My story about scientology. (Bid)
Tilman Hausherr
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Bid is so shy :-) So for those who haven't web access here her web
page.
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My story about scientology
Part 1
By Birgitta Dagnell, Sweden
It all started on the autumn of 1970 when I was out for a walk with my
babygirl. A man came by and asked me to do a test for finding out more about
myself. Later the same day I went into the so called Church of Scientology
in Örebro, Sweden for doing the test. I had never heard of this church
before. I found the people in the church very friendly and interested in me.
After the test was done I was introduced to the Dianetics book and told that
it was a brand new science discovered in that book. I didn't really believe
that so I said no about buying a copy. Then I was asked to do the
communication course and said no to that also as I didn't think I had any
problems with communication. I had been singing in public since the age of
six and was used to talk and sing without being nervous. And my public
seemed to like me. I was told that those facts had nothing to do with it -
the comm.course was entirely different. Anyway - I sad no thanks and went
away as this church thing made me a bit suspicious about what it really was
about. I didn't want to believe in or join some kind of organized new
religion.
In March 1971, I received a letter from them, saying that they wanted me to
come to them, some important person was about to hold a lecture. When
arriving in the evening I saw a man in uniform walking around and the others
told me whispering "this is Captain Bill - Rons closest man" and I
understood that he must be something special, but I wondered about the
uniform. He showed a movie about Sea Org and it started very dramatically
with the music "Also spracht Zarathustra" which impressed on me. So I signed
finally up for the comm.course and started next day.
oooooooo
The years passed by with many courses and lots of auditing and in December
1979, I joined staff and started to work as an Class IV auditor in the
Malmoe Org. All the training was paid by myself. In March/April 1980 the
Malmoe Org was raided 3 times by the police and they wanted me to handle bad
press and public relations. So I had to join the Guardians Office and I was
surprised to see that the GO always did know some ten minutes in advance
that the police should come to the org and also that the GO did know what
the Treasure Sec was telling the police when he was arrested. I was sent to
East Grinstead in England for an comprehensive PR-training. I remember I
read "Public Relations" by Cutlip and Center, "A spy and his Master" and
"Art of War" plus tons of issues from L Ron Hubbard. I had to understand
"Operation Snow-white" and other secret operations and programmes.
Back in Malmoe I started to work with PR and actually did good in this.
oooooooo
In 1982 many rumours and turbulence was going on. We had to learn that the
mission holders and the whole present management was suppressive and most
people in the Guardians Offices over the world. In January 1983 the Guardian
of Malmoe received an order from RTC to send all reserves money to
Luxemburg, which was complied with. Shortly after that I found myself
upgraded to AG Malmoe as the former AG and the other GO staff was ripped
off. The AG hadn't sent enought money. So we were two people left in the GO;
me and AG SOCO.
In February I was called to come over to FOLO in Denmark for a briefing. I
went over and met with the person in charge Allan Hubbert from Special Unit
in Los Angeles. He smiled and told me nicely that I had to do a little
"spring-cleaning-programme" called DPF (Deck Project Force). Had never heard
about it, but he showed me an Flag order written by LRH. I was told that all
remaining staff from the GO's in Europe should show up on the DPF. The
reason was that we were the cause why the churches didn't expand and that we
were enemies of the Church. The GO's should close down and be replaced by
"Department of Special Affairs". Only very clean, especially choosen,
non-guardian people should be appointed to this Department. We, the enemies
and traitors should be put onto the DPF as an rehabilitation.
I found that I had to start on the DPF right away. There was no time to go
back home to change clothes or bring more clothes or even to make a
phonecall to my husband and children. In order to make phonecalls one had to
write a dispatch, asking for permission and telling the purpose of the call
and so on. It took me around one month to get permission for my first call
home. So there I was in my black long trousers, black jumper and my mink
coat. I learned to use my mink coat as my pillow as well. Those cloths I had
to wear for more than one month. I was one of the first on place, of the 82
of us who soon should be collected from all over Europe.
The "rehabilitation" consisted of lots of work, mainly cleaning, and started
at 8 AM with roll-call. We had to say "Ay Sir" when called upon or spoken
to. We were not permitted to talk to people outside the DPF and later on not
to DPF-members from other countries. In that way be became isolated. The
first night we were only 2 people in a normal 2-beds room. Next night and
the following, we were 18 people in it. We happen to get breakfast
sometimes, but that was not normal. I remember one morning when the 82 of us
got 16 slices of bread to share and one man took 6 of them. It was near a
civil war got started. The meals was eaten in a cellar where we shared the
space with lots of pidgeons. It was very dirty, filled with birdshit. At one
occasion I had to fight with the pidgeons to get my meal. The food was never
enough for all of us and consisted of rice and beans. No plates, no
cutleries and no pots. Once we got soup, and I was lucky to possess a small
plastic mug so I could drink it. We used to feel like " the poor man with no
spoon when the sky is raining semolina".
The work consisted of mainly cleaning toilets, corridors and hotel rooms or
some painting and construction work. Supplies for cleaning was very poor,
like brushes with almost no brush left. Only cold water and no washing
detergent. I was mainly doing cleaning at Hotel Nordland and the small hotel
opposite to Nordland. At one occasion I should clean bathrooms and a long
hallway in the other hotel. I had high fever and the floor in the hallway
was very dirty. I had to do the cleaning with a toothbrush, crawling on my
knees as I wasn't able to stand up. Next day I couldn't get out of my bed, I
was too sick in pneumonia. Guards came and tried to get me up, but I
couldn't. The day after I had to get back to work again. The working hours
was to 11 PM but we were often waked up in the night for doing more work.
Sometimes we worked til 5 in the morning with only two breaks of 30 minutes
each, during all those hours. We were never allowed to walk or sit down -
always running.
Some work was pure evil;
1. One of us was assigned to paint the reception area at FOLO and 3
others of us did the preparatory work. She thought it was quite a nice job
and it looked nice and clean when she had finished painting. But after 5
days the colour hadn't get dry and we found out that the paint was mixed
without drying substance in it. She had to scrape the whole reception from
this wet paint and then she received an SP declare and left.
2. Some others had to wash scrap papers. It was 5 of us, standing on the
yard at FOLO, taking scrap papers from sacks, put it into ice cold water,
keep it under the water til it was soaking wet and then press out all water
and make small balls of it. Then return it to the sack again. The hands
ached as it was below freezing outside. The purpose of this washing was to
be able to put more paper into the sacks as the air was pressed out.
After a couple of weeks, we got to know that we should start doing ethics in
the evenings. We were pleased as that gave us a possibility to sit down on
chairs. It was not the kind of ethics we were used to anyhow; first one had
to write up all bad actions done (overts) in this lifetime and past lives.
Then one was put before an auditor with an E-meter. On each side of the
auditor a missionaire was standing (Mike Sutter and Isa-Bella Ferrer) The
auditor, his name was Des, read up the overt, checked it on the Meter and
the missionaires started to yell at you. This is called gang-bang sec
checking. "This is not what you have done, you have HUGE overts, you are the
most evil one on earth, we want your real overts.... " This screaming could
go on for an hour or more til we "recognized" that we really was that bad
and evil. Many couldn't stand it. One night an italian man started to cry
and admitted to be that evil and became very thankful to the missionaires
who had revealed the truth about him. He went down on the floor. Crawled on
his knees to missionaire Mike Sutter and kissed his shoes. Mike looked at
him scornfully and said "you are declared, get out of here". The italian man
had no money and didn't really know how to get back to his country. Later I
heard that he had found a cargo ship in the harbor who gave him a free ride
to Italy.
Another lady I remember was from Belgium. She got about the same treatment
as described above, but she gave them the wrong cognition. In the session
she told them that she finally understood how much she had neglected her
husband and children because of scientology. After the above treatment she
tried to escape but failed. The following week after this incident, she
didn't speak with anybody. She sneaked around on the yard, sometimes
laughting hysterically for herself. I was told that she went mad. Then she
suddenly was gone. I don't know what happened to her, but have been thinking
about her a lot.
After a month I got permission to go home and see my children over the
weekend. I called my elder daughter, she was 13, and told her that I should
come home on Saturday. She became so very happy and should make a nice
dinner to welcome me. We were both in tears of happiness when talking about
it. When Saturday came, I was told that my permission was cancelled because
they thought I shouldn't come back or tell people about what's going on in
Denmark. Half of the day was spent trying to convince them that I had to go
home to see my children, that they were expecting me and so on. Nothing what
I said helped. It was no. As I couldn't stand the thought of my little girl
being so happy, making dinner for me, I decided to escape in the evening. So
late in the evening I sneaked out from Nordland, walked my way to the
ferries and went to Malmoe. I arrived to my home around midnight and waked
up the family. We were all so happy to meet again until my husband told me
that I had to go back in the morning. I said no, no way, I never go there
again. But he persuaded me by saying that I had to go to the RPF or that we
had to divorce if I didn't. So I went back.
On my way to Nordland I met Barbara Schwartz from Germany. The two of us
were room-mates and friends as I helped her one night when she was gone and
they asked me if she had been in her bed during the night. I didn't really
know if she was, as I was sleeping, but told them that she was there the
whole night. Now, I met her and she told me that she had to report my going
away and that I should be sent to the RPF (about the same, but usually is a
longer cycle). I convinced her to not report me and she finally agreed as I
had helped her once.
So I was back on the Deck again. One night all of us were yelled at by the
missionaries. After the yelling one of them asked if we had any questions. I
had a question and stretched my hand. As they thought it to be very impudent
of me having a question, they should make an example and ordered me to come
forward. I was put onto an chair and faced the other 80 people. They told
the others to look at me as the real suppressive personality. The three
missionares yelled at me and derided me for two hours in front of the
others. Finally my comrades was told to go and I was alone with them. I was
sitting on the chair for three hours with them yelling at me, telling me
that I had never done anything good in my life. Mike Sutter worked up such
an anger that he spit into my face, threw chairs around and threw a table so
it hit my stomach. Mike told me I should be expelled from scoientology for
ever. There was nothing in life I was so afraid of as to listen to those
words. I remember I was thinking "expelled, but I'm still alive". After
those three hours, I started to cry and told them that I always had been
trying to do alright and that I had been following LRH policies all the time
on staff.
That became the turning point. I was told that this setup was a test to see
if I could keep my position. Now I was their first product! And I was their
star! I should become the first officer in the new Department of Special
Affairs! I felt very happy and very, very strong as I wasn't broken.
oooooooo
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