Seit ein paar Jahren beobachte ich schon die Scientology Lebensgeschichte des Adrian Kelsey, ein Ex-Scientologe, der im damaligen Glauben das Richtige für seine Kinder zu tun, diese in recht jungen Jahren der Organisation, genauer gesagt der scientologischen paramilitärischen Organisation (Sea Org) überließ. Im Jahre 2010 suchte Adrian Hilfe bei Brian Seymour einem australischen Journalisten. Mit seiner Unterstützung und der Unterstützung australischer Ex-Scientologen gelang es Adrian seinen Sohn Shane aus der Sea Org zu befreien.
Shane berichtete nun erstmals im australischen Fernsehen über die Torturen, de psychische Folter, die er seit seinem 6. Lebensjahr durchleben musste. Er wurde zu einem Arbeitssklaven. Mit 8 Jahren unterschrieb er den Vertrag der Sea Org und verpflichtete sich eine Milliarde Jahre für die Organisation zu arbeiten. Mit 18 Jahren kam Shane in das RPF, ein Straflager, besser gesagt Umerziehungslager…
Scientology Labour Camps
Reporter Bryan Seymour
Broadcast February 14, 2012
It is Australia’s secret compound where men, women and children are kept virtual prisoners.
It’s right in the middle of a quiet suburb.
It’s also a place where children are separated from their parents, forced to work full time for no pay and live in squalid conditions.
Those who’ve survived this place say they were brainwashed into believing they could not leave and that they deserved the shocking treatment dished out.
Tonight you’ll meet a young man who escaped this place with the help of his father.
„I lived in that garage for about a year and a half, maybe two years,“ said Shane Kelsey, a former Scientologist.
„Shane’s story is one of shocking abuse, child abuse, it’s one of a child being enslaved,“ said Senator Nick Xenophon.
„I was there for 10 years all up in the Church of Scientology as a staff member, and how could I inflict that on my children which I’ll forever feel like I have to make up,“ said another former Scientologist, Peta O’Brien.
Shane Kelsey is now 21 years old. Until just over a year ago he had never used the Internet, watched television or followed the media.
„You’re not allowed to read any books other than Scientology books, you can’t read newspapers, no radio, no movies, nothing,“ Shane said.
Shane says he was held captive and groomed to see all of us on the outside as pathetic, useless and stupid.
„So I lived in a garage until that got flooded by a storm and my mum got really pissed off and said ‚what the hell‘ and so I got moved into a closet. It is a closet under the stairs… maybe two meters long and a meter wide,“ Shane said.
This is the true Australian headquarters of the Church of Scientology. In the Sydney suburb of Dundas lays the RPF base — it stands for Rehabilitation Project Force. It’s
where Scientologists are sent for punishment and training… For crimes that most of us would regard as trivial.
Reporter Bryan Seymour at the Base: „Scientology promised us someone would come and talk to us, that hasn’t happened. I couldn’t get through on the phone. More than 50 requests for interviews on camera have been flatly refused. The bottom line is they don’t want people to know what’s going on inside there, those who’ve lived in there like Shane, say it’s like a gulag, a prison and yet it’s in the middle of a suburb, it could be any suburb in Australia. People here would he horrified to know what has been going on in there for so many years and continues to this day.“
Shane Kelsey’s mother and father were dedicated Scientologists in Sydney, so they put their son Shane into its highest corps at the age of six — little Shane moved into a tiny room with 11 other children.
By the age of seven…
Shane: „We’d go down the streets and there’d be eight of us, ten of us, young as and we’d go down and pledge people up to drug free lives.“
Seymour: „How old were you when you first started doing that?“
Shane: „I first started doing that when I was seven.“
At the age of eight…
Shane: „I signed my contract when I was eight years old.“
Seymour: „And what was the contract for?
Shane: „It was a billion year contract.“
Seymour: „Billion year contract?“
Shane: „Hmm, hmm.“ (nods)
Seymour: „And what does that mean?“
Shane: „It means you’re volunteering or servicing the Church for the next billion years….We used to do marching, close order drilling, things like that.“
Seymour: „What for, were you preparing for battle?“
Shane: „No, just because it was a form of discipline.“
Seymour: „How often were you able to see your parents?“
Shane: „I saw them once a week.“
Shane’s mother and father would soon separate and his dad Adrian moved overseas then left Scientology.
Meanwhile, the work schedule for children was full time, hard and without reward.
Seymour: „You were working 35 hours a week when you were eight years old. How many hours a week did that grow by the time you were, say, 14?“
Shane: „Ahh, by the time I was 14 I was working in the kitchen.“
A military muster every morning required marching and saluting to the cause of saving mankind from the intergalactic ravages described by its science fiction founder L. Ron Hubbard.
They wore all black uniforms and were required to run always, never walk.
So-called home schooling was provided in fits and starts, taking a back seat to hard labor and brainwashing.
Shane: „As soon as you turn 15, anyone, you’re straight out of school. It doesn’t matter what grade you’re in, what level of maths, what level of anything, you’re straight out.“
The mess hall served food priced at 30 cents per meal, mostly beans and rice. The adults ate first.
Shane: „Yeah, that’s right… they would all come in and eat whatever they wanted and then we went after them to take what’s there… sometimes there wouldn’t be much so you’d get little bits of food and it wasn’t really sufficient.“
Those who dared question the brutality of this place were dealt with swiftly and severely.
Shane: „They used to live under our squash courts…it’s a mud, dirt floor…We put people in there and they live in there, when they’re on the RPF’s RPF they’d sleep down there and they’d study down there.“
Seymour: „Why would you put people in a dank, mouldy, sinking foundation underneath a squash court?“
Shane: „Because you’re a bad person, you have to be segregated from everyone,“ Shane said.
By the age of 15 Shane was living a nightmare even he now struggles to believe.
Shane: „As soon as i turned 15 I was seven days a week, 14 hour days.“
Seymour: „That’s 100 hours a week?“
Shane: „Yeah.“
In a commercial kitchen, Shane and other children slaved away — cooking meals all day every day… studying and snatching what little sleep they could.
Shane: „We’d get anywhere between $4 pay to $35 ($35 a day?) $35 a week.“
„That’s completely unacceptable, but there’s not a law in New South Wales that makes it illegal to work a child for those hours… that’s extraordinary, but that’s the case,“ said lawyer Grainne O’Donovan.
Among those who needed to be fed was billionaire James Packer. For several years beginning in 2002, Mr Packer came to the Church of Scientology in the early mornings to receive auditing and instruction.
Seymour: „How much did you get paid for cooking meals for James Packer?“
Shane: „I didn’t get paid anything, there was no bonus or anything, it was just the meal you cooked.“
There is no suggestion Mr Packer had any idea who was preparing his meals or their work conditions.
Seymour: „What did you cook for him, do you remember?“
Shane: „Oh, just steak and chips or a nice salad or omelets those kinds of things, it had to be nice, like it wouldn’t just be sloppy, it had to be nice.“
Mr Packer left Scientology around 2008. It would be more than two years until Shane made his break for freedom.
In late 2010, Adrian Kelsey decided to rescue his son.
He invited us to document his attempt. He informed police of his plans to go to the compound and demand his son’s release. He had protest signs ready if they refuse to let him come out. Then Shane came out to meet his father… the first they’d seen each other in four years.
Shane and Adrian were followed by Scientology „enforcers,“ so Shane reluctantly returned to the compound to avoid trouble. One week later he was sent to work near the compound’s boundary and he made a break for it.
„Scientology have no right to mess with family,“ said Adrian Kelsey.
It took Shane 14 months to shake off Scientology, discover the truth, learn about the real world and tell his story.
„One thing that would be good is if they actually just stood up and said ‚Sorry, it wasn’t right, we’re going to change it‘ — but that is just not going to happen,“ Adrian said.
„Shocking! There were also children at the house,“ said Peta Obrien, who lived at the RPF base between 1997 and 2000. She confirms Shane’s account of the appalling conditions.
„You do two hours of work, then you go and study for two and a half hours in the RPF it was five hours and then you go to work again, hard labor, picking with a rock pick, chipping away at rocks till they erode,“ O’Brien said.
Now a successful architectural designer, Peta believes Scientology has nothing of value to offer the community.
„Close it down, doors shut and all the staff members going back to their families and living their lives,“ O’Brien said.
„This is degrading and inhumane treatment,‘ said lawyer Grainne O’Donovan. Based in Perth, O’Donovan has devoted her time and expertise to helping survivors of the cult seeking justice. O’Donovan has also campaigned with the Internet-based activist group Anonymous that has raised awareness about Scientology.
„At some level they (Scientology) have become convinced, I suppose, that it’s appropriate and that the group is more important than the individual,“ O’Donovan said.
RPF bases like the Sydney compound exist in other countries. Those who’ve escaped from them tell similar stories – Having fingers broken on the orders of the leader of Scientology, screamed at and slapped for 20 hours straight whilst having cold water poured over their head and much more… much worse.
„The authorities need to investigate this urgently. This is something that requires police investigation,“ said Independent Federal Senator Nick Xenophon, who has championed a campaign to shed light on the darkness at the heart of this group.
„What makes this worse is that this organization is being subsidized by Australian taxpayers because it doesn’t pay any tax,“ Senator Xenophon said.
Shane has his father back, yet his mother Lesley remains inside Scientology.
„I hope she hears word of this and sums up the courage to actually find it and watch it,“ Shane said.
„She will, she will have to escape… yeah, they won’t let her go… leaving’s not an option, she will have to escape,“ Shane said.
The Church of Scientology refused to be interviewed for this story. In a written response Scientology denied any mistreatment of its members.
The response also declared:
„Anyone on the program is there because they want to be there…“
„They are completely free to withdraw at any time during induction or later.“
„When Shane left the church in late 2010, he simply got his bag and walked out the door…“
„It is very sad that Shane has changed his story…“
The celebrities used to advertise Scientology likely have little idea that people like Shane Kelsey even exist.
Now they do.
Adrian and Shane hope they do something about it for the sake of other families.
„I regained a son.“
„I got my dad.“
Kindsein in Scientology 