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As someone who joined Scientology in 1968, 56 years ago, the class V orgs(cherchs) were pretty run down. At the time, Hubbard because of attacks on Scientology wanted a low key profile for orgs.

What was important was the quality of the staff members and the service they delivered.

The MEST was not important.

Miscavige who is definitely NOT a people person and drove away most of the talent that built up the organizations, had the simplistic solution that building shiny edifices would expand Scientology.

Yes, clean, organized spaces are necessary to run a business. However, it’s the experienced, skilled and caring people who create expansion and success.

What Miscavige has now, are shiny renovated buildings populated by Sciebots and Seaborgs.(brainwashed automatons)

That guarantees the continued contraction of his toxic cherchs.

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Mornin' Geoff. Example - San Francisco Org in 1974, half of a small floor in a business building at 414 Mason St. Shared with the Better Business Bureau and the Theosophical Society. Run-down but never dirty, heated by radiators, no air-conditioning.

The course room was always packed full, from early morning to late night. My guess is 50 to 100 people just on course, with many more doing auditing etc.

They moved to 83 McAllister, still busy later in the 70s. Right off Market Street, near the library. Still packed full.

Now they have a practically empty huge building in the financial district of all places. Oh well, less folks getting suckered so on the whole a win.

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Techie, I visited the San Francisco org recently. It was empty. There were two staff members in reception. One of the staff tried to get me to watch a video. There was a whole line up of stalls with video screens.

It is a perfect example of the robot organization Miscavige has created.

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Feb 23·edited Feb 23

Excellent! (wringing my hands like a Bond villain). Maybe Dave is God's way of dealing with Scientology for good.

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Geoff, you have hit the nail right on the head. "However, it’s the experienced, skilled and caring people who create expansion and success." The ousting of caring people started with the 'Mission Massacre' and has continued via Dave Miscaviges's purge of anyone who could be a threat to his unrestrained reign. Technical 'competence' and salesmanship has gone by the way ever since the 'massacre'. The smoke and mirrors of selling your imagination back to you has been replaced with intense fund raising and internal statuses being doled out for direct donations. Something Lron also forbade.

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Absolutely. The fish smells from the head. The ignorance and lack of human understanding that Miscavige displays has amplified the Scientology hoax to a new level of toxicity. His organization deserves to be destroyed.

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Interesting that Dave talks about the staff member who died in JoBurg as an excuse for Ideal Orgs. I was there in South Africa when that death occurred, a month or two after the opening of JoBurg Ideal Org.

We held a little sort-of memorial for him in the newly renovated JoBurg Chapel.

He was not staff at the Ideal Org, he was part of the Sea Org installation that was still down-town. There is a 15-passenger van we called the Dooly that goes around to pick up the Sea Org crew and take them home to berthing after work hours. This guy missed the last pick-up time and decided to walk home, right through the dangerous part of town.

Of course, all I know about it is the official statements of the Scientology executives, known liars, and the rumors that were buzzing around. But it is ironic that Dave would use it as an example when it happened after the Ideal Org was opened.

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The problem with ideal orgs is that LRH structured Scientology in such a way that people didn’t go into a big building for their first experience, you went to a humble mission, which he made easy to open for anyone with a few thousand dollars in their pocket.

Then when you got all the mission could offer, you moved on to the CLIV org for more, these places were a bit larger and fewer and further between. The CLIV Orgs fed to AOs or SH for specialized auditing or training.

By decimating the feeders and creating a buffet at each ideal org, allowing a no one to take a comm course there, Miscavige effectively killed the mystery sandwich. I continue to be impressed with the fact that Miscavige has no clue how steer the con he hijacked. Hopefully he will crash it soon.

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