[Ms Freedom]

As I was watching the HBO documentary, "Going Clear: Scientology and the Prison of Belief," I couldn't help but see the similarities between the Scientology members and the WMS members. As others have said in previous posts, it isn't as much about the "beliefs" of the group as it is about the behavior. There is a blue print that all cults adopt and you could easily substitute the bodies of these former members of Scientology with former members of WMS and the words would be the same. Please share your thoughts.

Lawrence Wright (Author of the book of the same name and co-producer of the film)

I've always been interested in religions and why people believe one idea rather than another.  I've studied Jonestown, radical Islam – they're often times good hearted people, idealistic, but full of a kind of crushing certainty that eliminates doubt.

I was interested in intelligent and skeptical people who were drawn into a belief system and wind up acting on those beliefs in ways they never thought they would.

Yvonne (Spanky) Taylor

I got involved right out of high school. You thought you were doing something good to have a positive effect on all of mankind.

Hana Eltringham Whitfield

Everything that I took offense with, I rationalized almost immediately. I had to. I could not continue in this game of Scientology without explaining away what he (L. Ron Hubbard) was doing. It got to be a way of believing and everyone of us got into that. It was part of the mind control, it was part of the cultic manipulation. He was the master who did it to us and we took it on and then we did it to ourselves.

Mike Rinder

Because Scientology is perceived and conceived by Scientologists as being the salvation for mankind, you can have people that lie with a very straight face – if they believe what they are doing is protecting the church of scientology.

Paul Haggis

I heard senior members of the church were speaking, so I started to look; I started to read.

I figured people would judge me as really stupid, but then I was really stupid. I was apart of this for 30 years before I spoke out. I felt deeply ashamed. Why didn't I do it earlier? Why didn't I look earlier?

Sara Goldberg

People are so endoctrinated and have been in Scientology for a really long time, or they've grown up in it and they don't know anything else. So it's scary to them to have to start all over – and it takes a really strong person to stand up to them and say no.

They say, "don't go on the internet, don't read, don't go to these sites!"

Paul Haggis

From the time that I got in, for 30 years, I never read one critical thing about Scientology. When I finally decided to open my eyes and look, I was shocked! Just shocked!

Mike Rinder

My wife disconnected from me, my daughter, my son, my brother, my sister, my mother, all of my nieces and nephews – and that is the only family that I have.

Marty Rathburn

You label these people suppressive so that everybody automatically is discredited and you must disconnect from them. And that's how you keep people in a bubble. (I just have to add my comment here – this is what WMS did to Ron Ramos and Diane – they edited video clips, put them together and showed them to their churches in order to discredit them and have people "disconnect" from them)

Sara Goldberg

They don't believe they can get it anywhere else. It's like brainwashing (really simple). That's a scary word. It took me a long time to come to that conclusion that that's what occurred.

Tom De Vocht

And I think that's how I and other people got involved in and stuck through it for so long. Because when you're out, you look at it and go "What the crap was I thinking?"

Yvonne (Spanky) Taylor

It's such a hard thing when you do wake up and go "oh my god!" because you have this wave of regrets. I just started to think that maybe my entire life has been a lie.

Paul Haggis

You just don't see it happening to you. You justify so much. Cults – they prey on people, suggesting that you should be able to think for yourself and then tell you exactly how you have to think or get out. And if you get out, there will be consequences.

What I take away from it – is that we lock up a portion of our own mind. We willingly put cuffs on. We willingly avoid things that could cause us pain if we looked. If we can just believe something, then we don't have to really think for ourselves, do we?

Going Clear: Scientology and the Prison of Belief. Dir. Alex Gibney. HBO, 2015. Film

[MountainMom]

[MountainMom]

Wow, as I watched Going Clear and read the book, I thought the same as you. Cults follow a blueprint.  Maybe each has a different spin, but the outline of how to control people is just the same in all of them. You put it all together on one page, and it is so easy to see that the WMS is following that same plan.  I can only hope that WMS members could look at this and see themselves.

I know a member who is so miserable in the WMS.  He wasn't at the beginning, but he really is now.  And he is a deacon, telling people how happy they will be if they just join!  He keeps putting on the fake happy face and keeps saying and doing what they tell him to.  He is living a lie.  Their lie. 

[Ms Freedom]

I agree Mountain Mom. Mike Rinder reminded me of Ron Ramos. At a high level within the church, defends every negative thing that is said about the church – until the negativity starts happening to them personally. Then they start to see the lies as lies! Both of them look back and can’t believe they believed this stuff!

I think that all members experience doubt, but instead of trusting that as a safeguard, they are “told” that it is Satan and they should ignore it. Pray harder – so god can take away your doubt. And sadly, like children believing that they have to be good because Santa is watching, they comply. Control is a very powerful thing and like Lawrence Wright says in his quote above – it can make people do things they never thought they were capable of doing.

Hundreds of people believed they were leaving the world and going to heaven with their leader Jim Jones. They pushed away their doubt and drank the poison. Do you think they went to heaven with Jones or were they manipulated? 39 people put on new Nike shoes, took poison because they believed they were going away to a better planet. Did the spaceship come for them or were they manipulated? Scientologists believe that L. Ron Hubbard purposely “discarded” his earthly body so he could reach the next level of OT research. Is he conducting research in a spirit form or are they being manipulated? WMS members believe that Ahn Sahng-hong was Jesus and Zahng Giljah is god the living mother. Will she discard her earthly body, ascend to heaven and take the true believers with her or are you being manipulated?

[MountainMom]

Ms Freedom wrote:

I agree Mountain Mom. Mike Rinder reminded me of Ron Ramos. At a high level within the church, defends every negative thing that is said about the church – until the negativity starts happening to them personally. Then they start to see the lies as lies! Both of them look back and can't believe they believed this stuff!

I think that all members experience doubt, but instead of trusting that as a safeguard, they are "told" that it is Satan and they should ignore it. Pray harder – so god can take away your doubt. And sadly, like children believing that they have to be good because Santa is watching, they comply. Control is a very powerful thing and like Lawrence Wright says in his quote above – it can make people do things they never thought they were capable of doing.

Hundreds of people believed they were leaving the world and going to heaven with their leader Jim Jones. They pushed away their doubt and drank the poison. Do you think they went to heaven with Jones or were they manipulated? 39 people put on new Nike shoes, took poison because they believed they were going away to a better planet. Did the spaceship come for them or were they manipulated? Scientologists believe that L. Ron Hubbard purposely "discarded" his earthly body so he could reach the next level of OT research. Is he conducting research in a spirit form or are they being manipulated? WMS members believe that Ahn Sahng-hong was Jesus and Zahng Giljah is god the living mother. Will she discard her earthly body, ascend to heaven and take the true believers with her or are you being manipulated?

 I just wanted to bump this up because Ms.Freedom's words always bear repeating.  She always hits the nail on the head.  She really brings to mind how much Ron Ramos and Mike Rinder's past experience's with their respective "churches" mirror my son's current experiences. 

Her quotes from former members of Scientology also bear reading again.  They are so interchangeable with the experiences of WMS members.  It's eerie, isn't it?  I have heard that the WMS has forbid members from watching Going Clear.  Has anyone else heard that?  I can certainly see why.  Members could very likely see themselves in the quotes from Going Clear.