Besides Scientology's litigious nature - and it being designed and operated as a deceptive and ruthless psychological-political operation which "asserts and maintains dominion over thoughts and loyalties" - fraudulently asserted
religious cloaking is a large part of the reason why Scientology escapes being held accountable for its actions.
There's a news story from southern California, from some years ago, about a family that kept another family member chained to a bed and imprisoned in the house. At some point the police discovered this and intervened.
This, in Scientology, is called "baby watch," and the people doing it at their home were Scientologists. To make a long story short, once the police learned that these were Scientologists, and Scientologists emphasizing that Scientology is "their religion," etc., the police became instantly meek.
The police asked that the people not doing it anymore and slinked away.
Perhaps someone can find this story as all I have is my recollection of it, but it's an example of Scientology's "religion angle" being applied.
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'Leaving and leaves' by L. Ron Hubbard, 1976:
"...informing fellow staff members that one is leaving is properly labelled a suppressive act."
http://www.tampabay.com/news/scientology/article1048136.ece
From Professor Steven Kent's notes in his 'Brainwashing in Scientology's Rehabilitation Project Force', under the category of 'forcible confinement', addressing events mostly from the 1970s:
"
[Former Sea Org members]... spoke about either being forcibly confined themselves... or seeing others who were... Jesse Prince insists that he saw metal cages in the RPF's RPF in the basement of the [Los Angeles] Cedars Sinai building [Blue Buildings] where inmates 'were locked up at night to ensure that they wouldn't try to escape'. On the east coast, Dennis Erlich [while on the RPF] joked about his RPF assignment and, in accordance with Hubbard's policy [against joking about the RPF], wound up in the RPF's RPF in Fort Harrison's basement. Guarded down there for ten days, Erlich states that he spent the first two or three days locked in a cage... Tonja Burden swore, 'under pains and penalties of perjury' that she personally observed a person chained to pipes in the boiler room in the Fort Harrison building for a period of weeks... Likewise Hana Whitfield swore that, while she was on the RPF at the Fort Harrison [in Clearwater, Florida], Lyn Froyland was assigned to the RPF's RPF and was chained to a pipe down there [in the basement] for weeks, under guard. She was taken meals and allowed toilet breaks but no other hygiene'."
My first experience, as a non-staff "public person," with someone being involuntarily held in a Scientology organization was second hand and occurred in the early 1970s. I heard about it from a still upset - and very naive - (Class IV, these days it's called Class V) Org staff member (I was naive too) who had encountered someone handcuffed to a large metal table in a part of the Org off-limits to the public.
In those days, being in any way "on lines," and - suddenly and visibly - deciding to leave the premises of an Org was taboo. Why? It was explained that people who wanted to leave were becoming the effect of their reactive minds and that it was compassionate to restrain them from leaving ("blowing").
As Hubbard had explained,
"reactive minds do not have rights."
Even auditing rooms were supposed to have the auditor seated nearer to the door in case the person decided to leave, so the auditor could stop the person from leaving.
One was supposed to handle the person attempting to (visibly and suddenly) leave.
Around the same time, there was also a minor PR flap around an incident where someone in the Org had suddenly "blown," and two staff members followed him out of the Org on to the street, and dragged him back into the Org. (Since the Org was in a large hotel - The Martinique Hotel in Manhattan - some "wogs" had complained to the hotel's management.) To the Scientological mind, this was an application of "8-C" or "good control." The person's reactive mind had forced him to blow, and Scientologists, connected to Source, the savior of the galaxy L. Ron Hubbard, etc. were applying the tech, and putting ethics in, by 8-Cing him back, so that he could be properly handled, and saved from the dwindling spiral, and eventually travel up the Grade Chart to Total Freedom.
Scientology and false imprisonment:
http://www.scientology-lies.com/imprisonment.html
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Video on Religious cloaking - the affidavit:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gZvqeGrbILw
The complete document:
http://www.lermanet.com/reference/brennan-dec.pdf
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Excerpt from the above video/affidavit on
RELIGIOUS CLOAKING
7. Based on years of work in the senior most legal bodies of organized scientology as covered above I have dealt with directly or supervised the handling of hundreds of legal matters involving the organizations of scientology which directly or indirectly had to do with using religious cloaking...
8. It was determined that the only way to handle many of the legal matters in front of us and still apply Hubbard’s policies that had to do with staff, ethics, sales of services, money, delivery of services and the like was to develop and use a religious cloaking saying scientology was a religion, its services religious, its staff members of religious orders and the like. I can state without doubt that the overwhelming main reason that organized scientology developed and pushed its religious cloaking was to avoid a myriad of real or potential legal problems that would exist by following Hubbard’s policies if it were not considered a religion. By developing this religious cloaking for organized scientology it was hoped to avoid legal requirements around the world that might otherwise have to be followed that would make it impossible to follow Hubbard’s policies. In developing the religious cloaking for organized scientology, the following were considered a few of the “benefits” so that Hubbard policies could be applied. There are countless examples but the below are listed simply as a few of them:
(i) minimum wages would not have to be paid;
(ii) staff could be sent to different parts of the world and be able to stay locally as religious workers;
(iii) standard employee rights, such as those found in laws like the Fair Labor Standards Act, could be discarded and thus Hubbard policies involving such things as ethics conditions, the Rehabilitation Project Force and the like could be applied without outside interference;
(iv) less scrutiny would be allowed on the controls of the funds of scientology and the intermingling of funds between the corporations and other legal fictions of organized scientology;
(v) it was hoped that the treatment of public scientologists and the use of their funds would be considered outside the purview of governmental bodies;
(vi) couching the demand for and flow of monies within organized scientology using “religious” terms (such as by saying that clear cut mandatory payments for services were “fixed donations” and were mandated by the scripture of “exchange”) was hoped to cut off attempts by governments and others to look into them further...
11. Two of the things that organized scientology felt were of the most importance in order to avoid compliance with many laws that were contrary to Hubbard policy were the religious cloaking as covered above and a corporate restructuring to make it very difficult if not impossible for outsiders to ever get to the main assets of organized scientology and to ensure that the real leaders of organized scientology could be insulated from legal liability by hiding their real controls behind a myriad of corporate and other legal veils. It was considered both a defensive and offensive strategy to have such cloaking (religious and corporate) in place.
Defensively it makes it very difficult for individuals or even governments to force legal compliance of the many types of laws as covered above. It also makes it almost impossible to hold those that really control organized scientology responsible legally or to get to the financial assets of organized scientology spread out around the world. Offensively, it gives organized scientology a “safe base” from which to attack critics and/or anyone it feels is its enemy. Hiding behind religious cloaking and corporate veils it can act as a victim when people point out its crimes and injustices calling them “religious bigots” and even scaring governments, many of whom are not supposed to get involved with “religious matters”. By calling policies by Hubbard or Miscavige that are otherwise abusive or contrary to law “religious scripture” it was hoped to avoid legal scrutiny of same.
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L. Ron Hubbard saw himself as a master of psychology.
From Hubbard's 1946 (to himself) 'Affirmations':
Your writing has a deep hypnotic effect on people and they are always pleased with what you write...
Your psychology is advanced and true and wonderful. It hypnotizes people. It predicts their emotions, for you are their ruler.
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A few years later the book 'Science of Survival' was written, where the Hubbard Chart of Human Evaluation and Tone Scale were presented. One little twist was that placement of the person on the Tone Scale could be easily ascertained by noting the person's opinion of Dianetics, the Hubbard Chart of Human Evaluation, and the book 'Science of Survival', and, of course, its author.
Wrote Hubbard in 'Science of Survival' of 1951:
Those chronically below 2.0 on the Tone Scale should have "
no rights of any kind," and, ideally, be "
disposed of quietly and without sorrow," or at least be quarantined or isolated from society.
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From 'Science of Survival: Prediction of Human Behavior' - by L Ron Hubbard, 1951:
The reasonable man quite ordinarily overlooks the fact that people from 2.0 down have no traffic with reason and cannot be reasoned with as one would reason with a 3.0. There are only two answers for the handling of people from 2.0 down on the tone scale , neither one of which has anything to do with reasoning with them or listening to their justification of their acts. The first is to raise them on the tone scale by un-enturbulating some of their theta by any one of the three valid processes .
The other is to dispose of them quietly and without sorrow. Adders are safe bedmates compared to people on the lower bands of the tone scale. Not all the beauty nor the handsomeness nor artificial social value nor property can atone for the vicious damage such people do to sane men and women. The sudden and abrupt deletion of all individuals occupying the lower bands of the tone scale from the social order would result in an almost instant rise in the cultural tone and would interrupt the dwindling spiral into which any society may have entered. It is not necessary to produce a world of clears in order to have a reasonable and worthwhile social order; it is only necessary to delete those individuals who range from 2.0 down, either by processing them enough to get their tone level above the 2.0 line — a task which, indeed, is not very great, since the amount of processing in many cases might be under fifty hours, although it might also in others be in excess of two hundred — or simply quarantining them from the society.
A Venezuelan dictator [Juan Vincente Gomez] once decided to stop leprosy. He saw that most lepers in his country were also beggars. By the simple expedient of collecting and destroying all the beggars in Venezuela an end was put to leprosy in that country.
This was an early expression of what, years later, would be formalized as Disconnection and the Fair Game Law.
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However, it wasn't until 1955, in his 'Manual on Dissemination of Material', that Hubbard began, formally, in writing, instructing Scientologists on such things as "attacking" and "ruining utterly."
And his instructions in this area continued, with Hubbard developing special "tech" for various forms of attacking, overwhelming, dominating, influencing, deceiving, and manipulating.
Much of this "tech" was directed at outsiders ("wogs") and at former members of Scientology who "squirreled," but much of it - in various forms - was also directed at members of Scientology in good standing.
A question from Hubbard's Security Check for Scientologists of 1961:
"Have you ever had unkind thoughts about L. Ron Hubbard?"
Hubbard remained concerned with what he called "SPs," and wrote extensively on the subject. He wrote in 'Discipline. SPs and Admin' in 1969:
"I am not interested in wog morality... I can make Captain Bligh look like a Sunday School teacher."
Also in the late 1960s, Hubbard wrote about
"taking over political guidance" by
"taking over absolutely the field of mental healing."
Those who were in a position to decide (and police) who is to be classified as "sane" or classified as "insane," and who had control over "mental healing," would rule, so the idea went.
And From an LRH Executive Directive of 24 November 1968:
"We're going to take over mental hospitals and political guidance and the whole field of mental healing [which includes criminal rehabilitation] It may take us years, but we've got the years. We've got the tech..."
And finally, from Hubbard's 1969 'Intelligence Actions, Covert Intelligence Data Collection':
"...take over absolutely the field of mental healing on this planet in all its forms...
"Our total victory [over the 'psychs' and 'wogs'] will come when we run his organizations, perform his functions, and obtain his financing and appropriations."
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Then, one day in 1973, Hubbard made an announcement [Hubbard in
red]:
THE TECHNICAL BREAKTHROUGH OF 1973!
THE INTROSPECTION RD
I have made a technical breakthrough which possibly ranks with the major discoveries of the twentieth century. It is certainly the greatest achievement of 1973 and is now being released after a final write-up of the research. It is called the Introspection Rundown.
....
In 1970 the actual cause of PSYCHOSIS was isolated... In the ensuing years this has been proven beyond doubt to be correct.
But what is a psychotic break?
Man has never been able to solve the psychotic break. In fact, human beings are actually afraid of a person in a psychotic break and in desperation turn to psychiatry to handle.
[And here Hubbard goes on about psychiatry, ice picks, electric shocks, etc., then...]
THIS MEANS THE LAST REASON TO HAVE PSYCHIATRY AROUND IS GONE.
[Then there are the steps of the RD, and the HCOB ends with...]
THIS PLANET IS OURS.
[Then there's the
HCOB of February 1974, titled...]
INTROSPECTION RD
ADDITIONAL STEPS
....
ISOLATION
In a person in a psychotic break, it is necessary to isolate them for them to destimulate and to protect them and others from possible damage...
There comes a point where the C/S must decide to release the person from isolation. To do this the C/S must know if the person can take responsibility for his actions...
The C/S's action is a direct comm line to the person by notes. The person is provided with paper and pen to reply. The C/S must determine the person's responsibility level. Example: "Dear Joe. What can you guarantee me if you are let out of isolation?"... "Dear Joe. I'm sorry but no go on coming out of isolation yet..."
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Randomly located on the Internet, here's Eileen Vernjack's SP Declare from 1972:
"...they cannot be granted the rights and beingness ordinarily accorded rational beings..."
There are many more "SP Declares."
Now imagine being regarded as a "Suppressive Person," or its equivalent, while being INSIDE a Scientology organization.
Hope this helps.
