CHAPTER ONE

The man sat quietly in an arm chair, facing an open window. The setting sun cast a light that profiled his face with sharp contrast, defining his facial features. He was in his early 50s. He had long hair that hung down below his neckline. Someone entered the room, closed the door and sat down across from him.

“Ok to start now?”

The man nodded.

“Tell me what happened?”

He took a deep breath and exhaled. He had never told his story to anyone except his wife, much of which required no telling as she had lived part of it in the real sense.

“Realize that what I tell you is only going to be said once. I will never repeat these words to anyone else.”

“I understand. I’m keeping notes and recording this as well. When we’re done, I’ll write the story and let you edit it before we publish the story.” The man clicked on the recorder and placed it on the coffee table in front of them. He was a writer. He’d been contacted by the man sitting across from him to tell his story. He knew little about the person, other than the fact that he spoke with a deep voice, maintained a certain swagger and nobleness about his gait and had impeccably good manners. What little he had heard of the man’s story had forecasted for him that the eventual resulting book would probably be controversial depending on which camp you supported in Scientology.

“My wife and I were both engaged as staff members of the Church of Scientology. We were members of the Sea Organization, a fraternal order that was established by the Founder of Scientology, to exist as the most elite and dedicated group within Scientology. Essentially, the Sea Org as it is called, existed to protect Scientology as a philosophical and spiritual body of knowledge and as a religion, and to ensure its growth. My wife joined in the 80s. I joined in the 70s. Between us we gave over five decades of our lives before leaving.”

“Some years back, roughly 2003, the Sea Organization, at its management levels, began to morph or change, in ways that were wrong, exceedingly wrong. Those of us that had been around through the 70s and 80s, during the “Hubbard” era when the Founder of Scientology was still engaged in management activities, are well aware of the spirit and dynamic of real Scientology. However, following Hubbard’s death in 1986, there was a definitive change in the zeitgeist of this movement – a change that corresponded with the take over of the movement by David Miscavige, who still heads it. The mentality shifted, it became more and more structured on force, do as I say and heavy handed use of ethics and extreme levied penalities. Military-style aspects began to creep in which regimented Sea Org members into similar classification as the Marines. No two organizations could possess such divergent or discordant qualities as the Sea Org and the military establishment. One, the Sea Org existed to ensure that OTs and free beings were created and that Scientology permeated society so as to bring about improvements, the other, the military, existed to kill and fight wars and yes – to defend. One uses passive approaches to improve spiritual existence, the other uses force and the ultimate threat of death to control. Yet, from 1986 through to the time when we finally left the organization some years ago, we saw the decline of the morale, pride and the very essence of what the Sea Org was and is supposed to be. In the 1970s and early 80’s, it existed as itself – and although not perfect – it was a far freer organization than it has ever been since then. Today, it is corralled, regimented, confined, penalized and driven by the force of threat and fear to make sure that people toe the line. In our day, a Sea Org member was respected for what he did. In the last decade, respect was commanded, and expected and if not given it was considered to be an issue and a matter of ethics.

We watched and were forced to exist in an organization which , in a matter of years, invoked so many penalties on us from its Command level, that we were not permitted to have time off and had not seen a day off for the better part of four years – working essentially seven days a week, 52 weeks a year. We were not permitted to own our own cell phones nor to have free access to the internet. We were told various reasons, all of them false, as to why such liberties could not exist. In truth, since leaving the Sea Org we have discovered that the internet reveals the true face of the senior management of the Church, and what other abuses have been going on in violation of human rights. In those few years from 2003 we were forced to muster up 3, 4 or 5 times a day, every day, often times being lectured at and told that we were inadequate, off—purpose and slack, and even humiliated in front of our peers and repeatedly told with brainwashing incisiveness - that David Miscavige was the only one getting anything effective done. Those of us that failed at tasks for whatever reason and however minor, were sent to wash dishes or to scrub garbage compactors with our uniforms on, a job that was as disgusting as it was unhygienic. RTC personnel (those who pretended to be Religious Technology Center since they were not in fact protecting the trademarks of Dianetics and Scientology but were working exclusively for David Miscavige) walked the base, strutting and snapping at people, barking out invalidations and making everyone feel introverted, and ineffectual. MAAs were on the constant watch, running in and out of offices, monitoring people, making sure that people were running to and from their offices, including 70 year old women who were made to run up several flights of stairs as part of “drills”. Meal breaks were often reduced to 15 minutes, with no breaks in between.”

He paused to calm his breathing. “I could detail a dozen more insanities – but I think you get my point. If I were to simply bring you into this organization and let you stand there and observe this, without anyone attempting a cover up to make it look otherwise, your independent conclusion could not be otherwise than this organization is insane, is a cult and is treating these people like slaves. Indeed, that was and is the case. I have no doubt that any of this has changed or improved whatsoever.

Realize at the same time, that NONE of this is a reflection of the subject called SCIENTOLOGY. The things I am telling you now are entirely deviative and are the machinations largely of one man and the people under him who have taken up his version of Scientology, morphed the organization to meet his "expectations" and which they profess is "the right version" - but who are all card carrying squirrels (people who alter Scientology procedures) on the simple premise that they are following Miscavige into the dark hole and trying to take everyone else with them.

“If any of this seems exaggerated to you, if you think there is an ounce of hyperbole in any of this, then I assure you that I am in fact understating the manner. Get the idea of going to work every day, seven days a week, 52 weeks ago year, arriving on your post at 9am and working until just before midnight every day. Study incorporated into that schedule. Taking a bus home, having no time to talk or spend with your wife or friends or kids, going to sleep, waking up and repeating the pattern over and over again. People were either ordered from or dissuaded from walking anywhere. You were expected to take Church buses only. There was no time to visit family, go to a movie, go out for a beer. All of this was frowned upon. On Sunday mornings you had three hours to clean your room, do your laundry, get inspected by someone to a pass and then race for the bus and start all over.

Sound like fun? It was a nightmare. Why? It wasn’t the hours. It wasn’t the demands or the expectations. Everyone that joins the Sea Org knows that the job will be tough and the demands will be astronomical.

It was the duress, the oppressive and suppressive enclosure of Sea Org members into a cult-like world, where you were cut off from friends and family and the natural communication lines of the world. How can the Sea Org be the elite of the crop if they cannot be trusted to own a cell phone, to have access to the internet, to have time off, or to be able to see their family and friends. A place where "authorities" had the power, and abused it too, to remove you from a your responsibilities, defame your name and reputation and assign you to menial work, for years. If there is a dichotomy of terms then the current definition of the Sea Org is the biggest contradiction of what LRH expected of it.

Naturally, David Miscavige and his network of “RTC” representatives, who enforce all of this through fear and force, wouldn’t know that because they are not attempting to run a Hubbard style Sea Org anymore. The Sea Org has been honed and fashioned to meet one idea only and that is David Miscavige’s idea of a group that will toe the line, jump when he barks and who will drink his brand of Kool Aid if he so deems it necessary.

CHAPTER TWO

Stay tuned….

Written by OUTSIDE THE BOX