Misplaced Pages

Revision as of 03:07, 12 July 2005

1934

How were German members of the Free Zone publishing a book on scientology in 1934? Wasn't scientology founded in the 1950's? -- 68.239.239.162

As you have realised, there were no scientologists in 1934. However, a book including the title "Scientology" (and completely unrelated to the cult) was published then. This has led some challengers to claim that the word "Scientology" is not owned by the religious group, since it had prior use. -- FP 20:52, Mar 20, 2005 (UTC)

POV?

"Scientology is evil; its techniques evil; its practice a serious threat to the community, medically, morally and socially, and its adherents sadly deluded and often mentally ill." That was one conclusion found in the Report of the Board of Inquiry into Scientology for the State of Victoria, Australia in 1965. It was based on half a year of testimony, demonstration and analysis. Note that the Church of Scientology is not what is criticized, but Scientology itself. The Board's experts found unanimously that Scientology techniques are dangerous to mental health. These condemned, hypnotic techniques are what are sold in the Free Zone.

Seems to me the assertion that the techniques are hypnotic is POV, if not the rest of this. I see no reason to introduce the techniques in such a negative light before saying this is what the Free Zone teaches. It would be better to explain what the Free Zone is up front and put the stuff below in a section on criticism that also mentions most criticism of scientology is applicable.

"Sold" is POV, as well.

Jdavidb 20:58, 19 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Yup, I've reverted those soapbox-style additions several times already. Note also the discussion I had with the user who keeps adding them back, which I'm pasting below. Mkweise 05:10, 20 Apr 2004 (UTC)

(From User talk:66.120.162.33) Please refrain from adding opinionated remarks such as "Scientology is evil" to articles. As an encyclopedia, it is our goal to treat even controversial subjects without bias. Thank you. Mkweise 16:03, 11 Apr 2004 (UTC)

The "scientology is evil" quote was the lead conclusion of the Board of Inquiry, an impartial government assembly formed to investigate Scientology without bias in Victoria, Australia. The Church of Scientology cooperated for several months; the Board's sittings occupied 160 days and 151 witnesses were heard. The evidence covered 8,920 pages with nearly four million words, and also thousands of documents were put in. 11 parties were represented. The final report was 173 pages with 19 appendices. It was not a hasty, biased statement. A negative statement in conclusion does not necessitate bias any more than a positive statement does, and if you have a problem with bias, what is a quote from L. Ron Hubbard doing on the same page, unmolested? user:66.120.162.33

If the source can be verified, I'm not opposed to quoting it. However, your "soapbox" style of writing is unnecessarily inflammatory and clearly intended to convey a particular point of view. Please take some time and read Misplaced Pages:Neutral point of view before making any more edits. Mkweise 16:46, 11 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Removing link to slanderous anti- Tommy Thomson site...

Is it really appropriate to leave this link up?

Opinions please... posted by 71.104.40.152 (talk · contribs)

Yes. It should be left up. This sites looks like it tells the other side of the story. There are always two sides to the story.

Look at http://www.whatstommyupto.com and http://www.freezonesurvivors.to

Suzy posted by 67.19.123.2 (talk · contribs)

Disputed

The current dispute is regarding categorizations. Free Zone is categorized in Category:Free Zone. The article does not define Scientology and therefore should not be in Category:Scientology.--AI 7 July 2005 22:42 (UTC)

WP:CLS Misplaced Pages:Categories, lists, and series boxes
"An article should not be in both a category and its subcategory, e.g. Microsoft Office is in Category:Microsoft software, so should not also be in Category:Software — except when the article defines a category as well as being in a higher category, e.g. Ohio is in both Category:U.S. states and Category:Ohio."

Category:Free Zone

This article belongs in Category:Free Zone. It does not define Scientology nor is the Free Zone article in a category higher than Category:Scientology. See WP:CLS. --AI 2 July 2005 21:59 (UTC)

Antaeus, do you have a comment about your reverts?--AI 2 July 2005 22:21 (UTC)

Sure do. That comment is "Don't go past your misunderstoods." Re-read the very policy you yourself quoted, starting with the word "except". "Except when the article defines a category as well as being in a higher category." Does Free Zone define a category? Yes it does. If your interpretation of categorization was accurate, what would Category:U.S. states look like? It would have a subcategory for every state but the article for each state would be distinctly missing -- it would have been removed from the higher category, because it belonged to a subcategory. However, as you can verify for yourself, it is not that way, because the policy specifically states the exception.

You're argument is flawed. The Free Zone is not a part of Scientology, regardless of their beliefs.--AI 7 July 2005 22:48 (UTC)

What you mean is "Regardless of the Free Zone's beliefs, it is my belief that they are not part of Scientology." Misplaced Pages does not exist to present your beliefs in preference to the beliefs of Free Zoners. Even if one were to argue that only Scientology which is practiced with the commercial seal of approval of the Church of Scientology and proper licensing of the trademarks is "really" Scientology, there is no disputing that the Free Zone is relevant to Scientology, which is why it is a subcategory of Category:Scientology. If people read the article, they will find out your belief that what the Free Zoners practice isn't Scientology. But the fact of the article's existence is not going to be censored because you believe differently from the Free Zoners and don't want their point of view to be mentioned. -- Antaeus Feldspar 7 July 2005 23:20 (UTC)

Now, would you like to provide any explanation for why you are calling this article "disputed"? So far as this talk page shows, you haven't actually disputed the accuracy of a single statement in the article. That's generally considered a step that should come before the "disputed" tag. -- Antaeus Feldspar 4 July 2005 00:01 (UTC)

I'm not disputing statements, I'm disputing the categorization and your reverts regarding this categorization. Quit playing word games and quit wasting my time Antaeus, is Irmgard paying you? --AI 7 July 2005 22:45 (UTC)

I disputed the categorization 18 hours before adding the tag, and only added the tag after Antaeus' reverts.--AI 7 July 2005 22:45 (UTC)

Let me try to put this dispute to rest. The FreeZone consists of a small number of ex-Scientolgists who became dissatisfied with the Church of Scientology. You can liken them to a sort of disgruntled ex-employee. The few in the FreeZone argue that the Church has been "taken over" and no longer practices standard Scientology as written by L. Ron Hubbard; yet the Church owns the copyrights as willed to them upon the death of L. Ron Hubbard. People in the FreeZone have been excommunicated formally from the Church of Scientology. The Church argues that the FreeZoners commited crimes or had such gross mis-conduct, the need for extreme measures were necessary. This is called an expulsion, declare or excommunication. Some FreeZoners are proud to have been expelled formally from the Church and grandly display their expulsions on their own websites. The church states in these expulsions that the subject FreeZoner, violated the moral codes of the Church by mis-appying the science of the mind it teaches. The belief is that Dianetics and Scientology are a science and therefore must be applied exactly as recommended by the Founder, L. Ron Hubbard, in order to obtain successful results; such as a higher IQ or happier life. FreeZoners call themselves free of the Church of Scientology and therefore they are no longer in the catagory of Scientology. The other, and this is the main point, FreeZoners claim that they no longer practice the exact science of Dianetics and Scientology as by law, they cannot. There are infringement issues involved. FreeZoners in fact, MUST not practice Scientology or they would be in violation of infringement laws. The Church has the right to insist that its counselling methods be delivered standardly as they own and protect the copyrights. Just as CocaCola has the right to insist upon only selling the exact, correct recipe be bottled and sold round the world, the Church of Scientology has this same right to insist upon only offering to the public its exact recipe for mental treatment. If one were to practice the counselling methods of this religion, hang out a shingle and charge money for that counseling, one must practice the counseling as exactly taught by the Church. If you want to do it some other way, then you are not practicing Scientology and you are not a Scientologist. FreeZoners do not practice Scientology. They practice their own brand of counselling as they HAVE to change the techniques or be sued for infringement. Are they practicing Scientology? Not at all. Are they Scientologists? Not any more. Dan

I am not picking sides but Dan, the legal "facts" you talk about is not the way copyrights work. The one this is, you cannot copyright data. CocaCola can't copyright their formula because it is data. They can only enforce the formula because they own the production company. Besides all the OT documents are public domain because they were used in a court case. Dianetics is available at any bookstore so all copyrights are taken care of provided you pay for your copy of dianetics. You can't copyright a procedure. You can patent a procedure though. However, I don't know of any patents on counciling methods ever being granted. As for trademarks the book Scientologie was published before Hubbard's Scientology. However, IANAL. --metta, The Sunborn 02:47, 10 July 2005 (UTC)

In any case, it's still moot to the question of categorization, or should I say, the two questions of categorization. The first question is, should Category:Free Zone be a sub-category of Category:Scientology? The answer is yes; the fact that they are not legally allowed to use the trademark of "Scientology" to describe their beliefs and practices does not stop them from being definitely, indubitably relevant to the subject of Scientology. The argument that "they are not really Scientologists, even if they think they are" is irrelevant; critics of Scientology are certainly not practicing Scientologists either, but the category is clearly relevant. So that establishes the answer to the first question.

The second question is, should the article Free Zone be placed in Category:Free Zone, Category:Scientology, or both? The answer is both. This might surprise some people, because one of the major purposes of establishing a sub-category is to reduce the clutter in a parent category. If an article's relevance to the subject of Scientology is entirely described by a sub-category (or more than one) this usually means that it should appear only in the sub-category (or -ies), and not in the parent category. However, what some people have failed to notice is that there is a clearly stated exception, for articles that define a sub-category. (Note: not "define the parent category" -- certain people persistently misread it as that, but they should not go past that misunderstood.) Thus: Free Zone defines the sub-category Category:Free Zone; Free Zone should belong to the same parent categories that Category:Free Zone does. L. Ron Hubbard defines Category:L. Ron Hubbard and thus should, like Category:L. Ron Hubbard, belong in Category:Scientology. However, L. Ron Hubbard bibliography does not define the sub-category it belongs to, and should not be added to the parent category as well as the sub-category. -- Antaeus Feldspar 00:32, 11 July 2005 (UTC)

IANAL. The OT documents are publicly available, not public domain, as a result of their appearing in the various court cases. A search today on the USPTO website for "Scientology" indicates no method/procedure patents. Prior use of a trademark word or phrase does not automatically preclude it from being trademarkable. However, these are quibbles. From a religious studies standpoint, the "Free Zone" members can be considered variously as heretical and/or schizmatic sects of the "Church" of Scientology, much as Gnostics and Protestants are to Catholicism. Trademark law may prevent "Free Zone" members from calling what they practice Scientology in the United States, but that does not change the substance (or lack there of) of the practices themselves-- although noting such explicitly in the article may have merit to cover Misplaced Pages's legal backside. As such, the "Free Zone" category makes sense, both as subcategory and an item within the Scientology Category. 16:08, 11 July 2005 (UTC)

Antaeus, the Free Zone article DOES NOT belong in Category:Scientology. You're insistence shows you do not know what Scientology is. --AI 03:03, 12 July 2005 (UTC)

Still disputed?

If so, what are the specific disputes? -- Antaeus Feldspar 00:11, 12 July 2005 (UTC)

You already know or have you forgotten? --AI 03:07, 12 July 2005 (UTC)