After Ep. 7 of Season 1 Scientology & The Aftermath viewer stats went into the Toilet. But the last 3 episodes show a weak rise.
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"Getting out of a 'cult' is not something that you recover from, it is something you are strengthened by." -- Alanzo
About Alanzo
Alanzo was a Scientologist for 16 years.
He reached the state of "Clear" and was on staff as an Executive Director and Course Supervisor in Scientology missions in the Midwest and Los Angeles.
When Alanzo had experienced enough in Scientology to see the extent to which he had been deceived, he left and immediately began speaking out on the Internet to expose its lies and abuse. Alanzo first began speaking out against Scientology on the Internet as "Poopsy Charmichael" in the alt.religion.scientology newsgroup in the late 1990's.
As the main Internet battleground between the Church and its critics, ARS soon became too negative and so Alanzo moved to Beliefnet.com and elsewhere on the Internet to engage with actual Scientologists, providing them with the information they needed to make informed decisions about their own involvement in Scientology. He spent many years in the early to mid 2000s presenting Scientologists with LRH's real biography & other information that the Church had been hiding from them. Alanzo saw many Scientologists "wake up" around the Internet, after finally getting the information they needed.
In January/February of 2007, Alanzo then moved to the brand new Ex-Scientologists Message Board (ESMB), where Exes were gathering to tell their stories in Scientology. From there, Alanzo witnessed the rise of Anonymous, and was in attendance when Marty Rathbun, in the summer of 2009, kicked the hornet's nest with his announcement that he had started up his new website, and thus the great 2nd Exodus of Independents had begun.
Alanzo found more Scientologists to engage on Marty's website in the Independent movement. Also, Alanzo spent a few years at Geir Isene's blog, where he engaged many very intelligent and free thinking Scientologists and Exes who had retained constructive and positive views of their time in Scientology. This influenced Alanzo greatly by reminding him of things that he had conveniently forgotten about himself and his time in Scientology while becoming an "Anti-Scientology critic".
Then, an unknown critic emerged onto the scene from the Village Voice, Tony Ortega. Alanzo posted often to the Underground Bunker and was one of its most frequently upvoted Anti-Scientology critics there.
That's where Alanzo was exposed to more "never-in" critics of Scientology he'd seen yet on the Internet. And with its mix of the cruelty of Anonymous and the disrespect and disgust for Scientologists, Alanzo began to see tribal behavior that was very reminiscent of the worst of the Sea Org. When Tony Ortega repeatedly went after a woman, a Scientologist whose daughter had committed suicide, he saw the cruelty that all those anti-Scientologsts whipped up in each other. This caused Alanzo to have yet another turning point.
He realized that the deeper he became involved in the Anti-Cult/Anti-Scientology Movement, the more he began to notice very similar tribal behavior to the most fanatical of Scientologists. Alanzo saw a rise of some of the same tribalism from Anti-Scientologists that he was trying to escape by getting himself out of Scientology.
It was like being stuck in a nightmare, and after finally wrenching yourself awake, you're relieved to have escaped that nightmare - only to realize that the nightmare is still going on! ☺
That's when Alanzo began applying the same critical thinking skills to the underlying beliefs of Anti-Scientology that he had earlier applied to Scientology. And that's when his anti-Scientology mindset collapsed on Alanzo, just like his Scientology mindset had collapsed on him so long ago.
And this is where Alanzo is today - applying basic skepticism to both Scientology and anti-Scientology beliefs. He has come to realize that this position of skepticism toward both Scientology & Anti-Scientology is the only sustainable view.
Alanzo's experience of the previous 18 years has led him to conclude that, as long as you continue to think critically and you remain loyal to the truth instead of any person or group, getting out of a 'cult' is not something that you recover from, it is something that you are strengthened by.Alanzo's purpose is to provide the information necessary for people to make informed decisions about Scientology & Anti-Scientology.
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15 Comments on "After Ep. 7 of Season 1 Scientology & The Aftermath viewer stats went into the Toilet. But the last 3 episodes show a weak rise."
So far I’m the only person who has posted negative comments about last nights episode on Mike’s blog. Let’s see what happens.
Prediction: You will remain the only person who posts negative comments about last night’s episode on Mike’s blog.
I was thunderstruck to discover that Paul Haggis was the first person to speak out about Scientology abuses, and that he led the way for so many others to follow.
yes, so was I, but no matter, they are speaking truth about their experiences, and that I appreciate.
Maybe one day somebody will read the heinlein/campbell letters other than me, and tie it all together, I bow my head in frustration of the true beginning of dianetics and how campbell and hubbard tried to get heinlein involved, the true first celebrity they tried to hook in.
Oh well, such is life, it’s hard to explain.
I will be ending off here Alanzo as this identity known as Gib and even on ESMB, for personal reasons, but I’ll be back. Time for a vacation, best of luck to you.
I certainly understand the immense benefit of a vacation, gib. Have a good one!
Mike did reply to you.
didn’t see it.
where?
I wrote;
“Leah and Paul want journalists and the media to start fair gaming celebrity Scientologists. No thank you.”
Mike responded; “Are you crazy?” He wrote one paragraph of “corrections” and then “Come back to planet earth.”
My other comment was;
“Paul Haggis seems to think that all celebrities associated with Scientology are complicit in crimes. That’s his opinion and is radical in my opinion.”
That received a couple of corrections.
I’m leaving it at that. They’ll try to assimilate me into The Borg.
I saw these.
I just sent you an email about them.
As John Doe might note, maybe a couple of pebbles got tossed into “the certainty machine”.
There’s a clip about journalists and reporters getting brushed off when asking scn celebs about scn. Remini says journalists who don’t persist in getting celebs to “answer up” are “pussys”. Haggis says scn celebs are “the face of Scientology”. So they are the worst of all scn-ists? They don’t look at it as fair gaming but it sure sounds like “Go after them” to me. The media can get pretty vicious. Some people might agree, some not,
The media can be vicious especially if all their sources are vicious and no one is telling them anything different from Tony Ortega and others like him.
There is a dedicated group of people who see it as their duty to make Scientology and all Scientologists look as bad as possible at every opportunity- whether it is deserved or not.
I don’t know who could live with themselves doing something like that day in and day out but I certainly can’t. No scn celeb I know has the power to put any one into the hole or make anyone disconnect or drive anyone into bankruptcy, not to mention do anything illegal for Scientology. I do not see how they could be anyone’s target who is thinking rationally about what to do about Scientology.
As for Paul Haggis, I think the ancient Chinese proverb applies very strongly: when setting out on a mission of revenge, dig two graves.
That was not a threat by the way. That was a person speaking from experience.
Always fun to watch, the Apple 1984 Super Bowl commercial
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=axSnW-ygU5g
Yes. I had been involved in Scientology for 3 or 4 months when this came out.
When I saw it for the first time, I was so stoked that my new group fostered non-totalitarian, rebellious, stick it to the man, “thinking for yourself” just like this. I also owned a Macintosh freaking computer.
At that time, and at the level of Scientology I was involved in, it did foster that kind of thinking, and those values – very definitely.
1984, the real one, was an interesting year for totalitarianism in my life.
The visual is naturally meant to dominate, but the dialog is also interesting. Here’s some of it.
“. . . The first glorious anniversary of the reincarnation of the information purification – A garden of pure ideology.
We are one people, one resolve, one cause – We shall prevail!” Boom!
Maybe gossip Lone Star did the voice-over. He’s good at creative fantasy.
I actually think Lone Star is a much better psychiatrist than he is a writer.