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Where Are All My Friends?

Gib

Crusader
I came into Scientology in 1973 at the age of 19. I resigned from the church in 2012 at the age of 58. During my nearly forty years with cult I made a lot of friends and acquaintances. There were also many coworkers who I have fond memories of.

Since regaining my independence from the church I've reconnected with a small number of people I knew during my cult days, but I can literally count them on one hand. Now, I know there's been an ongoing and accelerated exodus of staff and public out of the church since Debbie Cook's infamous email burst upon the scene, so it figures that lots of my friends and associates have left, too.

I have to wonder, though, where are they?

I'm well traveled on the Indie and ex-Scn message boards and websites, so I should have spotted plenty by now, but no. Even "The Big List" at WWP contains only a handful of names of people I know personally.

What's the deal? Are my old friends just too scared to come out and play, or what?

Have any of you experienced the same thing?
History wise, when Hubbard first started Dianetics he made a lot of friends, those friends poo poo'd him.
 

Clay Pigeon

Gold Meritorious Patron
I've been declared for over a decade. I can communicate with all the other SPs out including Leah, Tony or Mike if I and they feel like it. What is Co$ gonna do about it, declare me again? :hysterical:
So far as I know I've never been declared and I can communicate with "SP's" too
 

Voodoo

Free Your Mind And Your Ass Will Follow
So far as I know I've never been declared and I can communicate with "SP's" too
Oh, come on, Clay. You know they've got goldenrod on you.

I've never seen my declare either, but I'm sure my Scn family members have.

The CofS never mastered the art of keeping sufficient toilet paper in their bathrooms, but they sure mastered the art of making enemies and destroying their best and brightest.
 
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Gib

Crusader
Where are you getting your bullshit?
well, I guess his first and second wife. There's also Dr winter and John Campbell, Heinlein also but he never really poo' poo'd Hubbard but he also didn't get involved. Later on we have John McMaster.

Of course there are all the early people who got declared, they once thought they were friends of Hubbard.

Roger here and Alan Walters.

etc, etc.
 

Mick Wenlock

Admin Emeritus (retired)
My impression has been that the vast majority of people who leave Scientology just go on with their lives and leave Scientology behind them.

Many years ago on OCMB, I saw/communicated briefly with 4 ex-staffers that I knew.
They posted a few times then stopped.
One of them asked me "Why are you still interested in this topic?"
I think it's proportional to how deep and how long you were in it. Roughly 80% of people who get into scientology leave it within 2 years and in those cases I think I would agree with you, I have been surprised when talking to someone who did a couple of courses or some auditing and how casually they dismiss it. Thank god they do.

But I think as the infrastructure builds around you and as you withdraw from non-scientology the longer it takes to shed the skin. I know a lot of ex-SO and there are those who are 40 years out who still slip into the patterns. Some still hang on to some vestiges of belief.
 

Wilbur

Patron Meritorious
Mike's been out for 12 years. Most (if not all) of the information he would have would be beyond statute of limitations. He has talked to authorities, like the FBI. He's not a District Attorney or a Dept of Justice prosecutor. I'm satisfied that he is doing what he CAN do. He's done A LOT!
Plus, he was the head of OSA. Much of what went on during his time would have had HIS NAME on it, regardless of who actually ordered it. Personally, though it's little consolation for someone whose life might have been ruined on Mike's watch, I can understand that someone like him walks a tight-rope between exposing the wrong-doings of the organisation, and protecting himself.

Though we can blame people that high up on the org board for not leaving when they were ordered to do something unacceptable, it remains true that such people must have been under an awful dilemma. Do you defy the two most important beings in the universe and lose your eternity, for the sake of your own integrity, or do you give up your integrity, in the hope that you somehow magically get it back on OTIX, by following orders?
 

Mick Wenlock

Admin Emeritus (retired)
I have posted about 5 posts on this site in the last three or more years and it's a case of "plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose" someone is dissing someone and someone else is calling it OSA and ...

Mike Rinder was a friend of mine in the Sea Org and I consider him to be a friend now. When he was in he was, by Sea Org lights an honorable man. He stayed even while being abused because he believed. It's easy to look back in hindsight and say that any of us "should have known better" and jeezus is that as correct as it comes but it doesn't resolve anything. He's a good man and I am proud to be a friend of his.

When Mike and Marty first got out of the SO and first moved, gingerly, into becoming critics. I was as suspicious as anyone - and I take great schadenfreude in being the one who was one of the very first to point out that Rathbun's first post on ESMB was total self serving BS. For which a lot of people took umbrage.

Mike on the other hand managed to not adopt the hubris and instead, to my eyes, has worked to be a better person. Apart from committing seppuku on Fort Harrison Avenue and burning his own entrails while shouting "mea culpa" what on earth is he supposed to do? After nigh on 50 years of service he is bereft of family, has no savings, has no social security had to start his whole life all over again. He has left family and friends behind (just like many of us) . Now he is making a success of criticizing the CofS and using some of the stuff he learned when he was in . Good for him.

The great thing about being an ex is that we no longer have to reference everything to Hubbards dreck. We can just work on being ourselves. And try to do a good job of it.

I will say that if someone does have a personal beef with Mike - maybe feels that they were hurt directly by him - I would suggest writing to him on his blog.
 

I told you I was trouble

Suspended animation
Posted by Mick Wenlock and snipped.

When Mike and Marty first got out of the SO and first moved, gingerly, into becoming critics. I was as suspicious as anyone - and I take great schadenfreude in being the one who was one of the very first to point out that Rathbun's first post on ESMB was total self serving BS. For which a lot of people took umbrage.

I remember it well, I was one of them.

His only two posts here were totally self serving, anyone could see that ... he was just looking for PC's to earn some money and didn't pretend otherwise.

I remember thinking this won't end well and it didn't. Had he felt more accepted and less attacked it may all have ended very differently, we will never know now but I still don't think he's the complete arsehole many others seem to think he is even though those videos (that he made a few years ago) were nauseating and ridiculous ... I suppose he did what (he felt) he had to do and burned some good people along the way.

Scientology is poisonous, it can make good people bad and bad people worse.

:confused:
 
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phenomanon

Canyon
well, I guess his first and second wife. There's also Dr winter and John Campbell, Heinlein also but he never really poo' poo'd Hubbard but he also didn't get involved. Later on we have John McMaster.

Of course there are all the early people who got declared, they once thought they were friends of Hubbard.

Roger here and Alan Walters.

etc, etc.
OK.
 
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