Steve Poore, I agree totally. Its the BIG LIE syndrome – just too incredible to be believed – happening right under their noses.

I think you were fortunate. I’ve been non-SO staff at two SO orgs and on staff at a Class V org that was heavily impinged upon by SO members. Overall, I experienced and observed more inval/threats/face ripping, etc. than ARC or granting of beingness. This was true for staff member to staff member interaction and was generally more the case for senior/junior relations. ( Then there was the sleep deprivation problem.) This is why I found the stories on Steve Hall’s Scientology-cult web site to be believable.

Some of this is true. I don’t know how it got started, but LRH (or whoever) was getting letters from Mike on behalf of his company, which was consulting other companies using Scientology admin. Ron (or someone using his stationery and his signature) was replying back with occasional advice. This went on for some time, before WISE. I have seen, read and held the letters in my hands. The advice certainly *sounded* like LRH’s. I do not know if there was any financial arrangement. Neither Ron nor Mike ever mentioned it. Although WISE may have been created partially to take over this “consultancy” hat from LRH, its primary purposes were something entirely different. My understanding is that Mike Smith was not the only one doing this consultancy with Ron thing.

Although WISE appeared to be an idea of Ron’s, it was never able to fulfill its purposes and establish its value to the Scientology business community. The business sector was an incredibly productive route for new people into Orgs, but it was also a sector of great distraction and undue external influence on Orgs. WISE was meant to handle that problem. I don’t believe it ever effectively did.

Good point.

Nicely said Roy.

“People care not just about the brands they buy, but the companies behind them.”Take some of the extraordinary success stories of the new economy – Google, Apple, Starbucks, Nestlé, Vodafone. People may love what they do and give, but they also want to know whether they respect their customers, pay their taxes, use slave labour, cut down forests or whatever.”And in this future driven by digital trends, what’s happening is the convergence of corporate reputation and consumer behaviour. If customers suffer a bad experience, their stories can be shared and amplified online and picked up by the mainstream media, policy-makers and regulators. And, in turn, if brands are seen to behave poorly as a corporate entity, people now have the ability to connect and create mass movements against them. “It is people who wield the influence, not their job titles.”

The Wise piece is simplistic. The above is interesting vis-a-vis the church today too.

Key phrase in the Tech Dictionary dfn of criticism: “…if not borne out in fact”. That phrase pretty much qualifies most negative comments about the cos. It was also helpful in helping me decide whether to pull w/hs or handle the ARC X. Saved a lot of stress for the pc and me.

So if some disgruntled church member with an active WISE membership is lurking here and is planning on coming out of closest with their doubt formula in the future, PLEASE consider logging into the WISE members-only website and harvesting a hardcopy of the current membership list before you’re declared. That list can then be passed one of many outlets for leaking later on after the dust settles from your departure, and the world will be a much more informed place afterwards.