Scientology in the UK

Hello all, i know this might not seem the right forum but scientology is gaining a serious political grasp in the UK and i had some more worrying times yesterday.

It was 3am and i was dozing in bed, not really asleep just in and out as i often do. I heard footsteps outside but we have a few teenager kids in the street and this wasn't unusual, just coming home frm a club i thought. Until those footsteps walked up my drive, i became more alert and then i heard the letterbox go. I got up and headed downstairs, worried someone had pushed a firework or something through the letterbox. However all i found was a leaflet.

The leaflet has sadly been thrown away by my father so i can't scan it in but it had a picture of Albert Einstein on the cover and proclaimed how Hubbard had found how to use the other 90% of the brain we apparenlty don't use. Now i wouldn't havea big problem except this was 3am for gods sake!

Now i'm not in a big city, i'm in a smallish town, nothing much happens around here, no murders, no stabbings, no violent assaults. At least they are very rare occurences. I honestly have never had much trouble apart from some of the pubs i've been in.

The point being this is a small little town in the West Midlands with not much going on and yet scientology seems to be reaching out to even our small pocket of existence. This is a dangerous cult which i took seriously, but now i'm taking even more seriously. I've decided to warn my neighbors about this rather terrible cult as so many good people are sucked in, drained dry and spat out.

Anyone else had scientology leaflets? I'm most interested in small towns rather than big cities.

Sigh...scientology...have you ever actually watched the videos on the scientology website. Its pretty funny.

And did you know that it wasn't Columbus or the Vikings that discovered America, but it was L Ron Hubbard? Well, at least according to the biography they have on him on the scientology site.

I have never heard of leaflets in my city or even a branch here for that matter. Thank Jebus...

No Scientology here. But, then again, we here in the American Midwest don't take too kindly to fringe cults.

How ironic that Hubbard claimed to have found how to use the other 90% of the brain we don't use, when clearly he used no more than 2% in founding his so-called "religion."

Yes i'm fully aware of what scientologists apparently believe, that's why it concerns me that my entire area is being leafletted. The biggest part of it though was as i say we're a small town. Are they trying it on with the small towns before trying the big cities en masse?



I have to debate that, the man was a manipulative genius. Like any good con man he found a system that makes money, truly a prophet as he shows us what all modern religions are. A grab for money and power, you can hardly call that dumb. Worrying yes, dumb no.

[edit on 12-7-2008 by ImaginaryReality1984]

Well being of a curious nature, I bought Ron Hubbards book, "Dianetics". What I didn't expect was the persistency of scientologists, who every so often keep phoning me up, asking if I would be interested in visiting their premises for a chat. Even invited me to their 58th anniversary in Birmingham, which I politely declined. Apparently they have just opened up a new centre in Newcastle, so there presence & influence is slowly spreading throughout the UK.

reply to post by kindred

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Oh i should mention, there was a section on the back of the leaflet to buy the book dianetics. It included payment options (credit card was on there), and a sectionf or how many copies you wanted. They left a nice big space for that bit. These people really are dangerous, i was actually considering gettinga copy so i could read and truly find out everything. However my knowledge of scientologists kind of stopped me, i didn't want to be phoned every day, bothered at my home and maybe even have some unauthorised charges appear on my card.

Very good point. I will concede that.

I'm interested in psychology and how the mind works. That's the main reason why I bought the book, It's quite interesting, but the concepts are quite hard to understand. It's also a vey big book, about 600+ pages and for that reason alone, I never got around to finishing it.

These scientologists are very persuasive. They certainly won't take no for an answer. 4 years after I bought the book, they still ring me up asking how it's going. Someone rang up a few weeks ago trying to sell me their latest DVD. Even sent me it for free, just so they have the perfect excuse to ring back. I told them I wasn't interested, so hopefully that's the last I'll hear from them, but somehow I doubt it.

reply to post by kindred

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Isn't that the problem though, isn't that the sign of a true cult? At least the christians and catholics and other people, when they come a knocking don't then bother me 6 months down the line with phone calls and harrassment. I respect them for that. The big point i was trying to make is the question of whether scientlogists are trying to hit the small towns first to build up a support base and then try the big cities. Whilst i know they have headquarters in London, that's more a publicity stunt i think.

The leaflet i got had an address in Birmingham for anyone that's interested. We live a decent distance from Birmingham, as i said we're a small town relatively speaking, surrounded mostly by farmland.

Well I'm certainly not one to be suckered into a cult. That's why I'm not a big fan of organized religion. I believe people should think for themselves and form their own beliefs based on there own reasoning and common sense. Whether scientology is really a cult, I would have to go along and see it with my own two eyes, but yeah, you're right, they do come across as being determined to indoctrinate everyone and recruit them to their cause.

Here's a list of all their churches in the UK. They've more or less got the UK covered.

www.scientology.org.uk...

They're ridiculously popular.
You'd think with all the crazies involved in it, people would learn.
You know the woman who played Darma, on Darma+Greg?
She's one of them.
She's also been quoted as saying "AIDS isn't a disease, it's a state of mind"

Wow.


I've never gotten anything from them, then again I'm living in Canada...
Have been offered a lot of things while outside their offices here though.
They've got the damn things everywhere.

In the US it is illegal for anyone other than a Mailman to put stuff in a mailbox.

reply to post by hoppy

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Well good for the USA but this is the UK so please stick to the topic.

I thought maybe it was illegal there also, but I can't find any info on that.

reply to post by hoppy

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No it's not illegal here at all. Most UK letterboxes are in the doors themselves not out ont he pavement at the end of gardens like yours. It is perfectly legal for anyone to shove something through your letterbox. I prefer our system actually as we get lots of good stuff.

Anyway lets not go off topic, the point was scientology encroaching upon small towns and getting fully out of control.

My husband once got curious and visited a scientology headquarters. They have a series of classes one has to take, with different levels of achievement. The end goal is to become a "clear," which as I understand it is a person with no emotions, just an "objective" mind. They offered him the first class free. The catch was he had to pay to take the class after that, or else they would keep failing him at the first level. There are many levels so it gets to be a very expensive undertaking. He was satisfied that he knew as much about scientology as he wanted to know.

Scientology is not something that interests me at all but I guess they have the right to exist as long as they don't break any laws. I understand L. Ron Hubbard, the founder, was once thrown out of the U.S. and operated for awhile from a ship far enough off the coast to be out of U.S. jurisdiction, so he must have had some conflict with the government.

There are all kinds of cults and I guess the only thing one can rationally do is avoid them and attempt to educate the public about them. They have the right to exist, I suppose, if they do so legally. The trick would be to find some law they are breaking.

reply to post by Sestias

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Well that's the trouble, scientology gets information on all sorts of people, from phone records to internet usage, and they do it very ilegally. However proving they got it ilegally is another matter.

The difference between a cult who does no real harm and a cult who is dangerous is size in my opinion. Scientology is getting well out of control and whils ti agree with religious freedom, i don't liek the way sicentology is basically a money making organisation who does very real damage to it's members.

reply to post by ImaginaryReality1984

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3.00am is a bit much for dropping leaflets through people's door. Why not during the day? Can't see how they would think late night leaflets would be more effective? Or maybe they are looking for people who can't sleep? Seems odd.

reply to post by UFOpsychiczebra

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I have no idea, maybe they just couldn't sleep themselves after a thorough auditing, it does have some bad effects on many people if you read stories from ex-scientologists. They blanketed the entire area, i checked out some neighbors i know and some random houses streets away. That was an odd thing to knock on the dor abot i can assure you, it seems not many of the people i talked to knew of scientology. I talked to about 20 people and only 2 of them knew what scientology was. Is this maybe why they're targetting small towns, because people havn't heard the bad things about them?

If you've heard any detail abotu scientology then you probably won't be seduced as you know the awful truth and most likely your brain shuts down to recruitment as soon as one appoachs you, but someone unaware wouldn't have that problem.