Chapter 1 Scientology - the Aftermath, review

Leah Remini: Scientology and the Aftermath, a tv-program that has been on the american channel A&E this autumn/winter. If you're not living in America, you can watch them here: 123movies.net.

Let me start though, by talking about my own relationship with cults. Because boy, do I have one!

My interest in cults became clear to me one weird day on a trip I made with my class-mates to Pakistan. We were all students at the Danish school, Tvind. I was 17 years old and being out in the world was the best feeling ever. The excitement and the amazing opportunity to do those things that (I felt and thought) no one had ever done before. For me, this school was heaven. We had teachers who were more like friends and we could smoke ciggies all over the school, which to be completely truthful, did it for me. I loved smoking, still do. Oh the mind of the teenagers eh! So easy persuaded by small things. Anyway, we had this bus which we turned in to a house for a few months and then we drove (the teachers drove) through Europe and in to Asia to our final stop in Sukkur, Pakistan. From there we took other transportation until we went back home again.

Things were okay in a way, even though I became very ill, and some of my class-mates too. It seemed to be rather normal to our teachers so we didn't make a huge deal out of it. Also I hated imposing on poor families but even this was okay because my teachers told me that this is how it was done. Always.

As we were kids (teens at least) we were made to write a letter home to our parents etc once a week. (not sure that I did that every week..... ) The teachers collected our letters and sent them home for us.

So, that day, the weird day, came along as a huge shock and (a personal) realisation. We were knee-deep into something that none of us have thought about previously. That the teachers weren't our friends, but actually our enemies. (or so I felt back then)

Two of the girls in the class had found a telegram from the headmistress of our school, for our two teachers only. The first thing in the telegram was this line: "This has to be burned as soon as it has been read." Talk about the drama! Like in the movies, right? But someone had forgotten to burn it and now we all got to see what was said.

What became clear from the beginning of the letter was that all our own letters, to our parents and friends back home, were not being sent directly home, but instead they've sent them back to our school. And once there, they were opened and read by the headmistress herself, who then wrote the letter to our teachers on how to treat one and each of us. "Marianne needs a motherly touch", "Yvonne isn't totally in it anymore", "Sarah need to feel more part of things, put her together with someone warm and friendly" Etc. Crazy enough, they were doing this to keep us in the school... And I had noticed a very big change in the female teacher, Lone, how she treated me, and I thought it was just because she had come to like me a bit more. Haha!

It was like an avalanche. We all shouted on top of each other, we cried and we cursed. Some of us refused to be in the bus anymore. And as this was exactly before we were to head back to Denmark again, we needed all of us in there, or we couldn't go on.

So, what happened next? It's actually a bit unclear to me, how we ended up sitting in the bus in a group meeting, and the headmistress had flown over to us, and she was there, talking her way out of everything. I know that she had been forced to come, because if this got out, you know, in to the media or so, it would had been a catastrophe, not only to her personally, but to the organisation. Lucky for them, there was no internet or smart-phones or any mobile computer-like things back then.

For me, that day, when we were sat there in the group of twenty kids and three adults, it was the end of my adventure. First, I hated the fact that the telegram was there at all & and what had happened. Secondly, I hated that in the end, most of my class mates "forgave" the headmistress and she made all but a few of us come up and hug her and cry with her and then they were okay again. We decided that we weren't to talk about this anymore, not mention it at all in fact. The manipulation of our young minds were complete.

But I am not like that, I hold a grudge if someone miss-treats me, I will not forgive until I get a proper explanation and a real reason and apology from the heart. But that didn't happen that day, but damn it she was SO good at manipulating and turning everything into a normal occurrence.

I hated her. I still see her dropping comments on my friends (from back then) facebook posts and I'll just find it unbelievable. Oh well. Never mind that now.

Anyway. That is the long version, to why I got obsessed with cults. Since then, I've read book after book, watched movies, tv, documentaries, seen videos of interviews etc. Not just Tvind, actually not much Tvind at all, but cults from all over the world. They're fascinating. Scary too, of course, but I love the idea of them, the reasoning, the submission, the manipulations of incredible clever people. Mind-control.

Read more about this in chapter 2.