"Somebody some day will say 'this is illegal'.
By then be sure the orgs say what is legal or not."
L. Ron Hubbard, HCOPL 4 January 1966
Operation Clambake present:
DEAD AGENTING
Dead Agent means to spread malicious lies and rumors about Scientology critics or organization, in an attempt to so thoroughly discredit them that everyone concerned will be disgusted with them, and not listen to the information they have to give about the cult. Many attempts to Dead Agent the recently destroyed CAN, FACTnet and individual critics have been posted to the newsgroup alt.religion.scientology.
Header on the "DEAD AGENTING" document:
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These are actual quotes from a confidential policy letter used inside the "Church" of Scientology (CoS) to handle critics and bad media coverage. The cult threatens to sue because this information is made public on the net. You read on and check if we have the right to know.
Quote from the "DEAD AGENTING" document:
It is a not too infrequent part of the job of a PRO to encounter hostile
contacts. To handle such, one has to be fast and effective at dead agenting.
Every successful PRO knows how to dead agent and wins.
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(PRO means the Public Relations Officer in Scientology)
Building up an strong enemy identity is important for a cult, it ties the members even closer and alianates the world outside.
Quote from the "DEAD AGENTING" document:
Never let entheta pass unhandled. Prevention is better than cure. Handle
fast, handle with live communication, handle with documentation, use PR
technology including tone scale evaluation. Liaise with your senior and the
other divisions/bureaux. Maintain ethics presence and see the matter through
to a completion including the discrediting of the attacker.
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Entheta is "enturbulated theta". For example critisism about Scientology is called entheta by the Scientologists, but positive talk about Scientology is theta.
Tone Scale is a the list invented by Hubbard of all human emotional states, arranged beside an arbitrary scale number from -40 (total failure), through 0 (death), to +40. Tone 40 is a godlike state of command and control of others.
The goal is as usual to discredit the attacker, instead of facing the critisism or answering real questions. This is very visible in interviews with officials representing CoS.
Quote from the "DEAD AGENTING" document:
The technique of proving utterances false is called "DEAD AGENTING".
It's in the first book of Chinese espionage. When the enemy agent gives
false data, those who believed him but now find it false kill him - or
at least cease to believe him.
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The intelligence in CoS have what they call DA Packs on all known critics. Here they collect everything that possibly can be used against them one day. They would never go to a confrontation without having this ready so that any attack can be distracted.
Quote from the "DEAD AGENTING" document:
You only challenge statements you can prove are false and in any
conversation let the rest slide.
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In the DA Packs they also have information revealed by members during auditing. Auditing is the action of running Scientology or Dianetic processes on a PC (a preclear; someone receiving Scientology processing). Auditing usually involves an E-Meter, with the PC holding onto the soup cans electrodes, and the Auditor taking down notes and asking questions. In the DA Packs you will also find Knowledge Reports (K/R), a write-up of a cult member's supposed "crimes" given to the Ethics division; cult members are encouraged to report each other's transgressions a la Orwell's "1984." Even kids must go to auditing and write K/R's on eachother and even their parents.
Quote from the "DEAD AGENTING" document:
The quality of the documentation is a major factor. The PRO should have the
right to chit and demand better quality documentation if it's not up to
standard. One should be very inventive and very creative in the presentation
of his pack. As the false reports on us are generally repeated over and over
and over again in different ways one can have in stock, so to speak, false
report correction packs and booklets. One of these could be the Background
and Ceremonies of the Church, a WW publication. There are various bona fide
publications for different countries. There is Scientology 20th Century
Religion, there is the publication Viewpoint from the US and we now have
Omar Garrison's Hidden Story of Scientology. Then there are things like
the quote from the Encyclopedia Britannica Year Book, etc.
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A Scientologist will be well drilled and prepared if you don't meet him or her off guard. Among the documents seized in Scientology archives by Greek police was several long check sheets on how to handle the press and critics.
The Greek judge said:
"This organisation insults the very essence of man, forcing its members to modify their personalities and behaviour,"
Quote from the "DEAD AGENTING" document:
This is correct procedure:
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CoS is known to use a lot of private investigators against critics and journalists. PI's have reported that CoS is not satisfied before they come back with evidence of crimes etc. All this CoS says is because they have to defend themselves.
Quote from the "DEAD AGENTING" document:
Also press releases should always contain some factor of endurance.
This gives the public the idea that we endure. Examples:
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CoS have done their errors. Everything they do in public now is cynically planned. If the press isn't scared by the threat of lawsuits, they may be fooled to believe something is true if CoS only present it in the correct way - enough times.
Quote from the "DEAD AGENTING" document:
Reporters are a kiss of death unless one really is an expert PR man
himself. Reporters have to be handled and well. If truly friendly,
they have to be wooed. If not they have to be handled. The routine is
(1) Whisper of a bad story (2) Get a lawyer (3) Threaten suit (4)
Totally discredit using the technique of the Dead Agent caper which MUST
be understood in full.
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To Scientology journalists are either weapons aimed at them and therefor free to hunt down, or tools to be used to "save the universe". There is no moral limit to how Scientologists can use their "tools", as long as the goal is to make Scientology bigger.
Quote from the "DEAD AGENTING" document:
For example, a newspaper publishes its third entheta article. Legal plays a
hard line and PR plays the part of the peacemaker until a retraction and
legal settlement is made. Documentation is then sent to all press, the Press
Council and journalists and individual reporters. The documentation has a
plea for reform and clean up of ethical standards. The result: the reporter
in question will no longer be on staff.
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CoS is facing two major problems; first of all editors seems to have lost their scare for CoS, secondly Hubbard never saw the Intenet coming. There are no policy to handle neither the Net nor the critics here who are not afraid of them. Today Internet defenitely is the biggest threat to CoS.
Quote from the "DEAD AGENTING" document:
When one is not fighting a battle against Black Propaganda, public
relations is easy.
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No mentioning of Scientology in the media is a bad sign, it means they are working behind the scenes to build up relations ("comm lines") to use later. One prediction will never fail when it comes to Scientology; it will always generate controvercy.
End of the "DEAD AGENTING" document:
If there will be a long-term threat, you are to immediately evaluate and
originate a black PR campaign to destroy the person's repute and to
discredit them so thoroughly that they will be ostracized. (LRH)
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