I overheard someone talking about a recent “big” Church of Scientology event in Los Angeles the other day. This was one of the biggest of the six yearly events that David Miscavige puts on for all Scientologists. The Scientologist was quite perplexed, “There are 40,000 Scientologists in Los Angeles, and, at best, we can only get 4,000 to the events. Where are the rest?”
It is well known outside of Scientology that quite a number of those “Scientologists” who do show up at the big events do not consider themselves Scientologists. They show up out of curiosity, but slip past the post-event “sales gauntlet” without buying the latest Miscavige release. So even the count of event attendees is inflated — there are even fewer active Scientologists than event attendance would indicate.
Where are all the Scientologists?
Recently, David Miscavige released “The Basics”: A liberal rewrite and repackage of the basic books which were originally authored by L. Ron Hubbard. Based on the “number of Scientologists world wide”, Miscavige had a large number of the book and tape sets printed up, ready to be grabbed up by all those faithful Scientologists. “The Basics” were released with great fanfare … but surprisingly (to Miscavige), very few book sets actually sold! He had tons of books left over. How could this be?
In desperation, Miscavige has now resorted to sending out hit teams of loyal Scientologists, with lists of “Scientologists” who didn’t buy the new books — to force the recalcitrants with threats of dire punishments, to buy Miscavige’s new books! But the hit teams are having a lot of trouble. The books just aren’t selling!
Where are all the Scientologists?
After a tremendous push, using the heaviest threats over a period of years, the Church of Scientology has managed to purchase a small number of their well publicized “new buildings” but that has been a disaster. The “showcase” buildings bought and renovated at the beginning of the campaign, years ago, are expensive and empty debacles today. The more recent purchases remain as uninhabited shells with no money left to renovate them. The few parishioners who had any money have either been tapped out, have dropped out, or both.
Where are all the Scientologists?
Miscavige’s Church of Scientology claims more than eight million members world wide, but book sales and event participation show the numbers, world wide, are in the low tens of thousands. And the numbers keep dropping.
The local churches are empty; course rooms are empty; donations are down; world wide the church’s statistics are crashing.
There has been a huge project recently, ordered with the highest priority by Miscavige, to bring all Scientologists’ address information up to date — find out where everybody is! They are using every technique they can think of to track down everyone who ever had any contact with the church — much to the dismay of those who thought they’d finally managed to stop the junk mail from Scientology. And, again, the results have been a complete catastrophe. What they are coming up with is merely confirming that a vast majority of those “Scientologists” are not, in actual fact, Scientologists. They don’t want to have anything to do with the church.
Because of the church’s threats of “fair game” and “disconnection”, many of those who have left Scientology do not talk about it with other Scientologists. They just stop participating. In this way they can keep contact with friends, family and clients who may still be in Scientology. As a result, the church still thinks these non-Scientologists are “faithful but inactive”. They aren’t. The number of Scientologists is even smaller than Miscavige thinks.
So, where are all the Scientologists?
Gone. Miscavige’s Church of Scientology no longer controls these people. They are free.
- Those few who still wish to practice Hubbard’s technology do so as part of the loose association known as the Freezone. Everything is available there.
- Some ex-Scientologists have needed help recovering from bad experiences within the church, especially if they were in the Sea Org. They are recovering.
- But most ex-Scientologists are living good lives, free to look at anything they want, free to think the thoughts they decide to think — simply living life the way they decide.
If you are still a Scientologist, but are wondering about it, don’t worry, the world outside of Miscavige’s Church of Scientology is a great place. You will lose nothing of value by stepping away from Miscavige’s totalitarian control. Your friends are waiting for you.
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Ask the Scientologist 
I am going to try to make this is as simple as I can. From my own personal viewpoint.(What else?)I was introduced to Scientology in 1975. As a single parent, I did not get as much Bridge progress as I would have liked, or have the assets or resources to do any more than I was able to afford. I realize now that I was very fortunate in that respect, and also that this is exactly how LRH said it should be, basically. I did a LOT of volunteer work… because I wanted to. I was volunteer staff as well as paid staff. Mission as well as Org. When I did the Comm Course, I GOT it. When I did the HQS course, I GOT it. When I did the Student Hat, I GOT it. Dianetic Auditor, I GOT it. During my professional intensives of auditing, I was a very cooperative and eager PC. When I attested to Clear, it is because I really GOT it. Staff Statuses, etc. and other things I actually succeeded in DOING before the takeover of the “Church”, were real, and standard, and exactly everything that LRH said they would be. Once things began to not work, or didn’t seem right, I would either try to write up about it or talk about it, or I would just not allow myself to be exposed to it. I was fortunate in that I had the awareness to not be subjected to very much out-tech, or black auditing. This is when I mostly went into “volunteer” work or being off-line public for periods of time.I was an active and contributing and real Scientologist, and also successful at having raised my 4 kids to be very decent human beings, who respect me, and respect the way that I chose to live my life. I don’t think that they would change anything about their lives, and neither would I. I was also fortunate to have been exposed to 100% Standard Tech with the Mission Holder at the time I came into Scientology being OTVII, Class VIII, and numerous other STANDARD 100% LRH classifications. I will be eternally grateful to him for being absolutely dedicated to insisting on KSW, and APPLYING 100% LRH material at all times… with tons of ARC. There simply is nothing else like it. Because my life seemed so much more of a struggle, financially, than many other people that I was aware of in Scientology, I made SURE to make every penny or moment count. I did now screw around, or be there for any other reason, except to have faith that LRH really did care enough about me to not lie to me, or anyone else. I was not, nor have ever been, disappointed in the workability of ACTUAL LRH STANDARD TECH. Because of this exposure, I was able to easily sense when things started not being “right” anymore. Late 70’s, early 80’s is when it started to finally effect the mission I was at at the time. An insidious, gradual, cleverly disguised alteration of LRH and his works which was designed to destroy not only the tech, but the name of LRH and the effect that Scientology had had on our world up until that time. I did some more courses, and some staff time at the local mission here (here no longer…) in the hopes that it would somehow turn around, but finally had to submit a Doubt Formula and route myself out. I was contributing to something that was so evil and altered that I could not be there anymore. I had done all I could, and it just wasn’t enough. I did not belong to that group anymore. This was in 2001. So, 26 years of my life involved, in one form or another, in being a Scientologist. I am still a Scientologist. And proud of it. I know who is who and what is what, and that the Church of Scientology, current, has nothing to do with what L. Ron Hubbard’s goals were.It is a long and convoluted and wearisome tale since then. I feel such deep empathy for all of those who came after and were exposed to just enough LRH Tech to be baited, but to have not achieved what they came for because it was intentionally altered to prevent people from going truly free.I am doing great. As always, what I learned about myself and about Life, and the abilities and advanced spiritual awareness gained from being a Scientologist, always carry me through. Real LRH has never, never, NEVER let me down. The Freezone is where real LRH still exists. Because it IS standard, it slowly and steadily expands. You simply cannot stop the truth. It doesn’t matter how much shock, grief, pain, fear, or other lower emotions I have had to go through in my experiences as a Scientologist once I perceived that what Ron had warned us about was actually HAPPENING, because I always just KNEW that “they” could not possibly get away with this, and succeed in enslaving all of us, forever. I had had the taste of true freedom, and there is NOTHING that can take that away from me. Turns out I was right!Those of us who have been around for several decades now and so have seen all events unfold as Ron predicted and warned they might, are still at it. Healthier and heartier than ever and still APPLYING the tech. It really IS the only way out for now. It doesn’t get any better. Do support the Freezone. Us old farts aren’t going to be around in these bodies forever. Someone needs to pick up the batons…
Re: FreezoneI’m certainly glad that those who still believe in Dianetics, Scientology and Hubbard have various Freezone people and groups to go to.People should definitely have the right to believe what they believe without coercion or abuse. And, if people believe they are getting gains, that’s great!However, if the Freezone is pretending that they will produce real Clears (as originally defined by LRH), if the Freezone is claiming they can give people the “Abilities Gained” from the Grade Chart, if the Freezone is telling customers that they will create true OTs, then that’s just wrong.Until anyone has actually produced one of these states of being via Scientology, it remains a false promise. It hasn’t happened yet. Period.Even when LRH was directly running things, it didn’t happen. People should be fully informed as to what has actually and really been produced via Scientology. Releases, Clears and OTs, as promised by LRH, have not.If a Freezone practitioner avoids such false promises, I see nothing wrong with believing in some benefits from Scientology.
Just Bill, I’d like to add some info on the orgs having to stock the Basics as you covered above. All you said is indeed how it occurs, but also, all org are ordered to maintain arbitrary “minimum stocks” amounts for every item for sale in their bookstores including Meters.Minimum stocks are an area that has been used to pad income to the Gold Base and has been a real financial drain on the orgs. Here’s why: every time Miscavige alters and re-releases a text or tape or whatever, each org has to then replace all their current stocks of that item with the new and improved stocks. In other words, each org was ordered to keep several hundred of all the basic books in their book stocks at all times. When the Basics were released, the orgs themselves had to take the loss when those books were destroyed and replaced. So the org is immediately selling at a financial loss whenever they must go through the Miscavage “purge and refill” cycle on bookstock releases. The old items are called “dead stocks” and in the past, org staff would try to find out about a release and sell them off in advance to unsuspecting public to offset anticipated losses, but I am guessing this was not allowed with the Basics as the earlier books would have been branded “squirrel”. So this is just another nail in the coffin you have so well described as having been done by Miscavige. It’s been an ongoing situation draining the finances of orgs (saw it with my own two eyes, paid the money to Gold with my own hand) since he started changing shit starting around the mid to late 80s. One of the first alterations and restocks was the Volunteer Minister’s Handbooks, and those were expensive to replace. I immediately noticed that the definition of the “Second Dynamic” had been altered in those, and I was a pie-eyed cultie at the time. So people internally are noting these things, they just need a push in the right direction-out!In the early 90s, Gold released these really cheap, cheesy audio tapes of crappy music. The orgs were ordered to stock HUNDREDS of these things, and no one bought them, ever! We had HUGE stacks gathering dust. It was obviously a money scheme of some kind, Miscavige must have needed extra dough. The fact that these items are all produced in-house is also not a point the culties should be crowing about . The lower costs from them producing everything themselves just makes how much they overcharge for all these items that much more egregious.One of my favorite dead stock items were the old GO “dead agent” booklets that were PR crap for the culties to use. We had to throw out CASES of those things when the name was changed from “GO” to “DSA”.
Thanks Anonymous!Boy, just when you think you’ve uncovered the worst of it, here comes more information showing that, yes, it is worse than you thought.
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