Talk:Operation Snow White
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The "Snow White Program" was written by L. Ron Hubbard (LRH) as an attempt to reduce or eliminate false reports on Scientology, the Church and LRH; especially those held by Interpol and the U.S. Internal Revenue Service.
Some Church staff used the program as a reason to commit illegal acts. It is a matter of opinion whether the illegal acts were in the spirit of the program.
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[edit] Series Template
Removing this Series Template from across the Scientology related pages. This is not correct usage of Series Templates per the guidelines. They were set up to show the history of countries and were different articles form a sequential series. This is not the case with the Scientology pages, which are random pages on different topics – not a sequence of any kind. Wiki’s definition of a series is: “In a general sense, a series is a related set of things that occur one after the other (in a succession) or are otherwise connected one after the other (in a sequence).” Nuview, 12:20, 10 January 2006 (PST)
- See:
- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Article_series
- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:List_of_article_series
- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Navigational_templates#Religion
- There are both timeline-specific series, and series based a unifying theme. Ronabop 01:10, 11 January 2006 (UTC)
Written by a former Snow White Program Chief (with a hazy memory of the program after approximately 25 years)
- Why isn't the title "Snow White Program" a subsection at Scientology? --Wetman 21
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- 28, 9 Feb 2005 (UTC)
[edit] Why it is separate
When I read the Scientology page, I noticed a link to an "Operation Snow White" page, which did not include an article.
I guess the best person to ask is the person who created a link to the new page.
A former SWPC
[edit] NPOV concerns
Operation Snow White was the largest incident of domestic espionage in the history of the United States. That goes beyond Church members "using the program as a reason to commit illegal acts." The article states that it is a matter of opinion whether the illegal acts "were in the spirit of the program" -- if LRH had other methods, legal ones, for accomplishing the aims of Snow White, what were they? What legal methods did he have in mind for "reducing or eliminating" the false reports held by the agencies in question? -- Antaeus Feldspar 22:49, 9 Feb 2005 (UTC)
- Largest incident of PRIVATE domestic espionage. Hard to believe it, but there are forces in the universe worse than L. Ron Hubbard & Scientology - the largest incident of domestic espionage was the FBI's own COINTELPRO. -- LamontCranston 12:51, 21 January 2006 (UTC)
[edit] Answer to NPOV concerns
As I recall, the "Snow White Program" itself, which was written by LRH, was relatively short. It was at a strategic level.
I do not recall the wording of the Program and do not have a copy of it. (Perhaps it is on the web somewhere.) But I do not recall it specifying exactly what to do and how to do it.
There were hundreds, if not thousands, of projects which spawned from the original program which were not written by LRH and which implemented the Program. It is indeed possible (or probable) that some of those lower-level projects proposed/ordered committing illegal acts.
A former SWPC
- According to some testimony, Hubbard knew about the illegal acts: "Former Scientology agent Kathy Smith testified about safe houses referred to as "the garden", where secret information was amassed and filed. She said she wrote a letter to Hubbard outlining all the illegal activity she was involved in and received a note of congratulations back, signed Ron. [9] Scientology trial hears of intrigue and 'plants'", Toronto Star, May 16, 1992, p. A19." [2] Also, one witness disagreed that the "commit no illegal acts" version was the real one: As well, Marion Envoy, formerly Canada's top official with Scientology, [..] Defense council Ruby showed Envoy a document he suggested was the basis for the Snow White program and pointed out it specified using only legal means. She said it appeared to be a version of the program intended for the legal department. AndroidCat 23:13, 21 January 2006 (UTC)
[edit] Different NPOV concerns
The title of this article is "Operation Snow White," but the subject is a document called "The Snow White Program." A document is just words on a page; an "operation" implies action of some sort. What is the connection between the document and the "operation?" Also, it seems to be assumed that the reports held by IRS and Interpol were "false." Is this a generally accepted fact, or the opinion of the person who wrote the Snow White Program?
- None of this article is sourced. Is the person who wrote it originally still around to source it, or will someone need to go on a hunt? Titanium Dragon 03:38, 12 Apr 2005 (UTC)
Can we get some external links on this article? --67.126.213.162 7 July 2005 00:04 (UTC)
And some dates? Yaron July 7, 2005 05:08 (UTC)
[edit] Further Information
A little blurb about what happened to the people convicted (jail time/probation/fines/etc.) would be good. I for one would be interested as to what the punishment was for the incident. ThatDamnDave 18:27, 19 December 2005 (UTC)
- Mary Sue Hubbard was indeed convicted on the charges. Time magazine ran a piece on Scientology in 1991; I'll see if I can dig it up. Rogue 9 09:08, 7 January 2006 (UTC)
[edit] removed sentence
I've removed the following sentence: "Some Church staff used the program as a reason to commit illegal acts." There are two interpretations for this sentence, as far as I can see: one is "Church staff committed illegal acts in order to further the aims of the program," which is redundant with the rest of the article. The other is that "the Church staff who committed illegal acts were going to commit those illegal acts anyways and used the program as an excuse to commit them." While I can believe that someone might possibly hold this as an opinion (it fits with what I understand is the CoS's overall claim on the matter, which is that it was "rogue" elements who committed all the illegal acts) we need to know who is asserting this to be the case, and describe it as their assertion. -- Antaeus Feldspar 22:59, 17 January 2006 (UTC)
[edit] Verdict details
I think this article fails to answer some obvious questions. What exactly was each person convicted of, what exactly was each sentence (e.g. length), and what did each actually serve/pay for their offense? The Moxon & Kobrin article said they were convicted of treason, which I found doubtful, and removed (as incredibly few people are ever convicted of that exact offense in the U.S.). But, that made me look here to check, but I can't see what they were convicted of. Note, that since they were charged with a bunch of stuff, simply saying they were convicted isn't very informative, by itself. We know, basically what they were investigated for, and what the investigation found. But what they were actually convicted of is notably absent. The word "illegal" covers a whole lot of stuff. This is a mid-length article, so it can easily "fit" some more detail in it. --Rob 09:28, 12 June 2006 (UTC)
[edit] Uncited, probably Unciteable information.
- Early in the article appears; Mary Sue Hubbard (wife of founder L. Ron Hubbard and second in command of the organization, which is uncited. That piece of information is probably unciteable because Hubbard was known not being in command of the organization at that time. While it is likely he was in communication with those who did give orders, and while it is possible his communications were taken as suggestions, or in some other way, it is inappropriate for the article to make it appear as if Hubbard were in control of the organization and "gave orders". Unless of course a reference exists which states that Hubbard was in control of the organization at that time, or that Hubbard "continued to give orders" or something of that nature. The very last external link shows a personal website which presents what it calls an article which says that Hubbard gave orders, (at that time) but that isn't cited or referenced as being germane to the article. Terryeo 23:48, 14 September 2006 (UTC)
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- Shifted the Globe and Mail story up to a cite. Thanks for pointing that out. AndroidCat 02:36, 15 September 2006 (UTC)
- Some of the purported "legal documents" are on a personal website and don't appear to be legal documents, but are instead hand typed information which at least part of is claimed to have been difficult to hand type, the original documents the typist used, being of poor quality and not reproducable by photocopy. These sorts of hand typed reproductions don't satisfy WP:V (previously published by a reliable source) because the are reproductions by a website which has an partisan, tendentious point of view and might not, therefore, be reliable reproductions. Terryeo 23:48, 14 September 2006 (UTC)
Terryeo, would you please cite the wikipedia policy about websites with a "tendentious point of view"? There is wikipedia policy against tendentious editing on wikipedia, or is this another one of your ruses?--Fahrenheit451 11:33, 15 September 2006 (UTC)
