Leah Remini TV series about how Scientology rips families apart

Meet Diva Gustafsson, who for the Church of Scientology accused her "friend" of lying about childhood sexual abuse.

From Aaron Smith Levin, who appeared on the first season of Scientology and the Aftermath.

https://twitter.com/GrowingupinSCN/status/898052668140244992

Saina Kamula has provided more information on Facebook.

HT - Intergalactic Walrus on Tony Ortega's blog: http://tonyortega.org/2017/08/16/mirriam-and-saina-from-leah-remini-scientology-and-the-aftermath-the-lapd-has-let-us-down/#comment-3472333919

There's a related post here:

Celebrity battle lines: Michael Peña’s wife asks Scientologists to ‘Stand with Daniel Masterson’

By Tony Ortega, August 17, 2017

https://whyweprotest.net/threads/da...ons-investigated-by-lapd.132720/#post-2614810

5 More Reasons Why "Scientology and the Aftermath" is More Important Than You Think | Chris Shelton



With Season 2 of Leah Remini's Emmy-nominated Scientology and the Aftermath now begun, it's time to lay out 5 more reasons why this show is more important than most people realize, and why everyone should be watching it.

Masterson is both a physical and verbal abuser. Not surprised scienazis would support him.

I do hope WWP lurkers/regulars will give Chris Shelton's latest vid some love.

At his best, he is a clear and powerful speaker, with something worthwhile to say, and I was most impressed by this one in particular.

Although he has been guilty of leaderfagging, and also he fails at anonymous, it behooves me to mention that Darth Xander received a credit (for Archival Material) on the premier episode of the new season of Leah's show. Congratulations and kudos to him on that, but not on the other stuff he did that still pisses me off. Here's the screenshot.

Open letter from Moxie Magee to Diva Gustafsson.

https://twitter.com/MoxieMagee/status/898351239817289728

As he predicted, Pastor Willy Rice gets the Scientology ‘Fair Game’ treatment

By Tony Ortega, August 18, 2017

Excerpt:

...now, just as the pastor predicted, the Church of Scientology has launched an attack on him at the website it uses to take swipes at Leah Remini and the people who appear on her show as part of its “Fair Game” tactics against people it considers enemies.

Naturally, Scientology’s attack is ludicrously over the top and comical in execution. Calling the planned town hall at Calvary Church “KKK-like,” the screechy website attacked Rice for his conservative views on homosexuality.

The good pastor might have views that don’t comport with our own about same-sex marriage, but Scientology calling someone homophobic is just too precious.

https://tonyortega.org/2017/08/18/a...ice-gets-the-scientology-fair-game-treatment/

The scientology organisation is Nazi-like and Hubbard was homophobic.

Tonight on ‘Aftermath’: Suicide in Scientology, where sympathy and compassion are outlawed

By Tony Ortega, August 22, 2017

Quote:

Tonight’s episode of Scientology and the Aftermath packed quite a punch for us, even though we were already pretty familiar with both stories that Leah Remini and Mike Rinder tell in this, the second installment of the second season.

The episode begins with Marie Bilheimer talking to Mike and Leah about the 2004 suicide of her husband Aaron Poulin at the Hollywood Inn, a very familiar Scientology building on Hollywood Boulevard.

As we pointed out in our story last year about Marie and her family, it was really quite remarkable that the Church of Scientology managed to keep quiet that a 21-year-old Sea Org member had hanged himself in a Scientology facility in the middle of Hollywood. Not only had the death not been reported in the Los Angeles Times, Mike Rinder told us that he hadn’t heard anything about it at the time even though he was a high official in the church.

Marie explains how confusing and devastating it was not only to lose her young husband (she was only 21 at the time herself), and then be told by the church never to say what had happened to him. For years, she would be asked about her husband by other Scientologists who had no idea that he’d died.

As in our story last year, Marie wrestles with the reasons that her husband had sunk so far into despair that he would end his life. His career in the Sea Org hadn’t been going as well as hers, and he was facing some legal problems that she only really learned about completely several years later. But what comes through so clearly in this episode is that Aaron Poulin was a young man who needed help, and Scientology’s Sea Org is not a place where he was going to get it.

Marie’s account is heart-rending. But her family went through so much more than the death of Aaron Poulin. We encourage you to read the rest of the story, which involves not only another suicide in the family, but also one of the worst disconnection stories that we’ve ever reported.

In the second half of the episode, the story of 27-year-old Tayler Tweed’s suicide is told, and by someone we didn’t expect: Director Paul Haggis’s daughter Lauren Haggis.

We broke the news of Tayler’s death in 2014. (Like the death of Aaron Poulin, Tayler’s is another Scientology suicide in Southern California that has never been mentioned by the Los Angeles Times.) Tayler had used a revolver to take her life, and we spoke briefly with her mother, Cathy Tweed, nine days after Tayler’s death. Cathy said she didn’t think Scientology was involved in her daughter’s suicide, a view we were sympathetic to at the time. But two years later, friends of Tayler’s reached out to us with files of Tayler’s missing Facebook posts that she had put up in the months before her death.

Those posts told a different story, one that was definitely about a young Scientologist struggling with how to get help in an organization that denies that depression exists.

Now, Leah and Mike reveal that Lauren Haggis had gone to school with Tayler at Delphi, a Scientology school in Oregon, and had kept in touch with her. She too watched Tayler’s increasingly distressing Facebook posts about what it was like to try and get emotional support in a church that demonizes the mental health industry.

And Lauren has a surprise: She had obtained text messages that Tayler made with a good friend in her final weeks, helping to further explain the turmoil that she was going through, and how Scientology had made things so much worse.

“Scientology does not recognize depression as a mental illness,” Mike Rinder says, explaining that Scientologists, like Tayler, are told to “handle” their mental upsets with just more Scientology auditing and with taking vitamins.

Like Marie Bilheimer, Lauren Haggis is still clearly struggling with what happened, and she admits that as she watched Tayler’s online postings become more erratic, she was held back by her fears as a Scientologist — if she reached out publicly, she could find herself in ethics trouble.

“I let that fear control me. I wish I hadn’t,” she says, and later adds, “I’ve known five people in my life who have killed themselves. Four of them were Scientologists.”

Continued at https://tonyortega.org/2017/08/22/t...y-where-sympathy-and-compassion-are-outlawed/

The scientology crime syndicate seems to deny that their own dupes commit suicide. After Quentin Hubbard was found unconscious in his automobile near Las Vegas, NV, and later died in the hospital, the Guardian Office never revealed that he was dead and anyone who mentioned his death was told to shut up about it or else. ("You're spreading entheta!")

'Leah Remini: Scientology and the Aftermath' Investigates Suicide and Mental Illness in the Church

Two former Scientologists recount the suicides of their loved ones and treatment of mental illness by the institution.

By Jean Bentley, The Hollywood Reporter

Quote:

The second episode of season 2 of Leah Remini: Scientology and the Aftermath examined the lives of Church members who suffered from depression and "suicidal ideation." Throughout the episode, Remini and her Aftermath partner Mike Rinder noted that Scientology doesn't advocate treating mental illness with medication, instead advising members to treat themselves with auditing and vitamins and exercise.

The first interviewee was former Sea Org member Marie Bilheimer, who was born into the Church and remained a member for 30 years, and whose husband, Aaron Poulin, committed suicide in 2004 at age 21. The couple were married when she was 16 and he was 17, a year into her Sea Org tenure. But while Bilheimer ascended the ranks, she said Poulin would get in trouble (mostly for seemingly minor infractions like owning an Eminem CD, bleaching his hair or going out dancing).

When she became an executive and he kept getting demoted, she says she was encouraged to divorce him — but she didn't want to, because she loved him. Soon after, Bilheimer said, her husband kissed her goodbye one night and the next morning she was called to The Hollywood Inn, which is a building containing Sea Org dorms on Hollywood Boulevard. She was informed that Poulin had hung himself and died, and she was left to process the news alone outside the building before Church brass whisked her away. She also said she wasn't allowed to tell anyone that he had killed himself, nor that he was even dead.

Two months after Poulin's death, she left the Sea Org. While moving out, she found a ticket her husband had gotten for prostitution — he had killed himself just three weeks before his impending court date. Now, Bilheimer speculated that he worried she would have reported him and that's why he didn't confide in her about his troubles.

"I thought that he knew that he could be open to me," she said.

Bilheimer left Scientology in 2010, and the Church noted that she signed an affidavit stating that the Church was not responsible for her husband's suicide.

(Read the Church of Scientology's statement in response to this week's allegations here.) [Cult link removed]

The second subject of the episode was Lauren Haggis, daughter of outspoken ex-Scientologist Paul Haggis. Lauren detailed her friendship with fellow second-generation Scientologist Tayler Tweed, whom she met as a teen fresh out of the Sea Org. The girls drifted apart throughout the latter years of high school and college, but reconnected on Facebook in their 20s.

Lauren left the Church after 22 years in 2006, but Tweed was still a member and was going through a very public, messy breakup with a fellow Org member. Haggis said that although Tweed reported her ex's actions through the proper Church channels, no action was taken and Tweed began to post publicly about the experience and the emotional breakdowns she was experiencing as she lost more and more weight. Three weeks after apologizing for her behavior in a Facebook note, she shot herself.

Haggis later learned that Tweed had attempted suicide several times before, and had admitted to having suicidal thoughts since joining the Sea Org at age 12. But text messages with a mutual friend showed that the Church had recommended Tweed treat her mental health issues with vitamins and auditing, and though she was diagnosed with Bipolar I by a naturopath, she'd never been able to see any other type of doctor about her mental illness.

A month after Tweed's death, Haggis said Tweed's mother, Cathy, distanced herself from her daughter's struggles and spoke of being "at peace" with her decision.

The Church of Scientology challenges the credibility and statements of the contributors appearing in the series, and A&E provides information from the Church regarding claims made in each episode online.

Source: http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/li...gy-aftermath-season-2-episode-2-recap-1031904

Scientology Member Sherry Van Hootegem AGAIN covertly subtweet attacks Leah Remini after blocking Leah.

https://twitter.com/SherryVanHoot/status/899620889234481153

There's a related post in another thread:

Scientology’s new ‘STAND’ front unleashes bot army on Twitter — and gets zapped

By Tony Ortega, August 26, 2017

All of the newer “STAND League” bots have been permanently suspended for spamming.

https://whyweprotest.net/threads/sc...ccounts-spamming-twitter.133249/#post-2615452

Scientology draws dueling petitions involving Leah Remini, the IRS and change.org

By Tracey McManus, Tampa Bay Times, August 25, 2017

Quote:

Reaction to this month's Season 2 premiere of the Emmy-nominated Leah Remini: Scientology and the Aftermath series has been swift, from the religion's international spiritual headquarters in Clearwater and nationwide.

Two dueling online petitions have emerged since the Aug. 15 premiere: one calling for the IRS to investigate Scientology's tax exempt status. That one was launched by Jeffrey Augustine, Scientology researcher and husband of former Scientologist Karen de la Carriere, who served aboard the church's ship Apollo with founder L. Ron Hubbard.

The other, launched by a teenage Scientologist in India, calls for the cancellation of the series, alleging it is a "hate show" inciting violence.

But the most notable response comes from the Church of Scientology itself, which has historically prohibited members from reading or acknowledging negative media about the church.

Now the church's Scientologists Taking Action Against Discrimination arm is circulating form letters for parishioners to send to A&E advertisers, asking them to pull sponsorship of the show's "religious hate and bigotry which leads to violence."

Mike Rinder, a former senior Scientology official and consulting producer of the A&E show, said that's an unprecedented move. Historically, the "attack the attacker" response is handled solely by the organization's Office of Special Affairs.

Traditionally, Scientology has not wanted "people going on the internet and even knowing there is a show happening — they fear some of them will watch and be influenced," Rinder said Wednesday. "Presumably this show has gotten such wide coverage and acceptance that they figure everyone knows about it already."

Similar to other websites Scientology has launched against defectors and journalists, the church launched www.leahreminiaftermath.org in response to the show's first season. It features interviews with family members of Remini and Rinder, criticizing their characters and motives.

In a statement to the Tampa Bay Times, Church of Scientology International spokesperson Karin Pouw said the A&E series has inspired violent acts and death threats against the church.

"The singular goal of the program is to make money and boost ratings by spreading salacious lies and inciting hate and violence to promote A&E's ugly brand of religious intolerance, bigotry and hatred," Pouw said. "Scientologists have every right to answer back and make their voices heard about this disgraceful show."

A&E senior vice president Dan Silberman did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Scientology also launched a page on the website calling Clearwater Calvary Baptist Church Pastor Willy Rice "an incendiary bigot who uses his pulpit to disparage other religions and groups he doesn't like" in response to Rice calling Scientology an abusive and dangerous cult.

Rice made the comments in a statement to his congregation last month while announcing A&E producers were planning to film a town hall forum for the series at his McMullen Booth Road Church. Silberman told the Times previously the network was not involved and the filming will not take place.

The page condemns Rice's prior statements that homosexuality "is harmful for our culture, our children" and Islam is a "messed up religion."

Rice said Wednesday that Scientology's response was predictable and noted the church was attacking critics rather than countering allegations of abuse, fraud and manipulation. Rice said the A&E series has been crucial in educating the public about Scientology's alleged wrongs, like forced disconnection of families, abuse, financial exploitation and intimidation of critics.

"We want to be part of just sharing the truth about what we think is an abusive presence in our area," Rice said.

Rice said that since his statement in July, a group of about a dozen people wearing shirts from Scientology's Narconon drug rehabilitation program have attended Sunday services. He said they are welcome.

"Our church doesn't hide," Rice said. "We don't charge people $100,000 to find out what we believe in."

Pouw said the Change.org petition for the IRS to investigate and revoke Scientology's tax exempt status is "no different than if a group of white supremacists filed a petition calling for the NAACP to have its exemption revoked."

In his petition, Augustine says Scientology's tax exemption should be investigated because Scientology leader David Miscavige has become "the sole managing agent of Scientology," abolishing the system of corporate checks and balances promised in the 1992 exemption application. He also alleges Scientology has refused to grant refunds to dissatisfied members as represented in its application for tax exemption; uses tax-exempt dollars to engage in harassing critics and journalists; covered up child sexual abuse; abuses foreign workers and forces them to work for low or no pay; and other misbehaviors.

"Scientology is the alter ego of David Miscavige and they lied to the IRS to get their tax exemption," Augustine said Thursday.

In Clearwater, Scientology owns $207 million worth of property under its name, 74 percent of which is tax exempt for religious purposes. It paid more than $1 million in property taxes in 2016 on the remaining 26 percent.

City Manager Bill Horne said the city has no official position on whether Scientology's tax exemption should be examined. But he said given "their level of activity, the public could benefit from them paying more taxes."

Source: http://www.tampabay.com/news/scient...ons-involving-leah-remini-the-irs-and/2335085

Thank you Bill Horne for observing that the scientology crime syndicate does not pay a fair share of taxes, but receives multiple benefits from the tax subsidies of everyone else. The organization is a fascist parasite.

DAMN !!!

There's a related post in another thread:

How Scientology tore Leah Remini and Lisa Marie Presley apart

By Emily Smith, Page Six

https://whyweprotest.net/threads/li...out-ohh-the-lyrics.101616/page-9#post-2615555

Tomorrow’s ‘Leah Remini’: When Scientology destroys a family, it burns it to the ground

By Tony Ortega, August 28, 2017

Quote:

How far will a Scientologist parent go to punish their kids if they reject the church? That’s one of the questions we were left with after watching Tuesday night’s episode of Leah Remini: Scientology and the Aftermath, the third episode of Leah’s second season.

Leah Remini and Mike Rinder travel to Oregon in this episode to spend time with Liz Gale, someone we wrote a lengthy story about in November. But even if you’re familiar with that story, you’re going to learn a lot about Liz and her family in this episode that you haven’t heard before.

Liz and her older brother Philip grew up as third generation Scientologists. In fact, Liz explains that her grandmother got her great-grandmother into Dianetics, so she might be considered a fourth generation church member. Scientology, in other words, is a long tradition in the family, but it’s not the family’s only legacy.

As Liz explains to Mike and Leah, her great-great grandparents came west on the Oregon Trail and homesteaded what turned into a 1,300-acre spread of spectacular Oregon backcountry that, when the filming starts, Liz shares with her mother, Marie Gale.

And it’s fortunate that there’s so much land, since the two really don’t want to have anything to do with each other, and Liz points out that her mother lives far down the hill from her.

The two families uneasily shared the family land for a variety of reasons that Liz goes into in great detail. Her parents, she explained, were pretty much the perfect Scientology couple who met at a Scientology “org.” Their mother, Marie, became a national spokeswoman for Citizens Commission on Human Rights, Scientology’s unhinged front group that pretends that it’s going to rid the earth of the mental health industry. Marie did her best to give the impression that she was raising the epitome of a healthy Scientology family.

But parents who are so deeply into their Scientology journeys rarely have time for kids, and Liz and Philip were shipped off to Scientology boarding school at a young age. For Liz, it was hell, and she rebelled in many ways, culminating with her attempt to commit suicide at 14. Philip rebelled in another way — by being a prodigy, getting himself into MIT at only 15 years old.

As you can imagine, things didn’t turn out well for either one of them. Philip Gale’s 1998 suicide — he threw himself out of MIT’s tallest building on L. Ron Hubbard’s birthday, March 13 — and Liz’s rejection of Scientology have been well documented here at the Bunker and by journalist Mark Ebner. But once again, Leah Remini finds so much untold material as she draws it out of Liz in another compelling and emotional episode.

Continued at https://tonyortega.org/2017/08/28/t...-destroys-a-family-it-burns-it-to-the-ground/

Totally on-source:
"We rather have you dead than incapable." - L. Ron Hubbard

For the 2nd time now, PAC Base was solo-raided today by a masked Anon, carrying a sign that read:

"Watch Leah Remini: Scientology and the Aftermath on A&E"

'Leah Remini: Scientology and the Aftermath' Examines Family Dynamics in the Church

A former third-generation Scientologist recounts the hardships and tragedies that caused family conflicts and led to her leaving the church.

By Lexy Perez, The Hollywood Reporter

Quote:

The third episode of season two of Leah Remini: Scientology and the Aftermath assessed family dynamics existing within the Church. Despite suffering from hardships that include depression and suicidal thoughts, families are dedicated to placing the utmost importance on their religion.

Throughout the episode, Remini and her Aftermath partner Mike Rinder explained that Scientology can be difficult to walk away from, for those who've known nothing of life without the Church's influence.

Elizabeth Gale, the daughter of Marie Gale, a public Scientologist spokesperson of the Citizen Commission on Human Rights (CCHR), detailed the timeline of her doubts about her religion. Gale describes her and her brother Phillip as being born into a "perfect Scientology family," because of her mother’s important role and their family’s dedication to practicing traditional customs.

Recalling the emotional triggers that stimulated her doubts, Gale outlined Phillip’s accident that occurred when he was four. After breaking his arm, Phillip was required to undergo a surgical procedure. After surgery, her family noticed Phillip acting differently, with mood swings and tantrums. Marie attributed his behavioral change to her acting as a "restimulator."

According to L. Ron Hubbard’s book, Dianetics, a child’s misbehavior is the mother’s fault, because she activates bad memories in her child for what she did when the child was in the womb. When a child reaches the age of eight, the memories need to be "cleared."

Following dianetics protocol, Phillip was sent to Delphi Academy, a Scientology boarding school to learn the proper customs of being a Scientologist.

“She believed that she had to give him the best chance by giving him away from her to the next best place,” explains Gale of her mother’s decision to send Phillip away.

Phillip excelled as a student, whereas Gale struggled with being away. "I probably called home crying everyday," recounts Gale.

In 1995, Gale learned that her father died of a sudden heart attack. Marie refused to discuss it or unveil a sympathetic response, for it was considered wrongful by the Church.

Unable to cope with her emotions, Gale stopped going to school and moved to LA with her mother, where she began attending Church of Scientology Celebrity Centre International. She recounts her mother leaving her to be cared for by a stranger so that she could work at the Sea Org, a claim her mother has argued to be false.

“She’s basically saying, ‘I’m done being a mom,’“ explains Gale. Although Gale signed a contract to join the Sea Org at the age of 14, her feelings of abandonment led her to a suicide attempt. Gale recalls feeling "hopeless" and the pressure of having a path "too set in stone," describing the Sea Org as a "prison sentence."

“You’re told the outcome is you’re going to be happy and perfect. I just never felt that way, overall genuinely happy,” said Gale.

After her suicide attempt, Marie visited Gale in the hospital, only for Gale to learn that it was because of the Church’s orders and thus assuring she wouldn’t be put in the hands of psychiatrists, something the CCH fights against.

Gale began to question her religion, unsure as to why her mother would have to consistently leave her own children and why she failed to receive any love after her father’s death.

Meanwhile, Phillip began facing similar doubts and struggles. After graduating and attending MIT at the age of 15, he moved to Los Angeles to work for Earthlink. It was there that he began dating a girlfriend that didn’t follow Scientology. After consistently being approached about his dedication to his church, Phillip returned to MIT, only to suffer from depression and suicidal thoughts.

At 19 years old, Phillip jumped from the 15th floor of the Green Building on campus and fell to his death, leaving a suicide note that said his family had nothing to do with his decision, only his struggling mind. His death took place on the same day as L. Ron Hubbard’s birthday, a renowned celebratory day for the Church of Scientology.

It was later discovered that prior to his death, Phillip had joined an anti-Scientology newsgroup online and was anonymously interviewed by the Boston Herald. Marie contacted the group, blaming her son's death on their negative influence and citing that "he made his own decision," for his suicide had nothing to do with Scientology.

After 24 years, Gale left Scientology in 2007. Despite raising a family in an Oregon home, once occupied by her family's ancestors, Gale's distance from Scientology resulted in an estrangement from her mother. While her mother and step-father informed her that her children would be in Scientology whether they "liked it or not," Gale vowed to give her children the free life she was raised to believe she couldn’t have.

“I knew I wouldn’t inherit this anymore, but I had to pick. I picked my children,” said Gale.

Of Gale's story, Remini notes, “In the end, this family lost it all. The whole family has disintegrated, because of Scientology."

The Church of Scientology challenges the credibility and statements of the contributors appearing in the series, and A&E provides information from the Church regarding claims made in each episode online.

(Read the Church of Scientology's statement in response to allegations here [cult link removed].)

Source: http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/li...entology-aftermath-season-2-episode-3-1033776

Leah Remini Says Scientology Wanted Her to Convert King of Queens Costar Kevin James — but She Refused | People

While they grew close filming nine seasons of The King of Queens, former Scientologist Leah Remini says she never tried to convert her longtime costar and friend Kevin James — much to the chagrin of the church.

“They always tried to get me to, [asking] ‘Why is he not in? Why have you not promoted it to him?’ I was like, ‘Because he’s Catholic. He doesn’t want anything to do with it,’ ” Remini, 47, says in this week’s issue of PEOPLE. “They let it go after a while, but usually you’d be expected to recruit, especially with somebody you work with for nine years.”

http://people.com/tv/leah-remini-scientology-wanted-to-convert-kevin-james-why-she-didnt/

Leah Remini reveals that the Church of Scientology wanted her to convert this one actor | AOL Entertainment
https://www.aol.com/article/enterta...y-wanted-her-to-convert-kevin-james/23190761/

Leah Remini: 'I couldn't recruit Kevin James to Scientology' | Belfast Telegraph
http://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/e...ruit-kevin-james-to-scientology-36087035.html

Leah Remini Reveals She Was Pressured By Scientology To Convert King Of Queens Co-Star Kevin James But She Refused! | Celebrity Insider
http://celebrityinsider.org/leah-re...ns-co-star-kevin-james-but-she-refused-63007/

Why Leah Remini Says She Didn't Try Getting King Of Queens Co-Star Kevin James Into Scientology | Cinema Blend
https://www.cinemablend.com/televis...f-queens-co-star-kevin-james-into-scientology

Leah Remini Discusses Pressure to Recruit Kevin James for Scientology | The Daily Dish
http://www.bravotv.com/blogs/the-one-person-leah-remini-wouldnt-recruit-for-scientology

'You're expected to recruit': Leah Remini claims Scientology church asked her to convert her King of Queens co-star Kevin James | Daily Mail
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbi...-says-Scientologists-asked-convert-celeb.html

Leah Remini Says Scientology Pressured Her To Recruit ‘King of Queens’ Co-Star Kevin James | Decider
https://decider.com/2017/08/31/leah...o-recruit-king-of-queens-co-star-kevin-james/

Leah Remini Reveals Scientology Wanted Her To Convert ‘The King Of Queens’ Co-Star Kevin James | ET Canada
http://etcanada.com/news/251863/lea...nvert-the-king-of-queens-co-star-kevin-james/

Leah Remini: Church of Scientology wanted me to convert Kevin James | Fox News
http://www.foxnews.com/entertainmen...ntology-wanted-me-to-convert-kevin-james.html

Leah Remini Claims She Was Pressured To Bring Kevin James Into Scientology | HuffPost
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry...-into-scientology_us_59a6c46be4b084581a14acf3

Leah Remini Says the Church of Scientology Got So Mad at Her For Not Converting Kevin James | Jezebel
http://jezebel.com/leah-remini-says-the-church-of-scientology-got-so-mad-a-1798622288

Leah Remini Says the Church of Scientology Wanted Her to Recruit 'King of Queens' Co-Star Kevin James | Maxim
https://www.maxim.com/entertainment/leah-remini-kevin-james-scientology-2017-8

Leah Remini: Church of Scientology wanted me to convert Kevin James | News.com.au
http://www.news.com.au/entertainmen...s/news-story/b26dd79f6968534a8612a9120d133df9

Leah Remini says she was pressured to recruit Kevin James to Scientology | Newsday
http://www.newsday.com/entertainmen...recruit-kevin-james-to-scientology-1.14099937

Remini: Scientologists Wanted Kevin James | Newser
http://www.newser.com/story/247960/remini-scientologists-wanted-kevin-james.html

Leah Remini: Kevin James Coveted by Scientologists — But She Wouldn't Flip Him | Newsmax
https://www.newsmax.com/TheWire/leah-remini-kevin-james-coveted-scientologists/2017/08/31/id/810900/

Leah Remini Claims She Was Pressured To Recruit Kevin James Into Scientology During Their King Of Queens Days! | Perez Hilton
http://perezhilton.com/2017-08-30-l...-king-queens-church-recruit-convert-religion/

Leah Remini Says She Refused to Convert Kevin James to Scientology | Pop Culture
http://popculture.com/2017/08/30/leah-remini-kevin-james-scientology-convert-refused/

Leah Remini Convert Kevin James Scientology | Refinery29
http://www.refinery29.com/2017/08/170329/leah-remini-pressured-convert-kevin-james-scientology

Leah Remini claims Scientology pushed her to convert Kevin James | Salon
http://www.salon.com/2017/08/30/leah-remini-scientology-kevin-james/

Leah Remini: I Was Pressured to Recruit Kevin James Into Scientology | wetpaint
http://www.wetpaint.com/leah-remini-kevin-james-scientology-1613949/

Leah Remini Says Scientology Wanted Her to Convert 'King of Queens' Costar Kevin James — but She Refused | Yahoo Celebrity
https://www.yahoo.com/celebrity/leah-remini-says-scientology-wanted-120020889.html

This story was brought up 1 hour 19 minutes into the Drew and Mike podcast which prompts them to recap in detail the latest Aftermath episode.

As Leah Remini’s second season hammers away, Scientology is losing its mind

By Tony Ortega, August 31, 2017

Quote:

It’s probably safe to say that the Church of Scientology is now in the grips of a complete meltdown.

We were struck by the church’s response to the first season of Leah Remini’s A&E series Scientology and the Aftermath, but as we have pointed out before, Scientology leader David Miscavige took things to a whole new level when the news was announced that A&E was bringing Remini back for a second season.

And now that we’re three episodes into the second season, we’re starting to realize something. We’ve never seen David Miscavige lose his shit like this.

Scientology’s attacks on its critics has a long and well-documented history. Heck, we even wrote a whole book about it. And generally, over the years, you could count on Scientology to follow certain patterns in how it went after the people it perceived as enemies. During Leah’s first season, for example, we laid it out for her when we appeared in episode seven. Leah showed us all the scary letters that Scientology’s lawyers and spokespeople had sent A&E and the production company. And we told her, this was very standard for the church, and sometimes it actually works — we have personal knowledge of several television productions that were halted because executives panicked over similar threatening letters.

We told Leah that we knew such letters weren’t going to scare her off. But we told her what else she could expect: 1. Websites attacking her, 2. videos on those websites attacking her, and 3. websites and videos attacking the people she has as guests on her show.

All three predictions have come true, and we’ve written numerous times about some of the attacks on Leah and her guests that have shown up, particularly at a website that actually carries the name of the church on it. (In the past, Scientology used anonymously-run websites to post its smears.)

But what we didn’t predict is just how unhinged Scientology’s attacks have become, and so reckless. We can’t help wondering if the wheels haven’t simply fallen off the crazy train.

Let’s go through some examples of what we’re talking about.

Continued at https://tonyortega.org/2017/08/31/a...-hammers-away-scientology-is-losing-its-mind/

Leah Remini Feels Guilty Going to Therapy Because She Says Scientology Opposes It | People

Quote:

Four years after abruptly leaving the controversial church of Scientology, Leah Remini says she’s still adjusting.
“You rebuild slowly. It doesn’t happen overnight,” the actress, 47, says in the new issue of PEOPLE. “It’s a learning process; it’s changing the way you think.”

Indeed, Remini was in the church for more than 30 years before she walked away in 2013 with husband Angelo Pagán, 59, daughter Sofia, 13, and mother Vicki. And her post-Scientology life has been challenging.

The star has been seeing a therapist now for two years, which she says is difficult because of how her former church views psychiatry.

“I have that guilty conscience,” Remini says. “If I make the most minor transgression” of a Scientology rule, like being rude or losing her temper, “I call my therapist and go, ‘I should be punished for this; I need you to reprimand me.’ She’s like, ‘No, that’s not what therapy is.’ ”

“We really have no debate with a psychologist. We do have issues with psychiatrists who subject patients, especially children, to dangerous procedures and drugs,” a Scientology spokesperson wrote in a statement to PEOPLE.

Last year, Remini launched the Emmy-nominated A&E docu-series Leah Remini: Scientology and the Aftermath. Now in its second season, the show follows Remini as she shares fellow ex-Scientologists’ stories, including allegations of abuse within the church.

Continued at http://people.com/tv/leah-remini-feels-guilty-seeking-therapy-scientology-opposes-it/

Leah Remini: J Lo's Scientologist Dad Is Supposed to Disconnect From Her | People

Quote:

Leah Remini is opening up about how her longtime pal Jennifer Lopez fits into her fight against the Church of Scientology.

The actress, 47, walked away from the controversial religion in 2013. Her husband Angelo Pagán, 59, daughter Sofia, 13, and mother Vicki left with her, but Remini says many who leave Scientology have had family members who stay within the church feel forced to “disconnect” from them.

The church says no one is forced to cut contact, and disconnection is a choice.

During her last years in the church, Remini became disillusioned when she started to question disconnection and the actions of church leader David Miscavige, and she says the church hypocritically treats celebrities and their families — like her friend Jennifer Lopez’s father, David Lopez, who has been a Scientologist for 30 years.

“The [practice] of Scientology says her father should be disconnecting from her because she’s connected to me. And that hasn’t happened,” Remini says in the new issue of PEOPLE. “Although I don’t want that to happen to Jennifer or her family, it is the [practice] of Scientology. They do it to everybody else who is not a big name.”

Scientology denies that it distinguishes among its parishioners based on their fame. “It is Remini who is the attacker,” a Scientology spokesperson wrote in a statement to PEOPLE (read the church’s full statement [cult link removed] here). “Her whole anti-Scientology shtick was scripted and choreographed by her, casting herself in her drama as the ‘victim’ so she could cash in on her false narrative while savaging her friends and those who helped her most of her life.”

Last year, Remini launched her Emmy-nominated A&E docu-series Leah Remini: Scientology and the Aftermath. Now in its second season, the show follows Remini as she shares fellow ex-Scientologists’s stories, including allegations of disconnection and abuse within the church.

“I would like to be the face of resistance to abuse,” adds Remini, who will reunite with her The King of Queens costar Kevin James in season two of Kevin Can Wait, returning Sept. 25.

Source: http://people.com/tv/leah-remini-je...ogy-father-should-disconnect-because-friends/

Ex-Scientologist Leah Remini slams the church for hypocrisy for not forcing pal Jennifer Lopez's father to 'disconnect' from his famous daughter

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbi...Remini-slams-Scientology-hypocrisy-stars.html

I think most of the splinter groups are melting down as well, like the Freezone and Metapsychology. They are coercive, albeit substantially less.
You have to be quite stupid to not see that Hubbard's system is destructive even if you don't practice the worst aspects of it, like SP declares and forced disconnection.
They still demonize people who don't agree with them and use emails and phone calls to their acolytes that a particular person could be an unspecified threat and communicating with them is bad. It has the same effect. Been there, seen that.

Tomorrow on ‘Leah Remini’: You’re going to learn what it’s like on Scientology’s ‘Bridge’

By Tony Ortega, September 4, 2017

Quote:

After three gut-wrenching victim-centered episodes of Leah Remini: Scientology and the Aftermath‘s second season, A&E is shaking things up by running a “special” episode that we think is not only well timed, but a long time coming.

Tomorrow night, you will begin your training as Scientologists.

Well, that’s the line we used a few years ago when we did a similar thing here at the Underground Bunker — give non-Scientologists a taste of what Scientology’s “Bridge to Total Freedom” is all about in our series “Up the Bridge” with experts Claire Headley and Bruce Hines.

And we’re really happy to see Bruce show up in this episode. He’s not only someone who taught other Scientologists L. Ron Hubbard’s “technology,” he’s very good at explaining things for non-Scientologists. (We still consider his explanation of the “Truth Rundown” that he gave Mark Bunker one of the most chilling things to come out of Scientology.)

With Bruce’s help, Leah Remini and Mike Rinder set things up by talking about what Dianetics is, what it promised, and how it was originally pitched as a science, not a religion. And what did Hubbard promise if you engaged in his counseling and went up his “Bridge”?

“He promised superhuman powers,” Bruce says. And did Bruce ever see evidence of any, Leah asks him? After some 15,000 hours of auditing other people, Bruce says he never saw superhuman abilities demonstrated by a single Scientologist.

It’s a simple thing, but we’re really glad that Leah and Mike are taking the time to spell this out.

Leah also brings on her mother, Vicki Marshall, the person who got Leah into Scientology as a child. And she asks her mother a great question: What got you into it?

Vicki explains that she had wanted to be a nurse and to help people. And she liked what she read in Dianetics, that it claimed it could cure all human ailments. That sounded like a future she could believe in, Vicki says.

It seems so simple, but often we find that Scientologists tell us they were hoping for such basic promises — improving themselves, or the planet — and soon found themselves paying tens of thousands of dollars for courses, giving up their kids to a paramilitary organization, and expecting the world to become a better place, all based on the promises of a 1950 paperback.

What really makes this special episode useful is what happens next. After describing the Bridge, its promises, and how someone might be taken in by it, Leah and Bruce actually engage in some Scientology processes on camera to give viewers an idea of what it’s like. Bruce reads questions from the “Grades” — costly intermediate levels that a Scientologist goes through on the way to Clear — and Leah responds, illustrating just how simple and repetitive Scientology processes are, and how ludicrously expensive they are.

Again, it seems like a simple thing, but based on the kinds of questions we get constantly on Twitter and Facebook, this episode seems timed perfectly for the many new people Leah is attracting to the subject who naturally want some idea not only what the abuses of Scientology are, but what Scientology is actually selling, including OT 3, the infamous auditing level with the story of “Xenu” that even newcomers to the subject have heard about. Yes, Xenu really is what you learn about when you get to this expensive upper level.

“It’s insane. But we all did it,” Leah says.

We have a feeling those newer viewers are going to find this a gripping episode and truly useful.

Especially when Leah and company get to OT 8, the very top (at least currently) of the Bridge.

In just a few minutes, Vicki — who is OT 8 — and Mike and Leah take apart OT 8 in devastating fashion, and if this episode is remembered for anything, it should be this segment.

As Leah explains to one of the cameramen, who is apparently astonished by the secret of OT 8 revealed in the show, this program has just saved you anywhere north of the half a million bucks it takes to get all the way up the Bridge.

Continued at https://tonyortega.org/2017/09/04/t...o-learn-what-its-like-on-scientologys-bridge/

Does anyone know what this video was about? I only heard rumors it contained some bad shit about Leah Remini.

WTF is Prometheus Global?

They own Billboard and the Hollywood Reporter.

So what’s the story with the jewtube takedown? Anyone saved the video?

I don’t know how it got there but I think this is the video. It was on the kult channel and nao is no longer there.
https://rutube.ru/video/139d1cf0cd1340092531d24f1f59b874

Why would Prometheus take that video down?

I think Leah not vetting her sources is the point of the video. I have been told that it is bad journalistic practice not to vet sources. I think the take down is not about how long the video clip is but the way the video clip has been used by the cult might be embarrassing for Leah, just saying.