When King of Queens and Kevin Can Wait actress Leah Remini publicly and not-so quietly left the church of Scientology in 2013 she, along with former upper echelon member, Mike Rinder began a crusade to expose the church’s heinous mistreatment of their parishioners, including the children that were born into the cult-like organization. Their efforts are currently being recorded on A&E’s docu-series Leah Remini: Scientology and the Aftermath and perhaps the most disturbing facts are those that are surfacing about Scientology’s views and practices when it comes to kids.

At the risk of being disassociated from and shunned by family members and friends, survivors’ willingness to come forward and share their stories of abuse, neglect and harsh forms of punishment for even the slightest form of normal adolescent misbehaviour is putting an unflattering spotlight on this ‘religious’ institution that many celebrity a-listers remain active members of.

The church’s current leader, David Miscavige is under heavy scrutiny by former members and is described as an ego-maniacal violent tyrant who’s own father had to flee the confinements of the organization and described how dangerous his son’s delusions actually are when he spoke to Remini and Rinder. Although Scientology representatives and members consistently fire back in defence after any claims of impropriety are brought to the pubic’s attention, the world is quickly finding out that not all is well behind the closed doors of this secretive society, and as enrolment numbers decline and more ex-members speak out, it’s not very hard to see why.

17 They Are Treated Like Miniature Adults

The late creator of Scientology, L. Ron Hubbard wrote in his manual, CHILD DIANETICS: Dianetic Processing for Children, “A child is not a special species of animal distinct from Man. A child is a man or a woman who has not attained full growth.”

Ex-members born into Scientology who are now speaking out against the church have attested to the fact that they were essentially robbed of a childhood. It seems as though Hubbard dismissed the idea that children are cognitively incomparable to adults by no fault of their own, but rather insisted that the processes of maturation and brain development should not be taken into consideration when relating to a child.

Children are expected to comprehend and interact with adults as if they were adults themselves, often ending up in situations that are intimidating, overwhelming, inappropriate, or beyond their physical capabilities. Failure to adapt or comply to these standards generally results in punishment.

16 They Are Separated From Their Parents

While Scientology claims to foster healthy child development among it’s members, many survivors recall their experiences growing up in the organization quite differently. Children are often forcefully separated from their parents when customary child misbehaviour hinders doctrinal study. Author Sheila McGregor notes, on her website entitled Anti Dianetics, “Children who misbehave are by definition suppressive and so they are forbidden to have contact with their parents, because they hinder the advancement of their parents in Scientology.”

If parents agree to have their children educated within the church, it’s done so under a boarding school pretence where the children are sent to a Scientology institution to live and study the religion while their parents are located elsewhere studying and being further brainwashed into thinking that this particular situation is beneficial for the child and the parent. In addition, a young teenager may be manipulated in joining the Sea-Orgnanization, where parental isolation is even more extreme and members are required to sign a billion year contract that proves their dedication to the cause.

15 They Can Be Forced Into Having An Abortion

Many adolescent Scientologists are forced to live in near squalor under horrendous day-to-day living conditions that include hard manual labour along with hours of extensive studying and if they attempt to escape their distorted reality by engaging in activities that pubescent boys and girls are naturally inclined to do, there can be life-altering consequences.

If a young couple is caught fraternizing, no matter how innocent the tryst may have been, as was the case of 15 year old Astra and her friend Lawrence, a marriage between the guilty parties can be forcefully encouraged. Sea Org. Members are discouraged from having children because they are seen as a hindrance, but with practically no sexual education or access to birth control and young teenagers being forced into marriage, pregnancy is an inevitability. There are 2 choices when this occurs, one involves ‘Disconnection’ from everyone and everything you know, and the other is abortion as Claire Headley sadly relived in episode 5 of the first season of Leah Remini: Scientology and the Aftermath.

Physical abuse is widely committed and highly disregarded within the church of Scientology. If reported, it is often the victim that must make amends by way of an apology to the abuser in order to manipulate the child into thinking they’ve done something wrong.

Mirriam Francis recalled on A&E that her own Scientologist father violated her for years and when she finally admitted what was happening after showing signs of distress on an E-meter reading, she was quickly labeled a ‘trouble source’.

There are countless survivor stories similar to, or worse than Mirriam’s that are exposing the inner workings of the church and their resounding success in disempowering children while stealing their innocence and leaving deep psychological scars. The fact that blind eyes are being turned and cries for help are being silenced proves that there is nothing sacred about this supposed religious organization.

13 They Have To Attend Ranch Camps

In an episode of Leah Remini: Scientology and the Aftermath that aired on October 10th 2017 entitled ‘The Ranches’, two third-generation Scientologists, Nathan Rich and Tara Reile painfully relived their separate but equally painful experiences at the Mace-Kingsley Scientology Ranch - a boarding facility for wayward Scientology children and adolescents.

In both cases, these young people were led by their parents to believe that they would be sent on a fun, camp-like experience for a couple of months at the most. Whether or not the parents knew otherwise all along is unclear.

Rich attended the camp first at it’s California location and then, again, after it had been moved to New Mexico under the promise that conditions had improved. He was denied contact from his mother at her insistence and after graduating from the ‘school’ his devotion to the church still wavered and he and his mother remained estranged when she died.

Tara’s family paid $150,000 for her to attend the ranch after she caught him cheating on her mother, insisting that it was Tara that had done something wrong to cause her father to be unfaithful.

12 No Punishment Is Off The Table

Authority figures within the church regularly take advantage of their powerful positions, particularly when it comes to children. The fact that many young people are physically separated from their parents appears to be a strategy employed to ensure that there is no parental interference when it comes to corporal punishment. Parents are brainwashed into believing that their children are under care and guidance that will result in a productive parishioner and if mistreatment is discovered, it’s generally regarded as the fault of the mistreated.

Nathan Rich recounted being given an G.I. shower (publicly scrubbed with abrasive metal brushes) by staff and peers at a Scientology Ranch and spanked with a wooden paddle by a ranch manager.

Tara Reile described the exerting manual labour that was required every day of her stay at a ranch, including constructing her own shelter for punishment and imprisonment as well as being thrown in a lake wearing her only dry clothes followed by collecting water daily from a dirty spring for her peers in a five gallon jug using just a small cup.

11 There Is A Complete Lack Of Education

Religious doctrine is the only education that Scientologists deem necessary in order to accomplish their mission of ‘clearing the planet’. Sheila McGregor explains, “If they [children] do not go to a normal mainstream school but to a Scientology school then they live entirely inside Scientology and have no chance to learn anything else. They know they must work for Scientology, so that the world can be saved.”

Seemingly this appears to be a tactic exercised to ensure a sense of helplessness without the church. Scientology is structured in a way that leaves it’s members completely dependant on them, psychologically, emotionally and especially, financially; failure to comply with their rigorous requirements or attempting to separate from the church entirely can be a very intimidating option for people because they are overwhelmingly unprepared for life outside of the organization.

10 Mental Illness Is Not Taken Seriously

Scientology’s views on mental illness were thrust into the mainstream when Tom Cruise, after a series of over-the-top public appearances that included jumping on Oprah Winfrey’s talk show couch in an excited declaration of love for his new girlfriend at the time, Katie Holmes, sat down for an interview on Today with Matt Lauer to discuss his film ‘War of the Worlds’.

When asked for comments on former co-star Brook Shield’s personal struggles and subsequent book on postpartum depression and the use of psychiatric drugs to treat it (and any other mental illness that may involve prescribed interventions), Cruise aggressively argued his perspective on psychiatry as a pseudoscience. He went further to criticize Ritalin and attempted to manipulate the conversation by not-so-subtley integrating the topic of forced electric shock therapy before asserting that “there is no such thing as a chemical imbalance” and that “vitamins and exercise” can cure these types of problems, which, in a nut shell, is the church’s stance on the matter.

9 Complete Disconnection From Family

Arguably one of the biggest intimidation tactics that the church of Scientology enforces amongst is members is the threat of ‘Disconnection’. L. Ron Hubbard describes Disconnection as “a self-determined decision made by an individual that he is not going to be connected to another. It is a severing of a communication line."

While it is publicly stated that disconnection is ‘self-determined’ and that “There is no Scientology Disconnection policy that requires Church members to disconnect from anyone, let alone family and friends who simply have different beliefs,” former members will adamantly insist otherwise.

Members are often told to ‘disconnect’ from parents, children or other family members if a situation occurs where Scientology practices are even the slightest bit in question. This can obviously devastate a family whether it’s being done forcefully by high-ranking members or out of ignorance when a person is brainwashed to the extent that they truly believe this act is necessary.

8 Children As Young As Six Are Interrogated

Auditing is an interrogational from of intimidation used by the Church to extract information (true or untrue) that can be used to manipulate, blackmail, overwhelm and/or criticize the person being questioned or anyone (Scientologist or not) that they may mention in the process. Children as young as six are subject to this this practice in which they are made to hold metal tubes that are supposed to observe electrical particle changes on the skin but have been proven to do virtually nothing in reality while a trained auditor “probes the thoughts, attitudes and behaviour of an individual by asking them large numbers of questions.”

Children are not only forced to participate in this activity but they are also heavily and misguidedly recruited to perform it. The official Canadian Scientology website claims, “any young person would be fulfilling a great demand and greatly contributing to making this world a saner, better and more enlightened place by becoming trained to minister auditing.”

7 They Endure Extreme Threats

Scientology children become familiar with threat tactics at a young age. From threats by superiors when abuse or misconduct is discovered to the constant threat of Disconnection if a young person doesn’t fall in line. Scientology operates on the basis that they aim to control every aspect of your life and in return you are overworked, underpaid and often severely psychologically damaged in the process.

Not only are there specific threats made every day in order to prevent public relations disasters for the organization, but Scientology has actually created policy based on a particular threat-based tactic for critics and defectors. The practice entitled ‘Fair Game’ was covered on Remini’s show and in the 2015 HBO documentary Going Clear. While Scientology denies the existence of this malicious custom, official Scientology documents exist stating that an enemy of Scientology “may be deprived of property or injured by any means by any Scientologist without any discipline of the Scientologist. May be tricked, sued or lied to or destroyed.”

6 They Are Rarely Exposed To The Outside World

Scientology uses isolation as a form of currency. When a person becomes fully committed to the Church and it’s mission, they are quickly taken advantage of financially in order to establish dependance. Children that are born into the organization are isolated on a whole other level because they they are rarely exposed to the outside world in a realistic way. Phone calls, internet use, personal contact with others are all monitored closely. Reins are tightened if there is suspicion of unapproved behaviour and attempts to isolate the individual further, regardless of age, are escalated.

Aside from isolation in the bubble of Scientology and away from the rest of the world, there are also many forms of isolation that happen within the church itself. Children are seen as an inconvenience and are physically isolated from their families essentially as a means to wait out their maturation into adulthood in harsh military-like environments until they can prove to be more useful.

5 They Live In A Misleading Reality

Anyone that is severely isolated from the world will end up with distorted ideas of reality. As is the case with many members that become entrenched in this false sense of planetary salvation.

The Sea Organization is a branch within the church established for it’s most devout members. Upon entering the Sea Org (which many children are tricked into aspiring to do), members must sign a billion year contract demonstrating their devotion to the cause. Scientologists believe in the existence of past and future lives within one’s self making a billion years seem extreme, but plausible.

Some Sea Org members actually serve the organization out at sea, dressed in naval imitation garments on former cruise ships procured by church leaders, and spend extensive hours studying the abundance of doctrine documents from ages as young as fourteen; forgoing conventional education and sacrificing any hopes of a normal adolescence.

4 They're Taught About A 'Greater Purpose'

In the opening credits of Leah Remini: Scientology and the Aftermath, Leah herself is shown being interviewed at a Scientology gala in 1999 claiming that “without any Scientology organization, things are not gonna change on this planet.” The church claims that it’s ultimate goal is to ‘clear the planet’ by attempting to “rid the planet of insanity, war and crime, and in its place create a civilization in which sanity and peace exist.”

Children don’t exactly fit into this mold because they are ungovernable to a certain extent and detract true parishioners from their dutiful obligations; which is undoubtably why a military-esque structure was developed to control them. By the time that Scientology children reach adulthood, they’ve either been fully brainwashed into believing this ideal or they are forced to fight against everything they’ve come to know thus far in their lives to escape what their intuition tells them isn’t quite right.

3 They Have To Spy On Each Other

In order to maintain a sense of martial law within the sect, members are asked and sometimes forced to mistreat others. Children were expected to participate in public punishments administered to their peers at the Mace-Kingsley Ranch Camp and former Sea Org member and parent, Teresa Summers, claimed that “children are routinely asked to spy on one another and are subjected to gruelling punishments. ‘It’s called making amends, and it can be anything – my daughter was made to scrub poles, paint walls, report on her friends.’”

This strategy not only reinforces the intimidation factor amongst young members but also fosters an environment of distrust amid peers. Children (and adults) are ultimately being trained to believe that there is no place of reprieve or solace in order to maximize the dependance on the organization itself rather than an individual. Scientologists in positions of power go to great lengths to ensure that the emergence of a gang like-mentality rising up against mistreatment and abuse is an impossibility.

2 They Have Restricted Access To Medicine

Given that children are regarded as miniature adults, the Church has some controversial ideologies on how to care for them when they’re sick. Comfort and nurture is not recommended, neither is the use of conventional medicine even in exceptional cases from fevers all the way to cancer. Alternatively, as Teresa Summers recalled, “you get the child to hold an object still. That’s supposed to bring down the fever. When it doesn’t work, it’s because you aren’t doing it right or didn’t repeat it often enough.”

The foundations of Scientology set forth by L. Ron Hubbard revolve around his theory that man is capable of healing his own ailments, regardless of their form, with the correct training. There is little exception when applying this principle to children apart from the implementation of a solid object to transfer pain onto repetitively until the child coincidentally is rid of the pain or simply lies to be free of the activity.

1 They Don't Get Help For PTSD Or Self Harm

Despite the relief ex-members must feel upon their escape from Scientology, it’s often difficult to reenter a normal society without previous trauma interfering in an attempt at normal life. Many survivors are faced with the challenges that accompany overexposure to stressful situations and considering that ex-members have often left the organization under the conditions of Disconnection, a support system is unlikely immediately available. There are several accounts of suicide by both active and former members who, empathetic friends and family members say, were overcome with feelings of helplessness.

Marie Bilheimer, as seen on the second episode of season two of Leah Remini: Scientology and the Aftermath painstakingly recalls the Church forbidding her to tell others that her husband was dead, let alone that he had hung himself. The Church goes to great efforts to cover up instances of suicide or self harm among members or makes it a point to distance themselves from individuals heading in that path, consequently excommunicating them and/or labeling them a ‘suppressive person’.

Sources: Child Dianetics, AntiDianetics, EXSCN, This Is Insider, Hollywood Reporter, People.com, Scientology.ca, Scientology.ca, Alternet.org,