A Warning to All Concerned Citizens: Beware the Cult Awareness Network

In 1978, following the mass suicide of the People's Temple, an organization called the Cult Awareness Network formed for the purpose of opposing cults and reaching out to those within them. If someone had a friend or family member who joined a cult, that person could call CAN and they would be referred to psychiatrists and other people who could help. For the first time ever, there was a nation-wide organization dedicated to unmasking those who would turn the religious community into a market. In 1996, however, CAN became nothing but another front group for the Church of Scientology.

The Church of Scientology, one of the many cults that CAN labored to unmask, did not have any habit of turning the other cheeck and when it responded to CAN, it did so with a vengeance. Private investigators were hired to dig up dirt on key members while the Co$ fabricated lies and rumors. Protests were held, accusing CAN of being a hate group and general slander was spread at every opportunity.

In 1991, thousands of Scientologists applied for membership in CAN in an obvious effort to infiltrate the group. Like a small, sprinkling rain before a deadly hail storm, the applications were denied, but the real threat was still to come. Soon, over fifty lawsuits had been filed by Scientologists from all over America. The lawsuits were all either dropped or won by CAN but the cost of fighting them neared two-million dollars, almost driving CAN to bankruptcy.

In 1996, the Co$ dealt its final blow to CAN. In that year, a Scientologist approached an 18-year-old named Jason Scott who had been kidnapped by a CAN-recommended deprogrammer--it should be noted that deprogramming is legal when preformed on aminor--and convinced him to sue not only the deprogrammer but also CAN. The Cult Awareness Network lost the lawsuit and the 1.8 million dollars it was fined forced it into bankruptcy. Having finally slain CAN, the Co$ proceeded tomake a mask of cold, dead skin; in order to protect themselves from being individually liable to an impossibly large fine, the managers of CAN sold all rights to their organization to the Co$.