I may be missing something but it seems to be a repackaged, reheated serving of the same old same old. I've yet to see anyone attain OT no matter how much time in the chair and how much money they spend with whatever group. What exactly am I missing? Does it appear that I'm only here to cost Freezoners potential customers? If there is tech in the Freezone that provides stable case gain then I'm all for it but I'd be a hard sell. I knew some of the 1st OT's that went back to early days with Ron, like Dilliard Eubank, who were the 1st to sell OT levels on the sly. Dilliard as a liscenced psychologist, so health insurance would actually pay for it, but I didn't observed any lasting case gain . What's moar, I'd love to lurk there too?
I think perhaps you might not have talked to many FZers. This isn't meant snidely (or whiplashly) but I think there maybe are a lot of facets to this that may be unfamiliar to you.
The Freezone is not a centralized entity. It's a catch all term for non CofS Scn'ists. They don't have an RPF or staff contracts or a Sea Org or Freeloader debts. They don't have high prices. They don't have disconnection. They don't have declares or expulsions. They don't go after critics and "apostates". They don't try to infiltrate the government. They don't put LSD on toothbrushes. They don't come out with new certs and tell everyone to redo everything at some huge jacked up price.
I really think that the reason they don't have all those things is because they aren't centralized. There are plenty of groups that are centralized which do not pull this shit, right? But the church of Scn has been nothing but a mess since it started though I think it got worse and worse as time went on.
Another thing with the FZ is that it isn't any one school of thought that's standardized (non Scn sense of the word). There are a lot of actions in it. There're people who create their own processes. People who create their own emeters. People who stick by Hubbard's processes to the letter, people who don't.
Even the ones who kind of go by the book still don't do the stuff with the disconnection and all of that.
I was into it for quite some time and still have some friends in it of whom I'm very fond. I've not observed any of the phenomena in these people's lives that I saw were so dreadful in CofS.
I was in CofS before, too. I was expelled twice. Unlike many here, I was never in the SO, so you can certainly say I had less experience than some. But I am ex staff, I was in the church a good long time, I had the two fun filled expulsions, various acrimonious ethics handlings that I would never recommend, and so this has given me at least some frame of reference.
I only say that because I think this frame of reference gives me the wherewithal to make comparisons between CofS and the FZ.
I do have disagreements with a number of people and situations I observed in some FZ venues and situations. I saw some attitudes I didn't like. I don't think the states of OT and Clear are what were promised. But there were so many shitty horrible things I saw in CofS and that friends of mine- who are even more experienced than I ever was- saw and experienced- that just aren't present in non church Scientology venues. To me, that counts for a lot.
I do understand people having ideological disagreements with FZers as they do practice Dianetics and Scn. I do think that's where Chuck's coming from. But I don't in any way see the FZ as a repackaging or rerun or redo of what's going on in the cult.
I would not really trust a reformed CofS, even if the nicest FZer I ever knew was at the helm, though. I would wonder how they'd get everyone to disagree on which policies should be ditched. I wouldn't want to rely on that.
But as a grass roots thing as it is now? I don't have any problem with that.
