After doing their best to keep Scientology from opening a new organization in Ireland, and failing miserably – but stirring up a lot of hatred for Scientology there – John McGhee tweeted this tweet calling Scientologists “vermin” and saying Scientologists are “not welcome in Ireland”.
He also led a “raid” of a Church in Edinburgh, screaming at staff members who have harmed no one, and with small children studying in the courseroom.
Here, he harasses a group of musicians in a pub, solely because they are Scientologists.
For some people, the attention of being a big bad “SP” fighting the righteous fight against the fraud and abuse of Scientology is an inconsequential, if toxic, pastime. But for John McGhee, I sense there is something more there – something actually sinister that should be watched.
First Leah Remini tells the Hollywood Reporter that all Scientologists believe in pedophilia. Then Mike Rinder calls all Scientologists “vermin”. Now militant jackboots like McGhee have taken that up.
Not a good look for anti-Scientology. And not a good trend at all if you really want to target the specifc abusers in Scientology – like David Miscavige – and their specific abuse.
I do not believe John McGhee is out to do this at all. No, there’s something more sinister in John McGhee, which you can see in these videos.
I’ve now said my piece.
In the Jive Aces video he is definitely hyped up. The trumpet player got assaultive, the OSA woman was creepy. The French man made Scientology look good.
Once again it seemed to end on a friendly note.
I am not seeing the “sinister” side to any of this, or a militant jackboot.
I agree however that this is probably a toxic pastime, not sure that the protests in these two cases actually accomplished anything.
It’s funny that you have this attitude about this kind of behavior. I know that the question I’m about to ask you has been asked before but this time consider thinking about it. Anti-Scientologists usually roll their eyes and hide away from the question because Scientology is “different” because it is completely invalid and they therefore “deserve” it.
But what if these people were Jews?
Picture this video the same, but McGhee was targeting them because they were Jews.
Would the behavior of that OSA woman who was put into that attack situation – as a Jew – look creepy to you?
How about the trumpet player? If he fought back as a Jew would you see his actions as “assaultive”?
And make no mistake, the reason this assault by McGhee ended on a “friendly note” is all because of the Scientologists and not at all because of John McGhee. If the Scientologists did not work constantly to de-escalate this attack by McGhee, and let John McGhee know how exactly he was out of line here (quite rightly), it would have ended in a brawl.
What if I asked you this, Eileen? I’m not accusing here – but I am really asking you to consider this:
Have these kinds of “raid” videos that target Scientologists – simply because they are Scientologists – become a kind of entertainment outlet for you?
Do these videos act out what you yourself want to do to these Scientologists?
Alanzo, throw some ice water on your rhetoric, it is getting overheated.
People have a right to protest. However, I think an important dividing line is when “hands on” occurs, or property destruction. The only incident of that was the Scientology trumpeter.
What if the OSA woman was a Jew? What if she was a Nazi? Either way she was creepy to me. I wasn’t speaking about her belief system, but rather about her affect.
Other than the trumpeter I think both sides acted legally.
Have these types of videos become a source of entertainment for me? I only watched them because you suggested it. Now I am criticized by you for watching them?
Do these videos act out what I want to do to Scientologists?? Are you truly asking me that? Consider your answer Brazen Mask Boy.
I apologize if you’ve never seen a Scientology “raid” video. They’ve been around since the 1990s. There are dozens, hundreds of them. And I thought for sure you’d seen them before. They are part of anti-Scientology culture.
So really, I do apologize if you’ve never seen one and this is the first one you’ve seen, and now I am suggesting that you find them entertaining because this is what you want to see done to innocent Scientologists.
Or do you believe that the concept of “innocent Scientologist” actually exists?
I asked because you seemed to approve of McGhee’s behavior, as do a lot of Anti-Scientologists. And I wanted to know if there was an entertainment value in it for you. Because Scientologists are the “other”, right? The “out-group”. Not really fully as human as “us”, the “in-group”.
So why not attack innocent Scientologists who have nothing to do with the abuses and video it to show others so they can get their kicks out of it, too?
Right?
And yes, people do have a right to protest. I actually talked to a few of the people who did the raid in Edinburgh, including telling John McGhee what I thought of him and his attacks on innocent Scientologists. I said that standing out on the street and handing out pamphlets was perfectly acceptable. But had they not left the org when asked, it would have been a criminal act. And very rightly so.
In fact, entering the premises with no other intention but to disrupt them, as these people did, I’m pretty sure is actually a criminal act, or something a good attorney can make seem like one enough in court to get a conviction, which I would applaud.
Standing outside and handing out pamphlets – perfectly fine. But what they did was not fine at all in my opinion.
But maybe you’ve already gathered that was my opinion.
So do you find these videos entertaining?
What do you actually think about them?
“I thought for sure..” The first defense of a sloppy mind.
You were referring to these videos, not the many videos on the internet. In any event, I have seen only a couple of any protest videos. They were videos of protests, I think outside the San Francisco Org? Gentle people, drawing in chalk on the sidewalk. I found them charming and powerful.
You do not understand that I support the right to legal protest, don’t care who it is. I do not divide the world into bad protest and good protest. Only legal and illegal methods.
Did I find them entertaining? I found them to be painful. It is painful to watch people unable to reach across a divide, so locked into irrational beliefs that they are unable to relate as members of the human race.
So thank you, Alanzo, for exposing me to (another) example of humankind’s ability to fight over nothing.
Thanks for rising to my challenge.
No need to be timid about these things, is there?
Timidity has never been listed as one of my faults. I have gone nose to nose with people from your nightmares. I won.
That’s what I thought. I didn’t think my direct and challenging attitude would harm you in any way. Or I would not have taken it.
Classic Alanzo disarming tactic. I call Bullshit. You still need to defend your nonsense.
Please, what nonsense?
Angrily confronting innocent Scientologists in bars, just itching for a fight, to the point of being kicked out, and going into a church with children in it for the purpose of disrupting their services, is not valid protest.
Standing outside of DM’s house? Confronting DM in a bar? Hounding DM to the ends of the earth?
THAT’s valid protest.
Where’s my nonsense?
The price of a public persona is protest. Stop whining.
I’m protesting shitty protesting.
That’s the best protesting of all.
Trite..see above, talk to you Thursday. You can do better, I know it. Else, I wouldn’t spend time. Bye.
I have to go to work, real villains and big issues. Check in with you on Thursday. In the meantime get your shit together.
Sir yes ma’am! 🙂
LOL
You have apparently decided I am part of “antiscientology culture.” Proof that you have no concept of who I am. Your loss.
So you’re not an anti-Scientologist?
Do you agree with me that these people are innocent and do not deserve what they got from John McGhee and his krew?
Pro or anti is irrelevant and nonsense. No one is innocent. Stop dodging and running. It is time for the next step.
Completely disagree that no one is innocent. Those children are. Scientology is a top down organization where what’s done at the top is actively hidden from everyone else. Scientologists are lied to daily by people like Mike Rinder, when he was in, Marty Rathbun, Dave Miscavige and all the rest of them.
The criminals in Scientology have always been at Int.
The overwhelming majority of everyone else in Scientology is innocent and has every right to their chosen religion.
Legally and morally.
I’d probably add to your statement
“Scientology is a top down organization where what’s done at the top is actively hidden from everyone else. Scientologists are lied to daily by people like Mike Rinder, when he was in, Marty Rathbun, Dave Miscavige and all the rest of them.”
I’d add the name L Ron Hubbard to that list,
I said that the criminals were all at Int.
what criminals? Scientology has never been convicted for crimes, as you said.
There”s nothing innocent about scientology or it s members. It’s does harm that takes a lifetime to undo.
I’m not getting how someone can defend anyone doing that. Entering THEIR building with the intent to disrupt is NOT ‘peaceful protest’. It’s trespassing for starters. But some people get so filled with the fervor of being anti-Sci they feel they are above the law, as they’ve been told that everything Scientology does is against the law, so hey, laws don’t apply right when they trespass, right? WRONG!
Protesting outside an org or Sci event, is a-okay. Harassing private Scientologists in public places, ie: a bar, is not okay. Entering a Sci building to disrupt, cause chaos, etc is also not okay. Remember the person who drove their car into a Scientology building and just missed a room for kids? They could have harmed innocent people. Yet in so many anti-Sci’s minds anyone who is a Scientologist is NOT innocent and is therefore in line to be collateral damage in their zeal to wipe out Scientology.
People who do these things come off looking very bad, yet they go on to claim Scientologists are “vermin”? Who’s invading who? And who needs to call in for pest removal?
i’ll answer for myself.
So you do not like these video’s. One has to ask themselves maybe ex’s do not either, just because it is posted for all to to see does not form a crowd or tribe with agreement?
Myself, if I were to attend this event by scienlogists and if I was protesting scientology, I’d probably use the Socratic Method or one of the means of persuasion by Aristotle to present my protest or argument for one to get out of scientology, since I’m an exscielogist,
If I was using the Socratic Method, I’d probably say something like:
Hubbard said in the book Dianetics that he “cleared” 270 people, Where are these people? Do we know who they are? What have they accomplished since going “clear”?
If using rhetoric, and the appeal of logos, I’d probably say something like “I did the the whole training bridge to total freedom as well as achieved the status of OT8, it turns out no clears or OT’s.
So would I. And so have I for 18 years. Much better than assaulting innocent Scientologists like McGhee.
The CoS continually publicizes that it has millions of members and is rapidly expanding. If the remaining scn-ists actually believe that nonsense then I doubt the Socratic Method or any other method will convince them otherwise, although it might. At least in the 1970’s it was possible to believe scn was expanding.
I didn’t watch the videos. I’ve already seen enough of them with protesters shouting Xenu at scn-ists and so on. If some people want to become Anti Scientology Crusaders I guess they will.
When a Scientologist believes there are millions of members that makes it even easier to get them questioning management and thinking for themselves again. You just ask them how many missions and organizations there are on the planet and divide that number by 8 million.
The result turns out to be 37000 scientologists on average at every mission and Org. They know for a fact there aren’t 37000 scientologists at every mission and Org.
Over time this reality will eat away at thier beliefs. You will have installed a thought grenade(R).
thought grenade, I like that, it’s Socratic method.
Debbie Cook email had many thought grenades, at least from the viewpoint of the tech and squirreling, many other thought grenades have occurred since the beginning of Dianetics 1950, problem was those didn’t occur as rapidly.
I didn’t hear any screaming in the Edinburgh raid video. It seemed pretty good natured. I have to say that it made the director of the org look good. He handled them with calm and persistence.
It looked to me like McGee knew most of the staff, was pretty friendly with them. They don’t seem in the least intimidated or afraid, just just nicely got them out.
Credit to the Org for their handling.
Well maybe I haven’t fully said my piece after all:
These people are not coercing abortions, putting anyone into a hole, or the RPF, or even putting lots of people into massive credit card debt. They actually would never dream that kind of thing would go on in Scientology, and if they are like all the Scientologists I know who run orgs and missions, would never do this themselves.
Ever.
And those children studying in that course room certainly weren’t doing anything like that, either.
This to me is a disgusting act of religious intolerance. These Scientologists at the Edinburgh org are not the problem with Scientology. These people should be left alone, especially their children, and allowed to study and practice their religion in peace.
Do you know what those kids were studying? They were looking up words and learning to use a dictionary.
I now see this kind of raid behavior very differently than I used to. It’s like I’ve awoken from a vengeful mob fog of some kind.
Would you have participated in this “raid”, Eileen?
Why or why not?
Full answer, please, from your own viewpoint.
“It’s like I’ve awoken from a vengeful mob fog of some kind.”
You have no idea how much that statement hits home with me. I’ll finish reading the comments on this piece tomorrow!