I recently received an annoying, unsolicited spam announcement from the Jive Aces that, without being blind-copied, included their entire list numbering over 1000 recipients. In turn, I copied everyone on the list with the following message:

<<Since whomever handles this mailing list rudely broke common netiquette by not blind-copying their promotional missive, allow me to add my feedback...

The Jive Aces are literally a front group for the criminal cult of Scientology, and Whether it be John Travolta, Tom Cruise or a hack outfit like the Jive Aces, I stand firmly against any so-called "opinion leaders" shilling for an organization that has ruined countless lives.

As a journalist, I infiltrated, then exposed Scientology with my feature story in Spy magazine, "Do You Want To Buy a Bridge?" --

http://www.drasticmedia.com/Scientology.html --

Since then, I have been continually harassed by the cult, be it via their erstwhile fugitive from international justice President, their small-minded "intelligence" arm OSA (Office of Special Affairs) or their greedy lawyers.

Rather than litigate against a cult employing such bloodsuckers, I've continually taken the high road -- penning and publishing exposes on Scientology at any given opportunity.

Others damaged by the cult have not been as fortunate.

Lisa McPherson wrongfully lost her life as a result of cult "technology" gone hideously, tragically, criminally awry --

http://www.lisamcpherson.org/ --

Former Scientology minister/Earthlink founder Reed Slatkin now sits in prison, having bilked hundreds of unwitting investors out of their life savings in what's being recognized as the biggest Ponzi scheme of all time --

http://www.slatkinfraud.com/ --

Rather than linking you to hundreds of web sites that expose the crime cult and it's endless activity operating as a nonprofit group that blackmailed federal employees into its tax-free status, I'll now direct you to the most popular Scientology-related site on the Internet for a detailed overview and massive cross-linkage about the Mafia that operates under the guise of religion --

http://www.xenu.net/

No jive here.

Mark Ebner Journalist-at-large>>

While many of the replies to my mailing were the typical claptrap you'll find below, I received a bunch of personal notes thanking me for opening their eyes about a cult they knew little about. That means that they actually took it upon themselves to do some web research on their own. Though I fully admit to not observing netiquette, I did manage educate and to incite and interesting thread. Enjoy...

*Note: I'm now in an interesting private e-mail thread with this woman:

<<Hi Mark,

The scientology stuff was an interesting read, and i have understood for a while about their activities. The question is: how do you know that The jive Aces are a front group for the scientologists? I've met them and they are happy enough blokes from the UK with okay music. How did you come up with the link?

Thanks

<name deleted>>>

*Note: I responded to this woman with links to my non-scientology work:

<<Have you ever seen this band??? Who cares what they are...(Religion!). I am on their e-mail guest list cause I have seen them and they are great!!!! I do not need any extra feedback from you....Talk about etiquette! As for you being a journalist and all...

Let me know if you should ever write a story that has something good to say.

Because then, and only then... would I be more inclined to read it! Till then, <name deleted>>

*Note: Clearly, there are some critics already lurking in their midst:

<<Dear Everybody,

I agree. I just checked my e-meter and the thetans right now are overpowering my ability to refrain from responding - but no one else should voice their own worthless opinions - especially not to the selected one's (SO's) on this list - with that I wholly concur. Let this be that last word and none more be said.

One hasn't too dig too deep to realize that about every major religion in the world is in some kind of deep shit, Let's see. The Muslim's are responsible for 911. The Jews are responsible for the Muslims being angry at the Christians who are responsible for befriending the Jews. Of those the Catholics - need we say more, and this only serves to remind us of the scandals in the protestant churches in the last decade.

Religion is becoming a bit like politics - the shorter and less-interesting your History - the better candidate you become. As an x-cult member myself (Not Scientology) I appreciate the need to pressure religious and other cultural groups to be forthcoming and transparent - for which I respect Mr. Ebner.

Certainly the Jive Aces should be encouraged to defend and explain their beliefs So why not hear from them? What is their relationship with Scientology?

is it quid pro quo? - Or do you really buy into the bullshit about thetans and emeters and xenu? This Scientology is no longer a closed door secret - the holy books have been translated into the language of the people and are available for public discussion - and bottom line - as the basis of a religion - they make witch doctoring and large black rocks look substantial.

I've spoken to the Jive Aces - and they have said they're all Scientologists and I think something like "it helped us a lot" or thereabouts (That would have been in SF). Actually didn't realize it when they were playing in front of the scientology building in hollywood for the Christmas Parade. But I doubt there is any question but that they are indeed members of the thetan club - and I rather guess celebrity members at that.

<name deleted>>>

*Note: Here's the typical "I'm not a Scientologist" response:

<<Please!

Fellow readers of this list, do NOT jump to the bait here.

We all know that idea that the Jive Aces are responsible for the unfortunate death of Lisa McPherson is so preposterous as to not warrent consideration, so please let's do just that: not consder it.

Similarly I assume that we all know that the teachings of the Chuch of Scientology, which some of us here no doubt follow and others do not, are controversial.

Each person should investigate the truth for him or herself and reach his or own conclusions.

But please do NOT respond to this mail.

I realize that I'm setting a bad example here, but by responding quickly I hope that I can stave off a minor mail disaster.

Something like this happened with another musical group's mail that I read (The Bobs, I think, but I can't quite recall), and it was months before the e-mail flood receeded.

PLEASE do not respond to the list.

(Hassle individuals as much as you wish; if this is typical of the way that Mr.

Ebner behaves I should hardly wonder that he gets harassed. But please don't copy the entire list.)

Thank you.

PS: For the terribly curious: I am *not* a follower of the Chuch of

Scientology. But I hope that's not the point here.>>

*Note: This one came from a quasi-celeb signing himself "Scientologist":

<<remove me from your list you sad man

<name deleted>

Scientologist>>

*Note: Classic Scientologese!:

<<Mr Ebner, "Music"... is a culture of freedom...A culture is only as great as its artists!!! Artists have great power... and are able to change many things for the better.... in this world! I will continue to celebrate and support whatever I choose to!!! That is "freedom"! If a religion or group of people were promoting hate, and hurting or killing others...I would be the first on line to put a stop to it.

"Know" what you are talking about, or fighting against!

Reciting some headlines from some internet story, or some journalist lookingto make a quick buck, or Time magazine...It really does not do it for me...I observe and look at people, and take an interest to see how they do things...especially if they are succeeding in life! If I see someone getting great results, I wanna know how they are doing it! John Travolta has been an inspiration to me even before he was a scientologist! And he is even more of a role model for me NOW! As a scientologist! The #1 man in Hollywood! Great marriage and family! Great person! He is definitely doing something right!

And I want to know what it is and how he's doing it! That is the difference between you and me <name deleted>...and your friend Mr Ebner! Find out for yourself what Scientology really is...

Go and have that "hard look at it". Like you are telling others to do!

I will go and find out for myself, and make my own decision....

That is FREEDOM!

<name deleted>

P.S. lose my e-mail address in the meantime!>>

*Note: Clearly pissed off:

<<TO WHOM IT MAY CONCERN:

PLEASE NOTE THAT, BEYOND THE FACT THAT I ONCE WROTE A SMALL FEATURE ARTICLE ABOUT THEM IN ONE OF MY UK PRINT MEDIA COLUMNS, I HAVE ABSOLUTELY NO INTEREST IN THE JIVE ACES, OR THEIR CURRENT ALLEGIANCES OR ACTIVITIES ... ALLEGED OR OTHERWISE

KINDLY REMOVE MY DETAILS FROM YOUR MAILING LIST FORTHWITH.

THANK YOU <name deleted>>>

*Note: Can't we all just get along?:

<<I don't know who started this thread, or how I got on it, but please remove my email address. But before I go, let me just say - I've been a working professional musician for over 20 years. I've also been a missionary for a prominent Christian religion (we all have our checkered pasts, eh?).

Scientology works for a lot of people, as does Christianity, Bhuddism, Judaism, Islam, etc., etc.The beautiful thing about music is that it can communicate across those divisions and between those divergent world views and bring us together in a way that nothing else can. Religion, on the other hand, has a history of dividing and separating us. True, if you've found a great thing, people won't know if you don't share,but bear in mind that such sharing is extremely charged and carries with it an inherent judgement that the other person's way is flawed. Consequently, the use of a venue dedicated to the appreciation of _music_ is inappropriate for this kind of discussion and contaminates the otherwise beautiful connection that we share through music. If you'd like to share, do it on a personal level, please; and please leave me out of it. I'm quite happy, well-adjusted, and self-actualized.

Thanks for you time.

<name deleted>

PS: Please don't forget to remove me from your list. Thanks.>>

*Note: This woman wants no part of it:

<<To Mr. Ebner:

I'd like to inform you that one source failing to protect their list of addressees does NOT allow you to add your feedback. Since when do to wrongs make a right? Only when today's major religions are perverted to they promote that type of action.

To Mr. Ebner, <names deleted>:

Had I known that signing an email list at the end of a great night out dancing in a cheery little midwestern town would've placed me in the middle of a socio-religio-political imbroglio some three years later, I would've refrained.

In other words, leave me out of this. I consider your uninvited emails to be harassment.

Yours Earnestly,

<name deleted>>>

*Note: Fane mail from Clearwater:

<<Dear <name deleted>:

I was one of them who received your email. And I hope you accept my statement.

Why not use such circumstances to make the best out of the email - it is a substitution for personal communication face to face, which i would frankly prefer. My name is <name deleted>, I am 50 years old and I am in the music business for ever and working with musicians of any caliber together up to the highest level possible just sold 2 of my sound systems to Stevie Wonder etc......

Music, though abused here and there, is a form of art and art is one of the very highst standards in this world of communication and creation. Every true artist is blessed and a very valuable person on this planet, ( regardless his level of success an recognition) trying to help to make it a better world. Art does change the world. And it is great you are one of them.

I understand where you are coming from when you talk about Scientology. You speka the same language I spoke or thought 20 years ago. I took over the opinion which was available - media - - until one day I read some books - actually close to 10, talked to some Scientologist personally - you would be amazed to know how many artists are Scientlogists - and they explained to me what I needed to know to truly understand.

I felt so bad , about myself, you would not believe it. I was always a freedom fighter, believed that I was a clear thinker, nobody could manipulate me, I knew what a sgpoing on and how the world runs.......

And now all of a sudden I had to confront that propaganda in 1985 worked on me like it did on my father in 1938 in Germany, for which I always blamed him for being so stupid to accept the propaganda and not researching the true data.

I was not better than he was. Tough to confront this. I had mightly long hair and I was oh soooo cool. I was not.

So I started from scratch to learn, what no school taught me......how does the world function, how do people think and what makes them do good and bad things.I even worked for a while for the media and found out how this works.

And I discovered for myself my 3 basics questions:

- where do I come from - why am I here - where do I go after

I became a better person, discovered my talents from day to day and I am truly far from being perfect , but I keep working at it.

In a nutshell I can tell from true experience - Scientology helps to develop true freedom for everyone and for this Planet. It is not easy, but it is done everyday.

Do you have any true personal experience to base your opinion on - or did you just take over what you heard?

Lisa McPherson - I guess you did not know her. I did - she was a personal friend of mine. It seems you have read the press at that time this case took off - it seems you do not know the ending of that case. This is very unfortunate, because the press did not promote the true end of this case, as they did the start. If you are truly interested, all the truth is available to read and what the final result was.

As far it concerns the Jive Aces - I had the pelasure to meet with them on various occasions and even to work with them. They are true artists who take their profession as entertainers very serious, work hard, travel like crazy, are always on the run, never say we can not do it, we are too tired, leave me alone.... Great great spirits and they perfected their style of music.

They are truly free beings who promote Scientology - which is a technology and a philosophy to take responsibility and to become free.

And their music is simply good music. You do not watch John Travolta movies because he is a Scientologist ?? You do not listen to Isaac Hayes because there are dangeriuous messages in his music??

I would say 99% of the world population has a particular religion because their parents had this religion. I was born and raised catholic, because my parents were. I am dead sure, if my parents would have been muslims I would have been raised as a muslim.

Did you know that we have muslims, jews, catholics of each and every color, protestants, buddists etc..in Scientology?? Thousands in every age, color, race, "religion"...... Most of them are above the age of 40 I would say, as they chose - freely chose - their religion after looking around for years.

Scientology is one of the few religions fighting officially for free speech and free practise of philosophy and speech. If you really want to have a proof of this I could give you dozends of articles to proof all that. You would not believe what the Church of Scientology has done particularly in this field over the past 50 years.

But that would mean instead of 2 minutes instant news on the new channels, sit down and read and find out - and make up your on mind - truly your own opinion.

That' s harder but more rewarding than only listening to news.

I am more than happy to talk to you in which way of communication - it is up to you if you decide to truly find out for yourself and then to have an opinion of which you may truly say you researched it.

If you are prepared to that - I am available for you. Anytime.

All the best

<name deleted>

Clearwater Florida>>

*Note: Critics ahoy!:

<<Look I like the Jive Aces music - and if they didn't bring Scientology into the picture - it wouldn't be there - but they do promote it - and thus one should have a long hard look at what scientology is before inviting scientology into your culture. Swing is a culture of freedom and personal expression - The Jive Aces represent the opposite - a culture of bondage (No escaping the cult) and the suppression of free speech - they are the only "religion" to threaten free discussion of religion in the US and currently implicated in the death of one Lisa McPherson - see npr. So ask yourselves - what you are celebrating and what you support. <name deleted>>>

*Note: I left this guy's contact info intact. Anyone who continues unsolicited promotion on yet ANOTHER open-copied e-mail deserves the wrath:

<<At the risk of jumping into this pit again, a few facts:

First, and most importantly:

******************************************************************************

TO BE REMOVED FROM THE JIVE ACES MAILING LIST, please sent mail to:

The Jive Aces <band@jiveaces.com>

******************************************************************************

Only one person can remove you from the Jive Aces mailing list.

That person is the maintainer of the mailing list, Mr. Alex Douglas, my favorite member (the trombone player) of my favorite band. You can reach him at the above address.

Doing a group reply to ask to be removed just generates more annoying traffic for everybody else, who can't do anything about it anyway.

No matter whether you are removed from the underlying mailing list or not you may continue to receive mail from people following up to posts like this, because once the mail goes out with everybody's address in the to: line, it's in everybody's mail box and no force on earth can remove it from there. So even after you *have* been removed from the list you may continue to get annoying messages. If so, please just delete them--don't add to the problem.

You might want to think twice about whether you *want* to removed,

though: as I just pointed out, asking to be removed will not stop all the "please remove me" or other "followup" messages, but it *will* stop you from getting updates on the best neo-swing band on either side of the Atlantic.

(Hopefully you are, or at least once were, interested in such updates or you wouldn't be on the list to start with.)

The technical problem with the list has been remedied (Mr. Douglas sent me personal mail, and I assume that that information is not privileged) so the TO:

addresses should not be going out in the future; thus, this problem should be a one-time occurrance. (Granted that the Jive Aces are human so there are no absolute guarantees.)

So, if you don't care to get info on the Jive Aces, send mail to

band@jiveaces.com asking to be removed; otherwise, please exercise your delete key. Please don't send mail to the entire list regardless.

Thank you. And please accept my apologies in advance for adding to the clutter just a bit. My only intention with both this message and my previous message is to reduce the clutter for everyone on the list; if this message causes at least a few messages not to be sent to the entire group that otherwise would have been, then I will have succeeded.

--

Brian T. Schellenberger . . . . . . . bts@wnt.sas.com (work)

Brian, the man from Babble-On . . . . bts@babbleon.org (personal)

http://www.babbleon.org

http://www.eff.org http://www.programming-freedom.org

PS: As long as I'm here anyway . . .

If anybody would be interested in being *in* a discussion list about the Jive Aces which would be intended for two-way communication--a fan list, not a band list*--let me know. If there's enough interest I'll look into setting up a yahoo group or some other public mailing list for those who want more, rather than less, Jive Aces-related mail.

*Of course, any band members reading this would be welcome to sign up, too!

PPS: I've never done this before so please don't sign up if you aren't

prepared to tolerate the occasional technical glitch.>>

*Note: Finally, a bandmember promotes parishioners.org. Let it never again be said that the Jive Asses don't promote Scientology. They do:

<<Dear people on the Jive Aces mailing list,

Firstly I would like to apologize for the recent barrage of strange

messages that you may have been receiving from a certain Mark Ebner

(ebner59@aol.com). The last mailing I sent out I accidentally put your

address (along with a small section of our mailing list including Mr

Ebner's) in the TO: field and so as he managed to wangle his way onto my list (why, I don't know because he obviously isn't a lover of hot rockin' swing music). Apparently he has been Spamming the rest of the list with some less than truthful and quite positively bizarre literature.Also if you want to stop further spamming of your e-mail address, I suggest that you reply to the originator and tell him to take you off his list (NB. Please DO NOT REPLY TO THE ENTIRE LIST as this only further aggravates the problem).In closing, if this has caused any problems or upset then please write to me separately and I will do all I can to help resolve this matter.Again, sorry for the inconvenience and I hope to see you cutting a rug on the dance floor in the near future.

Alex - Jive Aces

P.S. As you know the purpose of the Jive Aces mailing list is to inform fans of the band of upcoming concerts and recent news of the band's activities. Yes the members of the band are Scientologists and would never refuse to answer anyones' questions about it but that is a separate, private discussion if anyone asked, i.e. not the purpose of our mailing list. As Mr Ebner's mail contained much false information on the subject I feel compelled to inform you of somewhere where you can get the other side of the coin, so to speak. This is at www.parishioners.org.>>

*Note: This one is a bonus because I thought it was funny.

<<Please check out the following website full of songs, places to dance around the world, dance lessons available, competition results & more.

www.dancedk.com

Enjoy,

<name deleted>>>

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