We're not done with the Church of Scientology yet.

[The Anabaptist Jacques]

We’re not done with the Church of Scientology yet.

It is getting slammed in the media right now.

But other cults have gone through the same things and then have found their ideas incorporated into society as a whole.

In the 1900s there was a small cult that believed the world would come to an end in the mid-18th century.

Since the world didn’t end you would think this cult would disappear.

Instead, it partially redefined itself and advocated the principles behind its reasoning rather than just that the world was coming to an end.

The emphasis was shifted from doomsday scenarios to Bible reinterpretation.

Eventually, the Fundamentalist movement grew from this between 1910 and 1914.

My point is that even though the Church itself is becoming more despised and loathed as each day goes by, the probability still exists that the ideas of Scientology will find an audience in society.

This is not to say that the ideas must be prevented from being disseminated; but the ideas must be challenged.

Right now people are beginning to see the Church as some crazy totalitarian space-opera cult.

And well they should.

But I don’t think people are criticizing the fundamental concepts of Scientology, like ARC, KRC, looking up words, etc.

It is inevitable that these concepts will get acceptance somewhere and possibly even grow into something larger.

I personally do not think that the problems in the Church of Scientology are due to Miscavige.

Nor do I think that it is because people have misunderstoods and are not following what Hubbard wrote.

I think the damage done by Scientology is inherent in the Technology itself, in admin and Tech and Ethics.

These at some point will have to be challenged and dispelled, otherwise the same phenomenon will occur and possibly in an even larger scale.

Just think, what if some aspects of society accepted as second nature some of Hubbard’s ideas?

Some may say that the concept of ARC is useful and workable in itself. But I disagree.

I think even acceptance of that concept requires acceptance of other parts of the Tech.

And even accepting the concept of ARC requires a logical and literate void in a person’s thinking.

Whatever emerges from the ashes of the Church of Scientology, like Martyism, or freezone, celebritology, or indies and outies, or whatever they call themselves, it is sure to be spread out.

Somebody, somewhere at some point is going to say that looking up words in the dictionary as Hubbard describes is a good thing.

But I am saying there are built in traps in the way Hubbard uses his “word-clearing” that while it may give an immediate rush it lays the seeds for a future undoing of a person’s literacy.

It seems to me all of Hubbard’s work is that way.

So the ideas of Hubbard that survive the Church itself will have to be challenged and shown to have harmful unintended consequences (harmful to the user).

This is only just starting.

The Anabaptist Jacques

 

[Lone Star]

...Somebody, somewhere at some point is going to say that looking up words in the dictionary as Hubbard describes is a good thing....

After all, no one looked up words before Hubbard came along. The psychs successfully convinced educators that looking up words was bad. Now the psychs have caused all dictionaries to be watered down and weakened.




About ten years ago a Scilon actually told me the above. I've paraphrased for brevity.

 

[secretiveoldfag]

I think the damage done by Scientology is inherent in the Technology itself, in admin and Tech and Ethics.

These at some point will have to be challenged and dispelled, otherwise the same phenomenon will occur and possibly in an even larger scale.

...

And even accepting the concept of ARC requires a logical and literate void in a person’s thinking.

...

But I am saying there are built in traps in the way Hubbard uses his “word-clearing” that while it may give an immediate rush it lays the seeds for a future undoing of a person’s literacy.

It seems to me all of Hubbard’s work is that way.

So the ideas of Hubbard that survive the Church itself will have to be challenged and shown to have harmful unintended consequences (harmful to the user).

This is only just starting.

The Anabaptist Jacques

There is plenty of evidence here and there on the Web that confirms this. There are plenty of intelligent people stuck in Hubbard's trap.

The bottom line is the number of bankruptcies, suicides and psychoses among people who have spent their lives studying to become Hubbard's dupes.

 

[freethinker]

I think the harmful consequences were intended.

So the ideas of Hubbard that survive the Church itself will have to be challenged and shown to have harmful unintended consequences (harmful to the user).


The Anabaptist Jacques

 

[The Anabaptist Jacques]

See what I mean....

This is from Isene

"My current stance on Scientology


10Jul


With recent events cencerning the subject and the church of Scientology, it seems appropriate to reflect on my current stance on both the suvject and the church.

Debbie Cook left the church. Katie broke up with Tom. And now the news that the one and only Mark Schreffler declared independence as a scientologist.These are but three of the many blows that the church of Scientology has suffered in 2012.

As you may know, I left the church in 2009 with a 6 page write-up on why I had had enough. Since then I have been exploring life along many avenues. This and my previous blog give a decent picture of my explorations. I even published a book titled “Six months in the open” to give some kind of insight into one person leaving at the top of the Bridge. When I wrote a blog post titeled, “I am not a Scientologist”, I got many reactions, even got de-linked on Marty’s blog. Some thought “Oh, finally, Geir has seen the light”. Others thought I had gone bonkers. But most people understood the blog post. Still, the picture is not quite descriptive of the present without this post you read now.

I will keep it short. I hold conciseness as a virtue.
•I believe Scientology contains much value – in the basic philosophy and in the tools it offers.
•I owe much to Scientology auditing; Personal integrity, confidence, artistic creativity, calmness, enlightenment, not taking everything so serious in life, enjoying life more fully.
•The lower Bridge is generally very good. The upper Bridge (OT levels) did me wonders – but I belive it handles something different than what L. Ron Hubbard describes in his very dramatic sci-fi way.
•I owe my surge in communication skills to the communication drills I did in Scientology. I owe my skills as a public speaker also to those drills, as well as to Mark Schreffler – the best public speaker I have seen.
•I know Scientology to give great insight into how reality comes about.
•I believe that the Tone Scale is a good tool to understand and help others.
•I find the Admin Scale a great tool to help people get effective in life. The Admin Scale can be improved, something I will cover in an upcoming book.
•I have seen the Study Tech, although incomplete, do wonders with kids and adults alike.
•There are many useful tools beyond the above.
•I think the Ethics Tech is unempathetic and humanly unfriendly. It equates human value to the person’s production output.
•I see the Admin Tech as mostly a disaster – responsible for the Orwellian cult called the Church of Scientology.
•I think it is important that thet human rights abuses in the church get stopped.
•I believe in Open Sourcing Scientology, to let it evolve.
•I still want to complete my Ls – L10 and L12.
•I still want to do the old OT levles (4-7).
•I still use Scientology every day in my life. I also use art, computers, psychology, physics and a lawn mover now and then.
•I am not a scientologist. Just like I am not an artist, computerist, psychologist, physicist or the lawn mover man.
•I am a seeker. An explorer of free will. Which is why a rewamped article, “On Will” is soon finding its way to a blog post near you.

If there is anything on the above list that you don’t understand, disagree with or want to question – feel free to ask."


The Anabaptist Jacques

 

[Mark A. Baker]

...
So the ideas of Hubbard that survive the Church itself will have to be challenged and shown to have harmful unintended consequences (harmful to the user).

This is only just starting.

The Anabaptist Jacques

TAJ, all ideas have the potential for harmful unintended consequences. Moral consequence is a question of how they are manifested.

An idea is simply a mental conception. Even 'harmful ideas' can have their uses. Where harm truly arises is where the responsibility for one's personal actions is displaced into service of some idea.

It is always a matter of the responsibility of individuals, it can never be simply passed off as 'a bad idea'.


Mark A. Baker

 

[Helena Handbasket]

My point is that even though the Church itself is becoming more despised and loathed as each day goes by, the probability still exists that the ideas of Scientology will find an audience in society.

Actually, there are a number of new "therapies", like Synergetics, that have incorporated Dianetic principles.

Right now people are beginning to see the Church as some crazy totalitarian space-opera cult.

And does that really make any less sense than the "supernatural" explanations offered by traditional religions? We've had supernaturalism in our world's religions for so long that nobody challanges it. Should we?

I personally do not think that the problems in the Church of Scientology are due to Miscavige.

It is my deep personal belief that Miscavige was planted there specifically to destroy the church from within. Of this, he is doing an excellent job, particularly with covert ops, that once they go wrong, make the church look really bad.

Helena

 

[Leon]

Yes. I agree with Mark on this. Scio is just a tool. You can use a hammer to build a house or you can use it to smash someone's head in. Scio is the same. The subject can never be fully separated from and seen in isolation to the person using the it.

 

[The Anabaptist Jacques]

TAJ, all ideas have the potential for harmful unintended consequences. Moral consequence is a question of how they are manifested.

An idea is simply a mental conception. Even 'harmful ideas' can have their uses. Where harm truly arises is where the responsibility for one's personal actions is displaced into service of some idea.

It is always a matter of the responsibility of individuals, it can never be simply passed off as 'a bad idea'.


Mark A. Baker

I disagree Mark.

Let us say you were a German auxilary policeman during World War II.

Now I am talking about a particular example here, so bear with me.

There was some problem with transporting Jews for execution so about 100 of these guys were called in to do the task.

That had to kill several thousand Jewish women with their infants.

There is a book written after the war where the author interviewed the guys that did the killing. They went from woman to woman, with most of the women holding infants, and shot each one in the head, Mother and infant too.

The men interviewed after the war felt it was their responsibility to do what they were ordered to do for their country.

That is an idea.

They believed that these Jews were parasites on their pure German race.

That is an idea.

A few declined to do any more killing claiming it made them sick.

Ideas are what is behind personal responsibility.

If you think something is wrong and yu don't do it, it is because you had the idea that it was wrong.

Maybe something in your prior upbringing or whatever.

But nevertheless the idea comes first.

You know I'm no existentialist, but Satre is right in that we are condemned to be free.

There is never anything other than that.

And if one person does something wrong, it is probably because they believed it was right.

Responsibility, as Hubbard describes it, is something that I do not think actually exists (as he describes it).

Instead there are ideas, morales, peer pressure, etc.

But not personal responsibility as Hubbard describes it and how you are using it here.

The Anabaptist Jacques

 

[Mark A. Baker]

I disagree Mark.

Let us say you were a German auxilary policeman during World War II.

Now I am talking about a particular example here, so bear with me.

There was some problem with transporting Jews for execution so about 100 of these guys were called in to do the task.

That had to kill several thousand Jewish women with their infants.

There is a book written after the war where the author interviewed the guys that did the killing. They went from woman to woman, with most of the women holding infants, and shot each one in the head, Mother and infant too.

The men interviewed after the war felt it was their responsibility to do what they were ordered to do for their country.

That is an idea.

They believed that these Jews were parasites on their pure German race.

That is an idea.

A few declined to do any more killing claiming it made them sick.

Ideas are what is behind personal responsibility.

If you think something is wrong and yu don't do it, it is because you had the idea that it was wrong.

Maybe something in your prior upbringing or whatever.

But nevertheless the idea comes first.

You know I'm no existentialist, but Satre is right in that we are condemned to be free.

There is never anything other than that.

And if one person does something wrong, it is probably because they believed it was right.

Responsibility, as Hubbard describes it, is something that I do not think actually exists (as he describes it).

Instead there are ideas, morales, peer pressure, etc.

But not personal responsibility as Hubbard describes it and how you are using it here.

The Anabaptist Jacques

Short form: any idea automatically suggests its 'opposite' or antagonist, thus any idea will spawn an anti-thesis which may be deemed to be 'harmful'.

Long form: read the Dhammapada, the Tao Te Ching. and the dialogues of Plato.


The reason for exploring the realm of ideas is in order to understand the best way to form one's own decisions. Gyrate any way you wish, it always comes down to the individual's responsibility for his own choices. Thoughts are patterns of interpretation and have no significance beyond that.


Mark A. Baker

 

[Gadfly]

TAJ, all ideas have the potential for harmful unintended consequences. Moral consequence is a question of how they are manifested.

An idea is simply a mental conception. Even 'harmful ideas' can have their uses. Where harm truly arises is where the responsibility for one's personal actions is displaced into service of some idea.

It is always a matter of the responsibility of individuals, it can never be simply passed off as 'a bad idea'.


Mark A. Baker

Yeah, I disagree too, as I always do when Mark says this same stupid shit.

Of course, people are responsible for what they do with ideas. One can take a neutral idea, and bend it to become harmful.

But some ideas contain the seed, mold, pattern or model for the bad behavior. Some ideas cannot be applied in any way other than "badly".

For example, one can't really take Hubbard's policy on Hard Sell and apply decently in ANY context? The IDEA itself cannot be applied in any way except INSANELY. The IDEA contains the notions that 1) "only Scientology can deliver total freedom", 2) "the reactive mind aims to STOP progress up the Bridge", and 3) "all concerns other than getting the Bridge are secondary and distractions to attaining the state of OT". These ideas themselves are DUMB.

The Muslim idea, "if one kills a bunch of heathens in a suicide bombing, then one will go to Heaven and be with Allah and the 71 virgins" is NUTS. It is NUTS regardless of any MIND that accepts and thinks with such nonsense. It is NUTS way before any person comes along to "responsibly" accept, adopt and use such an idea.

Take the idea inherent to KSW that "we have the only workable spiritual tech in existence". THAT idea sets the stage for a great many nasty and toxic related ideas and behaviors. How can that idea EVER be applied sanely? It can't. The IDEA itself is oof-the-wall. And , people who accept the idea also end up acting off-the-wall.

Take Hubbard's idea that "a person who attacks Scientology MUST be a suppressive person" and this "person MUST have hidden crimes and overts". This is based on OTHER nutty ideas such as "an SP attacks any and all betterment activities", and that "Scientology is the ONLY valid betterment activity on planet Earth". The idea contains the seed of the insanity that ALWAYS follows the acceptance of such an idea.

Take the Scientology IDEA that "survival" is the BASIC key goal of any organism, and that the basis of ethics is the "survival and expansion" of any organism or group. Take the idea of how the EXPANSION & SURVIVAL of Scientology is the MOST important concern of Scientology. How can anyone accept and adopt THAT idea and NOT have it be totally NUTS?

See, there is no amount of responsibility that can be enacted to make such ideas anything other than toxicly STUPID. There is no possible application or practice that can be anything other than harmful and abusive.

The ONLY option is to DISCARD the IDEAS. That is the ONLY responsible behavior regarding a great many Scientology "ideas".

Too often the IDEA itself contains the PATTERN of abuse and harm.

Hubbard's policies on "lying", "telling acceptable truths", and "garnering agreement to manipulate realities" delineates along NASTY lines. These are defined in ways that cannot be used in any other way except deceitfully and surreptitiously.

I could go on and on providing examples of IDEAS of Hubbard's that cannot be applied in any way except abusively or harmfully.

How about, "always attack and never discuss"? That is a really STUPID idea.

The idea itself, applied in just about ANY context, results in asinine behavior. Again, the idea itself contains the pattern of idiocy.

All idea are not created equal, and while people ARE responsible for how they interpret and use any IDEA, some ideas cannot be used in any other way except harmfully. THAT is the problem with a great many ideas of Scientology.

 

[Mark A. Baker]

Yeah, I disagree too, ...

Got it. You are not responsible because it was hubbard's stupid idea. No doubt you were only following orders. Yeah, that works.


Mark A. Baker

 

[The Anabaptist Jacques]

Short form: any idea automatically suggests its 'opposite' or antagonist, thus any idea will spawn an anti-thesis which may be deemed to be 'harmful'.

Long form: read the Dhammapada, the Tao Te Ching. and the dialogues of Plato.


The reason for exploring the realm of ideas is in order to understand the best way to form one's own decisions. Gyrate any way you wish, it always comes down to the individual's responsibility for his own choices. Thoughts are patterns of interpretation and have no significance beyond that.


Mark A. Baker

I disagree. You are reifying a concept of responsibility which I don't see existing in the manner you describe.

Theoretically, ideas do imply an opposite TO A FULLY RATIONAL PERSON WHO IS RATIONAL ALL THE TIME, but in real life there are few like that (not even you and me )

Pragmatically, this phenomenon of responsibility just doesn't come into the equation.

(Read William James, Charles S. Peirce, John Dewey, Richard Rorty)

Hubbard only used it as a way to blame a person for not succeeding.

(Read all of Hubbard's work)

But when you take the varying levels of consciousness a person goes through at various times each day, and all the unknown factors that effect a person, I'm not even sure you can positively make the case for free will, let alone personal responsibillity.

(Read Spinoza, Freud, Skinner, Derk Pereboom, Glen Strawson)

As I said earlier, ideas preceed actions.

(Read all of The Anabaptist Jacques' posts)

And quite possibly, the ideas themselves are more rather than less the effect of pre-determined causes.

(Read the entire Encyclopedia Britannica)

The Anabaptist Jacques

(Read Candide by Voltaire)

 

[The Anabaptist Jacques]

For the record, Mark doesn't say stupid shit.

I find his critique of whatever I write extremely helpful.

It compels me to re-evaluate my reasoning and that either strengthens me when I was correct or corrects me when I was mistaken.

Either way I benefit.

(but he does give too much homework)


The Anabaptist Jacques

 

[Gadfly]

Got it. You are not responsible because it was hubbard's stupid idea. No doubt you were only following orders. Yeah, that works.

Mark A. Baker

You are pushing what I said to some absurd "logical conclusion" that does not exist in the content of what I said.

But then, what else is new?

How did you EVER come up with your response from what I posted? :confused2:

Dub-in? Strange leaps of absurd logic? Some weird asscociations and connections of your own unique streams of consciousness?

There ARE "stupid ideas". And, then, there are stupid people who accept and follow these "stupid ideas". There are two different things involved here.

See Mark? Can you understand that? Is it not "logical" enough for you?

Sure, some people follow bad "orders". But, there IS something there in the "order" itself, that when followed exactly, causes the trouble. Such is the case with MUCH of LRH policy.

 

[R6Basic]

The real problem is once a large number of people latch on to an idea it's pretty much always going to be around.

I remember in the 80's or 90's watching a guy on TV that who spent his time trying teach people the world was actually flat.

 

[Gadfly]

For the record, Mark doesn't say stupid shit.

I find his critique of whatever I write extremely helpful.

It compels me to re-evaluate my reasoning and that either strengthens me when I was correct or corrects me when I was mistaken.

Either way I benefit.

(but he does give too much homework)

The Anabaptist Jacques

Yeah, I know, you have said this before.

Sorry, while often what he says is just brutally tedious and picky, at times, to me, he DOES say "stupid shit". Like what I cited above.

What I see as pretentious pedanticism in Baker's posts is so often NOT germane to the topics at hands, or to the manner in which they are being discussed.

He has NEVER agreed or admitted that ANY "idea" of Hubbard's contains the seed to its own toxicity. He just keeps pushing what he said above.

Whereas you TAJ are entirely correct when you say, "I think the damage done by Scientology is inherent in the Technology itself, in admin and Tech and Ethics." In other words, the problems are right there in the IDEAS themselves. You can talk intelligently, appeal to logic and reason, yet NOT sound pompously pedantic.

I agree with what he says about responsibility for ideas, but what we are talking about is the IDEA itself. I know - ideas don't exist outside of a mind. But, in a book or in a taped lecture, the words on the page or recorded on the tape embody what can be called an "idea", and this idea DOES have a sort of independent existence.

 

[The Anabaptist Jacques]

Yeah, I know, you have said this before.

Sorry, while often what he says is just brutally tedious and picky, at times, to me, he DOES say "stupid shit". Like what I cited above.

He has NEVER agreed or admitted that ANY "idea" of Hubbard's contains the seed to its own toxicity. He just keeps pushing what he said above.

I agree with what he says about responsibility for ideas, but what we are talking about is the IDEA itself. I know - ideas don't exist outside of a mind. But, in a book or in a taped lecture, the words on the page or recorded on the tape embody what can be called an "idea", and this idea DOES have a sort of independent existence.

I understand what you're saying.

It just means that we are not yet done with Mark A. Baker yet either.

If we can make him see then we can convince anyone.

The Anabaptist Jacques

 

[Ogsonofgroo]

We’re not done with the Church of Scientology yet.

It is getting slammed in the media right now.

But other cults have gone through the same things and then have found their ideas incorporated into society as a whole.

In the 1900s there was a small cult that believed the world would come to an end in the mid-18th century.

Since the world didn’t end you would think this cult would disappear.

Instead, it partially redefined itself and advocated the principles behind its reasoning rather than just that the world was coming to an end.

The emphasis was shifted from doomsday scenarios to Bible reinterpretation.

Eventually, the Fundamentalist movement grew from this between 1910 and 1914.

My point is that even though the Church itself is becoming more despised and loathed as each day goes by, the probability still exists that the ideas of Scientology will find an audience in society.

This is not to say that the ideas must be prevented from being disseminated; but the ideas must be challenged.

Right now people are beginning to see the Church as some crazy totalitarian space-opera cult.

And well they should.

But I don’t think people are criticizing the fundamental concepts of Scientology, like ARC, KRC, looking up words, etc.

It is inevitable that these concepts will get acceptance somewhere and possibly even grow into something larger.

I personally do not think that the problems in the Church of Scientology are due to Miscavige.

Nor do I think that it is because people have misunderstoods and are not following what Hubbard wrote.

I think the damage done by Scientology is inherent in the Technology itself, in admin and Tech and Ethics.

These at some point will have to be challenged and dispelled, otherwise the same phenomenon will occur and possibly in an even larger scale.

Just think, what if some aspects of society accepted as second nature some of Hubbard’s ideas?

Some may say that the concept of ARC is useful and workable in itself. But I disagree.

I think even acceptance of that concept requires acceptance of other parts of the Tech.

And even accepting the concept of ARC requires a logical and literate void in a person’s thinking.

Whatever emerges from the ashes of the Church of Scientology, like Martyism, or freezone, celebritology, or indies and outies, or whatever they call themselves, it is sure to be spread out.

Somebody, somewhere at some point is going to say that looking up words in the dictionary as Hubbard describes is a good thing.

But I am saying there are built in traps in the way Hubbard uses his “word-clearing” that while it may give an immediate rush it lays the seeds for a future undoing of a person’s literacy.

It seems to me all of Hubbard’s work is that way.

So the ideas of Hubbard that survive the Church itself will have to be challenged and shown to have harmful unintended consequences (harmful to the user).

This is only just starting.

The Anabaptist Jacques

that is such a good/nice post amma bumping

 

[The Anabaptist Jacques]

Thanks.

But I should have said 1800s instead of 1900s and 19th century instead of 18th century.

The cult were called Millerites.

The Anabaptist Jacques