Scientology information

[Bruised_Reed]

I took one of their tests and actually went through an “audit”. I sat in a chair facing this guy as we basically stared at each other. It was like a game of chicken; who flinched first. He called me our because I blinked or some **** like that and I’m, like, “I’m wearing contacts.” For some reason blinking was an issue and why it was may have been explained to me, but I didn’t give it any credence and I was probably focused on how to get out of there. I don’t know if they gave me a rookie or if they had successfully removed all the personality from the guy, but I was not impressed.

On the wall there was picture of Jesus or a graphic with a quote from the Bible which was my first clue that I walked into something dubious. Anything that is not Catholic (or main-line Christian) that uses the Bible or religious images makes me suspicious, even back then.

I ignored their follow-up calls until they quit, but once I realized who they were I wondered if I would be stalked for life because I knew their secret: It’s a sham!

They gave me some book to take with me and I showed to my mom who gave it to a priest, probably. I still a bit ticked I don’t have that for research/evidence/trophy.

 

[datritle]

this is some of the craziest stuff i have ever seen. xenu? volcano H-bomb souls? HAHA psychiatrists are mass murders?

 

[Pythons]

There was a sci fi movie I watched years ago that later I learned was essentially about scientology…
…Where these aliens came to earth and forced the hominids into slave labor to mine for I think gold.





As others have said the only value in Scientology is in it’s scifi - which sucks as far as scifi goes anyway…
…Here is a URL of the premise of the movie.

youtube.com/watch?v=h0R_FR9pD2k

 

[PazzoGrande]

I took one of their tests and actually went through an “audit”. I sat in a chair facing this guy as we basically stared at each other. It was like a game of chicken; who flinched first. He called me our because I blinked or some **** like that and I’m, like, “I’m wearing contacts.” For some reason blinking was an issue and why it was may have been explained to me, but I didn’t give it any credence and I was probably focused on how to get out of there. I don’t know if they gave me a rookie or if they had successfully removed all the personality from the guy, but I was not impressed.

I wish they’d stop calling themselves a church and stop using a cross. Don’t drag Christianity down with you, you know?

Maybe from your experience, you could enlighten us on this question: how does Scientology survive? That tactic they put you through sounds incredibly stupid, yet they manage to survive enough to the point where they could have Scientology centers spread around the country and it’s a business that’s worth millions. How on earth could anyone be duped enough to fall for it, and why would anyone wanna work for this? I can’t think of many people who could be susceptible to that stupidity. From what you saw, could you tell us what makes them tick?

There was a sci fi movie I watched years ago that later I learned was essentially about scientology…

Wow, what’s next? The Shroud of Xenu? Crossing the Threshold of Dope?

I thought religion was supposed to inspire. That movie clip reminds of me of that Prometheus movie, it has an air of sadness. Really, how does this rubbish survive?

I really don’t get it.

 

[cheezey]

I wish they’d stop calling themselves a church and stop using a cross. Don’t drag Christianity down with you, you know?

…how does Scientology survive? That tactic they put you through sounds incredibly stupid, yet they manage to survive enough to the point where they could have Scientology centers spread around the country and it’s a business that’s worth millions. How on earth could anyone be duped enough to fall for it, and why would anyone wanna work for this? I can’t think of many people who could be susceptible to that stupidity.

I really don’t get it.

I don’t get it either. I am not haughty by saying this, but if you don’t know many people who would be duped, count yourself as lucky. There does seem to be more and more dupe-able people out there. I don’t like it, I don’t like saying it, but it seems undeniable. I had wanted to read Steve Allen’s book, I believe titled “Dumbth: the Dumbing Down of America”, but it may not be the subject matter I thought it to be.

 

[ffg]

I think they survive off of Tom Cruise and the other Hollywood fooled.

What kills me is that their ‘donations’ would probably classify as tax deductible.

Would be interesting to see Tom’s tax returns now vs 10 years ago. He’s probably being told the gods are angry with him so pay up.

 

[Crescentinus]

I think they survive off of Tom Cruise and the other Hollywood fooled.

What kills me is that their ‘donations’ would probably classify as tax deductible.

Would be interesting to see Tom’s tax returns now vs 10 years ago. He’s probably being told the gods are angry with him so pay up.

I think their greatest cashcows are their posterboys and postergirls. Without them, they’d go bankrupt in less than a decade.

 

[Bruised_Reed]

I wish they’d stop calling themselves a church and stop using a cross. Don’t drag Christianity down with you, you know?

Maybe from your experience, you could enlighten us on this question: how does Scientology survive? That tactic they put you through sounds incredibly stupid, yet they manage to survive enough to the point where they could have Scientology centers spread around the country and it’s a business that’s worth millions. How on earth could anyone be duped enough to fall for it, and why would anyone wanna work for this? I can’t think of many people who could be susceptible to that stupidity. From what you saw, could you tell us what makes them tick?

Wow, what’s next? The Shroud of Xenu? Crossing the Threshold of Dope?

I thought religion was supposed to inspire. That movie clip reminds of me of that Prometheus movie, it has an air of sadness. Really, how does this rubbish survive?

I really don’t get it.

I honestly don’t know. If I speculate I would say that the people who are drawn in get something from it. They have a need of some sort and that need is satisfied to some degree but never completely or anything but superficially. And by the time their B.S. detector goes off they are so emeshed that they can’t leave easliy.

For example, someone who grew up in a nominally Christain home might see that verse from the Bible and think that it means it’s a Christian organization and let their guard down. They might be kind of lost. I was was searching but I wasn’t lost and I had my faith and what I was looking for was a completely different thing (insight to what makes me tick, or whatever).

I think the celebritites involved are told that Scientology can help them with their career, make them more successful. Having a connection to Schientology may help because of all the Scientologists in entertainment field so it looks like it helps.

And the money thing. Get enough rich people to fund major projects and use poor members for slave labor and that’s a successful strategy.

 

[Candescent]

Calling Scientology “pagan” is an insult to paganism It doesn’t even rise to that dubious level. Neo-pagan leaders may not have the truth of the Catholic faith, but at least they’re (I assume) sincere in their convictions. Hubbard? pfft.

Most of the Neo Pagans that I know are avid Science Fiction readers. they are amazed that anyone would fall for L Ron Hubbard’s line. As one told me recently, Scientology would flunk a beginning world building class in Science Fiction…no one would believe that anyone would fall for something so blatantly invented as a money making scheme.

 

[Lion_of_Narnia]

there was a sci fi movie i watched years ago that later i learned was essentially about scientology…
…where these aliens came to earth and forced the hominids into slave labor to mine for i think gold.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/f/fb/battlefield_earth_screencap.jpg

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/a/ae/battlefield_earth_planetship.jpg

as others have said the only value in scientology is in it’s scifi - which sucks as far as scifi goes anyway…
…here is a url of the premise of the movie.

youtube.com/watch?v=h0r_fr9pd2k

klingons on stilts! :d

 

[Lion_of_Narnia]

L. Ron Hubbard also had intimate dabblings w/ occultism, via Aleister Crowley’s long distance disciple, Jack Parsons, co-inventer of the JATO unit and co-founder of JPL. Parsons was running a occult-type commune right after WW2 in Pasadena, and Hubbard while on medical (psychological) leave from the Navy (he was relived of command by his EO after almost causing a internation incident with Mexico!) drifted into the commune (later Hubbard claimed he was on secret orders from the US Navy to investigate Parsons–yeah, right, sure ) Anyway, Hubbard and Parsons started getting involved with Parson’s wife in conceiving a “Moonchild” and per occult rationale, if you blunder the ritual in the tiniest bit, you have to abort the child or disaster will result. This may very well be the obssesion Hubbard later expressed in Dianetics about "AAs–attempted abortions producing really bad “engrams”. My understanding is that Mrs Parsons left Jack and later married L. Ron.

 

[johndesd]

Scientologists will try to “hard sell” you. If you say you don’t want to do it, they’ll keep trying to “help” you see why what they’re offering is really needed, how it’ll help you so much, and that people that have done it have had amazing “wins”, or improvements. They won’t hold you prisoner, but they will really try to convince you to sign up for these services.

Sounds like they would perfect for timeshare sales too!

 

[aychihuahua]

Hello. I registered in order to be able to answer questions about Scientology. I was a member of this cult for about 6 years beginning in the mid 70’s. Many things have changed with the “church” since then, but the fundamentals are the same. Scientology uses the standard cult techniques for gaining and retaining members-love bombing, forging distance between members and their non-Scientologist relatives/friends, hard sell, peer pressure, and fear.

The leaders of the Church of Scientology claim that the organization is growing by leaps and bounds, but the truth is that it is shrinking. Scientology missions and “orgs” that were thriving in the 70’s and 80’s are empty now. There are estimated to be only a few thousand active members left. The “church” spends millions to renovate buildings into “ideal orgs” and they do own some very lovely real estate and classic architecture but these buildings are Potemkin villages. At major events expansion is announced in terms of square feet acquired rather than numbers of people joining. This has been true for some time now. They are able to gain some ground in places like the nation of Colombia where they have some entree to the law enforcement community and also in Taiwan. Here in the USA and Canada and in Europe the internet has been the demise of Scientology. It is very easy to find out what the group teaches with a simple internet search. Things that were closely guarded a few decades back are broadly available to anyone curious.

The Ex-Scientologist Message Board and Operation Clambake are a couple of the best sites for learning about this group. The people who post there are telling the truth about Scientology. It would be difficult to exaggerate about how bad it is.

Someone asked about the cross used as a symbol. The design is said to have come from a tarot deck. Others, noting L. Ron Hubbard’s involvement with Aleistar Crowley, say that it is a “crossed out” cross. I think it does make the average person tend to view this group as a bona fide church and that is certainly something that is important to the leadership. There is nothing Christian about Scientology and much that is in direct conflict with basic Christian teaching.

I hope this isn’t too lengthy a post, especially for a newbie. There are other things that have been posted in this thread that I’d like to comment on, but don’t want to write a book.