Excerpt from Chapter nine of The Scientology Reformation: What Every Scientologist Should Know:
The Reformation
Reformation ends not in contemplation, but in action.
– George Gillespie
According to L. Ron Hubbard:
Unscrupulous and evil men and groups can usurp the power of government and use it to their own ends. Government organized and conducted solely for self-interested individuals and groups gives society a short life span. This imperils the survival of everyone in the land; it even imperils those who attempt it. History is full of such governmental deaths. Opposition to such governments usually just brings on more violence.
But one can raise his voice in caution when such abuses are abroad. And one need not actively support such a government; doing nothing illegal, it is yet possible, by simply withdrawing one’s cooperation, to bring about an eventual reform. Even as this is being written, there are several governments in the world that are failing only because their people express their silent disagreement by simply not cooperating. These governments are at risk: any untimely wind of mischance could blow them over.
LRH’s words reflect the philosophy of Henry David Thoreau, spelled out a little more than one hundred years earlier in his seminal essay, Civil Disobedience:
It is not a man’s duty as a matter of course, to devote himself to the eradications of any, even the most enormous wrong; he may still properly have other concerns to engage him; but it is his duty, at least, to wash his hands of it, and, if he gives it no thought longer, not to give it practically his support. If I devote myself to other pursuits and contemplations, I must first see, at least, that I do not pursue them sitting upon another man’s shoulders. I must get off him first, that he may pursue his contemplations too.
Sixty years ago Dr. Martin Luther King described the essence of how he helped stem a centuries-old, nationwide pattern of abuse, expanding on Thoreau’s message in Stride toward Freedom:
Something began to say to me, ‘He who passively accepts evil is as much involved in it as he who helps to perpetrate it. He who accepts evil without protesting against it is really cooperating with it.’ When oppressed people willingly accept their oppression they only serve to give the oppressor a convenient justification for his acts. Often the oppressor goes along unaware of the evil involved in his oppression so long as the oppressed accepts it. So in order to be true to one’s conscience and true to God, a righteous man has no alternative but to refuse to cooperate with an evil system. This I felt was the nature of our action. From this moment on I conceived of our movement as an act of massive non-cooperation.
As we have seen, David Miscavige is using the energy of Scientologists, in the form of their dollars, to actively oppress Scientologists. Without the continuing, active support of Scientologists, Miscavige would be powerless to perpetuate his abuses.
David Miscavige himself is acutely aware of the power that each and every Scientologist wields over him. In a 1998 interview with the St. Petersburg Times, he defined “power” as follows: “I’ll tell you what power is. Power in my estimation is if people will listen to you. That’s it.”
So the first thing to do is to cease following and contributing to the anti-Scientology oppressions of David Miscavige, as executed through Scientology Inc.
Some are initially unwilling to so withdraw support from the oppressor. They believe that if they do, they will have forsaken their religion and any chance of higher levels of awareness through application of Scientology. Those who think that way are simply misinformed. Virtually all Scientology technology – from the bottom of the Bridge to its highest reaches, is available outside of Scientology Inc. There are dozens of independent practitioners of Scientology around the globe. There is a growing movement of Independent Scientologists. You can review a list of hundreds of them, along with their Scientology credentials by going online, visiting scientology-cult.com and clicking on the “Indie 500” link. Virtually everyone on that list has attempted many remedies, aimed at making Scientology Inc. change its ways. Most have finally concluded that the best way to reform Scientology is to do as Ron said, and break the oppressive monopoly by going right ahead and applying Scientology in the manner they see fit…
Moving On Up a Little Higher 