Hold on a second. The scientology definition of an “Ideal Country” is all EXISTING ORGS with “ideal buildings”… This is what they push all the time. We need an “ideal USA” — that does not mean an ideal org in every city. It doesn’t even mean an ideal org in each State. It simply means, all the orgs that ALREADY EXIST need to have new buildings purchased for them (or in the case of Toronto and Los Angeles, simply renovate the one they have — which STILL isn’t done in Toronto).
Scientology hasn’t opened a new org anywhere in recent memory.
By this definition, the following COUNTRIES are ALREADY IDEAL!!
Japan
New Zealand
The Netherlands
Taiwan
Hungary
Colombia
Ireland
Belgium
Israel
The single orgs in those countries are “ideal” so they are “ideal countries.”
Canada is LONG way away from achieving this objective. As above, they cannot even pull off Toronto and they have had that building since the insane “Ideal Org” push began nearly 20 years ago. And they have an “Advanced Org” that has been sitting empty and unrenovated for almost as long as that….
As I often say, the delusion in scientology is great.
I think Scientology has an empty building fetish.Just saying.
I was going to make a comment about when the Launceston $camology was going to go ideal and by accident came across and…
Now I finally know why the Church of Scientology Mission Of Launceston Inc (all, roughly, 4 x 5 sqm of it) is shut all the time. The Australian Charities and Not-for-profits Commission revoked their charity registration in October 2014.
When I was going to University in Edmonton in the 90’s, Scientology had a beautifully stunning building downtown. Now they are on the west end in an industrial area: almost as far as you can get from being ‘Ideal’. There is, as far as I know, no Scientology office in Calgary: there was an office a few years ago but once again in more of a ‘dumpy’ area. Have never been a Scientologist – actually don’t know of anyone who has even taken a single course or read a book on the subject – other than against the cult. Not too sure how Canada is an example of an ‘Ideal Country’ to Scientology, but if it means having almost no Orgs and no memberships, well then I am very proud to say Canada is indeed ideal!
Donna, Scientology had a mission franchise, not a ‘church’ org, in Calgary as of a couple of years ago. It is reportedly no longer in this location, and may be entirely gone by now:
https://www.mikerindersblog.org/scientology-calgary-expansion-flat-out-and-vertical/
they also have a presence in Winnipeg, and as in quite a few other places long ago purchased a large old building there that has since just sat vacant, failing to complete their plans to remodel it and turn it into an ‘ideal’ org.
I’m pretty sure the only time a Canadian even thinks about scientology is as a punchline to a joke. Couldn’t find any official membership numbers for Canada online, other than maybe being clumped in the bottom 6% with zillions of “other” religions. It is not even classified as a recognized religion in Canada. The wikipedia entry for scientology in Canada shows what a car wreck scientology is. It is a bizarre failure, to be sure.
In Canada, scientology is as dead as a doornail.
WAYC, if Canada is typical and has 30 to 50 active members per org, and around double that who might show up for special events, then that probably amounts to fewer than a thousand who would claim themselves as scientologists on a census (taking into account some indies), and just a couple of hundred who are really active.
In the US it’s the small and failing orgs that have been unable to raise project funding on their own that are yet to go ‘ideal,’ so if all but one of Canada’s orgs are in that category, it also indicates that Scientology in the country must be in sorry shape indeed.
(In a Monty Python voice) “I’m not dead yet!”
Whenever I talk with people from Canada about this cult, they just laugh.
Orgs are places where people take classes and auditing right? Why do they need to be anything more than “basic” buildings?
Because Tom Cruise didn’t think they were fancy enough to invite his friends to.
O/T. Copyrighting God: Ownership of the Sacred in American Religion — Chapter on Scientology.
Book: Copyrighting God: Ownership of the Sacred in American Religion
https://www.amazon.com/Copyrighting-God-Ownership-American-Religion-ebook/dp/B07L144P5M/
Kindle: $28.00
Paperback: $31.49
Hardcover: $106.43
254 pages
First published by Cambridge University Press in 2018.
* * * * * BEGIN EXCERPT * * * * *
Book Description
Copyrighting God provides the first detailed account of how American religious organizations – from Christian Science to the Church of Scientology – used copyright in sacred texts not simply for economic gain but also for social organization and control and, in doing so, sought to appropriate secular law for spiritual ends.
About the Author
Andrew Ventimiglia is a Research Fellow in the University of Queensland TC Beirne School of Law. He works in the areas of legal history, religious studies, and media studies, with a research focus on the history and cultural effects of intellectual property law. Ventimiglia was awarded a Ph.D. in Cultural Studies from the University of California, Davis in 2015. He also holds an M.A. in Cinema Studies and a Certificate from the Culture and Media Program at New York University. Ventimiglia’s work has appeared or is forthcoming in Cultural Critique and the Journal of the American Academy of Religion.
* * * * * END EXCERPT * * * * *
That does sound like a very interesting point of view on the scene. I wonder why it was published by the Cambridge University Press, rather than with an American publisher.
There are 7 orgs in Canada and not one is ideal! Even repeating this ad nauseam does not make it so!
Cambridge is “ideal” – exactly as they define it: a big empty building with a large empty parking lot in the middle of nowhere….
Exactly! Cambridge is currently the flagship Org for Canada. Most of the Toronto public migrated there but even with that it stands pretty empty. I’ve been there a number of times and it is always sparse in how many cars are there, even at times when an Org would normally be at its busiest.
I’m amazed they are starting this whole fund raising thing again. Some years ago they raised $millions that was scooped up by Int. Then they did it again over the past few years. Still no renovations on Toronto. Big fail.
In the old days, “Ideal” or”Cleared city, state, planet” meant that most of the people living there had had auditing to the state of Clear. Now they don’t even try to make Clears anymore. That all changed with Miscavige.
And with the www.
DM couldn’t do it alone Cindy. Far as I can see DM is PTS to the middle class and lower and upper class. Sure glad he’s done such a bad job for his buddy Tom.
I wonder what they talk about?
Flavors of ice cream for the girls or something equally disgusting.
So glad we’ve excaped. #I’m out 🤣
Hope you are enjoying the holidays Cindy. 😘
Thanks Cece. Happy New Year to you. But what does “www” mean in your post? I’m so glad we escaped!
Cindy – world wide web – the abbreviation for the internet
P.S. When I started reading the scn blogs five years ago it took me four or five months to figure out that when people were mentioning “the scn rabbit hole” they were referring to Alice in Wonderland. 😇
Now now, Cambridge isn’t “the middle of nowhere “, it’s my town! Oh wait, wonder why we call it Lamebridge…..🤔🤔
Hey Sue: fellow Lamebridger here. Do say HI anytime and we can exchange DM jokes…
The Toronto building is a straight out real estate investment. No way are there enough Clams in the area to support it or staff it. As for Canada going ‘Ideal’, they have excellent brewerys and sports teams. That is ideal enough for me. What about the lack of missions between Toronto and Vancouver? Nothing ideal about Calgary or Edmonton. And I’m not counting little missions behind the chiropractors office.
Toronto may be one of the few cases where the CofS could make money — they’ve owned the property since values were low, similar to the situation with some of their holdings in LA. I wonder if management is unable to decide whether to finally renovate the now valuable property, or cash it in and follow their current strategy of buying the cheapest building possible out in an office park.
There are a few other of their buildings in central locations that might turn out to be profitable investments, but I think that in most cases they have bought white elephants, and then renovated them in ways that actually devalue them to prospective owners who will just have to reconfigure them again for normal uses, and on top of which will probably have been long neglected by the time they come on the market. The office park buildings that Scientology has been buying are cheap because they are older, haven’t been renovated in decades and have aging engineering and mechanical systems in need of replacement; some of their early ‘ideal’ org projects are now approaching that age themselves, and others will roll over into that category as time goes on.
Yeah if only Toronto had a pro hockey team – that would be Ideal
They will have a hard time meeting that goal here in Canada. Not only is Scientology not recognized as a religion in Canada, it is not in the data base of recognized charities for tax purposes.
I had stars in my eyes from Ideal Org fever when it arrived to my ‘hood back in about 2006. There was fast developing a new technology on how to engage Class V Org staff and public. It was a frightening fusion of International Association of Scientologists fundraising tactics and classic registration penetrate-and-pummel know-how.
Heavy emphasis on status and dramatic “plants” in the audience of live events who, on cue, would magnificently rise to announce a pledge of their entire life savings, the full remortgaging of their house they had worked so hard to pay off, the taking on of further loans and credit cards, the evacuation of children’s college savings. A fever was generated and, eerily, it worked. Public and staff each taking on new very substantial and implausible debt—bizarrely, a level of debt and monthly payment obligations that would curtail individuals’ Bridge access (no money) for a long time. (“Wrong Importance” here?)
Knowing what I know now, when I hear “Ideal Org,” I see a battlefield strewn with depleted bankrupt public, screamed at staff (to get the stats up), and a fundraising fervor that remains like a medically unsafe use of steroids.
The other part of this battlefield of individuals crushed is the many heart-filled able-bodied Class V Org staff that were lied to and enticed to pick up everything and move to a city where the next Ideal Org was happening. Only to find out when you get there, everything you were told was a lie—except for fact of the huge, beautiful building. Otherwise, everything else: your living arrangements, the opportunity to earn enough to live or have access to a good paying moonlighting job, transportation, all that.
Thanks for sharing that that, that is very fascinating if not a little disturbing also.
When I did my last services it was 2005. By May 31st 2007 I’d paid all my credit cards off the 87.5 hours of NOTS (that was spent on not clear and leaving staff (9 years earlier) security checks and the Patron which was supposed to be to help the families that lost so much in the tsunami that year. 109,000$ total. I left debt free. No one at AOLA has had the balls to send me a FL bill. I’d send them one right back 🤣
Did you know Michael Silverman? He made all those years worth it far as I’m concerned 💖
Hey Cece: I do know Michael very well and chat with him quite often. He is doing fine (considering) and so we spoke for an hour or so a few weeks back. I just thought you might like to know that. He’s one of a kind, that’s for sure… ELB
Things are well changed in the cult since I left. In these last 15 years it is just a huge stat push activity. These ideal orgs crap as well are just stat push.
Since very long time they started the downhill faster than never before. At the events they stopped showing international statistics about auditors made or auditing hours etc, and the reason was because there was nothing to show that would say ‘we are expanding’.
So the ‘leader’ decided it was better to invent something else to keep his sheeps deluded and believing that now was even better than before and of course producing more milk (money).
The truth is that were they live in is just a big bubble filled with a delusional reality that doesn’t exist at all. Scn is dying.
New Zealand does indeed sound like an ideal country, apart from the presence of an Org. Low covid rate, improving relationship with the pre-invasion peoples, diverse and unspoiled scenery, temperate climate …
The norths win against the south?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roald_Amundsen
https://www.xenu.net/
Yeah I don’t think so. My local org is a little shithole in a shithole district that’s been mostly empty since I first set foot in it last December.
I think Thailand is an Ideal Country too … We have NO Orgs!!!!
You speak sooth Joe. The correct definition of ideal from the non-Scientology dictionary…
In my city a narconon house was shut down befor they opened thank god. They lost the license they received after an outcry. This was right after a fire at a new legit rehab facilty. That delayed opening. They do have a “church”where I live. The building is usually empty only a couple of cars max.