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 Still one of our favorite photos: Louis Farrakhan at the Scientology Celebrity Centre in Hollywood for a gala several years ago, with Scientology’s Alfreddie Johnson and former X-Factor contestant Stacy Francis For several years now some of us in the press have been bringing up the strange relationship that has grown up between Scientology and the Nation of Islam. Most recently, Eliza Gray did a wonderful job looking at Louis Farrakhan’s embrace of L. Ron Hubbard in The New Republic. It’s been fascinating to watch Farrakhan explain in videotaped lectures how he’s managed to fall under the spell of the whitest man who ever lived. And it’s true that he’s asked many of his followers to get trained in Dianetics and to get training as auditors. But on this Saturday, we’d like to open up the blog for discussion of a question we have about this strange relationship between such unusual groups. Continue reading The Scientology-Nation of Islam Alliance: Sideshow or Armageddon?
 Friday mornings is when we look back at Scientology history, and we’re now winding down with our last couple of weeks of dispatches from the yacht Apollo.
From 1967 to 1975, L. Ron Hubbard ran Scientology from a small armada of ships that sailed the Mediterranean and the Atlantic. Each day, he’d send out a report to his crew which were known as “Orders of the Day.” We have a mostly complete set of them from late 1968 through 1971 that we’ve been sampling, week after week since last November. So join us as we take a look at what the Commodore was raving about during that time the week of October 21 to 27… Continue reading Scientology on the High Seas: Vixie, Vitamins, and Satan Worshippers
 By now you’ve no doubt heard that Tom Cruise has filed a $50 million lawsuit against Bauer Publishing and two of its magazines, Life & Style and In Touch, for claiming on the covers of a couple of issues in July that, following his divorce to Katie Holmes, Cruise had “abandoned” his daughter, Suri.
Cruise, in a complaint filed by his attorney, Bert Fields, accuses the magazines of writing checks on their covers that they couldn’t cash inside — in other words, the stories themselves didn’t have facts proving that Cruise had “abandoned” his daughter. While Tom did have a heavy work schedule following the divorce, Fields insists that the actor at least talked to his daughter on the phone every day. Well, he may have a point there. But does that mean Cruise is going to get $50 million out of Bauer? Continue reading Tom Cruise Sues, UK Scientologists Sue, Narconon Is Sued: It’s a Legal Free-For-All!!
 Tommy, where are you? One of our eagle-eyed commenters pointed out something yesterday: Tommy Davis has suddenly vanished from Scientology’s media relations web page. Sure enough, it’s true. The church’s website which lists its official spokespersons is now bereft of Davis and his wife, Jessica Feshbach. The two people who were behind them, Karin Pouw and Bob Adams, have been moved to the top tier. Pouw is now listed as the “international spokesperson.” After the jump, we’ll show you the before and after images of the church’s official page, and we’ll try to come to grips with this stunning news. Continue reading It’s Official: Tommy Davis No Longer a Scientology Spokesman
 We have to hand it to reporter Amy Jones of The Sun — she really punked Scientology leader David Miscavige and his obsession with security.
Late Monday night, the British newspaper published Jones’s account of walking into Scientology’s big annual gala which takes place in the UK each October to celebrate the International Association of Scientologists. The big IAS party is one of half a dozen major events put on by the church at different places around the world, and they all feature Miscavige on stage, feeding thousands of followers a lot of hard-to-believe assertions about Scientology’s expansion around the globe. We’ve reported on leaked videos of past IAS and other events. But for her story, Jones managed to get inside and watch this IAS party while it was going on, and was never challenged by Scientology’s legendarily tight security. Continue reading British Newspaper The Sun Sneaks Reporter into Scientology Annual Gala!
 Friday afternoon, we heard from the local Anonymous folks that the theatrical debut of a documentary featuring several of them was showing in town.
We attended, and had a great time watching We Are Legion: The Story of the Hacktivists. Director Brian Knappenberger was on hand to answer questions afterwards, as were some of the New York Anons featured in it: Vendetta, SethDood, and PokeAnon, who we have frequently seen at protests on 46th Street across from the Scientology org. Poke announced that night that there would be a “raid” on Scientology the following night, Saturday. But we had other plans and couldn’t go. Someone who did appreciate Saturday’s demonstration turned out to be comedian Lewis Black, who announced on his Facebook that it was the “Best. Protest. Ever.” Whoa! Continue reading Lewis Black Calls Times Square Anti-Scientology Demonstration “Best. Protest. Ever.”
 One of our tipsters briefly considered joining Scientology’s Sea Organization — the hardcore group of workers who toil for almost no pay and often do menial labor from dawn to midnight, day after day.
This person had second thoughts and didn’t join, but they still had a copy of the Sea Org’s application form and thought we might like to see it. Boy howdy, were we glad they sent it over. Get out your pens and pencils, kids, because it’s time to answer some pretty strange questions before you join David Miscavige’s planetary clearing crew for the next billion years… Continue reading Scientology’s Sea Org Application: What Are Your Crimes?
 Our tipsters have really come through for us this week with some fascinating new Scientology mailers. Has there ever been a better time to be a Scientologist? Just look at all the different ways you can donate money!
We’ll start with this weekend’s big event — the International Association of Scientologists (IAS) spectacular that took place in the UK. Each October, several thousand of the faithful gather to listen as, for three hours, Scientology leader David Miscavige takes the stage and goes on and on and on about all of Scientology’s good works and how this prison planet will soon become one big Narconon drug rehab clinic. Or something. We can only hope someone will leak us video of the event soon. And that Chill EB was allowed to perform one of his amazing rap songs. Continue reading Sunday Funnies: Let’s Put Scientology Kids to Work!
 We talked this week with yet another longtime Scientologist who is quitting the church, 35-year member Steve Poore.
On September 30, Poore became the latest veteran church member to declare his defection at the website of former high-ranking Scientology executive Marty Rathbun. Since 2009, Rathbun’s blog has become the place where more and more Scientologists are publicly declaring that they’re fed up with church leader David Miscavige and are going “independent” — still adhering to the philosophies of L. Ron Hubbard, but ditching the official, corporate church. Continue reading 35-Year Scientologist Steve Poore Says Church Leader David Miscavige is “Scared to His Core”
 On Friday mornings we leave our bodies and travel back in time to stand on the bridge of the Apollo with L. Ron Hubbard, circa 1968-1971, to watch the Commodore run Scientology as he sailed the Mediterranean and Atlantic.
We have an excellent set of excerpts from Hubbard’s shipboard dispatches this week, but we ran into a bit of a snag when we went looking for our other Friday morning feature, “OT Phenomena” — stories of superhuman Scientology abilities from old copies of Advance! magazine. It turns out, editor Jefferson Hawkins left out the very popular OT Phenomena in some of the issues we’re looking through now, in 1978. But then, in Issue 55, from November/December, we spotted something monumental that we can’t wait to share with you. It was then that L. Ron Hubbard changed life as we know it forever. Continue reading When L. Ron Hubbard Rocked the World: The OT 8 Release!
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