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Voodoo

Free Your Mind And Your Ass Will Follow
...probably earning for myself the worst communicator (most misunderstood statements) of the week award. I must harbor evil intentions to make misleading statements that make others write long posts based on the misunderstandings ;)
Suggestion: say more with fewer words.
 
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Karakorum

supressively reasonable
Scientology nearly died many times under Hubbard. The "system" that saved it was the same system the mafia uses. Scientology took off with the power of the lost 60s and 70s babyboomers. Those same babyboomers woke up and left.
I certainly can see that part of the equation. I just don't think that's the whole equation. If that was true, things would have fallen apart when I was a kid.

Yet, using ARIS data (withOrtega as a source), scn was still seeing some growth between 1990 and 2000:

scientologyrastafarian.jpg



Thing I'm getting at: This mess didn't end in the 80s and the most rapid decrease are the post 2000 defections. Those involve people from all generations.

Baby boomers such as Rinder, but also includes people from an older generation - such as Ron Miscavige and Karen. Yet we also gert people of my generation born into the cult: Myself, Astra, Aaron Smith-Levin or Jenna Miscavige.

I know internet is a factor, but even that doesn't seem to be the whole picture.

Suggestion: say more with fewer words.
I'll try images. :D
 
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freethinker

Sponsor
1. Ron died? Really? I hadn't heard that rumor. Do you have any dox to back up very dubious theory? If possible, photographs of Ron's ashes being scattered over the ocean with a DNA report attached.

2. Well, it's not an easy concept for many reasons. For example, just the other day I saw a color photo of Ron on the Apollo. I don't think they had color 33 years ago, so that kind of blows your whole theory.

3. If that spirit were to return, how would they be "somebody else" if the thetan is the same? I am thinking whoever gave you a pass on that clay demo should be KR'd.

4. That may be true, but I'd have to see Janis' Ethics Folder and OCA before I would have certainty about her data being correct. I mean what if the NewRon didn't want others to know he is the OldRon? He might intentionally misdirect people with intentionally wrong info about MSH. Hey, remember when Ron said we shouldn't show off our OT powers until a "few of the boys make it" up the line to OT? This could be one of those galactic strategy moves that Ron learned from his wholetrack research.

Please visit my shopping link where we are selling lots of standard Indy Scientology supplies. Today only we are offering a 20% discount on the just-released red/green/white MEGA hats!

Hey all you standard indie terminals out there, Make Engrams Great Again!

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Any decent Scientologist (I can't believe I just said that) knows Ron never died. He's working his fat ass off on target II.

The Apollo was more than 33 years ago but what caught my attention was he had it down to the month. That is devotion you don't see every day and hopefully not every day.


I hear Target II is much easier to fleece than Target I so chances are he never comes back. He left Scientology with incomplete tech, an auditing sheet with an absurd date that ran the whole page.

Everybody knows LRH came back as Joe Biden. He is soon to assume his next personality as a SJW as his politics were not received well.
 

JustSheila

Crusader
I certainly can see that part of the equation. I just don't think that's the whole equation. If that was true, things would have fallen apart when I was a kid.

Yet, using ARIS data (withOrtega as a source), scn was still seeing some growth between 1990 and 2000:

scientologyrastafarian.jpg



Thing I'm getting at: This mess didn't end in the 80s and the most rapid decrease are the post 2000 defections. Those involve people from all generations.

Baby boomers such as Rinder, but also includes people from an older generation - such as Ron Miscavige and Karen. Yet we also gert people of my generation born into the cult: Myself, Astra, Aaron Smith-Levin or Jenna Miscavige.

I know internet is a factor, but even that doesn't seem to be the whole picture.


I'll try images. :D
Yeh, you're right, there was an increase for a while between 1990-2000, kind of a resurgence after they got the tax exemption and DM seemed to be doing alright for a bit. Seemed to be, but that whole thing puzzles me. Was the increase mostly just focusing on the big donors and getting more money in from them and then using 2nd and 3rd world countries for slave labor to add to the numbers? It doesn't quite add up. Not sure those statistics are accurate - who knows how much of that info was provided by Scientology or from Internet bots they hired. It could be right, but I have my doubts. Scientology has always found ways to falsify their numbers and make them appear bigger than they actually were.

Many of that original older generation that joined and stayed a while were early hippies and beatniks... they are older now, but the mindset was similar and they were mostly all young when they got involved with Scn. Not babyboomers, no, but part of that first wave of Liberal drug experimenters and lost youth rebelling that took America and the world into an era of change. Good timing for a cult on Hubbard's part. Doesn't apply to DM.

What are your ideas?
 

Karakorum

supressively reasonable
Yeh, you're right, there was an increase for a while between 1990-2000, kind of a resurgence after they got the tax exemption and DM seemed to be doing alright for a bit. Seemed to be, but that whole thing puzzles me. Was the increase mostly just focusing on the big donors and getting more money in from them and then using 2nd and 3rd world countries for slave labor to add to the numbers? It doesn't quite add up. Not sure those statistics are accurate - who knows how much of that info was provided by Scientology or from Internet bots they hired. It could be right, but I have my doubts. <snip>
Well, speaking for my own west coast experiences: I recall a few people leaving in the 90s, but it did not seem common.We had some people from Russia or Latin America come over. There were babies born into the cult. I still recall quite a fe american recruits in the late 90s, even body-routing had some success.

I'd say the defections suddenly grew in number somewhere in late 2003 or early 2004. As ethics, I also delt with more and more people saying they are thinking of leaving, or that they had a friend who left and wanted him/her to come out as well.

This flood continued onwards for the next few years, which was when I myself left. I do not know if it stabilized or the drain goes faster ever on.

What are your ideas?
Ah, the big question: Reasons.

1. Internet was certainly a factor. Not everyone had internet access and those who had access had filter put on. Due to the nature of my post, the 2000s filter I had was of a "blacklist" not a "whitelist" type, so there were ways (which I'm not gonna describe in public - sorry Smurfs!) to get around it.

Media other than internet... I'd say these were not a factor back in the day. I left before the St Petersburg times articles.

2. The 2000s were a time when many 2nd generation members went into their early 20s and tried to chart their long-term career plans. Quite a few were dissatisfied with what scn could offer with regards to that. Me including.

3. Once the 2004 exodus started, it created an aftershock. "My friends and my mom left, I almost have nobody left inside" type of cases started to appear. Moreover, because of this we had an increase of memebrs who have "recent PTS" and SP connections, which caused an increasing number of sec-checks on the remaining members.

Perhaps it was a death-spiral? More checks lead to more pressure, so more people leave, which cause even more sec-checks...

Plus the fact that sec-checks were not free. A lot of people felt that: "Oh so because Johnny Doe left, now I am being punished?!". People really tried to jump through some hoops just to make the sec-checks last shorter so they would pay less. It was a stupid, self-defeating element of the process, which many times harmed our investigations.

4. I'm not sure if it was just my experience, because this was the time when I changed posts. I became part of the investigation teams, where we did things differently and had more space than in most other teams. But I feel like the "internal culture" of scn changed in the mid 2000s. J&D of Hubbard or of auditing was still entirely taboo, but amongst colleagues people openly engaged in J&D of the administrative process, mocking the inefficiency of it or the ineptness of executives from other branches.

At least we did so within ethics - things go so crazy workload-wise, that mockery of the admin process was a way to stay sane and do your job. I think open criticism of the administrative process led to covert (perhaps sometimes purely introspective) criticism of the fundamentals of scientology itself.

5. Quite a bit of old-timers during sec-checks started to mention regging or the fact that monetizing scientology is bothering them or is going too far. Looking back, I think this was something that was sizzling for a long time and in the mid 2000s it simply started to boil over.
 

PirateAndBum

Gold Meritorious Patron
'95 GAT begat dissatisfaction
the IAS ramped up its money sucking
the IDLE Org non-stop regging pretty much guaranteed you'd never be able to buy services (in combo with the IAS suck)
2007 "The Basics" nightmare regging push to remedy the semicolon debacle
bringing about the "Golden age of knowledge" -- multi-year training required before real auditor training could begin
2014 GAT II - you get to do St Hat yet again! YAY!
the IDLE Org & IAS status non-stop regging continues ...

all DM's bright ideas = empty IDLE orgs and public leaving in droves -- I'm sure Ron had something to say about it - LOL
 
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