Peter Schilte
Patron with Honors
Yesterday, on May 21, I went to a flash-raid in Amsterdam. There were
around 6-7 people present, including a long-time critic of
Scientology, Jeta Eggers.
We were handing out flyers in front of the Org for about 20 minutes
before a police officer showed up, the police station is right next to
the Org so he was wondering what was going on. He'd never heard of us
before (which is strange considering we participated in every raid)
and asked if someone could step into the station to explain
everything. I volunteered.
We discussed whether we were allowed to hand out flyers without a
permit because that right is usually reserved for religious groups. I
argued that even though Anonymous is not a religion, we were still
doing it from an ideological point of view and not for commercial
purposes or financial gain.
We couldn't agree on it and we had to stop flyering and keep the
enturbulation to a minimum.
I told the group this and we continued without flyers and spoke to
people passing by. We met a few Londoners who knew about Anonymous and
wanted a flyer, we gave them one and they went inside the Org to ask
for material.
They came out again with a free DVD.
After some discussion about how we were going to get our hands on one
of those DVDs I said: " Maybe I could just ask for one really nicely."
We discussed that option shortly but some guys didn't want to take
their mask off and we agreed that going in masked would put them off,
to say the least.
I was wearing sunglasses and a hood, I'm 5"8 and a girl, I do not look
threatening.
I didn't think I'd need physical protection stepping into what's
basically a church and/or a bookstore.
I thought the worst they would do was telling me to fuck off.
There was no indication we couldn't go in there to ask a question, in
fact, the British Anon-sympathisers just did. I wouldn't have tried it
otherwise.
Maybe this is naïve of me and maybe it was a stupid idea but I did not
expect their reaction would be this bizarre. This is not America,
there have been hardly any incidences of Fair Game or bullbaiting
here.
Once again, I did not walk in to troll them, I just asked one polite
honest question.
I walked into the Org and two people were standing at the reception
desk, a girl with dead eyes and an expressionless face and a guy who
seemed to immediately snap into focus when he saw me.
I walked up to the desk and said: "Hello, excuse me but I saw the DVD
you gave to the British guys and wondered if you had an extra copy for
me."
The girl didn't say anything, the guy asked me why I wanted the DVD. I
told him: "Just for information, I'd like to know where you are coming
from", he scoffed at me. He didn't seem to able to control himself for
a moment and started telling me how ridiculous that was coming from me
and how I had been standing outside for 30 minutes with "those guys".
At this point I was feeling like this wasn't going to go anywhere and
asked once more "Can you give me a DVD or not? Otherwise I'll just
leave."
He started acting shady and pretended to go look for a DVD to give to
me while walking around the room. I started to feel uncomfortable.
Then I heard a 'click' behind me and when I turned around I saw he had
just locked the door and was walking away from it with the keys in his
hand.
I don't start freaking out just yet, Anonymous was watching through
the glass doors and knocked on the window, pointing to the locked
door.
I asked the Scientologist guy why he had locked the door and he
continued to act shady, saying something like: "Oh, no reason. I'll
just find you a DVD now".
I start freaking out and demand he unlock the door so I can leave, I
tell them I'll gladly leave if they don't want me here and that there
is no reason to lock the door. I start raising my voice and try to
talk to the receptionist girl, asking her if she thought this was
normal behaviour and why they would lock me in without a reason. She
just blinked at me with those lifeless eyes and didn't respond in any
way.
I start yelling at the guy to let me the fuck out of the building, I
didn't want to be there any more and I showed no sign of aggression
before they locked me inside. The guy calls for back-up from upstairs,
several Scientologists arrive.
Apart from some beefy guys who didn't look like security (they were
wearing the regular Scientology 'math teacher from the 90's' clothes)
I remember one skinny guy with glasses getting in between me and the
receptionist guy. He stared at me and I asked him why they were doing
this, why I couldn't leave and if he thought this was appropriate
behaviour for a so-called church.
He kept staring at me and didn't react except for a slight nodding of
his head.
I decide "Fuck this, I'm leaving one way or the other." and start for
the door. Receptionist guy yells at one of the goons: "Stop her! Keep
her here!" and as I was nearing the door he got in front of me, I
pushed past him and he grabbed my arms.
At this point, Anonymous is standing less than two feet away in front
of the glass door. As they saw what was happening they started banging
on the glass doors and called out to me that they were calling the
police.
I yelled back: "Get a fucking camera!" but there wasn't a video camera
available.
I'm not ashamed to say that at this point, I was feeling the panic
rise up in me.
The beefy guy let me go and I started in on the receptionist again,
demanding to be let out. He told me: "You're not going anywhere,
you're staying here until the police shows up to take care of you."
I yelled at him that there was no way the police were going to arrest
me for walking into a building and that they were seriously in the
wrong here.
The police arrive, I bang on the glass door and tell them I've been
locked in and please, just make them let me go.
The Scientologists open the door for the police and I see the male
officer is the same one I've been talking to that evening. I was
relieved and shaky.
The police officer told me to sit down on the staircase while his
female partner went and talked to the Scientologists on the other side
of the staircase where the reception desk was. When I was sitting down
I couldn't see that area because of the high banister.
The cop started to yell at me about how that was the stupidest thing I
could have done and that I had disregarded our previous conversation
about keeping the enturbulation to a minimum.
At first I was shocked, I wasn't out for enturbulation and only asked
a polite question. I didn't understand why he was blaming me for what
just happened to me. I tried to tell him I honestly wasn't trying to
directly confront them, I was just asking for information.
I told me he didn't want to hear any of it and seemed to feel
personally betrayed by me after our previous conversation. He then
accused me of faking my shakiness and upset, which really pissed me
off. He asked for my ID.
http://i30.tinypic.com/2pt2ge1.jpg
Stunned, I gave it to him and he asked for my address. Earlier I
explained to him about Fair Game and why we were wearing masks, he
obviously remembered it when he leaned in while I recited my contact
information in an almost-whisper.
I told him I honestly didn't mean any harm and now saw how me going
inside could be interpreted as a hostile action.
He told me to shut up and sit down. He then joined his partner to talk
to the Scientologists.
Unable to just sit there, I got up and peeked out over the banister.
The cops saw me but didn't do anything about it. Julia Rijnvis was
there, Director of Special Affairs in OSA, and tried to smooth out the
situation with the cops.
The cops asked receptionist guy (who seemed pretty meek now) if he had
asked me to leave before locking the door, he admitted he didn't.
Rijnvis told them "security didn't handle the situation in the best
possible way", way to understate the situation.
One of the beefy Scientologists pointed to the cop's notebook with my
information on it and asked "Can I get a copy of that?", the cop said:
"No".
I left the building with the Police and he told Anon to move the fuck
away from the Org. Anonymous asked me if I was okay, what the fuck
just happened and one guy had a cigarette ready for me.
I love Anonymous.
I stood aside while the Police argued with Anon, taking a few deep
breaths of thetanless-air and wondering what the fuck just happened.
We eventually left and had some drinks to calm down.
I probably won't be pressing charges because I don't want them to find
out my identity and don't have the money to go to court over this. I
will be checking out the options I have without going public with my
name.
Please feel free to spread this story so we can learn from this. This
was obviously a tactic they had prepared even though it wasn't
executed very gracefully. Scientology is fighting dirty and trying to
intimidate individual Anon. I'll be coming to the next raid, and the
next one, and the next one.
They can't stop us.
Related links:
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.religion.scientology/browse_thread/thread/c6e0e57b575b10b9#
http://forums.enturbulation.org/15-breaking-news/anon-held-captive-org-during-mini-raid-15216/3/#post282588
http://ocmb.xenu.net/ocmb/viewtopic.php?t=27563&sid=a1aaea98ec20514f06cc24484efed991