The weekly show where I answer viewer questions left in the comments sections of my Critical Q&A videos or sent to me by email to AskChrisShelton@gmail.com. This week, the questions I answer are:
(1) How does the Church of Scientology decide where to establish a presence in a new area? Scientology critics like yourself, Mike Rinder and Leah Remini state the Church is after money and that one needs a lot of money in order to go up The Bridge. Well Mike Rinder posted a poster of speakers coming from the Cincinnati org to the Cleveland Mission on December 2. The Scientology Cleveland Mission is in Parma, a suburb of Cleveland and as blue collar as you can get. One would think they would try to establish themselves either downtown or in a white collar suburb. If the Church of Scientology has all this money, then renting or paying for property in a high rent/high priced district should not be any problem.
(2) I have a question that I hope is not too personal. I mean no disrespect to you Chris. In Scientology statistics are very important, whether you are considered a good person or not is dependent on production and expansion. The work you do now is also very statistics driven: how many views, likes, shares and pledges. Do you have trouble applying old feelings to new circumstances? Do you avoid looking at your stats on Thursdays or have other protocols to avoid doing what Scientology told you to do and think vis-a-vis statistics?
(3) You’ve said that homosexuals will never be allowed on the OT levels, but do you know if Scientologists have become convinced (or convinced their auditor) that they’ve been “cured” of homosexuality, and then allowed to move up The Bridge? Just to be clear, I don’t believe in people being cured of homosexuality nor that they need to be.
(4) Until 2011 or so, Scientology used to put up an elaborate Christmas display (called “L. Ron Hubbard’s Winter Wonderland”, if memory serves) on Hollywood Boulevard in LA. A lot of night time work went into this, and, if critics are to be believed, occupational safety was a big issue and a lot of work on the site was done by Sea Org members who were on the RPF. Are there any personal or perhaps second-hand anecdotes you can share about this, including the reasons for the eventual discontinuation of this tradition?
(5) You’ve spoken about how recently (in the last 10-20 years) that OTs have been sent back down the bridge to do lower levels. How does this work with staff and Sea Org members? It doesn’t make sense to me (from an operations perspective) that would be in the interest of a business to retrain “employees” on steps that have already been done. I’m guessing this doesn’t happen to staff and Sea Org members. Does it? And if it doesn’t happen, what is the justification (money??) for public to redo levels?
(6) What was the last Scientology viewpoint/approach you removed from your life?
(7) So….do they tell anyone that he is initially a science fiction writer? Just curious.
(8) There’s a rumor out there that Quinton Tarantino is going to direct the next Star Trek (J.J. Abrams version). It’s supposedly already rated R. What are your thoughts and considerations about this?