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Date Sun, 08 Oct 2000 06:57:45 -0400
Subject Re: To any reasonable Scientologists
If an individual wants to go through the levels of Scientology I think that's a
very fine thing. Some people will try and they won't make it, and often this
will be because they aren't dealt with properly during their courses and
auditing. Almost everyone will have ~some~ problems; Scientology is still
a pioneer activity and it's not as smooth as it could be yet.
Helping people to move along more smoothly is very rewarding. On the other hand,
if people aren't interested in spiritual philosophy/don't want to do
Scientology, my strong inclination is to give them a cheery wave, and then
either pass on my way or talk about any other interests we have in common.
If the one little lost sheep needs some help finding his way I'll certainly give
him some directions and maybe even give him a lift, but if he then carps and
moans at me incessantly he can jolly well find his own way home.
(If I was a vicious man I might have written that the miserable sheep could soon
find himself flayed, gutted, divided into convenient portions, and bagged up in
the trunk. But it's a nasty thought and not a good analogy so I'd rather just
leave him to find the way himself.)
I hope I'm not going to regret writing that paragraph. I'm leaving it in only
because it's funny.
Ungrateful sheep: "Baaa. You ~would~ prefer to do that to me,
Freddie. Baaa. You wouldn't leave me - you're going to kill me and eat me!"
Freddie T: "No, no, no, no. Please get out. You can walk."
Ungrateful sheep: "Baaastad."
(Sheep gets out of the car and exits stage left.)
That's an actual conversation, and as you can see, the sheep was not damaged in
any way.
Hem, hem. Anyway, fairly soon, after I've finished pointing out my recent
observations of the Church and telling a few more anecdotes, I'll be done for a
while. I might be inclined to do a bit more if I had more of my
Scientology materials with me. As I don't, it's a bit too much trouble to get
hold of the exact references I need.
Maybe anyone could benefit if they were given the ~best~ of Scientology. This
would be those precise actions most suited to their individual situation; those
actions would be performed very well and smoothly, and anything relevant which
changed in the person's life would be quickly picked up and dealt with.
That would be the ideal - and the more difficult the person is, the more that
they need this kind of superlative treatment. If someone is an easy case,
they'll generally read a book, roll into the org and get on services. Most
long-term Scientologists, in my opinion, can stand up to some bad programming or
bad handlings. If not they wouldn't still be there. ; ) I'm a fairly
easy case I think. I managed to get two or three of my grades without even a C/S
(it was once a very small org). A few mistakes were definitely made but we
picked them up and that time, during which I was doing the grades, was one of
the best periods in my life (so far).
Roughly, from the viewpoint of the person receiving the grades, the
auditor makes sure before you start that you're well-fed, rested and aren't
worrying about any pressing issues. He asks you a really interesting
philosophical question ( and if it's not interesting you drop it), and you tell
him your ideas. He listens carefully and understands and then asks the next
question in the process. And you do this until you feel good and have a
realization. It's wonderful.
By the way, that paragraph isn't meant to be a 'how-to-do auditing' type of
thing. It's just a description of what happened from my point of view.
Since I started posting a couple of
weeks ago I have been interested in correcting a few things that seem to me to
go against things I've actually seen.
Whilst I often read reports on ars about a decline in Scn, and orgs with only a
few people - these go against the observations I've made:
a. There has been a resurgence in the quality of services. I've not taken any
recently (so my affidavit isn't as good as it could be) but I've had rave
first-hand reports from trusted friends, and I've seen some big improvements in
the course packs. In the old days the supervisor had to dig around to find a
suitable reference when the student asked a question like: "What should I
do if I ask this supplementary series of questions but nothing comes up on the
meter?"
There was probably a bulletin or a lecture that covered this situation but it
took some experience to know where to look. In the new Golden Age of Tech packs,
those references have been culled and collated so that the reference is right
there and every student can study them and drill them.
b. There has been an increase in the size of the org I'm connected with. I've
seem lots of report on ars about how such and such an org appears to be
shrinking and doing badly. I've no idea how true these are. As I've said before,
the three orgs I know well are doing fine and are expanding year by year. Here's
the final post to Jane.
From: "Jane Allen" <jane_allen@my-deja.com>
Sent: Friday, October 06, 2000
Subject: Re: To any reasonable Scientologists
JA>You underestimate the dedication of people bent on self-improvement.
I don't think I do. I love people who are interested in self-improvement -
particularly when this manifests itself in things which make the world brighter
for people and the environment around them. I'm lucky to know a number of people
(Scientologists and non-Scientologists) who are like that. One of the guys I
know has a great party in aid of different charities at his house every month.
He also organizes beach clean-ups.
If the Church fell, the freezone would have a resurgence; the question is
whether the resurgence would last. I agree with you that
people around the world would keep doing self-improvement. There would be little
or no change at all for almost all of those people .
However standard Scientology is not easy to deliver; the various splinter
groups who've broken from the Church are very interesting, but not,
IMO, viable alternatives. Providing good-quality course rooms and holding the
line about what exactly should be done to get a result is not an easy business
and I think it demands a certain persistence and toughness to get it done.
FT> > If the Church ceased to exist, then a few things would be better,
JA> Which things specifically?
I've been thinking about this question and I've changed my mind now.
; )
OK. For a relatively few, already trained people, the full range of services
would be easier to obtain. Some communication lines that IMO don't need to be so
closed would be opened and many of the injustices that have occurred over the
years would lose a lot of their force.
FT >> but I'm afraid that in short order things
might well get a lot worse. Ideally, I'd like to see some reconciliation between
the Church and the Free-Zone.
JA> You can get in trouble for such wrong-think,
ya know.
Well, I'm not advocating teaching Dianasis or using Bilateral meters in session.
The things that I'm suggesting absolutely don't require the downfall of the
orgs, or even any very big changes.
I'd like to see a broad, unconditional amnesty for almost everyone and a
thorough review of all past declares. I'd like it to become very easy for
auditors to get their upper bridges - utilizing perhaps a supervised read
it--drill it--do it regime. I'd also like to see the prices come down and the
Church using the internet and DVDs to cheaply and broadly disseminate the entire
LRH library.
No big deal. It could be done within a few months.
FT>> The Church is a big, bureaucratic
organization
JA> Agreed. But it's much more than that and at
the same time far, far less.
I'm sorry, but I don't think you understand Scientology very well at all.
FT> > Scientology, as practiced in the
official centers, is workable for a lot of people. In my opinion it's safer and
much better to keep it as it is.
JA> You know what else is workable for a lot of
people? Hypnotism. You know what else? Capital Punishment. Numbers don't
interest me. Except when I see how un-workable for a lot of people some of
the Church's activities are.
> Your statements seem to avoid addressing any
intentional harm caused by the Church. Do you believe that there are
merely "bad apples" in the bunch or do you think Declaring SPs both
within and without the church is a practical and efficient method of keeping
things pure?
In the early eighties and during certain periods before that it was very easy to
get declared. Particularly if you had a position of authority.
A number of reasons for the harsh ethics
have been argued for - one of the most interesting to me is the idea that a lot
of the problems stemmed from covert infiltration. Variations of this idea have
been suggested by a number of diverse people. For example:
Bill Robertson; by the Ace of Clubs (fantastic prose style by the way, if you're
reading); in the time line put out by
"The Librarian" (and revisited recently by CL); the rumor line;
and finally by David Miscavige (in the satellite broadcast announcing the deal
with the IRS).
To summarize, the theory is that the church was infiltrated by its enemies; this
caused a lot of problems with things like false reports, sabotage and plenty of
injustices. The damage was not just in what those people did, but in the ripples
that were created - for example the mis-training of outer-org
executives who then went back and messed up their areas. And also, and not
least, because of the subsequent paranoia and witch hunts.
Of course the different people I mentioned above have very divergent views
whether the plants within the church have been fully cleared out, and also about
the degree to which the damage has been repaired. Hardly anybody knows for
sure, but I'm in the camp which would hold that the church is in good hands.
Here are my observations on SP declares: Justice is working better than it
used to. Since the late eighties it has been much more difficult get somebody
declared. One of my friends was something of a rogue (he was a reg in the
mid/late 80s) and eventually he had a lot of people baying for his blood. He very
nearly got declared suppressive, but it was too difficult. There is a long form
to go through to check that no gradient steps - like warnings and suspensions - have been missed. Also a review of the good things the person has
done. Finally the declare proposition was disapproved (more than once I think)
and he escaped with being routed off staff (fired).
I believe that previously missionaires could more or less declare people at
their discretion. Now, sensibly, the final decision is with someone up lines and
its a long, laborious business.
>What about the RPF, is it merely a boot camp
for malcontents or a concentration camp for wayward undesirables? Or don't you
think it exists?
A couple of my friends have done the RPF. Perhaps the most perceptive auditor I
ever had learned his craft there. He could really trace down an exact read on
the e-meter and find something that was charged but of which I was absolutely
unaware until he steered me with the meter to find it and look at it.
I've also worked along with the RPF on a couple of projects. They were working
hard but it wasn't ~terrible~. A number of people I knew in the SO in the
eighties had done the RPF at one time or another.
I think a lot of the critical stories we can read about it are overlarded. I
guess that some of them are probably more or less true. It's difficult to know which ones. Once again I think that things in the RPF are
probably easier than they used to be (I've heard one or two things about this
although I have far, far less direct knowledge here than I do with the orgs).
JA> I concede that I may have been misinformed
about the routines I was attempting, but I just wanted to see if an unblinking
stare was possible. I discovered that it was and I was content that I had the
attention and concentration needed for such an uncommon act. Doesn't mean
I'm going to join a yoga class either.
> Some people just want a little bit of help, others want to see the world
become a bunch of non-blinkers. I'm somewhere in the vast middle,
but I like to watch the people bicker as their eyelids flicker.
Poetic, and good luck to you as you watch, but blinking really isn't an
issue in Scientology.
Sometimes I meet someone and I think, "Hey, this guy is living his life
just fine. He doesn't need all the hassles that go along with doing
Scientology."
However, almost invariably as I get to know them better I find areas of upset
and worry that cause them all kinds of hassle. With one very pleasant
middle-aged lady I talked with last week I found that as far as possible she
didn't allow herself to look at the past because of the regret that welled up
out of her. Another, apparently successful lady who was part of the same
conversation then said something similar - that if she ever looked back, she
realized just how much her life was filled with sadness. Now that kind of thing
is something that Dianetics is good at dealing with.
At other times I've met good people who turn out to have huge problems with
their boss, or their mother, or ... .
These are areas of life that are well understood in Scientology. If more people
were able to apply Scientology basics to their lives -- the tone scale, the
principles of ARC, etc, then I think the world would be an easier place to live
for everyone.
Freddie T
