Just in time for Hancock, the LA Times exposes Will Smith’s school’s plan to use “teaching” methods devised cult founder and totalitarian L. Ron Hubbard.

Touretzky said many phrases and concepts on the school’s website are specific to Scientology. For example, the school lists a “Director of Qualifications” and another teacher who is an assistant in the “Qual” department. The “Qual,” said Touretzky, is where people who have completed a Scientology counseling, or “auditing,” session or a course in the Church of Scientology are tested by a qualifications teacher.

“There is no reputable educator anywhere who endorses [study technology],” said Touretzky, a critic of Scientology. “What happens is that children are inculcated with Scientology jargon and are led to regard L.R. Hubbard as an authority figure. They are laying the groundwork for later bringing people into Scientology.”

A spokeswoman for the Church of Scientology, Karin Pouw, denied Touretzky’s assertions and said the teaching methods are not religious and are widely used in schools around the world.

I don’t think she named any others, and if she did I have $20 that says the over 90% of them can be found on ABLE’s website.

This is the front page:

And here is the article.

Anonymous’s initial activities were silly - playing tricks or hijacking forums. Some were borderline legal. They would bring down websites by bombarding them with data (“distributed denial of service”). “Frankly, it wasn’t very noble. But it was fun,” explained one Anonymous, who called himself Halfdark. They have a word to describe such activities - lulz (see panel). Early this year, a video was posted online of Tom Cruise discussing Scientology. Unintentionally funny in its sincerity, it spread across the internet. Scientology called in the lawyers, and began forcing sites to remove it. Anonymous had a target.

“They had started screwing with the internet,” said Marc Abian, named afterthe Scientologists’ belief in an evil race of aliens called the Marcabians. “Initially we harassed them for lulz, but then we realised that they ruin lives. What we do is fun, but with a real cause.”

Moar here and digg here. This was three full pages in a big-time London newspaper.  The seal has been broken; time for other media to take note.

The Guardian has published a list of reasons to dislike Will Smith.  One of them:

Will is, as has been widely reported, the latest megastar to start recruiting for top loonball academy the Church Of Scientology. After shooting finished on Hancock, he gave crew members a delightful wrap “present” - a gift card for one personality test at any Scientology centre. It should be noted that personality tests almost always result in a series of previously unsuspected personality defects in the test subject that can be cured by the Church of Scientology, and that first personality tests are actually free anyway. Will, you shouldn’t have!

A voucher for a free personality test?  Does that mean all his extra money is being funnelled to the cult for auditing?