Celebrity Scientologists

Hm, are there many non-American celebrity Scientologists, or is the hardcore celebrity recruiting mostly a US thing?

puddingcup wrote:Hm, are there many non-American celebrity Scientologists, or is the hardcore celebrity recruiting mostly a US thing?

Other countries seem much more hip to the fact that it's a money-grubbing cult.

JESUS. Seriously.

Is this a huge scandal to many people, though? I feel like this girlfriend audition was kind of an open secret when Katie and he started dating.

I think it was more a rumor, but now there is corroboration!

There were gossipy rumors on the internets. I feel like the cover of Vanity Fair is giving it a legitimacy and mainstream presence that has to be infuriating the Clams. Friends of mine that pay no attention to Hollywood were talking about it.

I'm living at the cutting edge of Hollywood gossip, got it.

Plus, I had heard the Jennifer Garner and Scarlet stories, which were creepy, but also kind of funny (no harm done, etc.). This story about the British actress is horrifying.

Jimmy James never had luck with his wife candidate list, why did Tommy think it would work.

Leah Remini rumored as the next high-profile defector.

So the Leah Remini Leaves Scientology story gets crazier, as she filed a missing persons report for Shelly Miscavige.

But then, mere hours later, LAPD "find" her and close the case. Which is, you know, not REMOTELY suspicious or anything.

That poor, poor woman. (If it was even her.)

I don't remember knowing this about Neil Gaiman's past?

I've heard about it over the years. I didn't know his ex was still into it though.

So Going Clear.

Interesting to see Hubbard in all his pomposity. Sounds like a compulsive liar who started believing his own lie.

As for Miscavage all I could think of was Stalin, especially how after he gained power and became paranoid started purging the party of rivals, patsies and allies.

He's also SOOOOOO in love with Tom Cruise.

He's also SOOOOOO in love with Tom Cruise.

The picture of them on their matching bikes made me think of engagement photos I have seen.

Given how short he is I am wondering why Tom has never attempted to cast him as his best friend in a movie. Though my second cousin who I know is 5'7" recently posted a few pics of her and Tom for Throw Back Thursday and I was reminded that while he is short he is at least 5'8". For what its worth my cousin who has worked with some huge celebrities has always said that Tom is one of the nicest people she has ever met (not that he wasn't crazy) but that he was always super sweet, she never speaks negatively about celebrities even to family but when people are awesome she does speak about them (she spent two years traveling the world with Madonna and has never said a word about her, but her silence speaks volume). She had a baby a few years ago in her early 40s and hadn't seen Tom in about a decade and at the very least his assistant sent flowers and donated to money to a charity for premature babies (her daughter was born two months early), so I always do think about when I am talking how batshit crazy Tom is on the internet! I mean I still think he is weird, controlling and crazy but fuck Scientology!

To bring it back to Going Clear, I noticed that since it aired I have seen three or four ads for Scientology on normal television! I normally FFwd ads but literally rewound because I thought "is that an ad for Scientology?" The only ad I remember seeing for Scientology (in my youth they used to show ads for Dianetics on late night tv) was during the the 2014 Superbowl when my Seahawks slaughtered the Denver Broncos.

but fuck Scientology!

Yeah I know Gibney/Lawrence really targeted him and Travolta, for caving to blackmail, because they know how the plebes/non-celebrities are exploited and harmed, but I dunno it's still blackmail, and Cruise at least seems to completely buy in 100%, I absolutely get why they don't leave or abdicate. If you are in the grips of a cult you are in the grips of a cult, and it takes actual clarity and courage to get out.

My favorite thing lately is if you google any of the names of the people in the documentary, you get sponsored Google ads about the discredited Paul Haggis, Marty Rathbun, etc. Funny, I never actually wanted to opt out of Google text ads before now.

In the hit pieces on the ex-Scientologists in that website the sniping claims of "C-List Actor" and "His career has gone downhill in the last decade" certainly give credence to at least the spirit of the Fair Game policy.

To make it even worse they call Spanky a "Drama Queen" and accuse another woman of being a prostitute in their headlines. As if I weren't convinced they were loathsome, here's a bit of mysogny to remove all doubt!

Anyway I remember Kevin Pollack giving an interview at the height of Tom's sofa jumping crazy and saying in effect that he was still a good friend and a really nice person. At some point it's like someone having an abusive partner.

If Travolta is still in unwillingly as suspected I wonder what they have on him. I mean if he is gay that would hardly be a shock.

I imagine at this point it's hard for Travolta to imagine being out of the cult, and perhaps even harder to admit he was wrong for all those years. The Scientologists were (if I recall correctly), largely "handling" his son's health issues through their typical dubious methods, and he probably can't admit to himself that it might not have been the best possible treatment.

Jenna Miscavage Hill's Scientology memoir is 1.99 in ebook format on most retailers today.