Woman imprisoned on Scientology cruise ship for 12 years

[Doubting Thomas]

Just further proof that Scientology is a cult:

Woman imprisoned on Scientology cruise ship

[Minimalist]

Wow....even the fucking catholics don't have a cruise ship. They are in danger of falling behind in the bad taste category.

[The Grand Nudger]

They have a couple of boats for The Sea Org. Clearwater Harbor (and Clearwater as a whole) is HQ. There are tons of stories like this with regards to what goes on out at sea. Unfortunately scientology is pretty well known for having plenty of cash to pay armies of lawyers to push any of this under the rug. That they actively court drug addicts and others of "ill-repute" while simultaneously bilking them for money (however they care to come up with it) makes it even easier. They also file away the "confessions" people make while undergoing "auditing" (a process in which they are encouraged to air their dirty laundry to rid themselves of evil spirits). So, it's a pretty easy job to assassinate a dissenters character. If you ever want to know anything about scientology the St. Petersburg Times has you covered.

[Doubting Thomas]

Yeah I've read that before about how they record "audits" where members are urged to tell their deepest, darkest secrets, so that if they ever wise up and leave and then start speaking out against the religion, they'll have plenty of dirt with which to try to discredit them.

[The Grand Nudger]

Yeah, that was another one of the wonderful ideas put forward by the ORT, sponsored by the GO (Office of Religious Technology/Guardians Office). It was actually kind of a small militant nutter group within a larger nutter group until they proved themselves to be so useful/fanatical in securing the town of Clearwater, FL by proxy and raiding the IRS to remove any records that might cause them trouble. The former head of this office ended up becoming top dog in scientology after L Rons death (or that moment he decided he no longer needed his immortal "clear" body, lol). The machine used in those audits is actually a sort of rudimentary lie detector. They're not audits so much as interrogations. They change pace and rythm, tone, ask you innocent or innocuos questions and then incredibly strange, aggressive, or sick questions in quick succession. As you've mentioned, a cult cut and dry.

(Speaking of discrediting those who leave. This charge was recently leveled at them by former church members, not rank and file, important people. The church denied that they would ever do such a thing...and proceeded to smear the whistleblowers by releasing their "pre-clear logs". This policy is called "Fair Game".)

[Anomalocaris]

now how do we get scientologists and christian evengelicals to kill each other?

[The Grand Nudger]

Even at the height of frenzy, sharks rarely eat their own.

[Epimethean]

You don't want a frenzy. You want to set out a bait so desirable for them both, seemingly open to either, that the biggest sharks attack each other as they zero in on it. Get a mutually assured distruction in motion to which both are blinded by passion.

[The Grand Nudger]

Already in place, the lucrative and easy to game tax laws regarding religious organizations. Just look at how many evengelical shitwits took that bait and were later indicted.

[Epimethean]

Just so.