Transcript of Part Five

Stacy: So when you got...when you were taken off the EPF, where were you sent?

Zoe: I went back to the Cadet Org, like I knew I would, and I was assigned the post of Exec Est O, which was... I did... I had... I

Stacy: Ok, let's... let's stop for a second here. That means the Executive Establishment Officer?

Zoe: Yeah, and I would...

Stacy: ... and what were your duties?

Zoe: Like, I would write up programs with the Cadet Coordinator, ways to improve the Cadet Org, and then I would have to implement those programs.

Stacy: Mm-hmm.

Zoe: And then I'd become the HAS because they... they think that that post... Oh... HCO Area Secretary... I'm in charge of the division of the Org that includes, like, Ethics and Staff and... and...

Stacy: Recruiting...

Zoe: ... and the mail and recruiting...

Stacy: Taking care of the personnel...

Zoe: Yeah, stuff like that. So I'm going along in this and... and my dad, in the mean time, was scheming to get me out, and then my sister, and he says, "Let's go to Hawaii." And I said, "Oh my God, a vacation to Hawaii?" So we went to Hawaii...

Stacy: How did you get approval to go?

Zoe: Oh, it was hard, because we were going to Hawaii for ten days, and I said, well I'm going to take, you know, a big LOA, I'm going to take, like, a month or five weeks. My mom was saying, "OK, you can go, but I want you to go for eleven days: one day to fly there, then you fly to Hawaii, and then one day to get back to LA, and then you fly right back." She was so scared of me going. But I kept saying, "No way, no way..."

Stacy: Why were they letting you go... Why would they let you go?

Zoe: Because in the policy they said that, you know, it said that you could go on LOAs, and my stats were up, and, you know, they didn't have any reason not to let me... that they could say, not to let me go. They just kind of had to let me. During this time, my dad and my sister were really trying... they were... they didn't... they kind of criticized it, but I would say, "Stop, stop, I can't hear this," because, like I said, about the thought policing. You have to control every single thought of yours, and if someone says something bad to you, first you have to report that, but then it could get you thinking about it, and then you would have to report that too, and that's probably even worse, when you start to think about it yourself. That just blows up the whole thing, and you would get in a lot of Ethics trouble. So I come back from that trip in Hawaii, and I say, OK, I want to go for sure. I want to go. I want to leave. I want to go live with my dad. And I had another friend called Nicole... named Nicole Graham [sp?] who was trying to get out too...

Stacy: How did you know she was trying to get out?

Zoe: Because... Well, it was against policy to ever tell anyone that you were on a routing form to leave or anything, but it was obvious. Rumors went around in the Cadet Org, and that was one of the rumors, and also I lived with Nicole. She was my dormmate.

Stacy: So did she talk to you about it all?

Zoe: Yeah. We weren't supposed to talk at all, but we would... We started talking about, like...

Stacy: You did?

Zoe: Yeah, a little bit. If anyone ever found out, we would have gotten in a lot of trouble, but we would talk about how... how we liked having bodies, and being people around on Earth, and we didn't want to leave and go to other planets like what's taught in Scientology! [Laughter] Stuff like that.

Stacy: How did it start that you began to be able to talk to each other about this?

Zoe: Because we lived in the same room, and we both wanted to leave, so it was kind of like something we had in common, and Nicole...

Stacy: Was it kind of a big thing, the first time you guys...

Zoe: We would just be, like, a little honest, and we kept kind of injecting more honesty into our conversations. Nicole was known as, like, the girl not to mess with. She's kind of the tough girl, and she's got a lot of muscles, and she can, like, glare at you with her eyes, and it was just enough to make you run 100 feet. She's... she's just tough. Like, she had gone through a lot, like, at one point, when she refused to go in the Sea Org, she was, like, "I'm not going in!" Top management, RTC Rep, had come down and said, "She has to get audited or some spiritual [????] thing." And what they did was they sat her down in a room, they made her hold the e-meter, that electrical instrument, like a lie detector, and they said, "Who did you kill, who did...?" That was the only question. They said, "Who did you kill. Who did..." And she was, like, "No one! What are you talking about? No one!" And they're like, "Who did you kill?! Who did you kill?!" They were yelling it at her.

Stacy: What were they talking about?

Zoe: I was even walking by, and then I heard yelling, and I found out that she had... she was already getting up. She was like, "I'm not going through this. I'm not going to listen to this." And then the auditor, or the... the guy that was getting her confession, or was supposed to get her confession, he like walked around and held her hands to the cans, and was saying, "You're not going anywhere." Her friend [??????] hearing this, because her friend was on the other side... her name was Leheigh [sp?]... she punched the guy. So then Leheigh [sp?] and Nicole, like, ran off, and they refused to go back to the QI for, like, a day. They, like, stayed out...

Stacy: Why was he saying this, "Who did you kill?"

Zoe: I don't know. I don't know. Well, they assume that anyone who doesn't... who criticizes Scientology has high crimes, but also I guess it translated to anyone who knew of the greatness of the Sea Org and didn't want to go in must have crimes.

Lawrence: I... You know, I'm thinking a possible explanation for that... In a confessional, if the person's reluctant...

Zoe: Oh yeah.

Lawrence: ... to confess to crimes, they'll say to them, "Well, did you murder someone? Did... you know, did you this?" like, go through like a really bad crime to make it easier to confess... for them to confess, like, something less...

Zoe: Yeah.

Lawrence: ... It's like a technique.

Zoe: That was... I never thought of that.

Lawrence: I... so I think they were like...

Zoe: That's possible.

Stacy: You're right. It's called... It's called the Murder [??Test???]...

Zoe: Yeah!

Lawrence: Yeah! Yeah!

Stacy: ... the Murder Routine...

Lawrence: Yeah!

Zoe: Then that would make sense.

Stacy: ... It's called the Murder Routine.

Lawrence: I think that's what it was.

Zoe: Yeah, so Nicole was also known as kind of someone not to mess with because there had been like these big sort of campaigns that would go on in the Cadet Org by the Cadet Coordinator, the person that ran all the cadets, like, to censor like... I don't know how to say this, but... well just they would go through our rooms, look at all our magazines, bring them down to the office, look at all our CDs, and because any scented shampoo, conditioner, any hygiene products or anything you had scented [??????]... they would bring all your hygiene products down to the office...

Stacy: This is because it's a rule in the Sea Org that you can't have anything... any kind of smell...

Zoe: Yeah, and you...

Stacy: ... You have to use...

Zoe: ... because psychiatrists...

Stacy: ...laundry...

Zoe: ... make those, or something.

Stacy: ... [laughter] detergent without a smell. You have to use lotion without a smell. Everything has to be without a smell.

Zoe: Yeah. They would bring them down to the office, and we would get angry, because they would then take our CDs and throw them away. Even, like, things you would think would be OK, they would be, like, "No, they're not in the right emotional level," like the right tone level... very anger over something. Magazines were taken away because they dealt with sex and boyfriends and girlfriends, and in the Cadet Org we weren't allowed to date. You know Archie comics?

Stacy: Yeah.

Zoe: OK, at one point, for the longest time, even before this... this whole campaign started, we could only read Archie comics Saturdays, and later... Oh, and video games Saturdays... and later, both of those were totally against the rules, because Archie comics, you know, Archie is always trying to get with Veronica or Betty. They consider that adult... too much of boys and girls and dating and sex, so...

Stacy: You were fourteen and you couldn't read an Archie comic?

Zoe: No, this was... that started way, like when I was... when I first came to the Cadet Org, that was already a rule, like when I was nine. So they would just start throwing our stuff away, and we would get angry because we got... first we got no pay, then we got 16 dollars pay, and then it got reduced to eight. I was getting a little bit more because I had... I had higher school certificates, so I was getting 12 dollars. I really had to plan with my allowance, like, OK if I have the day off, I'm going to go to the movies. That's a three dollar, and I might have enough to buy one candy bar, and then I have to spend, like, six dollars doing my laundry, and then I'll save, like $1.50 to spend on snacks throughout the week, like that was about... that was normally what I... how I spent my pay. But anyway, so during all this I'm trying to get out with my dad...

Lawrence: Can I just butt in... I would like to just explain the trip to Hawaii, because at this point my other daughter had... she had been in the Sea Org, and then she'd gotten pregnant, she'd gotten out, and as... even though she had a beautiful baby, as far as I was concerned, her life had been screwed up. She was, you know... she had a huge complex about the fact that she'd had no education, hadn't graduated high school, and you know, I was just... The more she told me about her experiences in the Sea Org, the more disgusted... I was sort of coming out my shell... the more disgusted I was, and I was just becoming more and more determined that Zoe would not go in the Sea Org at any cost, and you know, so... plus I also had the thought of, well I'm not going to let a daughter of mine, who was, like, fourteen at this stage, go into the Sea Org, and then if she becomes pregnant by accident, or whatever, she's going to be thrown out with, like, another $90,000 freeloader bill. I'm just not going to have this done to my daughter. I'm... I, you know... so Astra and I... and I hadn't seen her for a year, so Astra and I schemed, like "How can we get her out? How can we get her out?" You know, we were walking a fine line. If we... If we talk to her, and present data to her, and criticize the church, she's going to... we're going to lose her. So then we came up with the idea of, let's have a... this great vacation in Hawaii, and we thought that if we said, like, we're already going to pay the... pay for the airfare, pay for the vacation. It's only for ten days. I haven't seen her. You know, we thought she'd get permission to come...

Zoe: Mm-hmm.

Lawrence: And so this... and then while she's in Hawaii, she'll see... she'll have fun, she'll relax, she'll spend time with her family, she'll see a whole other side of life, and it would just, you know, maybe unstabilize her, maybe, you know... and, anyway it... We went to Hawaii. She had a great time, but I just couldn't quite get through to her, you know, with... Wherever I tried to criticize Scientology or say what could happen in the Sea Org, she'd like withdraw. And eventually we came back. We finished our time in Hawaii, and we were back on the mainland and, like, I was getting, you know... then her mother started to call and say, "Zoe, you have to come back now. You have to come back now," and I was getting desperate, so like one night I remember, we just like... [speaking to Zoe] Do you remember that night? I just threw everything at you. I kind of lost it, and I...

Zoe: You weren't even that honest. You weren't even, like, "Scientology's so horrible." You were just, like, "The Sea Org's horrible."

Lawrence: Yeah, I was saying, "Zoe, are you really sure you want to go in the Sea Org?" Like... like, "Look what happened to your sister!"

Zoe: And I got angry.

Lawrence: And... and I was, like, losing you. You were... you were, like... you were, like, clamming up on me, you know... You didn't want me to be... And then I just pushed harder. I pushed harder and I said, you know, "Do you want to be pregnant? Do you want to end up with a huge bill?" you know, "Do you want to work an 80-hour week? Do you want to have no education?" I pushed harder, and then eventually I just... I just broke through, and she said, "You know, I want to leave, you know, I don't want to be in the Sea Org..."

Zoe: Because it's true.

Lawrence: It just... It was like a miracle.

Zoe: But I still went back. Dad was, like, "No, don't go back!"

Lawrence: And then I... then I said, "OK, Zoe, you don't have to go back. You don't have to go back. Please don't go back." And then her mother was calling her and guilt-tripping her, and I just couldn't... She said, "I have to go back. I want to go back and handle it. I want to go back and leave properly. I want to... I still want to... I love my mother. I don't want to leave on bad terms. I love my grandmother. I don't want to leave on bad terms." She was completely conflicted, and I said, "Zoe, just stay in LA, and you know, we can handle them by phone." And the more I pushed, the more resolve she had to go back and handle it properly, but I know the Sea Org, I know how it works. I knew that they'll just run her around in circles. And we drove her to the airport, and all the time we were, "Zoe, don't go back. Zoe, don't." And all the way up to the return gate at the airport, we were saying, "You don't have to do this. Stay. We can handle it." But, you know... [speaking to Zoe] But, I couldn't just force you by, like... we couldn't just hold you, you know, because...

Zoe: Yeah.

Lawrence: Anyway, so we let you...

Zoe: When I went back I wanted to...

Lawrence: ... She went back, you know.

Zoe: So then I went back, and I kept trying to handle it, and I got... I get into this program to... But every time I finished something, a new step was added to the program, a new Scientology doctrine study.

Stacy: When you went back, you told them that you wanted to leave the Sea Org?

Zoe: Oh, well, actually, they had... they had already gotten me all lined up. Nicole warned me when I got back. She said, "You know what, they are totally going to try to recruit you right now," because a bunch of the Cadets had just gone into the Sea Org, and they really wanted me for a certain job. And I said, "OK, thanks for warning me." So, like, three days after I got back, Jim Tadego [sp?] and my mother got together at the QI. My mother had just come for a visit somehow. It was really weird, because you know I never saw my mother at the QI. And they said, "Well, let's talk about... Let's take a walk," and I knew what was happening. I was like, "OK, let's take a walk." And we went outside, and they said, "What do you want to do?" and I said, "I want to leave." I said, "I want..." I said the same thing I said...

Stacy: You did?

Zoe: It was the first thing I said, like, years before. I said, "I want to go to college, and I want to live with dad." And I got the same reaction, sort of... like kind of muffled, because I was older now, and I... I had kind of grown up to be a bit more strong-willed than the other cadets in terms of, like, what people could force me to do. Yeah, then I got put on this program, and my mom was all disappointed in me, and I cried about that, but it was like, you know what, I have to get over it, because... I was starting to realize at that point that my mother would never approve of me doing anything different than the Sea Org, even if I was, like, a Scientologist and growing up... up the path to spiritual enlightenment, you know, and buying courses regularly. She would never approve of what I... of what I was doing or what I wanted to do. So, this was '98...

Lawrence: '98, yeah.

Zoe: I got put on this program, and I was treated as an... as a horrible person. I was... Everyone didn't really like me anymore. My friends kept trying to persuade me that I should go in the Sea Org, and that I was just putting myself through misery by. It was just... I wasn't doing the smart thing because I was leading such a bad life now. I... People just didn't like me anymore, and I'd known like all, about a thousand plus people here at the... in Clearwater, that were Sea Org members, and suddenly, when people found out about me leaving, or me wanting to leave, they kind of frowned at me and they didn't want to talk to me anymore, and I didn't really get pay anymore. I got a little bit of pay because I still worked. In fact, I worked more than usual, because... because I wanted to leave, so... I kept doing these studies. My mom kept adding stuff on, and I was still "significant" at this time. I still believed in Scientology, and I still felt that I should never ruin my Scientology studies by, you know, going past a word I didn't understand, so I was still "significant." So that went on more than a year, and no one wanted me to be with other people, because I might infect them with my new ideas of freedom. My stuff was just brought one day in a laundry basket and a cardboard box... all my belongings... and they just said, "Here's your stuff. You're moving in with your mom now." And I was really upset about that, because it was kind of like, all this stuff I owned, everyone else handled and just shoved into a laundry basket and just brought in, because we were at work, and said, "Here, you don't... you don't live here anymore," even though I'd been living at the QI then for, like, five years. So I just... I just lived with my mom. I slept on the floor right next to her bed... her small bedroom, which she shared already, with an elderly lady. I slept on the floor, like, crammed in between a table and her bed.

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