Aqua, I can remember when I ran a stress test booth at the local mall. All the drilling, positive postulating and enthusiasm didn’t do jack shit. I would often ask myself in frustration why can’t people see this? I was put through a confessional for not being ‘on purpose’. They never could figure it out.
Here’s how I see it. Back in LRH days people actually got wins and the church actually grew. Back then, books actually did make booms. Then Miscavige came along and fucked up everything.

To: TrevAnon
From: David Miscavige COB RTC
Re: Books Make Booms

LISTEN HERE, YOU! BOOKS ARE THE MOST EFFECTIVE MEANS OF COMMUNICATION! WHY? BECAUSE I SAY SO! FUCK THE INTERNET! FUCK KINDLE! FUCK E-BOOKS! NOTHING BEATS GOOD OLD PRINTED AND BOUND PAPER! I DON’T GIVE A SHIT HOW MANY FORESTS ARE SACRIFICED! I OWN THEM ANYWAY! SO GET YOUR ASS OUT THERE AND START SELLING BOOKS LIKE YOU’VE NEVER SOLD THEM BEFORE OR ELSE I WILL SHIP YOUR ASS TO THE FREEWINDS AND MAKE YOU CLEAN THE COAL SCUTTLE! YES, THE COAL SCUTTLE! FUEL GOT TOO EXPENSIVE SO WE HAD TO CONVERT THE SHIP TO COAL. DAMN VENEZUELA!

ML
Dave

And that’s saying something!

They probably dropped the cans after glancing at a copy of DMSMH on the table and said “Hey, wait a minute! Aren’t you people from Scientology?”

Here in the US a paperback copy of DMSMH sells for about $25.00. It’s not a small book but rather the size of a hardcover novel. The DVDs sell for about the same price.

I think that’s part of why they’re putting the new “ideal” orgs away from public areas, so that the staff don’t have to face the sort of constant rejection by the public that they get nowadays. There seems to be very little “body routing” except around Big Blue in LA where I’ve read it’s part of a training program, and sporadic attempts in other large cities like London, mostly just consisting of trying to hand out flyers and tickets than actually engage people. The guy recently featured at the Underground Bunker for getting ripped off, reported being put on the street to body route when he was at AOLA, as a sort of punishment.

Some places they seem to like to have members do sporadic attempts at these “stress test” type efforts that seem to be pretty low key, mostly just waiting for people to come to them. I’d think even that would run the risk of confronting members with how little interest there is in Scientology, but it’s similar to what groups like Jehovah’s Witnesses do – they’re now moving to street corner information racks rather than knocking on doors, perhaps because of a similar problem of increasing outright rejection. Proselytizing is typically used by groups to build comradery and reinforce a sort of us-against-them-loyalty, though the approach seems to be faltering as modern society becomes less open to those sort of pitches or even openly hostile.

There were some pictures recently of someone who was setting up a table by the edge of the sidewalk, I think in LA, and then just getting back in their van while it sat there – possibly even going to sleep. That sounded like someone just going through the motions of getting a “stat” for having the table out, and not even bothering to try to interact with the real word.

Thank you for the laugh, Mixed Metaphor Man.

Ridiculous. But they are winning!