We got around to watching Rebecca Minkoff’s final appearance on this season’s Real Housewives of New York, which was the second half of the reunion episode that aired on Bravo earlier this week.
I can't think of two things that don't mix more than SCN at a high level and Reality TV at a high level. This was never going to work and if I was Rebecca's agent I would have gotten her a show where new designers make handbags in different challenges and one wins a lot of money in the end. She would have gotten the publicity she wanted and no one would have been allowed to ask her pointed questions about SCN.
People at INT or Upper Management know very little about pop culture. They are not supposed to be watching TV and will never be as proficient at it as we are. They were full-on cheering Laura Prepon for her role on Orange is the New Black and I am sure less than 1% understood she played a lesbian, drug dealer.
As far as Rebecca Minkoff, you need more than a famous bag brand to make it on the Housewives franchise. The women on the show would be equivalent to the Navy Seals in the reality TV world. They know how to dump their husband, change gender, lose a fortune (or never have one) have a kid in jail, and never discuss one bit of that. They are experts in finding the most generic, safe storyline and riding that puppy until even the editor is like"Again with this BS? The viewers are getting restless." while not saying a word about their actual life.
Stories about women who are or may be pregnant and are past childbearing age seem popular.
Anything Rebecca said about SCN was going to be wrong. The Church wanted publicity but not real Housewives brand of publicity. She knew that and chose to say nothing.
I think her heart wasn't really in it, she was too pretty to be on this show with these women who are fighting aging like a boss. She didn't want these women to be her buddies or even fake buddies and as I said she should have gone the handbag contest route.
No, I would love to. I have watched a fair amount of reality TV and followed the stars. teen moms, Love is Blind, the Quints in Texas, etc. This is big business and the successful ones protect their brand like crazy. It takes a thick skin to survive.
I worked with a company in LA ( a client), and the whole company was made up of people waiting to be found and made into reality stars. These were very attractive people who were trying to get into the business. Think someone supposedly discovered on their job in some small town who was a great singer, a perfect match for the bachelor, etc.
A feel-good story.
The person chosen was an F-level celebrity, someone waiting for a break. If being from a small town in Mississippi with a disabled family member was the break, so be it. It was all fake. These wannabes were waiting in the wings for someone to come up with some idea and they would fill that role, The Bachelor, Ex on the Beach, Naked, and Afraid.
Meanwhile, they were serving drinks on a golf course.
The cult argument, only OSA (edited by Miscavige's top editing) spends time with the bigot counter argument.
Average non Scientologists don't buy that argument for a second.
Average under articulate persons all through history have needed their own word to show their disapproval of a group whom the average public has heard enough bad news about, and "cult" kind of is the population's word.
Official Scientology over emphasizes some of L. Ron Hubbard's worst ideas, to the detriment of the official Scientology followers.
Those instances of excessive application of extremist Hubbard's statements, end up backfiring all the time, in Scientology, due to the ignorance of the official Scientology staffers who go fanatical on each other.
Cult isn't a "legal" word, it's about as much attention that average people wish to give a label to a group that behaves fanatically with bad results.
The media has laid out thousands of the bad results which backfire on official Scientology due to the extremist application of Hubbard's Scientology regulations. Official Scientology's history has led the way in the "Cult" damage debris trail which official Scientology has left.
If any religion or group enforces their rules to the detriment of the followers, there's a tipping point, and then that group becomes a cult. Especially if the group cannot break out of their fanatical interpretation which continues to cause their followers much woe and suffering.
Cult as argued over is a popular word, it's a stopgap word, which when average people get fed up enough about a group which over and over does backfiring detrimental things in following their group's "founder's" regulations on themselves, then that group rises up to being simply thought of as a cult.
Official Scientology could "un-cult" themselves pretty easily. They'd just have to look at the Ron's Org's setups.
The problem, is Miscavige. He's interpreted Hubbard's regulations extremistly and allowed horrendous fanatical applications of Hubbard's writings.
Here's the questions I'd ask all the official Scientology celebs:
"Did you know that some of the splinter Scientology groups which still do the L. Ron Hubbard auditing and exorcism, those groups don't declare their followers SP and they don't have an OSA branch?"
"Did you hear of the beatings which official Scientology leader David Miscavige did and encouraged for years?"
"Why is official Scientology so much more fanatical than the splinter Scientology groups?"
"Don't you even know anything about the milder "Ron's Orgs" groups of splinter Scientologists?"
--------------------------------------
My first goals when I became a critic, were to hopefully push the study of Scientology sufficiently so that the new religious movement academics could differentiate between official Scientology and the splinter Scientology practitioners.
Why? Main answer, the splinter Scientologists act mainly less fanatical. They act LESS "cult" like.
That is a major point to make, and it has not caught on to keep noticing this point.
Official Scientology is more orthodoxly fanatical about applying the full backfiring sets of regulations and writings of Hubbard.
Splinter Scientology cut short and dispense with massive sets of the backfiring Hubbard regulations and writings.
-----------------------------------------
It just frustrated me that you can't get discussion of these important points like the above, which relate to whether the world could call a group a "cult" or not.
"Cult" calling is the right of anyone, it's free speech, and it's a popular word, not an academic word.
If Rebecca Minkoff could sit through an hour of discussion, I'd start with this above point I'm making, as the entry point.
THEN I'd get into the "Truth Rundown" newspaper story.
Then I'd get personal, and ask her why she hasn't joined Sea Org, and risen up to the "top management" ranks of Scientology. And I'd ask why haven't other super capable Scientologists risen up to the top management ranks of Scientology, and deal with the issues which the media has been reporting about Scientology's SP policies backfiring.
Freezone/Ron's Org splinter Scientologists simply don't have the problems official Scientology does, and haven't any of the prominent Scientologists even educated themselves enough of how to reform themselves enough to STOP being the fanatical "cult" group that Scientology continues to be year in year out?
All official Scientology would have to do is get new leadership, and go more lenient like the splinter Scientology groups.
They'd have to shed the fanatical interpretations of Hubbard's backfiring regulations and writings and it's been done, already, by the splinter Scientologists.
Rebecca Minkoff, and all official Scientologists are hours and hours away from studying up enough about their "religion" to even understand the above.
Oh well.
The simplicity of being in a "cult" is just follow orders of the fanatical interpreters in one's orthodox fake religion.
Official Scientology's "think for yourself" is absurdly pre-emptively backfiring.
Rebecca Minkoff ought to come here, and respond to my comment.
It's not a "legal" word, unless the lawyers and judges likewise adopt this popular meaning of the word cult.
There's no one in credible relevant groups, like linguists, who even know enough about the massive intertwining regulations and penalties and the history of interpreting Hubbard's regulations to the detriment of the Scientology followers, to even lay out the full argument sensibly, and be a cornerstone societal 'expert' and make the word "cult" the people's word meaning that IS a reality in the world.
Cult is bad, I wouldn't call the Ron's Org's a cult. I talk with some of the highest level Ron's Org people, and we can talk body-thetans even.
No way do Ron's Org Scientologists even for a second wish to regulate each other's lives and disconnect and call each other SP like do the official Rebecca Minkoff Scientology "church" does.
Good points. Groups and individuals that use Scientology to possibly help people without the strict green on white policy rules Hubbard wrote are more based around individual freedoms.
The Scientology organization follows the eight attributes of a cult including the key to the cult, a strong charismatic leader. I don’t recommend or give credence to the therapies on Hubbard’s “Grade Chart”, specially the OT Levels. At the same time I don’t vilify anyone for wanting to use that form of self help. The people and groups that practice Scientology outside the organization are a good first step in leaving the cult. Thanks Chuck for your coverage of Tony’s article today. Always thought provoking.
I, when I was in lower jobs in the upper ranks, used to think of the following:
I knew old celebs like you Geoff (I'd been a Flag Course Sup for admin training, and I'd read the old celeb mags, knew of the old original crew of celebs like you who even helped found and get CC going, many many CC staff trained and told me stories, and I even went to the CC which had the big Yvonne Office, which was LRH ordered, and when she died, the next group of execs transitioned and most quit, as her office was dismantled, then leading to the "President's Office" at CC and the WHOLE transition to modern CC Int, boy, someone could write that history, but it'd be a huge amount of work, but you lived it in spades!).
The details are just voluminous.
In simple terms, step back from it all, and one thing I felt, was that MORE highly capable people ought to have joined Sea Org from the professional Scientologist ranks, and put their smarts and common sense into reforming the movement.
LRH did allow two major loopholes, the "Definition of a PR" policy is one major top management loophole. The Class 8 "arbitrary" principle is the top top loophole.
There's a minor overview loophole, which I call the "blue pencil" loophole, from a 1965ish policy.
And there's the "if it's not true for you it's not true" highest level loophole.
I just wished smarter, you smarter Scientologists, had risen up, into the top ranks to fix the Hubbard extremes, apply the Hubbard loopholes, and slice out the fanatical options Hubbard left for whomever was "top management."
But it then was beaten into me by talking with smarter critics over the decades I've been a critic, that even IF you did all the reform, the quackery (the "tech") is a failure, and the goal of supernatural improvement "soul powers" is futile.
So, reform always will longer range fail.
BUT, at least, reform will stop the abuses to high degree.
That was my long range "hope."
When I was in, I still always thought the "OT" powers were being attained, and thus I was on board despite the crazy Miscavige era's nastiness.
My biggest coming back to sanity, is realizing I ought to have called 911 when I saw a Sea Org Commanding Officer punch and slap a subordinate. I ought to have just called 911.
The outside world needs to prosecute felonies committed by unchecked fanatical Scientologists.
'Reality shows' have no real basis in reality. That Minky didn't discuss $cientology was always in the cards. The last thing Miscavige wants is to show is the reality of the Clam scam. I am happy that $cientology got a lot more disrespect in the press, every time that happens another potential recruit goes past the mOrg door and doesn't look back.
I can't think of two things that don't mix more than SCN at a high level and Reality TV at a high level. This was never going to work and if I was Rebecca's agent I would have gotten her a show where new designers make handbags in different challenges and one wins a lot of money in the end. She would have gotten the publicity she wanted and no one would have been allowed to ask her pointed questions about SCN.
People at INT or Upper Management know very little about pop culture. They are not supposed to be watching TV and will never be as proficient at it as we are. They were full-on cheering Laura Prepon for her role on Orange is the New Black and I am sure less than 1% understood she played a lesbian, drug dealer.
As far as Rebecca Minkoff, you need more than a famous bag brand to make it on the Housewives franchise. The women on the show would be equivalent to the Navy Seals in the reality TV world. They know how to dump their husband, change gender, lose a fortune (or never have one) have a kid in jail, and never discuss one bit of that. They are experts in finding the most generic, safe storyline and riding that puppy until even the editor is like"Again with this BS? The viewers are getting restless." while not saying a word about their actual life.
Stories about women who are or may be pregnant and are past childbearing age seem popular.
Anything Rebecca said about SCN was going to be wrong. The Church wanted publicity but not real Housewives brand of publicity. She knew that and chose to say nothing.
I think her heart wasn't really in it, she was too pretty to be on this show with these women who are fighting aging like a boss. She didn't want these women to be her buddies or even fake buddies and as I said she should have gone the handbag contest route.
Just my take.
Your take is accurate in my opinion. Do you work in film/video production?
No, I would love to. I have watched a fair amount of reality TV and followed the stars. teen moms, Love is Blind, the Quints in Texas, etc. This is big business and the successful ones protect their brand like crazy. It takes a thick skin to survive.
I worked with a company in LA ( a client), and the whole company was made up of people waiting to be found and made into reality stars. These were very attractive people who were trying to get into the business. Think someone supposedly discovered on their job in some small town who was a great singer, a perfect match for the bachelor, etc.
A feel-good story.
The person chosen was an F-level celebrity, someone waiting for a break. If being from a small town in Mississippi with a disabled family member was the break, so be it. It was all fake. These wannabes were waiting in the wings for someone to come up with some idea and they would fill that role, The Bachelor, Ex on the Beach, Naked, and Afraid.
Meanwhile, they were serving drinks on a golf course.
The cult argument, only OSA (edited by Miscavige's top editing) spends time with the bigot counter argument.
Average non Scientologists don't buy that argument for a second.
Average under articulate persons all through history have needed their own word to show their disapproval of a group whom the average public has heard enough bad news about, and "cult" kind of is the population's word.
Official Scientology over emphasizes some of L. Ron Hubbard's worst ideas, to the detriment of the official Scientology followers.
Those instances of excessive application of extremist Hubbard's statements, end up backfiring all the time, in Scientology, due to the ignorance of the official Scientology staffers who go fanatical on each other.
Cult isn't a "legal" word, it's about as much attention that average people wish to give a label to a group that behaves fanatically with bad results.
The media has laid out thousands of the bad results which backfire on official Scientology due to the extremist application of Hubbard's Scientology regulations. Official Scientology's history has led the way in the "Cult" damage debris trail which official Scientology has left.
If any religion or group enforces their rules to the detriment of the followers, there's a tipping point, and then that group becomes a cult. Especially if the group cannot break out of their fanatical interpretation which continues to cause their followers much woe and suffering.
Cult as argued over is a popular word, it's a stopgap word, which when average people get fed up enough about a group which over and over does backfiring detrimental things in following their group's "founder's" regulations on themselves, then that group rises up to being simply thought of as a cult.
Official Scientology could "un-cult" themselves pretty easily. They'd just have to look at the Ron's Org's setups.
The problem, is Miscavige. He's interpreted Hubbard's regulations extremistly and allowed horrendous fanatical applications of Hubbard's writings.
Here's the questions I'd ask all the official Scientology celebs:
"Did you know that some of the splinter Scientology groups which still do the L. Ron Hubbard auditing and exorcism, those groups don't declare their followers SP and they don't have an OSA branch?"
"Did you hear of the beatings which official Scientology leader David Miscavige did and encouraged for years?"
"Why is official Scientology so much more fanatical than the splinter Scientology groups?"
"Don't you even know anything about the milder "Ron's Orgs" groups of splinter Scientologists?"
--------------------------------------
My first goals when I became a critic, were to hopefully push the study of Scientology sufficiently so that the new religious movement academics could differentiate between official Scientology and the splinter Scientology practitioners.
Why? Main answer, the splinter Scientologists act mainly less fanatical. They act LESS "cult" like.
That is a major point to make, and it has not caught on to keep noticing this point.
Official Scientology is more orthodoxly fanatical about applying the full backfiring sets of regulations and writings of Hubbard.
Splinter Scientology cut short and dispense with massive sets of the backfiring Hubbard regulations and writings.
-----------------------------------------
It just frustrated me that you can't get discussion of these important points like the above, which relate to whether the world could call a group a "cult" or not.
"Cult" calling is the right of anyone, it's free speech, and it's a popular word, not an academic word.
If Rebecca Minkoff could sit through an hour of discussion, I'd start with this above point I'm making, as the entry point.
THEN I'd get into the "Truth Rundown" newspaper story.
Then I'd get personal, and ask her why she hasn't joined Sea Org, and risen up to the "top management" ranks of Scientology. And I'd ask why haven't other super capable Scientologists risen up to the top management ranks of Scientology, and deal with the issues which the media has been reporting about Scientology's SP policies backfiring.
Freezone/Ron's Org splinter Scientologists simply don't have the problems official Scientology does, and haven't any of the prominent Scientologists even educated themselves enough of how to reform themselves enough to STOP being the fanatical "cult" group that Scientology continues to be year in year out?
All official Scientology would have to do is get new leadership, and go more lenient like the splinter Scientology groups.
They'd have to shed the fanatical interpretations of Hubbard's backfiring regulations and writings and it's been done, already, by the splinter Scientologists.
Rebecca Minkoff, and all official Scientologists are hours and hours away from studying up enough about their "religion" to even understand the above.
Oh well.
The simplicity of being in a "cult" is just follow orders of the fanatical interpreters in one's orthodox fake religion.
Official Scientology's "think for yourself" is absurdly pre-emptively backfiring.
Rebecca Minkoff ought to come here, and respond to my comment.
It's not a "legal" word, unless the lawyers and judges likewise adopt this popular meaning of the word cult.
There's no one in credible relevant groups, like linguists, who even know enough about the massive intertwining regulations and penalties and the history of interpreting Hubbard's regulations to the detriment of the Scientology followers, to even lay out the full argument sensibly, and be a cornerstone societal 'expert' and make the word "cult" the people's word meaning that IS a reality in the world.
Cult is bad, I wouldn't call the Ron's Org's a cult. I talk with some of the highest level Ron's Org people, and we can talk body-thetans even.
No way do Ron's Org Scientologists even for a second wish to regulate each other's lives and disconnect and call each other SP like do the official Rebecca Minkoff Scientology "church" does.
Also even the Ron's Org isn't even
Good points. Groups and individuals that use Scientology to possibly help people without the strict green on white policy rules Hubbard wrote are more based around individual freedoms.
The Scientology organization follows the eight attributes of a cult including the key to the cult, a strong charismatic leader. I don’t recommend or give credence to the therapies on Hubbard’s “Grade Chart”, specially the OT Levels. At the same time I don’t vilify anyone for wanting to use that form of self help. The people and groups that practice Scientology outside the organization are a good first step in leaving the cult. Thanks Chuck for your coverage of Tony’s article today. Always thought provoking.
I, when I was in lower jobs in the upper ranks, used to think of the following:
I knew old celebs like you Geoff (I'd been a Flag Course Sup for admin training, and I'd read the old celeb mags, knew of the old original crew of celebs like you who even helped found and get CC going, many many CC staff trained and told me stories, and I even went to the CC which had the big Yvonne Office, which was LRH ordered, and when she died, the next group of execs transitioned and most quit, as her office was dismantled, then leading to the "President's Office" at CC and the WHOLE transition to modern CC Int, boy, someone could write that history, but it'd be a huge amount of work, but you lived it in spades!).
The details are just voluminous.
In simple terms, step back from it all, and one thing I felt, was that MORE highly capable people ought to have joined Sea Org from the professional Scientologist ranks, and put their smarts and common sense into reforming the movement.
LRH did allow two major loopholes, the "Definition of a PR" policy is one major top management loophole. The Class 8 "arbitrary" principle is the top top loophole.
There's a minor overview loophole, which I call the "blue pencil" loophole, from a 1965ish policy.
And there's the "if it's not true for you it's not true" highest level loophole.
I just wished smarter, you smarter Scientologists, had risen up, into the top ranks to fix the Hubbard extremes, apply the Hubbard loopholes, and slice out the fanatical options Hubbard left for whomever was "top management."
But it then was beaten into me by talking with smarter critics over the decades I've been a critic, that even IF you did all the reform, the quackery (the "tech") is a failure, and the goal of supernatural improvement "soul powers" is futile.
So, reform always will longer range fail.
BUT, at least, reform will stop the abuses to high degree.
That was my long range "hope."
When I was in, I still always thought the "OT" powers were being attained, and thus I was on board despite the crazy Miscavige era's nastiness.
My biggest coming back to sanity, is realizing I ought to have called 911 when I saw a Sea Org Commanding Officer punch and slap a subordinate. I ought to have just called 911.
The outside world needs to prosecute felonies committed by unchecked fanatical Scientologists.
'Reality shows' have no real basis in reality. That Minky didn't discuss $cientology was always in the cards. The last thing Miscavige wants is to show is the reality of the Clam scam. I am happy that $cientology got a lot more disrespect in the press, every time that happens another potential recruit goes past the mOrg door and doesn't look back.
I generally don't care for the Daily Mail, but Claudia Smith packed a lot of stuff into very few words. Brutal (and beautiful).
I don't waste my time on trash like housewives. I have more important things to do--Lame Stream TV isn't one of them. 💜