Judge Denies Scientology's Request for an Injunction against Anonymous Demonstrations

Another small win for Anonymous: Scientology can't have a court order restraining Anonymous protesters this weekend: "This court is mindful of the anxiety that may be caused by anonymous threats of violence, or as a series of seemingly unconnected incidents, be they on the Internet or otherwise. However, the jurisdiction of the court must only be exercised to specifically restrain those known individuals that are shown to have some reasonable nexus to the actual threats complained of in the petition."

The Church of Scientology tried to prevent Anonymous from protesting on the birthday of the Church's leader, the late Ron L. Hubbard. The lawsuit alleged that Scientology churches around the world have been bombarded with harassing phone calls, obscene e-mails, bomb threats and death threats by members of Anonymous.

Anonymous condemned acts or threats of violence that may have occurred and said they were not the work of Anonymous. They urged demonstrators this weekend to protest peacefully and legally.

Anonymous Protests Around the World - A Summary

Anonymous, the Anti-Scientology group, was true to its word. Protests and demonstrations against Scientology were held all over the world, in Australia, London, Los Angeles, New York, New Orleans, Vancouver, Brisbane and much more.

Estimates say that around 9,000 people demonstrated against Scientology - worldwide. After all the noise, that's not a very impressive number.

Reports from the protests came online rather quick. First it was pictures and videos from Sydney, Australia. Then came live coverage from London. After that, reports from the USA.

Videos appeared on YouTube, depicting the Anonymous protesters carrying signs and wearing masks. There some reports of violence, but it appears that they were all false. The protesters were peaceful and many of them carried cameras to record the event.

According to Wikinews, London was apparently the place in which the demonstration was the largest - around 500 people.

Interesting pictures from the Anonymous "raids" appeared on Flickr, as well. A search of the word "Anonymous" yields a huge amount of photos from the protests.

Here is a slide-show from the protests in Manchester:

And a bunch of interesting links:

• Photo Essay: Anonymous Protest in Hollywood
• Anonymous in Canada
• Coverage of the protests in Boston
• Project Chanology