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[Stacy Brooks playing with pet dog]
STACY BROOKS: Come here, come here! Maggie, come here.
XENU-TV: In 1995, Stacy Brooks gave her first on-camera interview about her experiences inside the Church of Scientology. Presented here for the very first time is the complete unedited interview as given to Kurt Loder for MTV.
KURT LODER: --good, that was simple. How did you first become involved in Scientology? What drew you to it?
STACY BROOKS: Um, I was about 20, um, it was 1975.
KURT LODER: Um-hmm.
STACY BROOKS: Um, I was, um, looking for answers to things as young people tend to do and, um, [clears throat] I was very idealistic. Um, and I met some people who were in Scientology and, um, described it in a way that made it seem as if it would solve all my problems.
KURT LODER: Um-hmm.
STACY BROOKS: Um, I told them a little bit about what was happening in my life and they told me that Scientology would resolve all of those things for me. So I thought that sounded pretty good. Um, and I--that was how I first got into it.
KURT LODER: Um-hmm.
STACY BROOKS: Um--
KURT LODER: Did you have to go to a meeting first or something or was--
STACY BROOKS: [nodding her head]Uh-huh--
KURT LODER: How long did it take--
STACY BROOKS: There were, there were--there was a series of four free lectures.
KURT LODER: Um-hmm.
STACY BROOKS: Given at a mission which is one of those smaller lower level organizations in Scientology. [clears her throat]This is in Atlanta, Georgia.
KURT LODER: Um-hmm.
STACY BROOKS: Um, and the series--series of introductory lectures is at a very simple level, um, very basic concepts about communication.
KURT LODER: Um-hmm.
STACY BROOKS: Just really very common-sensical--
KURT LODER: Yeah.
STACY BROOKS: --kinds of concepts, and, um, really nothing that anybody would particularly object to. Um, and, uh, things that struck me as being, uh, just what I was looking for.
KURT LODER: Yeah. And so you--how did you pursue it?
STACY BROOKS: So, um, the next step in Scientology is to buy a course.
KURT LODER: Um-hmm.
STACY BROOKS: So I did that, I bought a course which was [clears her throat] the next step up, um, again fairly basic concepts, um, and the whole process in Scientology is one of very, very gradual steps further and further into the organization. So, um, [clears her throat] you know, part of it also was that I was making friends at the same time and I was starting to hang out with these people and I got a job working with all of these people and, um, it’s really--it’s really a very all-encompassing, um, kind of a--kind of a philosophy.
KURT LODER: Yeah.
STACY BROOKS: And a, and a--you know, the organization encourages you, um, to work with other Scientologists, to have friends with other Scientologists--not to talk to people who aren’t Scientologists, um, unless you’re disseminating Scientology to them. And right away, as soon as I started to take my first course, um, my world began to change from what it had been before into a Scien--a world with Scientology boundaries, basically.
KURT LODER: Um-hmm.
STACY BROOKS: And, um, again it was a fairly gradual process, but within a few months, I didn’t know anybody but Scientologists.
KURT LODER: Yeah.
STACY BROOKS: I was thinking like a Scientologist. There’s a whole language, um, that is part of Scientology which other people would have no way of understanding. You start to speak with almost a foreign language.
KURT LODER: Yeah.
STACY BROOKS: Um, and because you’re thinking in these concepts which are foreign to anybody else, it’s much easier just to talk to other Scientologists.
KURT LODER: Yeah.
STACY BROOKS: It’s much easier just to hang out with them. They’re the only ones who really understand you. Um, they’re the only ones who--you, you now begin to feel that they’re the only other people in the world who really know what’s going on.
KURT LODER: Yeah.
STACY BROOKS: Um, and everybody else is, um, ignorant and in need of being told about Scientology and being brought into Scientology. And that’s really what the world becomes for a Scientologist.
KURT LODER: Yeah. What are the--when you were initially getting involved in it, what is, what is it they’re telling you? What--what is Scientology? How do they explain it?
STACY BROOKS: Um, the way it was explained to me, the first very simple description that I was given by a woman that I met at a restaurant, was that, um, after we had chatted for a little bit--
KURT LODER: Um-hmm.
STACY BROOKS: Um, Scientology is a way of, um, learning how to communicate better and get in control of your life. And for whatever reason, just that little simple statement, um, uh, intrigued me--
KURT LODER: Uh-huh.
STACY BROOKS: And made me want to hear more. So I went to these lectures and I was told [clears her throat] some very basic concepts about communication. Um, one of the concepts is, um, uh, that there is, um, a triangle which is what communication is made of. And the man delivering the lecture had a blackboard and he would draw these concepts up on the board. Um, and the--that particular concept is what they call the ARC triangle. It’s a very basic Scientology concept, and basically, um, Sci--in Scientology, communication is composed of affinity, reality and communication and, um, it’s sort of all very formulaic. And you--if you want to increase your communication skills then you have to, um, increase one of the other of those particular aspects of your way of communicating and it’s, um, it’s all basically, uh--it turns everything into a very mechanical process basically.
KURT LODER: Yeah.
STACY BROOKS: Communication becomes a very mechanical process, um, um, everything that you’re thinking, all of your thought processes, become very mechanical. Um, it’s, it’s--Scientology really is, um, a synthesis of a lot of other theories of thought, it’s not, um--I don’t know that there’s very much of it that was original thought.
KURT LODER: Yeah.
STACY BROOKS: Um, but the founder of it, Hubbard, did was to make it--um, one of the worst things a Scientologist could do was to attribute any of these thoughts to anybody but him.
KURT LODER: Um-hmm.
STACY BROOKS: So by the time you’re in Scientology, if you--if you weren’t already very, very well educated on all of this background, um, you think that he’s a genius.
KURT LODER: Yeah.
STACY BROOKS: He’s brilliant, he’s come up with all of these incredible concepts and stuff where in fact it was actually synthesized from a whole lot of other things.
KURT LODER: Uh-hum. Did you--was he still alive when you joined the group?
STACY BROOKS: Yeah.
KURT LODER: Did you ever get to encounter him?
STACY BROOKS: No. No, no.
KURT LODER: Was he a rarified personality at that moment?
STACY BROOKS: Well, he was already in hiding by the time I had gotten into Scientology. He was--he was being pursued by the IRS and by--he had already been indicted in France and he was found guilty of fraud in absentia in France so he wasn’t able to come out in public because, um, of a lot of legal problems that were starting to pursue him.
KURT LODER: Yeah. So [?????]
[Stacy clears her throat]
KURT LODER: This all made sense to you at the time or your lifestyle or anything--
[Stacy starts laughing]
KURT LODER: You contin--you continued your ascent in the organization?
STACY BROOKS: Yes, yeah. Um, a few months after I got in, um, I--there’s a lot of controversy about whether or not there’s a particular type of person who’s more, um, predisposed to being brought into something like this or not. I don’t have the answer to that question but I know that for myself, I have always been a person who kind of never did anything half way, I mean--
KURT LODER: Yeah.
STACY BROOKS: If I was gonna do something I would really do it all the way and that’s what did with Scientology, too, unfortunately [Stacy and Kurt start laughing]. So that a few months after I got into it, I decided that I wanted to become a staff member in Scientology. And, um, not only did I want to become a staff member but I wanted to become a staff member in the inner circle of Scientology, which is called the Sea Organization.
KURT LODER: Um-hmm.
STACY BROOKS: Um, it’s a--it’s an unincorporated fraternal group of people who actually run Scientology.
KURT LODER: Um-hmm.
STACY BROOKS: Um, and, uh--so I did, I joined Sciento--I joined the Sea Org, and--
KURT LODER: How difficult was that? Did you have to pass through many of their--
STACY BROOKS: Well, it’s funny that you ask, because, um, you know, I was used to real life, where you have to present a resume, you have to have credentials and, you know, you have to be educated for a particular field or whatever. Um, so I--when I made the decision that I wanted to join the Sea Organization, I assumed that it would be the same kind of process, and I was really nervous and I was really, um, afraid that they wouldn’t accept me and all this kind of stuff. So I went to a great deal of trouble to, um, put a resume together and, um, make myself sound as attractive as I possibly could, as you do when you’re trying to get a job. And, um, I sent this all the way to, um, Denmark, which was where I was originally planning on, um, becoming a staff member.
KURT LODER: Um-hmm.
STACY BROOKS: And within some miraculous amount of time, it seemed like the next day but it must have been a couple of days later, I, um, had an answer back saying, "Yes! You are accepted, we want you to come right away!" [starts laughing]
KURT LODER: Wow! That was a good resume!
STACY BROOKS: Well, I thought so, I thought, "Wow! This is great!", you know, this is--um, they must really have thought I was very well qualified. It wasn’t until later that I discovered, um, you don’t have to have any qualifications to join the Sea Org. Um, there are recruiters who go around and look for people, just on the street--
[Kurt Loder starts laughing]
STACY BROOKS: For, for joining staff to help with whatever, you know, kinds of work that they need. But at the time I was just thrilled, I just thought, I thought, "Wow, I have really done it, this is great, I have really found my groove!"
[Kurt Loder and Stacy Brooks both start laughing]
STACY BROOKS: I was gonna be so happy. It was--it was kind of like, um,--it was almost as if--if you’re really a Trekkie--
KURT LODER: Yeah.
STACY BROOKS: If you’re really into "Star Trek", and you--and I’ve gone to a couple of Trekkie conventions.
KURT LODER: Um-hmm.
STACY BROOKS: And these people would love nothing more than for the ship to land and, you know, for the recruiters to go down and--
[Kurt Loder and Stacy Brooks both start laughing]
STACY BROOKS: For them to, you know, recruit for Starfleet Academy and for it to really be true. And Scientology really is kind of like that, really. I think it’s the best way for me to describe it.
KURT LODER: Yeah.
STACY BROOKS: It’s a very science-fiction world. Um, it has a galactic confederacy, it has space opera--
[Kurt Loder starts chuckling]
STACY BROOKS: It has lifetimes and lifetimes worth of, um, space travel that we’ve all been through and, um [clears her throat] it’s--it’s a very sort of, um, romantic, very heady kind of, um, view of the world that he created and, um, that Scientologists think is real.
KURT LODER: Yeah.
STACY BROOKS: And so I really kind of felt like I was, um, going to Starfleet Academy in a way. Um--
[Kurt Loder and Stacy Brooks both start laughing]
KURT LODER: Did you have to wear a uniform?
STACY BROOKS: Yeah. Oh, yeah. Naval uniforms--
[Kurt Loder starts chuckling]
STACY BROOKS: --in the Sea Organization. It was very paramilitary. It’s a paramilitary organization. Um, but that was really what I thought I was going to.
KURT LODER: Yeah.
STACY BROOKS: I think that’s what a lot of people, um, get into their heads, that, you know, you finally found a true group.
KURT LODER: Yeah.
STACY BROOKS: You know, where their captain is always very reasonable [starts laughing]. And everybody always gets along. [Kurt and Stacy both start laughing]You know, it’s just like on TV. Um, which of course it never is and it certainly wasn’t in that group. But I think--I think that that level of idealism is what really, um, gets people in there and--
KURT LODER: Yeah, sure--
STACY BROOKS: --gets people to stay. I know that the reason that I, um--when I got out there, the very first day, it was very obvious to me that this was no ideal group. Um--
KURT LODER: Why? Why so?
STACY BROOKS: The building that I was, um, to report to turned out to be, um, really close to a tenement. It was very, very run-down in Hollywood, in Hollywood at that time I think they started to, um, kind of rejuvenate it a little bit at this point, but at that time [clears her throat], this was in the mid-Seventies, it was really on its way down.
KURT LODER: Huh.
STACY BROOKS: And, um, I reported to this building which, um, which was kind of falling apart and very ramshackle and, um, kind of alarming to me. Have you seen that movie "Benjamin"--"Private Benjamin"?
KURT LODER: Yes.
STACY BROOKS: With Goldie Hawn? You know--[Kurt and Stacy both start laughing] I kind of had the idea that I was reporting to some really cool, space-shippish type of organization, you know, everything would be white and gleaming and beautiful and everybody would be, um, very intelligent and wonderful, and it didn’t fit that picture at all, you know, and the people were kind of, um [clears her throat] grubby and--
KURT LODER: Yeah--hmm.
STACY BROOKS: This one man who was in charge of all of the new recruits was in a very, very bad mood and yelling at everybody and [Kurt and Stacy both start laughing] really scary, and not at all what I had expected and for some reason took an instant dislike to me because I--well, actually, because you were supposed to call him "Sir". Um, you know, it was sort of like new navy recruits, you know.
KURT LODER: Um-hmm.
STACY BROOKS: We were supposed to report to their lieutenant or something like that. Well, I didn’t know this, you know [Kurt and Stacy both start laughing]. And, um, so I called him by his first name when he asked me something and, and he just got furious at me, [Kurt starts chuckling], really took offense, and I thought, "Well, gosh! I’m sorry, I didn’t know!" [Stacy starts laughing] And, um, it was kind of, um, from the beginning, immediately, you know, there’s really something wrong here, they don’t understand what’s really supposed to be happening here, you know. [Kurt starts chuckling]I, I’m obviously not at the part of the organization that I’m meant to get to. So I sort of began a search at that point, um, for the part of the organization that I had thought was what I was gonna find. And, um, every--you know, I kept moving up the ranks.
KURT LODER: Um-hmm.
STACY BROOKS: Um--
KURT LODER: You’re being paid well all this time? Are they paying you a living wage?
STACY BROOKS: You get paid about $24 a week [Kurt starts laughing] and you’re--and you live--in the Sea Organization you live, you’re given room and board and you live in, um--there’s Big Blue--well, you’ve seen the Cedars of Lebanon Hospital in Hollywood.
KURT LODER: Yeah.
STACY BROOKS: On Sunset Boulevard.
KURT LODER: Uh-hmm.
STACY BROOKS: Um, and it is painted blue, light blue.
KURT LODER: Um-hmm.
STACY BROOKS: And, um, we all lived in that building. Um--
KURT LODER: You weren’t out to sea very much.
STACY BROOKS: Oh, no. By 1975 that was over.
KURT LODER: Yeah.
STACY BROOKS: Or 1976, I think, was when, um, the ship landed for good and those people moved to Clearwater, Florida, and, um--
KURT LODER: Yeah.
STACY BROOKS: They’re all in Florida now.
KURT LODER: Yeah.
STACY BROOKS: But, um,
[short pause]
KURT LODER: Okay, I’m ready when you are.
STACY BROOKS: I was telling you why I went to the prison camp.
KURT LODER: Where was this prison camp? Did it have a--
STACY BROOKS: In Los Angeles. They have them where the Sea Organization units are.
KURT LODER: Um-hmm.
STACY BROOKS: Um, there was one in Los Angeles, um, there was one--there is one down at Clearwater, Florida.
KURT LODER: Um-hmm.
STACY BROOKS: Um, there was one out at the secret Scientology International headquarters which was in Hemet, California, out in the desert.
KURT LODER: Secret? Uh, why was it secret?
STACY BROOKS: Well--why was it secret? Um, at that time, in the late ‘70s-early ‘80s it was being kept a secret because they were hoping Hubbard would be able to come there and live there.
KURT LODER: Um-hmm.
STACY BROOKS: And it had to be kept very secret because he was in hiding.
KURT LODER: Yeah. Um-hmm.
STACY BROOKS: Um, it has--I’m not really sure why they continue to keep it secret, but they, um, they promote it as a film studio [clears throat] where they make all the promotional films for Scientology, but really it’s where Miscavige and his, um, head people all live and it’s where Scientology is run from, internationally. Um, Miscavige runs it internationally.
KURT LODER: Um-hmm.
STACY BROOKS: Um, it’s a very dictatorial political system, um--
KURT LODER: I imagine. [Stacy starts laughing]
STACY BROOKS: Um, and his word is law and everybody does what he says.
KURT LODER: Yeah.
STACY BROOKS: Um, but I was very critical of him. I felt that he was, uh, um, very, um, dictatorial.
KURT LODER: Um-hmm.
STACY BROOKS: Um, and--
KURT LODER: Where did he come from? Is he just a Scientologist who rose through the ranks?
STACY BROOKS: He--well, actually, he kind of grew up in Scientology.
KURT LODER: Yeah.
STACY BROOKS: Um, he is from Philadelphia, his family is from Philadelphia. Um, he got--his parents were both in Scientology.
KURT LODER: Um-hmm.
STACY BROOKS: And he got in at a very early age, I think--I’m not really sure what year, what--how old he was when he got in, but I think by the time he was 8 or 9 or something, he was, um, um, very much a Scientologist and, um, he became one of Hubbard’s messengers.
KURT LODER: Um-hmm.
STACY BROOKS: Um, Hubbard’s messengers were his, um--I don’t know what an equivalent would be, but they were very young children who ran Scientology for him. Um, they became his eyes and ears.
KURT LODER: Yeah.
STACY BROOKS: Um, um, when I say young children, I don’t mean 8 or 9, but they were in their teens.
KURT LODER: Yeah.
STACY BROOKS: Um, or something like that. And Miscavige was one of those. He, um, was basically raised at Hubbard’s knee.
KURT LODER: Um-hmm.
STACY BROOKS: Um, he rose in the ranks as a messenger, and, um, um, I think he was very ambitious. Um, I think he saw that it would be possible for him to take over after Hubbard died.
KURT LODER: Even though Hubbard had children.
STACY BROOKS: Yeah, but Hubbard’s children--Hubbard was never much of a family man! [Stacy starts laughing]
KURT LODER: Yeah.
STACY BROOKS: To say the least! [Kurt starts chuckling] You know, his wife, uh, went to jail for, um, crimes which he knew about, ordered, and then he kind of threw her to the dogs and let her take the rap.
KURT LODER: What crimes were they?
STACY BROOKS: Well, um, uh, Scientology--Hubbard became very paranoid that there was a conspiracy against Scientology world-wide.
KURT LODER: Um-hmm.
STACY BROOKS: And he decided that, um, the, the--all the false reports about Scientology in various government files, um, needed to be, um, taken out of the files.
KURT LODER: Um-hmm.
STACY BROOKS: And so he sent out orders that this was to be done. And, um, some of these agencies were not very cooperative about this, such as the IRS.
KURT LODER: Yeah.
STACY BROOKS: And, um, so some of the more, um, uh--there was--his wife ran a program which included, um, having people break into the IRS offices and steal documents. Um, and they got caught.
KURT LODER: Yeah.
STACY BROOKS: And, um, about I think 11 people went to jail in 1980 for that. And, um, Miscavige took over right after that.
KURT LODER: Um-hmm.
STACY BROOKS: And his whole, um--kind of the crisis that he rode in on basically was that crisis.
KURT LODER: Yeah.
STACY BROOKS: Um, and he took over control of all aspects of Scientology in 1981.
KURT LODER: In the sense of does he own the organization? Is he the--as a piece of property, does he own--
STACY BROOKS: No. He has complete control.
KURT LODER: Yeah.
STACY BROOKS: Over every single Scientologist in the world.
KURT LODER: Hmm.
STACY BROOKS: If David Miscavige told somebody to do something, they have to do it or they risk being thrown out of Scientology.
KURT LODER: Yeah.
STACY BROOKS: Um, which, for a Scientologist, obviously, is--
KURT LODER: Yeah--
STACY BROOKS: --like, I guess, a Catholic risking being ex-communicated or, um, anybody else who believes very strongly in what they’re doing.
KURT LODER: Um-hmm.
STACY BROOKS: You know, risking being denied access to that thing.
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