CICNS Commentary on the Presentation of the Parliamentary Commission Report on Cults and Childhood

The parliamentarians who presented the results of their partial inquiry into spiritual minorities and childhood on the morning of 19 December 2006 attacked, from the first minutes of their account, the “public authorities”, whose attitude towards cults they judge “negligent and complacent”.

A few of their statements illustrating this accusation:

Concerning the community of Tabitha’s Place: “We had to travel there to discover that four children out of 18 were not in school” (This is a lie; see the reply of the Tabitha’s Place community in their interview on our site, which restores the truth on this point (listen at 11:25), and also their press release). The conclusion of the report’s paragraph about the visit to Tabitha’s Place is a gem of anti-cult thinking: “Certainly, the children seem to express a certain joy in living and appear relatively fulfilled, but beyond this first impression, it remains the case that the adults impose on their children their own personal choice of life, wishing, at all costs, to hide from them the reality — even the dangerous reality — of the world.” Might this passage be trying to explain to us that conviviality, hospitality, the joy of living and fulfilment are not proofs of well-being, and that it would be the fact of exposing their children to dangerous reality and to knowledge of Zidane that would be symptoms of a successful integration?

“Why does the judicial institution not deal with cases of failure to obtain compulsory vaccination?” (perhaps because this subject would deserve an intelligent debate rather than blind repression? Denmark and Spain have no compulsory vaccinations. Great Britain, Ireland, the Netherlands and Germany make BCG compulsory only for certain exposed population groups. Are they less concerned about the health of their fellow citizens?)

“Why, two years after the vote on this law, has the implementing decree not been taken for the regulation of the profession of psychotherapist?” (perhaps because this subject would deserve an intelligent debate rather than an unbalanced regulation?)

“M. Leschi, of the bureau des cultes, supported a proposal contrary to the law, to case law and to the Conseil d’État’s decision of 1985 concerning the Jehovah’s Witnesses” (M. Leschi is the person heard who caused them the most trouble, so rigorously did he set out the reality of the facts)

“The Jehovah’s Witnesses have been ordered to pay a tax reassessment of 45 million euros which has not yet been paid” (such a reassessment is a barely veiled attempt to destroy a movement. This sum does not correspond to any fraud by the Jehovah’s Witnesses but to the consequence of an intensive campaign against them)

“The prefectures grant without difficulty the “little recognition” to the Jehovah’s Witnesses which allows them to be exempted from property tax” (There are many things that are granted and bring advantages to one party or another. Such as, for example, the fact of giving ample voice to anti-cult figures without confrontation with a contradictory view, which allows them to be exempted from criticism)

“How is M. Garay, an adherent of the Jehovah’s Witnesses, authorised to speak in an international body (the OSCE)?” (Why not? Should belonging be a reason for no longer having the right to speak? If these parliamentarians applied this method during their inquiry, there is no reason why everyone else should not do likewise)

The rapporteur’s introduction:

M. Vuilque, the commission’s rapporteur, spoke of the “vulnerability of children” and of a “disturbing finding”: “Children are easy prey” (… of the commission, which uses them as instruments to create an emotional reaction in the general public and thereby to establish liberticidal laws?)

He adds that they have “no precise figures of course, because it is terribly difficult to know the exact number of minors concerned” … but he does not hesitate to give this generous bracket of “40,000 to 80,000 children”, taken up by all the media for weeks.

He judges:

The insufficient awareness of the administrations.

The control of home instruction and of compulsory schooling too lax.

The control of the activity of psychotherapists insufficient.

50 proposals to remedy this situation:

among them:

Religious-association status made subject to the criterion of the higher interests of the child as an element in assessing a breach of public order.
A regime of prior authorisation for obtaining religious-association status.
Against “the social confinement of minors”: to complete the About-Picard Act by penalising the social confinement of the minor.
To redefine the conditions for bringing proceedings for proselytism (art. 19 of the About-Picard Act) and to remove the condition of several criminal convictions (1 alone will be sufficient).
To redefine home instruction.

Journalists’ questions: (paraphrased)

Q: On what basis do you put forward these figures of 40,000 to 80,000 children concerned?

A from M. Vuilque: All our interlocutors gave us these figures… except those who gave us lower ones, but they had not done the necessary research.

Q: Will there be a new list of cult movements?

A from M. Fenech: There will be no list of cults. Our work is focused on dérives sectaires … and establishing a new list would allow those who do not appear on it to take advantage of not being on it!

Q: How do you explain the negligence of the public authorities that you denounce?

A from M. Brard: It is because of a lack of awareness of the damage caused by cult deviances. There has been a kind of falling asleep. That is to say that the mobilisation of public opinion and of the media with investigative journalists gave the impression that there was no longer a problem. We were very struck during our visit to Tabitha’s Place, where the education inspector discovered the scale of the problem… The parents inflict corporal punishment on the children and refused to let them speak without their presence. (listen to the explanation of the members of Tabitha’s Place on this subject)

Q: A note calls into question the validity of the 1995 parliamentary report.

A from M. Gest: I do not know this note, but when we made the choice in 1995, we did so on the strength of information given by the RG. We thought about it and we stand by that choice. Those who complained are moreover those who are recognised as cults (The CICNS has been able to observe that the others did not have the means to complain!)

The journalist presses the point: How can one rely on information that is empty?

A from M. Gest: I have confidence in my country’s police, who supplied this information… and not in the cult organisations which contest it.

Brard mentions (while saying that he is not going to mention it) a letter from the Jehovah’s Witnesses used in anti-cult circles which would tend to demonstrate that they wished to collaborate with the Nazis in the struggle against the Jews in 1933. Then he moves on… to the mortality of Jehovah’s Witness women during childbirth, which he declares to be “40 times higher than that of women accepting transfusion”.

Q: What are the figures for women who have died in these conditions of refusal of care in France, and for complaints?

A from M. Brard: The dead rarely lodge complaints… The lack of figures does not prove that there are no cases, but a lack of mobilisation. We have no figures but a knowledge of the danger…

Q: What answer do you make to M. Vanneste, who points to dérives in your fight against dérives sectaires?

A from M. Fenech: erm.. Vanneste, who is one of our colleagues, is very much behind the times. In reality, this question was dealt with long ago: it is preferable not to define what a cult is… Cults do not interest us, the dérives interest us, we are in a country of freedom!

A from M. Brard, who adds: The cult is not defined in law but it exists in fact… M. Vanneste is known for his moderating remarks which have already put the Head of State in difficulty, and I inform you that M. Vanneste did not vote on the report because he was absent on the day of the vote…

CICNS conclusion:

A ponderous presentation, in the tone of a monotonous recitation, remarks without substance and full of calumnies. The journalists did indeed put embarrassing questions from which the parliamentarians extricated themselves very badly.

The absence of facts, glaring throughout the commission’s hearings, is compensated for by a coup de théâtre: to make the public service feel guilty about the fate of our children. How is one to believe that a few deputies, self-proclaimed psychologists of behaviour and of childhood during a 3-hour visit to a community, saw what the people on the ground in the administrations are supposed not to have seen?

There remains a feeling of powerlessness before a State machine that stops at nothing to achieve its ends. Never has a report been so crude and so damaging to the freedoms of a genuine democracy.

CICNS Commentary on the Presentation of the Parliamentary Commission Report on Cults and Childhood

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