Four strikes and I'm out

$cientology's outed me (identified me), so I come on out

Well, it seems that everybody in Scientology knows that my real name is Kristi Wachter, so I may as well share that information with my friends here on a.r.s.

$cientology's tried to out me several times now:

The first time was on June 30 , when "The Independent" ([email protected]) posted a message called "Kristi Wachter - Out of the blue", which included the following:

I have noticed something that strikes me as a bit of an oddity. Why would a person who has a record label and who is a computer consultant be harassing a church?

Whether I'm "harassing a church" is open to debate, but obviously, one's profession need not have anything to do with being an activist. You might as well ask, "Why would a person who has a record label and who is a computer consultant NOT be involved in activism?"

She appeared here out of the blue.

... as if there were any other way to appear on Usenet. What was I supposed to do, post a message a week saying, "I'm coming!" ???

And, of course, at the time this message appeared, I had NOT appeared on a.r.s. under my own name. (Except for one inadvertent post about Spider Robinson, which I hastily cancelled.)

I visited her web site and she seems to be a decent person, but her manner changes completely when posting to ars.

Which, of course, at that time, I hadn't done under my own name.

And actually, I don't think my manner changes much at all when posting to a.r.s., even under my alias. (I go on way too long regardless of which name I'm using. <grin>)

I think this was $cn's attempt at retaliation for my 5-org picket a few days before.

(And I thank all those gallant souls who sprang to my defense, especially Thad, who pointed out that I actually had a life, quite apart from my occasional activism.)

The second outing was on August 10 , when one of the many Rod Fletchers ([email protected]) posted "Concerned about Pickets?", which included these lines:

Let me just respond to Rod Keller, Kristi Wachter and Starshadow.

This line is fascinating. I'm guessing it was there to throw people off. Had Rod or Starshadow done anything around this time to tee $cn off?

You are a bunch of hypocrites because you do picket individual people and not just organizations.

Well, of course, I've NEVER picketed a person's home, only $cn offices. I have never denied that there are individual people in $cn, but I have often publicly stated, here and to my $cn handlers, that I have nothing against individual Scientologists. I just want the illegal and unethical behavior to stop. I try to be as pleasant to individual Scientologists as is possible under somewhat trying circumstances.

And yes I don't give a damn about your pickets, but I think we want to have some fun doing pickets on those who picket us.

Well, by all means, have fun! Doing a picket with a dour attitude is both unpleasant and ineffective.

Are you trying to silence us or oppress our first amendment right?

Certainly not. I recognize your constitutional right to picket, along with your right to create bad PR for yourselves by picketing in a residential area. You might keep in mind, though, that free speech has limits, and libel is against the law. (Yep - check those fliers. Check those signs, while you're at it. You know I'm not a "religious bigot", and defamation is illegal.)

And by the way the 5 December pickets that I am organizing are nothing compared to what you have seen so far. You know Scientologists can get organized. Rod

Oh, please. I SUSPECT Scientologists can get organized, but I certainly haven't seen much evidence for it. And do try to restructure that first sentence. Is that December 5, or 5 pickets in December? And do you really mean they are "nothing" compared to what we have seen so far? (I imagine you were trying to say "You ain't seen nothing yet," but that's not what you said.) And, of course, since I personally haven't seen ANY pickets by Scientologists, I'm sure any upcoming pickets would have to be markedly different from the previous non-existent pickets.

Well, pretty sure.

... I think this one was in retaliation for my announcement of my "Is $cn breaking the law" pages. (http://www.scientology-lies.com/re.cgi?http://members.aol.com/jour0/investigation.html)

Strike three came last Wednesday, August 26 . As I reported in my LA picket report, as I was wrapping up my conversation with my $cn handler, Leslie (?), I introduced myself as Jour, and she replied, "You're Krista Wachter, aren't you?" Alas, although my name had worked its way down to $cn LA, she wasn't quite able to remember it correctly. Still, this gave me one more confirmation that $cn knew my name, even in LA.

This one, of course, would have been retaliation for my having the chutzpah to picket in LA.

Strike four came later that day, when I returned home to San Francisco and heard about the $cn picket of my apartment building and saw the libellous fliers with my name.

When I started posting and picketing back in April, I took an alias because I was intimidated by $cn's history of viciously harassing critics. I recognized at the time, though, that they would probably go to the trouble of finding out my real name fairly quickly. Indeed, it only took them 2 1/2 months to reveal that they did, indeed, know my name.

My guess is that they obtained my name and home address either by tracing my car's license plates, or by contacting AOL and claiming to be me. Either method is probably illegal, and definitely unethical in my humble opinion.

But, now I'm out. I can stop using #$*(&$ AOL to post messages, and I don't have to worry about, say, giving my name to the press. I'll probably be able to move some of my pages to a more powerful site, and possibly add database features soon, none of which I could do on AOL.

And I can finally give people a way to contact me at pickets, giving me additional credibility and another chance to tell my side of the story.

I'll probably stop posting from AOL, unless anyone requests something from that address.

If anyone wants to know any more about me, feel free to visit http://www.scientology-lies.com/re.cgi?http://www.racerrecords.com , especially http://www.scientology-lies.com/re.cgi?http://www.racerrecords.com/Kristi.html , which reflects me reasonably well despite being horribly out of date. Or, of course, just ask. Like Claire Swazey, I reserve the right to refuse to answer some questions.

So, now comes the burning question: how many of you had matched up "Jour" and "Kristi Wachter" before now?

<creak of door opening>

<deep breath>

Yep, I'm out.

Kristi / Jour

I think $cientology is hurting people and breaking the law,
and I want them to stop it. See http://www.scientology-lies.com/re.cgi?http://members.aol.com/jour0 for more.

This page was last updated on May 8, 1999.