I believe that the Cult of Scientology is mortally wounded and it is only a matter of time for its final demise. There have been dramatic changes in information availability and flows over the last twenty years. This is not only the internet, but in the tracking of the flow of money, the movement of individuals and of course, the tracking of communications. There really is nowhere a person can hide. Hubbard's solution is no longer possible, extradition is much simpler and most former "safe havens" would now have extradition agreements with a European country.

It would appear Miscavige is setting up a similar arrangement to that of Hubbard, with the planned introduction of his new management team. However, this will not exonerate him of the crimes he has already committed, and as he releases his "hands on" approach, he will no longer have the control he is used to.

With the BBC fiasco, the Australian murders directly attributable to the policy of the CofS, where the posting of earlier deaths have been ressurected, and the behavior of Volunteer Ministers, the public are much better informed on the criminality of the CofS. I have no doubt that investigations have started, and that we will soon be hearing about them.

Yes, the Cult of Scientology is doomed. But what about the freezone? I believe that it will survive and that on the demise of the cult, some sort of society or institution will be formed. But it will not masquerade as a religion.

Regards, your mate.

Mate, I agree with you that COS probably can't survive (or at least will shrink to a much smaller, insignificant size).

My take on it is that Scn relies on raw meat that knows little to nothing about what they are getting into. I'm sure it was much easier, back in the old days, to hook unsuspecting people into the cult. Everything from the classes, to training routines, to OT levels absolutely are based on the victims being in the dark about what they are getting into. This is no longer possible.

Also, once bad publicity starts, it's almost impossible to stop. As you said, old stories are even resurrected. Every new story, that might have been ignored before, is now front page news. I said elsewhere that it's like the flesh eating virus stories, or the pitbull attack stories. These incidents don't increase in frequency, they simple fall on and off the media's radar. Right now Scn is firmly in the crosshairs.

One last thing: I think that Tom Cruise is the worst thing that has ever happened to COS. He is the one who caused the spotlight to be shined on Scn. Big big mistake.

I have no clue if they will survive or not...

But out here in Hemet, things seem VERY quite. I have passed by Gold Base several times in the last few months at different times, and it is rare to see anyone around and very little traffic coming in and out. There is usually only one guard in the hut at the main gate as well.

I have no clue what is going on inside, but there can't be much going on as there is very little going on outside.

The last org I walked past looked awfully quiet also. Perhaps all the action is in the "theta universe" instead.

I agree that Scientology has been mortally wounded and will not survive. No regrets either on the fact that the tech has never been standard to date and the titanium plates costing 16 million( ???) are "squirrel". I wonder who is in charge of melting the titanium plates down? Or will Scientology suddenly advance into the global metal market too?

I don't believe they can possibly survive as long as the Internet is around.
Too many people nowadays are informed about the cult, also thanks to
Cruise's sofa jumping.

The current rank and file members seem very different from when
I was involved, in the 70's.

Seems anyone with a conscience already left.

It appears to me we are dealing with a cult of sociopaths now.

Take tom cruise for example.

Or the dwarf.

The good thing is that such dangerous personalities are all under one roof...

The bad thing is there are still a few compulsive optimists, still in, being nursed along by the 'hope' of becoming OT... but Id say only a minority and. more at the lowest levels of the org board and in the RPF and amongst lower level public. The highest OTs seem really messed up, the hypnotic technique used on them is called The Dissassociative" technique, and it really WORKS. Take Tom Cruise for example...

Those in the management structure should all be wearing black SS uniforms and turns out there are reports this is true...

I find it hard to continue to care for them as most of the ones coming out now seem so damaged, so narcissistic, and so selfish.. if I wanted to devise a punishment for them - if I wanted to inflict misery upon them because they had chosen to be evil, in fact, I can think of nothing better than to make an effort to NOT get those people out of scientology.

This apparency may be being contrived by scientology to some degree i order to affect my decisions, however, all it takes is one call like the one yesterday... to remind me there are still some good people left in scientology.

I got a telephone call from a kid that had been in for 15 years yesterday. It was a classic call... Hello, is this Arnie Lerma? Yes...
Ive been reading your website for 3 days.... That kid was a good person, who believed in truth, honor, and just quests, I told him to stay in good standing and go back for his friends and family, because we didn't need any more stories of horrors, unless they are felonies or better.

Meanwhile Keith HEnson is still in jail, and I dont know how to fix it without a large pile of cash.. I believe that I could fix it with a quarter of a million dollars... It would be a good time for the next Bob Minton to give me a call at 703-241-1498 I promise I wont let you get 'destroyed utterly' but you will have to heed my advices.

Arnie Lerma

Last week’s non-event really became an epic event IMO. I managed to get some questions into a couple of my friends like:

Why didn’t L. Ron notice the typists’ errors and how did you get wins with the wrong tech? Is L. Ron still a physicist and a war hero in the new books? These are questions I never could have asked these people before Tom Cruise’s antics.

Travolta and Cruise are backfiring on $cientology. And the Keith Henson story and tragic murders by people deprived of meds by $cientology families are being noticed by the media and politicians.

$cientology is being chipped away little by little and its $cientology’s own fault.

If Scientology were a big tree, the axe has already cut half way through its base, and is on the brink of falling over and crashing hard. Thats my view of the state of Scientology these days. May the lumberjack continue to hack away at the tree of Scientology.

It can't survive, at least where it was.

The genie is out of the box, normal people see how freaking crazy the beliefs are and how even crazier its spokespeople.

Information = death to the CO$

As Arnie stated, there are enough optamists and sociopaths to keep the organization going. Unfortunatly, they will not just go out of business. No matter what they say, no matter what illegal activites they can get busted for, there will be people that will keep the organization going in some capacity. And IMO, if these changes are so drastic that it turns people off, there will probably be some kind of revolution and DM gets replaced.

Things like this will hurt the organization, but it won't kill it.

What will kill the "church" is the fact that nobody wants to join. L Ron talked about fresh meat. Well, thanks to the internet and many critics, everybody knows what $cientology is all about. Everybody who never joined $cientology knows who Xenu is. In fact, I would bet that a larger percentage of the non-$cino American public knows the story of Xenu versus the percentage of $cinos (as I understand it, most practicing clams have not reached OTIII). What will eventually kill the "church" is the fact that the current members will leave in one way or another (quit, be declared, or die). If nobody replaces them, the numbers dwindle down to zero. Things like this will speed up the process, but I doubt it will kill the organization.

When I was a kid my mom used to tell me in response to questions on how to deal with situations that required character... 'just be yourself"

This message was received from someone who read his thread:

the kid who called you, like any kid who tries to reach a parent....like if I even sit here too long... these kids who had noone to spend time with them, to go up to them and ask them what they wanted to do..... they give up on parents and seek other parents even if its a cult....you talk to many of these kids, grown kids who look years later for this guidance, because they had noone to spend that consistent time with them, their parents were occupado...so make sure you ask your kid what he wants to do today, because the time you spend with him is important in the long run, the time you spend validating that he is 'OK' just for the things you see him do.... just as he is, he is special

cult kids are much different as they reach out because they need someone to teach them it is OK to be themself....they never had someone around them that long to mirror that,,,,, it is different with your own kid because they do not learn by the same thing, that they are getting something they never got... the never got is the time spent NOW...

---------------------

Which reminded me, (yet again) that when we are dealing with true believer scientologists, we are dealing with the mentality of a child, which was hubbard's mentality... straight out of Lord of the Flies.

What it will take to totally handle scientology and other practicers of mental manipulation, will be something like what is done in Germany to inoculate school kids against the evils of the Third Reich.

Kids there go on field trips to visit more and more profound horrors of the Reich.. so that all citizens of Germany will have it instilled into them the consequences of menyal manipulation.

This is also why Germany has listed Scientology officially as a "Threat to democracy" - they know exactly what they are dealing with.

Hopefully in America, the horrific acts of what passes as a democracy, including the techniques of mental manipulation, will someday be taught to schoolkids... while they are young enough to decide deep inside "Never again" to allow the animalistic survival psyche to act without compassion, when there are civilized options.

That was a very sobering post Arnie, it got my attention.


Will Scientology Survive...this thread asked?

I suspect it will, in some form, for a long while. It will 'morph' into what it takes to survive.

The Volunteer Ministry was a brilliant 'morphing', that's when I quit under-estimating the cult.

Miller

The 'valuable final product' (VFP) of scientology is not valuable, final nor a product. (VFP is another term in the loaded language.)

The organization has only two resources that keep it going. Those resources are the organization's money and its people. The organization's evaluation of the relative value of those two resources is inverted.

When either of those two resources becomes sufficiently depleted the organization will collapse. The way I see it, incessant morphing is a symptom that the organization is in trouble.

I have a similar attitude to Arnie on those who are in who seem to be sociopaths. I think the apt punishment for them is to remain in. On the other hand the personalities of people who are in gets so skewed that I have to ask, "Are we looking at the real person or are we looking at what the 'tech' has rendered?" The only way to know for sure is to get them out and deprogram them.

By the way, deprogramming is a very much kinder and gentler activity than the cults and press have made it out to be.

Thank you AH, that is a hell of a compliment

Writings that make you think are bad for scientology which engages in thought stopping techniques at all phases of the experience.

The only time one is allowed to think in Scientology is when one is thinking about Hubbard's hypnotic commands, and then you must pay for the privilege, and they call it auditing.

"it's incredible how much money the hypnotized disciples of a clever and ruthless operator will plead and beg of him to accept from them"
http://www.lermanet.com/exit/hubbard-the-hypnotist4.htm

and Wieber

Thanks for mentioning that FACT. Considering how the entire field has been DEMONIZED...... it cannot be repeated too often.

If you attempt a deprogramming and fail to wake up the guy, after Sylvia Stanard gets hold of him, and Kendrick Moxon, he will be signing declarations that you duct taped him to a chair and beat him with a rubber hose.

When you never laid a finger upon him except to congratulate him when began to wake up.. with a hug or a handshake.

- read chapter one of Ted Patrick's book Let our children go here:
LINK