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Social Control in Scientology
by Bob Penny
Bob Penny, one of the founders of F.A.C.T.Net (Fight Against Coercive Tactics Network), gives this account of how his book was originally published in a dual edition with Margery Wakefield’s book, The Road to Xenu :
Margery wrote the first part of the book ( The Road to Xenu ), and I wrote the second part ( Social Control in Scientology ). We decided that the two parts complemented each other, so we published them together in one volume which we first released at the 1991 Cult Awareness Network conference in Oklahoma City. The printing was done in response to demand at the nearest Kinko’s or other quick printer. The volumes were bound in a thermal binding machine of mine. Both Margery’s work and mine were released to the public domain in 1993, when they were offered for download on the (non-internet) F.A.C.T.Net BBS. Neither are on file with the Library of Congress unless someone else put them there. The text has been available (with no remuneration to either Margery or me) on the F.A.C.T.Net BBS and on countless Web and ftp sites for I know not how long.
Social Control in Scientology is available on the World Wide Web at http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~dst/Library/ and http://www.demon.co.uk/castle/xenu/scs.html
Edition 2, released 25 July 1996. This document was formatted on 26 July 1996.
Introduction
A newsletter of former Scientologists, the inFormer , published a Gary Larson cartoon which shows a couple driving along a dark road surrounded by giant mutant vegetation and ants. The caption says: ‘‘Something’s wrong here, Harriet... This is starting to look less and less like the Road to Total Freedom.’’ That cartoon describes very well the last several of my 13 years in Scientology and the process by which I was finally able to escape from what was by far the most destructive and debilitating influence that my life has encountered. The clues were there all along, so it is no surprise that the experience finally reduced itself to absurdity. The wonder is that I wasted 13 years of my life and more than $100,000 before learning to handle the false loyalties and other tricks in which I was enmeshed for so long. Clearly, something was going on that my basic ‘‘street education’’ had not prepared me to deal with. Rationalizations such as, ‘‘it’s the best thing we’ve got,’’ and ‘‘at least it’s moving in the right direction’’ (neither of which is true) helped perpetuate the stasis. Even afterwards, it was hard to avoid rationalizations like ‘‘but I learned a lot,’’ or ‘‘the or- ganization sucks but the tech is good’’ which were at- tempts to minimize and not really face the harm which had occurred and from which I had yet to recover. The habits of self-censorship, loaded language, avoidance of contrary data, and other thought-stopping mechanisms took a long time to go away if, indeed, they are gone even now. I was intensely curious how such a bizarre situation had come to be. Coming to understand it was a part (only a part) of my recovery. The articles here are derived from my notes, compiled slowly as thoughts occurred to me over a four-year period after getting out of the cult. If you are looking for a systematic discussion of ‘‘mind control’’ or suggestions for helping loved ones in a cult, I recommend that you read Steve Hassan’s book, Combatting Cult Mind Control , Park Street Press, 1988. If you want a description and history of the Scien- tology organizations, read John Atack’s A Piece of Blue Sky , Carol Publishing Group, 1990. If you want a feel for life in the Scientology environ- ment, read Margery Wakefield’s The Road to Xenu.
The material I present here is none of those things. I have tried to step back from the narrative detail that Ms. Wakefield presents, to look at the underlying pat- tern and structure of Scientology’s manipulation and abuse of otherwise free people. By printing both works in the same volume, we provide an immediate jux- taposition of the specific and the general, the trees and the forest, so the reader can refer back and forth be- tween Wakefield’s specific narrative and my more general characterizations of similar experience. I believe this juxtaposition provides a more complete description of how cult entrapment actually occurs and what it consists of. These models of social manipulation, which I have drawn from my own experience, may be most recog- nizable to others with direct cult experience (any cult, really — my contacts with ex-members of various groups show the ploys and traps to be quite similar from one cult to another), so the primary use of this material may be in exit counseling. But it is possible too, I would hope, that these models may sensitize any reader to recognize them if such types of experience occur in his or her own life. Recognizing these patterns may make the reader less vulnerable to cult recruitment in the first place. It is my strong belief that there is a lot more mileage in education and prevention before the fact, than in trying to get people out of cults once they are in. Our ‘‘street smarts’’ must expand to cover the new dangers created by the growth and increased sophis- tication and power of destructive cults (and gangs, hate groups, etc.). This is an educational endeavor, a kind of consumer awareness education. As Wakefield shows, Scientology creates a special- ized environment within which anything can be made to seem true or reasonable or ethical. It is this insane environment, not any flaw in the individual person, which accounts for the apparently insane behavior which she and many others have described, just as similarly perverted environments trap otherwise good people in lynchings, gang behavior, Nazism, and other social ills. How does it work? The mechanisms of cult entrap- ment are not hard to understand, once you look at them. But there are many things in our social environ- ment we take for granted and do not look at, any more
Chapter 1
Shared Self-Deceptions
You hear about mind control in cults, but what is it and how does it work? It is not the same as brain- washing and we know that torture, at least of the physi- cal variety, is not involved. There are no scars on the bodies and you can’t see the ones on the minds. Manipulation of group agreements is the key. A manipulated social environment is created in which, to be loyal to one’s friends, one must believe the most amazing things and perform actions which, in real life, would be beneath contempt. Cults (not just Scientology) create a social milieu which gradually and covertly seduces good people into agreeing among themselves on self-deceptions, so they come to believe themselves an elite in unique posses- sion of the only right answers. The real result is depen- dence on the group and vulnerability to its control and exploitation. For example, to act in good faith, we who were Scientologists had to believe there was a good result to what we were doing. But immense pressure is put on any evaluation of result by the environment of selling and gung ho, by our own complicity and participation, by our disposition to grant benefit of the doubt, to cooperate, to be willing, enthusiastic, and loyal. Spiritual growth is what was promised, thus precluding any determination of result except subjectively by the influenced group member himself. What, then, can we say about result? First the obvious: that even if there was any validity to the claims made, this hothouse of social pressure would be the last place to expect any kind of objective perception, evaluation, understanding, or verification of results. What kind of science can work only within the confines of a closed group that actively suppresses nonconforming viewpoints while demanding and rewarding gung ho agreement? A kind of insanity is visible in the peculiar group- think ways of evaluating or not evaluating information (like Ron said so) that we accepted and sold to each other. If there was demonstrable result, why would all the hype and controlled information be needed? The hype is needed, of course, to allow us to share belief in a result. The process can be summarized in four steps — small steps at first, but larger and larger
each time around until the person gradually assimilates the group-think.
- Sell him something. The person is told that if you do X you will get better. It is standard practice to promise anything (without actually promising anything), and whatever the person can be made to admit to wanting (called his ruin) becomes the excuse for getting him into this process.
- Whip up gung-ho. Group members manifest their friendliness, concern and hope for the person. They make very clear that they want him to get better and they are very sure that participation in Scientology will do it. The expectations are set in place so that not to get better would be a betrayal of one’s friends.
- The person does X. While engaged in the action, he has special status. He is adulated for being ‘‘on purpose,’’ and carefully not disturbed or ‘‘en- turbulated.’’ He is clearly an important person. He may also be told how much better he is look- ing, and how apparent the change is. A social expectation of result is built for the particular case at hand.
- The person agrees that he is better. As a good group member, he will find some way to crea- tively play his part, to justify the time and money he has spent, avoid embarrassment, and not let his friends down. With all this weight of authority and expectation, merely focusing attention on an area of life may ‘‘rattle the cage’’ and give an impression that something has happened. Add the feelings of relief and solidarity after completing something important and sharing a success with one’s friends. The notorious unreliability of subjective perception is not considered, nor are there methods to control bias and ascertain the actual sub- stance of the experience. Instead, the resulting mental state is exploited uncritically in whatever way will best fit doctrine and make everyone agree that it worked. At that high moment, the person quickly attests in writing that he got an appropriate result from the ser- vice and is satisfied. He must do this to complete the service, or he is ‘‘handled’’ further at his own expense until he does. No gun is held to the person’s head so
Social Control in Scientology
the success story may be said to be freely given. The cost of remedial handling provides additional motive for everything to be all right. After I say that everything is all right, my agreement is taken as proof that what you are doing is OK. Your success provides the same rationale for me. By uncriti- cal acceptance of influenced, unreliable data, we deceive ourselves and keep the circle closed. If every- thing was not all right, one’s status in the group would be jeopardized. An enemy of the group, or ‘‘Suppres- sive Person,’’ is said not to have case gain. Success stories, attestations, and gung-ho agreement are evidence that one has ‘‘case gain’’ and so is a valid group member. Case gain requires no substantiation beyond the person’s attestation and other evidences of loyalty. As long as the supposed benefit is attributed to Scientol- ogy and does not contradict doctrine, the person is free to claim whatever he wants to believe about himself and dare anyone else to contradict his personal delu- sions (it is a crime to invalidate a Scientologist’s case or gains). When personal delusion is reinforced by doctrine, the result can be impaired self-knowledge, obstructed ability to deal with real situations, and a danger to the person’s mental health. Such is the quality of material which forms the basis for Scientology’s claim of results. A legal case for fraud would be difficult, because the person said in writing that he got what he was supposed to have got- ten. And it is difficult to go back on representations made voluntarily. One must defend the delusions or risk facing the terrifying loss of control of one’s life which has occurred. There are numerous motives to find ways to actually believe that one has experienced case gain. The payoff is whatever psychic benefit the in- dividual derives from belonging — the appearances of community and caring, certainty, allies, defense against others in life, and evasion of the real challenges of growth. Given such motives, the individual may well not care how the apparent benefit was obtained or what it cost, just as the high is everything to the drug addict. He has found where to get it. Alternatives are ir- relevant. I have even heard, ‘‘So what if it is a placebo....’’ Never mind that truly needed help may be foregone in favor of the immediate fix. Life goals may be aban- doned or redefined as the true cost of participation be- comes manifest. In this pressure-cooker of agreement
and gung-ho, the benefit may be illusory but the person can no longer tell the difference. As the cult member continues to deny his depen- dence, or to rationalize it as ethical and beneficial, employers, parents and concerned others must protect themselves as best they can. An obvious concern is the situation of children living in such an environment, whose welfare is subject to the parent’s need to believe and to belong.
‘‘TRs’’ (Training Routines)
Many of us considered TRs to be innocuous; yet we were aware they were part of something destructive, and didn’t know how to sort out the connection. I had fun doing TRs too. Chanting, meditation, TRs, hyp- nosis, physical exhaustion, a good back rub — these are all conditions that subjectively feel mellow and lucid while actually they heighten suggestibility and reduce critical awareness. We all have our more sharp and less sharp moments. The feeling of lucidity produced by TRs, meditation, drugs, etc. is merely a subjective state. The group tells you how to think about that state, such as ‘‘you are more in present time.’’ The suggestion is that you are less suggestible and you buy it because you are in a highly suggestible state. Other cults sell meditation or Jesus the same way. The cult environment systematically exploits these less-sharp moments. In a Scientology courseroom, for example, the student is surrounded with the cult’s pres- sure and loaded language. He might be receptive even without TRs. Maybe he’s tired or lonely. TRs are just one more device to enforce agreement and compliance. At least they’re more fun than ethics. Many of us have trouble enough recognizing and accepting our feelings even without any ‘‘help’’ from Scientology. To practice suppressing our feelings and substituting group-mandated responses in their place, all within this context of group pressure and heightened suggestibility, is destructive indeed. The next step is the success story where one talks about having more reality on the first dynamic and coming to understand that one’s real self wants only to serve the cult. Such understanding makes it much easier to send your kids to the Cadet Org and ‘‘disconnect’’ from your ‘‘suppressive’’ mother or spouse.
Social Control in Scientology
real abilities, real strengths, real human beauty. Their willingness, enthusiasm, even heroism, can be in- tensely admirable. That feels good to be a part of. When involvement occurs in a context called Scien- tology, then Scientology may be said (by unsubstan- tiated assertion) to be the source of the admiration and good feeling we share with our fellows when actually the source is agreement and cooperative action with like-minded participants, as may also occur, for ex- ample, in a theater company, military unit, or entrepreneurial business. The intense loyalties generated by group action, thus misdirected, produce further motive to creatively jus- tify the group’s ideology. We cooperate. We work creatively with the other actors to ensure that we all know our lines and that the show as we collectively agree it to be can go on. We mutually support each other in creating the appearances which are necessary for us to go on believing and acting in good faith. In a cult, this means we tell each other that we are an elite in unique possession of the only right answers. The person in a Scientology auditing session knows
the rules of the game and what the normal actions of the session will be. The auditor is a real person in front of him, in a situation of high affinity and community of interest. The normal cooperativeness of social inter- action is heightened by this affinity and by the environ- ment of pressure and expectation. One can be very creative in fulfilling the shared ex- pectations of this situation. The auditor’s role is to be there to be cooperated with. The ‘‘tech’’ is just stage management. The auditor is there as reminder of the social context and the im- peratives which await just outside the door. In this milieu, the preclear will produce appropriate ‘‘cog- nitions’’ (past lives, etc.). The auditor’s only error would be to disrupt the normal process of cooperation by obtrusive or distractive statements, actions, or man- nerisms. In this setting, the person discovers for himself how it could be that way — just as in everyday life we creatively find ways to go on letting doctors be doctors and janitors be janitors, and cover for each other’s un- zipped flies.
Chapter 3
A Destructive Cult
America is a land of voluntary associations, with the right to do your own thing well established in our tradi- tions. The diversity thus protected is a source of strength for American culture. But in recent years we have seen totalist groups systematically employ undue influence to exploit the shelter of this tradition, bypass our society’s normal controls on unethical activity, and mount large scale programs of entrapment and fraud. An internal power struggle in Scientology in the early 1980’s left many people willing to tell what they had seen, and a number of court cases have put some truth about Scientology into the public domain. Several books have presented documented descriptions of Scientology, the most recent being Jon Atack’s A Piece of Blue Sky , published by the Carol Publishing Group in 1990. Much of this information was published in a six-part expose by the Los Angeles Times in July, 1990, and an abbreviated version by Time magazine in May, 1991. The written sources tell what is easiest to describe: the trashed families and careers, lost savings, aban- doned educations, and the like, which are common stories among ex-members. But in my opinion, a primary harm done by Scientology is capture and cor- ruption of the group member’s ability to make moral and intellectual judgments. Impoverishment, broken families, etc. are merely what follow. To evade scrutiny, Scientology tries to pass as just another church or self-help group with laudable aims and programs. But Scientology is neither the answer to all problems of life nor even a helpful activity exerting influence in the right direction. Behind the hype and ‘‘PR’’ (public relations), Scien- tology is a money-making enterprise which systemati- cally exploits, under the guise of help, the hopes, needs, and weaknesses of those it recruits. It operates by selling questionable services with ambiguous products (so that fraud is difficult to prove), then using mind control techniques to substitute certainty (loyalty) in place of truth. The result is to make those who take the bait into captive group members who will sacrifice their lives and fortunes to the group, defend it, and insist publicly that they received benefit. In its efforts to conceal the reality, Scientology has
become notorious for vicious attacks and disregard of the civil rights of any who would expose the truth of its actual practices. As with rape and other abuse, cult activity can cause lasting harm to those involved, to their families, and to society. This is something from which one must recover, of- ten with considerable difficulty, and there is risk of lasting ill effects if the recovery is not complete. The process and difficulty of emerging from a cult and regaining one’s own integrity and growth are discussed at length in Steve Hassan’s book, Combatting Cult Mind Control , Park Street Press, 1990. Scientology represents itself as the way to better communication, health, ability to learn, a more suc- cessful career, or a better life. Scientology is not any of those things, but the bait gets you into the trap. Under carefully controlled conditions, you learn not to question the claims. You learn the countless reasons why your education is less important than learning Scientology, your career less important than serving Scientology, your family less important than clearing the planet. The means replace the end; loyalty substitutes for result; the group replaces life. That is no accident: the only true product of a cult is group members, desperately telling each other that they are an elite with the only answers to life’s questions. It becomes normal and commonplace to substitute certainty in place of truth, group loyalty in place of informed decision. As time goes on, one needs to believe in the group agree- ments in order to justify what he or she has done, the trashed families and so on. In such an environment, one is prevented from developing realistic understandings of self and the world. Instead, the person must defend illusory self- images composed of various abilities supposedly ac- quired through Scientology training and processing. That the snake oil is bogus cannot be faced without raising serious identity problems. How the harm comes to be done, the impairment of judgment and the fostering of delusion, is particularly evident if we ex- amine Scientology’s LRH Study Technology (dis- cussed in the next article) which Church members in- flict on children as well as on each other.
4.2 How Questions are Handled
wish to belong to. The actual issues are disposed of or rationalized away in whatever way will permit an un- ambiguous affirmation of loyalty. (This is an example of the distraction and misdirection which I have cited elsewhere as key words describing my own experience of Scientology.) The Doubt Formula includes gathering information on the two sides between which one is undecided. It is always a mutually exclusive either-or choice (no men- tion of none of the above). I never saw a doubt for- mula which gathered any information about Scientol- ogy beyond its own PR claims and stated intentions, nor would it be admissible within the group to do so. Other information, not under group control, is labeled with the sweeping generality ‘‘enthetha,’’ which categorically outlaws its consideration or dis- semination without regard to truth or fact. Thus infor- mation which has been publicly available to others for many years, such as the facts of Hubbard’s actual his- tory and qualifications, is not commonly known to Scientologists. The ideas of working hypothesis or conditional judg- ment based on the best evidence to date (which imply openness to new information) are excluded in favor of categorical appeals to group loyalty which require sup- pression of any contrary thought or data. A sense of something wrong with this, or disagree- ments on specific issues, are ‘‘handled’’ alike by demanding that the individual resolve it now (complete his ethics condition) and categorically re-commit to the group. This cuts short any thought process or con- sideration of other data and is one of the best examples of this group’s totalist, anti-pluralist control process. You are either totally with the group or totally against it.
I Will Wait until You Stop Asking
Questions may arise during training about unsub- stantiated claims or about the relation of this material to mainstream lines of thought. The standard handling of such questions in Scientology is to explicitly dis- regard them. Instead, the student is told to do it ‘‘ex- actly as the materials state’’ and then observe whether it works. That approach sounds sensible: see if it works. Yet in this group environment, the actual results are twofold. First, the student is prevented from integrating or aligning what he is studying with other things he al- ready knows or might learn if he investigated. The normal processes of evaluation, comparison and judg- ment are bypassed. Second, evaluation of the material is deferred until a
later time when he has learned it exactly as stated, which may be a very long time indeed, because it is asserted that if he has questions then he has not under- stood the material. This provides time for the process of socialization through which, for extraneous reasons of group loyalty, the person will come to accept what he has been taught, believe in its correctness, and stop asking questions. The effect is to replace questions of fact and evalua- tion of data with questions of group loyalty, to the point where the former become forgotten and indeed unthinkable. Study Tech is only one example of the reversal of values on a gradient, which is what happens as Scientology’s official line becomes correctly under- stood in actual group practice. Being able to live with such contradictions is the hallmark of a Scientologist. The trick has to do with ‘‘unmocking’’, or making nothing of other values, so the contradiction ceases to have meaning. Only devo- tion to the group remains.
Another Example of Scientology Training: ‘‘I Am Not Your Auditor’’
Early in the game, on the HQS course, for example, one is familiarized with certain rules of conduct called The Auditor’s Code, also referred to as rules for civil- ized conduct. This includes rules against invalidating another person and against telling him what to think about his case or about Scientology (called evaluating). This familiar and apparently humanitarian approach makes it easy for the new person to get into it. Later along the gradient, one learns that such rules apply only to an auditor during an auditing session, and that apart from that context (i.e., most of the time) in- validation is a standard means of control, and evalua- tion is the backbone of socialization into the group. In one of my early naive encounters with a registrar, I was aghast at his disregard for what I thought were central values of the group. His reply: ‘‘I am not your auditor.’’ The person hooked on The Auditor’s Code learns from experience with registrars and others what it is really all about. By being a good listener, for example, the Scientologist masters just one more trick of manipulating communication to obtain compliance with ethics and Hard Sell.
Social Control in Scientology
A Separate Realm of Thought
Through such experience, much of what winds up in the minds of Scientologists — including children ex- posed to this environment — gets there through infor- mal indoctrination under group pressures. Additional points of the informal indoctrination include:
- That one does not disagree with anything Mr. Hubbard said or question in any way the authority of Church organizations.
- That Scientology is beneficial and ethical, and that this topic is not open to question or discussion.
- That one does not openly value any other activity unless it is unambiguously subordinate to Scien- tology. Hubbard used bowling as an example, suggesting that whatever else you might be doing is as unimportant as bowling. I once told an auditor socially about an impressive ocean voyage made by a friend. The auditor disapprovingly called my friend a dilettante and not serious as a Scientologist.
- That if you have a disagreement or reservation, it indicates something wrong with you (never the Church), a problem to be solved by correcting you, whatever that takes.
- That past-life or any other experience contacted through Scientology’s exclusive methods are nor- mal, acceptable, and factually valid.
- That contact in auditing with this and other data is sufficient to establish its factualness without refer- ence to any other validation and despite its discon- nection from ordinary standards of evidence and evaluation (i.e., one comes to operate with and accept the separateness per se of this frame of ref- erence). Lack of alignment with ordinary reality is no ac- cident, but is a vital part of disconnecting the person from the rest of life. Scientology is not to be seen as like psychology or like anything else. The proselyte must set up a separate category of thought, suspending disbelief, maintaining politeness, granting benefit of the doubt, operating in a part of his mind as if these things were true. This separateness is necessary to create a niche of credibility, a beachhead for the trip, to create a concep- tual space within which, for example, there is room to believe that ‘‘OT’’ (‘‘Operating Thetan’’) means something more than a status within the group. We learn many things by setting them aside separately until enough understanding has been ach- ieved to make integration possible with the rest of life and thought (a conditional frame of reference). What is different about cult indoctrination is closure
— that the cult’s special frame of reference behaves like a cancer, preventing integration and seeking to destroy (invalidate) any competing or non-supportive realm of thought. For example, there is no reason in principle why recent-past-life experience contacted in auditing could not be verified historically, if valid, and integrated with other modes of thought. But Scientologists do not do that. Integration is prevented. Reference to non-Scientology standards of evidence are invalidated as meaning the person cannot observe or has fixed ideas or is subject to (dramatizing) unseen influences or evil intentions. To be a Scientologist, one must learn to accept it as a special frame of reference. This is a key criterion of valid group membership. This new beachhead is emotionally connected to one’s own ego and vanity. You have ‘‘cognited.’’ You know the Truth. You are special. But others don’t have the tech. They don’t know the real (i.e., past life) causes of what they do. You wouldn’t want to be like them, would you? This is the mental space from which other values and sources of meaning in life become subject to invalidation. These specialized images of self and others become part of the expectations of a highly visible reference group. In the busy-ness of ordinary life there is no occasion to challenge them. Making sense of it all, in any wider context, is Not Done. It would be too much trouble. It is not the easy, sociable thing to do. You would have to deal with what people would think about the nonconformity. You would risk losing all that flat- tery about what a good, special, and important person you are. Unresolved questions and dissatisfactions are easier to put off when conforming activities are so readily available (busy, rush, emergency, important) and when any deviation would be a big hassle. In Scientology, any nonconformity becomes a big hassle. Critical thought or independent evaluation of what one is doing is prevented by incessant busy-ness and rush. The hype says that Scientologists are rational, even scientific, but the atmosphere is one of continuous crisis and emergency which interrupts and prevents ra- tional thought. One gets points for how rapidly one completes a course. Sales cycles are always Buy Now because of some asserted emergency or other (the Church is under attack, we’re in a desperate race to save the planet, etc.). To step back and think it over before signing the check is a sign of case interfering with Clearing the Planet, and if you let that happen you are out ethics.
Social Control in Scientology
tions available were the redirection of attention type described above. Factors of life not accounted for in Scientology’s pop-psychology are called complexities. Attention to complexities is said to indicate something wrong with you, an inability to understand, or having something to hide. This discouragement of thought, plus the ever- present atmosphere of rush and hurry, left nowhere to go except deeper into gung-ho as the solution to all of life’s problems. Those years in Scientology were the most extended period in my life with the least of what I would con- sider real personal growth. They left quite an un- finished agenda for my real life to catch up on and go forward from.
After Gradual Erosion: Hard Sell
Not surprisingly, it takes increased force to maintain such increased levels of delusion, to ignore the vacuousness of claimed results and the ordinariness of superbeing ‘‘OTs.’’ Status within the group becomes more and more the sole and exclusive basis of self- image. As one becomes an insider, agreement is more and more presumed. Claimed respect for integrity and in- dividuality gives way to an environment of undisguised peremptory orders and Hard Sell salesmanship: of par- ticipation, auditing, commitments, self-conceptions, ideas, ethics, or anything Church representatives want you to believe or do. Truth comes to exist in Hard Sell salesman terms, i.e., whatever it needs to be at the mo- ment to invalidate your objections and obtain com- pliance. Hard Sell technique that I observed (and was sub- jected to) consisted of a fast-paced and disorienting swirl of asserted and presumed agreements, trumped-
up emergencies, plays on loyalty, physical exhaustion, sophistical arguments, accusations of betrayal, guilt- trips, browbeating, physical and verbal intimidation, humiliations, attacks, threats, insults, alienations of af- fection, ganging-up-on, asserted and presumed com- mitments, promises, demands, orders, invalidations, ridicule, plays on deeply felt needs, pleas, misiden- tifications, misrepresentations, putting words in my mouth, telling me what I think, asserted truths, valida- tions, praise, flattery, plays on status, ‘‘trust me’s’’ — anything to destroy my position, to close the sale, to get the stat, to get the check. On one occasion (per- sonal experience) this went on day and night for three days. These words do not begin to describe it. Hard Sell is official written Church policy. It is justified in terms of this preemptive definition: caring enough about the person to insist that he Buy Now and get the service that will rehabilitate him. Actual tech- niques are learned primarily from role models, but also in classes and workshops. The effect is to undermine all meaning and value apart from Scientology. It becomes permissible to destroy anything (of someone else’s) to produce a result useful to the Church. A registrar told my wife, ‘‘What have you got to lose?’’ when they were discuss- ing whether I might leave if she borrowed against our fledgling business to purchase Scientology services. That same registrar explained his actions to me, ‘‘I’m just doing my job.’’ I tried to explain away such events as just the iso- lated action of lone individuals, but after my 1986 trip to Scientology’s base in Florida I could no longer deny that this sort of action is typical, characteristic, and approved by the Church. I saw and experienced ad- ditional instances, and attempts were made to recruit me for similar activity. I saw that a major activity at the religious retreat is to train people in such actions and to handle their scruples.
Chapter 5
The Creation of Ignorance
A cult’s special kind of group-think may need to contend with alternative or competing ways of under- standing the world. Thus there may be special defini- tions which explain to the group member how he is supposed to understand other understandings and the persons who represent them. If the group member hap- pens to have knowledge of the alternative understand- ing, it may be necessary for him to create an ignorance of the alternative in order to be able to accept an emo- tional and unsubstantiated rejection of it — just as racism demands some degree of ignorance of the humanity of the ‘‘wog’’ or ‘‘nigger.’’ Consider, for example, the relation between Scien- tology and psychology. Both offer explanations of and methods to change individual human behavior and so might be seen as competitors. Scientology attempts to invalidate psychology (and psychiatry) by describing both as a single undifferentiated generality identified with the physiological school of Wilhelm Wundt (1832-1920). In thirteen years I never once heard any Scientologist communicate anything even vaguely in- formed about the actual state of psychology. Skinner, Maslow, Erikson, Piaget were all one with Wundt. To study (or teach) psychology would be heresy. To ac- cept and promulgate this viewpoint requires ac- complishing an ignorance. This kind of thinking can produce harm beyond that done to the person’s intellect. Scientology’s self- serving anti-psychiatry campaign led, in 1991, to a war on the anti-depressant medication Prozac; a war in which, as usual, individual Scientologists knew nothing of the facts but just followed group direction (‘‘Psych- iatry Kills’’ bumper stickers, for example). An FDA investigation, prompted by Scientology’s smear campaign, pronounced Prozac to be safe and ef- fective. But meanwhile, a public scare had been manufactured which deprived many patients of badly needed help, the April 19, 1991 Wall Street Journal reported. A representative of Prozac’s manufacturer is quoted as saying, ‘‘It is a demoralizing revelation to watch 20 years of solid research by doctors and scien- tists shouted down in 20-second sound bites by Scien- tologists and lawyers.’’ In another example of the creation of ignorance,
Scientology is laced with pseudo-scientific overtones such as referring to Mr. Hubbard’s opinions and pronouncements as data and tech to make them sound somehow scientific. This attitude includes ridicule of physics, often personified in the name of Albert Einstein, a name sure to be known by anyone, the im- plied assertion being that Scientology is far advanced beyond mere twentieth century Earth science — an assertion not borne out by any evidence that I know of. But a person actually educated in the sciences could have a very hard time un-learning enough to go native credibly in this environment. Anyone applying normal standards of validity and scientific method to the data of Scientology would become an instant pariah (‘‘he’s attacking my religion’’). To survive in the group one must accomplish an ignorance. A striking instance of willful ignorance is Scientology’s Purification Rundown, a supposed detoxification program developed by Hubbard which uses saunas and high doses of niacin and other vitamins. That procedure is also the basis of Narconon, a Scientology recruitment effort operating under the guise of drug rehabilitation (as their promo puts it, Nar- conon is the bridge to The Bridge). Dr. James J. Kenney, Ph.D., R.D., a member of the National Council Against Health Fraud (a group which also includes former U.S. Surgeon General C. Everett Koop) cites medical studies of the effects of niacin, and concludes: There is no credible support for claims that large doses of niacin clear toxins from the brain, fatty tissue or any other part of the body.... To subject people to ... poten- tially serious side effects on the pretense that they are being ‘‘detoxified,’’ ‘‘cleared’’ or ‘‘purified’’ is quack- ery. What else does Scientology want you to believe? Consider what you would have to ignore or cease to know in order to be able to agree with the following points of the Scientology group-think.
- One guy (L. Ron Hubbard) got it all right and nobody else has any chance of getting anything right except by agreeing with Mr. Hubbard (i.e., he is the exclusive and only possible Source of Scientology), including ...
Chapter 6
But I Thought You Cared about Your Children...
The salesman gets the prospect saying yes. Once the prospect establishes a pattern of agreeing, he is divested of his objections in small increments, each not unacceptable in itself, until finally he must either ac- cept the close or awkwardly contradict what he ap- parently agreed to before. If the prospect still resists, the salesman then can accuse him of betrayal, of lead- ing him on, of wasting his time, and attempt to shame the prospect into the close: ‘‘But I thought you cared about your children....’’ The salesman gets agreement on a sufficient number of apparently innocuous points to covertly define the terms of the discussion (the rules of the game, the agenda) in a manner that permits only one outcome. Scientology asserts a distinction between the spiritual being that is really you (good) and your case, which is the composite of all sources of irrational con- duct (bad), and that only Scientology can know which is which and free the spiritual being from its case. Suppose for the moment that you really want to better yourself and others, and that you have gone along with this thus far. What happens now, when you find agreement with whatever the registrar wants from you validated as really you (good) and any other of your interests and values ruthlessly invalidated and attacked as just case (bad) on the basis of the supposedly expert knowledge of the Scientologist? Suppose you were reluctant to mortgage your home or company, or trash your children’s college savings to purchase Scientology ser- vices. ‘‘But I thought you wanted spiritual freedom....’’ Of course this is logically absurd, but it is nonethe- less a cognitive trap that has nailed many people. Any sale results in the person getting on course, be- ing ‘‘connected up,’’ his ‘‘body in the shop’’ exposed to group influence.
Look Only Where I Tell You to Look
Scientology presents itself to the public as a dedi-
cated group of concerned people trying to help. The Scientologist might talk about how children do better in school if they look up misunderstood words in a dictionary (as though that notion was anything peculiar to Scientology). This is the stage magician’s trick of misdirection — he can make you see what he wants you to see if he can get you to look only where he wants you to look. In addition to this misdirective attempt to identify Scientology as consisting of one or a few acceptable concepts, contrast with criminals or drug dealers may be used to argue what a beneficial thing Scientology is by comparison. Note what hap- pens if you add none of the above to the artificially restricted choices offered by the salesman. Key words, such as ‘‘communication,’’ ‘‘drugs,’’ ‘‘education,’’ ‘‘management,’’ ‘‘religion,’’ ‘‘freedom,’’ etc., are buttons used to attract and direct attention. By attacking opponents of the cult as soft on drugs, against education, and so on, Scientology at- tempts to:
- divert attention away from critical evaluation of itself,
- create an unquestioned presumption that Scientol- ogy is effective and relevant to those issues,
- discredit and smear opponents,
- intimidate internal dissent,
- and publicize the buttons that will get new raw meat in the door and subject to group controls. Once one responds to a button, the first introduction to Scientology, such as a Dianetics lecture or Com- munications course, is generally pleasant, sociable, non-threatening and in some way useful or seemingly so. The perspective jolt of new viewpoints may be exciting and somewhat liberating in itself. The staff group’s morale is high and contagious, somewhat like that of a theater company whose members similarly share the task of presenting a special reality to the straight world. It is easy to say yes and go along with what is happening. This is salesmanship of membership — not of the ostensible purpose or activity — but of belonging to a group.
Social Control in Scientology
Scientology’s agenda begins with the fact of mem- bership — a matter handled as routine upon starting any activity with the group. The person who came in for a Communications Course suddenly becomes a member of something. He has joined something. He has, by whatever means and however naively, been persuaded to accept a new label and role with con- sequences as yet unforeseen — but this is not what you are supposed to look at or notice. One learns, in the Scientology environment, that he is either a Scientologist or a wog, a derogatory and racist term used to refer to non-Scientologists, defined as a person who isn’t even trying. That is the real curriculum and message. The fact of membership — then, of having taken a course or participated in any way — is asserted by registrars and others as evidence of commitment, often greater than the person ever understood or intended, to compel deeper participation which then can be used as evidence of deeper commitment, and so on. ‘‘You are loyal to your friends, aren’t you?’’ One might be asked, ‘‘What could be more impor- tant than starting your next course?’’ Any answer at all to such questions gives the registrar some area of meaning and value in the person’s life — anything that might compete with the priority of membership — to invalidate and knock out of the way. Through this ‘‘take a mile if he gives an inch’’ sales technique, the proselyte continuously is asserted to be more and more deeply committed to the group, so that he must either say yes and take another small step forward (then ra- tionalize having done so), or disagree and create a sig- nificant upset. Small non-upsetting steps are usually the path of least resistance.
Take a Mile If He Gives an Inch
The idea of ‘‘gradients,’’ or steps, is espoused in Scientology as the way to ‘‘handle’’ something in an orderly, step-by-step manner. In actuality, this concept becomes justification for deception. For example, the new proselyte is not told about Hard Sell because that would be ‘‘out gradient.’’ One who encounters ‘‘out gradient’’ material — for example, by witnessing Hard Sell used on another — is belittled and invalidated by being said to have ‘‘not cognited yet,’’ and treated like an immature school- child having trouble figuring it out. The implication is that when he grows up a little more he will come to agree with the use of coercion and become more skilled at understanding deception. Training courses are the usual introductory service (start of the gradient) sold to ‘‘raw meat.’’ Training for
life involves the same courses as training for the ‘‘profession’’ of auditor. The rationale is that one needs auditor training to ‘‘handle’’ life. In doing the Communications Course, for example, or another common introductory course called the Hubbard Qualified Scientologist (HQS) Course, one comes to discover that he has thereby em- barked upon auditor training. By the time he has completed the introductory course the new member will have spent enough time with the group to have become somewhat accepting of, or at least familiar with, the idea of becoming an ‘‘auditor.’’ Thus he is sold another new label and role, and be- comes subject to additional expectations and demands by the group. Now he must complete his auditor train- ing and then audit. The latter is commonly done by joining staff, and so it goes. Regardless of his original purpose, the new group member is expected to believe that this new profession exists and possesses a legitimate body of knowledge. And it is easy: one can become a valuable and skilled person wholly in group terms, without having to deal at all with outside standards of accomplishment. That initial course begins the softening-up process by which the proselyte is introduced and gradually ac- climated to the actual agenda of Scientology; i.e., this is his introduction to what really is being sold. The first pages of all Scientology courses are a policy letter called ‘‘Keeping Scientology Working’’ from which I quote: When somebody enrolls, consider he or she has joined up for the duration of the universe never permit an ‘‘open minded’’ approach. If they’re going to quit let them quit fast. If they enrolled, they’re aboard, and if they’re aboard, they’re here on the same terms as the rest of us — win or die in the attempt. Never let them be half-minded about being Scientologists.... The whole agonized future of this planet, every Man, Woman and Child on it, and your own destiny for the next endless trillions of years depend on what you do here and now with and in Scientology. One could walk out, but in most cases the habits of social cooperation suspend response to the unreality of this inexplicable diatribe. One cooperatively continues along the gradient, hoping that whatever this may turn out to mean, it will be sane and acceptable. The person who thought he was taking a Com- munications course thus unknowingly grants some de- gree of complicity to a different agenda which has as its goal making him a group member above all else, and an auditor, and signing him up for the duration of the universe. That apparently innocuous membership begins to acquire quite a different meaning, but group
