long and not very informative

I learnt very little listening to this book. It is unnecessarily long, self-consciously academic in style, very repetitive, and despite containing many promises of "astonishing" and "stunning" descriptions of scientology's activities in the hour-long introduction, it never actually delivers any stories about what it is that happens among scientologists which makes the cult so infamous.

The author clearly says that there are many things he cannot say because of a fear of legal action from scientology, and in the end the listener comes away none the wiser about what the problem really is with this group. For example, it is said that ex-scientologists have been bullied or harassed or threatened, but no concrete examples are given of such incidents.

As for the nature of the "religion" itself, it's such goobledygook that there is nothing to understand. One thing the author does not discuss at all is why anyone in their right mind would ever be attracted to it. It seems to me there is room for a discussion about why this kind of organisation appeals to people, but nothing is said about that.

Finally, the author's approach is politically correct in the extreme, maybe not for an American but certainly for a European. That is to say, he places scientogoly on the same plane as any other religion. He says all religions should be regarded in the same light, with both respect and suspicion, regardless of what they preach or of their methods. He even says government agencies should be treated in the same way. In other words, the IRS and the FBI should be regarded with the same amount of respect and suspicion as scientology!

Ultimatately, a two- or three-hour book, or even a Wikipedia page, would give you just as much information as this book does. Don't bother with it.

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