As Scientologists advance higher up, or deeper in (in the case of Sea Org, who can end up frozen on the bridge), they go from wanting to learn tools to improve themselves, to regarding themselves as elite supermen, the elect who are the only ones with answers to save the planet.

They will put the critics in the history books (Tom Cruise said this), dispose of people quietly, without sorrow (Hubbard wrote this), and clear the planet. They have all the answers, including the ones in Hubbard‘s quack medical cures, none of which have been proven medically (except regarding the power of the placebo effect) or scientifically.

The highest ranking Sea Org become master manipulators. They are the best ones at turning on the charm, in person. I’m glad Mike Rinder didn’t fool Janet completely.

“Clear the planet” is not a metaphor for Scientologists. It is their right, as the only ones who “know.”

When Tom Cruise made his video, he was not using the “tech” they use to find a person’s ruin — targeting the vulnerabilities of the “raw meat” — he was speaking of what Scientologists actually believe.

Producing the Tom Cruise video was one of the biggest tactical mistakes made by David Miscavige, who is as Janet pointed out, hamstrung by “source.”

I think the metaphor for the end of Scientology is the Tom Cruise video, a star making a fool out of himself as a brainwashed fanatic. Then cult members trying to explain what Tom means when he says Scientologists are the ONLY ones who can really help at a car accident. What a riot!

When it boils down to it, Scientology has very narrow appeal, and as Janet mentioned, they have lost their market, in people like disenfranchised college students.The same middle classes who bought into it are now looking on the web, and are either laughing or in horrified fascination at what they find about Scientology.

She says earlier on in the interview that L.Ron wrote seriously and was not simply a conman (I paraphrase). Even reading his first book, “Dianetics” there are so many promises including perfect memory, computer-like mind, optimum vision, no colds, 70% of diseases gone, cancer has been eradicated then he says that his “science” works as consistently as chemistry or physics and has been tested on 270 people. This sort of thing is the heart of the book. I must conclude that he was a liar and a swindler.

In addition I was a staff member in 1970. Minimum wage, in Canada, was one dollar an hour. Auditing was $25 per hour. A twelve hour intensive cost exactly as much as a semester of university. To say that Scientology was not expensive back then was nonsense.

And, as you point out, she writes “was not a ‘cult’ insofar as it did not require separation from mainstream society — though it encouraged its acolytes to ‘disconnect’ from those who were critical of Scientology.” Yet in the book she tells about how scientologists are educated to call all non-scientologists WOGs ( a derogatory term meaning that all non scientologists are ignorant, irresponsible and mentally and spiritually aberrated). So she is wrong about it not being a cult, just on this very premise. It’s not a rule one must follow to call or consider all non-scientologists WOGs but one is not allowed to disagree with anything Hubbard writes so once one is made to study the term and what Hubbard states about it, one is then indoctrinated into believing this WOG baloney, thereby separating themselves from WOGs as much as possible.

Scientology is the bigest con game around and it is a cult by the full definition. I understand the need tro be objective but I think she spent too much time being curried by one of her resources, religious scholar and scientology apologist Gordon Melton.

I want her book to sell millions of copies, and I think the timing is right for it to be a best seller, which I suspect it can do just on the merits of it being a fascinating well-written book, by an obviously intelligent author who did thorough research.

If only Janet could speak like Gore Vidal or Ed Champion though! She has a delivery problem.

I understand that with the number of interviews she’s going to be giving with the media, she doesn’t want to sound too canned, but I think she must prepare some two line descriptions of major talking points: such as the Lisa McPherson tragedy, if asked about it. She needs to do this so the general public knows what she is talking about.

Example:

Lisa McPherson was a 36 year old member of Scientology, who ended up being restrained, tied down, in the basement of a Scientology facility in Clearwater, Florida, where she stopped eating and drinking and died without being taken to a doctor.

She was treated using science fiction writer L. Ron Hubbard’s Introspection Rundown, and not allowed to leave.

Perhaps this isn’t so important with the longer interviews, but for the TV interviews, Janet should prepare with some points that will make people want to buy the book.

On TV, sometime she’s only going to be given a few minutes, and absolutely must come out with some compelling lines that cut to the core. Find a few things to focus on.

Be careful of using Sci-speak terms like RTC (I know what it is, but the public won’t).

I like the way Janet turned the question back on the interviewer. You read my book, what did you think?

Since Scientology is so complex, has so many dimensions, with some of these interviews, I think Janet should relax a little, let the interviewer — as long as they’ve read the book and seem knowledgeable — carry the conversation.

Now for a bone I want to pick with Reitman:

In August 1950, Hubbard lectured for a month to 300 students in California at a cost of $500 per head. That event alone bringing in $150,000. That’d be over one million dollars today.

So, how was it Hubbard wasn’t in this for all the money he could squeeze, from the very beginning?

Dianetics itself held the initial promise of getting him out of the penny-a-word pulp sci fi rut, and it did.

How was it that he didn’t see past life auditing as a HUGE cash cow, and exploit that greedily?

Imagine all the extra auditing people had to do, once they’d gone through their life’s problems, back to the natal period. Suddenly everyone had engrams and “electronic incidents” back trillions of lifetimes before.

In other words, I’d like to see her dig a little more at Hubbard, piss off the celebrities. Sales of her book will soar!