Scientologists: How Many Of Them Are There, Anyway?

[Lohan2008]

http://blogs.villagevoice.com/runninscared/2011/07/scientologists_1.php

According to the latest survey, the total number of people who identify as Scientologists is just 25,000 in this country of more than 300 million human beings.

Meanwhile, surveys from other countries show similarly paltry numbers. A 2001 census found only 1,525 Scientologists in Canada and 1,781 in England and Wales. A 2003 study in Australia found only 741 members

I told Headley that his story implied that Miscavige himself knew there were only about 15,000 Scientologists around the world

 

[The Anabaptist Jacques]

Too many.

The Anabaptist Jacques

 

[Auditor's Toad]

two.....too many !

 

[Freeminds]

For years, Scientology generated bullshit figures for membership that were allegedly derived from the assumption that any person who had ever endured a stress test had become a clam. This supposedly pushed their membership up beyond the 12 million mark.

With that in mind, I just had a look at YouTube's figures for the number of views of certain video clips.

• The Tom Cruise Scientology Video - the video that the Cult of Scientology tried to suppress, and thereby pulled in the whole 'Anonymous' thing back in 2008: 6,980,575 views.
• Anonymous' first 'Message to Scientology' - a key protest video: 4,521,332 views.
• Some crazy scientology stuff - Mike Rinder's lies exposed: 2,481,803 views.
• Scientology vs South Park - damning MSNBC news coverage: 2,392,705 views.
• The Un-Funny TRUTH about Scientology - Operation Freakout, Operation Snow White, Fair Game exposed: 2,112,002 views.

...and so on. The world is very thoroughly inoculated against the cult, now. If we're playing the "how many people has the 'message' reached" game, Scientology loses. On YouTube, despite all their money and legal shenanigans, their best (most viewed) pro-clam video clip, "Our Help is Yours", is ranked 43rd.

If there are still 20,000 Scientology victims in the world today, I'd be very surprised. Scientology's gone out of business; it's just that nobody has had the nerve to tell Wee Davey yet.

 

[TrevAnon]

If there are still 20,000 Scientology victims in the world today, I'd be very surprised. Scientology's gone out of business; it's just that nobody has had the nerve to tell Wee Davey yet.

I guess you just did...

Hi Davey! :wink2:

 

[bobthebuilder]

http://blogs.villagevoice.com/runninscared/2011/07/scientologists_1.php

According to the latest survey, the total number of people who identify as Scientologists is just 25,000 in this country of more than 300 million human beings.

Meanwhile, surveys from other countries show similarly paltry numbers. A 2001 census found only 1,525 Scientologists in Canada and 1,781 in England and Wales. A 2003 study in Australia found only 741 members

I told Headley that his story implied that Miscavige himself knew there were only about 15,000 Scientologists around the world

Great. Australia is 4 times the size of England and Wales but has half the amount of people sucked in. The Aussies obviously have more brains than we English and Welsh! Or is it that they are less gullible than us!

 

[Smilla]

I'm with Freeminds - I doubt if there's 20,000 worldwide, and membership is falling all the time. New people have stopped joining long ago.

 

[secretiveoldfag]

"The world is very thoroughly inoculated against the cult, now"?

"New people have stopped joining"?

I'd like to think so but this is probably true only for the evolved educated computer-literate white parts.

Meanwhile Freewinds is spending two weeks in Cartagena, Colombia, speaking Spanish, making friends, spreading happiness, and filling the ship. Not so long ago it was full of Taiwanese. These people don't count? Not our problem? Or what?

Do we really have any idea what organised Scientology is up to on a global scale?

 

[Smilla]

"The world is very thoroughly inoculated against the cult, now?"

"New people have stopped joining?"

True for the evolved educated computer-literate white parts (probably).

But meanwhile Freewinds is spending two weeks in Cartagena, Colombia, speaking Spanish, making friends, spreading happiness, and filling the ship. Not so long ago it was full of Taiwanese. These people don't count? Not our problem? Or what?

Obviously these people do count.

Do we really have any idea what organised Scientology is up to on a global scale?

If Freewinds is any guide it is business as usual.

Even taking that into acount the numbers must be way down.

 

[secretiveoldfag]

Even taking that into account the numbers must be way down.

Jeez you're fast. Quoted before I get it edited.

I hope you're right but I suspect they're getting going with Plan B. They used the Miami chapter to launch the Colombia campaign, and they have used the Smith kids to recruit in Santa Domingo.

It makes sense for them to move abroad. There are a LOT of people in the rest of the world and numbers are important even if they don't all have $$$$ to invest in the Bridge. And some people in the rest of the world are very wealthy indeed. And Davie likes that. Even if he doesn't like them.

 

[Freeminds]

. . ."evolved educated computer-literate white parts". . .

That's mid-20th century thinking: that when a product could no longer cut it in the West, you could continue to sell it for a generation in developing countries. That logic saw Morris Oxfords being made in India, and so on.

Maybe it worked back then, but the paradigm has changed with the arrival of the Internet. The pace of things has accelerated, and you can no longer wring some more profit out of a tired old design by shipping the production equipment out to some less discerning market.

It's very encouraging that the Scientology cult has tried to do this, because it shows that they have conceded defeat in the West. Their fundamental misunderstanding is that the previously untapped markets aren't ripe for the picking. They already have cellphones, satellite TV and computers. They've seen South Park, and so on... and they have endured centuries of missionaries. Anybody who wants to acquire a Western faith already has, and most of the rest are likely to be hostile.

Scientology's attempt to stave off its implosion with new blood from places where nobody has heard of Lisa McPherson will soon fail, because anybody setting up the Scientology cult in a new country will create their own version of Lisa McPherson or Kaja Ballo, or Stacey Moxon, or Quentin Hubbard, or Flo Barnett... because that's what Scientology does.

Assuming that these new countries full of potential victims will take fifty years to get wise to the scam, simply because most of the USA did from 1952 is a big mistake. Not least because an organization as fundamentally racist as the Church of Scientology is going to pull in a lot of problems along the way.

Popcorn please: this is going to get good, fast.

 

[Smilla]

Jeez you're fast. Quoted before I get it edited.

I hope you're right but I suspect they're getting going with Plan B. They used the Miami chapter to launch the Colombia campaign, and they have used the Smith kids to recruit in Santa Domingo.

It makes sense for them to move abroad. There are a LOT of people in the rest of the world and numbers are important even if they don't all have $$$$ to invest in the Bridge. And some people in the rest of the world are very wealthy indeed. And Davie likes that. Even if he doesn't like them.

I hope I'm right too. What you're saying does make sense, and paralells the Free Zone expansion into Eastern Europe, but I still think membership and income will be in decline overall.

 

[Scn.Hun]

Scientologists say that Hungary is a Scientology Empire. There are 18 missions and a Saint Hill Size org, but still: How many Hungarian Scientologists are there?

According to an internal scn email from 2006, there were 60000 names in the CF (Central Files), from which 8000 got some auditions or took some courses, the rest just bought a book.
According to the Hungarian IRS:
2002: 840 persons
2003: 833 persons
2004: 1034 persons
2005: 880 persons
2006: 1263 persons
2007: 1155 persons
2008: 1062 persons
2009: 1161 persons
2010: 1164 persons

(In Hungary you can give every year 1% of your income-tax to any Church. The Hungarian "IRS" collects all the income-taxes and forwards the 1% of it to the Churces. It releases every year a document with the data of how many people gave how much money to which churches.)

And the best is: the 1st of January 2012 Scientology lost its official Church status in Hungary!!!

 

[Mick Wenlock]

. . ."evolved educated computer-literate white parts". . .

That's mid-20th century thinking: that when a product could no longer cut it in the West, you could continue to sell it for a generation in developing countries. That logic saw Morris Oxfords being made in India, and so on.

Maybe it worked back then, but the paradigm has changed with the arrival of the Internet. The pace of things has accelerated, and you can no longer wring some more profit out of a tired old design by shipping the production equipment out to some less discerning market.

It's very encouraging that the Scientology cult has tried to do this, because it shows that they have conceded defeat in the West. Their fundamental misunderstanding is that the previously untapped markets aren't ripe for the picking. They already have cellphones, satellite TV and computers. They've seen South Park, and so on... and they have endured centuries of missionaries. Anybody who wants to acquire a Western faith already has, and most of the rest are likely to be hostile.

Scientology's attempt to stave off its implosion with new blood from places where nobody has heard of Lisa McPherson will soon fail, because anybody setting up the Scientology cult in a new country will create their own version of Lisa McPherson or Kaja Ballo, or Stacey Moxon, or Quentin Hubbard, or Flo Barnett... because that's what Scientology does.

Assuming that these new countries full of potential victims will take fifty years to get wise to the scam, simply because most of the USA did from 1952 is a big mistake. Not least because an organization as fundamentally racist as the Church of Scientology is going to pull in a lot of problems along the way.

Popcorn please: this is going to get good, fast.

I notice a distinct lack of action on the Muslim front from Scientology. Well except for their "alliance" with Farrakhan of course.

I think we should be encouraging DM and the "leadership" (oxymoron of course when it comes to Scientology) to open up Mecca to an ideal org, think of all the money and new starts they could get during the Hajj. DM could run it directly as an example to the rest of the SO and Scientology about how to handle these wogs.

 

[La La Lou Lou]

Scientologists say that Hungary is a Scientology Empire. There are 18 missions and a Saint Hill Size org, but still: How many Hungarian Scientologists are there?

According to an internal scn email from 2006, there were 60000 names in the CF (Central Files), from which 8000 got some auditions or took some courses, the rest just bought a book.
According to the Hungarian IRS:
2002: 840 persons
2003: 833 persons
2004: 1034 persons
2005: 880 persons
2006: 1263 persons
2007: 1155 persons
2008: 1062 persons
2009: 1116 persons
2010: 1164 persons

(In Hungary you can give every year 1% of your income-tax to any Church. The Hungarian "IRS" collects all the income-taxes and forwards the 1% of it to the Churces. It releases every year a document with the data of how many people gave how much money to which churches.)

And the best is: the 1st of January 2012 Scientology lost its official Church status in Hungary!!!

Well done Hungary! a shrinking Empire, just like Roman one, where are the Goths and Visigoths? Oh yes that's you. Very well done.