San Diego Global, Valentine's Day 2009

If true then 20 is not such a bad number for SDO (peaked at 60 one year ago). The video does not substantiate that claim, though. I counted a dozen at the most. Interesting also the mention that some Scientologists waived and made the peace sign (reminder of Tom Cruise autographing the peace sign on Anonymous' mask). BTW, the cake just looks full of colored chemicals, not appetizing at all

San Diego Global, Valentine's Day 2009 - alt.religion.scientology | Google Groups

"[...] Not much activity. A couple of Scilons waved at us while going to their cars, and one guy flashed me a peace sign after reading my sign as I stood by the driveway. [...]"

Manufacturing Enemies

"ANONYMOUS" IS A GANG OF CYBER-BULLIES AND ANTI-RELIGION EXTREMISTS: ANONYMOUS HAS NO POSITIVE SOCIAL VALUE

"Their original issues have been so clouded up by sensationalistic conspiracy theory and unreliable apostate testimony that it's nearly impossible for the public to even relate to Anonymous.

Their attempts to take their Internet gossip to the streets is often met with hostility and resentment. People are increasingly put off by the masked protesters with their invasive use of video cameras and offensive "bull-baiting" comments.

[...] There are hundreds of such incidents as these, in which Anonymous provokes and videotapes heated responses in order to convince the public that they actually have a reason to protest (they don't). They are manufacturing an enemy because there really isn't one."

Quote of the Day: Creepy Masks and Caek

News briefs - News/Features:

"Whatever the Scientologists are up to in there, at least they aren’t the ones standing on street corners, wearing creepy masks and offering cake to strangers."

Operation Chaniversary in Sydney.

Good balanced article on the upcoming Feb. 14 protest in Sydney - dubbed Operation Chaniversary.

Anonymous gears up for anniversary protest:

Internet collective Anonymous will take to Sydney's streets on Saturday in a protest marking the one-year anniversary of its battle with Scientology.

Similar protests will take place in over 100 other cities around the world in what is being dubbed "Operation Chaniversary".

"Sustained" in the paragraph below is the word. Though numbers have dropped, anons did keep at it on a regular basis for a year:

It's the latest stunt in one of the strangest protests in recent history, which has seen a disparate bunch of internet denizens launch a sustained assault on the controversial, celebrity-studded religion.

Anonymous more a meme than a group as such:

Anonymous is difficult to define, being more an internet "meme" than a group as such.

The split personality of Anonymous:

"Unfortunately enthusiasm for the campaign has certainly dulled … a lot of people are saying it's no longer Anonymous at all."

Much of what Anonymous does is "trolling" or "griefing", which involves causing trouble for a target through prank phone calls, hacks and other means, often illegal. [...]

But with the protest against Scientology, some Anons had found "serious business" that was just as important as "lulz", a term that roughly translates to having a laugh at someone else's expense.

Anonymous does take care that no one gets hurt, at least not physically. Psychologically, they do hurt innocent people through stalking, though:

"The way we protest goes back to our roots as trolls, but we make sure keep it legal and make sure no-one gets hurt," the Sydney-based Anon said.

I don't really believe anons get paid for protesting, though I am not quite sure what people like the Gay Pope mean when they say that they are paid to protest Scientology.

"We've found some of the kids who have been involved in the Anonymous protests, we've been told by some of them that they get $20 to come along to the demo," Ms Dunstan.

I believe the following is true. Some people realized that they acted out of ignorance and prejudice, and are sorry for their hurtful actions. Of course, they are afraid to come up publicly with it, lest they be the target of anonymous self-boasted "darker side". As I pointed earlier, the CoS is also trying to capitalize on the curiosity created by the protests to try and get their line across, using "know more about it before you criticize" line.

Ms Dunstan says several former Anonymous members have since approached the church to learn more about its creed and, in some cases, to apologise.

Finally, the article ends on an ironical statement. "There is life outside." Life outside? Coming from people who choose to spend their Valentine day protesting Scientology and who have been busy at it for over a year? Anons really live in the shadow of Scientology, and are about as much entangle with it as members, except that they of course don't benefit from its positive aspects:

"It's a complicated issue, but they're the yin to our yang pretty much. They are great people, but we're just hoping they realise there's a life outside that wants them back," he said.

Pith in the Wind

So the Feb. 7 disastrous low-number protests were not the one-year anniversary one? Ok, we'll see if they can do better this Feb. 14.

Frankly, I can think of so many better things to do on Valentine day than display ignorance and hatred for a minority religion.

Nashville - Nashville Scene - Pith in the Wind - Anti-Scientology Group Anonymous Wants You to Wear a Funny Mask this Valentine's Day:

"This year, forget the flowers and box of chocolates. Since nothing's tackier than a cliched Valentine's Day gift--and because your beloved is a unique little snowflake and wants to be treated as such--why not spend the day dressed up as Natalie Portman's sidekick in 'V for Vendetta' and yelling at Operating Thetans (Bonus points if you spot a Level VIII)?

You know, quality time.

Nashville's version of Anonymous, the one-year-old Rick Rollin' Scientology haters, are planning an 11 AM VDay protest and (of course) they'd like you to join them.

Related blog entries: -NashvilleOrg-

Clearwater Protest

"ANONYMOUS" IS A GANG OF CYBER-BULLIES AND ANTI-RELIGION EXTREMISTS: ANONYMOUS PHOTOGRAPHING LICENSE PLATES OF SCIENTOLOGIST OWNED VEHICLES:

"'We protested from 3 pm until 6 pm... scarring scilons back into their turtle shells...We got a couple honks and a lot of 'Fuck you' and 'You guys are the KKK!' from people driving by...I took pictures of...their license plates for your enjoyment.'"

One of Shallonymous' initial aims was to help "scilons escape the cult". By the quote above, they are not very successful at it and seem content of just "scarring scilons back into their turtle shells". Was that ever their noble initial purpose? These protests have now degenarated in just stalking and annoying the "clams". It serves no constructive purpose whatsoever anymore.

Note that this happened during the Feb. 7 Clearwater monthly protest, where five (read: 5!) anons protested, whereas last year in Feb. they had 150, and last Mar. 300! Now they have 5! Add this to the stats I reported last Feb. 8 and behold the sublime decadence of a movement that started well but could not keep up because they were unable to digg futher than a few millimeters down the real issues. That's why I now call them Shallonymous.

Another trend I observed lately is that because of the low numbers they are now too ashamed to call what they do "monthly protests" anymore, and pretend these are just "Flash raids", even though it happens on the date of the monthly protests!

Anonymous One Year Later - a Twinkle of What It Used to Be

One year ago, on Feb. 10, 2008, Anonymous members appeared out of nowhere to protest Scientology around the world. The numbers were spectacular. In March, following the prediction of Anonymous that the protests will occur in increasing numbers every month, the amount of protesters were even greater, estimated to around 9,000.

After March, though, and contrary to the Anonymous announcement above, the numbers have been decreasing every month. Nowadays 1,000 would already be a lot.

In this respect, it was interesting to see what would be the numbers for the one year anniversary of Anonymous. For sure, at least some of those who did not protest in subsequent months would come out for this special occasion.

It is not possible to easily follow these numbers anymore. After their stats crashed, Anonymous stopped posting them systematically. Today, to know what the numbers are, one would have the burden of wading through all the posts in the WhyWeBWAA forum, trying to extirpate them from hundreds of infantilic comments, and even so one may not find them reported. I am therefore only taking the reports posted in ARS as a basis for comparison. To date, there are only three:

Manchester:
Feb. 2008: 130
Mar. 2008: 200
Feb. 2009: Manchester, England Feb 7th 2009 - alt.religion.scientology | Google Groups: "about 40 of us"


Phoenix:
Feb. 2008: 50
Mar. 2008: 70
Feb. 2009: protest in Phoenix 2/6/09 - alt.religion.scientology | Google Groups: "9 protesters"


London:
Feb. 2008: 400
Mar. 2008: 725
Feb. 2009: Picket Report - London (UK) - alt.religion.scientology | Google Groups:
"about 25 Anons turned up outside Queen Victoria Street. [...] Then on to Tottenham Court Road, where our numbers went up to about 30.


Total for these 3 locations:
Feb. 2008: 580
Mar. 2008: 995
Feb. 2009: 79 - which is roughly 80-90% down...

Anonymous Chased by Police

Report from the WhyWeBWAAA forum. Only 9 anons present (30 Scientologists). Remember, Amsterdam was the place where a peak of 112 anons protested.

Apparently, the police were chasing anons indeed as soon as they put on their mask or pull off their sign, like it seems may have happened in Germany and the UK. They let them cool off in jail but didn't bother asking for their ID

Another mask signed, again with the peace sign.

Now the "Epic epic big win" for anons is a mask signed by Cruise! Pretty soon they'll start joining rank with Scientologists too...

One anon thinks that shouting to Cruise "Miscavige is your SP" is a way to get his mask signed.

Ah well... what else is new?

Amsterdam Valkyrie opening night - Why We Protest | Activism Forum

Anonymous Absent Presence in Berlin and London

As I wrote in my German and UK review of Cruise's premiere, Anonymous was all but absent from the press, except when Cruise signed a mask.

One of my regular commentators commented: "Well, they had two TV appearances in german TV. One in the news and one in a 45 min. documentary about Anonymous and Scientology."

Well, OK. We'll no doubt hear about that more from critics then.

Today, I read two references in the UK news outlets:

Cruise Wont Buy Into Jonathan Ross Scandal (from Evening Times): "Among the crowd were a small group of anti-Scientology protesters - Cruise is a Scientologist - wearing masks and waving banners."

So at least something...

You would expect that London, being the place that, by far, held the biggest number of Anonymous protesters, would come up with a sizable bunch for the premiere, one of their few remaining opportunities to get their masked face in the press.

So what happened? Did just a handful really come, or where there removed by the police?

The next press entry leaves me to think that something like that may have happened:

The 9 0'Clock News – Thu 22 Jan: "Famed for his mammoth meet and greet walkabouts on the red carpet, Tom didn't disappoint last night and the only hiccup was when one protestor had to be forcibly removed after holding up a 'Scientology is Evil' poster in reference to Tom's religious beliefs."

Riverside Ordinance Prevents Picketing

In spite of massive objections from Scientology critics, including a full blown letter from Graham Berry, Riverside County supervisors Tuesday unanimously approved an ordinance that restricts picketing outside homes and a Church of Scientology base near Hemet.

The funny thing in this is that it is worded in such a way as to effectively prevent picketing at all.

Indeed, the protesters are supposed to remain at least 50 feet from the property line of any residence they are targeting in unincorporated Riverside County. This would in concrete term exclude them from the whole compound.

The ordinance makes an exception to permit protesters on a sidewalk across the street from the property.

In the case of Gold, the street in question may in fact be a large and busy highway, mostly made of intraversible terrain, making any protest totally ineffective, not to say dangerous.

But that's not all!

The church's base in Gilman Hot Springs abuts both sides of Gilman Springs Road!

So this leaves the protesters no place to go!

Wait! It even gets funnier.

County Counsel Pamela Walls assured protesters would have many options, but when asked to indicate them on a map, she said that she was not familiar with the specific property!

I think this is hilarious!

There is hope for critics, however. Indeed, Walls said "We are going to make sure they have the ability to protest and do so visibly".

So, this is what I would do if I was one of these Anonymous clowns. I would go in full picket gear to Walls' office, or whoever is in charge, and ask where I could protest and do so visibly. If she can't tell, then I would picket the Chief Supervisor office instead. Providing he does not live there, of course!

County ordinance raises questions about Scientology

Update Jan 8: What the article above does not say, is that a public hearing must be held before the measure can be formally added to the books. The hearing would be placed on the board's calendar in the next two or three weeks. Guess we will be hearing of that story more then...


Related blog entries:

• Jan 17: Is Close-in Pictures of Passer-By Legal?
  
• Jan 14: The Riverside County Ordinance Farce Continues
  
• Jan 13: Riverside Ordinance - New Information
  
• Jan 06: Riverside Ordinance Prevents Picketing
  
• Dec 18: Barbz Gets a Letter
  
• Dec 09: Anonymous 2.0

Comments Shed Light on Low Numbers

Some interesting comments from StumbleUpon about Jeff Jacobsen's article on Project Chanology which I commented back in Dec 17.

These comments I think explain much about why the numbers of protesters crumbled down. They align quite neatly with what I thought about it so far, namely, that more informed onlookers do not share the belief of anti-Scientologists that Scientology is that bad, and the fact that the original Anonymous feels its spirit has been sort of betrayed.

Most of the comments fall in reason 1 above, with reason 2 being an important part as well.

Indeed, at the time of writing, there are 25 comments made during the last 5 days. Seven of these could be said to fall in reason 1, and four to fall under reason 2. Four are comments about the photo, tl;dr, or are non-sensical, living the ten remaining comments to be split between neutral, positive, and negative.

Here are some representative excerpts:

Reason 1:

• Scientology doesnt seem to be that big of a problem to me. It just appears to be about as bad as other religions. I really just wish these kids would channel this energy and creativity into better forms of protesting.

• There are far more important/interesting things in the world that they could have focussed their attention on. Can't help feeling that this is just a bit of attention-seeking by a bunch of geeks whose only achievement was to take someone's advice and get out more.

• Scientology is not worth your protesting.

• (From one Andizzle314:) Anonymous has to be the most self-righteous bunch of assholes on the internet next to 9/11 conspiracy theorists. Grow some balls and take on a real religion that actually has influence on world matters.

• Andizzle is right on the money.

• They cannot be serious , and they are not funny either . Bunch of clueless spoiled teens , having no other stuff to do in their life (like work for money , protest some REAL issues , or just do anything creative/intelligent ) throwing overused memes on a sci-fi club . Some people decided to use their herd (sheep) mentality for their own purposes and this is how "project failology" was formed . Anonymous might seem like a good idea , but they are doing it wrong . I wont even say cancer , because 4chan = Myspace . Get over it , and find better chans to lurk .
  
  
• Whatever... this is not my fight. Let them do what they want. It keeps em busy anyway.
  

Reason 2:

• Fucking moralfags ruin everything.

• Project Chronology, though it has roots in anonymous, is not anonymous. Someone wanted an army to combat Scientology, and they culled them through 4chan. It is an offshoot, they are "moralfags". Wearing V for Vendetta masks and rickrolling Scientology places does not make you anonymous. And while they are a diverged group from anonymous, I think that what they are going is pure win.

• Epic win for Project Chanology, but I can't help but think that an anthropological examination of anything related to /b/ is a wasted venture.

• i was there, the first day it started, the DDoS attacks that followed... then after a while the fags came in and ruined everything, there came millions of people who said "anonymous, the anti scientology group". wtf, that's not what anon is... this one is okay.. at least it's not a site about "anonymous" that's just about scientology.

An Idea of Stats

It's hard to keep stats of the number in the monthly anti-Scientology protests those days, since they are not rounded up anymore, and they are not always reported for individual locations either. I guess it would be possible to draw a figure but it would take an awful lot of time. Not worth it.

To have an idea, though, I have taken a quick look at the Dec 13 entries for the London post game, as London was always by far the biggest player in the field.

If this post is true, and there are no other entries about numbers (really I did not wade in all details through the 9 full pages posted that far), then we are speaking of a maximum of 20!

This for a location that peaked at 725 in March and was still at 566 in July when all the rest of the world took the plunge, and was still at 120 back in September!

Protest Stats

Jens Tingleff points out the Anonymous effect on the annual Lisa McPherson vigil in the U.K., that went from one protest with 5-10 protesters last year, to five protests across the country totaling about 200 protesters.

Even though this is only the tail end of the wave that started a bit more than a year ago and that is slowly dying out, you've got to admit that it did revive, at least for a while, the OG movement that was almost on the bring of extinction.

Trend of Protests

Statistics about numbers in protests have become difficult to gather in view of the fact that Anonymous does not tally them anymore (I guess they are not as proud as they were in the beginning when the numbers were spectacular and they built up detailed statistic pages). You only get figures mentioned in individual reports, when they are mentioned at all. You can also guess figures from photos. Not surprisingly, the later are considerably lower than the figures announced.

Today I see two posts in ARS with figures. Those for Toronto and Phoenix. In the meantime I also see that the whyweprotest forum, that was down, is now back on line, but for lack of time I will focus on the two ARS posts only.

The trend of these two would reflect the world-wide trend, except that this world-wide trend would be somewhat lower in percentage since many locations have crashed down to zero since quite a while ago.

Here is the graph for Toronto (click on the graph for a larger view):



What this shows is that the big initial numbers have completely crashed and only a few hardcore members are left to protest every month. Part of these are OG who were already protesting before Anonymous.

Note: The source for these stats are the same as the one used for my July computation, plus information culled from enturbulation.org, whyweprotest.net, and ARS. In some cases I had no indication (either because numbers were not reported or because I had no time to chase them up) so had to make an average or had to make an estimate based on photos. For Toronto, I had to do this for the month of October, where the maximum numbers of people I counted on the photos was 9.

By all means, if you happen to read this and have better information, kindly leave me a comment and after checking it will adapt the figures if necessary.

The ARS post where I got my number for November is to be found here. 10-15 was reported, so I took the average of that.

Here is the graph for Phoenix:



As you can see, a similar pattern is reflected: from June onward, the numbers are hovering within the same range, representing the hardcore of members dedicated enough to go on protesting every month.

For Phoenix, I had to take an average for August. I also found unlikely that there were no protesters for July (as reported in Anonymous tally) so I took an average for that month too. The ARS post for November is here, and the first photos are here (showing only one protester out of the supposed ten, most probably OG Jeff Jacobsen).

As noted before, this is only a pattern in those town that maintained regular protests. Many town have crashed down to zero at some stage or another and have remained to the ground since then. The graph of the world-wide crash would therefore be much more pronounced.

The Power of Lulz

The new August 16 protest of Anonymous seems to be called "The Power of Lulz", and is sub-titled "Anonymous takes back chanology".

The way I interpret this is as follows: Anonymous tries to boost up the dwingling numbers by getting back to its chan roots, do it for the lulz, and "takes back" the channel after the Tory/Magoo incident.

There is something ironic in promoting lulz and at the same time promoting Scientology with accusatory signs of "Scientology Kills", backed up by conspiracy theories....

Anyway, that guy on the video above really can dance and it's a fun video, and the music is nice too.

By the way, I believe that dancer is MGB, the guy who was manhandled by Tommy Gorman and who was at the origin of the whole Tory/Magoo debacle. Now that's a prime pick for leading the "take back chanology" theme of the Aug. 16 protest...

Over 9000 Anon March - Epic FAIL

Anonymous was to hold the "Over 9000 Anon March", a big rally on July 19, that would have been a national and international event gathering thousands of anons in what was supposed to be an apex in months of hard work by Anonymous. Some of the very low statistics for US cities on the July 12 protests were explained away as people preparing for the July 19 momentous event.

The event did take place but it was a pathetic show with an estimated less than 200 anons attending. This, of course, goes hand in hand with the spectacular crash in numbers during the monthly protests. Interestingly, critics are now trying to make it a sort of OSA crime to even discuss the low numbers.

Scientologists Hanging with Anons

OT5 Karel Jeelof did the right thing - quietly hanging with Anon and listening to what they have to say.

Anon does not like it, however, and claim that he is only pretending to be nice and is only trying to "handle" them, then speak of going to picket his company in retaliation.

You can never win. Either you avoid anon and are accused of hiding, or hang out with them and are accused of being a "handler".

July 12 Protest Statistics - Crash in Active Anonymous Members, not Scientologists, Continues

Trend continuous to crash though, surprisingly, the London protested drew twice the amount of June, from 300 to 600! London is now 1/3rd of the rest of the world!

Some of the American cities crash (such as New York that went from 225 to 30 and used to peak at 700 in March!) may be explained by a possible confusion with the National demonstration on July 19 but this does not explain the spectacular crash for so many non-US cities (such as Sydney that went from 80 to 10 and used to have 225 in Feb!). Many other cities just got cleared from the protest map with nobody attending anymore.

See stats details.

Portland July 12 Protest

The Willamette Week, a local Portland newspaper, has an article about the July 12 Anonymous protest.

It gives a fairly equal time to the views on both sides, something that tends to infuriate anonymous members in their comments. Nor is the depiction of CoS' harassment strong enough for anons demonized views:

""Heckling" is an awful mild description of the treatment received by people like Mark Bunker and Paulette Cooper"

The author's depiction of the protest, however, is quite accurate:

"the group tromped off, clad with accusatory signs ("Scientology Kills," "The Church of Scientology is a Criminal Organization"), blank name-tags and spirits driven by conspiracy theory"

Scientology's point of view was parted by Gwen Mayfield-Barnard (photo).

"She maintained a matriarch's composure, calling out "There are cookies!" and gesturing to a table laden with nibbles whenever a new Scientologist walked in the door."

She reminded me of Yvette Shank, the New York Scientologist, whose warm motherly attitude transpired from one of the Anonymous videos trying to demonize her and twist her words.

The cookie note also shows what I reported earlier, that Scientologists increasingly just ignore Anonymous protesters at their door and have their own small parties inside, while Anonymous hold their "Epic" parties outside, sharing "ceak".

Mind you, even such an innocent gesture is questioned by anons, who have to ask:

"Ok, Gwen. What's in those cookies?!"

Anonymous Increasingly Blocked from Protesting in Front of Orgs

More and more anons are prevented to protest in front of the CoS buildings:

• Amsterdam:

  "We're moving to Beursplein, because the surrounding stores and restaurants at the Org are unable to draw in customers during our raids. We had a very nice chat with most store owners as well as the police and mutually agreed it would be best for everyone involved if we GTFO'd to a location where we can properly party."

• Toronto:

  "We are no longer allowed to protest in front of the Org, and we must now do so from across the street"
  

• Los Angeles:
  

  "The cult and the LAPD have effectively blocked Anonymous from picketing across the street from the Big Blue location. In fact, they have blocked off a 2-block swatch entirely around L. Ron Hubbard Way forcing Anonymous to picket 3 blocks away at the subway station, corner of Sunset Blvd. & Vermont. "