,
Miss Anonymous

There was immaturity here, ignore it.

Signage for the 3/15 Rally

Hey guys,

Just a few things I wanted to point out about signs for the next protest -- specifically, the large foamboard-type signs to hold up for passing cars during the event.

First off, the most durable types of handmade signs turned out to be the traditional marker-on-foamboard variety. Things that had printed paper taped to a board did not hold up to the wind, so refrain from this style of sign next time. The more professionally made ones, like the one on the pole with the "When your check clears" bit were very effective, I thought, so if anyone has the capability to make signs like that, go for it.

Also -- when the PPG reporter visited, he commented about how we were claiming not to be a hate group, but we had a "honk if you hate Scientology" sign. Now, the "honk if" concept turned out to be very effective -- I heard people estimate an 80% honkage rate, which is awesome. However, we need a new verb for signs like this. Something that won't send a mixed message when we try to portray the fact that we don't hate religion or other people's beliefs. "Oppose" or a less "hate"-like word would do. Feel free to post suggestions here. We definitely need the honk signs, though -- clearly, the cops didn't mind the horn noise, and it obviously got the attention of motorists.

XOXO,
Miss Anonymous.

How to Approach Operation Party Hard (3/15/2008)

It seems to be considered a given at this point that Pittsburgh Anons will be taking part in Operation Party Hard, the next tentatively-planned raid on Saturday, March 15, 2008.

Now, considering the press that Anonymous and the Pittsburgh Anons have gotten with the first demonstration, it is quite possible that we're attracting a new demographic of people who are interested in participating for the next round. I'm writing here as a way of eliciting ideas for the handling of an influx of new potential protesters.

Currently, the Anonymous protesters seem to be college-aged or recently graduated from college, Internet-savvy/obsessed, and reasonably in keeping with the necessity of keeping identities discreet, obeying local codes of conduct for peaceful protests, not giving in to the temptation of directly confronting members of CoS, etc.

But last time, Anonymous was pretty easy to keep under control. The vast majority of us were either active posters or friends of active posters in such places as forums.enturbulation.org, Something Awful, or CoSplay, and as a result updates were easy to dispense, rules easy to lay down, and so on.

I'm beginning to get the sense that next time, we're going to have a whole slew of newbies involved. And while the greater exposure and with it the increased support from the local community is a wonderful, wonderful thing, I personally believe it is a double-edged sword.

Case in point: I have an annoying little sister who has never heard of 4chan, rickrolling, neckbeards, Guy Fawkes, or goons. She likes such things as Hannah Montana and cute purses. However, she tells me that my high school alma mater is abuzz with news of Project Chanology and the Pittsburgh protest. Because she is a flipping idiot, she has semi-outed me, no doubt due to her immense pride in my actions, to her classmates. As a result, she has been inundated with offers to "help" with Party Hard.

Needless to say, I reamed her out for her ignorance regarding WHY the group had to remain Anonymous. I don't think she quite managed to convey to others the importance of this aspect of our movement. And it makes me uneasy that the only real way we have to communicate with this group is by using her as a proxy.

I wouldn't be blogging this if I didn't suspect this high school incident of being a microcosm of the situation that is about to arise in the weeks leading up to Party Hard. Basically, the next generation of Anonymous is going to be well-intentioned but more unpredictable and difficult to communicate with en masse.

Please comment with suggestions for handling the participation in the next protest. Despite the drawbacks of it all, I still believe there is strength in numbers and that surpassing fifty for the next event will be a win for us, so I don't want to write off new protesters.

Love Always,
Miss Anonymous

Front page!

So, we got on the front page of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, which is pretty awesome. I thought their article had a few issues, but at least they make it clear that we're protesting their tactics, not their beliefs. Read it for yourself here:
http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/08042/856555-85.stm

giv3m3truth's coverage of the protest

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vBqN9d8D_Zc
Seems like he was mostly there right at the start, but he got some good interviews with "Lisa" and "Noah" (I hope he knew those were pseudonyms).

Channel 4 Coverage

So, for those of you who missed the Channel 4 coverage of the raid, it was generally very positive. They explained very clearly how we don't attack CoS's beliefs, only its methods, and had an interview with Miss Anon where she did a very good job of representing our position. They also had more than a few shots of our signs, which does a good job of spreading our message. They did, of course, have to air the response from the Scientologists, which was basically the standard "Anon == bigots" thing, but that argument rang pretty empty when taken together with the rest of the segment. I think, though they couldn't say it, Channel 4 was pretty clearly on our side (we got a lot more airtime than the CoS :p). Hopefully all the other news reports will be equally well done.

Also, it'd be really great if people, particularly people who saw the report, would voice their appreciation at a job well done. Channel 4's contact page is:
http://www.thepittsburghchannel.com/station/index.html

2/10 Protest Results

So, for a summary, a shameless copypasta from what I wrote on Chanology:
It was damn cold, and damn windy, but we had at least 30-40 people despite that. The protest was right next to a busy street (Carson St.), and many drivers responded to the "Honk if you hate Scientology" (as well as "Honk if you think Tom Cruise is insane") signs. We even had an ambulance honk. Virtually no response from the CoS, there were a couple of police officers stationed across the street at the CoS building, but this may have been because we contacted them beforehand. We had a good amount of media coverage, including newspapers and even a local news channel. Will post links to these as they become available.
Overall, a very good, peaceful, protest, which I think got the message across very clearly. No legal troubles or troubles with CoS members.

Now, a request: if anyone has any pictures, videos, etc., please either email them to me or email me a link where I can find them. I'll be putting up a compilation of media from the protest once I get some more responses to this.

Another request: as some of you know, we got media coverage (epic win!). I don't have all the info on who's going to be covering us when, etc., so email me that, or drop a comment, if you have that info.

And now, a personal message to all of you who braved the single-digit windchills to get out there and fight the good fight: Awesome job, guys. Everyone did amazingly well at keeping the protest nonviolent and informative, rather than offensive. It's absolutely great that the police who were there spent 99% of their time inside the CoS building. Hopefully the media coverage will reflect what I saw today: a group of concerned, committed citizens fighting to get the truth out there in a nonviolent fashion. Let's see the CoS try to spin that one the same way they attacked us in their last press release (though I'm sure they'll try). Excellent work, everyone.

Love,
Xenu

PGH Anon blog created

I coordinated the 2/10 raid/protest nearly entirely over email, with a little help from the IRC channel. This turned out to be reasonably effective, but it was a lot of work, and it made it so that the only way to get information on the raid was to contact me directly, or use the slightly limited resources available online. While this did have the advantage of keeping the information contained to a smaller group, it's not like it would've been hard to infiltrate - pretty much, if you contacted me, you got on the mailing list. The list was also somewhat difficult to maintain, particularly with having to figure out who needed what information, etc.
So, I had the idea (naturally, during the raid itself) to set up a blog as a central point of information for the Pittsburgh area Anons in our fight against Scientology. I feel that this way we can have a website anyone can point to that has up to date information on events (no more business like the 9th/10th confusion caused by a misprint on ED). In addition, we can have multiple people certified to post, which will lessen the load on me (wondering why some emails got out later than they probably should have? Xenu had work...or was lazy...) It also gives you a good site to link other people to when trying to recruit them for events.
So yeah, we have a blog now. If you want posting rights, contact me, though this will probably be limited to people I've met IRL (no offense, but you guys understand the need for security). While most posts will be event-related, some may just be relevant info about Scientology, etc. We'll see how it goes

-Xenu