The “group” above all…
This encapsulates “scientology think” in two sentences.
Chris Music?
Bet it was amazing.
Who is he?
World and Latino music…
And regges. Lots of regges.
Always a great way to ring in the New Year.
CO WISE Speaks
I thought WISE was a “secular” organization? Hell, they go to GREAT lengths to claim the “technology” they insert into businesses is NOT religious. Because that would get them sued…
Yet here he is, “Mr. WISE” selling Clear, Dianetics and whatever else at “church” of scientology of Chicago.
Creepy Holiday Greetings
A “team” consisting entirely of regges. CSRT has no function other than collecting money for scientology buildings. It’s now the L. Ron Hubbard Hall. Since Charmaine went on her 21 year Leave of Absence, I bet they are not pulling in money like they used to.
The L. Ron Hubbard Hall is a tougher sell than the “Sooper Powerz Building”…
We reserve the right to turn away…
No mention of those who are declared SP’s? But you know they would.
Oh dear
This is their good news? They got people to attend “paid seminars” in missions in France and elsewhere? This is the “Flag” OT Committee? They fudge their numbers by including anyone, anywhere who did anything?
This is “scientology math”.
Yikes
That’s a New Years Resolution from a horror movie….
Igor Kovic
Will make your dreams come true?
Who the hell is Igor Kovic?
Let’s try it all and see if anything sticks
Group processing, crafting and a seminar all in one.
Elio Cervi
Actually, HE will make it all happen for you.
Maybe Harvey Jacques and the Flag OT Committee could attend to help them make it go right in 2019
The really BIG picture…
Presented along with a potluck dinner at a tiny, failing Mission.
They really have it nailed.
Bring artists and opinion leaders to CC
This is the “cause” they love so much. Making FSM Commissions…
Damn…
They didn’t make it. What now?
Meke Kattan???
Who?
He/she is a draw?
Find out how Jerry “changed the Philippines” with WTH
Last I checked, things were not really rosy in the land of Duterte?
But a big consolation — David Pomerantz will sing too.
Only $100!
Isn’t that amazing.
ANOTHER “Donate Now”
There are so many of these “causes” in scientology it is really hard to keep track
The only Class VIII on earth…
Everyone else had to turn in their certs because nobody who is not GAT II is allowed to call themselves a certified auditor. There is no GAT II Class VI or Class VIII course.
Wonder how she gets away with this?
It’s the old staff bonuses pitch
Pity the poor staff. Give us some money and start on a service so we can get a bonus. Because everyone knows we make nothing.
The stats were down but not crashed like last year…
Oops.
Gavin Potter
At least we know who he is…
But for some reason he is facing backwards?
He’s versatile
He can tell you all about the Upper OT levels.
He can tell you how to achieve affluence “on all dynamics” (can you image the flower beds he must have?)
And he can also tell you how to do everything with no effort. But he needs some NSO person with him…
Pity he can’t do any of the things he claims he can teach others to do…
Rebecca Minkoff steps out of the shadows
Now there’s a famous name not often mentioned.
Bet she LOVES being associated with scientology to help her sell her handbags…
pAnd that father of hers is a Google search nightmare.
The sad tale of ASHO
The home of the “dukes of the auditor elite” trained on the Briefing Course (that has been canceled for a decade or more now) are groveling for people to do Objectives. It’s a service that is SUPPOSED to be done at Missions and lower level orgs.
This one sounds really scary….
Apparently no potluck though?
They’ve got chutzpah
A good yiddish word seems appropriate.
Not backing off from proudly promoting the anti-semite. Scientology doubles down on the NOI.
About 7 years ago via who knew Rebecca Minkoff from Flag, I learned that she (“Becky” as she is known in Scientology) pledged one million to her original org Celebrity Center New York. Now she’s being hit up to donate to another org. “Never Enough”.
Hi! Is there any chance I could ask you a couple more questions about this for a story I’m writing? Would be so grateful and appreciative!
Sure, Rachel.
Ask me any questions you like.
I live for gratitude and appreciation 🙂
And I have a couple for you.
This article of Mike’s is more than 2 years old and yet you responded to my comment 2 days ago. I’m wondering why you would be reading an old article like this in present time? Are you researching someone in particular?
Looking forward to your response 🙂
Hi again! I think you may have received a private message with my email in it. If you’re open to it, and wouldn’t mind getting in touch, I would still love to ask you a couple questions. thanks so much again and looking forward to hearing from you.
Rachel,
I’m open to it but right now I’m extremely busy and will be so into next week. I’m not saying this to dodge you. I am interested and I will contact you but please allow me about 2 weeks at the outset before doing so. Thanks.
Aqua
Totally cool. Thank you so much for offering to chat, and will look out for your email.
hate to be so annoying! but would still love to ask you a couple questions if you have any availability this week. LMK, and thank you again.
Rachel, you’re not in the least annoying. In fact, you’re probably the least annoying person I don’t know 🙂 This week thru Saturday won’t be good but on Sunday I’ll be free. Mike has my cell and you can call me roughly any time between 11AM and 4PM my time. Will that work?
Phew! And thank you so much again. For some reason I can’t respond to your last comment, but yes, any time between 11 and 4 on Sunday is perfect for me (I’m in NYC btw so EST, but let me know if you’re not!). Will reach out to Mike for your number. Thank you!
Understood on all, Rachel. Sounds like a plan. We’re on the same page. Mike will give you my number. Looking forward!
Noting the info here that the Eventbrite platform setvices Scientology functions,
I submitted this below via the “Report Event” link on a Celebrity Center event listing:
“I used the Eventbrite platform for several years when I was tech support for our Mountain AA Conference and was much impressed with your support, responsive communication, and ethical standards. I must call to your attention that allowing any Scientology function or that of their related “front groups” onto Eventbrite is greatly lowering your credibility and the aforementioned reputation. I suggest you google “scientology,” or watch any episode of the A & E series, ‘“Scientology: Leah Remini and the Aftermath,” to understand the extent of criminality and human suffering propagated by the evil, nefarious Scientology network.
Eventbrite owes this inquiry into Scientology to all those you serve with pride and committment.
Regards,”
And today in Australia, some poor kid tries to visit his mum at AOSH ANZO in Sydney and stabs someone to death. https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-01-04/scientology-stabbing-inside-the-enormous-hq/10684328
But what also catches the eye is the side by side photos of the newly opened (pr bull) AO in 2016 and the place in reality, 2019. Look for it.
I love to mock scientology, but everytime I look at those nice beautiful people smiling for the photos, it breaks my heart.
These people are good humans, who have been absolutely deceived.
I am a little weak right now, and beg all scientologists to please re-evaluate. Love ya all!
“Deceived”?
I think not.
The evidence that the Scientology Ideal Org program is an utter failure has been plainly in view for a decade. No one even has to read the internet. Just LOOK!
These people are either willfully blind or mentally retarded.
My money is on “willfully blind”.
As such, they deserve to be taken for everything they’ve got.
If they were not being fleeced by the cult someone else or some other organization would be ripping them off.
If they’re “deceived” its because they WANT to be. They practically BEG to be lied to and deceived.
Its like this: for some people, seeing is believing. For others believing is seeing.
UTRs excepted because they’re only pretending.
And, very key, as regards UTRs when we view these people on cult promotional material, etc. we have NO way of knowing who among them are UTR. Smiles and glowing words are not a reliable index. How much they donate would be a reliable indicator of their true dedication to the cult.
“Becky” Minkoff is no dummy. She’s a bright, innovative born in Scientologist who with her brother started a highly successful and lucrative handbag business. She’s a New Yorker born and bred. Do you think she’s unaware of how empty New York Org is? That this org (per its Facebook Page) produces on average 1 Clear per year whilst it sits 100 yards off of Time Square, the “Crossroads of the World? Do you think she doesn’t know what an utter failure New York Ideal Org is? You think she doesn’t KNOW this? And yet she gave a million dollars to Celebrity Center NY per someone I know who heard it from her when they were at Flag together. And now she’s regging for donations for yet another org, Long Island Org, and has probably donated big bucks to that one as well. In brief, do you honestly believe she doesn’t know that the orgs are morgues?
No way.
She absolutely knows, and yet continues to fork over major money to the cult.
And THIS is someone to pity?
Not me.
You make a good argument for this, Aqua.
Aqua, I always wonder about the extent to which both members are leaders are deluded. The historical record for both cult-like groups and totalitarian regimes, as well as major frauds – and I’d say Scientology counts on all accounts – shows that those involved are often much more in denial of what is going on or even isolated from reality, than outside observers might think. And that’s not to excuse anyone from responsibility for getting themselves in these sorts of situations.
It occurs to me, for instance, that as a client of the local Celebrity Center, Minkoff may well be led to believe that her status allows to her to enjoy that quieter, less busy org, compared to the supposed hustle and bustle of the Times Square org – Scientology is always booming somewhere else, of course. She may only go to the main org for major events that Scientology packs with as many people as possible, deliberately cultivating a false impression of the state of things. And then of course when she attends major international events, Miscavige has pulled out all the stops to make relatively large venues appear packed, and lays on the carefully presented propaganda about how Scientology is booming. That may be enough to fool gullible or less discerning people, or at least make it relatively easier for some to remain in denial.
Successful and supposedly savvy people fell for Bernie Madoff’s financial scheme, too.
PeaceMaker, it’s not all that different than devout German Nazis who were gathered in beer halls in early 1945 saluting the Fuhrer and singing songs about how he was going to work a miracle and win the war. At the same time, American tanks and trucks were rumbling into their village and the GIs were ripping down all the swastika flags and the Heil Hitler signs.
As the saying goes, there are none so blind as those who will not see.
Alcoboy, I think that’s an apt comparison. Trying to avoid transgressing Godwin’s law, I’d also point to the example of Saddam Hussein’s Iraq, where the the infamous propagandist “Baghdad Bob” was claiming there were no foreign troops in the country, up to the point at which video showed coalition tanks on the move literally just out of sight of the spot in Baghdad he was making pronouncements from.
The film Downfall (Der Untergang) whose bunker (Führerbunker) meeting scene has famously been parodied with humorous re-captionings, also gives an idea of that sort of mentality, with Hitler and some of his loyal followers holding onto the belief that forces remain which will rally and force the Allies into retreat. I’d also recommend watching the special features on the DVD, which delve a bit more into the sort of dynamics that are reminiscent of cults or high control groups.
Valid points. What you stated is possible. Highly improbable, but possible.
In her case – and this is just me, I have no proof – but in her case I believe she is totally in bed with the cult because not only has her father been paid to keep his mouth shut about Lisa McPherson but SHE and her business have been helped by the cult by connecting her up with cult celebs like Jenna Elfman. This helped launch her business and make her famous. Again this is just me – this is coming from the dark recesses of Aqua’s so called mind. And to complicate things even further I personally LIKE her products. I think she’s talented and produces high quality very attractive handbags. She’s good at what she does, IMO. But anyway, for all the reasons I listed I still think its improbable, highly improbabe that she doesn’t know exactly what she is doing and why. She shills big time for the cult and I can’t prove it but I believe its highly improbable that she doesn’t know exactly what she’s doing and why.
But then, Peacemaker, really, who knows! You could be 100% right. She really could be honestly deluded.
As Sherlock Holmes told Watson repeatedly: “When you’ve eliminated the impossible, what remains, no matter how improbable, is the truth.”
I love that man 🙂
Aqua, I guess we’ll have to agree to disagree. Though I’m glad you at least acknowledge the possibility that delusion could be at work….
I have an interest in human foibles of various, or related, sorts, and so followed the Bernie Madoff investment Ponzi scandal quite avidly – which I think provides an interesting example. Many people were (and still are) sure his wife and sons had to have known, and yet it turned out that just as he had an uncanny ability to fool and intimidate regulators and accountants, it seems that he fooled even those closest to him. It’s not even clear that any of his employees realized he was running a Ponzi scheme; those at the top who were complicit in bogus accounting (a circle kept deliberately small, and mostly filled with relatively uneducated loyal long-time employees), seem to have been lead to believe that it was just covering up something like shady money-making in other part of Madoff’s business, not actual defrauding of investors. Similarly, among investors who realized that the promised returns seemed almost too good to be true, there was the belief that Madoff was making the money through his status and connections, and essentially cutting them in on the sort of lucrative insider deals they imagined were normally only available to deal makers. I think the lesson is, it’s often a mistake to try to imagine ourselves in the positions of others, when those are unusual people or unusual situations.
Also, in Madoff’s case, he had no plan for what to do if things fell apart – no cash stashed in a country that doesn’t have an extradition treaty with the US. In the case of Scientology, observers often assume that Miscavige has plans to flee with a bunch of money if things fall apart, but that’s not necessarily how people in such situations think.
Oh, and one of the investigative journalists who reported on the Madoff case, and has long been at work on a book about it, is Richard Behar – if that name sounds familiar, he wrote the famous Time Magazine 1991 cover story Scientology: Thriving Cult of Greed and Power.
Tone 40. Tone 40. Tone 40. Drill in that false emotion. Damn it, no matter what, have those TRs in.
Smile. Smile. Smile. Group think that face into present time.
Soon if it is not already true, telling the truth will be added to the list of high crimes. That is the main thing I did; just telling what I saw and heard. That is all it takes nowadays ro be declared. OK, I got that, but why do they have to be cowards about it and not tell me or give me a copy of the declare order?
i know, right?
“He can tell you how to achieve affluence “on all dynamics” (can you image the flower beds he must have?)”
Hah!! ?
Wasn’t Chan the Noddle Man strutting his stuff at Flag last week? Where is he now? What has he done? His stats… mmm? So many questions, so few answers – oh that’s right, money trumps everything in Scientology! He must be seeing his accountant this week.
Well if a “win” consists of not being as downstat as you were last year then there must not be any wins as per the real definition of the term. I personally preferred it the way it was.
Sometimes it took a superhuman, Tone 40, all-out effort on my part to get the stats up. Example: One Thursday the D/Chf Engineer proudly announced that the % of operational equipment stat ( The main stat of the E/R) would be down. Apparantly there was a water leak on Gen #3 which had just started. It was in a location (the leak) that required major disassembly of the engine to access. This would take at least 12 hours of hard work and I was only told of it 5 hours before Thursday at 2 pm. He appeared proud of the fact that the stat would be down but then he had other characteristics of SPs. My viewpoint was that it would be better for me to die trying to get the stat up than to just report the stat down. I went down there alone and attacked ( and I mean attacked) the problem. In so doing I injured one of my fingers smashing it with the turning gear bar. Ignoring the pain and the blood I just kept attacking. I finished the job and it was tested leakfree at one minute before 2.
I tell you this not to impress you with myself but to impress that if being downstat is a commendable, then nobody will pull off tough cycles like the above, and even without all the other things, Scn as the organization is dead. I saw many things in the last year I was in the SO along these lines but I could not leave the organization of my own free will. My savior was the same thing that killed 25 million people; the AIDS virus, along with the current church management. Some people have escaped the S.O. in the trunks of cars. They are far senior to me. The only way I considered it acceptable to leave the SO was in a box.I hereby assume the new rank of PSD (Psychodog)
Some of you have probably aready awarded me this rank. But if it is not written then it is not true.
It is virtually certain that I am aberrated. But this is clearly what the church wanted.
A slight continuation of my last rant is that DM and others cannot want staff to go up the Bridge as LRH said. If staff were to become more able and more rational, they would see DM for who he is. Now this no doubt presented DM with a problem i.e. since LRH said staff should go up the Bridge and DM’s authority stems from claiming to follow LRH yet he cannot allow anyone to out-smart him. He “solved” the problem the only way he could; by squirreling the Tech so that no-one would become more able. Yet by continuing to promote LRH Tech while at the same time working to ensure that there is no workable tech left.(Such as when he changed the definition of the 2d to “creativity” on the LOC).He maintains a totally unjustified authority based on lies, which I hate to say are assisted by the stupidity of its members (where that exists). OSA TAKE NOTE ; I have nothing personally against either you or DM.(ALL HEIL OUR FUEHRER) but you and his fueherness have crossed a line with me in that you are harming others I care about. You should have let me stay and die at my post. You screwed up by offloading me thereby allowing my then wife to get me medical treatment. You allowed others (namely el Capitan Freewinds) to pronounce me dead without evidence in the Compliance Report. Per LRH one gets the condition one fails to assign. Herr Miscaviage used to sec-check people to find out if they had bad intentions toward him. In those days nobody could have cared less. I hereby declare under penalty of perjury that I will do anything in my power to stop DM in his thurst for power and greed.
You had best get off your ass and take me out while you can. YOU HAVE HEREBY BEEN WARNED.
I will try to lessen the overt for OSA if they decide to take me out. This is because I understand the impulse to do what ones seniors want done.
Dead Men Tell No Tales will probably be dead soon anyway. I was in the hospital twice this week already. It would be nice to live a long time but I consider it more important to live the truth of what you know. And, to you my friends, it has been a pleasure to know you. Hopefully, I will get to know more of you. But whatever happens, (and I quote LRH here:
Thank you for listening.
Bill Straass Dead Men Tell No Tales.
P.S. Thank you, Mike.
no; please don’t go. We need you! Be healthy and strong…Eat your vegetables. not joking
I am touched and moved by your comment. When I was dying of AIDS in 02 there was no similar comm from the Church. They held my wife on the ship for 6 months while they waited for me to die. They figured that once I was dead my wife would stay in the SO. I stayed alive mainly by will power in those days because the Church had all but ensured that I would get no medical treatment. In those days I was fighting to stay alive for my wife. Now I will work to stay alive for you and others on this blog.
Thank you Dead Men Tell No Tails. We want you here among us all so that you will live to see DM and his church taken out. Per a CPA who works with the IRS, he says it won’t be long.
Hmmm …. recently a couple of people in this forum mentioned Bernie Madoff’s name and ……
BLAMMO!
The next day he is dead!!!
I wonder …..
David Miscaviage, David Miscaviage,
David Miscaviage, David Miscaviage,
David Miscaviage, David Miscaviage.
Let us all hope for the best!
My best thoughts and hopes for your better health, Bill.
Thank you Joe.
Clearly Miscaviage doesn’t want the staff trained. He would rather have them sit and do nothing than work on training each other when they have no customers.
Bill, I’m glad you got treatment. I’ve learned a lot from your various comments over the years. I’m hoping the current problem is a false alarm, and wish you the best.
Cre8ivewmn:
Thank you. My current medical situation is that my heart is weak and only pumps a third of the normal amount of blood. The doctors do not know for certain why this is; tests for blockages and heart attacks have come up negative.
The cause is likely due to the HIV which was allowed to ravage my body for 13 years. The HIV was easily controlled with a few meds but I guess that the Church did not realize that one has to take the meds while he is still alive.
Bill we want you to live to see the day that DM and his church is taken out. A good goal for you to live for!!!
Sadly, I think it could be easier to go Mano a Mano with a leaky engine than to get Scientologist into the classroom over the holidays.
Not a great start for Aussie church of scientologists for 2019. There was a stabbing incident at their Sydney AO yesterday, where one died, possibly a SO staff member and another injured. And very certainly they will be getting plenty of unwanted media attention over this. https://www.sbs.com.au/news/teen-in-custody-after-beloved-member-of-sydney-scientology-church-fatally-stabbed
horrible story…reminds me of the sad way that this cult seems to have on the destruction of life due to not believing in scientific psychological care
Does anyone else google “celebrity centre eventbrite” to see what events they are offering to the public in LA? (It doesn’t work as well to put in los angeles rather than cc.) There are more events than what comes up on their ccindustryseminars.com website. I wonder how some of these people have time to have any kind of life or career with all the free seminars they offer at CCI.
The Sunland mission, lol. I guess they couldn’t afford the rent on Honolulu ave, so now it’s just somebody’s house. Pretty sad showing.
I think Sunland/Tujunga must have lost its mission holder/franchisee, as I noted in another comment – and has also been delisted on Scientology’s website, reduced to an even more shadowy existence than some of the small and failing ones that at least still have an owner. If I recall correctly, mission events have bounced between being listed as different local members’ homes, presumably because no one wants to be saddled with responsibility for it.
It will be interesting to see what comes of Scientology’s announced emphasis on establishing new missions, given that all the old ones are starving and dying. The trend for the small number of missions established or taken over in recent years, seems to be for the mission holders/franchisees to be “whales” with the resources to subsidize operations that aren’t financially viable.
I laughed out loud on “the emphasis will be on establishing new missions” because all Flag has done in the past ten years or so is eat up the missions and steal their public and the things they can deliver to public. Who would want to create a mission just to have it gobbled up?
As far as living less while moving away from the 3rd dynamic, I’d love to announce that I continually have had more, lived and loved more, enjoyed life and living more as I’ve separated from that money-making concern calling itself a “religion”. I don’t believe there is an organization that is less religious than scientology, nor is there one which is more openly avaricious,( ‘cept, *possibly*, the IRS…. And that group of guys causes more people to pray to their gods every year.)
Parenting seminar, the LRH way: “Abandon them.” Remember, it’s the wife’s job to raise the children and take care of her MAN! [How paleolithic can a guy get?, but that’s what MSH was moved to write, poor woman. AND then she was abandoned to needlessly die of cancer, and alone, abandoned by the “man” who she had given her all for for all those years]
Rather than superhuman, I see Tubby as not nearly up to human standards, a rotten student, only excelling at conning ‘the rubes’, not feeling emotions, but using them as weapons.
The “tiny, failing Mission” of Sunland (AKA Sunland-Tujunga) is one of the zombie missions that lost its premises, and apparently also its mission holder/franchisee, and now seems doomed to wander between various local members’ homes. It’s no longer even on the Scientology website’s list of missions – and that list includes quite a few nominal missions that are actually little more than token presences in mission holder/franchisees’ businesses or residences.
I wonder how much closer St. Louis got to their goal in the last 3 days. My bet is that Cummins’ and Bridgeforth’s matching money is quite safe – the sad question is how much more Scientology got out of the broken and plundered local “field” there, are they even keeping up with the $100,000 or so in yearly taxes for the deteriorating old building that management is now apparently planning to give up on?
I’ve been saying that orgs are the new missions, with Scientology’s slow collapse. So it makes sense that upper-level entities like ASHO are the new orgs, delivering services like the SRD that local orgs used to provide. I suspect that eventually most of the massive “ideal” orgs will start to become little more than glorified test and event centers, with skeleton staffs doing local recruiting and promotions, sending people away for any significant services
And scientologists’ Freudian slips are indeed precious – “stats were down a bit but not crashed like last year” says a lot about the actual state of Scientology.
Maybe Miscabbage can swoop in with a comma to fix it:
“stats were down a bit but not crashed, like last year”
PeaceMaker, thank you for very good comments and truth. I remember when STCC (Success Through Communication Course) was only offered at your local mission. Now Flag has stolen even that little intro course from the Missions. Flag has been cannibalizing it’s missions and orgs for years now. Pretty soon there will be nothing left for Flag to eat to get its stats up. It’s the New Scientology!
I’m glad if my comments are of value. I try to add what I think may be of interest to those who follow the subject, while trying to balance that with some background for newcomers.
As I often try to note, from what I can tell the truth is that Scientology has been cannibalizing its outer organs since about the mid-1970s, when it started to be starved for “raw meat” due to the end of the flood of young baby boomers, and the rise of newer generations that had different priorities as well as more wariness of groups and gurus. As an example of the culture shift, for instance, from 1980 to 1981, the Preppy Handbook spent twice as long on the bestseller lists as Dianetics had in 1950 to 1951, and the bestselling non-fiction books of the 1980s all had to do with money, success and business, fitness and diet (Dianetics made an infamously staged comeback on the lists late in the decade, but was not actually among the top 10 best sellers in any year).*
I’d say the New Scientology is shrinking back to the same size as the Old Scientology of the 1950s, in terms of members and activity, but with an oversized organizational and physical footprint, in a sort of perverse fulfillment of Hubbard’s 1960 pronouncement:
“We own a tremendous amount of property. We own a tremendous amount of material, and so forth. And it keeps growing. But that’s not important. When buildings get important to us, for God’s sake, some of you born revolutionists, will you please blow up central headquarters. If someone had put some HE under the Vatican long ago, Catholicism might still be going. Don’t get interested in real estate. Don’t get interested in the masses of buildings, because that’s not important.”
Speaking of the STCC, I got to do a version without the heavy TRs and with some new material on actual communication techniques, that was being developed by a former mission holder to adapt to changing times, right before Hubbard had Miscavige crack down. Hubbard apparently explicitly rejected attempts to innovate.
* As an interesting historical aside, it caught my eye that back in the 1960s, the perennial non-fiction bestseller was actually the pop psychology book Games People Play: The Psychology of Human Relationships by psychiatrist Eric Berne, based on the Transactional Analysis theoretical and therapeutic framework that was intended to be able to be used by laypeople – but nothing by Hubbard cracked the top 10.
The address on the event poster isn’t what the IRS has. The last address with the IRS for this “mission” is 11112 ORO VISTA AVE, SUNLAND, CA 91040, which looks like a not very well maintained house.
That address is about a mile and a half West of the other one, and shows up as associated with Richard Stewart Painting – in Google street view, several large ladders are visible to the right. The mission and its sorry state, including a small community of members apparently delusional about the number of scientologists in the area, was a topic about a year ago:
https://www.mikerindersblog.org/the-big-lie-rolls-on/
I have a note there that the address on the promo pieces appears to be that of Richard Stewart and his wife, so maybe they’ve moved. There are various other details in the comments, including a 2010 associated address for yet another residence, 10640 Wheatland Avenue, Shadow Hills, CA 91040, about two and a half miles further West, possibly that of a former mission holder/franchisee.
With all those new names giving seminars, the RPF must be overflowing. On another note to Mike, Karen and Tony. We are already sending boxes back home to the Philippines, my wife’s home, so we will be reporting back from there starting around the middle of May. (The actual story) on what is happening at that mission.
Ah yes: The ‘group above all’
By the late 70’s this had festered out into the open even in the tech arena. I was sent to cramming because my solo hours were NOT 12.5 hours in a week, along with some 6-8 others. We started debating about silly s**t like: There are 8 dynamics and 24 hours in a day, so we should only spend 3 hours a day on each dynamic…. Gee, an 8 hour day job is robbing the other dynamics….. Hey, I have several 3rd dynamics how do I split my time ethically…. etc. The cramming officer left and brought back a SO uniformed tech person who commanded that ‘this dilettante dev-t stop!’, ‘this is a deadly serious game’, ‘Scientology is the only dynamic that counts’ , and some other dribble. Yep, Ron’s sea ogors lived up to our worst expectations.
For scientology, there is NOTHING other than scientology: all other dynamics are subservient to it, and the “greatest good” is always calculated to be what scientology (DM) wants you to do, even if it’s at odds with the last orders he spewed forth. Ya’ gotta be in line with Command intention, whatever it is at the moment, since he doesn’t necessarily say what it is until you’re a CICS and he gets another chance to beat on you.
I’m sure folks have been ‘Holed’ never learning what it was that ticked him off, been there for years never knowing for sure.
I see that you learned quickly that the greatest good for the greatest number of dynamics only counts when scientology is the only dynamic.
OK Janice Kenne, here’s reality,
All of your volunteers and FSMs contacted an average of 5.1 people per day per the data you present. You do not say if these were repeat contacts or if each was a new separate contact, but still, 5.1 people per day.
Of those 5.1 people per day contacted, 12.8% of them arrived somewhere.
914 people arrived at 30 different locations. So if we divide that evenly, each location got approximately 30.5 new arrivals from the FSM and Volunteer activity for the year, or an arrival at each location every 8 or so days.
Of course you also list GAK courses, paid seminars and Div 6 courses as services they arrived for which means they spent a few hours there or did an extension course online.
Can you hear the echo in your empty halls? Do you realize just how abysmal these statistics you quote really are and the true picture they paint of the state of scientology?
That big emptiness is a VACUUM into which the hordes will be sucked, since Nature abhores a vacuum and wogs are essentially somewhat-living MEST and obey the laws of MEST, primarily. At least, that’s wht I expect the upper management ‘spin’ on the idle morgs is, if asked by someone with the effing RANK.
More likely, none of them “see” the emptiness, only the beautiful spaces and the PR that THAT represents massive expansion. That’s their prison of belief.
I’m still waiting for someone (DM) to wise up and start calling these useless MEST ‘things’ as “scientology Cathedrals®”. Sherman’s been missing the mark on a tie-in between those monstrosities and the “religion”. If they REALLY saw themselves as a religion, that would be an obvious connection, I believe. Thus, I see them as not believing “the religion angle” in their heart of hearts.It’s sad to see scientologists turning so cynical, since all the long-termers I met back then were killing themselves (often literally) to achieve the lofty goal of Planetary Clearing™. Now, they’re just slogging away to get what they can from that multinational organization mascarading as a religion for legal and financial gains.
I get so tired of seeing this word ‘alumni’ spread around when they obviously don’t know what it means. Alumni is plural. It refers to a group of people who attended the same academic institution. A single person would be an alumnus or an alumna. And giving money doesn’t make you one.
of COURSE they don’t understand alumnus/alumni, since so many ‘blow’ from High School LONG before graduation, never go to college since it’s useless (compared to scientology). And even more useless is understanding that dead language, Latin, since no one important uses the language these days. So what if they sound illiterate to those of us who did get a decent education before scientology screwed us over, and who still learn about these things
Thank you for clarifying this. I was confused by what they were saying in that poster. I assumed it meant she had taken all the courses they offered and had moved on or “graduated” and left the Long Island facility. Very strange.
Worse yet, we’ve seen “alumni” applied to small children in promo pieces, whose parents have given money in their names – in typical Scientology style, the word has been re-defined as a financial donation “status,” completely detached from its normal meaning.
In the case of the children, it’s sadly ironic their parents’ donations, and Scientology’s attitude towards real education, make it unlikely that those poor children will ever actually be alumni of a college or university, and maybe not even of a high school.
Alumnus | Definition of Alumnus by Merriam-Webster
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/alumnus
1 : a person who has attended or has graduated from a particular school, college, or university an alumnus of Columbia University —usually used of a man in the singular but often of men and women in the plural. 2 : a person who is a former member, employee, contributor, or inmate a Saturday Night Live alumnus.
Juat wanted to say that I love when we can see by your faces that you and Leah are hearing information for the first time. It is obvious that your interviews are not scripted or planned. They are real and honest. I just listened to Aaron’ Smith Levin’s recent interview with Chantal Dodson. Anyone that saw her A&E episode will appreciate hearing some backstory about that interview with her mom. I remember wondering what all was going on when I saw Chantal’s reactions. I did not fully understand the timeline and that what we were witnessing was so raw and fresh. That is real and brave reporting. Thank you Aaron amd Chantal for sharing more info so we could have a better understanding of what you went through and are continuing to go through. I wish families reconciliation, healing, peace and joy in 2019.
Regarding Dave’s good friend Tony Muhammad and wonderful NOI group:
This is from another award bestowed by the Simon Wiensenthal Center. Seems the NOI is in the top 10 for aniti Semetic atrocities for 2018
During an October speech in Detroit, Nation of Islam
leader, Louis Farrakhan, said this about Jews: “I’m not
mad at you because you’re so stupid… So when they talk
about Farrakhan, and call me a hater, you do what they do:
call me an anti-Semite…. Stop it, I’m an anti-termite.”
Miscavige and the Co$ may just rue the day they made their unholy alliance with Farrakhan.
Yes. Look at the trouble the Women’s March is having now with loss of donations and participation because several of the leaders were exposed as connected to NOI and anti-semitic.
Mike and Leah – I am a lurker that rarely posts anything anywhere.
It has taken many years to get over the betrayal of Scientology. Recovery was hard and painful.
I am watching your show and I am out of apathy. Yes – something can be done about it and you and Leah are doing just that! Thank you and Happy New Year.
You restored my hope in humanity. Because of you and your show I am getting my power back.
I wish to restore anyone lurking out there’s hope and power as well. YES! Something can be done about it.
I was contacted by a Scientologist after New Years Eve. Someone that I had not heard from for many years. I knew the person donated $100,000 to the Ideal Org and then a Staff member told me they filed bankruptcy and lost home to foreclosure. The Staff member also told me they did not pay a huge hospital bill and were bragging about how they got out of it. They left the area.
I wanted to share with you and everyone the text message exchange. I left out names and locations to protect myself and the Scientologist. I don’t think they will write it up because it causes so much HE&R, however, I don’t care if they do. Someday I will tell my horror story along with evidence of extortion.
Here is my “hat write” up on how to handle the Irresponsible Scientologist.
Lurkers – It is irresponsible to file bankruptcy after giving $100,000 to a Non Profit organization sitting on billions of dollars – for a big, empty building. We know how you justify it but you have been lied to. By not taking responsibility for your debts, you are hurting our economy.
The church of Scientology is doing nothing for anyone out here in the World. You need to stop watching propaganda films and LOOK for yourself.
To make matters worse, you choose to not look at what hundreds of thousands of people are saying about members being harmed by Scientology and that is out ethics.
The tech can’t get in until ethics is in. Remember that!
Here is the Text:
Scientologist: Hi ( ex member )xxxx, this is XXXX, the Scientologist.
Me: Hi XXXX, Scientologist, OMG! How are you? It’s been a very long time and I had no idea what happened to you and the family. Happy New Year!
Scientologist: Hi xxxx (ex member) ! How wonderful to get such an enthusiastic response from you! We moved and have been going up the Bridge. (Brags about how VGI’s everyone is from doing Scientology). I will be in your area and would love to catch up. We go back and forth and they keep bringing up getting together.
Me: XXXX (Scientologist),
I am so sorry but I won’t have anything to do with Scientologists.
I will never have anything to do with the Organization either.
There is a lot you don’t know about what the leader has been and is currently doing.
Please be responsible and look for yourself. Don’t be a robot.
It’s supposed to be the science of knowing how to know.
You need to look.
While people have wins in Scientology, many people have been harmed and it is not okay.
Leah Remini was in for over 30 years and was good friends with David and Shelly Miscavige.
She is trying to get ethics in.
You guys should too if you care about the future.
Watch her show and decide for yourself.
I wish you the best always. ML and ARC – xxxx (ex member)
Scientologist: Thank you, xxxx, best wishes to you as well.
He read it. He can never erase those words.
Now – this WILL crack that bubble of delusion, if only a hair. Scientology will do the rest.
I hope they get out. They are good people that mean well and they are caught in a very sticky trap.
Wow! That is a pass!
Spirit Seeker – VWD! That was perfect. Great handling of the Scientologist.
I am getting braver too because ex Scientologists are coming out in droves.
They are speaking out and taking responsibility.
Personal integrity works. OSA – get some.
Ex Scientologists coming out of fear and apathy.
No more suppression by the Church of Scientology!
This is what you created Mike and Leah. Hope.
You are true humanitarians and you have our utmost respect.
Thank you!
Interesting comment. In my experience, the only people who’ve bragged about not paying their bills have been Gypsies and Scientologists.
Thru work I became acquainted with 2 Gypsy families. I’m tolerant of other cultures and they picked up on this and sought me out, invited me to their homes. The wives were the breadwinners, reading palms and tarots and so forth. The men don’t work but they manage the money and make all the decisions for the family. They have an interesting culture that flourishes in large cities right. They know a LOT about us and we know almost nothing about them. As I said, they found me congenial and non-judgemental and were very hospitable and forthcoming about their lives, customs. No one in Gaj (non Romany) soceity knows their real names. They change names all the time but their real names are Romany names. For a Rom, a Gaj name is important only as it serves a particular purpose at a given time. The men do not work and they consider the concept of “working for a living” ) stupid and a waste of time. Rom kids don’t go to school, mostly. The girls are trained by their mothers to be palm and tarot readers and other things they do that bring in bigger money from the Gaj. Girls are valuable and the more skilled they are at the various Rom arts the more valuable they are. The family of a son getting married to a Rom girl pays the dowry to that girl’s family. Girls and boys are “married” in the Romany faith long before adolescence and their ability to consummate the marriage. Frequently they “exchange” children, meaning 1 family will send their kids to another family, related or not, who live in another area, sometimes very far away, and in return they receive that family’s kids. These exchanges are done as sort of deals. The Rom move around a lot; they are peripatetic. They did brag to me about skipping out on their bills – rent, utilities, phone, etc. I was fascinated, listening to them. I had no idea this whole sub culture existed right under our noses. Perhaps they were flattered by my interest and lack of fear of them. They couldn’t tell me enough about themselves. Perhaps they exaggerated some of it for effect. I wouldn’t know. I’m only relaying what they told me. But it was a huge point of pride with them that they skipped out on their bills.
And then so many years later, I heard Scientologists bragging about not paying their bills and declaring bankruptcy and I drew a parallel, I couldn’t help it.
“And a person ceases to live to the degree that he falls out of his 3rd dynamic”
Well, that means Hubtard was getting smelly by the late 70’s when he was hiding from his 3rd dynamic…
True that.
“They’ve got chutzpah
A good yiddish word seems appropriate.
Not backing off from proudly promoting the anti-semite. Scientology doubles down on the NOI.”
I still think if nothing else ever does it, this is what’s going to be DM’s ruin. He does know he’s white, doesn’t he? He does know this group doesn’t like white people doesn’t he? Well, whites and most other races except their own. I can’t help but think if that Indian legend of the boy and the snake. DM’s an idiot.
It’s striking to me that Scientologists are so unaware of how bad their parenting is that they think they can teach parenting. Similar to people who don’t object to human rights abuses of their own clergy but instead call telling the truth about those abuses “human rights violations.” Textbook case of how cults use their distortions of language to render their members incapable of perceiving the most blatant problems with the cult.
I agree Cat. The idea of a parenting course from scientology is hilarious and so freaking sad.
Cat and Ann,
Any time this cult claims they know squat about parenting it makes my skin crawl. The best thing that will result when this cult falls is that the children trapped there will have a chance to be children.
But but but – the barley formula https://brittshealthtips.com/barleyformula/
Yeah. I tried to feed my daughter that. She was breastfed. When I would give her a bottle with barley formula, she would pull the nipple off and throw the bottle across the room. Broke me of the habit really fast. I thought she hated the bottle, now I realize she may have taken a bottle if she had been given something palatable.
Valerie it’s hard to believe lrh went so far as to act like he knew what he was talking about with the barley formula. Arrogance and cruelty abound. Really pisses me off.
Thanks for that reminder of one of Hubbard’s most readily falsifiable pseudo-scientific pronouncements. I’d like to ask Foolproof about that one – if Hubbard said that with such certainty and yet got it so wrong, what else is there in Dianetics and Scientology that is just as bad and worse, that’s just not as obvious or readily disproven?
I’m glad to hear that you did the right thing. There are stories of scientologists sticking to Hubbard’s advice, and having their infants end up in the hospital. I also think I’ve seen one reference that the CofS has “squirreled” Hubbard’s original formula and published a version with added nutrients, presumably as a tacit admission of the dangerous shortcomings of “source.”
Malnutrition associated with a formula of barley water, corn syrup, and whole milk
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/6894664
This thread also references another research paper about a Scientology baby who got scurvy:
Hubbard’s Barley Water Formula For Babies Of Stupid Parents
http://exscnforum.com/index.php/topic/53-hubbards-barley-water-formula-for-babies-of-stupid-parents/
As usual the same old “looking for an Achilles Heel” where there is none. Now I am not in the Church any longer, despite Mike labeling me as Fast Eddie, but I did a little lab ratting research and lo and behold came up with this inside a minute of “scientific research”, more commonly known as googling. If you read the whole link your daft question is more than adequately answered. So yet another bogus story of something so tangential to the main theme of the workability of Scientology it’s right out in the boondocks. Getting really desperate now although I have often seen this dissing of the Barley Formula. Can’t you find something else like “the meter works on sweat” or “scientists prove that Scientology doesn’t work by making an utterance” to assuage your desperate lust to find something, just something that you can carp about. Anyway, here’s the link:
https://www.scientologyparent.com/regarding-barley-formula/
Feel free to feel suitably invalidated.
Very sad Cat. Scientologists think they are the only poeple qualified to raise children. I was told by my son-in-law that i was not qualified to look after my grandchildren because i told him i didnt want to do scientology courses.
My favorite Thursday Funny was from Sue Moore with her brutally honest statement: “…the stats were down but not crashed like last year… Thank you for all you do, you guys are the best of the best!”
If these guys are the best of the best, I guess the Average Joe is a real loser.
I’m guessing that the good folks at OSA who monitor this sight will be writing up some KRs on Sue and she will be doing yet another set of ‘lowers’ as she welcomes in 2019.
That’s better than saying, soooo….the stats are down for the second year in a row, which was the truth.
I still get the willies remembering these “fun” events that were mandatory for staff. The crush regging was so dis-spiriting. Thursday at 2! Ugh.
The FSMs and Volunteers consider 7,136 people FSM´d in a WHOLE year an outstanding production?
That gives you a perspective of how really, really bad things are in the world of this cult…
Silvia, REALLY bad considering FSMs primary job is to bring in NEW people. I bet 100% of that 7,136 were recycled scamologists and/or BTs.