(idea) by sidlon Tue Mar 27 2001 at 17:36:06
It has widely been observed that the scientologist strategy seems to be "always attack, never defend". Perhaps this can be a place for Scientologists to disprove this. I've never really met a Scientologist, and while what I've seen so far would lead me to believe that it is a cult, I'd like to hear more from the people who are actually involved.

To the Scientologists among us: please use this node to answer the questions many critics have.

  • What do you feel you get out of the auditing process?
  • Do you really believe in Xenu and the body thetans?
  • How confident are you that LRH's "science" was the result of his out-of-body explorations and not drug-induced hazes?
  • Have you been pressured to sell all your posessions to fund the movement?
  • What's your take on the "fair game" document? (http://www.xenu.net/fairgame-e.html)
  • Why is the practice of psychiatry & psychology so hated?

I like it! 1 C!
(idea) by DoctorNo Tue Apr 17 2001 at 8:52:49
In response to Prophet4's questions...

P4: What do you feel you get out of the auditing process?
DN: Immensely increased mental clarity; freedom from the influences of past trauma; increased enjoyment of life; decreased reaction time; ambiversion.

P4: Do you really believe in Xenu and the body thetans?
DN: Don't know, don't care. I am more interested in the tech than in the religion, and this brings up an important point. There are really two parts of Scientology, "tech" - which is the basic applied stuff, like Dianetics and similar therapies - and then there is the religious aspect, which involves Xenu and body thetans and all that other stuff. You can be an all-tech Scientologist.

P4: How confident are you that LRH's "science" was the result of his out-of-body exporations and not drug-induced hazes?
DN: Does it matter? Van Gogh burned off his ear and mailed it to his girlfriend. Does that make Starry Night any less beautiful? Many FreeZoners believe Hubbard was an inspired synthesizer, that he took information that already existed and synthesized something new and wonderful with it.

Have you been pressured to sell all your posessions to fund the movement?
DN: No, but they do aggressively sell their goods and services. But you already knew that.

What's your take on the "fair game" document? (http://www.xenu.net/fairgame-e.html)
DN: This policy was rescinded. However, it is said that 'Fair Game' is still referred to in some up-to-date literature used by the Church. This kind of behavior - that is, the actual carrying-out of Fair Game - is contrary to everything Dianetics stands for, not to mention the officially posted Scientology Code of Ethics.

Why is the practice of psychiatry & psychology so hated?
DN: We believe they do far more harm than good. Any Dianeticist who has truly read and understood the book, and undergone actual auditing, knows that those groups do not have any business pretending that they know how to cure mental ills. For starters, they like to say things like, "We will never fully understand the workings of the human mind." This is a defeatist assertation. Psychiatrists in particular are irksome to us. They used to drill holes in people's heads and claim that they were curing them. Today, they are restricted to such things as ECT and Ritalin. One of the fundamentals of Dianetics is that the human mind has native capabilities which can be tapped to relieve any mental ailment. Sending voltage through the brain, or drilling holes in it, or modifying its chemical structure with drugs, introduces an unstable element into the equation. There is a long-standing bylaw that those who have been under the care of psychiatrists may not be audited because of said unstable element.

If there is anything further I may answer, feel free to ask.

kozmund asks, re: scientology:

k: How far along in scientology are you, and how much have you paid thus far. (the second question may seem hostile, but i am actually curious)
DN: I have received approximately fifty hours of auditing. Auditing goes for about $18 an hour, so you do the math. I have also done Self Analysis, one of Scientology's few solo processes, which is $7.00 for the book and the auditing is free and you can do as much of it as you want. (I don't count that in the ~50 hours.) Self Analysis is hugely popular with churchgoers and FreeZoners alike.

I have been offered various extension courses but haven't done any yet.


Rockytastic wanted to know why I became interested in the first place. I have always been fascinated with the operation of the human mind, and I always wondered why people did crazy things. This may seem a little wierd, but when I watched the Road Runner cartoons at a younger age, I always rooted for Wile E. Coyote. Now, we're SUPPOSED to root for the Road Runner and be happy when the Coyote falls 800 feet down a canyon and gets hit in the head with an anvil, but I never did. The Coyote was just trying to eat to stay alive, you know? I always wondered about that, but I never quite articulated it into anything. When I discovered Dianetics, it was a revelation: Crazy people act crazy for the same reason that Wile E. Coyote chases the Road Runner. They do it because in their minds, it's the best possible way to attain maximum survival. One of the main theses of Dianetics is that organisms are constantly striving for maximum survival, and that "craziness" - the kind that's detrimental to survival - is indeed caused by weaknesses in the mechanism of the mind. Better still, the mind has native mechanisms that can be used to fix what's wrong - so in addition to identifying the problem, Dianetics presents a method of actually doing something about it. I hope that's not too ephemeral.

Any more questions? Just /msg me in the Chatterbox.

I like it! 3 C!s
(thing) by everyone Sat Jun 02 2001 at 0:01:01

Please feel free to contribute to this node by /msging a Content Editor or one of the admins. Listing it here does not imply any endorsement of the content of any particular article by the site.

Parts of Scientology:

Organisations: Documents:

People to do with Scientology:

Misc.:

I like it! 2 C!s
(thing) by bcube Sun Sep 01 2002 at 9:18:14

Scientology is an organization that believes, at its core, that humans have far more potential than we can understand, given our current poor state of existence. This belief is coupled with the belief that we can improve ourselves, provided we don't continue to look at the human race as another form of animal or physical mechanism. Scientology teaches that one must regard a human as a spiritual being in order to fully understand what kind of composite mankind really is. And societies have fallen where they have left this important component out of the equation.

Scientology is not an easy path to follow, for it attempts to make people more responsible and more ethical by getting them to deal with those personal issues most people have decided to bury and try to ignore. By their very definition, these are uncomfortable things to bear. But the Church of Scientology (COS) believes they can be dealt with, and in a very scientific reproducible way.

The term Scientology is taken from the Latin word scio (knowing in the fullest meaning of the word), and the Greek word logos (study of). By its definition, Scientology attempts to teach people how to learn. To give people the tools to be better at examining information given to them and deciding what is relevant and what is not. Ultimately teaching people to be better skeptics. One of the major mottoes of the church is "What is true, is true to you." Meaning that, if anything doesn't make sense to you, it's not going to be a concept you can do anything real with. Going through the motions is pointless. If you don't get a better understanding of life and how things work on this planet out of it, there is no point in studying it. And they stand by this principle.

Scientology has proven to be able to raise intelligence and regain native abilities to people. This is accomplished by getting people to deal with their own selves and past experiences. COS believes that all the troubles you see around you in the world are the result of ourselves. This is obvious. But they teach that this trouble is not our true selves, it is the product of the reactive mind. This is a Scientology concept that experiences which have threatened, or appear to have threatened our survival in the past can become "stuck" in our minds. And when new situations come along that approximate similar conditions, we can suddenly find ourselves reacting in a kind of preprogrammed way, rather than how we normally would. Certain situations can cause a person to become enraged, even though, looking back on the situation, we agree that that reaction usually does more harm to the initial situation. This is an example of the reactive mind deciding our actions, maybe just for a moment, but truthfully, most people walk around in a semi-state of this most of the time. Most people are reacting and not acting.

I have been an on-again-off-again member of the COS for 5 years now. I, being human, have my own problems and issues to deal with, and the off-again nature of my relationship to the church is just my own stubbornness. It has never had to do with anything the church has said or done that I thought was bogus or beyond belief. That being said, I have also not seen any of this material that I see on websites as to the "upper level" of information. If it does exist at upper levels, then the road I have been taking with the church has only led me more and more to a point where I would be able to examine what they are saying and tell them "bullshit!"

I have seen real improvements in my life. And I have seen this in others also. I have seen people come into the church in a condition most people would label introverted or bordering on anti-social, and I have seen drastic improvements. Courses I have been taking there always seem to deal with providing me a new way of seeing life and what is important in it. The primary thing being communication with others, because that is the core of what life is about. And the one thing most people have the most trouble with. I have taken some courses on different aspects of communication and they have helped me immensely. But I have never had one piece of dogma shoved on me or been told that I have to believe any specific thing or else I am not really "in the church".

There has been no doubt that the Church has been an adversary to Psychiatry, believing that the problems should be handled rather then their symptoms be medicated. And this has led to a bit of a war. Especially when you see actual numbers on how much money the pharmaceutical industry is bringing in each year. And this is growing by leaps and bounds. Remember when there wasn't any psychotropic drug commercials on TV? But I digress. There is a very real campaign going on to pull in more consumers. But don't confuse Scientology with Christian Scientists. Scientology knows that medical problems must be handled by a qualified physician. They have found that many problems, however, stem from "a troubled soul/spirit" (my words), and can be handled through spiritual means. And this view will always create doubters and enemies when there is much vested interest in seeing people as just chemical reactions that need a little tweaking. In my time in the church, which has gone beyond the "entry level", I have seen no church business that looks even a little strange. Just people wanting to help people with techniques that seem to work over and over again. Even after decades of testing. The best answer about what is Scientology, logically, comes from the source. I am just paraphrasing some of L. Ron Hubbard's words and I'm sure with a little work even what I have said here could be taken out of context or twisted. I would invite anyone to explore what it has to offer and make up their own mind. Fortunately, through the sacrifice of countless others, we live in a country where we are free to do this.

I like it! 2 C!s
(idea) by dc_ Sun Jun 08 2003 at 22:00:37

As a non-scientologist at a study tech (aka CoS) school, I regularly observe the ways in which the CoS operates. In the last few weeks the school has become a field day for all those charming Sea Org recruiters, and over 15% of the students in their teens have signed the Sea Org contract, some being very good friends of mine. It's interesting to see how they are attracted to joining the SO. Most are recruited in their middle teens when they're most vulnerable time when they're looking for some sort of place in the world, making their ruin easy to find. The recruiters disgust me in the way that they recruit people like this. At school I'm constantly surrounded by scientologist children and teachers, everyone is very cautious about not pushing me into it, but the utter secrecy of their organization is what really draws people into it. I constantly have other students squirreling to me, going on about Planet X and the government conspiracies. This was the kind of stuff we grew out of at 12 when we realized that science was correct and explained how life was. To most scientologists, all of science is wrong. According to scientology, matter can be created and destroyed just by thinking of an object in your mind (and believe me, I had a 2 hour argument with my physics teacher about this), and there's much more where this came from.

Also most scientologists, think the the whole government is full of SPs, and there's no one intelligent working there because they've all been suppressed. So one day I asked the teacher who said this "Why hasn't scientology taken control of the government if they know so much about it, and are able to handle SPs? L. Ron Hubbard was an intelligent man wasn't he?". The answer I got was pretty vague, but something along the lines of, "There are too many SPs there...scientology is focusing of making the whole planet clear first...LRH did write a letter to President Kenedy, but then they were raided shortly afterwords by the FBI...", you get the idea.
I must confirm that almost all the of the information I have read above and at Xenu.org is pretty true. All my scientologist friends find it very hard to talk with normal people, and they constantly try at assess and handle people, instead of just making friends with them like any normal person would do. They're also pretty arrogant most of the time, mainly because from a child they're given the view that the rest of the outside world is wrong. They all talk so much about applying scientology and how well it works, yet many of them don't even understand what their parents have told them. Scientologists always go on about how verbal data can never be trusted, yet they frequently discuss what they might learn on OT III, and try to get our OT teachers to levitate objects for them. And what about the confusion with dates through L. Ron Hubbard's life, it seems every source has some different date. So much for solid data.

Aside from all this the school does have its benefits. The study tech has been a great help for me (although it makes you very slack), and the people there are very kind and friendly. There has never been any incidents of bullying or drugs (but that also makes life pretty boring).
So maybe scientology is doing something right. But even so, LRH was a pretty 'alternative' guy. (oh and my physics teacher is on a diet of bananas).

I like it! 1 C!
(thing) by Pandeism Fish Thu Feb 14 2013 at 21:39:46
Here's a surprise: the word "Scientology" was first invented in 1875 by linguistically creative author, Stephen Pearl Andrews, as part and parcel of a tome chock full of comparable coinages, titled The Primary Synopsis of Universology and Alwato (which, Andrews blithely assures readers, will be "the new scientific universal language"; don't ask me what Alwato means).

The word is described thusly in the ornately written 'Table of Contents':
Scientology, the Science of the Scientismus, or of that Secondary Department of Being, or Stage of Evolution, in which Scientism, the Spirit or Principle of Science (or of that which is analogous with Science) preponderates—strict, legal, and law-abiding; Formal, regular; characterized by straightness, accuracy, and adjustment; as of Straight Lines, Parallelisms, Rectangularities, Squares, Cubes, etc. (See Index.)
And here's a sample of its use amongst the writing of which the book is strung together:

58. SCIENTOLOGY, is, on the contrary [to Naturology], that Branch or Aspect of Universology in which the Universe is considered and treated as consecutively and logically evolved from the Three Abstract Universal Principles above specified (2, 45), related to the Three Primary Numbers. It is, in other words, the Logical and Mathematical Evolution of Being universally, from the Primordial Categories or Basis-Thoughts of Being. Scientology is therefore Universology developed in the spirit of the Exact Sciences, and is wholly new in kind. It is the Core or Centre and the most distinctive Department of Universology, that in which the discovery of this New Universal Science mainly consists; but it is proportionally less popular, in character, and more remote from old and existing scientific ideas.
The paragraph numbering, incidentally, is present throughout the book, which his 250 such paragraphs from beginning to end (though many of these run a page and a half, and some are simply lengthy 'testimonial' quotes by asserted authorities on the subjects covered). Towards the end of the book is a "condensed account," which the author explains was "requested by the publisher"-- who was apparently as flummoxed by Andrews' inventive vocabulary as, well, any typical reader would be.

'Scientology' is but one of many sentimentations invented by Mr. Andrews. It is 'Universology' which is the core subject proposed by this author. And though Mr. Andrews incorporates the study of prevailing religious views into his system (under the title of 'Theandric'), his is no work of theology. It appears mostly concerned with the arrangement, organization, and designation of scientific fields. And lastly (in case you were wondering), no, the book makes no mention of alien spirits deleteriously attaching themselves to human souls as a result of mass genocide in Earth volcanoes at the direction of an evil alien overlord (though one still must wonder whether L. Ron Hubbard ever happened to come across this book while seeking inspiration for his own invention).
I like it!

Log in or register to write something here or to contact authors.