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Petition: Prohibit Scientology from Delivering Auditing to Minors as Anti-Gay Conversion Therapy.
I was checking on the status of Joyce Miller's short film project (referenced in this thread), and noticed that she had created the above and below petition.
This is Joyce's Kickstarter update announcing the petition.
https://www.kickstarter.com/project...ars-of-heterosexuality-was-just/posts/1684533
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Update #7
Sep 18 2016
Scientology Homophobia Petition
I wanted to share a petition I created that goes into the construct of Scientology's religious homophobia and the possibility of Scientology Auditing containing a passive, incidental strain of anti-gay conversion therapy. Thank You! -Joyce
http://petitions.moveon.org/sign/prohibit-the-church-of-1.fb52?source=c.fb&r_by=587994
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This is the Petition:
http://petitions.moveon.org/sign/prohibit-the-church-of-1.fb52?source=c.fb&r_by=587994
* * * * * BEGIN EXCERPT * * * * *
Prohibit the Church of Scientology from Delivering the Practice Known as Auditing to Minors on the Grounds that it Covertly Accords to the Logic of Anti-Gay Conversion Therapy
Petition by Joyce Miller
To be delivered to Governor Andrew Cuomo
One of Scientology's explicit goals is to bring every single person on the planet up to a spiritual level known as "Clear" through a memory based therapy practice known as "Auditing". One of the irrefutable characteristics of “Clear” is heterosexual behavior.
There are currently 6 signatures. We need 50 signatures!
PETITION BACKGROUND
Scientology avoids specifying a stance on homosexuality through the tightly constructed loopholes and semantics of its late founder L. Ron Hubbard. Throughout my involvement in the church from age ten to the end of college, I was told by multiple staff members this is because it is not legal for Scientology to claim it addresses or seeks to alter any specific trait. I knew repeated accounts of Scientologists saying “Don’t you ever want to learn the real reason behind why you’re gay?” when recruiting openly gay people. To anyone who has been indoctrinated in the Church, it is very clear that Scientology is inextricably homophobic and negates homosexuality at the core.
One of Scientology’s explicit, urgent goals is to bring everyone on the planet up to a state of spiritual existence referred to as “Clear”, achieved primarily through the practice of Scientology auditing. Auditing is Scientology’s signature (pseudoscientific) therapeutic practice of recalling traumatic events until the emotional weight is dissipated, meant to raise a persons level on the “Emotional Tone Scale” or “Hubbard Chart of Human Evaluation”. Scientology’s fundamental criterion for human behavior, “The Hubbard Chart of Human Evaluation”, irrefutably characterizes the sexual behavior of a “Clear” as heterosexual, and classifies homosexual behavior as the byproduct of aberration, or a lower undesirable spiritual state on the chart.
You can find “The Hubbard Chart of Human Evaluation” pictured and explained on Scientology’s website and the internet, or in books like “Self-Analysis”, available at such retail stores as Barnes and Noble. Every row in "The Hubbard Chart of Human Evaluation" corresponds to numbered ascending and descending levels of spiritual existence or “tone levels”. Every column describes a different category of behavior, such as “Emotion” and “Sexual Behavior”. In Scientology each "tone level" is usually referred to by its number and/ or emotion, (Content is 3.0, Anger is 1.5, etc.) since Scientology teaches that you can most easily spot a persons position on the “tone scale”/“Hubbard Chart of Human Evaluation” by observing their emotional state.
The "tone level" associated with homosexuality, “1.1, Covert Hostility” is characterized in the sexual behavior column by the term “Irregular Practices”. It is widely known in Scientology that "Irregular Practices" is basically synonymous with “homosexuality”.
To confirm for someone unfamiliar with "The Hubbard Chart of Human Evaluation" that "1.1" is without argument how Scientology categorizes homosexuality, here are some excerpts from the writings of late Scientology founder L. Ron Hubbard:
“Homosexuals don't practice love; 1.1s can’t."
and
“Such people should be taken from the society as rapidly as possible and uniformly institutionalized; for here is the level of the contagion of immorality, and the destruction of ethics; here is the fodder which secret police organizations use for their filthy operations. One of the most effective measures of security that a nation threatened by war could take would be rounding up and placing in a cantonment, away from society, any 1.1 individual who might be connected with government, the military, or essential industry…” (1)
Scientology and all of L. Ron Hubbard’s writings on which Scientology is based functions as a model of infallibility; a source of applicable, unfaltering technology.
There is not room for dissent or interpretation in Scientology. Dissent or interpretation in Scientology are at best considered mistakes to be corrected and at worst justify vicious organized attack from the church. There are no “Versions” of Scientology that validate homosexual behavior. Scientology only allows for one version of Scientology, and it is one in which homosexuality is defined as a byproduct of “aberration” that Scientology auditing explicitly aims to restore.
As a child, I poured over “The Hubbard Chart of Human Evaluation” starting at age twelve or thirteen, through signing up for “The Volunteer Ministers Course”. Substantial auditing was beyond my family’s price range, but in my case indoctrination with “The Hubbard Chart of Human Evaluation” was enough to shape my thinking as a kid.
“The Hubbard Chart of Human Evalution” additionally posits that though everybody has a chronic “tone level” with corresponding columns generally predicting each aspect of behavior, "tone level" acutely fluctuates throughout the day or over time, since each “tone level” corresponds with a different emotion and people experience varying emotions in different situations. According to Scientology, whatever emotional tone you acutely experience, your will accordingly exhibit the corresponding behaviors. Recognizing same sex attraction in myself as a seventh or eighth grader, I asked the course supervisor “So, according to a persons mood, you could feel same sex attraction without being chronically 1.1?” The course supervisor thought for a second and said “Does it make sense according to the chart”? And by the screwed up logic of “The Hubbard Chart of Human Evaluation”, it does.
"The Hubbard Chart of Human Evaluation” erases the concept of homosexuality as anything more than a changeable byproduct of existing in a lower spiritual state. For a developing queer child attempting to modify their behaviors in accordance to Scientology’s “Hubbard Chart of Human Evaluation”, or simply trying to exist in a religious context that erases the validity of their instincts, the detriment is clear.
Despite being a rigid system of highly engineered totalitarian indoctrination that readily qualifies as a cult, Scientology manages to steamroll its way into the definition of a religion. It is nevertheless important to protect the right to individual religious beliefs.
Scientology auditing, however, is not a belief, but a practice. Auditing is a practice that is taught and executed with deliberate precision and uniformity, and for which the definition of success includes and necessitates heterosexuality. The practice of auditing, in the context of Scientology's immovable philosophy surrounding homosexuality, should therefore be classified as a form of anti-gay conversion therapy and not permissible for use on minors.
Scientology’s language contains precise measures to rigidly define a reality all its own, including invented or warped usage of words. To some degree it encodes itself from scrutiny. If a religious leader punches children in the face, but uses the word “enlighten” instead of “punch”, should it be considered less of a transgression? Forgive the crude example, but it begins to illustrate how Scientology’s highly engineered language routinely shapes reality and negates the identities of its members in more nuanced forms of spiritual abuse. Scientology gets a great deal of strength from its highly regimented structure and uniform totalitarian language, difficult to deconstruct even with inside familiarity.
Scientology is routinely damaging to children and adults regardless of sexual orientation.
Taking away The Church of Scientology’s capacity to deliver auditing to children would still allow it to freely indoctrinate and manipulate them, but stil be a positive step. At the very least I’d like to raise awareness about this strain of Anti-Gay conversion philosophy that is indirectly defined, but nevertheless existing in the groundwork of Scientology.
It is possible to practice auditing for its own sake, irrespective of "The Hubbard Chart of Human Evaluation" though many more sophisticated forms of therapy exist. However, in context of the Church of Scientology's totalitarian rigidity, and faulty quackery of "The Hubbard Chart of Human Evaluation", auditing cannot separate from a definition of spiritual growth that negates homosexuality.
Going Clear = Going Straight.
1.) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientology_and_sexual_orientation
* * * * * END EXCERPT * * * * *
I was checking on the status of Joyce Miller's short film project (referenced in this thread), and noticed that she had created the above and below petition.
This is Joyce's Kickstarter update announcing the petition.
https://www.kickstarter.com/project...ars-of-heterosexuality-was-just/posts/1684533
* * * * * BEGIN EXCERPT * * * * *
Update #7
Sep 18 2016
Scientology Homophobia Petition
I wanted to share a petition I created that goes into the construct of Scientology's religious homophobia and the possibility of Scientology Auditing containing a passive, incidental strain of anti-gay conversion therapy. Thank You! -Joyce
http://petitions.moveon.org/sign/prohibit-the-church-of-1.fb52?source=c.fb&r_by=587994
* * * * * END EXCERPT * * * * *
This is the Petition:
http://petitions.moveon.org/sign/prohibit-the-church-of-1.fb52?source=c.fb&r_by=587994
* * * * * BEGIN EXCERPT * * * * *
Prohibit the Church of Scientology from Delivering the Practice Known as Auditing to Minors on the Grounds that it Covertly Accords to the Logic of Anti-Gay Conversion Therapy
Petition by Joyce Miller
To be delivered to Governor Andrew Cuomo
One of Scientology's explicit goals is to bring every single person on the planet up to a spiritual level known as "Clear" through a memory based therapy practice known as "Auditing". One of the irrefutable characteristics of “Clear” is heterosexual behavior.
There are currently 6 signatures. We need 50 signatures!
PETITION BACKGROUND
Scientology avoids specifying a stance on homosexuality through the tightly constructed loopholes and semantics of its late founder L. Ron Hubbard. Throughout my involvement in the church from age ten to the end of college, I was told by multiple staff members this is because it is not legal for Scientology to claim it addresses or seeks to alter any specific trait. I knew repeated accounts of Scientologists saying “Don’t you ever want to learn the real reason behind why you’re gay?” when recruiting openly gay people. To anyone who has been indoctrinated in the Church, it is very clear that Scientology is inextricably homophobic and negates homosexuality at the core.
One of Scientology’s explicit, urgent goals is to bring everyone on the planet up to a state of spiritual existence referred to as “Clear”, achieved primarily through the practice of Scientology auditing. Auditing is Scientology’s signature (pseudoscientific) therapeutic practice of recalling traumatic events until the emotional weight is dissipated, meant to raise a persons level on the “Emotional Tone Scale” or “Hubbard Chart of Human Evaluation”. Scientology’s fundamental criterion for human behavior, “The Hubbard Chart of Human Evaluation”, irrefutably characterizes the sexual behavior of a “Clear” as heterosexual, and classifies homosexual behavior as the byproduct of aberration, or a lower undesirable spiritual state on the chart.
You can find “The Hubbard Chart of Human Evaluation” pictured and explained on Scientology’s website and the internet, or in books like “Self-Analysis”, available at such retail stores as Barnes and Noble. Every row in "The Hubbard Chart of Human Evaluation" corresponds to numbered ascending and descending levels of spiritual existence or “tone levels”. Every column describes a different category of behavior, such as “Emotion” and “Sexual Behavior”. In Scientology each "tone level" is usually referred to by its number and/ or emotion, (Content is 3.0, Anger is 1.5, etc.) since Scientology teaches that you can most easily spot a persons position on the “tone scale”/“Hubbard Chart of Human Evaluation” by observing their emotional state.
The "tone level" associated with homosexuality, “1.1, Covert Hostility” is characterized in the sexual behavior column by the term “Irregular Practices”. It is widely known in Scientology that "Irregular Practices" is basically synonymous with “homosexuality”.
To confirm for someone unfamiliar with "The Hubbard Chart of Human Evaluation" that "1.1" is without argument how Scientology categorizes homosexuality, here are some excerpts from the writings of late Scientology founder L. Ron Hubbard:
“Homosexuals don't practice love; 1.1s can’t."
and
“Such people should be taken from the society as rapidly as possible and uniformly institutionalized; for here is the level of the contagion of immorality, and the destruction of ethics; here is the fodder which secret police organizations use for their filthy operations. One of the most effective measures of security that a nation threatened by war could take would be rounding up and placing in a cantonment, away from society, any 1.1 individual who might be connected with government, the military, or essential industry…” (1)
Scientology and all of L. Ron Hubbard’s writings on which Scientology is based functions as a model of infallibility; a source of applicable, unfaltering technology.
There is not room for dissent or interpretation in Scientology. Dissent or interpretation in Scientology are at best considered mistakes to be corrected and at worst justify vicious organized attack from the church. There are no “Versions” of Scientology that validate homosexual behavior. Scientology only allows for one version of Scientology, and it is one in which homosexuality is defined as a byproduct of “aberration” that Scientology auditing explicitly aims to restore.
As a child, I poured over “The Hubbard Chart of Human Evaluation” starting at age twelve or thirteen, through signing up for “The Volunteer Ministers Course”. Substantial auditing was beyond my family’s price range, but in my case indoctrination with “The Hubbard Chart of Human Evaluation” was enough to shape my thinking as a kid.
“The Hubbard Chart of Human Evalution” additionally posits that though everybody has a chronic “tone level” with corresponding columns generally predicting each aspect of behavior, "tone level" acutely fluctuates throughout the day or over time, since each “tone level” corresponds with a different emotion and people experience varying emotions in different situations. According to Scientology, whatever emotional tone you acutely experience, your will accordingly exhibit the corresponding behaviors. Recognizing same sex attraction in myself as a seventh or eighth grader, I asked the course supervisor “So, according to a persons mood, you could feel same sex attraction without being chronically 1.1?” The course supervisor thought for a second and said “Does it make sense according to the chart”? And by the screwed up logic of “The Hubbard Chart of Human Evaluation”, it does.
"The Hubbard Chart of Human Evaluation” erases the concept of homosexuality as anything more than a changeable byproduct of existing in a lower spiritual state. For a developing queer child attempting to modify their behaviors in accordance to Scientology’s “Hubbard Chart of Human Evaluation”, or simply trying to exist in a religious context that erases the validity of their instincts, the detriment is clear.
Despite being a rigid system of highly engineered totalitarian indoctrination that readily qualifies as a cult, Scientology manages to steamroll its way into the definition of a religion. It is nevertheless important to protect the right to individual religious beliefs.
Scientology auditing, however, is not a belief, but a practice. Auditing is a practice that is taught and executed with deliberate precision and uniformity, and for which the definition of success includes and necessitates heterosexuality. The practice of auditing, in the context of Scientology's immovable philosophy surrounding homosexuality, should therefore be classified as a form of anti-gay conversion therapy and not permissible for use on minors.
Scientology’s language contains precise measures to rigidly define a reality all its own, including invented or warped usage of words. To some degree it encodes itself from scrutiny. If a religious leader punches children in the face, but uses the word “enlighten” instead of “punch”, should it be considered less of a transgression? Forgive the crude example, but it begins to illustrate how Scientology’s highly engineered language routinely shapes reality and negates the identities of its members in more nuanced forms of spiritual abuse. Scientology gets a great deal of strength from its highly regimented structure and uniform totalitarian language, difficult to deconstruct even with inside familiarity.
Scientology is routinely damaging to children and adults regardless of sexual orientation.
Taking away The Church of Scientology’s capacity to deliver auditing to children would still allow it to freely indoctrinate and manipulate them, but stil be a positive step. At the very least I’d like to raise awareness about this strain of Anti-Gay conversion philosophy that is indirectly defined, but nevertheless existing in the groundwork of Scientology.
It is possible to practice auditing for its own sake, irrespective of "The Hubbard Chart of Human Evaluation" though many more sophisticated forms of therapy exist. However, in context of the Church of Scientology's totalitarian rigidity, and faulty quackery of "The Hubbard Chart of Human Evaluation", auditing cannot separate from a definition of spiritual growth that negates homosexuality.
Going Clear = Going Straight.
1.) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientology_and_sexual_orientation
* * * * * END EXCERPT * * * * *
