Category Archives: Scientology

Scientology Culture

Posted on September 28, 2013 by | 168 comments

Henry David Thoreau’s description of mid-nineteenth century American culture could serve as a fairly accurate description of Scientology culture today, in my opinion.

Thoreau:

It is remarkable that the highest intellectual mood which the world tolerates is the perception of the truth of the most ancient revelations, now in some respects out of date; but any direct revelation, any original thoughts, it hates like virtue.  The fathers and mothers of the town would rather hear the young man or young woman at their tables express reverence for some old statement of the truth than utter a direct revelation themselves.  They don’t want to have any prophets born into their families, – damn them!  So far as thinking is concerned, surely original thinking is the divinest thing. Rather we should reverently watch for the least motions, the least scintillations, of thought in this sluggish world, and men should run to and fro on the occasion more than at an earthquake.  We check and repress the divinity that stirs within us, to fall down and worship the divinity that is dead without us.  I go to see many a good man or good woman, so called, and utter freely that thought which alone it was given me to utter; but there was a man who lived a long, long time ago, and his name was Moses, and another whose name was Christ, and if your thought does not, or does not appear to, coincide with what they said, the good man or the good woman has no ears to hear you.  They think they love God!  It is only his old clothes, of which they make scarecrows for their children.  Where will they come nearer to God that in those very children?

168 Comments

Posted in healing, Integral Theory, Jesus, policy, quotations, Scientology, squirreling

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Crossing Over

Posted on September 25, 2013 by | 413 comments

There comes a time when it well behooves one to review the bidding in the game called life.

What follows are some thoughts that some might find useful in such a review.

I have used the term ‘construct’ many times on this blog and in my books.   This is the definition I have mainly been using:

Noun

1 b :  a working hypothesis or concept <the unconscious was a construct that came from the daily effort to understand patients>

To date I have used the term mainly in reference to the space opera scenarios inculcated into Scientologists at the upper levels of the Scientology.

I believe that one reason some Scientologists have so hysterically reacted to the idea of considering such indoctrinations as constructs is that they are implanted to believe constructs to be unalterable truths from the get-go of their Scientology experiences.   Consequently, they are living in a sort of parallel universe; an agreed upon and reinforced one that requires such firm policies and notions as ‘disconnection’, ‘squirreling’, ‘treason and enemy conditions’ and the like to protect its constructs from analysis against data of comparable magnitude .  By adopting such self-constricting, voluntary-ignorance vows,  Scientologist can be thoroughly dissociated from observation outside of their firmly believed constructs.

With that introduction, I am going float an idea that is liable to shock the sensibilities of the most liberal minded Scientologist.  That is that just about everything one learns in Dianetics and Scientology is a  construct; a working hypotheses or concept to hold in order to practice a ritual.

In fact, the very first unalterable law one learns is so thoroughly implanted as unquestionable fact that what I am about to impart is pretty much guaranteed to lose me friends and readers.   But, I’ll go ahead and share the idea, confident that it will be of some service to some who have made honest efforts to integrate, evolve and transcend their Scientology experiences.

All of Dianetics and Scientology from one’s first introduction through the highest of OT Levels are utterly dependent upon this first construct.   I will be the first to vouch for its workability to a certain level.  I will also be the first to state that if not evolved and transcended from, continued adherence and reverence to it is the very glue holding a debilitating addiction in firm control of the individual.

That construct is the equation expressed as a fundamental law of the universe even three years before the publication of Dianetics: The Modern Science of Mental Health.  The equation is “the individual is lesser than bank (the reactive or subconscious mind).  Auditor plus individual are greater than bank .”

If one were allowed freedom to experience the ‘state’ of Clear (the long-held goal of Dianetics and Scientology) one could not help but to soon realize that upon attaining Clear.   But, that is not allowed in Scientology.  Instead, the equation is re-stated with a great deal of false promise and threat of eternal damnation upon the attainment of Clear.

Some people who have moved on through solo auditing will understandably chafe “that’s bullshit, when I solo audit it is me against the ‘bank’.”  And here is where the thought stopping theater of the absurd begins.  First, what bank?  It was supposed to have vanished at attainment of Clear.  The reaction from the die-hard Scientologist of course is that he feels betrayed by this question because it is the ‘bank’ he has vowed never to converse about.  So, the conversation ends there with some.   And the solo-auditor will assiduously go on confronting the bank that no one can speak about, directed every step of the way by his solo C/S (case supervisor), solo D of P (director of processing), Master at Arms (Ethics Officer), ad infinitum.  In other words, it is no longer ‘auditor plus individual is greater than bank’, it is more like ‘individual plus C/S, plus D of P, plus MAA, plus the Sea Organization, and the 5th Sector cavalry might have a fighting chance against the inter-galactic forces of evil that constitute what is wrong him.’

Few, it seems, stop to contemplate and recognize that the further one goes, the more formidable, and interminable his baggage becomes in Scientology.   Fewer still, it seems, recognize the construct nature of the fundamental law that served as the glue to addict him or her to cult life in the first place.

‘The bank is great than individual’ or ‘the individual is lesser than the bank’ is an invented construct.  It has its uses.  But, it is not a fact.

Those who have achieved Clear in Scientology might learn a handy lesson from the man L. Ron Hubbard once claimed to be the architect of the heritage of Scientology, and once claimed to be himself, Siddhartha Gautauma.    The Buddha has been reported as passing along this little parable:

A man walking along a highroad sees a great river, its near bank dangerous and frightening, its far bank safe.  He collects sticks and foliage, makes a raft, paddles across the river, and reaches the other shore . Now suppose that, after he reaches the other shore, he takes the raft and puts it on his head and walks with it on his head wherever he goes.  Would he be using the raft in an appropriate way?  No;  a reasonable man will realize that the raft has been very useful to him in crossing the river and arriving safely on the other shore, but that once he has arrived, it is proper to leave the raft behind and walk without it . This is using the raft appropriately.

In the same way, all truths should be used to cross over; they should not be held on to once you have arrived.  You should let go of even the most profound insight or the most wholesome teaching; all the more so, unwholeseome teachings.

 

 

 

413 Comments

Posted in Buddha, Casablanca, healing, Integral Theory, l. ron hubbard, philosophy, Scientology, tech

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That’s As Real As It Gets

Posted on September 24, 2013 by | 55 comments

It don’t get no realer than that.

The world is seeing the actual aftermath of Scientology real time, thanks to Leah Remini.

As Jason Beghe noted on Tony Ortega’s blog, overcoming intense, directed negativity is not an exception for stars, it is the rule for those who dare to leave Scientology.

Jason also talks plain truth as to the provenance of the vengeful nature of the Scientology cult.

In my view, the moral of the ongoing story is:

Regain your positivity and contribute to the resurrection of others who are similarly situated.  Help one another to gain your own definition.

55 Comments

Posted in acknowledgments, black dianetics, celebrities, David Miscavige, ethics, harassment, healing, jason beghe, justice, l. ron hubbard, legal threats, office of special affairs, policy, Scientology, Tao Te Ching

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Viva Los Tres Hombres

Posted on September 16, 2013 by | 214 comments

As many folks know by now David Miscavige paid a tremendous amount of money in order to attempt to deprive Monique Rathbun of her constitutional right to the counsel of her choice against Scientology’s scorched earth assault upon her rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.   The courts in America have consistently found that the Sixth Amendment to the United States Constitution applies to civil litigation, e.g. see this essay.   Sixteen lawyers were dispatched by Scientology to Comal County Texas last week fighting like wounded steers to attack Monique’s only possibility of legal assistance.  They came from Washington D.C., New York City, Los Angeles, and Dallas to join perhaps three of the priciest, most prestigious law firms in San Antonio to attack the integrity of the only three lawyers in Texas with the courage and determination to take on Scientology’s war machine.

This is a fact.  In the eight years we have lived in South Texas, I have come to learn a little something about the chances of retaining counsel.  Some of the toughest litigators in this state have approached Monique and I about the outrage visited upon Monique on David Miscavige’s orders.  To a one, when they did a little homework on Scientology’s scorched earth policies and history of attacking lawyers personally, they politely bowed out with comments such as, ‘life is too short.’

We are overwhelmed by the outpouring of moral support for Monique that we have heard from folk from around the globe.   We firmly believe in the power of wishes, intentions and prayers (see Lynne McTaggart’s The Intention Experiment for scientific evidence that such can be effective).  So, our deepest appreciation to you all for those.

It just occurred to me though that perhaps lost in the fog of war that Scientology is so adept at manufacturing are the men who put their careers at risk to do the right thing on Monique’s behalf.  Miscavige is not only attempting to deprive Monique of representation, in his inimitable style he is attempting to destroy her lawyers by having a court of law brand them as ‘unethical and immoral.’   It is done pursuant to the firm Scientology policy to cause perceived enemies’ ‘professional demise’ or even to ‘ruin them utterly.’

If Scientology were successful in disqualifying her counsel, Monique assures me she is going to manage one way or the other, even if it means self-representation between her 50 hour work weeks, plus 10 hour per week of commuting.

But, Monique is just as concerned about the potential future problems disqualification creates for the members of her legal team.  So, we hope we can direct a measure of your good wishes, intentions and prayers toward the only three lawyers in the state of Texas who are willing to put their careers on the line to right wrongs they just won’t cotton to happening in their great state.

Hot, Blue, and Righteous:

Elliott Cappuccio

Elliott Cappuccio

Elliott Cappuccio, http://www.pulmanlaw.com/attorneys/elliott-cappuccio.php

Marc Wiegand

Marc Wiegand

Marc Wiegand, http://wiegandlawfirm.com/Attorney_Profile.html

Ray Jeffrey

Ray Jeffrey

Ray Jeffrey, http://www.sjmlawyers.com/attorneys/ray-b-Jeffrey

214 Comments

Posted in acknowledgments, black dianetics, harassment, healing, miscavige crimes, miscavige lawyers, Monique Banks Rathbun, monique rathbun, office of special affairs, Scientology, texas, Uncategorized

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Emotions IV: The Top Of The Tone Scale

Posted on September 6, 2013 by | 384 comments

references:

Real Emotions

Emotions II: Play Acting Scientologists

Emotions III: The Tone Scale

Some Scientologists unaffiliated with the church clearly believe Ron Hubbard had everything completely taped with no need and no room for additional thought or discussion.  They certainly have a First Amendment right to assert their firmly held religious beliefs concerning the only way to proceed along the only road to total freedom; provided they do not commit civil or criminal wrongs while doing so.   By the same guaranteed freedom, I can continue to attempt to free captive minds caught in suspended cognitive dissonance.

Some have posited that the Tone Scale in Full referred to in the posts here about emotions refers to ‘tones’ which don’t qualify as emotions because they occur only with spirits who have transcended bodies, or are experienced by spirits independent of any other physiological phenomena connected with emotions as understood by the rest of the civilized world.  By the way, that assertion is made notwithstanding the fact Hubbard’s last words on the subject were those written in his Tone Scale film script.  In that work he had actors, in bodies, depict (with their bodies) all of those vaunted alleged out-of-body tones.  In either event,  these states are normally associated with the highest levels of consciousness attainment in Scientology.

As religion is religion because it deals with, among other perhaps less important matters, life and death and ultimate concerns, should not the life and death of the author of whose words may not be discussed or questioned be of some relevance?  Scientology demands as much by clothing itself with scientifically guaranteed claims, while adhering to institutional policy that requires the personal destruction of anyone who might attempt to objectively discuss or weigh those claims. By his own firm policy, which has resulted in the destruction of scores of relationships and careers of the curious over decades, Ron demands that the only proofs of Scientology be purely subjective.  That leaves the only available objective measure of workability to be the examination of the lives and conduct of those making subjective claims about the product of the subject.

I am interested in hearing from adherents their take, particularly as it relates to the application of the Tone Scale and emotion as they interpret it, to the ultimate emotional state or tone or consciousness state of Ron.  I have included a passage of a discussion I had with Steve ‘Sarge’ Pfauth – a very dear and loyal friend to L. Ron Hubbard to this day – about Ron’s ultimate states of emotion or tone or consciousness.   I have fully discussed – in an in-depth context – my views about it in my book Memoirs of a Scientology Warrior.  Let’s hear yours.

From Memoirs of a Scientology Warrior:

Sarge (Steve Pfauth):  So, anyway, he (L. Ron Hubbard) wanted to see me.  So I went into the Bluebird and sat down.  And he sat across from me and he said, “Sarge,”…boy I wish I had written it all down because I don’t want to goof it up, because this is kind of important.  Basically he said, “Sarge, I need you to do something.”  He wanted me to build him a machine that would get rid of the bts [body thetans] and kill the body.

Mark (“Marty” Rathbun): Wow.

Sarge: Yeah.  It’s kind of heavy.  It struck me real hard.  He told me a few things.  He said, “Yeah, I’ve done all I can do here and I’m just… I’m not coming back. I’m leaving and I am not coming back.”  He wanted to die, basically.  You know, his body was going to hell and all that stuff.  He was having trouble with bts.

Mark: And you say that was in late ʼ85?

Sarge: Yeah.  Fall of ʼ85.  Yeah, it was right around October.

Mark: Like three months before he died.

Sarge: Yeah, like three or four months.  So, I didn’t want to do it. But I didn’t tell him that.  And I was hoping I could talk to Pat because Annie insisted that I build the machine.  And I said, “Annie, I don’t know that much about building machines that fry people, you know what I mean?”

Mark: Well, did he describe how it should be done?

Sarge: Basically, he wanted to hook it up to the e-meter.  And he wanted enough voltage in there that it would get rid of the bts.  And I asked him about voltages and I asked him some questions…it was so long ago. And, uh, well, I gotta tell ya, it upset me a lot.

Mark: I bet.  So, the idea was that you’d be holding the cans…

Sarge:  Turn the thing on and then, in other words, he was gonna audit the bts away and the body was gonna die.

Mark:  Right. So there would be enough voltage to kill the body?

Sarge:  To do it all.  How he figured I was going to figure that out, I have no idea…

… Sarge:  Yeah.  Earlier on I cooked for LRH.  He thought I was a good cook.  And then he got sick.  Anyway, what happened was I was very upset.  So I got pissy-ass drunk and Annie found me about four o’clock in the morning with beer cans all over the green truck, out at the racetrack.  I had passed out on the seat.  And she was screaming at me, “Oh, you son of a bitch!” Oh man, she laid into me.  And I said, “All right, Annie,” and my head was hurting.  But I was upset, I was very upset.  I was crying and everything.  That was a rough time. Very rough.  Uh, so anyway, then days went by, okay?  And Annie kept saying, “He wants to know about the machine, he wants to know about the machine. What are you doing on the machine?”  Annie says, “If you don’t do anything on this Sarge, he’s going to get the local electrician to build one for him.”  Can you picture that?

Mark: Wow.  That would have been a…

Sarge: I said “No way, man.”  So I had to show some progress. So I went to an electronics place in San Luis Obispo and I bought some Tesla coils and some up-transformer things and I got all sorts of things. I basically built him a battery-operated automotive coil type thing.  This is my reasoning now, Marty.  If he gets zapped by that sucker, it’s gonna shock him but it ain’t gonna kill him.  Okay?

Mark: Okay.

Sarge: It’ll shock him but it ain’t gonna kill him.  It’ll scare him and he won’t want to do it again.

Mark: These are like 12-volt batteries?

Sarge: Yeah.  But the voltage is going to go way up on a transformer.  It’s like an automotive coil sort of thing.

Mark:  So your thought, what you understand is that he is not going to get…

Sarge: I’m not frying him!

Mark: Exactly.  I gotcha.

Sarge:  I didn’t want anything that is going to plug into the wall.  I didn’t want to fry him, but I didn’t want to tell him I didn’t want to fry him.  You know what I mean?

Mark: Yeah, I think about what you are saying right now, and I try to put myself into your position and I…

Sarge:  It was very difficult.  I didn’t want to kill the old man.  So anyway, he used the thing and he fried up my Mark VI [e-meter].  I had a Mark VI that got fried.

Mark:  He used it?

Sarge:  Yeah.

Mark:  LRH actually used it?

Sarge:  Yeah, it was my Mark VI, yeah.  And it fried the Mark VI.  I knew that was going to happen.  Fried it.

Mark:  You mean he actually tried…

Sarge:  Oh, yeah. It had burn marks on it and everything.

Mark:  He didn’t get burnt?

Sarge: He may have.  But after that there was no more mention of any machines.  And that was my intention.  That was my intention.

Mark:  He probably got a good, hard jolt.

Sarge:  I think it scared him, or something.

Mark:  And it burned the plastic?

Sarge:  It was burnt.  It was fried.  The insides were gone.  Because, you know, those things are like a computer.  You can’t put that much power into them without zapping them…I do think people need to know. I just wish at the time when I first blew that I would have written it all down.  But I carried it because I had no terminals [people to talk to].

384 Comments

Posted in black dianetics, cover up, David Miscavige, healing, independents, Integral Theory, l. ron hubbard, Memoirs of a Scientology Warrior, ot 8, philosophy, propaganda, Scientology, tech, the Reformation, Uncategorized

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Scientology and Psychiatry

Posted on August 17, 2013 by | 210 comments

We concluded the last post here, Scientology and Misogyny, with the following words:

Regardless, there is little question that the church of Scientology and its 30-year-tenured supreme leader David Miscavige are so misogynist as to qualify as anachronistic, if not outside of the law and boundaries of common societal mores on the subject of the sexes.  We will shed more light on this subject over the next several days.

Now, let’s address some facts.

Lori Hodgson visited with us in April 2011.  She was there on 18 April when the Squirrelbusters (SQBs) first arrived.   I had already just learned quite a bit about the leaders of the original SQB crew prior to their arrival. That is because one of the reasons for Lori’s visit was to heal from the terror they had already individually and collectively visited upon Lori.  I was going to publish this article while Lori was with us, but we held off because Lori considered it might not help at that time in her ongoing efforts to reunite with her two children that had recently been estranged from her.  We both agree that publication is now appropriate.

Hearing Lori’s story in full reminded me quite a bit of the Clint Eastwood directed movie Changeling. Eastwood accurately and brutally depicts early/mid 20th Century psychiatry used as a corrupt, political tool by the powerful and greedy. The movie is based on a true story.  Watching it a second time, and comparing it against what Lori and others have been subjected to by the church of Scientology made me recognize that Scientology has come full circle. In some ways it has become worse than that which it so blindly and aggressively resisted for so long: 1950’s institutional psychiatry.

Lori Hodgson did not have her family knocked apart by random, unfortunate circumstances.  She was subjected to Black Dianetics in the worst sense of the word, including Pain, Drug and Hypnosis techniques.   It was carefully planned, artfully and then overtly and quite intentionally executed.

Two key characters in this story were participants on the bizarre raid on my home conducted on April 18th 2011 (which raids continued unabated daily for 199 days), see Squirrelbusters: Day One.  Mark Warlick, the silent one, with the camera at the bottom of the stairs, was the Director of Special Affairs Los Gatos Scientology Organization that day. John Allender was the gang leader – a go-to OSA (Office of Special Affairs –the dirty tricks and propaganda arm of corporate Scientology) field operative.  Allender’s ‘security rating’ as an OSA operative was certified by Warlick with these words, ‘I trust him with my life.’

Lori’s former husband is a man by the name of Jim Leake.  He is pals with Allender and Warlick, mainly by virtue of being a good, reliable, ‘OSA-volunteering’ Scientologist in the San Jose area. John Allender’s wife Lynda – as “Senior Case Supervisor” was overseeing Lori’s Case Supervisor (the Scientology authority who closely supervises auditing sessions, including the intimate states of her client’s minds) through much of her “auditing” in the church.

These characters – and others – conspired over three years to steal Lori’s daughter and son, protect a dead beat dad (whom many states prosecute and jail for extended periods of time), and intimidate so as to obstruct Lori from exercising her legal rights to remedy the injustices.  All the while they used Scientology ‘philosophy’ and ‘technology’ to cave her in in an effort to make her think it was she that was lacking spiritually and mentally in demanding that truth and justice prevail. Just as institutional psychiatry was used in dealing with the woman portrayed by Angelina Jolie in Changeling.

In late 2008 – while in the middle of her Dianetics auditing program with the Church of Scientology (as supervised by Lynda Allender), Lori required invasive knee surgery.   The first surgery was a gross case of medical malpractice.   The problem that was supposed to be cured was exacerbated, leaving Lori crippled and in chronic pain.  But Lori was discouraged from seeking redress, since the  doctor was a renowned surgeon whose former wife and two kids were on staff at Los Gatos org.   He was known not to be too happy with that state of affairs and apparently the church didn’t want that sleeping dog disturbed.  Lori had the first surgery corrected in 2009 – which involved extremely intense work to remove the previous surgical product and replace it properly.   Both surgeries necessitated Lori taking pain killers over extended periods.

While Lori was being hooked up to IVs with pain killing drugs in preparation for the  (first) extensive knee surgery, her former husband Jim Leake was frantically attempting to solve his several year old potential criminal prosecution for violation of dead beat dad statutes.  Jim had been in continual arrears on child support for the daughter and son Lori had born and raised, since shortly after 2006 (Lori divorced Jim in 2002.) Jim was creating that debt while continually pitching in at every insistence by the likes of the Allenders and Warlick and their Scientology brethren.  Jim’s solution fit hand in glove with the intentions of the Scientology organization.  And pursuant to the Scientology ethics system, since Jim’s aims paralleled the Scientology organization interests, he would be backed by the full power of the organization and Lori would be treated as fair game for personal destruction.

Through brainwashing, coercion and fear tactics Jim was seeking to get Lori’s children into the Sea Org, before they developed the maturity to evaluate right and wrong for themselves. In this scenario Scientology would win netting two new second generation Scientologists for a lifetime of unpaid labor, and Jim would win, ‘because how is Lori going to demand child support when he’s deposited both of their children (without a proper education) into Scientology’s ‘religious’ order?’

Before Lori’s surgery ordeal Jim and the Scientology org had already accomplished this with Lori’s then-15 year old daughter Jessica.  One day she announced to her mother that she would never go to school again. That was when Jessica was an honor student and was clearly enjoying her traditional education.  It was also after high pressure recruitment sessions Jim arranged with Los Gatos org staff.   After 6 months of fighting this Lori finally agreed that her daughter could go to a Scientology school to finish High School.  Little did she know that recruiters had arranged for, and executed, her daughter to ‘graduate’ in 3 months at the age of 16 and signed a five-year Scientology staff contract.  That same year her daughter got home sick while on full-time study at Flag and came home to San Jose; she was straddled with a 12-13,000 dollar debt at age 16.

While Lori was flat on her back recovering from (her 1st) surgery, Jim took Lori’s 15 year old son Jeremy to a three hour high-pressure session with Sea Org recruiters.  Following the event, Jim and Scientology recruiters sent Jeremy to Lori’s house demanding that she sign away her parental rights so that he could join the Sea Org.  While Lori was recovering, in intense pain and while on heavy pain killers, Jim and the recruiters kept sending Jeremy after Lori pestering her to sign the papers.  Finally, a group of Sea Org recruiters arrived unannounced at Lori’s home, and while she was in excruciating pain in the bathroom, they pounded on her front door shouting and demanding entry (much like the Allender crew did at my home on April 18th 2011).  Lori attempted to protest this activity, but her own auditor – the one working under the Snr C/S Lynda Allender – persuaded her to shut up. Lori continued to protest, but Lynda Allender (Senior C/S) ignored her pleas and ordered her to focus on her ‘Scientology assists.’

Just two weeks before the second surgery Lori finally succumbed to the collective pressure and complied with demands that she sign parental consent for Jeremy to join the Sea Org.

After the messy, complicated second knee surgery, on day two in recovery at the hospital, Lori’s daughter was sent in to tell her mother ‘good bye’, informing she was leaving for the Sea Organization (to fulfill a billion year contract she had signed).

Jeremy  lasted only 7 months in the Sea Org.  He cried many nights to come home, but never was allowed to tell his mom.  He finally did come home.  But when she tried to remedy whatever he had experienced in the Sea Org that caused him so much terror and grief, she was rebuffed because Jeremy was forced to sign a non-disclosure bond that threatened him with a $3 million fine if he told his mother anything about his Sea Org experience.

Jessica lasted even less time in the Sea Org.

After recovering, Lori attempted to pursue Jim Leake for his nearly two years of delinquent child support payments.  The Director of Special Affairs Mark Warlick stalled her from going to court using Scientology policy against ‘suing’ fellow Scientologists as authority. Finally, in 2010 Lori began to educate herself on the Black Dianetics nature of the Scientologist church.  She traveled to Corpus Christi for a few day visit with Carol Kramer, Mosey and myself.   She resolved to return to utilize Dianetics and Scientology techniques to remedy her engrammic Scientology church experiences.

Three Camp Fire Girls Dishin'

Lori with Monique and Carol at Casablanca

Within a day of her return to San Jose Lori was stalked, assaulted, and threatened by John Allender.   Allender hid in the (parking lot) by her office and spied on her for hours. When he saw her leave for the day and that she was alone, he assaulted her and threatened her in the parking lot, asking ‘how do you like beatings?’

Lori’s daughter Jessica and son Jeremy were then put into long, mind control sessions with Rick Melrose at the San Jose Mission.  Rick with the help of Jim Leake, convinced Jessica and Jeremy to disconnect from their mother.  They also convinced them that Lori was “imagining” that John Allender had assaulted her, that there was something wrong mentally with Lori. Jeremy was so viciously brainwashed that he coolly looked Lori in the eye and told her that it was her reactive mind telling her that Allender had assaulted her. Taking the pre-1950s psychiatric abuse of Changeling to a whole new level, not only the ‘practitioners’, but the child of the target was recruited  to convince his truth-telling mother that she was crazy.

On the morning of 18 April 2011, Lori and I had a long counseling session where we addressed all of the above – attempting to mitigate and repair the pain and suffering she had been subjected to.   When we broke for lunch, the Scientology team of Allender, Warlick and two other thugs with cameras – dressed out of some ugly, nightmarish implant – stormed my home.   The very day of the raid Lori received papers from Jim Leake’s attorney – clearly paid for by the church or at its direction – since Leake cannot even see fit to pay for his children’s upbringing.  The papers announced Jim was going to vigorously oppose Lori’s attempt to have her rights vindicated in court.   The four creeps being sent to Corpus Christi was clearly timed to prevent Lori’s personal recovery and also to intimidate her into dropping charges that were pending – an attempt to cut her  trip short so that she would have to return home to continue her legal battle against dead beat Leake.

Many people have speculated why I momentarily appeared to lose my temper during this incident and rip the microphone out of Allender’s hand when I learned his identity.   Perhaps this sheds more light on the context.  Less than ten minutes earlier Lori had run through Allender’s previous stalking and threats leveled against her in San Jose. Lori was frighteningly watching and listening to this entire incident as it was happening right outside her window in the downstairs apartment just behind me in the video.

Lori pursued the court action to remedy the law mandated 60% child custody Lori was deprived of by Scientology and Leake’s causing Jeremy and Jessica to disconnect from their mother.  Lori also sought to raise the issue of her son being made to sign a $3 million gag order upon leaving the Sea Org. Scientology and Leake ultimately dragged out the war against Lori until after her son Jeremy turned 18.  While Lori was awarded financial restitution, by the time Jeremy turned eighteen the court was powerless to do anything about the forced disconnection of her children.

To appreciate how Scientology has come to the complete dramatization of becoming that which it so vigorously resisted, please watch the movie Changeling.  Please review the facts here.  Please confront what has happened to your erstwhile “church.” It has apparently become an institution resembling the mid 20th century state institutional psychiatry it spends millions railing against. Wake up.

210 Comments

Posted in black dianetics, David Miscavige, disconnection, ethics, harassment, office of special affairs, psychs, Scientology, texas

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Scientology and Misogyny

Posted on August 14, 2013 by | 188 comments

Misogyny is described in Wikipedia as follows:

Misogyny /mɪ’sɒdʒɪni/ is the hatred or dislike of women or girls. Misogyny can be manifested in numerous ways, including sexual discrimination, denigration of women, violence against women, and sexual objectification of women. Misogyny has been characterised as a prominent feature of the mythologies of the ancient world as well as various religions. In addition, many influential Western philosophers have been described as misogynistic.

Misogyny within Scientology has been so prelavent that Wikipedia’s entry on the former includes a section on the latter:

Scientology

See also: Scientology and marriage

L. Ron Hubbard wrote the following passages in his 1965 book Scientology: A New Slant on Life:

“A society in which women are taught anything but the management of a family, the care of men, and the creation of the future generation is a society which is on its way out.”

“The historian can peg the point where a society begins its sharpest decline at the instant when women begin to take part, on an equal footing with men, in political and business affairs, since this means that the men are decadent and the women are no longer women. This is not a sermon on the role or position of women; it is a statement of bald and basic fact.”

These have been criticised by Alan Scherstuhl of The Village Voice as expressions of hatred towards women. However, Baylor University professor Dr. J. Gordon Melton has written that Hubbard disregarded and abrogated much of his earlier views about women, which Melton views as merely echos of common prejudices at the time. Melton has also stated that the Church of Scientology welcomes both genders equally at all levels from leadership positions to auditing and so on since Scientologists view people as spiritual beings.

Whether misogynist views are implanted along with Scientology indoctrination is an interesting question.  It would seem they are – at least on some level – for those who take the fundamentalist position that Ron is ‘Source’, and it is illegal and punishable to state or infer or consider that anything he uttered or wrote is ‘background’, ‘no longer in use’, or ‘historical’.

Regardless, there is little question that the church of Scientology and its 30-year-tenured supreme leader David Miscavige are so misogynist in practice as to qualify as anachronistic, if not outside of the law and boundaries of common societal mores on the subject of the sexes.  We will shed more light on that subject in the near future.

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Posted in David Miscavige, healing, l. ron hubbard, Orgs, philosophy, Scientology

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Ability

Posted on August 11, 2013 by | 80 comments

Related posts:

What We Do: Part 1

Graduating Scientology (What We Do: Part Two)

What We Do: Part Three

Ability

In my estimation one of L. Ron Hubbard’s most important contributions to spiritual psychotherapy was his guided approach to witnessing.  The Scientology Grades were for the most part developed in Ron’s attempt to build a smoother, more sure-fire route to ‘Clear’, which he defined as the ‘unrepressed, self-determined’ state of being that is not continuing to unwittingly create his or her own mental barriers.  Engram running of the early fifties was a grinding, messy affair.  Notwithstanding ample claims otherwise in Scientology publications and lectures, the results were inconsistent and many times catastrophic.  Fifteen years of experimentation and research led to the introduction of the Grade Chart.  It was the culmination of years of research on how to achieve ‘Clear’ more rapidly and certainly than with the uncertain, hit-and-miss Dianetics engram running method.

As Ron developed each Scientology grade, along the line he claimed that each, individually, was the answer to attaining Clear, quite independent of one another.  For example, Grade 0 is the Communication grade.   The book that serves as the backbone of Grade 0 technology – and the auditing (communication) process itself – is called Dianetics 55!   The book explains the entire universe within the sole construct of communication.   It posits that if one were perfectly ‘cleared’ on the subject of communication one would have no ‘case’ (the cumulative aberration of an individual) and thus would not only be Clear, but also OT (Operating Thetan, later ‘higher’ postulated state of being).

It is the same for Grade 1 (problems), Grade 2 (hostilities and sufferings), Grade 3 (change), and Grade 4 (fixed conditions and ability to do new things).   The statement of those goals, intentions, and results at each Grade were memorialized in his lectures along the way.  And at every level you can find Ron postulating – in fact, stating as factual certainty in his own inimitable style – that that grade is the answer to Clear and beyond.

During much of that research period Ron included a caveat about each of those levels being the answer in and of itself.  That is, that if an auditor were addressing the recipient-client from the perspective and with the intention of improving ability his postulated Clear and beyond could and would occur.  Addressing ability was starkly in contrast to the approach in Dianetics, which attacked disabilities.   This is well covered in the Ability Congress lectures.  There, Ron pronounces as ‘law’ that if an auditor approaches a client with the attitude of improving ability, he will get more ability. If he focuses on addressing disability, he will cause more disability.

As was most often the case in the history of Dianetics and Scientology research, the survival considerations of fighting enemies and having the wherewithal to do so and carry on affected the ability or willingness to test out the hypotheses and claims Ron made along the way.  It was a fast-moving train constantly receiving and firing volleys, while attempting to lay ever-more instant and consistent track.  Critics of Scientology and Hubbard will give more nefarious, ill-intentioned reasons for that omission of testing.  The reason why is of little import, because regardless of causation, the fact remains.

Along the way, the once stable foundation of the priority of addressing ability as opposed to disability was lost.  I have found through 35 years of practice that this loss was fatal.  Focusing on disability results in a never-ending ‘bridge’ requiring cult-like devotion and ultimately creating regression.  Focusing on ability brings greater ability and determinism.   There is one thing that perhaps best distinguishes how we practice from others we are aware of.  Our first stable foundation is that we audit and train toward ability.

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Posted in Casablanca, healing, Integral Theory, l. ron hubbard, Monique Banks Rathbun, Mosey Rathbun, philosophy, Scientology, texas, the future, Uncategorized

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Graduating Scientology

Posted on August 9, 2013 by | 131 comments

A lot of what I do has come to be characterized by my wife and me as assisting folks to graduate above Scientology.   It is somewhat of a unique notion.  In fact, the vast majority of people who devoted much time to Scientology ultimately go through the graduation process;  reconciling what they learned and gained, differentiating it from the entrapment mechanisms involved, and finding ways to integrate with society, and to evolve and transcend as a person.  As far as Scientology-understanding assistance along that route, resources have been slim.

To date there has really only been a couple of paths for Scientologists and ex-Scientologists; at least ones that are assisted by Scientologists or ex-Scientologists who understand something about the subject.  Both avenues are of the least resistance variety; the easy, least effective ways that ultimately don’t lead toward graduation.

First, one can cling to his firmly held Scientology religious beliefs and continue with the installed cognitive dissonance that entails.  He or she can be guided to pretend that it is all ‘over-there’ in the church and play the ‘I am the resurrection of the real Scientology’ game.   That ultimately leads to a sort of bitter, secluded ‘victorious Confederate soldier’ megalomania and melancholy.  Second, one can be guided to redirect the implanted Scientology need for an enemy and spend years in a state of suspended enturbulation, senselessly flailing at the church or Scientology itself.  The latter route leads to much the same state of mind and consciousness as the former.

I think both routes are infected by perhaps the most insidious virus one is inoculated with in participating in Scientology.   That is the need to have an enemy.  I have written about this before, e.g. Cults, Enemies and Shadows.  It is a decidedly ‘effect’ state of mind; a continual restimulation of a paranoia about the external ‘true’ cause of one’s travails.  It does not lead to growth, evolution and transcendence in any sense.  It is like remaining in High School year after year, failing to evolve past the angst of adolescence.

There has been a tremendous amount of research done on stages of human growth; cognitive, psychological, moral and more.   This is research done by way of learning more about biology, and observing and interviewing tens of thousands of people for over a century.   It is not ivory tower ‘psych’ chatter.   James Fowler thoroughly studied this huge body of work and spent many years observing an entirely new category of development consistent with those already done on moral, biological, and cognitive bases.  His work was on the stages of development of faith.  Please read this excerpt from his book on the subject,  Stages of Faith, concerning the observed stage of adolescence:

New expectations, qualitatively different disciplines and a host of difficult decisions are the requirements with which societies greet the now more womanly or manly adolescent. In trying to meet and fulfill these requisites youth will call on the available and personally resonant ideological resources of their environments, particularly those that are embodied in charismatic and convincing leaders.  They will seek sponsoring groups and figures and will appoint otherwise well-meaning persons as temporary enemies over against whom their identities may be clarified.  They may band together in tight cliques, overemphasizing some relatively trivial commonality as a symbol of shared identity.  In this cliquishness they can be quite cruel as they exclude those who do not share this common element.

The Scientologist and ex-Scientologist adolescent pack mentality can be graduated from.  It opens up to view a wonderful horizon of possibilities and futures.  I think first and foremost it entails getting over the implanted need for enemies.

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Posted in healing, independents, Integral Theory, l. ron hubbard, Memoirs of a Scientology Warrior, philosophy, psychs, Scientology, Tao Te Ching, the future, Uncategorized

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Emotions III: The Tone Scale

Posted on August 6, 2013 by | 190 comments

Someone posted here once a lecture reference where L. Ron Hubbard pronounced that ‘action’ and ‘games’, were the places to aim for in terms of chronic emotion or state of consciousness (see Real Emotions for how Scientology tends to collapse the two ideas).  The idea was that the top of the scale ‘serenity of beingness’ was far too boring for a being to stay with for very long. For those who made those ‘emotions’ their chronic targets, or their aspired to states of consciousness, here is something to think about.  Games and Action are not emotions.  They are activities.  One could and does engage in ‘games’ and ‘action’ at every level of emotion. The next higher ‘emotion’ on the Scientology emotional tone scale, Postulates, too is not an emotion – and like ‘games’ and ‘action’ is engaged in during all manner of actual emotion.  While ‘Serenity’ may well be an emotion, ‘serenity of beingness’ is probably something else entirely (more on that at another time).  Perhaps the placement of activities on the emotional tone scale contributed to some of the confusion that occurs in Scientology with respect to the role and purpose and worth of emotion.

This begs the question, are there emotions higher than exhilaration (perhaps the highest Scientology tone scale position that is fairly sure to be an emotion)?  I think it is a worthwhile exercise for people to work out for themselves how the emotional tone scale should or could or can be logically and intuitively seen to be.  That is particularly so for those who have set their life goals around the achievement of the non-emotions placed at the top of the Scientology tone scale. It can be a liberating exercise.  I have done a lot of work on it myself – by self-observation and observation of others.  I share some of my notes on it below.  This sharing is not for the purposes of indoctrinating or selling an idea.  Instead it is provided in order to stimulate thought and conversation and input.  The plain type items accompanied by numbers are from the original Hubbard Tone Scale In Full.  The italicized typed items are tones on the existing scale that I question as being emotions in the first place (as noted above).  The bold-faced, italicized entries are emotions I added by observation in their relative positions to the existing Tone Scale In Full.

 

Bliss, Pan-equilibrium (Non-Duality)

Serenity, equilibrium (Justice)

40.0  Serenity of  Beingness                                          Know

Compassion (Responsibility)

Care  (Nurturing)

Empathy (Transcendence of ego/pan-emotion)

Appreciation (Acknowledgment)

Release (Letting go)

30.0  Postulates                                                                Not Know

22.0  Games                                                                       Know About

20.0  Action                                                                         Look

8      Exhilaration                                                              Plus Emotion

6      Aesthetics

4      Enthusiasm

3.5  Cheerfulness

3.3  Strong Interest

3.0  Conservatism

2.9  Mild Interest

2.8  Contented

2.6  Disinterested

2.5  Boredom

2.4  Monotony

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Posted in Casablanca, healing, Integral Theory, l. ron hubbard, philosophy, Scientology, tech, the future, the world

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