Rant: The vanishing world of L. Ron Hubbard

[quote]It looked like Scientology would finally reach the heights of power that L. Ron Hubbard had dreamed of until the internet came along. With the internet came the power for anyone in the world to publish information anonymously and to broadcast it to millions of people at once. Before Scientology had controlled their reputation with an iron fist, going after Time Magazine in 1991 for an unfavorable article and sending the rest of the mainstream media into a cowering silence. However now individuals who had been victimized inside or concerned citizens who were worried about the misuse of Scientology's raw power and money could be found with just a single search. As more and more stories came out about abuse, manipulation and exploitation inside more people began to balk at joining. Today, when nearly everyone who wants to learn more about something will simply type it into a search engine and hit enter, the full story about Scientology is available to anyone who wants to read it. Both the Scientology website as well as critical sites are freely open for the curious reader or potential new member. With this new knowledge available, many have began to turn down offers to join and membership has fallen drastically. In 2000 the number of Scientologists in the US census was around 55,000. Today some estimates place their membership at fewer than 20,000 members.{/quote]