Andrew Rinder recounts that his brother Mike was an inconsiderate son, then an absentee father, always trying to get something for himself—even at his family’s expense.
Mike, as a child, was aloof, different, didn’t participate, didn’t particularly have many friends, you know. Left the family at a very early age—just sort of walked out.
Andrew Rinder observed that his brother Mike was an inconsiderate son, then an absentee father, always trying to get something for himself—even at his family’s expense.
I mean, one of his last years at school, he never went to school. Never! But he used to tell my parents he was going to school, So, his whole life was a deception from a very early age.
It’s a personality trait. It’s his—it’s him, you know. Who he is and how he was, was hidden very well but his personality trait of wanting to suppress others or not grant any life or livingness to other people unless they could help him in his own self importance, was about where it was at.
And that maintained all the way through. And I knew that from day one. I mean, the actual truth is he tried to just about kill me when I was a baby by stuffing bread down my throat, you know. So I’d known for a very long time. He had no association with the family—like we would be on the Freewinds [Scientology motor vessel/religious retreat] for six days, and he was there and would never—unless somebody else made him come and say hello—would never bother even to come and talk to us. We were not important enough in his world of social climbing; because his own esteem and his own belief in himself had to be supreme for him.
You know, we’d cared through a lot of things that went on in our family that Mike never had any interest in whatsoever. His mother was nearly dead a couple of times in car accidents and the hospitals—never had an interest whatsoever. Didn’t have an interest in his children—in fact, his daughter, Taryn, calls me her pseudofather; she calls me “Uncle Dad.” I was more her father than I think he ever was—in fact, I’m sure of it, you know. And my family is the tightest knit, loving group of people you’ve ever seen. My brother chose to leave that. That’s his choice. It’s not my choice, you know.
My mum had just been moved into an aged-care facility. He went to that facility and said he’s “her son and blah, blah, blah, blah.” And they said, “Well, she’s not here, obviously”—we were out of state at the time. And he somehow managed to talk his way in with a film crew and filmed her room with the idea of saying, “Well, look at what people do to old Scientologists.” This is one of the most exclusive, beautiful places for an age retirement you could ever imagine, that was about half a kilometer from where we lived. We were there every two or three days and she used to spend the weekend at home with us. But it disturbed my mother immensely that he [Mike] could just walk into her room when she wasn’t there and, you know. That’s just another thing—it wasn’t about her. He didn’t go there to visit her. He went there to try and do something evil and bad.
Mike Rinder is an individual that is solely concerned with himself. Anything he does that associates with other people is with the consideration of, “What do I get out of it?” That’s it. And, you know, at one point in our Church he had status. That’s what he was getting out of it. He enjoyed the status. He didn’t ever do it, I don’t think, to help Mankind.
