This is the *quick* FAQ, the one to give people first up. The succour of
the confused and overloaded lurker. Suggestions are welcomed. The idea is
to keep it no more than a page (66 lines) in length (between the lines)
and 78 (pref.75) characters in width.
http://thingy.apana.org.au/~fun/scn/links/ufaq.txt
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a.r.s. Short FAQ for Newcomers version 0.11
0. If you want detail, IT'S ALL ON WEB PAGES. Ours are all accessible from
http://www.tiac.net/users/modemac/cos.html, theirs are all accessible from
http://www.scientology.org/ . Dive in and read till your brain overflows.
1. Many excellent critical books written over the years are listed at (and
available via) http://www.ncf.carleton.ca/~av282/books.htm -
in particular, you should read 'Bare-Faced Messiah' and 'The Road to Xenu' -
http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~dst/Library/Shelf/bfm/ and
http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~dst/Library/Shelf/xenu/
2. Yes, all the stuff about Xenu and volcanoes and clams is true. Bwahaha!
And that only costs you US$160k out of US$360k or more total. Eek.
3. A killfile is necessary to read a.r.s, due to both Co$ spam-bombings and
juvenile crossposting twits. (Feel free to write to the latter asking them
not to post off-topic noise.) Windows: Agent (http://www.forteinc.com) is
popular. Unix: tin, trn or slrn. Macintosh: YA-NewsWatcher.
4. Yes, it is a cult.
5. No, even though they stare like that they probably won't hurt you.
6. Yes, there are ex-scientologists who still believe that Hubbard's
stuff works - the 'free zone'. http://www.lightlink.com/clearing/
Mostly quite nice people.
7. Yes, the e-meter is basically a "lie detector". For full info, see
http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~dst/Secrets/E-Meter
8. No, you aren't supposed to understand Koos. He was too crazy even for
the Co$. Amusement or killfile. A 'Koos FAQ' is posted regularly.
9. Yes, it appears that many different $cientologist posters use the same
accounts, probably in violation of the agreements they have with their ISP.
10. Yes, the Co$ really has harassed critics. Most have survived, though.
11. Yes, they will threaten to sue you for posting Fair Use extracts of
their sEkRiT sKrIpToOrS. No, they haven't managed to make it stick.
12. No, there is no organized conspiracy to bring the "Church" to its
knees. If we were organized we'd have already done it and would be working
on the people who enacted the CDA.
13. Yes, a $cientologist who makes sense, rationally argues their view and
refrains from constant personal attacks does show up now and then. But
they either blow the cult, get thrown into RPF indefinitely or disappear
until the next all-hands-on-a.r.s alert. (Whippersnapper may or may not be
officialdom, but serves mostly for amusement value only.)
14. No, randomly answering personality tests won't confuse them any more
than they are already confused.
15. If you haven't read the Web pages, go and do so *NOW*. Before you post.
16. No, Scientology doesn't really matter very much at all; it's small and
getting smaller. It's who tries this *next* that we have to worry about.
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