Now that we’ve read Going Clear: Scientology, Hollywood, & the Prison of Belief, we’re going to refrain from writing the sort of thing you’ve been seeing in some other publications. You know, the “Ten Most Explosive Things in Lawrence Wright’s New Book” sort of article.
For those of us who watch Scientology closely, and have for many years, most of those articles that have popped up in recent days seem to be gasping over things that have been known or written about for many years.
Look, the history of Scientology is very weird. And scary. And the abuses detailed by former members can be shocking. And so can the tales of Scientology’s appetite for retaliation.
We know this. And we would argue that for much of the public, the word was already out long before today’s publication of Wright’s book. (Look at the reaction, for example, when on Monday the Atlantic magazine ran a paid church advertorial at its website extolling the virtues of Scientology leader David Miscavige. Even though there was nothing really wrong with the Atlantic taking the church’s money for an ad, the public denunciation of the magazine was so swift and loud, the Atlantic caved and took it down.)
Larry Wright’s book carefully explains how the church got into its current mess, and the sheer amount of territory he covers in only 365 pages is astounding. Yes, there are stunning new details in every chapter, but Wright weaves together his story with such hypnotic flow and even-handedness, the new and the old fit together seamlessly.
Tonight is the night we move into a new era: for the first time, a television network is putting on not just a story about some of Scientology’s worst abuses — spying on perceived enemies, degrading treatment of workers, splitting up families — but it’s being dramatized in a 1-hour show that pulls no punches.
We’ve seen the whole thing and can attest to the high production values and the respect with which the Investigation Discovery network and its new series “Dangerous Persuasions” is treating Nancy Many, who had one of the most remarkable careers in Scientology.
What timing — just hours after The Atlantic magazine apologized for running a paid “advertorial” about Scientology’s “Ideal Org” program, Buzzfeed has published a lengthy investigation of the church’s building program that writer Alex Klein has been working on for quite a while.
He contacted us several weeks ago, and it was obvious then that he’d been doing his homework about Scientology leader David Miscavige’s aggressive real estate caper.
As we pointed out just last night in our story about the Atlantic, Miscavige (through his spokespeople) answers nearly every criticism of Scientology by touting all the new buildings that he’s been opening up around the world. But former Scientologists tell us that the constant fundraising for these new “Ideal Orgs” is actually one of the key things fueling internal unrest in the church, and driving away longtime members.
Now, Klein has dug into the financial numbers behind two of the Ideal Orgs in particular — in Seattle and Orange County, California — and the results are startling.
NBC’s Rock Center just sent us another peek at its Thursday night show with Paul Haggis and Lawrence Wright. Wow, take a look at these quotes from Haggis!
UPDATE 11:45 PM: THE ATLANTIC JUST REMOVED THE SCIENTOLOGY ADVERTORIAL IN THE FACE OF MOUNTING RIDICULE. THEY POSTED THIS NOTICE:
“We have temporarily suspended this advertising campaign pending a review of our policies that govern sponsor content and subsequent comment threads.”
ALSO, The Atlantic took down all 25 comments on its Scientology advertorial, but we nabbed them before they disappeared. We’re reproducing them for posterity below.
AND NOW, the Atlantic has apologized. See the latest update, below.
The Atlantic is a venerated magazine (founded in 1857!) which has been celebrated for the way it has made use of the Internet probably better than any highbrow publication, its AtlanticWire getting high marks for originality and innovation.
But taking paid puff pieces from Scientology? This innovation is resulting in a big backlash.
If you’re unfamiliar with how magazines and newspapers work, we can tell you that AtlanticWire editor Gabriel Snyder may not have known that this piece — which at first glance appears to be a normal article on the website — was coming. As “sponsored content,” the publication of this Scientology-written article would have been worked out with The Atlantic’s sales side, without editorial input. (Mother Jones co-editor Clara Jeffery points out that this advertorial showed up on the main site, not AtlanticWire. Atlantic editor in chief James Bennett is being pelted on Twitter for the ad being published at all.)
In these economic times, print publications and their websites are pretty desperate for any form of revenue. But even if this sponsored advertorial was held at arm’s length from the magazine’s editorial purview, the Atlantic still risks harming its hard-won reputation by getting into bed with such a controversial group as Scientology.
The second half of the series in the Tampa Bay Times about the 2010 FBI investigation of Scientology landed on the Internet tonight, and we’ve given it a good look.
Joe Childs and Tom Tobin have done another fine job amassing new details about the FBI’s probe of human trafficking allegations at Scientology’s facilities, where workers, some of them children, toil long hours for little pay. As in our own story about the FBI giving up, the Times reporters found that at one point the federal investigators were taking seriously the idea of raiding Scientology’s international base east of Los Angeles.
Childs and Tobin advance the story in a major way by consulting experts who explain how the FBI — and the prosecutors it would turn over its evidence to — were confronted with a difficult proposition. Even with evidence that some workers were treated appallingly, Scientology had strong protection in the First Amendment, which keeps courts from meddling in church affairs.
We wrote our own story about that in March 2012. We found that despite talking to many ex-church members who alleged human trafficking abuses, the FBI lost steam and its investigation resulted in no charges being filed. (More recently, we broke the news that the Department of Homeland Security took up where the FBI left off, but also seems to be having issues with its investigation.)
The Times also put together this great 19-minute video about Scientology’s bizarre office-prison for executives, called “The Hole,” and it features interviews with former church spokesman Mike Rinder and former Sea Org worker John Brousseau.
The folks over at NBC’s Rock Center were good enough to send us this promo this afternoon…
…just as we were about to walk into a 3-hour movie. Oh well. So you’ve probably already heard this news. But heck, there’s still plenty of time to talk about how great it is that Paul Haggis talked to Harry Smith about leaving Scientology, and that Larry Wright will also be featured. Some other ex-Scientologists were also interviewed, we hear, but we don’t know if they’ll be included in this show.
Welcome to our ongoing project, where we blog a 1950 first edition of Scientology’s bible, Dianetics, with the help of ex-Scientologist, Bay Area lawyer, and writer Vance Woodward. Go here for the first post in the series.
Last week, we started with the book’s opening sentence, which appears in a ten-page synopsis. That’s followed by a five-page introduction, a three-page guide titled “How to Read This Book,” and then another five-page introduction to Book One.
We now want to speed through all this frontmatter to get to the main course, so we’ll rapidly sum up what’s in it. In the synopsis, the boasting continues after the first sentence, which asserted that the discovery of dianetics was more important than the invention of the wheel…
Just a quick afternoon post to acknowledge that Paul Thomas Anderson’s movie, The Master, garnered three acting Oscar nominations today. (But PTA himself, and his film, got snubbed for Best Director and Best Picture.)
Joaquin Phoenix was nominated for Best Actor for his role as Freddie Quell, Philip Seymour Hoffman was nominated for Best Supporting Actor for playing the L. Ron Hubbard analog Lancaster Dodd (the Master), and Amy Adams received a nomination for Best Supporting Actress in her role as the Master’s wife, Peggy Dodd.
You know what this means — even more media attention aimed at the film and its relationship to the early days of Scientology. Oh, the fun.
Speaking of media announcements, we have one of our own…
Now that we’ve read Going Clear: Scientology, Hollywood, & the Prison of Belief, we’re going to refrain from writing the sort of thing you’ve been seeing in some other publications. You know, the “Ten Most Explosive Things in Lawrence Wright’s New Book” sort of article.
