Big Story reporter for award?

Is there some award for bravery in TV journalism? If so, I wonder if Alison Braund, who smuggled a hidden camera into the Dianetics Mission in Poole and then into Scientology's national headquarters in Saint Hill to expose hard-sell techniques and ridiculous "training courses", will get a mention?

Scientology is accused of brainwashing its adherents, and research such as Conway and Siegelman's has documented the negative emotional effects of L Ron Hubbard's "therapy". Ms Braund's approach to these allegations was to submit herself to the courses, a bit like investigating lions by sticking your head in their throats!

Ian Howarth of the Cult Information Centre strongly advises people not to investigate cults from the inside: the risks to your own mental health (and of course your safety if they discover what you're doing while you are still inside) are too great.

Ms Braund was in the cult from April until mid-July, when she was discovered filming documents at Saint Hill. She had to go through frequent "security checks"; interrogations in which she was asked whether she was a journalist and whether she had been sent by anyone to infiltrate Scientology. She did the Communications Course, was audited on traumatic experiences from her life and took TR-1, which involved staring into someone's eyes for one and a half hours (as a result of which she suffered bizarre hallucinations). When she tried to enter the Sea Org, she had to fill out a list of all her sexual partners, what she had done with each and how many times. The psychological pressure she must have been under to keep her act up under hours and hours of investigation is incredible.

Scientology has a reputation for underhanded tactics against anyone or anything that it perceives as an enemy. You can be quite sure that all those involved in the program have been put on the cult's "Fair Game" list and that the cult will do whatever it can get away with to ruin the reputation of these people in future, like it has done with Russell Miller, Jon Atack, Bonnie Woods, Dennis Erlich... This started on Wednesday of this week, when Scientologists countered a demonstration on Tottenham Court Road by handing out leaflets that appeared to be openly defamatory (IMHO- We'll see how Carlton's lawyers respond). The special edition of "Freedom"- Scn's propaganda paper- compared Ms Braund to "a reporter working for the Nazis gaining entrance to a synagogue by false pretences".

Some classic television came out of that programme: I had read about the infamous "shouting at an ashtray" routine but never expected to see it on prime-time TV! Twenty-Twenty have performed a valuable public service in showing millions of people just how wigged-out Scientology is. -- MARTIN L: Postgrad. studying "Probability and Belief" at Bristol University POULTER : KNIGHT NATASEVOLLLEWYLLOJI WWW Home Page & Scientology Critics' OF Scientology is a dangerous cult stuff: <a href="http://mail.bris.ac.uk/~plmlp">http://mail.bris.ac.uk/~plmlp</a> XENU -warn your family and friends.