"Bat Child (Sue M.)" wrote:

> Found at:
>
> http://www.myinky.com/ecp/letters_to_the_editors/article/0,1626,ECP_769_1202586,00.html
>
> ====================
>
> [snip]
>
> Scientology story lacked information
>
> To the editor:
>
> A wire service story concerning the Church of Scientology in Florida
> which ran on May 18 on the Internet site of the Evansville Courier &
> Press ("Man who fought Scientology testifies for church") left out
> some pertinent information, and I would appreciate the opportunity to
> correct that. The truth, as determined by the state medical examiner,
> is that a member of our church died as a result of a pulmonary
> embolism. The witch hunt perpetrated by Robert Minton and Ken Dandar
> is nothing more than an attempt to smear the religion of Scientology
> and profit by the unfortunate death of a church member. This is not
> the first time we have been attacked by bigoted individuals. If the
> Evansville Courier & Press wants to do a story on Scientology, you
> might want to look into the work done at Ground Zero in New York City
> by more than 800 volunteer ministers who traveled from all over the
> country, including Illinois and Indiana, to give aid and comfort to
> rescue workers and victims of that tragedy. After a few days, the New
> Yorkers who had never heard of the Church of Scientology were knocking
> at our doors to ask how they could learn the Assist Processes our
> ministers used to help the hundreds of police and firemen at that
> disaster site. You might want to talk about the thousands of children
> and adults who have learned to read, thanks to the World Literacy
> Crusade which uses the study technology developed by Scientology
> founder L. Ron Hubbard.
>
> Charles Benedetti
>
> Mount Prospect, Ill.
>
> ====================
>
> http://members.cox.net/batchild1
> http://members.cox.net/scorseseinfo

Editor,

If the Evansville Courier & Press wanted to do an article on Scientology, you would do well to research sources outside the Scientology Organization for a real world perspective on this cult. Scientology has many front groups designed solely to put a happy public face on a sinister, secretive organization.

Lisa McPherson, the Scientologist who died from negligence while being held against her will in Florida, lost 40 lbs. during her 17 day incarceration. This is not consistant with death from a blood clot. The Medical Examiner initially attributed the cause of death to dehydration. When the Scientologists finally decided to transport her to the hospital, they selected one 20 minutes away where there was a Scientologist doctor, passing up two others.

Joan Woods, the ME, abruptly changed her diagnosis to attribute the death from a blood clot, and subsequently quit her job and vanished. Lisa McPherson's condition has been well documented, yet Mr. Benedetti prefers to offer the shore story put out by the Scientology PR department. This case is set to go to trial now in August 2002.

If I were writing an article about Scientology, I would also include the behavior of another cult front group, the Volunteer Ministers. They flock to disaster like vultures. At Columbine high school following the shootings, they handed out their propaganda to vulnerable and grieving families. Following 9-11, they converged on New York City, disrupting rescue efforts as well as legitimate mental health services. Fox News was deceived into running a crawling banner across their news feed, advertising the National Mental Health Assistance group, another Scientology front group who's name mimics the legitimate National Mental Health Association. This was noticed when someone realized that the 800 number was also the number for Dianetics. Fox was alerted and the banner was pulled.

Research into Scientology's 50 year history exposes it as something less than beneficial and humanitarian. There are far too many accounts of families, minds, and lives destroyed, not to mention savings and careers. Organizations dedicated to helping people recover from cults note that it takes much longer to recover from Scientology's mental processing than other cults. The Scientology Organization behaves more like a crime family than a church. It actively attacks people who speak out against it, abuses our court system to harrass its critics, and attempts to discredit and intimidate people who try to expose the fraud and criminality of Scientology.

I would be delighted if more newspapers did articles covering this group! There is a wealth of information on them in newspaper archives, as well as on the web.

A good place for those interested in learning about Scientology is http://www.xenu.net. This extensive website is constantly targetted by Scientology, who would like very much for it to go away.