The Top 25 People Crippling Scientology, No. 17: Jefferson Hawkins

On August 5, we started a countdown that will give credit — or blame — to the people who have contributed most to the sad current state of Scientology. From its greatest expansion in the 1980s, the church is a shell of what it once was and is mired in countless controversies around the world. Some of that was self-inflicted, and some of it has come from outside. Join us now as we continue on our investigation of those people most responsible…

The Top 25 People Crippling Scientology#17: Jefferson Hawkins

Hawkins

Last year, Jeff Hawkins sent me a copy of his book, Counterfeit Dreams, and I have to admit, I wasn’t expecting much. I really didn’t know about Hawkins’ more than 30 years in Scientology, and had no idea what he had done for the organization.

Now, after reading the book, it’s difficult to think about Scientology’s amazing expansion in the 1980s without thinking of Jeff Hawkins.

In Counterfeit Dreams, Hawkins skillfully narrates his journey as he went from an eager young joiner learning how to produce church publications during Scientology’s hippie days in the late ’60s, to becoming Scientology’s marketing architect during the greatest period of its expansion.

What I wrote about the book last year:

It was Hawkins and his ideas for television ads (the “volcano” TV spot, for example) that propelled Dianetics to meteoric heights, leading many to wonder if Scientologists themselves weren’t just buying up the books by the truckload to make sure it topped the New York Times Bestsellers List.

Hawkins assured me that such deception wasn’t needed. Through his TV ads and a slick print marketing scheme, books were flying off shelves, even as Scientology faced a terrifying future — would the movement survive its founder, L. Ron Hubbard, who died in January, 1986?

Here’s what Marty Rathbun had to say about that marketing effort:

What Jeff accomplished by getting Dianetics onto bestseller lists in the Eighties is in my opinion the central reason there was any expansion of Scientology for the four short years after Hubbard’s death. As has been well reported in the past year, after the down turn of 1990, International Scientology statistics have been down ever since.

And if Hawkins convinces you utterly that he was the most enthusiastic, energetic and useful kind of smart executive that the church needed as it navigated troubled waters, he is just as convincing that his disaffection was a significant blow to the organization, and a sign that innovation and creativity were becoming less welcome.

Again, from my previous review of his book:

Like others who have come forward, Hawkins details the physical abuse he witnessed at the hands of [Scientology leader David] Miscavige, the orders that were impossible to fulfill, the constant threats of punishment, and the hopelessness that Scientologists feel when they are forcibly separated from family but feel that they can’t under any circumstance, leave the organization.

I couldn’t help reading Counterfeit Dreams as a serious blow to Scientology. If the organization is driving away people like Jeff Hawkins, it’s hard to see how it could ever regain its momentum and begin to expand again.

Check out this portion of Hawkins’ interview with Mark Bunker, part of Bunker’s upcoming documentary, “Knowledge Report.” Hawkins explains the us-versus-them psychology of Scientology:

Another reason why Hawkins is a key defector is that he had such a personal knowledge of the actual vital signs of the church’s health. There may be no one with a more authoritative knowledge of Scientology’s actual membership numbers.

“I have an advantage here because I used to work for Scientology’s Central Marketing Unit, and had access to all of the actual lists and statistics,” he wrote at his blog last year. And he explained how he came up with an overall number of worldwide members: “I know that event attendance internationally was somewhere in the region of 25,000 to 35,000. The International ‘Bodies in the Shop’ (people actually in the orgs that week for service) was 16,000 to 18,000. IAS was struggling to get 40,000 members. Based on this and a lot of other information I was privy to, I estimate the actual number of Scientologists at a maximum of 40,000. That’s on the high side.”

For me, Hawkins’s estimate is more solid than anything else we have — whether it’s government surveys on the low end, or Scientology’s claims of “millions” on the upper end.

And knowing that Scientology’s worldwide membership could barely fill a baseball stadium — that may be one of the most devastating pieces of information to come out in the last few years.

The Top 25 People Crippling Scientology
#1: L. Ron Hubbard
#2: David Miscavige
#3: Marty Rathbun
#4: Tom Cruise
#5: Joe Childs and Tom Tobin
#6: Anonymous
#7: Mark Bunker
#8: Mike Rinder
#9: Jason Beghe
#10: Lisa McPherson
#11: Nick Xenophon (and other public servants)
#12: Tommy Davis (and other hapless church executives)
#13: Janet Reitman (and other journalists)
#14: Tory Christman (and other noisy ex-Scientologists)
#15: Andreas Heldal-Lund (and other old time church critics)
#16: Marc and Claire Headley, escapees of the church’s HQ
#17: Jefferson Hawkins, the man behind the TV volcano
#18: Amy Scobee, former Sea Org executive
#19: The Squirrel Busters (and the church’s other thugs and goons)
#20: Trey Parker and Matt Stone (and other media figures)
#21: Kendrick Moxon, attorney for the church
#22: Jamie DeWolf (and other L. Ron Hubbard family members)
#23: Ken Dandar (and other attorneys who litigate against the church)
#24: David Touretzky (and other academics)
#25: Xenu, galactic overlord