For people with lots of time on their hands, here's a priceless blog article written to defend Scientology against APOSTATES. And guess what religion the author points to with the same problem? Jehovah's Witnesses, of course. Here's the link and an excerpt. And don't forget to read the few hundred comments too. Sounds like some of our Apostates are training their Apostates the art of ridicule.
Defectors About Scientology - Breaking with Scientology
by jsmado
Sat Mar 06, 2010 at 09:10:41 PM PST
Sea Org, disconnect and ex-Scientologists
The vast majority of false allegations put forward, primarily on websites on the Internet, to attempt to stigmatize the Church of Scientology, have been systematically spread by a handful of disgruntled former Scientologists, Church of Scientology staff members or members of the Sea Organization (Sea Org) —apostates(1)— who commonly have "an axe to grind."
Courts, scholars and objective and responsible government bodies routinely discard testimony by apostates of any religion because their credibility is always suspect, their anecdotal allegations inevitably motivated by personal interests, and their claims frequently fueled by greed to support outlandish and unwarranted demands for monetary compensation in legal actions from their former faiths.
- jsmado's diary :: ::
It is unfortunate that some government officials and media continue to rely on discredited apostates to justify discriminatory policies against the Church of Scientology and its members. Virtually all punitive government actions targeting Scientology in the past decades were based on unsubstantiated anecdotal testimony from disgruntled apostates. When the evidence was finally reviewed by objective government officials or judicial bodies, the Church emerged completely vindicated while the false allegations of apostates were exposed and discredited.
Apostasy is a well-researched phenomenon in the field of religion and sociology, and leading scholars have devoted major studies to documenting the inherent unreliability of apostates' allegations against their former religions.
Dr. Bryan Wilson, Reader Emeritus in Sociology at Oxford University from 1963 to 1993, was one of the world's pre-eminent scholars of new religions during his lifetime. He was a fellow of All Souls College at Oxford and the British Academy. He researched, published and lectured on religion and new religious movements around the world for 50 years and provided expert opinions on religion for the British House of Commons and the courts.
Dr. Wilson noted that apostates of new religious movements generally crave self-justification by seeking to reconstruct their past to excuse their former affiliations, while blaming those who were formerly their closest associates. They must be regarded as inherently unreliable sources by government bodies, the judiciary and the media:
"Neither the objective sociological researcher nor the court of law can readily regard the apostate as a creditable or reliable source of evidence. He must always be seen as one whose personal history predisposes him to bias with respect to both his previous religious commitment and affiliations, the suspicion must arise that he acts from a personal motivation to vindicate himself and to regain his self-esteem, by showing himself to have been first a victim but subsequently to have become a redeemed crusader. As various instances have indicated, he is likely to be suggestible and ready to enlarge or embellish his grievances to satisfy that species of journalist whose interest is more in sensational copy than in an objective statement of the truth."(2)
Another acclaimed expert, Dr. Lonnie Kliever, longtime Professor of Religious Studies at Southern Methodist University, determined that the credibility of apostates is highly suspect. Dr. Kliever found that the overwhelming majority of individuals who exit from religions harbor no ill-will toward their past religious associations and activities. However, there is invariably a much smaller number of disaffected individuals—apostates—who are deeply committed to discrediting and undertaking actions designed to denigrate and destroy the religious communities that once claimed their loyalties. In Dr. Kliever's opinion, these apostates:
"[P]resent a distorted view of the new religions to the public, the academy, and the courts by virtue of their ready availability and eagerness to testify against their former religious associations and activities. Such apostates always act out of a scenario that vindicates themselves by shifting responsibility for their actions to the religious group.... Such apostates can hardly be regarded as reliable informants by responsible journalists, scholars, or jurists."(3)
Courts and administrative bodies also routinely dismiss the anecdotal testimony of apostates as inherently unreliable...
[edited to remove interferring code] Lady Lee
