Alternatives
Yertletheturtle wrote (Feb 2, 2001):
> Hi Freddie,
> I am glad you are willing to communicate.
> For me, I do think the biggest issue has always been the Scientology organization's unwillingness to actually communicate in their expectation that people just follow directions and accept the dictates of management.
Fair enough.
I agree that the organization and its communication lines are not
ideal.
As LRH said:
"Scientology is a ~workable
system~. This does not
mean it is the best possible system or a perfect system (HCOPL 14 Feb 1965).
It's helpful to think about the ways in
which the system isn't perfect. In that way we can be alert to any inherent
potential liabilities.
The Scientology world and system is made up of:
1. The whole body of work produced by LRH.
2. That selection of his work which he made into Scientology technology and Church policy (remembering that he often revised and cancelled things later).
3. That selection of his work considered valid today. With strict admonitions to keep his work pure he did give permission to the church management to make new compilations of his work and to make certain well-defined changes. Please see this page for details.
4. Each individual's understanding (and misunderstanding) of Scientology.
6. The culture of the international church today.
7. The culture within each individual Scientology center.
8. Habits. Some things, like having the preclear shake out his hands before a can squeeze, or the 'wins session' that was given at the end of course turned out not to have been based on any textual authority. They had nevertheless somehow become habitual throughout the organization.
There are probably more examples of habits like these and if you can think of any good ones please let me know.
The organization operates under various kinds of
stress, and the individuals who comprise it have their own individual problems,
flaws
and misunderstandings. Sometimes the system doesn't work as it should because of these factors.
>What disturbs many people is the way the organization has put great pains into
preventing people from looking at alternatives.
Organizations and churches don't usually encourage their members to look at
alternatives.
For example: I never saw anything about the
better aspects of Islam or Buddhism when I was in Sunday school. Intel doesn't
help AMD. However I ~don't~ agree with spending any time or effort squashing Freezone groups. It
appears as though that isn't happening much these days,
although we'll have to see what happens if any grow to an appreciable size.
I believe that the principles of KSW should be applied by Scientologists inside the organization (in a high-toned
way)
but that, per our creed, we allow other individuals and groups to exist and to
follow their own religious and spiritual beliefs.
----------------------
We of the Church believe: ...
'That all men have inalienable rights to their own religious
practices and
their performance;
'That all men have inalienable rights to conceive, choose, assist or support
their own organizations, churches and governments;
. . .
'That all men have inalienable rights to think freely, to talk freely, to
write freely their own opinions and to counter or utter or write upon the
opinions of others;'
http://www.scientologytoday.org/corp/creed.htm
----------------------
Freddie
