from a post to the alt.religion.scientology newsgroup:

From: "Dan Garvin" 
Newsgroups: alt.religion.scientology
References: <[email protected]>
Subject: Re: the WISE spin on Reed Slatkin - are you with us or against us?
Date: Sat, 17 Jan 2004 21:44:04 -0500
Message-ID: <[email protected]>


I didn't think the Church of Scientology could shock me any more, but this
WISE Info Letter has managed to do it.

Hypocrisy -- that doesn't surprise us. Lying -- that's normal. But this is
hypocritical lying with a brazen gall that hasn't been matched in a long
time.

Here's what actually happened: Slatkin did fail to renew his WISE
membership. In accordance with his duties, the WISE Ethics Officer West US,
a friend of mine and a decent guy, submitted a WISE issue listing those WISE
members who had failed to renew, including Slatkin. CMO seniors responsible
for WISE refused to allow the issue to go out, ordering the EO to "handle"
the non-renewers instead.

Had it gone out, that would have been what's described below:

>"Therefore, one of the duties of WISE
> is to make known any who choose not to subscribe to the Code of a WISE
> Member or who do not agree to the stipulations as laid out in the WISE
> membership agreement or WISE License."
 ...
> "Where the individual chooses not
> to cooperate, cease their destructive activities and sign up as a member
> of WISE, WISE will similarly make known such terminals, giving applicable
> factual specifics so as to not create a mystery."

Of course, Reed Slatkin needed to be "handled" by police, prosecutors, and
courts, not by a 20-year-old WISE Ethics Officer  (not that anybody knew at
the time what he was up to -- he just wouldn't pay his dues). So, he
couldn't be handled, and WISE was *prevented* from informing WISE members
that this particular member (among many others) had declined to remain a
paying member of WISE.

So, Slatkin gets caught, and suddenly our young friend, the WISE EO, is
removed from post and getting sec checked because he had failed to issue the
list of non-renewing members that would have warned everybody that Reed
Slatkin was (by implication) no longer to be trusted.

And who is it that is busting our young EO's balls? Why, it's the CMO, the
same ones who wouldn't let him send out the very same issue he was being
busted for not sending out.

And so, in a shining example of Scientology justice, the WISE EO is assigned
to the RPF.

I do hope this information gets to as many WISE members and ex-members and
other Scientologist businesspersons as possible. This is how WISE is looking
out for your interests and protecting you from being taken advantage of.
-- 
Dan Garvin
Sea Org member for 25 years
Free for 2 years!

"Wasn't the S.O. much gentler than a wog prison system where you would be
exposed to large quantities of insanity and suppression, and
butt-fucking?" -- Phil Chitester, Church of Scientology defender


"Kristi Wachter"  wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> One of my kind sources sent me a fascinating WISE Information Letter. It's
> WISE Info Letter 36, entitled "The WISE Membership - Are You With Us?"
> It's dated December 21, 2003, and marked for distribution to "All WISE
> Members."
>
> It's three pages, 32 paragraphs.
>
> It appears to be intended to spin the Slatkin debacle into a tool to
> pressure WISE members into maintaining their WISE membership.
>
> Paragraph 3 says,
>
> "However, the primary reason WISE was established was to see to it that
> Scientology organizations, their staff and their public, are kept safe
> from individuals involved in unethical business practices."
>
> This strikes me as, at the very least, a shift in focus. WISE has
> historically emphasized the goal of promulgating Hubbard's administrative
> policies as its primary purpose.
>
> International Scientology News Issue 35 says:
>
> "WISE has the purpose of disseminating and getting LRH's administrative
> technology broadly in use in every business, organization, and government
> on the planet."
>
> The 1996 WISE Membership Agreement says:
>
> "A. WISE is a nonprofit religious fellowship organization formed for the
> purpose of uniting all businesses and professional individuals and
> organizations of whatever kind that use the technology of L. Ron Hubbard
> ("LRH") for administrative, business and improvement purposes, to promote
> and foster the religious teachings of LRH in society. This includes
> encouragement of adherence to the goals, tenets, doctrines, codes, Creed,
> policies and practices set forth in the Scientology Scriptures and other
> writings of LRH ("the Hubbard Writings") in secular business activities,
> and protocting its members, whether individual or corporate, from
> unethical practices and unfair competition."
>
> Paragraphs 6-8 of the Info Letter appear to describe Reed Slatkin, and
> this section begins a series of implications:
>
> * Most importantly, if you're not with us, you're against us - if you're
> not a WISE member, it indicates unethical business practices.
>
> * As a WISE member, you have a duty to find out whether others you do
> business with are members of WISE.
>
> * WISE will inform members about individuals who are have demonstrated
> being "out-ethics" by failing to be WISE members.
>
> Given that choosing not to join WISE is described as a "clear indicator"
> about one's business ethics, the implication is that if you don't join
> WISE, you're unethical, and WISE will make sure that others know about it.
>
> Here are paragraphs 6-8:
>
> "One individual offered his financial management services to his 'friends'
> as a favor to 'help' them with the management of their hard-earned
> savings. Offering high returns for investment ventures, always ensuring
> that those he was 'assisting' knew he was being generous by allowing them
> to partake in such great opportunities, this person was not participating
> as a real group member and was instead using these lines only to procure
> more 'business.'
>
> "It was later found that this person's activities were fraudulent, with
> the result that his victims have lost huge amounts of money and some are
> being sued to return money they received. This person has since been
> declared a Suppressive Person by the Church of Scientology, in which he
> had been pretending to be a participant, and been subjected to criminal
> justice - which means serving a prison sentence. While this group and
> society in general are now safe from his covert and destructive ways,
> those who placed trust in him and mistakenly viewed him as a friend and
> fellow group member have learned a hard lesson.
>
> "While it is one thing to now know that some individuals who were deceived
> by this criminal saw outpoints and failed to report them to WISE, what was
> worse is that those who dealt with him did not demand to know if he was a
> member of WISE who subscribed to the Code of a WISE Member. Had they
> asked, they would have found that this person refused to be a member of
> WISE."
>
> Paragraphs 9 and 10 note that some of his clients weren't WISE members,
> which shows that those client had false data and "an omitted or altered
> (lower) importance" because they didn't recognize the obvious benefits of
> joining WISE.
>
> Paragraph 13 says that WISE signs up anyone (implying everyone),
> Scientologist and non-Scientologist alike, who uses Hubbard tech "for
> commercial and improvement purposes." It goes on to imply that people who
> don't join choose not to because they don't subscribe to the Code of a
> WISE Member or agree with the conditions of the membership agreement.
>
> Paragraph 14 says that anyone who SAYS they want to "be connected" to
> others who are using Hubbard tech "yet refuses membership in WISE, is in
> actual fact contradicting the wishes of LRH" and quotes HCO PL 10 Sept 90
> III, point 33, describing an ideal scene:
>
> "Businessmen who are public on lines are being put in contact with the
> World Institute of Scientology Enterprises and signed up as members."
>
> Paragraph 17 reads, "One could ask such an individual, 'What other LRH
> policies are you choosing to neglect?'"
>
> Paragraph 19 says that WISE members "safeguard the purity and standard use
> of LRH technology" and improve the ethics of the business world, and
> implies that anyone who wouldn't choose to be part of that must be
> unethical: "For those who choose not to be part of that group, it is a
> clear indicator."
>
> Paragraph 20 reads, "Where individuals with other agendas and counter- or
> other-intentions refuse to come up the scale or who choose not to
> subscribe to such aims, it is important that the true members of this
> elite group are aware of their actions." In other words, if you don't
> join, or if someone at WISE decides you're out-ethics, WISE will tell
> other WISE members that you can't be trusted.
>
> Indeed, Paragraph 21 spells it out: "Therefore, one of the duties of WISE
> is to make known any who choose not to subscribe to the Code of a WISE
> Member or who do not agree to the stipulations as laid out in the WISE
> membership agreement or WISE License."
>
> Ooh, but here's where it gets really interesting, from a completely
> different perspective: "Another duty and fuction of WISE is to rapidly and
> terminatedly handle any business person or business activity found to be
> adversely affecting a Scientology organization. This is done by getting
> the offending persons familiar with the policy regarding such activities,
> getting their agreement to cease any destructive activities, and then
> getting them signed up as a WISE member. Where the individual chooses not
> to cooperate, cease their destructive activities and sign up as a member
> of WISE, WISE will similarly make known such terminals, giving applicable
> factual specifics so as to not create a mystery."
>
> So, while OSA was going after Bob Minton with all their ops and dirty
> tricks, WISE was simultaneously supposed to be introducing him to LRH
> admin tech and regging him to join WISE? I mean, Bob was (and probably
> still is) a "business person" and was definitely adversely affecting
> Scientology organizations.
>
> Back to Reed, though, at what point was WISE supposed to tell everybody to
> stop doing business with Reed? Surely THEY knew at what point Reed stopped
> being a member of WISE - CoS spokesman Aron Mason said Reed left WISE in
> 1998. So why didn't WISE notify its members to avoid Reed?
>
> Paragraphs 23-26 describes Non-Member Issues as a form of ethics order
> recording an individual's violation of the WISE membership agreement.
>
> Paragraphs 27-31 basically recap the Info Letter, stating that WISE uses
> Non-Member Issues to tell WISE members about people who have "not agreed
> ... to abide by the Code of a WISE Member."
>
> Paragraph 32 is four words long:
>
> "Are you with us?"
>
>
> My impression of the point of this newsletter is to subtly threaten WISE
> members with a loss of business if they choose not to renew their
> memberships (and whap them with a sense of amorphous guilt for whatever
> counter-intentions must be interfering with their continued association
> with such an ethical group). Nevertheless, I can't help but be amused at
> the blanket nature of WISE's role: "one of the duties of WISE is to make
> known any who choose not to subscribe to the Code of a WISE Member." I
> mean, I certainly don't subscribe to the Code of a WISE Member, as I have
> no intention of applying Hubbard admin tech nor of availing myself of
> Hubbard ethics and justice tech (points 1 and 2 of the WISE Code of
> Ethics). Does that mean WISE is going to tell all their members that I
> refuse to subscribe to the code?
>
>
> Sheesh.
>
>
> Many, many thanks to the fabulous person who sent this to me - and thanks
> to that person for pointing out the most interesting bits, making my job
> that much easier.
>
>
> Wisely,
>
>
> Kristi
> --
> Kristi Wachter
> the activist formerly known as "Jour" (before $cientology outed me)
>
> If I am not who you say I am, then you are not who you think you are.
>   - James Baldwin
>
> I think $cientology is hurting people and breaking the law, and I
> want them to stop it. See http://www.scientology-lies.com for more.
>
>    KSW: http://www.truthaboutscientology.com/alteringtech.htm