Name: "Going Clear" Writer Lawrence Wright Talks Scientology and Tom Cruise
Uploaded: 2021-01-05T22:19:07.000Z
Description: Watch the stand-up comedy video '"Going Clear" Writer Lawrence Wright Talks Scientology and Tom Cruise' from PowerfulJRE on Comedy Buff. Published 2021-01-05. Transcript available.

Watch the stand-up comedy video '"Going Clear" Writer Lawrence Wright Talks Scientology and Tom Cruise' from PowerfulJRE on Comedy Buff. Published 2021-01-05. Transcript available.

one of the most bonkers things in our culture today yeah amazing that's that
Scientology is like still I mean I passed by the Church of Scientology here
just the other day I was like oh still works yeah hey they've just moved it I
when the documentary came out some woman had just gone to see it at the movie
theater in the end the it was on the drag you know in Guadalupe across from the
University and she drove her car through the plate glass windows the Scientology
building and she didn't stop there she drove around the lobby a little bit
knocking over bookshelves and I had to issue a statement deploring violence in
any form was she a victim of it or no she had just seen the documentary and she
was really worked up Wow so that's a hype she might have some other issues yes
you might maybe Scientology could have helped her yeah I run it and I might
have
been a course for that well it's a weird thing when you see so many people that
are so successful that are Scientology at least you used to see that I had a
neighbor who's one of the nicest guys he was a great guy who's a in my old
neighborhood and he was Scientologist and I found out in the most bizarre way
because there was a piece of land that was for sale and he was talking about
this
piece of land about possibly purchasing it but he was gonna have to put it off
because he needed $50,000 because his wife was going clear right and it was
like
like a scene in a movie where the record skips and I went what like what are
you
doing and this was me of you know I was probably 28 at the time 29 I was the
podcast is radically changed the way I look at things so I've had a chance to
educate myself and have all these conversations with brilliant people and
just enough of these conversations where I have a different perspective but
back
then I really didn't know too much about Scientology other than I had bought a
book from Dianetics online because not online rather on television late-night
TV
94 and they wouldn't stop sending me these pamphlets asking me to come to all
these various meetings and this and that and sending me all these things for
programs they have discounts and I mean I was in one way I was kind of it I
admired their hustle I was like this is these guys don't stop right like they
just kept sending this shit to my mailbox I thought it was like a self-help
book and I would always been in the like Anthony Robbins and all these
different I was into motivation like what can I what can I get that's gonna
help
me like work harder or succeed better you know whatever so I saw this thing and
it
was like wow this seems very compelling and I knew that there was a bunch of
famous people that were Scientologists like Tom Cruise and all right I was like
maybe this is maybe this is legit and I was reading it and I was like this boy
this is like seems odd it seems off without getting too much into it so when I
talked to this guy who was my neighbor really didn't have a deep background and
understanding it but that was the beginning of me like really getting into
it like talking to him and finding out like how much money he had to spend and
what was it about and like what do they do for you and they he was explaining
how
nothing would ever influence you again no negative influence that's going
clear meant that was probably one of the first times I had ever heard that
expression yeah I first time I ran into it was when I was in college and I was
my
girlfriend and I were living in an apartment above this little storefront and
it was Scientology and I never heard of it before and you know they they showed
me
the the e-meter and stuff like that and I just thought I thought it was an
interesting you know I wasn't put off by it I was you know I thought maybe so I
didn't pursue it how old were you at the time I was 21 21 yeah and you know it
was I've always been interested in religions you know it's one of the the
themes I guess of my work and and why people go into one religion rather why
they
believe one thing rather than another because in America you can believe
anything you want and you know it's not true in a lot of countries but in our
country there's a smorgasbord of religions you can choose from and if you
don't see something you know you can make up your own and you know it's a very
fertile religious culture which interests me and and I as a reporter I think
about how people have strong political beliefs and it doesn't affect their
behavior at all you know yeah you know a lot of people like that I'm sure but
you
know if you have powerful religious beliefs it determines your life and you
know as
as journalists we should pay more attention to that so I've always been
intrigued by different religious manifestations and so Scientology was on my
list I had wanted to write about it and because they're you know they're always
scaring everybody with you know legal threats or you know shakedowns and stuff
like that they still do that or have they kind of backed off from that oh the
people that some of my sources for that you know they hounded them mercilessly
and you know they hire private investigators they're not they're not
doing the the job that private investigators are you know they're doing is not
so
much to uh sneak up on your you know go through your trash although they do
that
it's to intimidate you and you know they had somebody following me around for a
while
mainly to my public events you know when I was making speeches I I'm in a band
and he
came to one of my gigs what kind of band you it's a blues band we play you know
Texas
Louisiana music and we used to back before the pandemic I don't know if our we
had a regular
gig at the Skylark lounge in East Austin and opening I want to come see you oh
you'll be invited
yeah we got it we're gonna be really rusty we need a lot of rehearsal now that's
to be expected so um
um you got really fascinated by religions and what what made you focus on
Scientology I mean
there's there's a lot of crazy religions out there one of the weirdest ones
about Scientology is we know
who made it right yeah it's like him and Joseph Smith those the Mormons and
Scientology the only ones
where we know who the creator is and the Scientology one is particularly weird
because it was a science
fiction author yeah it's like that what that didn't raise any red flags of
people like well you know
you you mentioned Mormons in the same breath and I think that's apt you know
they were the most
stigmatized religion in the 19th century uh you know Mark Twain hated them uh Zane
Gray wrote a uh a novel
about you know how wicked they were they were hounded from one state to another
and Scientology is kind
of the modern equivalent of that you know they and one of the reasons I wanted
to write about it is you
have these famous and sometimes wealthy people as you point out affiliating
with this organization
there must be a kind of public relations martyrdom for them I mean you you can
admire Tom Cruise or
John Travolta for their acting but you also think are they a little nuts you
know is there something
going on with them that they need this religion and uh so why do they affiliate
why do they lend their
celebrity and their standing to uh such a stigmatized religion that was one of
the reasons I wanted to
write about it well they must get some benefit out of it that's what I and they
do yeah I'm not you
know I think especially at the lower levels you know they offer courses like
Jerry Seinfeld was in
for a while I don't think he was ever in I think he was interested in it and he
was studying it he took
some courses yeah and but he was never like committed as a Scientologist watch
what is a Scientologist I
mean once you're going to the Celebrity Center and you're taking courses you
know I say you're
a Scientologist if you go fishing once are you a fisherman yeah that case aren't
you it's a good
question I'm testing the water I've played basketball a couple times I'm hardly
a basketball player it's a
little different is it I mean I guess it is but I mean I feel like taking
courses and things doesn't
well Leonard Cohen did as well Rock Hudson I mean there were a lot of people
were drawn to it and
I think you know part of it is uh Scientology set itself up as a religion for
celebrities it deliberately
targeted people like that and uh for instance if you go to Hollywood and you
look at you know prominent
actors and actors and so on they tend not to be Southern Baptists you know they're
right it's not
designed for them and uh you know they may come from a Southern Baptist uh
background but if they move
to Hollywood and they're looking for a group of spiritual seekers like
themselves and they're you know
they want to affiliate with people like them Scientology says here we are and
we have the Celebrity Center
where people like you you know can come and you can hang around with other
famous people
uh I think they offer a certain amount of protection and I think there's some
something that
there for that and there's also I think um there's a structure that exists and
I think there's a lot of
people that especially in such a volatile um sort of it's a uncertain world the
world of acting
in particular it's such a crazy world I mean I always said if you want the a
formula like why is LA the way
it is we'll just stop and think about what it is you you have a bunch of people
that move there from
somewhere else because they want fame right right and then you make them
audition which is the weirdest
thing you go into an unnatural environment usually a conference room there's a
bunch of people sitting
around judging you and you want them to like you enough to pick you to do this
thing so you can't
in any way buck trends you have to be like uber polite you have whatever the
ideology is that's
accepted the general vibe of Hollywood you must confirm to that you must
conform to that rather
you like there's they don't even have opinions they have this conglomeration of
opinions they've adopted
in order to be let in to this tribe and then you you hope that they pick you
and so you have these
incredibly insecure people who want acceptance and love and then you make them
beg for it they're
essentially like going there and hoping that these people will like them and
that's where you get the
abuse like the harvey weinsteins of the world and these type of people it's
like they're preying on
this need to be accepted and brought into this group in order to to to to be to
to work to be able
to work you you have to play this up game and so if something comes along like
scientology that gives
you structure and gives you family and gives you like the we are for you we're
going to help you become
clear we're going to bring you to the next level you know you're you're a six
it gives you something
where you feel like like have you ever done martial arts i did judo when i was
in high school one of
the beautiful things about martial arts is the belt system yeah because like
you when you're a white
belt and all of a sudden they tie that blue belt on your waist you're like wow
i am making progress
this is really happening and you feel fantastic whereas if you went to a
martial art like uh i did kickboxing
for a while there's no belts and it just feels weird like you don't know where
you are like where am
i like it's not it's not the most success and like and because of that some
kickboxing systems even
muay thai some weird systems have developed their own belt structure which is
weird the system they've
just sort of added to the existing martial arts that didn't have a belt
structure but it's to give
people this sense of progress give people scaffolding give people structure
give people this thing where
you feel like something is happening for me and i think that's one of the
things that scientology does really
well for these fucked up people absolutely catch new episodes of the joe rogan
experience for free
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"Going Clear" Writer Lawrence Wright Talks Scientology and Tom Cruise

one of the most bonkers things in our culture today yeah amazing that's that
Scientology is like still I mean I passed by the Church of Scientology here
just the other day I was like oh still works yeah hey they've just moved it I
when the documentary came out some woman had just gone to see it at the movie
theater in the end the it was on the drag you know in Guadalupe across from the
University and she drove her car through the plate glass windows the Scientology
building and she didn't stop there she drove around the lobby a little bit
knocking over bookshelves and I had to issue a statement deploring violence in
any form was she a victim of it or no she had just seen the documentary and she
was really worked up Wow so that's a hype she might have some other issues yes
you might maybe Scientology could have helped her yeah I run it and I might
have
been a course for that well it's a weird thing when you see so many people that
are so successful that are Scientology at least you used to see that I had a
neighbor who's one of the nicest guys he was a great guy who's a in my old
neighborhood and he was Scientologist and I found out in the most bizarre way
because there was a piece of land that was for sale and he was talking about
this
piece of land about possibly purchasing it but he was gonna have to put it off
because he needed $50,000 because his wife was going clear right and it was
like
like a scene in a movie where the record skips and I went what like what are
you
doing and this was me of you know I was probably 28 at the time 29 I was the
podcast is radically changed the way I look at things so I've had a chance to
educate myself and have all these conversations with brilliant people and
just enough of these conversations where I have a different perspective but
back
then I really didn't know too much about Scientology other than I had bought a
book from Dianetics online because not online rather on television late-night
TV
94 and they wouldn't stop sending me these pamphlets asking me to come to all
these various meetings and this and that and sending me all these things for
programs they have discounts and I mean I was in one way I was kind of it I
admired their hustle I was like this is these guys don't stop right like they
just kept sending this shit to my mailbox I thought it was like a self-help
book and I would always been in the like Anthony Robbins and all these
different I was into motivation like what can I what can I get that's gonna
help
me like work harder or succeed better you know whatever so I saw this thing and
it
was like wow this seems very compelling and I knew that there was a bunch of
famous people that were Scientologists like Tom Cruise and all right I was like
maybe this is maybe this is legit and I was reading it and I was like this boy
this is like seems odd it seems off without getting too much into it so when I
talked to this guy who was my neighbor really didn't have a deep background and
understanding it but that was the beginning of me like really getting into
it like talking to him and finding out like how much money he had to spend and
what was it about and like what do they do for you and they he was explaining
how
nothing would ever influence you again no negative influence that's going
clear meant that was probably one of the first times I had ever heard that
expression yeah I first time I ran into it was when I was in college and I was
my
girlfriend and I were living in an apartment above this little storefront and
it was Scientology and I never heard of it before and you know they they showed
me
the the e-meter and stuff like that and I just thought I thought it was an
interesting you know I wasn't put off by it I was you know I thought maybe so I
didn't pursue it how old were you at the time I was 21 21 yeah and you know it
was I've always been interested in religions you know it's one of the the
themes I guess of my work and and why people go into one religion rather why
they
believe one thing rather than another because in America you can believe
anything you want and you know it's not true in a lot of countries but in our
country there's a smorgasbord of religions you can choose from and if you
don't see something you know you can make up your own and you know it's a very
fertile religious culture which interests me and and I as a reporter I think
about how people have strong political beliefs and it doesn't affect their
behavior at all you know yeah you know a lot of people like that I'm sure but
you
know if you have powerful religious beliefs it determines your life and you
know as
as journalists we should pay more attention to that so I've always been
intrigued by different religious manifestations and so Scientology was on my
list I had wanted to write about it and because they're you know they're always
scaring everybody with you know legal threats or you know shakedowns and stuff
like that they still do that or have they kind of backed off from that oh the
people that some of my sources for that you know they hounded them mercilessly
and you know they hire private investigators they're not they're not
doing the the job that private investigators are you know they're doing is not
so
much to uh sneak up on your you know go through your trash although they do
that
it's to intimidate you and you know they had somebody following me around for a
while
mainly to my public events you know when I was making speeches I I'm in a band
and he
came to one of my gigs what kind of band you it's a blues band we play you know
Texas
Louisiana music and we used to back before the pandemic I don't know if our we
had a regular
gig at the Skylark lounge in East Austin and opening I want to come see you oh
you'll be invited
yeah we got it we're gonna be really rusty we need a lot of rehearsal now that's
to be expected so um
um you got really fascinated by religions and what what made you focus on
Scientology I mean
there's there's a lot of crazy religions out there one of the weirdest ones
about Scientology is we know
who made it right yeah it's like him and Joseph Smith those the Mormons and
Scientology the only ones
where we know who the creator is and the Scientology one is particularly weird
because it was a science
fiction author yeah it's like that what that didn't raise any red flags of
people like well you know
you you mentioned Mormons in the same breath and I think that's apt you know
they were the most
stigmatized religion in the 19th century uh you know Mark Twain hated them uh Zane
Gray wrote a uh a novel
about you know how wicked they were they were hounded from one state to another
and Scientology is kind
of the modern equivalent of that you know they and one of the reasons I wanted
to write about it is you
have these famous and sometimes wealthy people as you point out affiliating
with this organization
there must be a kind of public relations martyrdom for them I mean you you can
admire Tom Cruise or
John Travolta for their acting but you also think are they a little nuts you
know is there something
going on with them that they need this religion and uh so why do they affiliate
why do they lend their
celebrity and their standing to uh such a stigmatized religion that was one of
the reasons I wanted to
write about it well they must get some benefit out of it that's what I and they
do yeah I'm not you
know I think especially at the lower levels you know they offer courses like
Jerry Seinfeld was in
for a while I don't think he was ever in I think he was interested in it and he
was studying it he took
some courses yeah and but he was never like committed as a Scientologist watch
what is a Scientologist I
mean once you're going to the Celebrity Center and you're taking courses you
know I say you're
a Scientologist if you go fishing once are you a fisherman yeah that case aren't
you it's a good
question I'm testing the water I've played basketball a couple times I'm hardly
a basketball player it's a
little different is it I mean I guess it is but I mean I feel like taking
courses and things doesn't
well Leonard Cohen did as well Rock Hudson I mean there were a lot of people
were drawn to it and
I think you know part of it is uh Scientology set itself up as a religion for
celebrities it deliberately
targeted people like that and uh for instance if you go to Hollywood and you
look at you know prominent
actors and actors and so on they tend not to be Southern Baptists you know they're
right it's not
designed for them and uh you know they may come from a Southern Baptist uh
background but if they move
to Hollywood and they're looking for a group of spiritual seekers like
themselves and they're you know
they want to affiliate with people like them Scientology says here we are and
we have the Celebrity Center
where people like you you know can come and you can hang around with other
famous people
uh I think they offer a certain amount of protection and I think there's some
something that
there for that and there's also I think um there's a structure that exists and
I think there's a lot of
people that especially in such a volatile um sort of it's a uncertain world the
world of acting
in particular it's such a crazy world I mean I always said if you want the a
formula like why is LA the way
it is we'll just stop and think about what it is you you have a bunch of people
that move there from
somewhere else because they want fame right right and then you make them
audition which is the weirdest
thing you go into an unnatural environment usually a conference room there's a
bunch of people sitting
around judging you and you want them to like you enough to pick you to do this
thing so you can't
in any way buck trends you have to be like uber polite you have whatever the
ideology is that's
accepted the general vibe of Hollywood you must confirm to that you must
conform to that rather
you like there's they don't even have opinions they have this conglomeration of
opinions they've adopted
in order to be let in to this tribe and then you you hope that they pick you
and so you have these
incredibly insecure people who want acceptance and love and then you make them
beg for it they're
essentially like going there and hoping that these people will like them and
that's where you get the
abuse like the harvey weinsteins of the world and these type of people it's
like they're preying on
this need to be accepted and brought into this group in order to to to to be to
to work to be able
to work you you have to play this up game and so if something comes along like
scientology that gives
you structure and gives you family and gives you like the we are for you we're
going to help you become
clear we're going to bring you to the next level you know you're you're a six
it gives you something
where you feel like like have you ever done martial arts i did judo when i was
in high school one of
the beautiful things about martial arts is the belt system yeah because like
you when you're a white
belt and all of a sudden they tie that blue belt on your waist you're like wow
i am making progress
this is really happening and you feel fantastic whereas if you went to a
martial art like uh i did kickboxing
for a while there's no belts and it just feels weird like you don't know where
you are like where am
i like it's not it's not the most success and like and because of that some
kickboxing systems even
muay thai some weird systems have developed their own belt structure which is
weird the system they've
just sort of added to the existing martial arts that didn't have a belt
structure but it's to give
people this sense of progress give people scaffolding give people structure
give people this thing where
you feel like something is happening for me and i think that's one of the
things that scientology does really
well for these fucked up people absolutely catch new episodes of the joe rogan
experience for free
only on spotify watch back catalog jre videos on spotif