The guilt, huh? Let me guess: You “let down the group”…? Is that what they got you with? Oh, brother. Would I like to wring these peoples’ necks. Joe, there’s plenty I could say but for now I’ll just say this: its only a matter of time before each and every one of them realizes they’re on a sinking ship, and not because someone has scuttled it, but because its hull is rotten. They’re phonies, passing themselves off as helpers. Some are doing it intentionally, others cluelessly. No matter, they’re all still phonies. One day in their own time each of them will realize this. As they realize this, they’ll jump ship. Possibly they’ll help others jump ship. Its only ignorance, real of feigned, that keeps them on board. Its just a matter of time before they wake up and leave, as you did. That’s not betrayal of the group; that’s survival. I’ll leave you with this one thought: There’s such a thing as betrayal of oneself too, you know. And when one has betrayed oneself, one is as good as dead. Pity them, but know that it is within their ability and power of choice to observe what they observe, to look and not listen. Have compassion for them, but don’t allow them hold your mind and heart, don’t let them clutch at you with their cold, dead fingers. Not that I’m religious or even technically a Christian but there’s something that Jesus Christ says in the New Testament: “Let the dead bury their own dead.” That’s them, Joe, until they, like you, learn to look, not listen. You can’t learn that lesson for them. Its a bitter, painful truth but the guilt is THEIRS unless and until they can cease twisting and turning and once and for all confront the truth that’s right in front of their faces.

@aquamarine

Thank you for these kind words. Even after being gone from Scientology since 2005, I still struggle with the guilt.

To say the least, I haven’t been declared or expelled per se. Unless I have and I just don’t know it!!

I’m hoping one day I can share my story. I’m sure I’m not the only one who’s gone through the hell I went through growing up as a Scn.

Talk about a clueless Wrong Why, Joe. Your sharing that your being gay and as such “out ethics” having been given you as the reason for your courseroom being empty – well, reading this, I want to laugh, cry, and fly into a raging rant all at the same time.

Targeting you that way…look, I have no words and can’t afford to get worked up right now.

I’m just so sorry and angry and contemptuous of them that you were put thru that kind of distress, Joe.

Please know that at the same time that you were Chief Acad Sup with course rooms very sparsely attended, at that very same time, clear across the continent on the East coast existed the same situation in my tiny org.

In fact, in the 27 years I was in Scientology as a public I saw the Academy Courseroom go from bursting in the mid-80s to almost no one except for a smattering of students in 2011 – maybe 8 or 9 at the VERY most – on Saturday and Sunday afternoons, with about a third of THESE being org staff, not public!

During course time in the evenings there’d be about 4 of us.

Very likely the REAL WHY for reduced student attendance STARTING IN THE LATE 90S was GAT, the first GAT, mandating that all auditor training be FULLY redone AND paid for AGAIN.

Last but not least, Joe: Thank you, for being on staff and wanting to help. Don’t EVER feel bad about that. Your heart was in the right place. It is THEY who run things in the cult who should feel bad. It is THEY who should feel the shame, and they will, some day. Oh, they will, yes.

@Aquamarine

When I was a young and naïve Scientologist on staff, I just figured we weren’t working hard enough, but the empty course rooms around the late 90s/early 2000s were the norm. I was the Chief Acad Sup around that time (2000/2001) and my course room was never full. And when it was “full”, it was maybe 15 students at once?

Also… just as a note, one of the “whys” as to why my courseroom was empty was because I was out-ethics (for being gay) and therefore impeding people from coming into the org to get on service.

Since I’ve been out of Scn since 2005 and STILL seeing the fact the orgs are empty whenever I have walked past one just reminds me it’s not me nor was it ever.

@Joe,

“Don’t get me started on how empty the course rooms were.”

Interesting and informative comment, thank you, Joe.

I was never staff, for 27 years always a public, and, except in the very beginning in the 80s when I did intro courses in the basic course room, was always in the Academy doing some course or another.

I noticed the Academy course room in my org starting to empty out around 1998. Before that I’d be worrying about getting a seat and not having to be set up in the hallway!

Also, and no surprise, around that time finding a twin for certain courses became an issue. And btw my little org was on the east coast in a major city. Interesting that SF org’s course attendance paralleled my little East coast org.

Lol it’s always been this small. I was on staff there back in the early 2000s. That org was NEVER full and I think Day and Fdn had maybe 35 staff each? If that? Don’t get me started on how empty the course rooms were. I worked in the Basic Courseroom and would have maybe 2 students a day.

Scientologists of the org set mentality require constant assurance they are doing the right thing. It only takes a one or two of them and it spreads like a virus.
In the 40s if you didn’t raise your arm in salute in Germany – the same type of thing really. Witch hunting and persecution resulted if you didn’t do it.
You are not alone in that ill feeling Aqua, applauding a picture or a hunk of bronze.

Sums it up pretty well Chuck. Each to their own interpretation but I’ve traveled that path and would not recommend it to anyone. The wins and the fun dried up just before Clear and it only became like wandering around a desert beyond that and gave me a “hunted” feeling.
It was kind of fun initially, back in the day and passes for a therapy imo (the lower levels stuff and some of the correction lists). But to follow the so called bridge into Clear & beyond, well… to put it bluntly is a fucked up mess!
I think if I would have left, ie walked out the door, not to return after level 4 and never gone near Clear I’d be a happy camper right now. It’d be bygones and I would have dodged a bullet so to speak. However, at the time that never occurred to me and the people on the ‘old OT levels’ didn’t seen to bad mouth it, nor were they regged within an inch of their lives back then either.
But you are right imo – Hubbard was sure into the bad karma of it all and the more he delved into it the worse it got. Nothing he came up with solved anything. It drown him in his own goo, and anyone who followed or believed in him or his organisational nightmare he created.
Any “eureka” moment of or in Scientology is a myth.

In all the years I was in the cult, I could never overcome my hesitation in bringing in any non Scientology friends of mine thereby subjecting them to the org’s seemingly insatiable demands for money. And then there were other things too; the non stop phone calls to ensure event attendance, and then, last but not least – believe it or not – having to “give a hand to LRH for the tech” at the end of each course period! I really didn’t like doing this!

Now Don’t get me wrong; I LIKED the tech. I liked it very much. I wanted to be there, on course. My back off on this LRH acknowledgement was in the public display of gratitude mandated. It always made me uncomfortable. I would have preferred to have offered my own personal, private, sincere yet non verbalized thanks to LRH, when the spirit moved me to do so. “Hip Hip Hooray” and clapping while looking at his photo on the wall I just found to be an embarrassment that never really went away over time! Go figure.

“Well, I’ll be…” (you haven’t run away yet) – “you’re in!”