The Smiley Smile Message Board

After recently watching the HBO documentary film Going Clear, it made me think of the mental prison that Landy surrounded Brian with. Cutting off family, creating dependency, siphoning large sums of money,  shrouded in secrecy and similar types of stuff.   Obviously, a major difference is regarding views on pharmaceutical drugs… But other than that, there seem to be many similarities.

The film got into how Scientology began to proliferate more and more in the early 1970s, and I wonder if Landy saw this phenomenon happening, then saw dollar signs of his own, and helped to create his own disturbing, yet on the surface, effective techniques of manipulation, right around the same time period. I can't think that Landy was unaware of the parallels himself.

Once you know the details of Brian's Landy-era story, and the hell he had to go through to escape, it's hard to not see many deep parallels. Also, Landy and David Miscavige in particular seem to have lots in common - a couple of sick, power and money-hungry wackos!

I should add that I sincerely hope I don't offend anybody by this post.

Most cults are like that... Landy was just the Guru of his own cult...

I may be mistaken,  but weren't both he and Gary Usher Scientologists?

Knowing how many folks who get into it will try to get others into it (especially with someone with moolah like Brian had), I would think that if Landy had been a big Scientologist, he would have had Brian signed up for that in a heartbeat and funneling all sorts of money into that, and I haven't heard any evidence that Brian ever got into it.

I recall a post from someone years ago who said that at various points over the years Carl Wilson explored a number of things including Scientology, but I don't think he ever got on board with it as far as I know.

Believing Carl Wilson a follower of Scientology is about like referring to Jesus Christ as the Prophet Muhammad.