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Cult Awareness Network
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
This article forms part of a series on Scientology |
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The Cult Awareness Network (CAN) was founded in 1978 in the wake of the Jonestown mass suicides. CAN is now owned and operated by associates of the Church of Scientology, an organization that the original founders strongly opposed. Prior to the takeover, CAN provided information on groups that it considered to be cults, as well as support and referrals to so-called deprogrammers.
Supporters and detractors alike use the terms "old CAN" and "new CAN" to refer to the two periods of the organization's existence.[1][2][3][4]
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CAN evolved out of the Citizens Freedom Foundation, of which Ted Patrick was "the prime force in organizing."[5]
The CAN predecessor, CFF, was founded in the wake of the Jonestown mass suicides, and was run for a time by Patricia Ryan, the daughter of US Congressman Leo Ryan, Jr. (D-Millbrae, California), who died from gunfire while investigating conditions at the Jonestown cult compound in Guyana. The "old CAN" collected information on many controversial organizations and religious movements. However, the "old CAN" also became the subject of considerable controversy. Galen Kelly and Donald Moore, both of whom were convicted in the course of carrying out 'deprogramming', are linked to the "old CAN" by its detractors.[6]
Opponents of the "old CAN" charge that it deliberately provided a distorted picture of the groups it tracked. They claimed it was "a Chicago-based national anticult organization claiming to be purely a tax-exempt informational clearinghouse on new religions."[6]
In 1995, CAN, Rick Ross and two others were found guilty of conspiracy to violate the civil right to freedom of religion of Jason Scott, then a member of the Life Tabernacle Church. Ross was ordered to pay more than $3 million in damages; CAN was ordered to pay in excess of $1 million. Ross had been involved in hundreds of interventions with members of various religious groups over a 15-year period. Scott was allegedly violently and brutally kidnapped, and was forcibly confined for five days. The large damage award, plus a large number of additional civil tort cases brought against CAN by the Church of Scientology, drove the "old CAN" into bankruptcy in 1996, and its assets, including records, names and phone numbers, ended up in the hands of Scientologists.[7]
In 1991, Time magazine reported:
- According to the Cult Awareness Network, whose 23 chapters monitor more than 200 "mind control" cults, no group prompts more telephone pleas for help than does Scientology. Says Cynthia Kisser, the network's Chicago-based executive director: "Scientology is quite likely the most ruthless, the most classically terroristic, the most litigious and the most lucrative cult the country has ever seen. No cult extracts more money from its members.'" [8]
Around this time, the Church of Scientology struck back. In The American Lawyer, an article recounts:
- Starting in 1991, CAN was forced to fend off some 50 civil suits filed by Scientologists around the country, many of them asserting carbon copy claims and many pressed by the same law firm, Los Angeles's Bowles & Moxon. Scientologists also filed dozens of discrimination complaints against CAN with state human rights commissions nationwide, requiring the services of still more lawyers. The avalanche of litigation staggered the network. By 1994 CAN, which ran on a budget of about $300,000 a year, had been dumped by its insurers and owed tens of thousands of dollars to attorneys.[9]
After this litigation had driven the Cult Awareness Network to bankruptcy, Scientologist attorney Steven Hayes appeared in bankruptcy court and managed to win the bidding for what remained of the organization for an amount of $20,000: The name, logo, phone number, office equipment, and judgements that the organization had won but not yet collected. Initially, the Scientologists did not succeed in getting the CAN files, because of the threat of litigation against the bankruptcy trustee; the files were returned to the board. After Jason Scott sold his $1.875 million judgment to Scientologist Gary Beeny for $25.000, this made Beeny, who was represented by Moxon, CAN's largest creditor. [10]The CAN board then settled with Beeny by turning over the files to him instead of the possibility of being individually liable for the judgement. [11]
On December 12, 1996, a usenet posting by 'lah' (later reported by TIME magazine to be the account of one Sister Francis Michael [12] of the Heaven's Gate group) in the newsgroup alt.religion.scientology applauded Scientology for their "courageous action against the Cult Awareness Network" [13], which she blamed of "promoting all sort of lies (including) cult activities."
Opponents of the 'new CAN' say it has become effectively a subsidiary organization of, and a front group for, Scientology, as it exclusively promotes Scientology's point of view regarding cults and deprogrammers.[7] For example, a section of its website relating to the Aum Supreme Truth sect authored by Nick Broadhurst, a New Zealand Scientology Spokesman, [14] stated that "...the media was unable to be see[sic] the actual source of the crimes at Aum, which of course was the psychiatric treatment, and which continues in hospitals around Japan today;" [15] Scientology is extremely hostile towards psychiatry. The site does not contain any criticism of Scientology, unlike most other sites which claim to provide anti-cult information (other than those dedicated to other specific groups).
In the Scientology publication IMPACT, Nr. 72, Scientologist and CAN VP Jean Hornnes explained:
- We have successfully prevented deprogrammings and we have taken broken families and helped to put them back together by using standard LRH technology on handling PTSness.[16]
The New CAN has been accused of passing the name of a caller, a concerned mother, to the cult she was inquiring about, which resulted in further damaging the relationship with her daughter.[17]
- ^ About the Scientology-backed "Cult Awareness Network", Apologetics Index
- ^ Cult Awareness Network, Rick Ross
- ^ Newsletter of cultawarenessnetwork.org Volume I Issue II
- ^ A Letter from the Church of Scientology, by Leisa Goodman
- ^ Sterba, James P.. "Parents Form Group to Fight Religious Cults' Hold on Young", New York Times, 1974-09-02, p. 18.
- ^ a b CAN, We Hardly Knew Ye: Sex, Drugs, Deprogrammers’ Kickbacks, and Corporate Crime in the (old) Cult Awareness Network, by Anson Shupe and Susan E. Darnell, October 21, 2000, paper presented at SSSR meeting
- ^ a b Group that once criticized Scientologists now owned by one, CNN, December 19, 1996
- ^ Scientology: The Thriving Cult of Greed and Power], by Richard Behar, Time, May 6, 1991
- ^ Did Scientology Strike Back?, The American Lawyer, June 1997
- ^
- ^ Original Cult Awareness Network, Inc. confidential records turned over to Scientologist, F.A.C.T.Net Newswire, May 17, 1999
- ^ Gleick, Elizabeth. "Heaven's Gate", Time, 1997-04-07, p. 3. Retrieved on 2006-07-10.
- ^ Thanks for Actions Against CAN, usenet posting by "lah", December 21, 1996
- ^ What is Scientology®? Exhibit Tour creates strong interest in Australia and New Zealand
- ^ [1]
- ^ PTS means "Potential Trouble Source", see Scientology beliefs and practices
- ^ Knapp, John M. (1997-07-18). A Mother's Betrayal by the New CAN. TranceNet.org (discontinued in 2005). Retrieved on 2007-02-23.
- The "Old" Cult Awareness Network - prior to June 1996, this link is to another Scientology front group
- Official New Cult Awareness Network Web site, Scientologist
- Retrospect: Cult Awareness Network: the collapse and takeover of CAN
- "The Cult Awareness Network:" TV news story by 60 Minutes on the end of CAN
- Background info on the new CAN
