There’s nothing at all wrong with Scientology being an alien religion whatsoever. Christians think an eternal old dude called god sits on the clouds hanging out with angels. Every belief system has an aspect that is easy to poke fun at and it’s just immature when critics do.

But there are fundamental differences that make Scientology a cult, it’s the extreme view they have of one another and an even more extreme view they have on non-members and, lastly the rise of fundraising as standard practice since the 80s.

The money is easier to cover. It used to be up until the 80s that you paid a lot for Scientology religious services, and I mean a lot. This fixed-rate donations and pay as you go type of religion is not unique and not in and of itself bad. The prices aren’t hidden from view and if a follower agrees to subscribe to this, if it’s a consenting adult, it is what it is.

However in the 80s there was such a thing as the Portland crusade as it was called. So the story went, a person had successfully sued Scientology for fraud and Scientology was trying to win the appeal by marching in the streets of Portland, Oregon.

During this time many Scientologists packed their bags and went to live in the streets of Portland. And marched during the day around the court.

Fundraising began to fund a war chest over and above money paid for services. This was organised around a membership system and a Scientologist could buy higher status of membership for more money. From an annual ($250) membership to lifetime ($3000) to patron ($50,000) and beyond to even high levels into the $millions. This membership was called the International Association of Scientologists or IAS. Initially it was a real come together gungho movement, peoples flights were being paid for, field kitchens were funded and the artists came along and sang while everyone held candles or lighters aloft to keep the flame alive. I saw some beauty of it through the eyes of a 9 year old. People coming together for a peaceful cause they all believed in.

But when Portland was won and over with, the IAS remained.

So the staff now asked the public not only have you paid for your Scientology services (in advance) but also ask how high your status was with the IAS.

Now the initial line was the price of services was so high as the Church had to fund all the expenses for the ‘technologies’ it was getting out widely into the world school systems, drug reform systems, prison reform etc…

But then staff started going direct to the public to pay for these social betterment activities. So now you were paying for the services, the IAS status, and now also the social betterment activities.

Then the Ideal Org program was launched…

So all public had to raise funds to buy a fancy new building in their local town, give the deeds to the mother church and then pay rent for the property those members paid for themselves. On top of services, the IAS…

You can see a pattern here I hope. From the 80s the price of being a Scientologist started rising. A heck of a lot. With the death of its founder, it became more about the money.

There’s a twist in the money tale as well, doesn’t matter what you donate to: services, IAS, social betterment, Ideal Org… at a whim all of it can be dispersed to harass critics, pay for private investigators of critics, cover the defense of Scientologists who have harmed critics. I don’t have the numbers but the amount they spend on lawyers is well noted. So when your paying in to ‘help the world’ its more likely being used to haras an ex-member who has or is speaking out about an injustice.

How Scientologists view themselves and others is a bit more complicated. How they see each other is like an extreme version of small village syndrome. So everyone knows everyone’s business, rumors and backchat are rampant and constant. with everyone on their own level or status. So everyone wants to know your level when they talk to you. Everyone is senior or junior to one another.

So everyone knows everyone’s business and your level is your devotion badge, yes your IN but HOW IN. So your try improve your level to be more IN.

Some draw comfort from this I know, I hated it. A strict set of values to conform to and massive peer enforcement and expectation is all par for the course, for some that works and is comforting to them.

I’m a rebellious artist type, I believe in the art of graffiti, I like to test the rule book for its flaws, not blindly subscribe to it. So it wasn’t for me. Each to their own there but it does make life hell for a kid like me. Which is why I left as soon as I could.

The last straw that broke the camel’s back for me was the sheer and utter contempt in which Scientologists view ‘wogs’. That’s right if you’re not into Scientology then your a wog in the wog world dramatizing wog aberrations, until ‘us’ Scientologists can get at you and cure them.

It goes further though, journalists, the LGBTQ community, politicians, members of any intelligence agency, the taxman and psychologists and psychiatrists are all evil reincarnate and dangerous. The advice is to put them all on an isolated island as if they were lepers.

The rest of y’all more normal wogs, we’re happy to manage (please excuse me while I talk about this in the first person as if I was still in their midst, it’s easier). There are services you can avail yourself of to cure your aberrations, which so long as your paying for it and ‘keeping your ethics in’ (behaving how we tell you to) then you can slowly but surely join and be accepted into the fold and un-wog yourself.

But your not quite off the hook yet, the founder wrote quite a hard sell policy in 1967. Some argue this document made Scientology into the cult it is today. It in a nutshell it says, you are either onboard 100% or you’re a dilettante! This is in what he rated as the Church’s most senior policy.

So from the off your getting this ‘your all in or all out’ proposition creeping up on you. Tom Cruise mentions it in the Youtube video the Church produced of him making an acceptance speech for an award. He clearly states your in the game or out of the ballpark, there are no spectators. It’s well watched by church members.

So to be considered an equal by another Scientologist, you have to be in the Church every week doing services to improve yourself, digging deep into your pocket at every weekly event and be open to this everyone knows everything about you type stuff. Then you start earning the trust of your peers within, now you have a lifetime mission ahead of you to do all the services on offer, total price tag all in is >$300,000.

I won’t get into the leaving part too much here but when I was 32 I decided to untangle myself, it’s still a work in progress and I am now 44. It took me to 32 to pluck up the courage to face the world without contact with any relatives I grew up with (they do disconnect from you for leaving). And the harassment I have had since I left has included death threats.

So if you do decide to join, know it comes with control of your family connections as well. A price tag and then there’s another kind of price tag to pay, if you decide to leave.