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"I'm being stalked by Scientology"

CommunicatorIC

@IndieScieNews on Twitter
"I'm being stalked by Scientology."

Grazia: "I'm being stalked by Scientology"

http://lifestyle.one/grazia/news-real-life/real-life/scientology-stalked-louis-theroux/

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'I'm Being Stalked By Scientology'

By Emily Maddick4 Oct 2016 12:46

[SNIP]

I knew I was being stalked by Scientology when two strangers arrived on my parents’ doorstep at 10 o’clock on a Sunday night looking for me. It was about seven years ago and my father, aware of Scientology’s keen interest in me, informed them I had moved to Australia (I hadn’t, I was in the kitchen.) The middle-aged couple were adamant they needed contact details for me, but when Dad asked if they were Scientologists, they refused to answer him, admitting only that they were from East Grinstead, where Scientology’s global HQ is based.

[SNIP]

I never knowingly expressed an interest in joining the Church of Scientology. I unwittingly logged my personal details with them at a health and well-being fair in London in 2005. The stand – with no visible sign of Scientology - was offering free ‘stress-tests’ if you filled in a form.

I was arguing with my boyfriend at the time, so decided to take one. My fingers were attached to an ‘e-meter’, which I now know Scientologists use for ‘auditing’. They kept asking me if I was being physically abused because the meter was going so wild – I wasn’t, but I was given a free copy of Ron L Hubbard’s Dianetics and told to call them, which I didn’t. Thus began the weekly bombarding; weird Sci Fi-looking pamphlets sent to my home address; some would be disguised as holiday brochures or office furniture catalogues - all with Scientology in the small-print. Then came the letters and the phone calls, which I must have given them at the fair.

Whether coincidence or not, the frequency of the communication escalated around the time I first wrote about Tom Cruise for a newspaper. I interviewed biographer Andrew Morton about the expose he was writing on Tom Cruise, and afterwards seemed to receive more attention from the church. Similarly, while working for Grazia, whenever we published Tom Cruise stories it would spark a peak in harassment.

The most recent call that I believe to have come from a Scientologist was last week on Friday 23 September at 01.23am. Sometimes I engage with them (always fun after a few drinks) but most of the time I ignore them. BBC journalist John Sweeney made the now infamous Panorama documentary Scientology and Me back in 2007. The church released footage of Sweeney, explosively losing his temper at the International Spokesperson for Scientology, Tommy Davis.

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lotus

stubborn rebel sheep!
"I'm being stalked by Scientology."

Grazia: "I'm being stalked by Scientology"

http://lifestyle.one/grazia/news-real-life/real-life/scientology-stalked-louis-theroux/

* * * * * BEGIN EXCERPT * * * * *

'I'm Being Stalked By Scientology'

By Emily Maddick4 Oct 2016 12:46

[SNIP]

I knew I was being stalked by Scientology when two strangers arrived on my parents’ doorstep at 10 o’clock on a Sunday night looking for me. It was about seven years ago and my father, aware of Scientology’s keen interest in me, informed them I had moved to Australia (I hadn’t, I was in the kitchen.) The middle-aged couple were adamant they needed contact details for me, but when Dad asked if they were Scientologists, they refused to answer him, admitting only that they were from East Grinstead, where Scientology’s global HQ is based.

[SNIP]

I never knowingly expressed an interest in joining the Church of Scientology. I unwittingly logged my personal details with them at a health and well-being fair in London in 2005. The stand – with no visible sign of Scientology - was offering free ‘stress-tests’ if you filled in a form.

I was arguing with my boyfriend at the time, so decided to take one. My fingers were attached to an ‘e-meter’, which I now know Scientologists use for ‘auditing’. They kept asking me if I was being physically abused because the meter was going so wild – I wasn’t, but I was given a free copy of Ron L Hubbard’s Dianetics and told to call them, which I didn’t. Thus began the weekly bombarding; weird Sci Fi-looking pamphlets sent to my home address; some would be disguised as holiday brochures or office furniture catalogues - all with Scientology in the small-print. Then came the letters and the phone calls, which I must have given them at the fair.

Whether coincidence or not, the frequency of the communication escalated around the time I first wrote about Tom Cruise for a newspaper. I interviewed biographer Andrew Morton about the expose he was writing on Tom Cruise, and afterwards seemed to receive more attention from the church. Similarly, while working for Grazia, whenever we published Tom Cruise stories it would spark a peak in harassment.

The most recent call that I believe to have come from a Scientologist was last week on Friday 23 September at 01.23am. Sometimes I engage with them (always fun after a few drinks) but most of the time I ignore them. BBC journalist John Sweeney made the now infamous Panorama documentary Scientology and Me back in 2007. The church released footage of Sweeney, explosively losing his temper at the International Spokesperson for Scientology, Tommy Davis.

* * * * * END EXCERPT * * * * *

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I am suspicious...Am I alone ????? :unsure:


My fingers were attached to an ‘e-meter’,

Is that how, you guys , would say it in english ????


They kept asking me if I was being physically abused because the meter was going so wild – I wasn’t, but I was given a free copy of Ron L Hubbard’s Dianetics and told to call them,

A new way of giving free stress tests ????
(look like confusing a free stress test with auditing session)


but I was given a free copy of Ron L Hubbard’s Dianetics

I never seen once in my $cientology life an org\mission kiosk giving DMSMH book for free :no:
Did you????


$cientologists stalking a green public, at home ,(who, was allegedly, only ''given'' for free, a book in well-being fair ) , for years ????


This story, as reported, doesn't appear plausible to me
Although, I may be wrong, and there are more suitable details untold to make sens of it :confused2:

The only part that is plausible to me, is, the never ending reg phone calls after she bought a DMSMH, intensifying after major media bad PR involving celebs
 
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Dulloldfart

Squirrel Extraordinaire
I never seen once in my $cientology life an org\mission kiosk giving DMSMH book for free :no:
Did you????

Orgs/mission have thousands of these suckers, with new editions forced on them -- which they have to pay money for -- by Int Mgmt. They're not allowed to sell old editions to the public, unless that has changed now (unlikely). It used to be that you could collect donations for old editions that could then be sent to prisons etc., but it usually ended up that you had boxes and boxes of these things gradually going mouldy and taking up storage space somewhere.

It could be that they had a pile of "charity copies" -- could be, I'm saying -- and someone felt sorry for her and gave her one. In exchange for her contact details that would be a good deal for the org (as they see it!).

Paul
 

WildKat

Gold Meritorious Patron
I am suspicious...Am I alone ????? :unsure:

Is that how, you guys , would say it in english ????

A new way of giving free stress tests ????
(look like confusing a free stress test with auditing session)

I never seen once in my $cientology life an org\mission kiosk giving DMSMH book for free :no:
Did you????

$cientologists stalking a green public, at home ,(who, was allegedly, only ''given'' a book in well-being fair ) , for years ????

This story, as reported, doen't appear plausible to me
Although, I may be wrong, and there are more suitabel details utnold here :confused2:

The only part that is plausible to me, is, the never ending reg phone calls after she bought a DMSMH, inetnsifying after major media bd PR involving celebs

A lot about this doesn't make sense. Org promo sent out "disguised" as office furniture catalog? There's red flags all over this stupid story.

Yes, I too, can believe the never ending phone calls after a free stress test. But a lot of the rest is implausible.

(Yeah, the phrasing "my fingers were attached to an e-meter" was also a bit odd.)
 
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CommunicatorIC

@IndieScieNews on Twitter
A lot about this doesn't make sense. Org promo sent out "disguised" as office furniture catalog? There's red flags all over this stupid story.

Yes, I too, can believe the never ending phone calls after a free stress test. But a lot of the rest is implausible.
I'm not saying I'm necessarily buying the story, and I'm not trying to defend it per se, but I would be cautious about discounting someone else's story based on one own's past -- and I emphasize the word past -- experience. I do so for four reasons.

First, I recall a dispute between two Exes concerning a show produced by one of them. (I really do not want to name names or get into particulars. The outline will suffice for my purposes here.) Ex. #1 insisted that the show produced by Ex. #2 was false, exaggerated, etc. because what Ex. #2 said "never happened -- ever." Behind the scenes I tried to caution Ex. #1 that the Church of Scientology has done different things at different times at different places.

Secondly, I've known some outer Orgs to do truly-weird ass, off-policy (even for Scientology) shit out of desperation.

Thirdly, I've known the Church of Scientology to pilot some weird-ass shit.

Between 2 and 3 above, it doesn't strike me as being beyond the realm of possibility that somebody would get the idea to disguise promo as some sort of lifestyle magazine with the idea that, "At least they might open it, and if they open it they might read it....."

Fourth, I've heard more than one credible story of OSA gas-lighting people in a plausibly deniable way -- e.g., calling them, messing with their yards, messing with their mail, causing them to be sent unsolicited catalogs (or on Mosey's case, dildoes at work). And doing so in order to make them look paranoid or crazy if they complained or tried to blame the COS.
 
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WildKat

Gold Meritorious Patron
I read the whole story just now, not just the excerpts. I think it is mostly valid, and true about getting on the cult's mailing list and never getting off. We've all experienced that one. The fact she is a journalist means she probably received more scrutiny from the cult, and also that she MAY have dramatized the retelling of it a bit more. But in looking at it again, it probably happened pretty much how she said.

There were just a few things that struck me odd when I first read it, as Lotus pointed out. Doesn't mean I don't believe her. I do, actually.
 

Adam7986

Declared SP
No one's memory is that good. Could be that she forgot what holding the meter was like, or forgot that she paid for the book rather than being given it for free. I mean who wants to admit to themselves they paid for a crock of shit, so the memory might be edited for self-preservation reasons. The meter going wild comment sounds like hyperbole for the sake of making the story more interesting.

Sounds to me more like her memory of what actually happened when she first encountered Scientology has faded.
 

CommunicatorIC

@IndieScieNews on Twitter
The meter going wild comment sounds like hyperbole for the sake of making the story more interesting.
Given the situation -- "The stand – with no visible sign of Scientology - was offering free ‘stress-tests’ if you filled in a form. I was arguing with my boyfriend at the time, so decided to take one" -- I have no problem believing she was rock slamming all over the place. She might have been upset re: her boyfriend, uncomfortable with procedure, realized "Oh shit, this is Scientology," etc.
 
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