A team of ex-Scientologists has launched 20 strategic billboards across Los Angeles offering help to Sea Org members trying to leave Scientology, following last year's attempt when Scientology quickly shut down a single billboard.
• Billboards feature three designs with memorable phone number 888-300-2002
• Strategic placement ensures Sea Org members will see them on bus routes, near facilities
• Scientology cannot block these billboards as they don't own adjacent properties
• Aftermath Foundation provides comprehensive support for those leaving
• Crisis line is staffed 24/7 to help people safely exit the organization
• Campaign estimated to reach nearly 2 million people weekly
• Billboards placed near PAC base, Scientology Media Productions, and throughout Hollywood
• Mike Rinder quote featured: "The difference between a religion and a cult is what happens when you try to leave"
• Former members collaborated on campaign design, locations, and strategy
• Billboard campaign funded by donations to the Aftermath Foundation
Visit theaftermathfoundation.org to sign up for our newsletter, volunteer, or donate specifically to the billboard campaign. Subscribe to our YouTube channel to help us reach 10,000 subscribers.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:12):
Hey guys, welcome back to the channel, welcome to
another episode of Blown forGood.
We have a whole bunch ofspecial guests here today.
We have my wife, claire, andthen we have two new guests that
we've not ever had on thechannel at the same time before,
and that is Alex apostate Alexand Phil Jones.
(00:33):
And here they all are, hey guys.
Speaker 2 (00:37):
Bt is activate.
Speaker 3 (00:40):
Awesome, I know we're mixing it up, we pulled a fast
one on all of our viewers.
So sorry, it's been a very longwork week, but we have some
amazing news to talk about.
So you know, we kind of justdropped everything last minute
and flew news.
The Aftermath Foundation put upsome more billboards all over.
Speaker 1 (01:01):
Los Angeles, and it's 13 that are up right now.
Speaker 4 (01:16):
right, and then another seven that are no, there
were 13 yesterday.
Five more went up this morningearly, early, and then there's
two more that should go uptomorrow.
So we're at 18 right now.
Be 20 by tomorrow morningbefore 8am.
Speaker 3 (01:31):
Amazing and so so let's just give a the two minute
overview while we allow peoplethe time to show up for this
unannounced stream.
Last year, right in time for LRon Hubbard's birthday, on March
11th 2024, we put up abillboard, with Phil's help,
(01:52):
right next to the PAC-basedcomplex in Los Angeles, and
within what Phil I think, twohours.
Speaker 4 (02:00):
Well, it's a little longer than that, but it came
down in the middle of the night.
Speaker 3 (02:03):
1 am I think it was yes, but I mean within two hours
they had blocked it.
Speaker 4 (02:09):
Right, right, yes, yeah, they put up a scissor lift
in front of it.
Speaker 3 (02:13):
Yes, Scientology's response was to immediately
erect a scissor lift thatblocked the entire billboard
from their Sea Org members,which it was the exact intended
targeted audience that we knewneeded to hear our message, and
it wasn't.
It was simply need help,leaving Scientology call the
(02:35):
aftermath.
Anyway, yeah, so within twohours they had put up a scissor
lift.
They then went hard and heavyon the billboard company and
within I think, three days, ifI'm not mistaken, they succeeded
in taking it down.
However, as we are havecommitted to this cause of
exposing Scientology abuses, wedid not let it go at that, and
(02:59):
we've had many, many effortsongoing behind the scenes, and
thus this announcement today,and both phil and apostate, alex
and katherine olsen um havebeen all very instrumental in
making this happen, so let mejust pause to say thank you to
all involved.
Speaker 4 (03:18):
Yeah, also, if we can give a shout out to kernan
coleman for the for doing thegraphic arts on these.
Speaker 3 (03:24):
Yes.
Speaker 4 (03:24):
Brilliant graphic artist and he's almost stepped
up.
He's the one who did the CallMe billboards back in 2016 and
the one from last year.
One point on the one last year,the reason they were able to
put up those scissor lifts isthey owned the property right in
front of where the billboardwas.
But this year, with those 20,they don't own any of the
(03:46):
property in front of any ofthose billboards.
There's no scissor lifts coming.
Speaker 2 (03:52):
Yes, and, by the way, go ahead, alex.
I was going to say, phil, yourcomment on Tony Ortega's blog
was that Scientology is going toneed more scissor lifts.
It made me laugh so much.
There's no way, there's nohiding this campaign.
It's big enough that there'snothing they can do about it.
Speaker 3 (04:09):
Yeah, yes, exactly, and thank you to Catherine Olsen
for her hours poring over theLA maps to find exactly which
billboards would have the mostexposure, specifically to
current members of the Corganization.
Speaker 2 (04:26):
Yeah, catherine spent a very long time looking at
there was.
This project has been in theworks for months, I think off
the back of Phil's original one,the one you guys did last year,
and it got taken down.
I was like, okay, thinking withmy marketing hat on, how do we
stop this happening again?
And the way of doing it in mymind was let's just do more
(04:46):
billboards if we get slightlysmaller ones, but they're really
strategically placed and theyall go up at the same time.
It's going to be really hardfor Scientology to pull a
scissor lift trick or to try,and even if they were to succeed
in you know, threateninglawsuits and getting them taken
down, it's going to take time toget rid of 20 billboards, even
(05:07):
if the decision was made on thesame day.
So it was kind of a fail safe,get the message heard thing.
And Catherine spent hours andhours looking at the bus routes
that the sealed members takefrom birthing to the pack base
and to SMP, and also the thefood delivery routes that they
use to deliver the food for thestaff and things like the Sunday
(05:29):
market where people hang out ontheir time off, on their CSP,
and it was like let's make surewe've got billboards in all of
those locations.
So whatever happens, they willsee the message.
Speaker 1 (05:40):
Yeah, there's no way that the buses or that the staff
are going to be able to pick aroute that's not going to see 20
billboards.
Speaker 4 (05:50):
And if they're up long enough time, they're going
to see them.
And that phone number that yougot Claire was brilliant because
it's so easy to remember thatthey don't need to write it down
.
So if they get caught lookingat it and remembering it, what's
the Scientology going to do?
No, you need to forget thatnumber.
If it's in their head, it's notgoing anywhere.
Speaker 3 (06:12):
Right, and we know one thing for sure what's that?
Speaker 1 (06:20):
I was going to say I'm going to pull up Tony
Ortega's blog and see if I canput that up so we can show the
pictures of the billboards too.
Speaker 3 (06:24):
Yes, perfect, yeah, but if there's one thing we know
for sure is that seaorganization members are very
adept at committing things tomemory especially if you're
clear and you have total recallright once you've seen it,
you're going to remember itforever, apparently yes,
completely, I totally, and I didwant to mention, too, why this
(06:46):
is so very important to the workthat the Michael J Rinder
Aftermath Foundation does is theone thing that members of the
Sea Organization do not have byvirtue of the isolation and the
lives that they live currently.
They have no hope of lifeoutside of Scientology, and so
(07:07):
this is a message of hope and amessage of hey, listen, we know
you're in a bad spot.
There is a life outside of thisworld, and there are many
different families and peoplewe're working with currently
through the work the foundationdoes, who had they known years
ago that there was resourcesoutside of the sea organization,
(07:29):
they would have left years agoyeah, here let me put up the um.
Speaker 1 (07:33):
Can you guys see that ?
Speaker 4 (07:36):
yeah, yes, 888-3002, that's like you look at it once
and you've got it in your head.
Yes, brilliant, there's threedifferent billboards.
Speaker 3 (07:47):
You contributed to that.
Yes, I found it, but we wereboth 100% on the same page that
we needed something easy toremember and just at a glance,
you'd have it yeah.
Speaker 1 (08:02):
This is the second one.
Speaker 3 (08:04):
And these newer designs, by the way, were
inspired by alex.
So brilliant, alex, thank you.
And this is a offshoot of thecurious uh billboard scientology
has been running in the londonunderground.
Speaker 2 (08:20):
Alex, want to talk about that and your inspiration
on this oh yeah, I mean they ranthese billboards that said I'm
a Scientologist curious, and itjust links to a page on the
Scientology website with videotestimonials of people talking
about their time in Scientologyand I kind of, as a joke, made
like a little I'm anex-Scientologist curious, like a
(08:41):
little banner and posted onsocial media and people were
like, hey, you should like, youshould make that happen.
And so it's like, ok, maybe,maybe there's something in that,
what can we do with it?
And it was a bit of fun.
But it's also like noScientology have had a chance to
inform the public of what lifeis like inside Scientology,
allegedly.
And so I think it's only fairthat you know we run some
(09:03):
billboards that say I'm an exScientologist, you know, and
here are some stories of whatlife is like for other people
and maybe get some exposure ofthe abusive stuff that perhaps
sealed members don't, don'trecognize mic story and be like,
hey, that happened to me or Irecognize something like that
(09:24):
that's similar to what happenedto me, and not realize you know,
they're not alone in theirsuffering and there is a
community here of people tosupport them yes, absolutely yes
go ahead.
Speaker 3 (09:40):
no, I was just going to say, and, phil, you're having
your experience and input onthese billboards just from the
call me billboards andeverything else has been amazing
, so thank you so much for that.
Speaker 4 (09:52):
You're welcome.
I'm always happy to help.
It's a worthwhile cause.
And you know, I've always hadthis thought that you know
somebody in the Sea Org.
I've never been in the Sea Org.
I've got two kids in the SeaOrg and they're still there.
And you kind of I have thisidea that somebody might want to
walk out the door.
But where do they go?
They step out the door, they goleft.
Do they go right?
They got no money in theirpocket.
(10:13):
They have maybe no contacts, norelatives.
What do they do?
They end up not walking out thedoor because they have nowhere
to go.
But if they have that phonenumber in their head, they just
need to find a phone and help isthere.
So I think that having thosebillboards out there, I think,
is just really important to givethem an escape route.
Speaker 1 (10:35):
Totally, and also I wanted to show the map, so this
is again.
This is on the undergroundbunker Tony Ortega sub stack.
But you can see, there's somany of them.
I love it.
There's so many locations Nowand also Scientology.
(10:56):
They have properties all overHollywood.
I want to say they probablyhave between 15 and 20 different
properties between the big bluecomplex that's down on a
fountain, and I want to sayEdgemont is kind of where the
main um like between sunset andfountain avenues in Hollywood,
but then they've got multipleproperties on Hollywood
(11:17):
Boulevard.
Um, they've got multipleproperties, uh, at the end of
Hollywood Boulevard and thenkind of strewn throughout it and
, yeah, they've got that studiothat's on the kind of like the
eastern side of Hollywood.
So these are everywhere.
There is no way for them toavoid this.
Speaker 3 (11:39):
Yeah, exactly what are they going to tell the Sea
Org members?
Don't look up.
Speaker 4 (11:45):
One of the locations.
I had a friend of mine go downand take a picture of one of the
billboards and it's just almostright across the street from
Scientology Media Production SeaOrg facility.
So I mean you can see thebuilding from the billboard.
Speaker 1 (12:02):
Nice.
Speaker 3 (12:02):
Love it, absolutely love it.
Speaker 2 (12:05):
I wonder if you can see it from David Miscavige's
office at SMP.
Speaker 1 (12:10):
That would be amazing yeah.
Speaker 4 (12:13):
But the people got to drive out of there.
Speaker 1 (12:16):
Yeah, we did talk to somebody who could see exactly
where David Miscavige's officewindow was from a nearby bar
that he was going to, and Ithink I don't know if we lost
claire or not she was having aweird connection up there.
Um, let's, uh, there's somegreat comments that are coming
(12:37):
up here.
I'll put these up.
Necessary trouble, says alex isso good with ideas for signage.
Very clever thank you.
Speaker 2 (12:44):
I mean, look, it was a team effort, and I think this
is another thing that made mefeel so passionate about this is
like Scientology like to divideand conquer and pit people
against each other.
You know, osa are full of lotsof trickery and bad faith acting
and that sort of thing.
One of the strongest things, inmy opinion, is to unite
(13:05):
together as a community and worktogether, and teamwork really
is, you know, makes a dream work, and this is such an example of
different people pitching inwith their ideas and working
together, collaborating on this,and it's something that will
reach SEAL members, you know,without a doubt, there's no way
they can miss it.
Yes, and exactly to.
Speaker 1 (13:25):
Phil's point.
Sorry, we're walking all overeach other because there's a bit
of a delay, so we're all kindof hearing each other right as
we start talking.
When you are in the Sea Org,one of the biggest things is who
can you turn to if you escape?
And that is a giant barrier toSea Org members getting out is
(13:46):
their family is usually not inthe same state or even involved
in Scientology.
They have no way to get a holdof those people.
They have no way to warn themthat they want to come or find
out if they could come.
None of these things can reallytake place until after the
person's escaped.
So if they see something thatsays, oh, those guys will help
(14:07):
me and they can help me get outof here, then they can call us
and they can get all thatarranging done while they're
still in the C organization.
And this is a key, key thing.
And we help them with thecommunication thing.
We help them with figuring outwhere they can go and we can
(14:29):
also do research on their behalfto talk to their family members
and talk to these other peopleto kind of suss out what the
situation is and then help themfigure out exactly what the best
idea is.
So this is why we do this, andthe Aftermath Foundation has
been doing this for severalyears now, and in this last year
(14:52):
did you mention the newsletter.
If people want to sign up toget the newsletter, yes.
Speaker 3 (14:58):
So two things.
First of all, if you go to theAftermath Foundation website,
theaftermathfoundationorg, youcan sign up there for our
newsletter.
We sent out our firstnewsletter in a very long time.
I don't think we've done anewsletter since 2018, if I'm
not mistaken but the idea we'reat least going to try to do two
(15:21):
to three, to hopefully eveneventually quarterly newsletters
with dates and news.
So if you haven't signed up forthat, please go to the
aftermath foundationorg and youcan sign up there to receive our
newsletters.
Speaker 1 (15:37):
We can put a link to the newsletter in the
description of the video sopeople can go to it, and then,
once they have a link, they canjust sign up on the website if
they just want to get itwhenever we release it.
Speaker 4 (15:47):
Is there a way to get ?
Speaker 3 (15:48):
access to previous newsletters.
To what sorry?
Speaker 4 (15:52):
Is there a way?
To get access to previous yeah.
Speaker 3 (15:55):
That's a great thought and I will talk with our
team about that.
I'm sure there is, so we'llwork on that and fortunately
Clara is here, so she's probablygoing to be most helpful with
that.
We'll get that taken care of.
But I did also want to mentiontoo specifically about the
crisis line and the number thatis on that billboard.
(16:16):
We worked very extensively tofind a company that would answer
that phone 24 seven, and theway that it works is there's a
very carefully scripted umpatter that gets used.
When somebody calls in, first ofall, make sure are you in a
safe place and if they're not ina safe place, immediately take
(16:38):
care of that first, and thenthis company will then connect
the person directly to anAftermath Foundation staff
member or volunteer to help whohas the knowledge needed to have
a conversation with the personand provide the assistance that
they need.
So sometimes it's pressing, butit's not always.
(16:59):
But nonetheless, the billboardshave absolutely spread that
number and we've been getting alot more calls and a lot more
active people interested in thefoundation services and how
we're able to assist them ingetting out.
So it's just amazing, and Iwould like to say also too, we
(17:22):
covered this in our newsletter,but now we even have one of
these phone numbers.
Am I frozen?
Speaker 1 (17:29):
You are, but we can hear you.
Speaker 3 (17:31):
And hear you, oh okay .
Well then I'll just finish thatthought.
Um, we have another dedicatedline solely for law enforcement,
as requested by law enforcement, so that if someone in law
enforcement runs into someonetrying to exit scientology, they
can also make that connectionthat's amazing.
Speaker 1 (17:52):
Yeah, this is um.
This is we're trying, we'relearning over the years, we're
learning all the ways, kind ofnot to do it, and then we're
learning the ways to do it andwhich ones are working.
and, um, even when that onebillboard went up um, originally
the one by the complex and gottaken down, the aftermath got in
(18:13):
enough donations that we coulddo multiple billboard campaigns
over and over again.
So hopefully, in addition toreaching out to Sea Org members,
we'll also reach people thatare willing to donate to the
cause and support the AftermathFoundation so that we can better
help the people that areleaving and then we can just
(18:36):
keep this going.
Speaker 3 (18:37):
Yes, In fact, on the foundation website you can
actually select.
If you'd like to support thebillboard campaign, you can make
a donation and mark that it'sspecifically for this purpose.
Speaker 2 (18:50):
So I think the key thing as well with billboards
and this is why I love this ideaso much is how do you reach
somebody in this organization?
Because Scientology controlsevery aspect of your life.
It controls your access to theoutside world.
It senses your Internet.
You know it's very rare for aSEAL member, especially in LA,
(19:10):
to have free Internet access,for example.
So it's really hard to reachthese people with a message.
So they may not even be awarethat there's support available
to them.
But the good thing about abillboard is there's nothing you
can do about it.
You just have to walk down thestreet and you see this message
and there's nothing Scientologycan do to prevent a sealed
member from seeing it,especially when you have so many
(19:33):
and they're on every corner ofthe route that you could take to
any of the Scientologybuildings.
Like it's not.
Like they can just change theirroute and go a different way to
work because they'll seeanother billboard, right, that's
the whole idea is that youcan't miss it and the message
will get through to the Sealsstaff there.
Speaker 3 (19:49):
Yep, 100%, and it's amazing to me too, by the way
you know we've talked about itnumerous times.
I'm sure all of us have,individually and collectively
that it's obviously Scientologyhas such a litigious reputation
that they will go after andsquash any efforts to get out
(20:11):
any message of hope or help forlife after Scientology.
I think it's important torecognize, though, that,
particularly since HBO is goingclear, and then, of course, the
three seasons of Leah Remini,scientology in the aftermath,
with Leah and Mike Rinder thatthe public perception and
awareness of the abusesScientology commits have has
(20:32):
been so dramatically increasedthat now the, the companies that
we work with, nine times out of10, or maybe even 100 percent
I'm sure Phil could comment onthis they were like we, 100
percent support the work thatyou do.
Speaker 4 (20:47):
As far as billboard companies, I mean, the one we
used last year was Clear Channel, but the one that stuck with us
back in 2016,.
We got shut down several timesbefore we ended up being able to
get those Call Me billboards up.
And it was the same companythat we're using now, lamar and
they stuck with us.
(21:08):
And back in 2016, it went allthe way up to the owners of the
company who approved it.
And also back then we had theword Scientology on those
billboards twice.
It's only on our billboardsonce now.
Speaker 3 (21:27):
Oh my gosh.
Speaker 2 (21:28):
The URL.
Obviously there's the one thatsays call me with the phone
number or call us, sorry, butthe other two the the one with
mike rinder on it and the onewith yourself claire that the
urls are scientology abuse andscientology stories and they
redirect to a page on theaftermath um website where it
just tells personal stories,right?
So there's not really anythingto sue about because it's just
(21:50):
personal people telling theirpersonal stories of what
happened to them in thisorganization, and I think that's
really, really powerful initself.
You know it's not saying we'reaccusing you of this or you know
we're not putting anythinglibelous or slander or anything
on these billboards.
It's just saying I'm anex-lantologist, here's a link to
a story about what happened tome, right, and then you're able
(22:13):
to see other people's storiestoo.
Happened to me, right.
Speaker 3 (22:14):
And then, you'll be able.
You're able to see otherpeople's stories too.
Speaker 1 (22:16):
Yeah, the other great thing is on the aftermath
website there's alsotestimonials, and in the
newsletter there's testimonialsof people that we've helped.
So if a seer member was goingto go to the site, they'd be
able to see those testimonials,and the things that the people
are saying they need help withare the exact things that they
know they need help with findinga vehicle or getting a job, or
(22:40):
even getting a place to stay,yeah, or just stay for a little
bit, or a plane ticket or all ofthe logistical thing that I
realized when I was lookingthrough the newsletter is
SeaWorld members think very theyattach significances to
(23:07):
logistical things.
It's not like I need a place togo, it's I need a ticket, I need
a car, I need transport, I needthese things in order to get
away from here, and they don'teven really think about all the
other things that they're goingto need once they get to the
place.
So it's just we kind of.
I mean, we've talked about thisbefore, but Claire and I were
doing this many, many yearsbefore there was an Aftermath
(23:29):
Foundation.
We were doing this in our ownand a lot of the people that are
part of the AftermathFoundation board have been doing
this for over a decade on ourown and helping people with jobs
or helping people kind of getget going and get on their feet
again, and so over the years wehave learned a lot of tips and
tricks on how to get thesepeople sort of.
(23:53):
You know you have to get theirfeet running and then put them
onto the treadmill of life, sowe know how to do that now so
they can get up to speed reallyquickly.
Speaker 3 (24:05):
Yeah, oftentimes their mind gets there and then
the other pieces fall into place, like they learn to shed the
language and they learn to shedthe, the false expectations that
have been set for them byScientology.
Like, oh, you'll only ever flipburgers the rest of your life
or you know you'll you'll end upon the streets with nowhere to
(24:28):
go.
You know, that's what.
That's what Scientology wantsthose sea Organization members
to believe to keep them thereand keep them doing the work of
staying there.
It's absolutely as we know.
We've many, many times seenpeople and helped people get out
and then completely flourish,turn their lives around and
(24:49):
truly inspire other people toleave as well.
Speaker 2 (24:53):
Yeah, and billboards as well.
Sorry to keep harping on aboutthis, but I think the fact that
it will reach sealed members,whether they like it or not is,
is really powerful, because ifyou've been told that there's no
support out there, you'll justbe flipping burgers, you know,
and that's what you've beenconditioned to believe.
When you're walking aroundbetween you know different
offices or whatever in LA, justdoing your job and you're
(25:15):
thinking about leaving and yousee a billboard one, two, three,
hey, 20 times, right that sendsus like a message to that
person that hold on.
There's a united effort here.
There's clearly a group ofpeople who have resources to put
billboards up.
Maybe there is support outthere, maybe there is some sort
of help that I can get and theresources that I need.
(25:36):
It almost doesn't matter whatthe billboard says.
Just the fact that there is amessage of hope there sends a
really important message, andthen throw in there the crisis
helpline and the URL to thestories and it's just a winner
all round, in my opinion.
Speaker 3 (25:50):
Yes, completely Completely.
Speaker 4 (25:53):
It's nice to hear that you're getting more calls
too.
If you're getting more calls,that means more people are
walking out the door.
Speaker 3 (25:59):
Yes.
Speaker 4 (26:00):
That's nice.
Speaker 1 (26:00):
Yes.
Speaker 4 (26:02):
And so many orgs are so empty now and like even
that's just not Sea Org Orgs,but they're so empty, they're
going to eventually, they'regoing to run out of people.
Yeah for sure.
Speaker 3 (26:14):
That's the idea, that is the idea.
Speaker 2 (26:16):
Sunderland Ork in the UK has three staff members.
Speaker 3 (26:20):
Sunderland Wow.
Speaker 4 (26:23):
I mean, you see these pictures of academies where
people are studying one person,maybe two or three at most.
I remember back when we were inand our academy would have 60
people on the weekend You'd bebringing in extra chairs to seat
the rest you know people andthen that's just the academy.
Downstairs, basic courses wouldhave another 50, 60 people as
(26:44):
on a regular basis, and nowthey're lucky to get three
people in a in a course room.
So they're definitely shrinkingin a big way.
Speaker 3 (26:53):
Completely, and I did .
I did want to take a moment togive a shout out and just thank
literally every single personwho has ever donated to the
foundation to support our work.
We would not be able to do thework we do, and especially not
on the scale that we've beengrowing into, without your
(27:15):
support.
It means so, so much to us.
Literally this is you know,every board member is volunteer.
This is a passion project,definitely for Mark and I, and I
know the other board members.
It means so much to us thatthose trapped in a cult have the
option of hope and help outsideof that world.
Speaker 1 (27:36):
Totally, totally.
The other thing that Phil mademe think is that if there are
Sea Org members that live in LosAngeles, there's a lot of those
Sea Org members their parentsor their family also live and
work in Los Angeles.
So there's also a good chancethat just public Scientologists
are going to see thesebillboards and then a lot of
(28:00):
Scientologists, I don't know.
I mean Phil could probablyspeak better to this as a public
or a civilian Scientologist,but I don't think a lot of
Scientologists know the depth ofabuse that occurs inside
Scientology's C organization.
I think they know that theywork long hours and I think they
(28:22):
know they get crew meals and amess and all that, but I don't
think they know about the horrorstories.
What do you think about?
Speaker 4 (28:30):
that.
Speaker 1 (28:30):
Phil.
Speaker 4 (28:31):
You know, when our kids were in the C org, you know
what we would say on a regularbasis Well, at least they're in
a safe place.
That was our thought, that atleast they're not going to be in
a criminal environment.
That was the abuses that weregoing on.
(28:54):
You know, that was the wholething.
It's like, yeah, well, you know, okay, they might not be doing
this or that, but you know, atleast they're safe where they
are.
Speaker 1 (29:08):
We had no idea that it was just so horrible, yeah,
and in a lot of cases, dangerous.
I mean there's SEERB membersthat have lost fingers and
printing equipment, choppers andsaws.
Speaker 4 (29:19):
Elevators, yeah, elevators.
Speaker 3 (29:22):
I came a hair away from losing my foot, as we all
know.
Thank goodness that didn'thappen.
Speaker 1 (29:29):
Anyway.
But yeah, I think, so that Ithink that if there are family
members seeing billboards thatare offering to help somebody
escape from Scientology, theneven the, even the family
members and the relatives ofthem, might kind of be like I
need to, I might need a light onthe Sea Organization.
They start letting them go onliberties.
They start letting them go toweddings and family funerals and
(30:06):
other family reunions and stufflike that also helps plant the
seeds.
When they do get away from theSea Org and they see how happy
their families are or theirrelatives outside of Scientology
, and then they go like wait aminute, I thought everybody were
like criminals and drug addictsand like the whole world was
(30:28):
horrible.
These guys don't seem likethey're having that bad of a
time at all.
Speaker 4 (30:32):
You know that was a good point you made with the
those the two, the one with Mikeand one with Claire, with those
domain names on there.
If I was still in and I wouldhave seen that as a public I
would have gone to one of thosesites and looked.
I would have.
I ended up getting out.
I saw the newspaper the TampaBay or the St Pete Times back
(30:57):
then and you know the truth'srun down.
But I would have looked.
I would have seen that on abillboard.
I wouldn't have said anythingto anybody because you know you
don't want to get reported, butI would have gone on the
Internet and looked and I'm surethere will be some people who
do, for sure there will be somepeople who do, for sure.
Speaker 3 (31:17):
Yeah, you know what?
Speaker 2 (31:18):
I'm willing to bet money that there are more
scientologists curious aboutlife outside of scientology than
there are never ends who arecurious about getting into
scientology that's true just thepoint of, like you know, the
fact that there needs to bebillboards that say if you need
help leaving, there's resourcesand support here, like just the
(31:39):
fact that there needs to be thatmessage indicates hold on.
You know, maybe thisorganization is doing some bad
stuff here, like why would Ineed help leaving or why would
anyone need help leaving anorganization unless they were
doing some shady stuff?
Speaker 4 (31:53):
you know organization , unless they were doing some
shady stuff.
You know, yeah, when we wereoriginally, when we were
originally designing thatbillboard, we were going to use
the word escaping instead ofleaving.
We thought it's a little bittoo harsh, we thought leaving
would probably be a little bitbetter totally and just to the
point that these billboards doplant the seed.
Speaker 1 (32:13):
Catherine just said that she saw one of the Call Me
billboards when she was still inthe seaboard.
I've talked to a few people whohave said that.
Speaker 3 (32:22):
Yes, I have too.
Speaker 4 (32:24):
But you know, actually somebody brought that
up recently, I think it was Alex.
It was you that mentioned thatyou'd seen or you'd heard about
them.
I went back and I lookedthrough all my notes and I had
all these messages from allthese people who had seen the
billboard and written to us.
A 10-year-old girl wasdisconnected from her parents
(32:46):
Where's a 10-year-old girl goingto go?
And she had written to ushaving seen the Call Me
Billboards.
Amazing number of people thatwrote to us from that Incredible
.
Speaker 1 (32:58):
Wow, yeah, just for anybody who's just joining in.
I just want to show thebillboards again.
So these are the billboards.
There's three of them so far,and this is the first one, and
this is the second one withClaire there, and what an
amazing quote from Mike Rinder,by the way.
Speaker 3 (33:18):
The difference between a religion and a cult is
what happens when you try toleave.
Speaker 2 (33:24):
Exactly, I love that quote Because Scientology will
try and tell you when you're inthat these big bad SPs will try
and change your mind andconvince you of things.
And they've just got their ownagenda and Mike Rinder's post
here, like that quote itliterally just plants the seed.
It says, hey, the differencebetween a religion and a cult is
(33:44):
what happens when it tries,when you try to leave.
It doesn't try and say youshould leave scientology or
scientology is it.
It just makes a very good pointthat's going to plant a seed of
doubt and people are going tostart thinking, well, hold on.
No, scientology is Scientologyis a religion.
I can leave anytime I want, orcan I yep, you know?
Speaker 3 (34:02):
because every, every, every member of the sea
organization knows what's goingto happen if they try to leave.
That's why that rings.
So so true, um and yes, andthere's the map, and I saw
someone oh, here's one of thephotos that's actually, yeah
that a friend of mine wentaround and took that picture.
Speaker 4 (34:20):
20 billboards, yeah, that one, um, oh no, no, this
one actually a picture fromlamar.
They took that picture, oh, theother.
There's a the uh.
The other picture, the one ofthe uh need help leaving.
That was.
That's the one that's near uhthe scientology media
productions nice that was in thecomments.
(34:41):
I think I posted that one inthe comments at the bunker, so
if you sort by best, um, yes,definitely the best comment,
phil, good job well, picture thebillboard.
Speaker 2 (34:53):
That's supposed no no I'm trying to click on the
screen not the uh, I think it'sin the comments on the bunker
rather than the sub stack.
Oh, I get it.
Speaker 1 (35:03):
Oh, that's fine sorry right, right, okay, good um the
other thing I wanted to say ohlook, we got, we got osa office
of spoofed affairs nice thankyou that's very generous of you
office of spoofed affairs.
Um, I just saw there was somenice comments there.
Mike's legacy lives on.
Yes, absolutely it is nice tosee mike's picture up there, it
(35:24):
really is I know and we actuallythat goes by, that I don't miss
mike yeah, we just did that foryou there, uh, that the ed's
mom, um, the uh, we just so.
Everybody knows this wholecampaign started when Mike was
still with us and that's when weworked all of this out, so it
(35:44):
was even when Mike was still onthe board.
Um, so this has been going onfor many, many months and, um,
probably actually even over ayear now, because we had, um
that we had that other billboardthing happened, where they took
it down right away andScientology pressured the
billboard company.
Speaker 3 (36:02):
And then we also had about four contracts between
then and now.
That that were we, were, youknow, on the home stretch, and
then, for one reason or another,scientology bullied them or
they got cold feet because oftheir legal department, whatever
, we just kept at it.
Like you know, keep going,exactly.
Speaker 4 (36:26):
I think people might not realize just how much work
is involved in gettingbillboards up.
There's a lot of logistics toit and bits and pieces.
Alex knows that, catherineknows that she's the one who
went around, looked at all thosebillboards on the ground and
Alex setting all that.
I mean it is a lot of back andforth, a lot of bits and pieces
until they finally get acontract up.
(36:47):
But it's nice that they're nowup and you know it took a bit
but it's actually rewarding tosee it.
Speaker 3 (36:59):
It really is.
I know.
Speaker 2 (37:01):
So many hours went into this from everybody
involved.
You know it wasn't justresearching the billboards, it
was also researching, like youknow, some of the original ones
we wanted to go for are all insort of long-term contracts with
specific clients, and so therewas a lot of negotiation around
which ones are coming availablesoon, how long are they, you
(37:22):
know, reserved for, which onescan we put up fairly quickly and
easily, and you know which oneshave longer contracts and
shorter contracts.
And then, obviously, workingout the different routes this is
what Catherine did is like okay, this is the way they normally
go on the bus from birthing toto work.
Um, and so if we put abillboard there, what route are
(37:42):
they going to take to divertaround it?
Okay, well, can we put abillboard here?
Well then, which way do theyhave to go to avoid that one?
And that's how this campaign allcame about.
It's like where can westrategically place them?
Where they literally cannot bemissed.
There's no escaping them.
So it was a lot of work puttingin all of that so many
spreadsheets, lots of liaisonbetween the mar and everybody
(38:05):
else around, like which ones wewant to go for, and we were
talking about differentlocations as well.
Um.
So yeah, I'm so glad that weall work together as a team to
get it done, and I'm reallyproud of it, and I hope you guys
are too.
Speaker 3 (38:16):
Oh, oh, 100%.
No, absolutely.
Collaborations like this arethe best and most effective.
When we work together to sayyou know what?
Let's keep our eye on themountain.
We want we want Scientologistsand Sea Org members to know that
there's life outside ofScientology, and we want people
(38:37):
who have never been inScientology to be aware that
this is an abusive and dangerousorganization.
When we all work together toaccomplish that, amazing things
happen 100% yeah and thanks forputting my link up there, mark.
Oh, mark, you're muted, markthat's rare oh sorry, I muted
(39:02):
myselflex got my joke only anenglish only an english man
appreciates uh english humor Ijust put up alex's link.
Speaker 1 (39:16):
Where can people find you if they want to find out
more stuff?
Speaker 4 (39:19):
Phil.
Well, I've got some videos onYouTube.
I haven't posted that muchrecently, but I've got a bunch
of videos up there.
People are welcome to go there.
It's just youtubecom slashphildoggo.
P-h-i-l-d-o-g-g-o.
Speaker 1 (39:35):
Awesome.
We'll put a link in thedescription below in the video,
All right, and we'll put Alex'sin there too.
And then people were asking ifthey wanted to just support the
Aftermath Foundation.
You could just go to theaftermathfoundationorg.
That's where you can sign upfor the newsletter.
That's where you can listyourself as a volunteer.
That's where you can donatedirectly to the Aftermath
(39:56):
Foundation.
Speaker 3 (39:57):
Oh and let me add.
Let me add something it wouldbe super, super helpful just to
do one single thing go to theAftermath Foundation YouTube
channel and subscribe.
Our goal is to get to 10,000subscribers at the Aftermath
Foundation channel, which is arequirement so that we can
(40:17):
officially, just every once in awhile, do fundraisers through
YouTube.
Youtube covers all the fees andevery any donation made goes
directly to the aftermathfoundation.
So our goal is to have it sothat we can host them on the
aftermath foundation channel andthen any other YouTube channels
(40:38):
that want to contribute to thatfundraiser can do so.
It's an amazing feature.
So there you go, One easy thingthat everybody could do.
Speaker 1 (40:48):
Awesome, and I'll put a link in the description to
the Aftermath YouTube page aswell.
And then also we have Big NavyDavy Dolls Bobbleheads.
We have a Mike Bobblehead, mikeRinder bobblehead, we have a
Leah bobblehead and we have aset of them that are they have
signed headshots from Leah andMike, and then we also just have
(41:10):
a signed one of Leah and asigned one of Mike.
But all of the proceeds fromall of the things at the
spshopcom, all of those proceedsgo to the Aftermath Foundation
to support.
Speaker 3 (41:21):
Yes, and we should mention thank you very much.
Rest in peace, mike.
We miss you every day.
Mike, in September of last year, signed these set number of
photos.
So it is while supplies lastobviously goes without saying.
But there you have it.
Speaker 1 (41:41):
Yeah, I was trying to find if I had a.
It's just bobbleheads, whateverit's the spshopcom.
We'll put all these links downbelow.
Then I figured before we gotout of here we could take a
little bit of comments.
Love my mic.
Speaker 3 (41:55):
You want me to read them, honey?
Speaker 1 (41:57):
Yes, please.
Speaker 3 (41:59):
I'll get my glasses on.
Speaker 1 (42:01):
Okay.
Speaker 3 (42:04):
Me and my glasses.
Okay, catherine Olson, at Jay,they all went up within 24 hours
.
No secret anymore.
There you go, but we have lotsof secret things in the work.
So, as we mentioned, go to theaftermathfoundationorg.
Sign up for our newsletter.
Follow us on social media.
Subscribe to the aftermathfoundationorg.
Sign up for our newsletter.
Follow us on social media.
Subscribe to the youtubechannel.
We have so many announcementscoming.
Daniel, danielle chamberlain sogood to see you here, danielle.
(42:28):
Thank you for the super sticker.
We appreciate it.
Betsy, sue, just call me betsy.
Bravo, I'm in tears.
Thank you for all you do,absolutely, and thank you for
Everyone here for supporting thework that the Michael J Rinder
Aftermath Foundation does.
It's deeply moving to know thatthere are so many people out
there that support this cause.
(42:49):
Necessary trouble, the courageand perseverance you all have
shown in fighting this cult ismind blowing.
Speaker 1 (42:57):
Kudos to all of you, thank you have shown in fighting
this cult is mind-blowing.
Kudos to all of you, thank you,yes, and thanks for phil and
alex for uh joining in and andhelping it's.
It's always amazing when umpeople that are have all left
can work together and we cankind of, you know, use uh our,
our talents to help uh otherothers do get to where we're at,
(43:18):
sort of thing.
Speaker 3 (43:18):
Yes, because everyone knows we have a very wide set
of talents.
Transfer of Madness, any plansfor other billboards in
different cities?
Many yes, stay tuned, kristen.
Speaker 2 (43:33):
H.
We're only just getting started.
Speaker 3 (43:35):
Yes, yes, there's one thing I think we've all proven
we cannot be shut down.
What Scientology cannot takeaway from us is hope and
persistence.
Kristen H, thank you all.
I'm in SoCal near Gold but toldthe hubby I want to drive any
photos to social at theaftermath foundationorg of any
(44:02):
photos of these billboards.
We would love to post yourphotos on the foundation's
social media awesome love it.
Wow, I never considered howmuch work goes into these
fantastic job all you know, lastyear there was one up and they
shut us down.
Speaker 4 (44:22):
What do we do?
We came back with 20.
Speaker 3 (44:24):
Yes, yes, Lupita, I really admire the work you all
do.
Your message is clear and it'sobvious.
You're in it for the rightreasons.
All that hard work doesn't gounnoticed.
Thank you so much and again Ican never say it enough Thank
you to everybody who supportsthe work that we do.
We could not do it without you.
Speaker 2 (44:46):
And I don't want to speak on your behalf or anything
but for me if these billboardsjust get one person to come out,
if we have one person reach outand contact the Aftermath
Foundation and say, hey, I sawthe billboard and that was my
trigger to leave.
For me that makes it all worthit.
Just one person, right?
Speaker 3 (45:06):
you, you and me, and all of us, we are absolutely 100
that this is, this is themessage that we need to get to
the people trapped in this cult.
For sure, gilles jakeilles,jacques, you should make bumper
stickers with them.
Okay, yes, Good idea.
Speaker 1 (45:24):
I haven't been able to figure out how to do that on
fourth wall, but I think when Isaw that comment I actually just
thought of a way that we can doit.
Speaker 3 (45:33):
Glenda Stevenson question.
Has there been any backlash yetfrom the cult about the
billboards?
Speaker 4 (45:40):
Not yet Haven't heard yet Well.
I've been kind of keeping anear to the ground on that, but I
haven't heard any anythingnegative come back yet.
Speaker 3 (45:48):
Yes, and shout out to everybody who has helped us to
get the word out about thiscampaign, including all the work
you've been doing Phil, you,alex, tony Ortega put up a whole
big article, as we've shownhere today.
So to everybody that has helped, we appreciate it.
We could not do this workwithout you, melanie Johnson.
(46:13):
Bravo to Lamar, too, for notbacking down to bullies 100%.
Oh my gosh, I think between allof us we have stories for days
about people who back down tobullies Coffee, milk, dude.
Good to see you here.
Thank you for joining us.
Speaker 1 (46:23):
Thank you, that's very generous.
One or two last ones here.
Speaker 3 (46:29):
Glenda Stevenson, it's wonderful that you've
posted the billboards again.
Thank you so much.
It's nice to get back to whatwas the original purpose of
ex-Scientologists coming forward?
Yes, indeed.
Well, we've always been doingit, but yes, agreed.
Speaker 2 (46:45):
It's such a strong signal that we're here.
We stand united, ready andwilling to help and they can't
take that away from us, nomatter what they try, what legal
threats they throw at us, whatyou know backlash, having my
door kicked in and all thisother fair game stuff no matter
what, they cannot change that.
We are going to work togetheras a team, collaborate and help
(47:07):
people get out.
Speaker 3 (47:09):
Completely, and that has always, by the way, been
Scientology's biggest beef withMark and I since 2006 is that we
just wouldn't stop connectingpeople, talking to people,
holding SP parties, bringingpeople together.
They just literally we drivethem nuts.
Speaker 1 (47:29):
Yeah, for a little while we were doing this thing
in Los Angeles, where we wouldgo to a lake that was about
maybe an hour and a half northof Los Angeles and we had jet
skis and we'd have SP jet skiparties and I would just invite
any and all ex-Seahawk membersor Scientology people that we
knew.
Speaker 3 (47:50):
Even Anonymous came to those too.
Speaker 1 (47:52):
Yeah, anonymous came.
I think some OSA people came toa few parties.
I mean, we let everybody go tothese parties and we'd go jet
skiing at Lake Pyramid for theday and we did them.
I want to say that we did thosefor a few years.
Like at least one summer wewere going like almost every
single weekend when it was hotand I'd go up on Friday night
(48:14):
the night before and get in linewith the jet skis at the lake.
Speaker 3 (48:17):
Sleep in the back of the car waiting in line the jet
skis at the lake.
Sleep in the back of the carwaiting in the car.
Speaker 1 (48:20):
Yeah, it was wild.
Yeah, anyway, this is uh, thisis a little uh, this is a little
less gas money doing billboardslike this than uh running for
two skis all day long.
Okay, few last comments andthen we'll get out of here, guys
, thank you.
Thanks for sticking in theretill the end of year.
Speaker 3 (48:37):
Yes, melanie Johnson, I can only imagine the
scrambling Scientology is doingright now.
Yes, exactly, exactly, rebecca.
The billboards also continue toremind the public that
Scientology is so crazy thatpeople in the cult need help.
Exactly, and that is what'smost important, by the way, to
me personally and I know toeveryone most important, by the
(49:00):
way, to me personally and I knowto everyone, you know, mark
Phil Alex, is that the abusesstop and that innocent people
stop being hurt.
That's what is at the top of mypriority list 100%.
Speaker 4 (49:12):
It also helps prevent people from going in because
people see that kind of message.
And if I look at I got in backin 1969, my brother, my sister,
then they've got kids, they'vegot grandkids.
I mean there's like 15 peoplebehind me that got in just after
(49:35):
I did.
So one person getting in couldbring in family members.
So if you prevent one personcoming in it can be a big deal
of not bringing in an entirefamily.
Speaker 2 (49:49):
Totally Part of this billboard campaign as well is
you get the statistics of thefootfall and the vehicle traffic
that goes past the billboards.
This campaign is estimated toreach just under 2 million
people every single week.
That it's up right and, like Isaid, if just one of those is a
SEAL member, fantastic.
But that's a whole bunch ofjust members of the public that
(50:10):
are now informed.
Scientology is an organizationyou need help leaving from, and
I think that's huge.
Speaker 3 (50:16):
Yep.
Speaker 2 (50:17):
Totally.
Speaker 3 (50:17):
I agree completely, Terry Ray.
You all make such a good team.
I'm so proud of you all.
Thank you.
As we've been saying, teamworkmakes a dream work.
Todd Johnson, more billboardsneed fundraising for this.
Yes, agreed, and, as wementioned, you can go to the
aftermathfoundationorg.
We do have billboards there asa campaign that you can
(50:38):
specifically support.
So if you choose to do that,those funds are restricted for
use in the billboard campaign.
And again, thank you.
Scientology Money Project OSAAnti-Aftermath Foundation
Billboard.
Ot Emergency Committee Meetingat PAC, donations being raised.
(50:59):
That's exactly right, jeff,there you, you go these
billboards the dev t rightcompletely developed traffic, so
we don't give anyone amisunderstood word.
Speaker 1 (51:09):
My apology I can just imagine scientology assigning
an ot from the ot committee.
Okay, you're like they have to.
They basically have to farmthese out like they're.
Somebody has to be responsiblefor covering or getting rid of,
or uh doing something, even justgoing to find them.
Speaker 4 (51:30):
Initially.
You go out and find out wherethey all are.
Speaker 1 (51:33):
Oh, that's right oh, that's the other thing if
anybody watching this lives inLA and sees one take a selfie or
take a picture and send it tous.
We'd love to see them all.
We're not in Los Angeles.
Speaker 3 (51:46):
Yeah, send it to social at the aftermath
foundationorg and we will sharethat.
I wanted to answer thisquestion from Betsy Sue.
Well, they put up curtains onthe inside of the vans so the
people being transported can'tsee out.
Yes, there is a possibilitythey might do that, but even
then it plants the seed to thepeople inside the van what can't
(52:09):
I see outside that window, andit will plant a seed of
curiosity that may take root.
And so there you have it.
Speaker 2 (52:20):
And also people will walk between buildings as well.
Right, it's like you won't geta car from one side of the
street to the other and yes, weknow there are some tunnels in
some of the buildings, but likethere are so many of them, like
it's going to be impossible torestrict the view of every
single one of them for everysingle seal member.
It's.
It's frankly impossible, andthat's the point totally,
(52:40):
completely awesome guys.
Speaker 1 (52:43):
Well, I think, um, I think we got all of them.
They got, uh, we got that lastone there.
Um, as we normally do here atthe end, here, um again, I'll
put up the link to the aftermathfoundation store where we
basically sell all the merch.
There's Mike Rinder bobbleheads, leah bobbleheads and signed
headshots.
(53:03):
You can get all that stuffthere.
We also have SP bracelets.
Those are still selling.
We've got all kinds of signsthrough those.
Speaker 3 (53:13):
Yeah, let me add too, at the spshopcom and also from
the Aftermath Foundation website, you can also get the printed
cards.
If you'd like to hand those outand share them with people, all
that we ask is that you coverthe cost of shipping.
We print them and ship them toyou.
Anyway, yes, those have alsoproven very effective.
Which cards are those?
Speaker 2 (53:34):
It's the Aftermath.
Speaker 3 (53:35):
Foundation cards and there's curious ones.
We have curious, curious, youknow, yeah.
Speaker 4 (53:42):
I had some printed up with the Need Help, Leaving
artwork on it.
I had some cards printed up andsent to a friend of mine in LA
who goes around the buildingsand he's going to hand them out
to any Sea Org members he sees.
Speaker 3 (53:57):
Yes, and we have those.
They all have the phone numberon it.
Yes, perfect.
We have stocks of all thedifferent designs of those cards
, including the billboard one.
Speaker 4 (54:07):
Oh great, okay, so for future, then I'll have them.
Speaker 1 (54:11):
We can just send them to you, we have boxes and boxes
.
Speaker 2 (54:15):
And I've got bunches of the ones with the UK phone
number on as well.
So if anyone in the UK wantsthe UK number, let me know and I
can send you a bunch from here.
Speaker 1 (54:23):
Awesome Teamwork makes the dream work.
Thanks guys, we reallyappreciate you joining us for
this.
And yeah, we do have somefundraising stuff for the
Aftermath that's coming up inthe next few weeks.
So if you sign up attheaftermathfoundationorg you
can be alerted to that and thenotherwise, we'll put all the
(54:44):
links of all the different stuffwe talked about we'll put all
of that down below in the videodescription.
Speaker 2 (54:55):
Anybody got anything else.
I meant it when.
Speaker 3 (54:58):
I said I'm not messing around, we're only just
getting started, right?
Yes, 100%.
Speaker 4 (55:02):
Yes, stay tuned until next time bye guys, thanks a
lot.
Speaker 1 (55:08):
Thanks for watching.
If you'd like to help supportthe channel, feel free to check
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(55:30):
the Iron Curtain of Scientologyin hardback, kindle and audible
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And if you'd like to watchanother video, you can click on
this link right here, or you canclick on this one here, or you
(55:51):
can click on the subscribebutton right here.
Thanks a lot, until next time.
Hey guys, welcome back to the channel, welcome to
another episode of Blown forGood.
We have a whole bunch ofspecial guests here today.
We have my wife, claire, andthen we have two new guests that
we've not ever had on thechannel at the same time before,
and that is Alex apostate Alexand Phil Jones.
(00:33):
And here they all are, hey guys.
Speaker 2 (00:37):
Bt is activate.
Speaker 3 (00:40):
Awesome, I know we're mixing it up, we pulled a fast
one on all of our viewers.
So sorry, it's been a very longwork week, but we have some
amazing news to talk about.
So you know, we kind of justdropped everything last minute
and flew news.
The Aftermath Foundation put upsome more billboards all over.
Speaker 1 (01:01):
Los Angeles, and it's 13 that are up right now.
Speaker 4 (01:16):
right, and then another seven that are no, there
were 13 yesterday.
Five more went up this morningearly, early, and then there's
two more that should go uptomorrow.
So we're at 18 right now.
Be 20 by tomorrow morningbefore 8am.
Speaker 3 (01:31):
Amazing and so so let's just give a the two minute
overview while we allow peoplethe time to show up for this
unannounced stream.
Last year, right in time for LRon Hubbard's birthday, on March
11th 2024, we put up abillboard, with Phil's help,
(01:52):
right next to the PAC-basedcomplex in Los Angeles, and
within what Phil I think, twohours.
Speaker 4 (02:00):
Well, it's a little longer than that, but it came
down in the middle of the night.
Speaker 3 (02:03):
1 am I think it was yes, but I mean within two hours
they had blocked it.
Speaker 4 (02:09):
Right, right, yes, yeah, they put up a scissor lift
in front of it.
Speaker 3 (02:13):
Yes, Scientology's response was to immediately
erect a scissor lift thatblocked the entire billboard
from their Sea Org members,which it was the exact intended
targeted audience that we knewneeded to hear our message, and
it wasn't.
It was simply need help,leaving Scientology call the
(02:35):
aftermath.
Anyway, yeah, so within twohours they had put up a scissor
lift.
They then went hard and heavyon the billboard company and
within I think, three days, ifI'm not mistaken, they succeeded
in taking it down.
However, as we are havecommitted to this cause of
exposing Scientology abuses, wedid not let it go at that, and
(02:59):
we've had many, many effortsongoing behind the scenes, and
thus this announcement today,and both phil and apostate, alex
and katherine olsen um havebeen all very instrumental in
making this happen, so let mejust pause to say thank you to
all involved.
Speaker 4 (03:18):
Yeah, also, if we can give a shout out to kernan
coleman for the for doing thegraphic arts on these.
Speaker 3 (03:24):
Yes.
Speaker 4 (03:24):
Brilliant graphic artist and he's almost stepped
up.
He's the one who did the CallMe billboards back in 2016 and
the one from last year.
One point on the one last year,the reason they were able to
put up those scissor lifts isthey owned the property right in
front of where the billboardwas.
But this year, with those 20,they don't own any of the
(03:46):
property in front of any ofthose billboards.
There's no scissor lifts coming.
Speaker 2 (03:52):
Yes, and, by the way, go ahead, alex.
I was going to say, phil, yourcomment on Tony Ortega's blog
was that Scientology is going toneed more scissor lifts.
It made me laugh so much.
There's no way, there's nohiding this campaign.
It's big enough that there'snothing they can do about it.
Speaker 3 (04:09):
Yeah, yes, exactly, and thank you to Catherine Olsen
for her hours poring over theLA maps to find exactly which
billboards would have the mostexposure, specifically to
current members of the Corganization.
Speaker 2 (04:26):
Yeah, catherine spent a very long time looking at
there was.
This project has been in theworks for months, I think off
the back of Phil's original one,the one you guys did last year,
and it got taken down.
I was like, okay, thinking withmy marketing hat on, how do we
stop this happening again?
And the way of doing it in mymind was let's just do more
(04:46):
billboards if we get slightlysmaller ones, but they're really
strategically placed and theyall go up at the same time.
It's going to be really hardfor Scientology to pull a
scissor lift trick or to try,and even if they were to succeed
in you know, threateninglawsuits and getting them taken
down, it's going to take time toget rid of 20 billboards, even
(05:07):
if the decision was made on thesame day.
So it was kind of a fail safe,get the message heard thing.
And Catherine spent hours andhours looking at the bus routes
that the sealed members takefrom birthing to the pack base
and to SMP, and also the thefood delivery routes that they
use to deliver the food for thestaff and things like the Sunday
(05:29):
market where people hang out ontheir time off, on their CSP,
and it was like let's make surewe've got billboards in all of
those locations.
So whatever happens, they willsee the message.
Speaker 1 (05:40):
Yeah, there's no way that the buses or that the staff
are going to be able to pick aroute that's not going to see 20
billboards.
Speaker 4 (05:50):
And if they're up long enough time, they're going
to see them.
And that phone number that yougot Claire was brilliant because
it's so easy to remember thatthey don't need to write it down
.
So if they get caught lookingat it and remembering it, what's
the Scientology going to do?
No, you need to forget thatnumber.
If it's in their head, it's notgoing anywhere.
Speaker 3 (06:12):
Right, and we know one thing for sure what's that?
Speaker 1 (06:20):
I was going to say I'm going to pull up Tony
Ortega's blog and see if I canput that up so we can show the
pictures of the billboards too.
Speaker 3 (06:24):
Yes, perfect, yeah, but if there's one thing we know
for sure is that seaorganization members are very
adept at committing things tomemory especially if you're
clear and you have total recallright once you've seen it,
you're going to remember itforever, apparently yes,
completely, I totally, and I didwant to mention, too, why this
(06:46):
is so very important to the workthat the Michael J Rinder
Aftermath Foundation does is theone thing that members of the
Sea Organization do not have byvirtue of the isolation and the
lives that they live currently.
They have no hope of lifeoutside of Scientology, and so
(07:07):
this is a message of hope and amessage of hey, listen, we know
you're in a bad spot.
There is a life outside of thisworld, and there are many
different families and peoplewe're working with currently
through the work the foundationdoes, who had they known years
ago that there was resourcesoutside of the sea organization,
(07:29):
they would have left years agoyeah, here let me put up the um.
Speaker 1 (07:33):
Can you guys see that ?
Speaker 4 (07:36):
yeah, yes, 888-3002, that's like you look at it once
and you've got it in your head.
Yes, brilliant, there's threedifferent billboards.
Speaker 3 (07:47):
You contributed to that.
Yes, I found it, but we wereboth 100% on the same page that
we needed something easy toremember and just at a glance,
you'd have it yeah.
Speaker 1 (08:02):
This is the second one.
Speaker 3 (08:04):
And these newer designs, by the way, were
inspired by alex.
So brilliant, alex, thank you.
And this is a offshoot of thecurious uh billboard scientology
has been running in the londonunderground.
Speaker 2 (08:20):
Alex, want to talk about that and your inspiration
on this oh yeah, I mean they ranthese billboards that said I'm
a Scientologist curious, and itjust links to a page on the
Scientology website with videotestimonials of people talking
about their time in Scientologyand I kind of, as a joke, made
like a little I'm anex-Scientologist curious, like a
(08:41):
little banner and posted onsocial media and people were
like, hey, you should like, youshould make that happen.
And so it's like, ok, maybe,maybe there's something in that,
what can we do with it?
And it was a bit of fun.
But it's also like noScientology have had a chance to
inform the public of what lifeis like inside Scientology,
allegedly.
And so I think it's only fairthat you know we run some
(09:03):
billboards that say I'm an exScientologist, you know, and
here are some stories of whatlife is like for other people
and maybe get some exposure ofthe abusive stuff that perhaps
sealed members don't, don'trecognize mic story and be like,
hey, that happened to me or Irecognize something like that
(09:24):
that's similar to what happenedto me, and not realize you know,
they're not alone in theirsuffering and there is a
community here of people tosupport them yes, absolutely yes
go ahead.
Speaker 3 (09:40):
no, I was just going to say, and, phil, you're having
your experience and input onthese billboards just from the
call me billboards andeverything else has been amazing
, so thank you so much for that.
Speaker 4 (09:52):
You're welcome.
I'm always happy to help.
It's a worthwhile cause.
And you know, I've always hadthis thought that you know
somebody in the Sea Org.
I've never been in the Sea Org.
I've got two kids in the SeaOrg and they're still there.
And you kind of I have thisidea that somebody might want to
walk out the door.
But where do they go?
They step out the door, they goleft.
Do they go right?
They got no money in theirpocket.
(10:13):
They have maybe no contacts, norelatives.
What do they do?
They end up not walking out thedoor because they have nowhere
to go.
But if they have that phonenumber in their head, they just
need to find a phone and help isthere.
So I think that having thosebillboards out there, I think,
is just really important to givethem an escape route.
Speaker 1 (10:35):
Totally, and also I wanted to show the map, so this
is again.
This is on the undergroundbunker Tony Ortega sub stack.
But you can see, there's somany of them.
I love it.
There's so many locations Nowand also Scientology.
(10:56):
They have properties all overHollywood.
I want to say they probablyhave between 15 and 20 different
properties between the big bluecomplex that's down on a
fountain, and I want to sayEdgemont is kind of where the
main um like between sunset andfountain avenues in Hollywood,
but then they've got multipleproperties on Hollywood
(11:17):
Boulevard.
Um, they've got multipleproperties, uh, at the end of
Hollywood Boulevard and thenkind of strewn throughout it and
, yeah, they've got that studiothat's on the kind of like the
eastern side of Hollywood.
So these are everywhere.
There is no way for them toavoid this.
Speaker 3 (11:39):
Yeah, exactly what are they going to tell the Sea
Org members?
Don't look up.
Speaker 4 (11:45):
One of the locations.
I had a friend of mine go downand take a picture of one of the
billboards and it's just almostright across the street from
Scientology Media Production SeaOrg facility.
So I mean you can see thebuilding from the billboard.
Speaker 1 (12:02):
Nice.
Speaker 3 (12:02):
Love it, absolutely love it.
Speaker 2 (12:05):
I wonder if you can see it from David Miscavige's
office at SMP.
Speaker 1 (12:10):
That would be amazing yeah.
Speaker 4 (12:13):
But the people got to drive out of there.
Speaker 1 (12:16):
Yeah, we did talk to somebody who could see exactly
where David Miscavige's officewindow was from a nearby bar
that he was going to, and Ithink I don't know if we lost
claire or not she was having aweird connection up there.
Um, let's, uh, there's somegreat comments that are coming
(12:37):
up here.
I'll put these up.
Necessary trouble, says alex isso good with ideas for signage.
Very clever thank you.
Speaker 2 (12:44):
I mean, look, it was a team effort, and I think this
is another thing that made mefeel so passionate about this is
like Scientology like to divideand conquer and pit people
against each other.
You know, osa are full of lotsof trickery and bad faith acting
and that sort of thing.
One of the strongest things, inmy opinion, is to unite
(13:05):
together as a community and worktogether, and teamwork really
is, you know, makes a dream work, and this is such an example of
different people pitching inwith their ideas and working
together, collaborating on this,and it's something that will
reach SEAL members, you know,without a doubt, there's no way
they can miss it.
Yes, and exactly to.
Speaker 1 (13:25):
Phil's point.
Sorry, we're walking all overeach other because there's a bit
of a delay, so we're all kindof hearing each other right as
we start talking.
When you are in the Sea Org,one of the biggest things is who
can you turn to if you escape?
And that is a giant barrier toSea Org members getting out is
(13:46):
their family is usually not inthe same state or even involved
in Scientology.
They have no way to get a holdof those people.
They have no way to warn themthat they want to come or find
out if they could come.
None of these things can reallytake place until after the
person's escaped.
So if they see something thatsays, oh, those guys will help
(14:07):
me and they can help me get outof here, then they can call us
and they can get all thatarranging done while they're
still in the C organization.
And this is a key, key thing.
And we help them with thecommunication thing.
We help them with figuring outwhere they can go and we can
(14:29):
also do research on their behalfto talk to their family members
and talk to these other peopleto kind of suss out what the
situation is and then help themfigure out exactly what the best
idea is.
So this is why we do this, andthe Aftermath Foundation has
been doing this for severalyears now, and in this last year
(14:52):
did you mention the newsletter.
If people want to sign up toget the newsletter, yes.
Speaker 3 (14:58):
So two things.
First of all, if you go to theAftermath Foundation website,
theaftermathfoundationorg, youcan sign up there for our
newsletter.
We sent out our firstnewsletter in a very long time.
I don't think we've done anewsletter since 2018, if I'm
not mistaken but the idea we'reat least going to try to do two
(15:21):
to three, to hopefully eveneventually quarterly newsletters
with dates and news.
So if you haven't signed up forthat, please go to the
aftermath foundationorg and youcan sign up there to receive our
newsletters.
Speaker 1 (15:37):
We can put a link to the newsletter in the
description of the video sopeople can go to it, and then,
once they have a link, they canjust sign up on the website if
they just want to get itwhenever we release it.
Speaker 4 (15:47):
Is there a way to get ?
Speaker 3 (15:48):
access to previous newsletters.
To what sorry?
Speaker 4 (15:52):
Is there a way?
To get access to previous yeah.
Speaker 3 (15:55):
That's a great thought and I will talk with our
team about that.
I'm sure there is, so we'llwork on that and fortunately
Clara is here, so she's probablygoing to be most helpful with
that.
We'll get that taken care of.
But I did also want to mentiontoo specifically about the
crisis line and the number thatis on that billboard.
(16:16):
We worked very extensively tofind a company that would answer
that phone 24 seven, and theway that it works is there's a
very carefully scripted umpatter that gets used.
When somebody calls in, first ofall, make sure are you in a
safe place and if they're not ina safe place, immediately take
(16:38):
care of that first, and thenthis company will then connect
the person directly to anAftermath Foundation staff
member or volunteer to help whohas the knowledge needed to have
a conversation with the personand provide the assistance that
they need.
So sometimes it's pressing, butit's not always.
(16:59):
But nonetheless, the billboardshave absolutely spread that
number and we've been getting alot more calls and a lot more
active people interested in thefoundation services and how
we're able to assist them ingetting out.
So it's just amazing, and Iwould like to say also too, we
(17:22):
covered this in our newsletter,but now we even have one of
these phone numbers.
Am I frozen?
Speaker 1 (17:29):
You are, but we can hear you.
Speaker 3 (17:31):
And hear you, oh okay .
Well then I'll just finish thatthought.
Um, we have another dedicatedline solely for law enforcement,
as requested by law enforcement, so that if someone in law
enforcement runs into someonetrying to exit scientology, they
can also make that connectionthat's amazing.
Speaker 1 (17:52):
Yeah, this is um.
This is we're trying, we'relearning over the years, we're
learning all the ways, kind ofnot to do it, and then we're
learning the ways to do it andwhich ones are working.
and, um, even when that onebillboard went up um, originally
the one by the complex and gottaken down, the aftermath got in
(18:13):
enough donations that we coulddo multiple billboard campaigns
over and over again.
So hopefully, in addition toreaching out to Sea Org members,
we'll also reach people thatare willing to donate to the
cause and support the AftermathFoundation so that we can better
help the people that areleaving and then we can just
(18:36):
keep this going.
Speaker 3 (18:37):
Yes, In fact, on the foundation website you can
actually select.
If you'd like to support thebillboard campaign, you can make
a donation and mark that it'sspecifically for this purpose.
Speaker 2 (18:50):
So I think the key thing as well with billboards
and this is why I love this ideaso much is how do you reach
somebody in this organization?
Because Scientology controlsevery aspect of your life.
It controls your access to theoutside world.
It senses your Internet.
You know it's very rare for aSEAL member, especially in LA,
(19:10):
to have free Internet access,for example.
So it's really hard to reachthese people with a message.
So they may not even be awarethat there's support available
to them.
But the good thing about abillboard is there's nothing you
can do about it.
You just have to walk down thestreet and you see this message
and there's nothing Scientologycan do to prevent a sealed
member from seeing it,especially when you have so many
(19:33):
and they're on every corner ofthe route that you could take to
any of the Scientologybuildings.
Like it's not.
Like they can just change theirroute and go a different way to
work because they'll seeanother billboard, right, that's
the whole idea is that youcan't miss it and the message
will get through to the Sealsstaff there.
Speaker 3 (19:49):
Yep, 100%, and it's amazing to me too, by the way
you know we've talked about itnumerous times.
I'm sure all of us have,individually and collectively
that it's obviously Scientologyhas such a litigious reputation
that they will go after andsquash any efforts to get out
(20:11):
any message of hope or help forlife after Scientology.
I think it's important torecognize, though, that,
particularly since HBO is goingclear, and then, of course, the
three seasons of Leah Remini,scientology in the aftermath,
with Leah and Mike Rinder thatthe public perception and
awareness of the abusesScientology commits have has
(20:32):
been so dramatically increasedthat now the, the companies that
we work with, nine times out of10, or maybe even 100 percent
I'm sure Phil could comment onthis they were like we, 100
percent support the work thatyou do.
Speaker 4 (20:47):
As far as billboard companies, I mean, the one we
used last year was Clear Channel, but the one that stuck with us
back in 2016,.
We got shut down several timesbefore we ended up being able to
get those Call Me billboards up.
And it was the same companythat we're using now, lamar and
they stuck with us.
(21:08):
And back in 2016, it went allthe way up to the owners of the
company who approved it.
And also back then we had theword Scientology on those
billboards twice.
It's only on our billboardsonce now.
Speaker 3 (21:27):
Oh my gosh.
Speaker 2 (21:28):
The URL.
Obviously there's the one thatsays call me with the phone
number or call us, sorry, butthe other two the the one with
mike rinder on it and the onewith yourself claire that the
urls are scientology abuse andscientology stories and they
redirect to a page on theaftermath um website where it
just tells personal stories,right?
So there's not really anythingto sue about because it's just
(21:50):
personal people telling theirpersonal stories of what
happened to them in thisorganization, and I think that's
really, really powerful initself.
You know it's not saying we'reaccusing you of this or you know
we're not putting anythinglibelous or slander or anything
on these billboards.
It's just saying I'm anex-lantologist, here's a link to
a story about what happened tome, right, and then you're able
(22:13):
to see other people's storiestoo.
Happened to me, right.
Speaker 3 (22:14):
And then, you'll be able.
You're able to see otherpeople's stories too.
Speaker 1 (22:16):
Yeah, the other great thing is on the aftermath
website there's alsotestimonials, and in the
newsletter there's testimonialsof people that we've helped.
So if a seer member was goingto go to the site, they'd be
able to see those testimonials,and the things that the people
are saying they need help withare the exact things that they
know they need help with findinga vehicle or getting a job, or
(22:40):
even getting a place to stay,yeah, or just stay for a little
bit, or a plane ticket or all ofthe logistical thing that I
realized when I was lookingthrough the newsletter is
SeaWorld members think very theyattach significances to
(23:07):
logistical things.
It's not like I need a place togo, it's I need a ticket, I need
a car, I need transport, I needthese things in order to get
away from here, and they don'teven really think about all the
other things that they're goingto need once they get to the
place.
So it's just we kind of.
I mean, we've talked about thisbefore, but Claire and I were
doing this many, many yearsbefore there was an Aftermath
(23:29):
Foundation.
We were doing this in our ownand a lot of the people that are
part of the AftermathFoundation board have been doing
this for over a decade on ourown and helping people with jobs
or helping people kind of getget going and get on their feet
again, and so over the years wehave learned a lot of tips and
tricks on how to get thesepeople sort of.
(23:53):
You know you have to get theirfeet running and then put them
onto the treadmill of life, sowe know how to do that now so
they can get up to speed reallyquickly.
Speaker 3 (24:05):
Yeah, oftentimes their mind gets there and then
the other pieces fall into place, like they learn to shed the
language and they learn to shedthe, the false expectations that
have been set for them byScientology.
Like, oh, you'll only ever flipburgers the rest of your life
or you know you'll you'll end upon the streets with nowhere to
(24:28):
go.
You know, that's what.
That's what Scientology wantsthose sea Organization members
to believe to keep them thereand keep them doing the work of
staying there.
It's absolutely as we know.
We've many, many times seenpeople and helped people get out
and then completely flourish,turn their lives around and
(24:49):
truly inspire other people toleave as well.
Speaker 2 (24:53):
Yeah, and billboards as well.
Sorry to keep harping on aboutthis, but I think the fact that
it will reach sealed members,whether they like it or not is,
is really powerful, because ifyou've been told that there's no
support out there, you'll justbe flipping burgers, you know,
and that's what you've beenconditioned to believe.
When you're walking aroundbetween you know different
offices or whatever in LA, justdoing your job and you're
(25:15):
thinking about leaving and yousee a billboard one, two, three,
hey, 20 times, right that sendsus like a message to that
person that hold on.
There's a united effort here.
There's clearly a group ofpeople who have resources to put
billboards up.
Maybe there is support outthere, maybe there is some sort
of help that I can get and theresources that I need.
(25:36):
It almost doesn't matter whatthe billboard says.
Just the fact that there is amessage of hope there sends a
really important message, andthen throw in there the crisis
helpline and the URL to thestories and it's just a winner
all round, in my opinion.
Speaker 3 (25:50):
Yes, completely Completely.
Speaker 4 (25:53):
It's nice to hear that you're getting more calls
too.
If you're getting more calls,that means more people are
walking out the door.
Speaker 3 (25:59):
Yes.
Speaker 4 (26:00):
That's nice.
Speaker 1 (26:00):
Yes.
Speaker 4 (26:02):
And so many orgs are so empty now and like even
that's just not Sea Org Orgs,but they're so empty, they're
going to eventually, they'regoing to run out of people.
Yeah for sure.
Speaker 3 (26:14):
That's the idea, that is the idea.
Speaker 2 (26:16):
Sunderland Ork in the UK has three staff members.
Speaker 3 (26:20):
Sunderland Wow.
Speaker 4 (26:23):
I mean, you see these pictures of academies where
people are studying one person,maybe two or three at most.
I remember back when we were inand our academy would have 60
people on the weekend You'd bebringing in extra chairs to seat
the rest you know people andthen that's just the academy.
Downstairs, basic courses wouldhave another 50, 60 people as
(26:44):
on a regular basis, and nowthey're lucky to get three
people in a in a course room.
So they're definitely shrinkingin a big way.
Speaker 3 (26:53):
Completely, and I did .
I did want to take a moment togive a shout out and just thank
literally every single personwho has ever donated to the
foundation to support our work.
We would not be able to do thework we do, and especially not
on the scale that we've beengrowing into, without your
(27:15):
support.
It means so, so much to us.
Literally this is you know,every board member is volunteer.
This is a passion project,definitely for Mark and I, and I
know the other board members.
It means so much to us thatthose trapped in a cult have the
option of hope and help outsideof that world.
Speaker 1 (27:36):
Totally, totally.
The other thing that Phil mademe think is that if there are
Sea Org members that live in LosAngeles, there's a lot of those
Sea Org members their parentsor their family also live and
work in Los Angeles.
So there's also a good chancethat just public Scientologists
are going to see thesebillboards and then a lot of
(28:00):
Scientologists, I don't know.
I mean Phil could probablyspeak better to this as a public
or a civilian Scientologist,but I don't think a lot of
Scientologists know the depth ofabuse that occurs inside
Scientology's C organization.
I think they know that theywork long hours and I think they
(28:22):
know they get crew meals and amess and all that, but I don't
think they know about the horrorstories.
What do you think about?
Speaker 4 (28:30):
that.
Speaker 1 (28:30):
Phil.
Speaker 4 (28:31):
You know, when our kids were in the C org, you know
what we would say on a regularbasis Well, at least they're in
a safe place.
That was our thought, that atleast they're not going to be in
a criminal environment.
That was the abuses that weregoing on.
(28:54):
You know, that was the wholething.
It's like, yeah, well, you know, okay, they might not be doing
this or that, but you know, atleast they're safe where they
are.
Speaker 1 (29:08):
We had no idea that it was just so horrible, yeah,
and in a lot of cases, dangerous.
I mean there's SEERB membersthat have lost fingers and
printing equipment, choppers andsaws.
Speaker 4 (29:19):
Elevators, yeah, elevators.
Speaker 3 (29:22):
I came a hair away from losing my foot, as we all
know.
Thank goodness that didn'thappen.
Speaker 1 (29:29):
Anyway.
But yeah, I think, so that Ithink that if there are family
members seeing billboards thatare offering to help somebody
escape from Scientology, theneven the, even the family
members and the relatives ofthem, might kind of be like I
need to, I might need a light onthe Sea Organization.
They start letting them go onliberties.
They start letting them go toweddings and family funerals and
(30:06):
other family reunions and stufflike that also helps plant the
seeds.
When they do get away from theSea Org and they see how happy
their families are or theirrelatives outside of Scientology
, and then they go like wait aminute, I thought everybody were
like criminals and drug addictsand like the whole world was
(30:28):
horrible.
These guys don't seem likethey're having that bad of a
time at all.
Speaker 4 (30:32):
You know that was a good point you made with the
those the two, the one with Mikeand one with Claire, with those
domain names on there.
If I was still in and I wouldhave seen that as a public I
would have gone to one of thosesites and looked.
I would have.
I ended up getting out.
I saw the newspaper the TampaBay or the St Pete Times back
(30:57):
then and you know the truth'srun down.
But I would have looked.
I would have seen that on abillboard.
I wouldn't have said anythingto anybody because you know you
don't want to get reported, butI would have gone on the
Internet and looked and I'm surethere will be some people who
do, for sure there will be somepeople who do, for sure.
Speaker 3 (31:17):
Yeah, you know what?
Speaker 2 (31:18):
I'm willing to bet money that there are more
scientologists curious aboutlife outside of scientology than
there are never ends who arecurious about getting into
scientology that's true just thepoint of, like you know, the
fact that there needs to bebillboards that say if you need
help leaving, there's resourcesand support here, like just the
(31:39):
fact that there needs to be thatmessage indicates hold on.
You know, maybe thisorganization is doing some bad
stuff here, like why would Ineed help leaving or why would
anyone need help leaving anorganization unless they were
doing some shady stuff?
Speaker 4 (31:53):
you know organization , unless they were doing some
shady stuff.
You know, yeah, when we wereoriginally, when we were
originally designing thatbillboard, we were going to use
the word escaping instead ofleaving.
We thought it's a little bittoo harsh, we thought leaving
would probably be a little bitbetter totally and just to the
point that these billboards doplant the seed.
Speaker 1 (32:13):
Catherine just said that she saw one of the Call Me
billboards when she was still inthe seaboard.
I've talked to a few people whohave said that.
Speaker 3 (32:22):
Yes, I have too.
Speaker 4 (32:24):
But you know, actually somebody brought that
up recently, I think it was Alex.
It was you that mentioned thatyou'd seen or you'd heard about
them.
I went back and I lookedthrough all my notes and I had
all these messages from allthese people who had seen the
billboard and written to us.
A 10-year-old girl wasdisconnected from her parents
(32:46):
Where's a 10-year-old girl goingto go?
And she had written to ushaving seen the Call Me
Billboards.
Amazing number of people thatwrote to us from that Incredible
.
Speaker 1 (32:58):
Wow, yeah, just for anybody who's just joining in.
I just want to show thebillboards again.
So these are the billboards.
There's three of them so far,and this is the first one, and
this is the second one withClaire there, and what an
amazing quote from Mike Rinder,by the way.
Speaker 3 (33:18):
The difference between a religion and a cult is
what happens when you try toleave.
Speaker 2 (33:24):
Exactly, I love that quote Because Scientology will
try and tell you when you're inthat these big bad SPs will try
and change your mind andconvince you of things.
And they've just got their ownagenda and Mike Rinder's post
here, like that quote itliterally just plants the seed.
It says, hey, the differencebetween a religion and a cult is
(33:44):
what happens when it tries,when you try to leave.
It doesn't try and say youshould leave scientology or
scientology is it.
It just makes a very good pointthat's going to plant a seed of
doubt and people are going tostart thinking, well, hold on.
No, scientology is Scientologyis a religion.
I can leave anytime I want, orcan I yep, you know?
Speaker 3 (34:02):
because every, every, every member of the sea
organization knows what's goingto happen if they try to leave.
That's why that rings.
So so true, um and yes, andthere's the map, and I saw
someone oh, here's one of thephotos that's actually, yeah
that a friend of mine wentaround and took that picture.
Speaker 4 (34:20):
20 billboards, yeah, that one, um, oh no, no, this
one actually a picture fromlamar.
They took that picture, oh, theother.
There's a the uh.
The other picture, the one ofthe uh need help leaving.
That was.
That's the one that's near uhthe scientology media
productions nice that was in thecomments.
(34:41):
I think I posted that one inthe comments at the bunker, so
if you sort by best, um, yes,definitely the best comment,
phil, good job well, picture thebillboard.
Speaker 2 (34:53):
That's supposed no no I'm trying to click on the
screen not the uh, I think it'sin the comments on the bunker
rather than the sub stack.
Oh, I get it.
Speaker 1 (35:03):
Oh, that's fine sorry right, right, okay, good um the
other thing I wanted to say ohlook, we got, we got osa office
of spoofed affairs nice thankyou that's very generous of you
office of spoofed affairs.
Um, I just saw there was somenice comments there.
Mike's legacy lives on.
Yes, absolutely it is nice tosee mike's picture up there, it
(35:24):
really is I know and we actuallythat goes by, that I don't miss
mike yeah, we just did that foryou there, uh, that the ed's
mom, um, the uh, we just so.
Everybody knows this wholecampaign started when Mike was
still with us and that's when weworked all of this out, so it
(35:44):
was even when Mike was still onthe board.
Um, so this has been going onfor many, many months and, um,
probably actually even over ayear now, because we had, um
that we had that other billboardthing happened, where they took
it down right away andScientology pressured the
billboard company.
Speaker 3 (36:02):
And then we also had about four contracts between
then and now.
That that were we, were, youknow, on the home stretch, and
then, for one reason or another,scientology bullied them or
they got cold feet because oftheir legal department, whatever
, we just kept at it.
Like you know, keep going,exactly.
Speaker 4 (36:26):
I think people might not realize just how much work
is involved in gettingbillboards up.
There's a lot of logistics toit and bits and pieces.
Alex knows that, catherineknows that she's the one who
went around, looked at all thosebillboards on the ground and
Alex setting all that.
I mean it is a lot of back andforth, a lot of bits and pieces
until they finally get acontract up.
(36:47):
But it's nice that they're nowup and you know it took a bit
but it's actually rewarding tosee it.
Speaker 3 (36:59):
It really is.
I know.
Speaker 2 (37:01):
So many hours went into this from everybody
involved.
You know it wasn't justresearching the billboards, it
was also researching, like youknow, some of the original ones
we wanted to go for are all insort of long-term contracts with
specific clients, and so therewas a lot of negotiation around
which ones are coming availablesoon, how long are they, you
(37:22):
know, reserved for, which onescan we put up fairly quickly and
easily, and you know which oneshave longer contracts and
shorter contracts.
And then, obviously, workingout the different routes this is
what Catherine did is like okay, this is the way they normally
go on the bus from birthing toto work.
Um, and so if we put abillboard there, what route are
(37:42):
they going to take to divertaround it?
Okay, well, can we put abillboard here?
Well then, which way do theyhave to go to avoid that one?
And that's how this campaign allcame about.
It's like where can westrategically place them?
Where they literally cannot bemissed.
There's no escaping them.
So it was a lot of work puttingin all of that so many
spreadsheets, lots of liaisonbetween the mar and everybody
(38:05):
else around, like which ones wewant to go for, and we were
talking about differentlocations as well.
Um.
So yeah, I'm so glad that weall work together as a team to
get it done, and I'm reallyproud of it, and I hope you guys
are too.
Speaker 3 (38:16):
Oh, oh, 100%.
No, absolutely.
Collaborations like this arethe best and most effective.
When we work together to sayyou know what?
Let's keep our eye on themountain.
We want we want Scientologistsand Sea Org members to know that
there's life outside ofScientology, and we want people
(38:37):
who have never been inScientology to be aware that
this is an abusive and dangerousorganization.
When we all work together toaccomplish that, amazing things
happen 100% yeah and thanks forputting my link up there, mark.
Oh, mark, you're muted, markthat's rare oh sorry, I muted
(39:02):
myselflex got my joke only anenglish only an english man
appreciates uh english humor Ijust put up alex's link.
Speaker 1 (39:16):
Where can people find you if they want to find out
more stuff?
Speaker 4 (39:19):
Phil.
Well, I've got some videos onYouTube.
I haven't posted that muchrecently, but I've got a bunch
of videos up there.
People are welcome to go there.
It's just youtubecom slashphildoggo.
P-h-i-l-d-o-g-g-o.
Speaker 1 (39:35):
Awesome.
We'll put a link in thedescription below in the video,
All right, and we'll put Alex'sin there too.
And then people were asking ifthey wanted to just support the
Aftermath Foundation.
You could just go to theaftermathfoundationorg.
That's where you can sign upfor the newsletter.
That's where you can listyourself as a volunteer.
That's where you can donatedirectly to the Aftermath
(39:56):
Foundation.
Speaker 3 (39:57):
Oh and let me add.
Let me add something it wouldbe super, super helpful just to
do one single thing go to theAftermath Foundation YouTube
channel and subscribe.
Our goal is to get to 10,000subscribers at the Aftermath
Foundation channel, which is arequirement so that we can
(40:17):
officially, just every once in awhile, do fundraisers through
YouTube.
Youtube covers all the fees andevery any donation made goes
directly to the aftermathfoundation.
So our goal is to have it sothat we can host them on the
aftermath foundation channel andthen any other YouTube channels
(40:38):
that want to contribute to thatfundraiser can do so.
It's an amazing feature.
So there you go, One easy thingthat everybody could do.
Speaker 1 (40:48):
Awesome, and I'll put a link in the description to
the Aftermath YouTube page aswell.
And then also we have Big NavyDavy Dolls Bobbleheads.
We have a Mike Bobblehead, mikeRinder bobblehead, we have a
Leah bobblehead and we have aset of them that are they have
signed headshots from Leah andMike, and then we also just have
(41:10):
a signed one of Leah and asigned one of Mike.
But all of the proceeds fromall of the things at the
spshopcom, all of those proceedsgo to the Aftermath Foundation
to support.
Speaker 3 (41:21):
Yes, and we should mention thank you very much.
Rest in peace, mike.
We miss you every day.
Mike, in September of last year, signed these set number of
photos.
So it is while supplies lastobviously goes without saying.
But there you have it.
Speaker 1 (41:41):
Yeah, I was trying to find if I had a.
It's just bobbleheads, whateverit's the spshopcom.
We'll put all these links downbelow.
Then I figured before we gotout of here we could take a
little bit of comments.
Love my mic.
Speaker 3 (41:55):
You want me to read them, honey?
Speaker 1 (41:57):
Yes, please.
Speaker 3 (41:59):
I'll get my glasses on.
Speaker 1 (42:01):
Okay.
Speaker 3 (42:04):
Me and my glasses.
Okay, catherine Olson, at Jay,they all went up within 24 hours
.
No secret anymore.
There you go, but we have lotsof secret things in the work.
So, as we mentioned, go to theaftermathfoundationorg.
Sign up for our newsletter.
Follow us on social media.
Subscribe to the aftermathfoundationorg.
Sign up for our newsletter.
Follow us on social media.
Subscribe to the youtubechannel.
We have so many announcementscoming.
Daniel, danielle chamberlain sogood to see you here, danielle.
(42:28):
Thank you for the super sticker.
We appreciate it.
Betsy, sue, just call me betsy.
Bravo, I'm in tears.
Thank you for all you do,absolutely, and thank you for
Everyone here for supporting thework that the Michael J Rinder
Aftermath Foundation does.
It's deeply moving to know thatthere are so many people out
there that support this cause.
(42:49):
Necessary trouble, the courageand perseverance you all have
shown in fighting this cult ismind blowing.
Speaker 1 (42:57):
Kudos to all of you, thank you have shown in fighting
this cult is mind-blowing.
Kudos to all of you, thank you,yes, and thanks for phil and
alex for uh joining in and andhelping it's.
It's always amazing when umpeople that are have all left
can work together and we cankind of, you know, use uh our,
our talents to help uh otherothers do get to where we're at,
(43:18):
sort of thing.
Speaker 3 (43:18):
Yes, because everyone knows we have a very wide set
of talents.
Transfer of Madness, any plansfor other billboards in
different cities?
Many yes, stay tuned, kristen.
Speaker 2 (43:33):
H.
We're only just getting started.
Speaker 3 (43:35):
Yes, yes, there's one thing I think we've all proven
we cannot be shut down.
What Scientology cannot takeaway from us is hope and
persistence.
Kristen H, thank you all.
I'm in SoCal near Gold but toldthe hubby I want to drive any
photos to social at theaftermath foundationorg of any
(44:02):
photos of these billboards.
We would love to post yourphotos on the foundation's
social media awesome love it.
Wow, I never considered howmuch work goes into these
fantastic job all you know, lastyear there was one up and they
shut us down.
Speaker 4 (44:22):
What do we do?
We came back with 20.
Speaker 3 (44:24):
Yes, yes, Lupita, I really admire the work you all
do.
Your message is clear and it'sobvious.
You're in it for the rightreasons.
All that hard work doesn't gounnoticed.
Thank you so much and again Ican never say it enough Thank
you to everybody who supportsthe work that we do.
We could not do it without you.
Speaker 2 (44:46):
And I don't want to speak on your behalf or anything
but for me if these billboardsjust get one person to come out,
if we have one person reach outand contact the Aftermath
Foundation and say, hey, I sawthe billboard and that was my
trigger to leave.
For me that makes it all worthit.
Just one person, right?
Speaker 3 (45:06):
you, you and me, and all of us, we are absolutely 100
that this is, this is themessage that we need to get to
the people trapped in this cult.
For sure, gilles jakeilles,jacques, you should make bumper
stickers with them.
Okay, yes, Good idea.
Speaker 1 (45:24):
I haven't been able to figure out how to do that on
fourth wall, but I think when Isaw that comment I actually just
thought of a way that we can doit.
Speaker 3 (45:33):
Glenda Stevenson question.
Has there been any backlash yetfrom the cult about the
billboards?
Speaker 4 (45:40):
Not yet Haven't heard yet Well.
I've been kind of keeping anear to the ground on that, but I
haven't heard any anythingnegative come back yet.
Speaker 3 (45:48):
Yes, and shout out to everybody who has helped us to
get the word out about thiscampaign, including all the work
you've been doing Phil, you,alex, tony Ortega put up a whole
big article, as we've shownhere today.
So to everybody that has helped, we appreciate it.
We could not do this workwithout you, melanie Johnson.
(46:13):
Bravo to Lamar, too, for notbacking down to bullies 100%.
Oh my gosh, I think between allof us we have stories for days
about people who back down tobullies Coffee, milk, dude.
Good to see you here.
Thank you for joining us.
Speaker 1 (46:23):
Thank you, that's very generous.
One or two last ones here.
Speaker 3 (46:29):
Glenda Stevenson, it's wonderful that you've
posted the billboards again.
Thank you so much.
It's nice to get back to whatwas the original purpose of
ex-Scientologists coming forward?
Yes, indeed.
Well, we've always been doingit, but yes, agreed.
Speaker 2 (46:45):
It's such a strong signal that we're here.
We stand united, ready andwilling to help and they can't
take that away from us, nomatter what they try, what legal
threats they throw at us, whatyou know backlash, having my
door kicked in and all thisother fair game stuff no matter
what, they cannot change that.
We are going to work togetheras a team, collaborate and help
(47:07):
people get out.
Speaker 3 (47:09):
Completely, and that has always, by the way, been
Scientology's biggest beef withMark and I since 2006 is that we
just wouldn't stop connectingpeople, talking to people,
holding SP parties, bringingpeople together.
They just literally we drivethem nuts.
Speaker 1 (47:29):
Yeah, for a little while we were doing this thing
in Los Angeles, where we wouldgo to a lake that was about
maybe an hour and a half northof Los Angeles and we had jet
skis and we'd have SP jet skiparties and I would just invite
any and all ex-Seahawk membersor Scientology people that we
knew.
Speaker 3 (47:50):
Even Anonymous came to those too.
Speaker 1 (47:52):
Yeah, anonymous came.
I think some OSA people came toa few parties.
I mean, we let everybody go tothese parties and we'd go jet
skiing at Lake Pyramid for theday and we did them.
I want to say that we did thosefor a few years.
Like at least one summer wewere going like almost every
single weekend when it was hotand I'd go up on Friday night
(48:14):
the night before and get in linewith the jet skis at the lake.
Speaker 3 (48:17):
Sleep in the back of the car waiting in line the jet
skis at the lake.
Sleep in the back of the carwaiting in the car.
Speaker 1 (48:20):
Yeah, it was wild.
Yeah, anyway, this is uh, thisis a little uh, this is a little
less gas money doing billboardslike this than uh running for
two skis all day long.
Okay, few last comments andthen we'll get out of here, guys
, thank you.
Thanks for sticking in theretill the end of year.
Speaker 3 (48:37):
Yes, melanie Johnson, I can only imagine the
scrambling Scientology is doingright now.
Yes, exactly, exactly, rebecca.
The billboards also continue toremind the public that
Scientology is so crazy thatpeople in the cult need help.
Exactly, and that is what'smost important, by the way, to
me personally and I know toeveryone most important, by the
(49:00):
way, to me personally and I knowto everyone, you know, mark
Phil Alex, is that the abusesstop and that innocent people
stop being hurt.
That's what is at the top of mypriority list 100%.
Speaker 4 (49:12):
It also helps prevent people from going in because
people see that kind of message.
And if I look at I got in backin 1969, my brother, my sister,
then they've got kids, they'vegot grandkids.
I mean there's like 15 peoplebehind me that got in just after
(49:35):
I did.
So one person getting in couldbring in family members.
So if you prevent one personcoming in it can be a big deal
of not bringing in an entirefamily.
Speaker 2 (49:49):
Totally Part of this billboard campaign as well is
you get the statistics of thefootfall and the vehicle traffic
that goes past the billboards.
This campaign is estimated toreach just under 2 million
people every single week.
That it's up right and, like Isaid, if just one of those is a
SEAL member, fantastic.
But that's a whole bunch ofjust members of the public that
(50:10):
are now informed.
Scientology is an organizationyou need help leaving from, and
I think that's huge.
Speaker 3 (50:16):
Yep.
Speaker 2 (50:17):
Totally.
Speaker 3 (50:17):
I agree completely, Terry Ray.
You all make such a good team.
I'm so proud of you all.
Thank you.
As we've been saying, teamworkmakes a dream work.
Todd Johnson, more billboardsneed fundraising for this.
Yes, agreed, and, as wementioned, you can go to the
aftermathfoundationorg.
We do have billboards there asa campaign that you can
(50:38):
specifically support.
So if you choose to do that,those funds are restricted for
use in the billboard campaign.
And again, thank you.
Scientology Money Project OSAAnti-Aftermath Foundation
Billboard.
Ot Emergency Committee Meetingat PAC, donations being raised.
(50:59):
That's exactly right, jeff,there you, you go these
billboards the dev t rightcompletely developed traffic, so
we don't give anyone amisunderstood word.
Speaker 1 (51:09):
My apology I can just imagine scientology assigning
an ot from the ot committee.
Okay, you're like they have to.
They basically have to farmthese out like they're.
Somebody has to be responsiblefor covering or getting rid of,
or uh doing something, even justgoing to find them.
Speaker 4 (51:30):
Initially.
You go out and find out wherethey all are.
Speaker 1 (51:33):
Oh, that's right oh, that's the other thing if
anybody watching this lives inLA and sees one take a selfie or
take a picture and send it tous.
We'd love to see them all.
We're not in Los Angeles.
Speaker 3 (51:46):
Yeah, send it to social at the aftermath
foundationorg and we will sharethat.
I wanted to answer thisquestion from Betsy Sue.
Well, they put up curtains onthe inside of the vans so the
people being transported can'tsee out.
Yes, there is a possibilitythey might do that, but even
then it plants the seed to thepeople inside the van what can't
(52:09):
I see outside that window, andit will plant a seed of
curiosity that may take root.
And so there you have it.
Speaker 2 (52:20):
And also people will walk between buildings as well.
Right, it's like you won't geta car from one side of the
street to the other and yes, weknow there are some tunnels in
some of the buildings, but likethere are so many of them, like
it's going to be impossible torestrict the view of every
single one of them for everysingle seal member.
It's.
It's frankly impossible, andthat's the point totally,
(52:40):
completely awesome guys.
Speaker 1 (52:43):
Well, I think, um, I think we got all of them.
They got, uh, we got that lastone there.
Um, as we normally do here atthe end, here, um again, I'll
put up the link to the aftermathfoundation store where we
basically sell all the merch.
There's Mike Rinder bobbleheads, leah bobbleheads and signed
headshots.
(53:03):
You can get all that stuffthere.
We also have SP bracelets.
Those are still selling.
We've got all kinds of signsthrough those.
Speaker 3 (53:13):
Yeah, let me add too, at the spshopcom and also from
the Aftermath Foundation website, you can also get the printed
cards.
If you'd like to hand those outand share them with people, all
that we ask is that you coverthe cost of shipping.
We print them and ship them toyou.
Anyway, yes, those have alsoproven very effective.
Which cards are those?
Speaker 2 (53:34):
It's the Aftermath.
Speaker 3 (53:35):
Foundation cards and there's curious ones.
We have curious, curious, youknow, yeah.
Speaker 4 (53:42):
I had some printed up with the Need Help, Leaving
artwork on it.
I had some cards printed up andsent to a friend of mine in LA
who goes around the buildingsand he's going to hand them out
to any Sea Org members he sees.
Speaker 3 (53:57):
Yes, and we have those.
They all have the phone numberon it.
Yes, perfect.
We have stocks of all thedifferent designs of those cards
, including the billboard one.
Speaker 4 (54:07):
Oh great, okay, so for future, then I'll have them.
Speaker 1 (54:11):
We can just send them to you, we have boxes and boxes
.
Speaker 2 (54:15):
And I've got bunches of the ones with the UK phone
number on as well.
So if anyone in the UK wantsthe UK number, let me know and I
can send you a bunch from here.
Speaker 1 (54:23):
Awesome Teamwork makes the dream work.
Thanks guys, we reallyappreciate you joining us for
this.
And yeah, we do have somefundraising stuff for the
Aftermath that's coming up inthe next few weeks.
So if you sign up attheaftermathfoundationorg you
can be alerted to that and thenotherwise, we'll put all the
(54:44):
links of all the different stuffwe talked about we'll put all
of that down below in the videodescription.
Speaker 2 (54:55):
Anybody got anything else.
I meant it when.
Speaker 3 (54:58):
I said I'm not messing around, we're only just
getting started, right?
Yes, 100%.
Speaker 4 (55:02):
Yes, stay tuned until next time bye guys, thanks a
lot.
Speaker 1 (55:08):
Thanks for watching.
If you'd like to help supportthe channel, feel free to check
out the merch store link in thedescription.
We have hail xenu xenu is myhomeboy and bft branded mouse
pads, shirts, mugs, all sorts ofother stuff in there that helps
us to bring you new content ona regular basis.
You can also pick up a copy ofmy book Blown for Good Behind
(55:30):
the Iron Curtain of Scientologyin hardback, kindle and audible
versions as well.
There's also a link to ourpodcast and you can get that on
Apple, spotify or wherever youlisten to podcasts.
And if you'd like to watchanother video, you can click on
this link right here, or you canclick on this one here, or you
(55:51):
can click on the subscribebutton right here.
Thanks a lot, until next time.
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