There Goes the Neighborhood
Well, in addition to anything else, I like to keep up with what’s happening with my local Portland Idle Org.
To recap, in 2008, after regging every public they could find to empty their bank accounts, take out second mortgages and rob their children’s college funds, the Church bought the historic 12-story Stevens Building in downtown Portland in an all-cash deal for $5.38 million.
Of course, they emptied the building out, encouraging the existing tenants of the building to move out before their leases expired. It was all rush, rush, rush to start the renovations.
Well, two years went by, and still the building stood empty. They were supposedly regging money for the renovations. How much they collected from their field, we don’t know.
Then, on March of this year, it was suddenly announced that the Church was selling the Stevens Building. After two years of contemplating the empty building, they suddenly decided it was “unsuitable for their purposes.” There “wasn’t a space big enough to have a large church service or a large church event.” Really. It took them two years to realize that.
Nevertheless they unloaded it. The asking price was 4.95 million. By my calculations, if they bought it for 5.38 million and are selling it for 4.95 million, that’s a $430,000 loss – if they got their asking price.
Well, the next chapter of the saga is that they have now bought a six-story office building at the corner of Third and Oak. It’s currently the location of a Ruth’s Chris Steak House, a national restaurant chain.
The only problem? Well, it’s not exactly a posh neighborhood, as this article points out. The block is lined with strip clubs, tattoo parlors, seedy retail stores and shabby grocery stores – the kind with heavy bars over the windows and doors. The article says,
“So it’s not exactly news that the Portland location of national chain Ruth’s Chris Steakhouse is moving from its strip-club flanked locale into fancier digs downtown (the long-standing rumor was confirmed today that Ruth’s will anchor downtown’s Pacific Center on the corner of Southwest Taylor and Broadway).
“Here’s what’s hilariously newsworthy: Ruth’s old digs on SW Third will apparently be turned into the Portland headquarters for the Church of Scientology (we shit you not), which, as we would like to remind you, will be flanked by strip clubs. Amazing.”
There goes the neighborhood.
Leaving Scientology 
The church did not pay a dime for this building. It was purchased with the blood, sweat and tears of scientologists in the field; people who work for a living, who are trying to raise children, pay a mortgage, make ends meet, or just stay afloat despite crushing (church incurred) debt.
Miscavige just made a $4.95 million profit on a property that he essentially embezzled from that public.
The question is, now that it’s happened to the Portland field how many scientologists (in Portland and elsewhere) will see the writing on the wall, and how many will fall for the same scam at a different address?
Spot on,Lunamoth. Projecting the existing trends, in very short order Miscavige will be left with no church to speak of, but with a real estate empire worth hundreds of millions of dollars. All MEST, no theta, just the way he likes it.
It is this kind of idiotic operating basis that greatly contributed to my losing faith in management.
How is it with all the GREAT admin tech and “OT” managers that $cientology has, can this kind of stuff happen. I am sure they can throw someone under the bus to blame which is a big part of there op basis also.
But it is still so easy for them to judge us when we are on lines and let us know of our out-ethics and such.
Let’s face it ( for fence sitters) the “church” is incompetent. Sure they may do some good here and there but largely they are injuring peoples survival not really helping it.
You can’t help but get the feeling that they think they “know best” for all of us. The -think for yourself- slogan was just false propaganda. They don’t really want you to think for yourself because they don’t really think that you can handle it. You don’t know the BIG picture with target two and all. They will handle this sector of the universe if it kills everyone, because that is the greatest good for the greatest number of dynamics.
Could you please tell me where target 2 came from? I have heard that referenced before and told it was where LRH’ went. I asked for it in writing and no one could show me anything. What’s it all about?
It’s from LRH ED 339R Int, 13 Mar 82 (Revised 12 July 1982) “Revision of the Birthday Game 1982/1983”:
“And some day–how many birthdays later?–you’ll give me and yourselves and all your friends–a CLEARED PLANET!
“And I’ll go off with you to Target TWO and we’ll clear another one!”
Thank you, Jeff. Seems that it has been altered by some to mean that LRH has gone off to Target 2.
@ tony
And the absurdity is that their job is so SIMPLE. Just put a course room there to train auditors and then provide space and services for auditors to audit. SIMPLE SIMPLE SIMPLE. How they get from there to all this rule the world shit is just incredible. I worked at a Mission part time for a while. That’s really all that needed to be done. Then let people get on with it and GET THE F OUT OF THEIR WAY!!!!! So yes, I agree with your point that the Church took on a job it should never have had and that is telling people what to do with once they are trained and audited. They want to be the big eye in the sky? Never going to work. Never in a million years. And here we are — it only took 20 years to demonstrate that the big eye in the sky and the Church as the sole thinker and planner is out the window completely unworkable.
Jeez.
Hi Anna.
I agree with you. It could be SO EASY…
Just do what you said in your comment. Charge a reasonable price and let us get on with it.
These guys got themselves all whipped up into a lather about something. I can’t figure it out.
They take themselves WAY to seriouosly.
Ok MR. Captain sir, why don’t you run off to target two with all the people that want to do that and let us live in peace??
If we are so whacked out and squirrel and so forth then why don’t they just leave us to our own destiny?? They are obsessed with getting us to put their ethics in. They have elected us to be their “mommies and daddies” ..Well…I guess we will end up putting their ethics in. I would rather they did it themselves, but just as some babies need some guidance, the same applies here.
Well, if things don’t work out and the org is not booming, they’ll have a new excuse: We’re PTS to the lower class.
Cool Observer,
I know we have our disagreements at times but I think your comment is 100% correct.
Though you gotta look at the advantages.
I mean between sessions PCs have now have a unique opportunity to take in the strip clubs and drop any remaining bills they might have down the g-string and then stroll over and get a tat and instead of needing an 8th of JD to kill the pain they can run it out!
(that is if they actually have an auditor)
Maybe they could show a little T&A themselves while the rubes…er…I mean the public are waiting for the results from their OCA.
Move in a tat specialist and their rocking and most importantly in ethnics.
Any remaining bills? You gotta be kidding…
I actually was conveying a hypothetical possibility CO 😉
The new regging technique I think that is in vogue these days is to use the DHS’s new back scatter X-rays to detect any possible currency being carried by the suc… prospect.
Those orgs that do not have such advanced equipment available as part of their new “Ideal Org” are forced to rely on the old reliable strip search and cavity inspection.
imho, Portland Org’s staff are just set up for inevitable failure.
And, imho, it’s a part of DM’s plan (his “ser-fac”, in fact) to make them fail, and show his minions and everyone else that Portland Org’s staff are “not good for nothing” and that He was right in having Stevens Building sold (“because they don’t deserve that”).
Don’t mean to be mean here to those decent beings that call themselves Portland Org Scientology staff, but I just tell how I see it.
Will be interesting to see documents of staff’s attempts to “safe-point” that “DB”, “out-ethics”, “PTS” community they now find themselves in.
How deep will their bullshiting that neighborhood go?
They’ll have to “clear” that community *first*, right?
It will be a point of interest to see reports from folks in those strip clubs, tattoo parlors after Church’s attempts at “safe-pointing” them and getting them into Scientology and attempting to make them change their ways.
Looking forward to reading those stories. :popcorn:
Here’s something I just found. That’s how they will *try to* go about (I’m sure of that. Scientology’s ways are predictable and never change because “it’s LRH!”).
By Tory Magoo, written back in 2004:
http://www.torymagoo.org/wthscam.htm
Results? – FAIL! (That everyone can predict, with no fail)
Reminds me a bit of the time we got kicked out of our buiding for not paying the rent and moved into a MORE expensive building (the mind boggles) and it was in a seedy area too. It was actually justified by this statement: By putting all that theta there we will destimulate the area and bring the crime rate down. Yeah right!…THEN we got kicked out of there and moved out into the suburbs with no foot traffic into an old unused hospital off the beaten track, and as you walk to the course-room you get to pass the pan room. Hmmm!..seems like a sign from the heavens to me..The church really is going down the toilet.
Sad and disgusting. Come on public – WAKE UP and LOOK at this!
Jeff-
It escaped me you were in Portland. I was up there with the family Thanksgiving week for a couple days (during that surprising very-cold snap). Stayed downtown at the Embassey Suites and had dinner in the restaurant up at the top of that tall building — really nice. Had to visit Powell’s of course.
Went down to Troutdale and took the old highway by all the waterfalls, toured the dam, generally had a great time. I would have enjoyed the chance to meet: I grew up near Sierra Madre and lived there for a while (still live nearby; ate at Taco Lita last night if you remember that place on Duarte between 1st and 2nd; still in business after 40 years). At worst I could have introduced you to my second-cousin-once-removed who lives in Portland 😉
Brendon, sorry I missed you. Sounds like you had the grand tour of the area.
I can hear the spin now. Here’s DM in an imagined speech at the next event.
DM: Friends we’ve reached another MAJOR milestone in our expansion. I once said that we would reach for the able to make them more able. Well — I’ve done that. I have reached out and put my touch on the able in numbers that — well there are no numbers to describe it.
Through our 100-gazillion X expansion, I have brought an entire strata of earth’s population under my domain. The able have been contacted. We are now big enough, strong enough and able enough to now reach DOWN to the next lower strata of society. It’s time to let them know that help is on the way.
That’s why we will soon be opening our newest Ideal Org is the heart of Portland’s DB district. We’re going to polish that “D” off of them.
I, The Church of Scientology, made you more able. Now it’s your turn to give back. YOUR donations will make the renovating, decorating, staffing and running of this Ideal DB Org possible. Any one of the SO members lining the back wall of the auditorium and barring the doors will be able to help you with your donation.
Nicely done Craig,
I busted a gut on “… and barring the doors …” It shot me back to my last IAS event.
Ain’t it the truth … locking or barring the doors is common practice at any event now.
IAS, Ideal Org, you name it … next thing you know, they’ll have regs outside the doors selling Int R/Ds for all those who just wanted to get the hell outa there.
LOL! Look out for your job, Dan Sherman!
Well, if that isn’t a slap in the face for every Portland loyal public! Are they now going to require the field to pay for the new building? From scratch?
And how long will it take management (DM) to decide that it too is “unsuitable”? You and I could figure that out now, but those in the church aren’t allowed that privlege.
Boy, does this need to end, before others livelyhoods and futures are forfeit.
This gives me a very cool real estate investment idea.
Step 1) Watch Scientology Buy overpriced real estate
Step 2) Wait
Step 3) Buy said real estate at a reduce price when the org is finally drained it’s coffers.
Ka-ching!
Dantalion
Jeff,
Once again an insightful article!
Hey they can always change the place into a strip joint and Tat parlor if they find they aren’t making any money on “the Basics”.
Auditing and Training!
Fagetabbatit!
That’s so old school.
I’d love to see the “Ideal Org” opening for this place!
They’ll probably have to hire the Portland Chapter of the HAs to run security.
Sheesh!!!
This whole Portland Ideal Org tragedy is just mind-numbingly incompetent. It leaves me feeling a good bit of sorrow for all those Portland scientologists who gave so much for this ass-clown show.
This is unsustainable.
Implosion imminent.
On a lighter note: I guess Ruth’s Chris’s Steakhouse will be discontinuing the Tenderloin cut and the Strip Steak…
bah dah boom.
Damn I’m glad you came along! LOL!!
I really do feel sorry for the Portland Scientologists, and angry at how they were used.
As a critic, I tried to collect all the news stories about Scientology, and the Portland org would frequently come up in Portland community articles. At first I assumed that it was the usual PR facsimile, but reading the articles in detail, they were really getting involved in things like community charity events. (The sort of thing the general public expect from church groups deserving charity status.)
So one of the best examples of Scientology as just another religious community is being destroyed by DM’s motto: Greed is God.
I don’t think it was incompetence….seems like it went exactly as planned: public buys building, turns it over to the church, church sells building, keeps money. It’s a scheme that has probably been played over and over again, each time putting huge amounts of cash into DM’s pockets.
Wow, it boggles the mind. As Lunamoth pointed out, the parishioners paid for the building, DM sold it and keeps the money. He can do that with any of the idle orgs. Could that have been part of the strategy in the first place? Cash reserves ready to be raided as needed in the face of an ever dwindling field?
I can just see it now.
The Portalnd Org told to evacuate the premises for lack of production.
The stats of the Portland Org have been down trending now for two years despite heroic efforts from Int management. DM oversaw the purchase of a beautiful new building and all for nothing. ThisPortalnd crew is real downstat and made up of dedicated losers. We as Int management have kicked them out of the Ideal Org building and are making them pay their own way as renters again. Int will be selling the Ideal Org building to recoup some of the expenses we have incurred through wasted management time and operating costs.
We hope that the Portland Org gets its ethics in and come to its senses.
Should they come to their senses, Int management would consider the possibility of starting another Ideal Org project with them once they show that they are really ready for it and truly want it!!
ML,
Int Management for DM
What an incredible debacle. I really feel for the hard working parishioners (and staff) who donated everything they had for this ’cause’.
In SF, the old building was in such a bad location that EVERYONE wanted desperately to move, so the public were really behind the effort. However, all of the buildings that were looked at which could be reasonably afforded (and also were in higher foot-traffic locations), were not approved. One that they almost got was great, but deemed ‘too small’ (but was still bigger than what they needed based on then and current production).
Everyone thought the org would BOOM when it opened. It did not. Not at all. Many staff and public alike really thought that location and mest were the ‘whys’ behind the held down stats. Though I supported the new building, I never saw it as a ‘why’. To me, it seemed like a big case of ‘having to have before you can do’.
As for the locale, I am reminded of working at the HGB and having to walk by that strip club that was 2 doors down every day. It was literally ‘LRH Life Exhibition’, then some little store and then a strip club! WTH?
The only time SF did well was when it was at the old Mason St address near Union Square.
There is a technology – a marketing technology – for determining location. It’s not a secret, it’s broadly used. It has to do with determining the demographics of your customers – age, education, income, many other factors – and then plotting those demographics on maps. You find the concentrations and then locate there. Few orgs have ever done this, and of course Miscavige knows nothing of this. He’ll spend millions on a posh building but nothing on a marketing study to find out WHERE to locate. Because he cares nothing for ACTUAL expansion, only throwing up a facade.
The old LA Org boomed on 9th Street, but then they moved to the Complex and have been empty ever since.
This is very true. Location was never the priority, or even a consideration; it’s all about image. Surveys or actual research on location were never done, it was just whether or not the building itself was grand enough. Notice how many of these new buildings have the word ‘historic’ attached to them (including the SF one). As if having quarters in a historic building will lend credibility.
The SF building is honestly not well suited for org production; it’s oddly shaped and it was actually deemed too small by ‘management’ as soon as the move in was complete (although it wasn’t… most of the 2nd and 3rd floors – Div 6B, C and Qual – were and remain to this day largely empty). I’ve mentioned it before, but the org was told they had to raise even more money to buy and renovate another building as soon as the move was done. Pretty messed up.
After watching how the shots were set up by Gold for the SF St Hill Size video, I realized that they didn’t care that most of the things they were shooting weren’t real, they just needed the shots set up and done. It was all about image, image, image.
As for LA Org, it was also fully renovated and declared St Hill Size in the mid 90’s and it, too, remained rather empty. The renovations did nothing to improve the stats. There were multiple Div 4 and 6 courserooms that never got used or only ever had a few students in them. The only time a bulk of the auditing rooms got used was when a mission spent the better part of a year recruiting auditors and manning up the HGC. After they left, the auditors started dropping off staff again.
Have we sunk so low that we’re now looking at the insane and bank-controlled wogs for guidance? Whatever happened to “Make it go right”?
Roger that Jeff,
Miscavige is totally into the facade or as the Brits say “keeping up appearances”.
I think that he’s pissed off about 80% of the now mostly former Scientology public by insisting on this clean homogenous cookie cutter image for all Scientology staff and public.
I remember in my final days there when the staff at ASHO was enforcing some kind ridiculous “dress code” for all students and internes which excluded blue jeans!
I mean this is LA where lawyers and other professionals mostly wear designer jeans to their offices.
Get f*cking real!
What alternative ethnic universe are these guys in??????
Needless to say the “dress code” didn’t go over to well with the student body and we practically stood in line to file our “Orders Query”.
Short story long seems those of us who protested the new dress code spent a lot of our time cooling our heels in ethics until we somehow saw the light and went along with the new Church of the SRA’s new edict which was one of the small endearing actions that convinced me to take a long unscheduled vacation from the place 😉
So you could say I have a skosh of BPC on this whole point of ethnics, Jeff.
Sheesh
Not only does the new regime ignore ethnics they try to enforce their own concept of the ideal ethnic now like a bunch of puritanical holly rollers.
This was evident in their squirrelly version of the KTL/LOC course where the supposed “EP” seemed to be being “dressed for success”.
One of the reasons I avoided the line up like the plague.
Because their “graduates” ended up looking like fricking body snatching pod people!!!!
I mean one of the main reasons I got into Scientology was because of its tolerance of “alternate lifestyles”.
Just look at the originally produced and directed by the Ol’man himself ‘The Professional TRs Film’.
Their all a buncha long haired hippies or bikers!
A category me and yes ladies and gents reading this that Ron’s son Arthur would have fallen under!
Fer Christ sake!!!!!
I mean we both rode hogs and both were ABATE members and hung out with the local bikers just like many other Scientologists did at the time.
In fact many of us were instrumental in putting Glendale Harley Davidson’s ‘Love Ride’ together every year!
Yet here was “management” giving us the big fat finger and telling us if we didn’t get “a hair cut and get a real job” we were no longer welcome in the Dave’s little squirrelly f*cken’ church in the dale!
Sorry Jeff as Sarge like’s to say I got a bit sudden there 🙂
Anyway I’m pretty sure if the Ol’man saw what that little hypocritical (who slugs back a fifth of fine scotch before securing for the night) self righteous puritanical little bastard and his team of money grubbing org wrecking team of holier than thou hypocrites were doing to his Church he’d be dragging his sorry whiny RUB ass behind his Harley using a spare motorcycle chain.
In closing.
This tune’s for you Dave or for one of your OSA ass clowns to convey to you.
I know you got the first part down but you should really work on the latter.
You useless little parasite.
There that feels better 🙂
Thanks for allowing me “vent” Jeff.
You’re a bro!
Cool Observer, not sure if I’m missing the sarcasm in your post or not. If it’s the former, my apologies for being to serious, and if the latter, are you serious?
I’m not sure how ‘make it go right’ fits into this conversation and even LRH advocated using the marketing, PR and sales technology of the ‘insane and bank controlled wogs.’
“There is a technology – a marketing technology – for determining location. It’s not a secret, it’s broadly used. It has to do with determining the demographics of your customers….”
OK, but what if you HAVE no customers? 😉
Well actually Cool Observer not to make you wrong or anything.
The “tech” that Jeff is discussing is actually part of Scientology policy.
There’s a whole series of PLs called the ‘Marketing Series’ another one called the ‘Survey series’ …the ‘PR Series’ etc.
One’s that Jeff used to run one of the most successful book campaigns ever.
(Don’t be modest Jeff we all knew you not only were able to move mountains but handle the crap from dead beats posted higher on the org board some call “management” but known to anyone involved in actually getting products as a stop)
Not to mention his own panache.
(Did you know that Jeff’s Dianetics Ad was almost as popular back in the day as the famous Master Card Ad is?
I mean it was priceless!
Hate to butter ya up like this.
But you know somebody’s gotta do it 🙂 )
So did they give Jeff the kudos he deserved.
Naw!
They stuck his sorry ass on the RPF which he covers in his book ‘Counterfeit Dreams’ or on his website by the same title.
(hey if you ever need an agent)
That is after His Satanic Majesty spawn of evil kicked him around like a cur dog.
Yeah that tech’s pretty hot and a lot of it has side stepped into the “wog world” thanks to Jeff, Diana and her sister Suzette who used to run a company here in LA called ‘White Marketing’.
(Suzette showed her support of the new regime by leaping out of a second floor window just to get the f*ck outta there!
Unfortunately Diana who is a real nice person is stuck there in the purgatory of the Int Base still tilting at wind mills and trying to fix what can’t be mended)
Things like positioning, the be do have, the RFO which means Really Find Out and the one we are discussing known as an Ethnic Survey which the Church did intensively here in LA and decided to ignore because I’m sure HSM knew better and decided to try and make LA into his own twisted image and that of his butt buddy Tom Cruise.
How’s that working out for you Dave?
I mean if you look at the complex now a days it resembles Calico.
A virtual ghost town or a boom town gone bust.
All it needs is a few tumbling tumble weeds.
Dave you should be proud.
What it took several US Government Agencies to even attempt you’ve managed to do practically single handedly.
Sheesh!
@ all
The post above is pure sarcasm.
Cool Observer, I thought that might be the case, but hadn’t read enough of your posts to know if it was pure kool-aid or pure sarcasm. Apparently the difference isn’t entirely discernible!
I got it, C.O.
MF,
Didn’t you know that the hot babes that worked as docents at the LRH Exhibit also pulled double duty at the strip joint?
I think Dave takes a percentage and gets a protection fee on the establishment 😉
Oy, RJ. Have to say that I’ve known some of the women who have worked there, one particularly well, and respected them far too much to really be able to laugh at that one, so I’ll just have to accept your comment in the spirit of play in which it was made! Jim Connelly (not sure if I spelled that correctly, it’s been too long) used to run the LRH Life Exhibition and he was a really wonderful guy; I knew his wife, Kay, a long time ago and loved them both.
MF,
You’re right.
It is what I like to consider “my rapier wit” which is “J&D” to some and sick and perverted to others.
Ah, I’ve no problem with the comments themselves, being known to toss around bawdy language myself. It was really a skewer on DM and not the women in question, I know; it’s just that you don’t realize how close to the heart you hit with the rapier!
sometimes the information on these boards (which I know to be true) is so beyond my understanding that I have nothing to say.
I totally understand Nancy.
I’m left speechless at times myself.
However sooner or later the words just spill out in a torrent though they are not the kind of words that would be condoned by the FCC.
Sheesh!!!
+2
RJ,
Wow–you are quite the tiger.
Thanks CP that’s quite a compliment coming from you 🙂
I can speak from personal experience that Scientology and strip clubs don’t mix. The thing that comes to mind with the Portland idle orgsettling in is that immediately there will be a few male staff members who have recurring “ethics cycles” for poking their head in the doors on their way home from a hard days work. In other words, they’ll be persecuted for being attracted to the opposite sex.
My own experience is that your average scientologist is somewhat judgemental and taught that strip clubs are the work of the devil (the psychs). One time I met a business customer at a strip club and a scientologist that knew me and saw me go in the front door verbally told the ethics officer about it. I received no copy of the KR because there wasn’t one. When I explained to the ethics why I went into the strip club, i.e. for business reasons, he quoted some irrelevant passage from the “Route to Infinity” tapes about how I was commiting some kind of overt on the whole of mankind for degrading females. When I asked to see a KR and that I had a right to be confronted by my accuser as per various LRH policies, the 18 year-old ethics officer fresh from EO training at Flag stood up on his hind legs and shouted at the top of his lungs “I AM THE ACCUSER!” In other words, he said he didn’t have any obligation to produce a KR and that a verbal report from an anonymous source was just as good, even though I was an ethics upstat based on my donations to the IAS. At that point I knew my days in $cientology were numbered. I felt like I was being treated like a 10 year old and that no so-called “religion” would ever have a say what I did in my personal life. I’ve felt free ever since leaving that destructive cult. And no, I haven’t been in a strip club in over three years, not that it’s anyone’s business.
Yeah these sexually repressed puritanical teens that become “Ethics” Officers or MAAs are usually real whack jobs (pun intended).
They should just go get laid or something.
The nice way of telling ’em to f*ck off.
RJ, usually they do eventually get laid and, if they’re in the SO, they then end up on the RPF or they blow. I’ve seen it so many times. It’s often those who act most puritanical who blow first. The truly good of heart don’t need to be puritanical; they can be a little rowdy, a little off-color, but they tend to stick around longer because they also tend to be more responsible and,when it really comes down to it, more ethical.
Thanks; I feel duplicated. BTW, I knew from a certain source that that the 18 year old puritanical teen happened to be a virgin, a fact that he bragged about it. I think people who have a little bit of “dirt” on them tend to be more honest and reliable than those who profess to be all “sweetness and light”. I never met anyone perfect, well except for David Miscavige of course, and we all he doesn’t have any overts. But that’s besides the point, I had decided at an early age this lifetime that I didn’t want any kind of “organized religion” evaluating for me or telling me what to do. It used to that when I was in the sea org and someone told me to jump, I would say “How high sir?” These days if someone tells me to jump, I tell them to go f*ck themselves. Maybe that sounds like a ser fac, but I’m my happy to be my own boss these days, slave to no one.
Ironically, the lack of evaluation is what initially attacted me to scientology. There’s even an HCO PL called “2D rules” that states that it’s not the business of orgs to interfere with individual’s private lifes, i.e. the organization doesn’t dictate any kind of “proper” sexual behavior. However, we all know there is what is written and what is practiced. Case in point, I get taken off course and sent to Ethics based on an anonymous, verbal “KR” over something I consider petty and no one’s business. Oh well, it just feels like a big relief to be away from all that BS…
No prob BD,
Yeah when I found out that the sex police were routing PCs and Pre OTs to ethics for 2D “overts” I just stopped reporting them on any eligibilities I audited since it violated 2D Rules and because it was none of their damn business.
(I could imagine some twisted MAA like the one you mentioned with his hand around his putz while reading the folder.)
Funny the auditors who had the least experience with sex were the ones who pulled the most “2D overts”.
I think it gave ’em a vicarious thrill of some kind.
Stuff like that used to bore me to tears.
(I mean I started auditing when I was about 18 years old and some of my first PCs included strippers or exotic dancers and prostitutes.
So you could say the thrill was gone 😉 )
Anyways I’ve always hated that “holier than thou” attitude whether it was some holy rolling Christian sect or Scientology.
Puritanism was never really a turn on.
Yeah I agree I think people (like myself) with a little dirt on ’em are usually the most interesting and usually more able.
And MF.
You’re so right the kids who decided to live life were usually the most responsible and were the ones more likely to try and tilt at wind mills while the holier than though crowd usually abandoned ship at the first opportunity.
Ml
RJ
Yeah, the repressed 2D stuff was just too much. It got to be that people would get into serious ethics trouble in Pac for “2D flowing”. Sheesh. I once had a missionaire sit me down and tell me that something ‘serious’ had come up relating to the 2D with my then-husband. She sat me down and I was really worried. Yeah, he’d apparently looked at what wouldn’t even amount to soft-core porn online. I just about laughed my ass off. I sat there wondering what this young woman would think if she ever read Soltan Gris’ adventures.
It is Lord of the Flies, that’s the only book that has helped me to understand that scientology is misunderstood, because it changes colors constantly to get to where they want to be, and are living back in the 50’s…..
nance
Peaople change.
You changed. I changed.
Not everyone keeps believing into what he was believing some years ago.
Now, when I look at a Scientologist trying to “make a reach” for someone, I have a good laugh.
One thing to keep in mind is that, irrespective of the typically meaningless stats that get publicly reported, DM is well aware of the actual stats of the important stuff.
More than anyone, he knows that membership is declining. While lip service can be made to the idea that the Ideal Orgs will help boom membership, he already knows that won’t work since Ideal Orgs have been around long enough to demonstrate their ineffectiveness.
It is obvious these actions don’t make any sense if the idea is to deliver Scientology. Instead, they are all about the final fleecing of the flock.
The Bulgravia trip packing list is almost complete.
Spot on. So many people complain that “the church” has become so out-exchange, shaking down its victims for so-called voluntary donations for ideal orgs, super power, IAS etc. Those monies are gone permamently and RTC is not obliged to refund them. Final fleecing of the flock indeed (I love the alliteration).
BTW: Who can explain the difference between a fixed donation and a purchase price?
There really is no difference CO.
Originally the Ol’man called a spade a spade and called them “fees” or “servicing fees” and then when the Church got into a donnybrook with the IRS over the term because it didn’t quite align with IRC 501 iii c so the AG Legal at the time created the concept of “minimum donation” meaning you could donate more if you wanted but when they raised that flag the IRS still weren’t willing to salute it.
Anyway most of the public back then didn’t really care if they got a tax write off or not ’cause many of ’em didn’t file taxes anyway 😉
The one’s who did didn’t care ’cause the price for services back then were pretty cheap compared to what they are now.
So they were willing to eat any deduction.
It wasn’t till the IAS came into being that many Scientologists started clamoring for a deduction because they were donating thousands some millions for various statuses and paying practically the same for service which became lousier as time went on to point now were any “service” offered by the Church these days is practically worthless.
In fact you could honestly say that it totally aligns with one of the 501 iii c proscriptions of “no personal benefit”.
RJ,
it was more of a rethorical question to point out the oxymoron “fixed donation”, but thanks for your effort. Maybe some lurking member will read it and have a cognition…
Ideals orgs are made up of Ideal Beings.
There are NONE of “Ideal Beings” (including OT VIIIs there are around). None anywhere in this Earth.
Thus, there are NO Ideal Orgs, and NO Ideal Staff Members.
(We are all just Humans, for gawd’s sakes!)
“Ideal Orgs” are doomed to fail.
Can you see that?
The whole idea of any org to be ideal is nothing but an utopia (believe me, I know thу scoop. ;))
Man … just a terrible location.
It reminds me of Ottawa Org
Here is the beautiful logo/promo – **note the entrance door – lower right
Now, let’s pan out around that doorway to get the full effect
Wow two Tat Parlors and a Head Shop.
High Times dude 🙂
LOL, wow. The CoS is starting to look like a Republican National Convention. Is this now a location requirement? The San Francisco Org is a full block and a half away from any strip club. Someone must have gotten RPF’d for that. Actually, they’re about a 2 blocks from about 20 strip clubs, so I guess that makes up for it!
It certainly makes sense to me, after all isn’t there already documentation about DM’s (and crew) clubbing antics posted on Steve’s site. It certainly makes partying with friends or simply degrading staff with unwanted birthday attention just a few steps away.
I just realized the Marketing Series wasn’t completely thrown out the window. The customers were surveyed as if DM was the correct public, the results were showy glitz that makes one LOOK impotent, sleezy bars and clubs nearby. He’d blend right in with all the other cockroaches except you’d be able to spot him because of all his BLING!
“The San Francisco Org is a full block and a half away from any strip club. Someone must have gotten RPF’d for that.”
Exactly MF!
I mean how is poor DM supposed to keep himself entertained on his visits to his Idle…er….I mean Ideal Orgs.
Here in LA I think the ‘Office of David Miscavige’ is near ‘The Seven Veils’ and somewhere close to ‘Fredrick’s of Hollywood’ where he reviews the type of uniforms he’d like to see on the female staff (after trying them on himself of course) which is just down the street from ‘Victoria’s Secret’.
Don’t tell anyone but I think he’s been personally working on getting Larry Flynt into Scientology so he can dump Cruise which is probably the reason for his shift in ….er…..outreach.
I mean the guy being as star struck as he is needs a new source of celebs since the Hollywood community is starting to reject his…er…Church and turning to Kabala or something else.
So he figures he needs star power from somewhere else and he probably views the triple x porn crowd as an untapped resource.
I read the comments up to this point, and (pardon me if I missed it) but how the HELL do they think they’re going to audit and do course work in a restaurant? I know they plan on regging TONS of money for the renos, but isn’t a restaurant a little small, especially for DM?
The restaurant is on the ground floor but it’s a six story building.
I keep hearing this notion that the orgs are put in bad parts of the city to destimulate them. First time I heard it was about the Pac Base. Here’s a reality check – way back then, the orgs had to be able to pay for their own premises and they didn’t have a lot of money to spend or rent or mortgages. Consequently, they took what they could afford and that meant real estate in less than lovely neighborhoods. Someone, somewhere along the line excused that with this idea that it was deliberate, I guess. But there’s no excuse like that now and the first time I made a donation to an ideal org several years ago I thought that the org was going to be able to live rent free in that building. I was PISSED when I found out that the Int Landlord was going to charge them rent for the building we donated to that org. We thought we were helping our local staff, who we liked a lot and wanted to help. I was never told that the building would be owned by someone other than that org.
Anna
I think it goes further back than that. Per LRH, it was his notion that, for effective dissemination’s sake, he found that locations in ‘working class’ areas
were the best places to set up shop. He was referring to Dublin, Ireland at the
time as well as to the infamous Bernie Green, God bless ‘im.
I hardly think that’s a part of anyone’s strat these days. Better to get a 12 story chrome and steel mausoleum with a 5 car parking lot. Or… an ex-cat house sandwiched between a porn and tar shop.
That was back in the days when services were supposed to be not anymore than what the average person (lower middle class) could afford from their wages and one the reasons that Ron pushed Auditor training.
So the average person could co-audit their way to the level of power then when they went to SH they got power, R6EW and the CC as part of the SHSBC.
The solo courses were also pretty cheap back then as well.
To get from OT I to Original OT VII co-auditing on IV and VII EP probably cost under 3 grand if you include the expense of the VIII Course which was required to co-audit those levels.
Now they no longer allow VIIIs unless they’re SO to coaudit any level above OT Preps and even then you have to submit a CSW now.
Eligibility and the rest of the levels above?
Faggatabatit!!!
Now it must be done arbitrarily by a SO drone according some papal bull(sh*t) from Scientology’s “Pope”.
You know the man who supposedly “cancelled” all arbitraries.
Ensuring eligibility takes longer than one could possibly imagine (Ka Ching) because the little sexually repressed cretin will spend extra time pulling all your “overts” of spanking your monkey or playing with pussy.
Of course after they fully gotten the TPFE and any J’s on stealing those paper clips from HASI.
Sheesh.
I thought the same thing too Anna.
I thought the local Org would be free of any rent/lease/mortgage payments … all they would need is $$ for taxes & utilities. Taxes are hefty enough if the org is in a half decent location.
I thought this was great … finally the staff could pay attention to their posts and public instead of constant fundraising, the staff could be paid a bit better and the threat of eviction would disappear. I know I payed numerous utility/phone bills for our local org.
I’m sure most of the public donating for the Ideal Orgs believe that the local org will own the building and not have to pay rent to Landlord Int or the IAS.
I would think the Portland public would be really pissed to find out $430,000 of their hard earned donations were flushed down a toilet.
What other organization or ‘church’ would have it’s members buy a building for it and then charge rent back to those same people.
This is the exact definition of CRIMINAL … something for nothing, or no exchange … a total one way flow.
These actions by both the IAS and the church are criminal. Ripping off the very people they are supposed to help & protect.
Quicksilver and Anna,
Has anyone who formerly works/worked at an Idle Org actually confirmed that that is the case, i.e. that the Org has to pay “rent” after buying the building? (As opposed to paying the mortgage payment?)
I ask because the Idle Org I (stupidly) donated for several years ago, also took out a mortgage after a large down-payment was made — so the building is owned, but there is a mortgage payment. Of course, in this Org’s case (in the northeast), there wasn’t enough money to pay off the mortgage, letalone pay for the renovations. So it’s been sitting empty for 6+ years, with staff and public struggling to make the mortgage payment and/or the normal rent payment on the older current rented space (while SO missions occasionally go in to extract/crush reg enough to pay off the mortgage).
Jeff,
Please excuse this off-topic post. Tonight I was floored to see what seemed like a one-minute long TV commercial on Scientology (I’m in Orange County, CA). Have you heard of this or seen it yourself? It had pretty good production values, not too corny.
BBSox
I’m amazed that they are running “image” TV ads and expecting it to do anything but waste money. Even their own Policy says ads should sell a book – it’s off-Policy to run an “image” ad. But that’s all they do. Yet their image remains as bad as ever because so many former members and staff are exposing the rotten insides of Scientology. The ads, like their “idle orgs” are all about facade and fooling people. But mostly they fool their own members.
Jeff,
I think this whole selling image thing started after management consulted with PM guru Robert Gray and H&K.
The same guys who sold the American public on the War in Iraq #1.
The same guys who ran damage control for Exxon when the Valdez spilled tons of oil on the pristine shores of Alaska.
And probably the same guys currently handling the BP account.
Not to mention the effort they put into making Moon’s wacky Unification Church seem “Mainstream” which is exactly the same tactic they are using with the Church.
I remember being briefed by some management terminal in the late ’80’s or early ’90’s that they intended to make the Church of Scientology’s S and double triangle as familiar as Micky D’s Golden Arches and the service the same and indistinguishable from one org to the next as a “Big Mac”!
( I practically gagged at that point)
This is why I believe they came up with the Golden (Arches) Age of Tech and “Golden” every thing else and the concept of “Ideal” Orgs that look more like fast food or theme restaurants than actual orgs.
And also why you won’t find any Policy on Perception Management or selling image.
The irony is that despite the fact that when the Sea Org “moved in” and decimated the Mission network and the field the stats continued to rise throughout the ’80’s solely due to your successful Book I campaign.
I was there and saw the results!
When I was auditing at AO we were practically falling over all the PCs and Pre OTs in the HGC waiting area.
In fact we had public donate several couches and line them up along the hallway because we couldn’t hold them all in the lounge.
Then after you got pulled up to Int and the campaign stopped.
It was like someone turned off the tap.
The flow to the Pacifica stopped.
Totally weird!
Anyway all that fancy PM tech with the ostentatious ads and the flashy buildings and the staff dressed in the latest Vampirella and Count Vorga fashion hasn’t really done much to improve the org’s image.
In fact as each day passes it looks more like a cult then it did at anytime before in its history!
And more unbelievable than your average politician as Cool Observer points out in his link.
Pretty amazing!
Seems Dave and his team of miscreants can’t even apply PM tech straight!
Watch this and you know how believable the cult is.
http://www.mediacurves.com/Religion/J7477-Scientology/Index.cfm
Jeff’s post is sad.
On one hand. Folks (dedicated and contributing all they could and couldn’t) were duped.
On the other hand, that message is quite positive and helpful. – Why? – Because now more folks feel *disaffected* and wil eventually leave Co$ to its own devices. And, hopefully many start looking things about dark side of Scientology on the Internet.
The more folks disaffected with Scientology in Portland, the more power Freedom has. They easier our messages will be to get across.
More power to David Miscavige in getting people disaffected with $cn and Co$ ways. 😉
Some ideas here for Portland’s Anons protest signs:
“Your Upper Management duped you. Again! Aren’t you disaffected yet?”
“Why aren’t you in the Stevens Building?”
“It’s Ok to be disaffected with your Upper Management. They don’t care about your welfare/working conditions”.
“Why are you still there and not in the Internet, googling freely the word “Scientology” and reading top 10 sites?”
“Look at those who moved you here. Is it what you have deserved?”
“Stop thinking that this place is what you and your fellows deserved. BE disaffected with your Upper Management”.
“It’s just human to be disaffected with those who are inhumane to you and your eternity”.
… just some thoughts. Hope there are more and better ones (those that WILL get a Scientologist disaffected with what has been done to them by “Upper Management” as a group and to him personally as a member of that group).
Actually, to the best of my knowledge, they haven’t unloaded the Stevens Building just yet. That means they have *2* empty Ideal Org buildings in Portland, with one for sale. And get this – they’re still holed up in a couple of leased spaces on the other end of downtown with almost zero foot traffic.
2 buildings, 1 lease, and lots of off-policy donations.
At least when (if!) they move to the Sherlock building, they’ll be closer to Voodoo Donuts. It’s a protester favorite! Also, much closer to the Saturday Market, where protesters often go to spread the word when they’re done watching nothing happen at the current Org.