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With clear skies, and temperatures in the mid-70s, what better day to have a raid?

April 22, 2009, 9:53 PM

You really couldn’t ask for a better day to raid. You really couldn’t. This past Saturday, the sun was shining, and temperatures were in the mid-70s. Perfect raid weather.

And thus April 18, 2009 was when Anonymous DC had its monthly raid against the Church of Scientology. We had better turnout than we’ve had at the last several raids (we counted 22 people at one point), and we had fun, with a theme of Watchmen.

As we arrived, one thing stuck out prominently. We usually write messages all over the sidewalk in front of the Org and on the triangle across the street from the Org, but this time, the sidewalk was pre-chalked! Turned out that it was a little counter-protesting, as the “chalk tech”, as we called it, promoted the Youth for Human Rights International organization – a Scientology front group. Take a look:

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Categories: Project Chanology

GENTLEMEN!

April 12, 2009, 10:19 PM

No one expects the Inquisition. And this time, Anonymous, as part of Operation Inquisition, raided the Scientology “Mission” in Richmond, under the theme of “Operation GENTLEMEN”.

Richmond was a little different than most, because in Virginia, wearing a mask is illegal. Seriously – it’s a class 6 felony. Thus Anonymous went unmasked. That’s not to say, however, that people didn’t go to this raid completely out in the open. While some people didn’t care about being seen and photographed completely unmasked, others used fake facial hair to disguise themselves. One Anon wore a set of “Groucho glasses” with a fake nose and mustache, while the women used spirit gum to attach fake mustaches and goatees to their faces. And so here we are, raiding in Richmond:

Raiding in Richmond

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Anonymous DC does Philadelphia…

March 30, 2009, 1:21 AM

On Saturday, March 28, Anonymous DC pulled off a surprise raid outside the Church of Scientology in Philadelphia. We told no one, not even our own parents. We called it “Operation Inquisition”, because no one was expecting us, just as no one expects the Inquisition. And at 9 AM, we departed, arriving in Philadelphia just past noon. Thank goodness for HT’s GPS, which guided us straight to our destination without problem.

And having parked the cars, our raid began outside the Church of Scientology in Philadelphia. This was a very different experience than raiding outside our own local Founding Church of Scientology. For one, we have more room in DC. We have the sidewalk in front of the Founding Org, as well as the triangle across the street. In Philadelphia, we had half of a somewhat narrow sidewalk in front of – get this – a “storefront church”. Yes, the Org in Philadelphia is a storefront location, with two “Free Stress Test” signs on the door. How fail.

But regardless of what it might have looked like, we raided it. The cops, who came out to see what was up, even noticed that we weren’t the usual Anonymous that raids outside this Org. Yes, we were from DC, and Philadelphia Anonymous had been “pwned”.

The storefront Org.
The storefront Org.

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Something about the rain that keeps people home…

March 15, 2009, 10:39 PM

Anonymous had its March raid on Saturday, and those of us who came out to brave the cold and the rain had a great time protesting the Church of Scientology. It was raining on and off all day, and it was a bit cool, which makes for cold rain. It was enough to where I had to leave the Canon in the bag and shoot with Duckie all day. I had kind of figured that the Canon’s first protest would be an Anon raid (specifically, this one), but it looks like that distinction will go to a Funk the War demonstration later this week.

Nonetheless, though, for those of us who came out, we had a blast, “celebrating” L. Ron Hubbard‘s 98th birthday. And of course, we got photos…

JB got us started on the right foot, with a "Honk if you oppose Scientology" sign for MaidofWin to troll the cars with. The use of "oppose" was new this time, since consensus was that the previous "Honk if you hate Scientology" was playing too much into the Church of Scientology's hands. We don't hate them, after all, and we would welcome any Scientologist who escapes the cult with open arms. We oppose Scientology's practices.
JB got us started on the right foot, with a “Honk if you oppose Scientology” sign for MaidofWin to troll the cars with. The use of “oppose” was new this time, since consensus was that the previous “Honk if you hate Scientology” was playing too much into the Church of Scientology’s hands. We don’t hate them, after all, and we would welcome any Scientologist who escapes the cult with open arms. We oppose Scientology’s practices.

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Categories: Project Chanology

So what is this supposed to accomplish?

March 9, 2009, 5:55 PM

Okay, check this out:


(Apologies for the butt crack – I have no control over that)

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Categories: Project Chanology

We had far more than enough win to go around on Saturday night thanks to a model UN conference…

February 16, 2009, 12:35 PM

So I had fun on Valentine’s Day, and it had nothing at all to do with love. After all, I am single, and all these couples getting kissy on Valentine’s Day makes me nauseous after a while. I am one of the many who calls the day “Singles Awareness Day” for that matter.

But yes, the fun came not from actually getting a date or something, but rather, I, along with a small group of other DC Anons, raided outside the Founding Church of Scientology. This was Part 2 of a two-part strategy for that day. Part 1 was a visit to Katsucon, which is an anime and manga convention for enthusiasts of the genre, being held at the Hyatt Regency Crystal City, where we had previously held AnonyCon. The mission there was basically trolling, going around and handing out literature in the non-paid areas to Katsucon participants. I’m told it went well until Anonymous was booted due to fire code issues – Katsucon was at capacity with the paid participants, and Anonymous trolling put them over the limit as far as occupancy loads went.

I skipped Katsucon mainly because of Metro. Metro took the entire Presidents’ Day weekend to do a major track maintenance project on the C&L Junction (where the Blue and Yellow Lines join just north of Pentagon), and thus Pentagon station was closed, cutting off Pentagon City and below from the rest of the system. I didn’t want to deal with a bus bridge between L’Enfant Plaza and Pentagon City, so I skipped it.

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Categories: Project Chanology

So we had a meeting of about fifteen people, all named “David”, outside the Founding Church of Scientology on a Saturday afternoon. And that means…

February 9, 2009, 9:27 PM

Yes, a meeting of about fifteen people, all named “David”, outside the Founding Church of Scientology in Washington DC on a Saturday afternoon means that it was once again time for Anonymous DC to have its monthly raid, protesting the practices of the Church of Scientology. And as always, we had fun, we had epic win, and we had more than enough lulz to go around. And in Anonymous, everyone is “David”.

This time around, the theme was “Space Opera”, taking a science fiction theme, mainly centering around Star Wars.

MisterTastee wore two cinnamon buns on his head, imitating Princess Leia's distinctive hairstyle.
MisterTastee wore two cinnamon buns on his head, imitating Princess Leia’s distinctive hairstyle.

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Categories: Project Chanology, WMATA

I’d say that in January, Anonymous made a bigger splash than usual…

January 18, 2009, 8:17 PM

In January, Anonymous DC raided not once, but twice. This stemmed from the fact that the global raid date was January 17, and for us, bringing out the big guns on January 17 for the global was not the best idea in the world, considering that right now, Washington DC is swamped with out of town tourists – and out of town cops – for Barack Obama’s inauguration in two short days. Thus we had our “global” raid on January 10, and we flash-raided on the 17th. Win was had by all, though it was cold as hell on both days.

On the 10th, our raid was loosely themed around the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Thus:

We had Shredder.
We had Shredder.

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Categories: Project Chanology

A year of Anonymous…

January 8, 2009, 7:39 PM

It was recently brought to my attention today that Project Chanology, the Scientology-protesting offshoot of Anonymous, has been going on now for a year. And despite the Scilons’ best efforts, including bogus legal threats, bullbaiting by Scientology spokesmodel Sylvia Stanard, and many other half-assed efforts at intimidation, Anonymous goes on.

And if you think the protesting of the Church of Scientology is just a DC thing, you are sadly mistaken, as Scientology has been protested across the United States and worldwide. This video sums up the situation quite well, that despite the Church of Scientology’s best efforts, we are still alive, and not going anywhere:

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Categories: Project Chanology

Long hat is long!

December 15, 2008, 7:12 PM

Let me just say that I had a wonderful day on Saturday. First off, I had an early lunch with Kathleen Haines, the Lutheran and Presbyterian campus minister at JMU, whom I had not seen since 2004. We went to Cafe Luna, one of my favorite Dupont Circle restaurants. Kathleen looks exactly the same as she did back in my day, and we had great stories to share. It was great seeing her again. And afterwards, we got a quick photo together:

Kathleen Haines and Ben Schumin

And yes, this was a quick turn-the-phone-on-ourselves kind of shot.

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Categories: LPCM, Project Chanology

Scientology thinks they can avoid us by having their awards event elsewhere? I think not…

November 9, 2008, 1:50 PM

Anonymous DC had its monthly raid last night, and we had a blast. We started at the Org, and then moved on to the Marriott Wardman Park Hotel in Woodley Park, where Scientology was having their International Association of Scientologists (IAS) awards ceremony.

Meanwhile, my Anon look changed again for this one. Early on, I went like I would for a black bloc. Then in June, I did that one-off pirate look with the V for Vendetta mask. Then six raids in zentai. With the weather getting too cold for my zentai, I wore whatever and the V for Vendetta mask – with glasses. That was an interesting look, since it made the grinning Guy Fawkes face look particularly scholarly. Take a look:

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Categories: Project Chanology

I won “best concept”!

November 2, 2008, 7:03 PM

So halloween went swimmingly. We dressed up at work, and had a costume contest. We had four different categories: best concept, best execution, “that took guts to wear”, and “most likely to traumatize a child”. I ended up winning best concept, with my 3000-Series Breda. Take a look:

My Breda 3000-Series costume

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Now this is an interesting situation…

September 24, 2008, 7:06 PM

This is an interesting situation. Halloween will involve a costume contest at work, and also likely an Anonymous raid after work. Lots of fun stuff going on, all requiring special outfits.

And the problem is that I can’t exactly wear the same costume for both things. I thought about just wearing the zentai that I wear for Anonymous for both things, but we run into two problems. First of all, the zentai has a set of gloves built into it, and I generally don’t do well with that, since for me, gloves rarely ever fit me “like a glove”. It’s a cruel reality. And my zentai is no exception. I’ve tried typing in it, and it doesn’t work. The other problem is that the zentai only has a back zipper that goes from mid-back to shoulders. No zippers in the front. If I need to answer nature’s call, I have to peel the whole suit off. I’ve commented that going to the bathroom in the zentai takes ten minutes. Four to take the suit off, one to actually answer nature’s call, one to wash my hands, and then four to put it all back on.

However, it’s not like my coworkers don’t know about the fact that I run with Anonymous, and about the zentai I wear to raids. After all, one of my coworkers yelled my name out at the May raid, and another one of my coworkers was passing by and posed with me for a photo at the September raid. Take a look…

Justine and I at the September raid.  I'm obviously the one in the zentai suit.

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Who doesn’t like a free hug?

September 10, 2008, 10:54 PM

So as far as I was concerned, International Free Hug Day was a resounding success, as free hugs were given to all who wanted them. This was an event that I organized with Anonymous as a flash raid, and so we gave our free hugs on the triangle across from the Founding Church of Scientology, in front of La Tomate. I was out there for three hours, having come straight from work, and Heidi joined in about halfway through. Check us out:

Heidi with my "FREE HUGS" sign  Me with my "FREE HUGS" sign

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Scientologists don’t scare me!

July 21, 2008, 7:10 PM

I finally got the opportunity to scan the letter, and so here is the Church of Scientology’s effort to try and silence me, reprinted here in its entirety:

Scientology letter, Page 1

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Categories: Project Chanology