What's new

New member originally from Boston area

JJBoston

Patron
Hi everyone, I've actually been "lurking" here for a couple of years, but finally decided to register so I can post.

I was a Scientologist for only about 5 years, maybe a little less, from early 1979 until sometime during the summer of 1983. Most of my time was spent at the Cambridge Mission, where I was even on staff for a short time - I think it was less than a year. Then my last year or so in, I was at the Boston Org.

My introduction was through the Cambridge Mission body router, who I later ended up marrying. I took the usual introductory classes, did the purification rundown, took the student hat course.

I've been out for almost 30 years. My Scientologist-husband and I divorced around the time I left the church. I've since moved probably at least a dozen times, got remarried and changed my name, and live in a completely different part of the country.

And yet, I started getting the phone calls last year. I blame Facebook ... I stupidly had my previous married name there so that old friends could find me. Unfortunately Scientology also found me ... some guy I've never heard of started messaging me and I finally had to block him. That's when the phone calls began.

Anyway, I don't want to make this first message too long, just wanted to give you a little background.
 

Sindy

Crusader
Hi everyone, I've actually been "lurking" here for a couple of years, but finally decided to register so I can post.

I was a Scientologist for only about 5 years, maybe a little less, from early 1979 until sometime during the summer of 1983. Most of my time was spent at the Cambridge Mission, where I was even on staff for a short time - I think it was less than a year. Then my last year or so in, I was at the Boston Org.

My introduction was through the Cambridge Mission body router, who I later ended up marrying. I took the usual introductory classes, did the purification rundown, took the student hat course.

I've been out for almost 30 years. My Scientologist-husband and I divorced around the time I left the church. I've since moved probably at least a dozen times, got remarried and changed my name, and live in a completely different part of the country.

And yet, I started getting the phone calls last year. I blame Facebook ... I stupidly had my previous married name there so that old friends could find me. Unfortunately Scientology also found me ... some guy I've never heard of started messaging me and I finally had to block him. That's when the phone calls began.

Anyway, I don't want to make this first message too long, just wanted to give you a little background.

images
Do you know Roger Rosen by an chance?
 

Type4_PTS

Diamond Invictus SP
Hey JJ, glad to see another escapee from the cult here, especially someone that was back in Boston at the same time as myself! :thumbsup:
 
Welcome JJ! :) Glad you decided to come out of lurk mode and join us! :happydance:

Wow! Did anybody else here marry their body router? :biggrin:

I think there was a big push on to try and recover everybody, no matter how old or tenuous the connection to COS. Just shoo them away like pesky flies! :thumbsup:
 

JJBoston

Patron
Sindy - No, I don't remember a Roger Rosen. I'm guessing he was at Boston Org, since I really never got to know a lot of the people there.

Type4 - You look familiar to me, I seem to remember you being the person at the reception desk in the lobby, right?

Sweetness - Yeah, I know, and really that was what made me sign up for my first course. I wanted to see more of that body router! Also, I have read some things online about the big push to get past members back. Do they really think any of us is unaware of what's been going on???

Thanks for the welcome all. I've been trying to find more from and/or about people who were at the Cambridge Mission. There was some stuff in a thread titled "Boston"; that brought up some names I hadn't thought of in years.

I read an article by Tony Ortega (Village Voice) recently that listed people who were or had been in the HOLE. One of the people on the list, Tom Ford, was familiar to me. I knew him slightly, but his wife Pam was a pretty close friend back then. When my ex and I split up, I stayed with them for a month until I could find my own place.

Does anyone know if Pam is still in? Or if Tom is still in the hole? Are they still married?
 

GoNuclear

Gold Meritorious Patron
Welcome JJ! :) Glad you decided to come out of lurk mode and join us! :happydance:

Wow! Did anybody else here marry their body router? :biggrin:

I think there was a big push on to try and recover everybody, no matter how old or tenuous the connection to COS. Just shoo them away like pesky flies! :thumbsup:

The calling of long time cult escapees is a sign of desparation, but it does a number of things. First ... if enough calls are made, they are likely to recover a few here and there ... perhaps very few, but, if nobody is otherwise coming in, those very few are better than nothing. Anyone who comes in after being recovered will be redge bait, sooner or later. Second ... calling long time cult escapees is a valid move, from their standpoint, because exposure to Scientology has a way of leaving a lasting impression. If that wasn't the case, WTF are we all doing here on ESMB? I know I am here as an outlet, a chance to carry on a bit as the class clown, I get to rant from time to time on liberty related issues, and of course, when the news of the final collapse happens, I want to be right there on top of it ... all of that is true ... but, I will admit ... the Scientological/HubTurdian belief system has a way of lingering in your soul. There was just a whiff of validity for that to be the case. I imagine that virtually everybody here has that lingering bit of curiousity. But on to the third and fourth items ... it allows staff the illusion that they are really doing something. Mainly they are spinning their wheels, of course. And finally and most importantly ... IT KEEPS THE STAFF BUSY.

If there are no students to course supe, if body routing is a total bust, if the stress test tables setup outside the org are a bust with people either ignoring them or mocking them ... what else is there? Do you remember those last few days at the end of a school year ... the yearly ciriculum was over, you were kept there for what purpose ... to play games and shoot spit balls at each other, while you were chomping at the bit to go on summer vacation? OK for kids, perhaps, but WTF would staff do when there is nothing TO do? Sooner or later you get bored with playing chess or scrabble or doing TR0-BB for that matter. Then you figure out you are wasting time and not making any money. Then you leave. Then you have an empty building. I'm sure it's pretty close to that already, but, in order to retain the remaining staff, they have to be kept busy enough to not think. They need the illusion that they are doing something. Hence the outgoing phone work. But that's OK, I'm pretty sure that the hangups, refusals, xenu mocking, etc. take a toll after awhile anyways.

Bottom line ... take your clam calls and have fun with them!

Pete
 

NoName

A Girl Has No Name
We can really help you with the having fun with clam calls part of it. For example, I've been known to answer the phone as Baltimore Psychiatric and Counselling Center, as Barely Legal Escorts, and as the Coroner's Office (will this be for delivery or take out?).

Really, the comedic potential is pretty unlimited.
 

GoNuclear

Gold Meritorious Patron
We can really help you with the having fun with clam calls part of it. For example, I've been known to answer the phone as Baltimore Psychiatric and Counselling Center, as Barely Legal Escorts, and as the Coroner's Office (will this be for delivery or take out?).

Really, the comedic potential is pretty unlimited.

I unfortunately only received one clam call, and the wife got that one and raised holy hell, I never did get to shuck that clam. But I had plenty of fun with my zombie bill collector. My favorite approach was to answer (tipped off by caller ID) "Psychiatric helpline!" The zombie would ask "Is this Pete?" To which I would answer "This is DOCTOR Peter (last name)!" The zombie would go into the bill collector pitch, and I would then go into my routine ... "Let me give you a reality factor ... this is a special phone line, that can only be reached from within a psychiatric institution by patients. I know you believe that you are a bill collector, that is part of the reason you are institutionalized. Your delusion is about the most acute phase of cranial rectal inversion syndrome. But I need to know ... has your resident psychiatrist been abusing you? Has Doctor Patel been insisting that you lick the crust off of his butt plug again? (slight pause) You do know that while somewhat unorthodox, that IS a legitimate part of your therapy and is NOT considered patient abuse! You need to get with the program and do as Doctor Patel says!" (long pause, to allow the bill collector to do his pitch) "Have you gone off your meds? YOU HAVE TO STAY ON YOUR MEDICATIONS!!!! The last time you were off your meds, you eloped! You were recovered after running down the street totally naked, screaming, and I will quote here ... I AM THE GREAT CORNHOLIO! I NEED TEEPEE FOR MY BUNGHOLE! Do you recall that incident?????" I would go on and on. The name of the game was to have the bill collector hang up first and to not break up laughing myself. NoName has assured me that this would work well for clam calls.

Pete
 

GoNuclear

Gold Meritorious Patron
One last point here ... the average zombie bill collector has far better TR's than your average clam. Their TR0-BB is always in, and almost always flawless. From time to time I would get one to laugh, but, zombie TR's are almost always in better than clam TR's. So have fun, and really shuck those clams!

Pete
 

JJBoston

Patron
You know, I've only answered their calls twice. The very first one (because it caught me totally off-guard), where I told them they had the wrong number. Obviously not very convincingly, though, since they've continued to call ... and call ... and call ... :eyeroll:

The other time I answered was when they called at about 10:30 one evening when I was in bed but not quite asleep yet. It was a woman, and she sounded young and kind of flustered. I remember saying "what the hell is wrong with you people?!" and I heard her say "oh ..." as if she had no idea how to react to that. I hung up on her eventually.

All other calls I've let go to voice mail, and my phone has a feature allowing me to add numbers to a "reject list" --- if they call again from a rejected number, my phone doesn't even ring, nor does it go to voice mail. It simply cuts them off. I know this because I tried blocking a friend's number and then she attempted calling me.

They just keep calling from different numbers, sometimes the caller id will just indicate "private". They will sometimes leave a message, always saying essentially the same thing -- that they want to verify that I'm the person they're looking for from the Boston area, and that they want to update my mailing address to that I get all my mailings from them. A couple of times they've said that they had some "important information" for me. Yeah, right.

I guess I should start answering and having fun with them ... you guys have given me some good ideas! :lol:
 

Pooks

MERCHANT OF CHAOS
Another Bostonian! Yaaaaaay!

Welcome.

I was in the GO Boston back in 1979. :duh::duh::duh::duh:

Last I heard Tom was still in the hole. Not sure what Pam's status is.

Tom's twin brother Tim was a good friend of mine. I'm pretty sure Tim and his wife and kids are all still in Scn.
 

JJBoston

Patron
Thanks, everyone.

Pooks -- We had to have crossed paths at some point. I remember doing some type of project once, I think it was for the GO, where I was going through phone books making a list of all the names or businesses in a certain zip code. I think it was for a mailing.

Also, I never realized there was a sauna at the Boston Org. I just read that on another thread. I did my Purif when I was still at the Cambridge Mission and I remember having to get a membership at a raquetball club in Waltham or Watertown (???) in order to do the sauna portion. I did it with Debbie Freedman (Freeman?), and I remember feeling like we were doing something wrong by being in there for so long every day. I think we weren't supposed to tell anyone there what we were really doing. This was probably back in 1980.

I read somewhere that most of the people who were at the Cambridge Mission all blew at around the same time. Do you know if that included Gail Mello and Bob Ford? I remember at the time I was there they lived in an apartment on the top floor of the mission building.
 

Boojuum

Silver Meritorious Patron
Welcome JJ.

I did the purif around the same time you did. Sometimes the sauna was at the Newton Tennis Club, sometimes at the Y. Eventually they put a sauna in the org and it was icky. At the tennis club, people would whisper about us staying in the sauna for 4 hours. I heard one clubby woman comment to her preppy friend, "What are they DOING in there?" The other woman replied, "It's a new religion. It's called melting." I had to laugh.

I knew Bob Ford and Gail Mello. and many more. You got out at the right time. You'll find a few old pals on ESMB.

Enjoy the ride. It's therapeutic.
 

smartone

My Own Boss
Hi everyone, I've actually been "lurking" here for a couple of years, but finally decided to register so I can post.

I was a Scientologist for only about 5 years, maybe a little less, from early 1979 until sometime during the summer of 1983. Most of my time was spent at the Cambridge Mission, where I was even on staff for a short time - I think it was less than a year. Then my last year or so in, I was at the Boston Org.

My introduction was through the Cambridge Mission body router, who I later ended up marrying. I took the usual introductory classes, did the purification rundown, took the student hat course.

I've been out for almost 30 years. My Scientologist-husband and I divorced around the time I left the church. I've since moved probably at least a dozen times, got remarried and changed my name, and live in a completely different part of the country.

And yet, I started getting the phone calls last year. I blame Facebook ... I stupidly had my previous married name there so that old friends could find me. Unfortunately Scientology also found me ... some guy I've never heard of started messaging me and I finally had to block him. That's when the phone calls began.

Anyway, I don't want to make this first message too long, just wanted to give you a little background.

Welcome JJBoston!

I've never understood why people want to put all their private business and photos on Facebook anyway.

And don't even get me started on Twitter. What a brain-numbing activity that must be.

I like being incognito. I never get any unwanted phone calls, no emails, no mail from that CULT.
 

Anonycat

Crusader
Hi and welcome!

From a couple of people I know (one a lifetime SO member) said the only way to get your file closed and to stop getting junk mail is to write "deceased RTA" on everything and send it back.

I too know people who after over 30 years out, still get many bits of junkmail every week. Sometimes 5 postcards a day. They also showed up at his door asking if he'd like to take another course. After 30+ years?

The cult is absolutely desperate, and anyone who has ever been in contact enough to have given up their address, is screwed. I also changed cell phone numbers, because they somehow came up with it, and were calling constantly.

I noted the callers number and asked their name. Later, I posted the number with name for people to be wary of, and block if desired.

Hi everyone, I've actually been "lurking" here for a couple of years, but finally decided to register so I can post.

I was a Scientologist for only about 5 years, maybe a little less, from early 1979 until sometime during the summer of 1983. Most of my time was spent at the Cambridge Mission, where I was even on staff for a short time - I think it was less than a year. Then my last year or so in, I was at the Boston Org.

My introduction was through the Cambridge Mission body router, who I later ended up marrying. I took the usual introductory classes, did the purification rundown, took the student hat course.

I've been out for almost 30 years. My Scientologist-husband and I divorced around the time I left the church. I've since moved probably at least a dozen times, got remarried and changed my name, and live in a completely different part of the country.

And yet, I started getting the phone calls last year. I blame Facebook ... I stupidly had my previous married name there so that old friends could find me. Unfortunately Scientology also found me ... some guy I've never heard of started messaging me and I finally had to block him. That's when the phone calls began.

Anyway, I don't want to make this first message too long, just wanted to give you a little background.
 

Boojuum

Silver Meritorious Patron
Phone calls

The scienos are relentless on the phone. After being aggressively inactive for 25 years they still call (and my name is not on the number?!). I used to dread the calls but now I actually look forward to getting them because of all the training I've gotten on ESMB.

Some exes use a different tact but here's the latest tech which I've found to be 100% workable in the 2 times I've used it.

Say, "LRH was a con man, a total fraud, before Dianetics and especially after Scientology."

"There are no clears and no OT's. There is no proof that the "Clears" or "OT's" from Scientology ever achieved anything. None. It's all a fraud and you're selling a fraud."

"When was the last time you had a vacation or spoke to your mom?"

"There you are, working 100 hour weeks with no health insurance, no retirement savings, getting nearly no time off, broke, worried about getting RPF'd, calling someone who has been out for 25 years. Don't you think that's a bit crazy?"

By this point in the conversation the caller told me that I was a Suppressive Person and told me that I was spewing vomit and hung up.

Being nice never seems to work.

Or, you can simply ask to be taken off the list and hang up.

Realize that the scienos are playing with a different set of rules than you are used to.

That's my two cents.
 

NoName

A Girl Has No Name
One last point here ... the average zombie bill collector has far better TR's than your average clam. Their TR0-BB is always in, and almost always flawless. From time to time I would get one to laugh, but, zombie TR's are almost always in better than clam TR's. So have fun, and really shuck those clams!

Here are some fun videos that illustrate really advanced clam call tech. Some ESMB favorites.

[video]http://youtu.be/kAb8vGSRBoE[/video]

[video]http://youtu.be/6mgWES4oBhs[/video]

:lol:
 
Top