The "Science" behind Psychiatric Drugs

I just came across this fascinating article about The Psychiatric Drug Crisis in the pharmaceutical industry.

The article covers not only that crisis, but also the history behind many psychiatric drugs and the complete lack of science behind them.

For example, the use of the drug lithium for people who experienced mania came about because it sedated guinea pigs that had been injected with the urine of manic patients. Honest, I kid you not. If you don't believe me, read the article (see the link above).

Here is a quote from the article:

By 1960, the major classes of psychiatric drugs—among them, mood stabilizers, antipsychotics, antidepressants, and anti-anxiety drugs, known as anxiolytics—had been discovered and were on their way to becoming a seventy-billion-dollar market. Having been discovered by accident, however, they lacked one important element: a theory that accounted for why they worked (or, in many cases, did not). That didn’t stop drug makers and doctors from claiming that they knew.

The article also exposes the truth about the myth of the "chemical imbalance," which even its long time proponents no longer espouse.

It's nice to have someone in the actual industry completely validate everything you've been saying for the past twenty plus years.

Questions from a Nurse

I just got a couple of good questions:

Hello,

I am currently in nursing school to become an LVN. The new criteria is 'transcultural nursing'. This new subject is a way for nurses to cater better to the different cultures and religions that are in this wonderful world of ours. My theory teacher has assigned us all to give presentations on topics that we choose. Mine is Scientology. There are many questions that we are required to ask and learn so that we may educate our fellow classmates. Would anyone be willing to educate me on a couple of questions for now and then I can ask more later?

1. If ill or have a condition, do you seek out a doctor for help or a respected individual in the community?
2. If someone had a condition like hyper tension (high blood pressure), diabetes, or asthma, can you take prescription medications or are there remedies or herbs that you prefer? If so what are they and what is in them?
3. WHen pregnant does the individual see a doctor? If so does she go for regular check ups? In child birth are there rituals, traditions, or certain actions that are made or certain parts needed (such as umbilical cord, some cultures need it)? Is birth control an option for teens?

If I have offended anyone, I apologize. I would like to get as much information for my report and to educate my fellow classmates just as you will do for me. Thank you for any insight that you may provide and I look forward to hearing from you soon!

Best Wishes,

Taylor

Hey Taylor,

I'm going to answer each of these questions from the viewpoint of the Church as I understand it.

Q1: This depends on the individual and their preferences. It is recommended by the Church that a person get care when they are ill. This is one of the precepts of the book "The Way To Happiness". The book itself is non-religious, but it is recommended by the Church that Scientologists follow it. How the individual implements this recommendation is up to them. They could go to a medical doctor, a naturopath, a chiropractor or whoever they prefer. Such a choice is individual and not an area in which the Church interferes.

Q2: Again it is up to the individual. If you want to go to a medical doctor and take prescription drugs then that is your choice. If you prefer to try something that is actually effective (e.g., Lower high blood pressure, handle diabetes, handle asthma) then it is your choice. The Church simply recommends that you get care when you are ill.

Q3: This is really four questions in one.

The answer for the first and second parts: it is up to the individual.

For the third part of the question: At birth there is an additional recommendation that the birth is kept as quiet as possible. For full details you can read this article, Scientology Silent Birth: 'It's A Natural Thing' . There are no other recommendations and no requirements. The physical bits connected to birth should be handled in whatever way the individual decides. Standard hygienic practices are always a good idea.

And for the last part: guess what ... it is up to the individual and, in the case of someone underage, their parents.

Not any real earth shattering or controversial answers but, hopefully, they tell you what you want to know. If you have more questions please feel free to ask. I'll try to answer a bit quicker than I did with this one. Last week was rather busy for me.

Good luck with your studies.

Alternative Media (Guest Post)

This is a guest post from Anthony Fox, the former editor of No Agenda News.

I've been seeing some terrible stories about Scientology in the news recently and pretty much every one of them leaves me wondering, "What do the Scientologist's have to say about this?"

The mainstream media quite often leaves me, and many others, with unanswered questions. The alternative media came into existence as an attempt to answer those questions.

As the mainstream media becomes more and more connected to big corporations; promoting the corporate agenda at the expense of the individuals, small businesses and organizations; the alternative media grows in response.

So what is the alternative media?

Wikipedia:

Alternative media are media (newspapers, radio, television, movies, Internet, etc.) which are alternatives to the business or government-owned mass media. Proponents of alternative media argue that the mainstream media are biased. While sources of alternative media can also be biased (sometimes proudly so), proponents claim that the bias is significantly different than that of the mainstream media, hence these media provide an "alternative" viewpoint. As such,advocacy journalism tends to be a component of many alternative outlets.

Because the term "alternative" has connotations of self-marginalization, some media outlets now prefer the term "independent" over "alternative".

Most, if not all, alternative media does at least some reporting on media bias, as it is the reason alternative media exists.

I saw what I believed was media bias in the reporting on Scientology. So I did a piece on it 'Attacking Scientology' and a follow up 'Attacking Scientology Revisited' where I relate my experiences with the 'Anonymous' group after posting the original piece. I did these articles, not because I'm a member of the Church of Scientology (I'm not) or because I think Scientologists need to be defended. I did them because it was an opportunity to take a shot at the corporate owned media. And if you read the articles, you'll see, I hate bullies.

My name is Anthony Fox and I am the former editor of No Agenda News. I'm a member of the alternative media.

This is what I want:

I want you to find alternative media blogs.

I want you to subscribe to those blogs.

I want you to leave comments on those blogs.

I want you to tell other people about those blogs.

I want you to create links to those blogs on other websites, blogs, and forums.

I say these things, not only because they are true for me, but because they are true for all bloggers. And, bloggers are the foundation of the alternative media today. If you want your story to be reported in the alternative media, bloggers are the key. Scratch their backs and they may scratch yours.

Here's how you can use this:

I want you to find alternative media blogs. - Where do you find alternative media blogs? There are a number of excellent blogs and websites that aggregate the content of other blogs. The majority of the content on No Agenda News, when I was editor, was aggregated. I also had a list, called a blog roll, on the right hand side of the blog which was composed largely of sites that do aggregation. Follow a site that does aggregation and when you see a story that appeals to you, track it back to the authors personal blog.

Find author's that write about things that matter to you and are relevant to the type of stories you want to suggest they look into.

I want you to subscribe to those blogs. - Subscribe to a site that aggregates the kind of stories that interest you and subscribe to the personal blogs of the authors that write those stories. This requires a newsreader. I recommend Google Reader it's the most popular and it's what I use. You'll need to find the RSS feed to the blog you're trying to subscribe to, you may see an icon similar to this or a link that says 'RSS' or 'Atom Posts' or any of dozens of other possibilities. If it's too hard to figure out, move on to the next blog.

I want you to leave comments on those blogs. - If the author has a lot of people commenting you probably will want to find another blog. The author may not moderate their comments, which means they don't read much of them, and you want to stand out as someone who takes a particular interest in their work.

Don't leave comments anonymously. I probably don't need to say that here, huh?

It's important to leave comments that show you read and understood what the author was writing about. This might seem obvious, but apparently, it's not to most people who leave comments. If your comments are relevant to the post it will be noticed.

While you do want to engage the author, you don't want to seem desperate and lonely. If you get into a conversation with the author don't change the topic when that one is exhausted, wait for their next post and discuss that.

Keep in mind your goal is to develop a relationship with the author. Don't twist their arm or spam them.

I want you to tell other people about those blogs. - Tell people about the amazing article you read and let the author know. It wouldn't hurt to set up an account on one of the social bookmarking or social news sites: StumbleUpon, Delicious, Reddit etc. (I'm assuming you're already on Twitter, Facebook, Buzz or something similar. You are, aren't you?)

I want you to create links to those blogs on other websites, blogs, and forums. - Links are a way for people to find the authors blog and they also help the blogs SEO (search engine optimization) which makes the blog more likely to be found by people searching for the content contained in the blog. With this also, let the author know.

Forums are also good places to meet and engage bloggers. No Agenda Forum and Above Top Secret are forums I follow for alternative news, though I am sure there are many others. I suggest following them in your newsreader.

I hope this information is useful and gets used. I really would like to hear what the Scientologists have to say for themselves.

(Grahame's Note: When Anthony left No Agenda News and it became a reviews blog I updated this post to refer to "alternative media blogs" instead of specifically No Agenda. I attempted to alter the content of the post as little as possible so tell me if I didn't achieve that.)

Scientology Ex-Members

A small handful of ex-members of the Church of Scientology have been getting some attention in the media recently.

When you take "that species of journalist whose interest is more in sensational copy than in an objective statement of the truth."¹ and you connect them up with the noisiest of ex-members, each of whom is "likely to be suggestible and ready to enlarge or embellish his grievance"¹, you will understand why the resultant media attention occurs.

Of course, the truth is nowhere near as entertaining as the fictional accounts of a disgruntled ex-member who "acts from a personal motivation to vindicate himself and to regain his self-esteem, by showing himself to have been first a victim but subsequently to have become a redeemed crusader."¹

Courts and other official investigators ignore the testimony of such people because it is well known that ex-members "always act out of a scenario that vindicates themselves by shifting responsibility for their actions to the religious group."¹

Of course, not all ex-members have complaints. In fact, the majority have been found by sociologists to harbor no ill-will against their former faith and because of this, ex-members with an axe to grind have been given the name "apostates" to differentiate them from the benign majority of ex-members.

For a more detailed discussion of "apostates" and their recent allegations see this article: Defectors About Scientology - Breaking with Scientology

(1) Quoted from "Apostates and New Religious Movements" by Prof. Bryan Wilson

(2) Quoted from "The Reliability of Apostate Testimony About New Religious Movements" by Lonnie D. Kliever, Ph.D.

Scientology: What is the Sea Organization?

Here is a great article giving a very complete description of the religious order of the Church of Scientology, The Sea Organization (Sea Org): Church of Scientology Sea Organization.

This is probably the most comprehensive article I've seen on the subject.

Working with David Miscavige (3)

And yet another statement by someone who worked with David Miscavige for decades: General Affidavit Declaration Of Information By Jason L. Bennick.

.

Working with David Miscavige (2)

Here is another statement from someone who worked closely with David Miscavige for decades: Affidavit Of Yael Lustgarten. It's a fascinating read.

My Time in the Sea Organization of the Church of Scientology

The Sea Organization is the religious order of the Church of Scientology. Many religions have religious orders, in the Catholic Church this often consists of monks and nuns who swear oaths of chastity and poverty. They dedicate themselves to their religion and to helping others, e.g. Mother Teresa is an outstanding example of this.

For a good description of the Sea Organization and why it is called the "Sea" Org read the article here: The Sea Organization, The Religious Order Of Scientology.

I was in the Sea Org for a couple of years. In that time I worked in the staff training area, training executives in the Church's administrative technology.

I enjoyed it, I learned a lot, the job had its tough times and its fun times and I made many good friends.

It was very clear from the start that I was working in a religious fraternity. We didn't wear monks' garb and we didn't pray several times a day but we were definitely and without doubt working in a religious capacity.

I was in the Sea Org at Saint Hill in England, which is a beautiful place (that's what you see in the picture above). I loved to take walks in the gardens in front of the Manor house. It was so peaceful and serene there.

I've moved to the US since I left the Sea Org but recently, on Facebook, I've found old friends I knew there. It's so cool to be able to connect up again despite the distance between us.

Both my kids were recently in the Sea Org, over here in the States. Their experiences were very similar to mine and both have many good friends from their time serving our Church.

Sorry I couldn't be more controversial or put some exciting conflict in there like the news media always manages to, but often the truth is not as entertaining as fiction.

If you have any questions about the Sea Org then I'd be happy to answer them. Just make sure you follow my blog guidelines.

Recent Allegations

A couple of unreliable yet noisy media outlets have recently publicised allegations made by a former Scientologist against the leader of our religion, David Miscavige.

If you read these allegations and are wondering about their accuracy then you should read this: Mark "Marty" Rathbun.

If you wonder about the reliability of ex-members and what they have to say about their former religion (and this doesn't just apply to Scientology - witness the havoc caused by ex-members of Opus Dei and how Dan Brown used their outrageous allegations in his book, "The Da Vinci Code") then you should read what sociologists have to say about these "apostates":

- The Reliability of Apostate Testimony About New Religious Movements
- Apostates and New Religious Movements

A telling paragraph from the second article:

Neither the objective sociological researcher nor the court of law can readily regard the apostate as a creditable or reliable source of evidence. He must always be seen as one whose personal history predisposes him to bias with respect to both his previous religious commitment and affiliations, the suspicion must arise that he acts from a personal motivation to vindicate himself and to regain his self-esteem, by showing himself to have been first a victim but subsequently to have become a redeemed crusader. As various instances have indicated, he is likely to be suggestible and ready to enlarge or embellish his grievances to satisfy that species of journalist whose interest is more in sensational copy than in a objective statement of the truth.

-

Scientology and the Da Vinci Code

The other day, a co-worker who has the subtly and diplomatic skills of a charging rhino (I'll call him Bill), asked another co-worker (Joe) who the woman and child were in the picture on his desk. Joe replied that it was the Virgin Mary and baby Jesus. Bill went on to extract from Joe that Joe was a Catholic. Bill the rhino then asked Joe if he'd read the Da Vinci Code and what he thought about it. Joe (who does have some diplomatic skills) said he hadn't and attempted to move the subject off to something less controversial, but Bill persisted.

Being a mediator at heart, I jumped in and said a couple of things about the book that directed the rhino charge elsewhere and saved Joe from further embarrassment.

Having read a couple of the books referenced in the Da Vinci Code and not having a foot in either camp, I sent Joe a link to an FAQ, that authoritatively and accurately debunks Dan Brown's assertion that "all descriptions of [..]documents, and secret rituals in this novel are accurate" and are based specifically on the fact that "in 1975 Paris' Bibliothèque Nationale discovered parchments, known as Les Dossiers Secrets" which reveal the story of the Priory of Sion. (See The Da Vinci Code Faq.)

As I said, I have read a couple of the books that are referenced in the Da Vinci Code and I must say they make fascinating reading and I can understand how they could have influenced Brown to write his book. They are filled with fascinating speculations and intriguing deductions but they are not filled with much in the way of facts.

I re-read the Da Vinci Code FAQ and was struck by the idea that, in all probability, millions of people now believe that the Priory of Sion exists and that Christ was married-with-kids. And all based on the attempts of an impoverished French would-be aristocrat to ascend to the thrown of France followed by the machinations of a TV producer attempting to improve his ratings by embellishing an already outrageous story.

It's a frightening commentary on how gullible people are. Just because a fiction writer says at the start of his book that something is true doesn't mean it is, but apparently millions of people are willing to just accept it without question.

So what has all this got to do with Scientology? Well, if you are foolish enough to start hunting around the Internet for web-sites about Scientology you will find many that say extremely alarming, damaging and downright nasty things about Scientology and the Church of Scientology and, like Dan Brown in his opening note to the Da Vinci Code, they will assert that what they are saying are "facts".

Of course I can simply tell you, "It's a pack of lies" and then you can say, "So how can I tell if your blog isn't just a pack of lies also?" And the answer is that, without further research, you can't.

So, here is what I suggest:

• If you are not interested in further research then please don't believe any of it. Don't believe the detractors and don't believe me. Just stay completely neutral on the subject. Allow Scientologists the same rights as anyone else when it comes to what they believe and what religion they wish to practice (See: Universal Declaration of Human Rights)
• If you are willing to do some further research then buy a basic book on the subject (such as Dianetics: The Modern Science of Mental Health or Scientology: The Fundamentals of Thought), read it and then use the practical methods the book gives you to improve your life or the lives of others. At that point you will be able to evaluate for yourself if the subject is valid or not.
• Another thing you can do is go to a Church of Scientology (Scientology Church Locator) for a free introductory lecture or a low priced introductory service. That way you get to see what the subject is, use the practical methods of the subject to see if they work and meet real-life Scientologists so you can observe people who use the subject daily in their lives. Then you can make up your own mind based on personal, first-hand experience.

Is it a deal?

-

Question about "Scientology: A History of Man" book

A question about a book:

First of all, Grahame, nice work on the site. There is a lot of useful information here. (Also, I read your profile, and we have similar interests in music. I only recently discovered Symphony X!)

I am not a Scientologist, and can't actually see myself ever becoming one, but I have been researching it lately, just to try to get an idea what it's all about.

Here's my question for you: what is your opinion on Hubbard's book, Scientology: A History of Man? Frankly, it seems (to the non-Scientologist, at least) a little farfetched, e.g. Piltdown Man, clams, etc. I only recently acquired a copy myself, and have only glossed through it so far.

I would just be interested in whatever light you can shed on this interesting book would be appreciated.

Regards,
Cory


Hey Cory,

I'm glad you like the site. Thanks for your question. I'm always ready to answer questions from a fellow music lover :)

First let me say that if you want to get an idea of what Scientology is all about then the Scientology Handbook site is a good place to start. It contains down-to-earth, practical applications of Scientology to everyday life. I'd suggest that as a starting point and then, if you are still interested, go for the Dianetics and Scientology Basic Books.

A History of Man is not going to tell you what Scientology is because that was not its purpose when it was written.

Here is what I know of the book "A History of Man": In the late 1940's Ron Hubbard developed methods to help people remember. He used these methods to alleviate problems caused by past traumas (birth, operations, injuries, etc.). He published the book Dianetics: The Modern Science of Mental Health so he could share his discoveries with others.

As more and more people received Dianetics counseling some began to recall things that had not occurred in their current life. At first these were called "imaginary incidents" and were thought to be false memories caused by the traumas, but it was found that if these incidents were addressed as if they were real and the trauma removed from them, the person got better. When they were treated as imagination and ignored, the person did not get better. So Ron decided to treat them as real and researched further to find out what was really going on.

After a great deal of research with a large number of people Ron found that many people recalled the same or very similar things. The people recalling these same or similar incidents had never met and had never heard of these things before, yet they recalled them from their own viewpoint.

Ron's eventual conclusion was that these were incidents that people were recalling from past-lives. He published his initial findings in the book "History of Man".

The book was meant for experienced Dianetics and Scientology practitioners who had encountered past-lives while counseling others. It was aimed at helping them understand what they were encountering and at helping them help others. It is not a beginning or introductory book.

The couple of things you mention from the book in your question are actually very unimportant and got put in merely so practitioners would know what they were encountering if they came across them. They get a very brief mention in the book and were not deeply researched.

For someone who has never encountered past-lives, the book might appear pretty wild in places, but if you have experience with past-lives, either with your own or with those of people you have counseled, then it doesn't seem that wild at all.

I hope that answers your question. Feel free to ask any more that you may have.

Scientology and Aliens

Crystal just posted an excellent article about Aliens and Scientology. I think she tells the truth about this subject very well.

Have a read and tell me what you think: Aliens!

You can read my take on this subject here: Why Aliens?

A Question from "Magnolia"

Hey Magnolia,

Thanks for your question. You say: I'm curious by nature. I've been searching for a while sites about Scientology. The majority of them, no offence intended, say it is "trash". I can't help but ask myself "why?".

There are sites on the Internet attacking Scientology, but they are not the majority. I just did a search on the word "Scientology" on the three leading search engines and I found 69% of the sites that came back on the first page of results were positive and 14% were neutral. So that leaves only 17% negative. That is not a majority.

There are millions of Scientologists all over the world who are very happy with their religion and how it helps them in life compared to a small number of very noisy people who attack it. The majority who like it are busy getting on with their lives and helping others. The minority are so consumed with hatred that they spend hours and hours each day spreading lies and distortions.

Here is a video of Scientologists giving their opinions about their religion

So now the question, "Why do they attack my religion?"

There are a several answers:
First is the fact that any religious movement and any group that seeks to improve the world and help their fellow man will be attacked by a small minority of bigots:

• The Jewish religion has a huge website devoted to defending itself: Anti-Defamation League.
• According to the "Watch Unto Prayer" movement the Roman Catholic Church is actually a renewed version of the cult of Mithra and other extremist fundamentalist Christians say the Pope is the Antichrist.
• Examples of attacks on the Internet on well known people.

Scientology is just another group being attacked by the same type of Internet crazies.

There are those who make a living out of attacking new religious movements:

• Article on The (old) Cult Awareness Network
• Why do some people oppose Scientology?
• Anti-Religious Extremists

One of the main methods used by these bigoted extremists is to spread lies about a new religion on the Internet. In a paper presented at the annual conference of the Association for Sociology of Religion (ASR), in Chicago in August 1999, Massimo Introvigne said:

Authoritative scholars of information terrorism via the Internet, such as Denning (1999, 101-129), include "perception management" in their studies, in the form of "offensive operations [which] reach the minds of a population by injecting content into the population’s information space". She lists systematic "lies and distortions", fabrications, hoaxes, social engineering, "denouncement" ("messages that discredit, defame, demonize, or dehumanize an opponent"), and -- strictly related to the latter -- "conspiracy theories". Denning also includes harassment through hate mail or "spamming", and even systematic copyright infringement (90-94). The latter, she argues, may in fact become part of a terrorist "offensive information warfare" when aimed at destroying an organization or corporation through the destruction of copyright as one of its most valuable assets.

The sites you have come across calling Scientology "trash" are using "messages that discredit, defame, demonize, or dehumanize an opponent" as described here.

In the same article Introvigne says:

The Church of Scientology is the subject of the largest number of such assaults.

He describes one of the largest websites that attacks Scientology:

Among hundreds of pages, one can hardly find any reconstruction of Scientology’s beliefs, or a philosophical, or theological, criticism of its worldview.

This particular website also attacks individuals who are Scientologists, attempting to encourage others to discriminate against them:

It is difficult to be amused when reading Hausherr’s Web page laundry lists of individual Scientologists and of "companies and organizations owned or managed by people listed as Scientologists". Some are well-known Scientologists such as Kristie Alley or John Travolta. Most, however, are private individuals unknown to the general public. Companies "owned or managed by people listed as Scientologists" (an ambiguous concept) range from law firms to architects, computer businesses, and to Elvis Presley Enterprises (Priscilla Presley is a Scientologist). Finally, there is a list of "miscellaneous support for Scientology", including both academics and other scholarly "cult apologists" (Hausherr maintains an encyclopedia of cult apologists in the form of a FAQ, and posts it regularly to Usenet groups), as well as others accused of being "soft" on Scientology. The latter include the CNN (accused of having "a long record of supporting Scientology"), the IRS (because of the 1993 settlement), the Los Angeles Police Department, and even a lawyer who actually fought against Scientology but settled in terms Hausherr did not approve of. It is unlikely that CNN or Elvis Presley Enterprises will really suffer from being listed in Hausherr’s Web page. A doctor, dentist, or architect in a small town, or a small business, on the other hand, may be easily discriminated against. If "Scientology is evil", nobody should associate with an "evil" business. And who would want a Scientologist as a doctor or architect if Scientologists are "often mentally ill"? Although no actual violence is advocated, the list, a main feature of Hausherr’s site, becomes in fact a "hit list".

Why Tilman Hausherr maintains his hate site is a difficult question to answer but then hatred and bigotry are difficult to understand in this modern world.

Then there are those who see Scientology as a threat to their livelihood:

• This article talks about the motives behind the attacks of "Anonymous" on the Church of Scientology.

Does that answer your question?

The Secrets of Scientology

I really get bored with "know-best" comments from people who are not Scientologists, have never studied it, have only read twisted and inaccurate descriptions of it or the supposed "secrets" of Scientology and yet think they know more about it than me.

After all, I've only been a Scientologist for over thirty years, studied millions of words on the subject and listened to hours and hours of lectures. I've only had thousands of hours of auditing. I've only done most of the available auditing in Scientology, so of course I would know almost nothing about it.

What really bores me the most is people who don't understand the words used in the subject telling me that I'm lying about what Scientologists believe. Yet when they explain what I'm "lying" about they expose their lack of understanding and the fact that they haven't bothered to find out the facts before spouting off.

What brought me to this tirade? It was a comment from Gigazz in response to my article "Why Aliens?". He (or she) said "Therefore, 'thetans' ARE alien ghosts. And, as we all know by now, dealing with these thetans are the key to happiness. That is the spirituality of Scientology". Thanks so much Gigazz for telling me what the spirituality of my religion is.

One slight flaw in your reasoning is that the term "thetan" means "the person himself-not his body or his name, the physical universe, his mind, or anything else; that which is aware of being aware; the identity which is the individual."

Due to this basic misunderstanding of the word "thetan", Gigazz also said, "You've got somebody else in your body, mucking up your head, and you've got to fix that in order to become 'clear'. That's the whole point of Scientology. Fix yourself. Get better - Get rid of your thetans."

If you put the correct definition of "thetan" into what Gigazz said you'll see that what he is proposing is ridiculous. How can you get rid of yourself? He has some weird idea that you "have a thetan" whereas the correct definition of the word shows that you "are a thetan."

He also has the term "Clear" totally screwed up. Clear means: "the name of a state achieved through auditing or an individual who has achieved this state. A Clear is a being who no longer has his own reactive mind. " Simply put, a Clear has gotten rid of past traumas that were causing him to act irrationally.

I was going to just delete Gigazz' comment and forget about it, but I realized there are probably others out there with the same misunderstandings.

I want to stress that I welcome genuine questions. If you've read something weird about Scientology and you want to clear it up then go ahead and ask. I have some rules for comments, so please follow them.

But if you want to tell me I'm lying about my beliefs because you read some nonsense on a web site written by someone who didn't understand basic Scientology terms, then forget about it. You will either get no reply or you'll suffer a tirade about your lazy stupidity like Gigazz just got.

Is Scientology a Perfect System?

Luis said: Hi Grahame. I am glad to have found a pro Scientology set of opinions and perspectives. From my viewpoint, personal growth, freedom, sanity, strength and greatness requires being able to examine honestly and objectively all viewpoints available pro and con and being able to recognize and admit to the one that is being perceived as having the most truth in it, even if painful, even if it makes one, or one's viewpoint, or one's group flawed.

While the Mantra "what is true for you..." is frequently used by Scientologists to point out the intention of the Church to encourage freedom to think, it, from my experience, is neither encouraged, nor applied nor nourished, but used to “impossibilitize” the existence of mass production of blinded followers because there exists this precept.

Grahame said: I don't know what your experience is, but that is not mine. I've found Scientologists to be strong individuals who definitely think for themselves. A lot of Scientologists I know own their own businesses, you can't be successful in business if you can't think for yourself and think on your feet.

Luis said: From the moment you read Keeping Scientology working, and from the statements I have seen of Ron Hubbard claiming to have THE only valid viewpoints and technology, THE only person able to be the source of spiritual-growth-producing” data, THE only “bridge to total freedom”; THE only person capable of decoding life….the nourishing of critical thinking and examination of information presented begins to be slowly stultified.

Grahame said: What you say is not accurate. The article "Keeping Scientology Working" says that Scientology is "workable". It is a workable way to achieve spiritual improvement. That is why the article is called "Keeping Scientology Working".

There is a whole set of articles called the "Keeping Scientology Working Series." Number 4 in the series is called "Safeguarding Technology" and in it L. Ron Hubbard says, "Scientology is a workable system. This does not mean it is the best possible system or a perfect system. Remember and use that definition. Scientology is a workable system."

If a system claims to be workable then a person can figure out pretty quickly for themselves if it is or is not. If the system says do A, B and C and you will get result D, then you can test that out easily. That is what the "what is true for you" quote is all about, seeing for yourself if it works or not.

If you decide it is not a workable system then fine. Go find another religion. But if you do find that it is workable then follow it correctly, so it works.

LRH also says in the same article, "People have following the route mixed up with 'the right to have their own ideas.' Anyone is certainly entitled to have opinions and ideas ...."

Luis said: If Ron would have presented his viewpoints as HIS viewpoints and not THE viewpoints to be had, he would have been encouraging (by allowing the space) for evaluation of his precepts and, moreover, for development of the capacity for individuals to think for themselves, to be determining for themselves, even while in The Church, what is or is not true, what makes sense and what does not.

Grahame said: I covered this point in my article, Scientology: What is true for you. Briefly, LRH presented the technology as something that works and that should be exactly followed to get the results because that is what he found. He presented his opinions as merely opinions that you can take or leave. But read the whole article and the comments as it covers that and more.

The most common statement I hear from Scientologists is "This is what Ron says..." and not "This is what I think". That is, to me, an indication of the loss of the ability to establish and be faithful to ones own viewpoints.

That is why, in my opinion, the perception exists, in some people, including myself, that in talking to a Scientologist, you are most likely to get canned responses, including "what is true for you....."

Grahame says: If you are referring to talking to Scientologists about Scientology then, sure, you will probably hear "Ron says" a lot, because he's the one who wrote the materials that make up the subject. It's like talking about Christianity and saying "the bible says" or talking about General Relativity and saying "Einstein says". Of course the people taking about it will refer to those sources because they define the subject.

Also, has it never crossed your mind that someone saying "Ron says ..." may be telling you what is true for him personally?

When it comes to other subjects I don't find Scientologists saying "Ron says ...." For Example, when I am solving problems in my job, I often am working with a team to solve them. If I think we should do something I say "I think we should do blah. What do you guys think?" I go out of my way to get collaboration going because that's what I've found works in my profession.

Luis said: In my opinion, once you become a “Keeping Scientology Working Scientologist”, the conduct and intention, in any situation, becomes promoting the illusion that Scientology and Ron are flawless, pure, the greatest ever, and incapable of sinning.

Grahame says: That is your opinion and "in any situation" is a huge generality. It is certainly not my observation. Scientologists will insist that the technology is applied correctly because they have seen for themselves that applying it correctly gets desirable results and they want to help their fellow man. That's where they will be insistent.

Your insistence that we think Scientology and Ron are "flawless ..." etc., is not correct. I can only give you my own personal viewpoint and that of the Scientologists I know personally: L. Ron Hubbard was a great guy who figured out how to help us raise ourselves spiritually to new heights. He never claimed to be perfect, above others or something special. Scientology is a workable system of spiritual improvement. Ron never claimed it was perfect (see my comment earlier).

Luis said: These, of course, are my viewpoints. Regards, Luis

Grahame says: thanks for your comments.

Cost of Scientology Services - Again

This question has been covered extensively here: Cost of Scientology Services. However, it seems from Tom's question that there is still some misunderstanding, so I will answer it again in order to clear up any confusion.

Tom Newton asks:

Ok, my question is this. You say "training" in scientology costs very little compared to a 4 year degree in any other religion.

OT VIII costs upwards of $300,000 USD to attain, assuming you have no "overts" to "go over again" (aka another intensive at $12,500USD). - Amounts taken from ASHO ordering form.

A 4 year degree cost at most $50,000USD from any recognized theological college.

Would you care to explain possibly where my data is incorrect in regards to this?

Hey Tom Newton, I will try to explain where your data is incorrect.

First of all, your data confuses Scientology Training with Scientology Auditing. For example, OT VIII is not training, it is a level of spiritual ability reached through Auditing.

Training is what you do to learn how to apply the spiritual technology of Scientology to help others. This would compare with the degree at the theological college. I don't have price lists handy but $50,000 would be more than enough to get you up to Class VIII, the highest level of auditor training if you are not working in a Church. This is actually equivalent to more than a four year degree.

Auditing is the spiritual counseling that uses the spiritual technology. Auditing is more expensive than training because it is one-on-one and requires a lot of support staff for it to be delivered standardly. There is a very large amount of auditing available in Scientology. For example I am on OT VII and it has taken me over 30 years to get that far and it has NOT cost me $300,000. I don't know where that figure comes from but it is not accurate.

Also, if you want to pay less for auditing then you can get trained and find someone else to "co-audit" with - you audit them and they audit you. Or you can work in a Church and get your auditing for free. The way it works is the more you help others the less it costs you.

On your data that intensives (12 1/2 hours of auditing) cost "$12,500" - I have never ever paid that much for an intensive. Also the statement "Amounts taken from ASHO ordering form" means that your figures for such things as the cost of all services up to OT VIII are going to be wrong because ASHO doesn't deliver even half of those services. It is primarily a training Church that delivers very specialized auditing services, so any figures you get from an ASHO donations list are not representative of other Churches. (Perhaps that's what the $12,500 figure was, something very specialized.)

I hope that answers your questions.

What we don't believe

It is quite amazing the weird ideas people get about what Scientologists do and don't believe.  Here are a couple of weird ideas that Julia has encountered:

Scientology and... Mint?
Scientologists - What Do We Believe About Hell and Earth?

There are plenty of others, here is one I blogged about in May: Scientology and Weird Stuff

I often wonder where they get all this stuff from.  Someone has a good imagination.

Why Aliens?

This is the second article on this subject. The first is here: Aliens and Counting Planets

Here are some questions and answers regarding Scientology and aliens:

1. Do Scientologists worship aliens? No.
2. Do Scientologists believe that someone in the religion is in contact with aliens? No.
3. Do Scientologist believe we are descended from aliens? No.
4. Do books on Scientology mention aliens? No.
5. Are aliens contained in the beliefs of Scientology? No.
6. When religious scholars have examined Scientology have they found that Scientology contains a belief in aliens? No.

So why do you find descriptions of Scientology on the Internet that insist that we do believe such things?

The two simplest explanations I have come up with are Religious Bigotry and the thing the media seems to worship called "Controversy."

Bigotry

People who, for whatever reason, hate Scientology and Scientologists are the ones who started this whole "they believe in aliens" thing. It's an old technique: you make the target of your hatred look weird, strange or dangerous so that people won't object when you attack them.

One of the most famous uses of this technique was in the creation of the "Protocols of the Elders of Zion", a fabricated document that was claimed to be the Jewish plan for world domination. Despite being proven over and over and over and over again to be a complete fake, it is still being used to this day, a hundred years after its first publication, by anti-Semitic groups to attack Jews.

So I guess Scientologists have to expect that the same old lies about us will still be circulating in a hundred years. It seems to be part of human nature to hold onto false data to justify hatred or bad acts.

Controversy

The media seems to think that controversy is essential to a news story. Forget such unimportant things as facts or truth. Controversy, Conflict, Big Names, Harm, Sex, Money - these are the things the media believes attracts eyeballs or sells newspapers. So if some bigot says "they believe in aliens" then that is far more attractive to the news hounds than "they believe man is a spiritual being."

Truth

From the article "Doctrine of the Scientology Religion"

Scientology religious doctrine includes certain fundamental truths. Prime among them are that man is a spiritual being whose existence spans more than one life and who is endowed with abilities well beyond those which he normally considers he possesses. He is not only able to solve his own problems, accomplish his goals and gain lasting happiness, but also to achieve new states of spiritual awareness he may never have dreamed possible.

Because we believe we have lived before (something we share with most Eastern religions), because we believe we've been around for a very, very long time, because we believe that we (as spiritual beings) existed before this planet did and because we can recall existences prior to this planet, the bigots twist this to mean we believe in aliens and try to position us with the "UFO Religions" who believe they are currently in contact with aliens. I hope my post yesterday and this one show how false that is.

Bigots don't care about truth. They will twist it to suit their own ends (Just look at how "Jeff" twisted the beliefs of Christianity to make it look like a UFO Religion). The order of magnitude of the attacks on Scientology is nothing compared to what the Jews have had to deal with for thousands of years or the Mormons for 150 years, but the same methodology of misinformation, twisted facts and outright lies is being used.

So the moral of the story is "don't believe everything you read: think for yourself".

Aliens and Counting Planets

In the last couple of months I've been challenged in anonymous comments (from their style I think they're all from the same guy) regarding Scientology and "Aliens".

I've already said a couple of times that Scientologists don't believe in "Aliens" but this doesn't seem to satisfy Mr. (or Ms.) Anonymous.  So let me try for a definitive answer.

Let's start by examining the scientific view of aliens.  In our galaxy there are an estimated 100 billion stars and 30 billion Earth-like planets.  There are an estimated 200 billion galaxies in the observable universe.  So that means there are about 6,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 Earth-like planets in just the observable universe.  (That is 6 sextillion, if my arithmetic is right and I didn't mistype any zeros.) 

Even if the odds of life forming on such a planet are one in a billion that still leaves a lot of Earth-like planets with life on them out there.  So I think the chances of there being life on other planets are pretty good. Someone else did a similar calculation here: Is there any other life in the Universe?, and, using the Drake Equation, Frank Drake came up with an estimate of 10,000 technological civilizations in our galaxy alone.

So, do I believe in that sort of alien?  Sure and I'm in good company: The SETI Institute.

Now let's move on to the "space alien" theories that you can find around the Internet.  I'm not very familiar with them, but I did read a book a couple of years ago that was supposed to be historical but by the end it was telling me all about the "Twelfth Planet".  It was very entertaining and would make a great sci-fi story but there are such obvious gaping holes in the theory that I am amazed that so many people take it seriously.

So, do I believe in that sort of alien? No.

Now what about the "UFO Religions" which cover such movements as Raelism, Zetatalk and the Aetherius Society.  Such movements have belief in the existence of extraterrestrials and/or UFOs as a central component of their belief system.  In order to write this article I took a quick look at those three so that I could answer the question:

So, do I believe in that sort of alien?  No.

So, if I, a typical Scientologist, say I don't believe in aliens (except in the first example above) and I insist that other Scientologists don't either, then why are there claims around the Internet that we do?

Stay tuned and I'll tell you tomorrow.

"I hate Scientology," he said

While out exercising, a friend of mine got into a conversation with a guy and just as they were ending the chat, the fellow said, "You'd better not hang around here. The Scientologists will recruit you." (They were not far from the local church.)

In a light, joking tone, my friend said, "Too late. I was already recruited." To which the man replied, "I hate Scientology. I hate Tom Cruise. I hate John Travolta ..." and more.

My friend could have just told the guy to stick his opinions where the sun doesn't shine, but she decided to find out why he "hated" everything about Scientology.

It turned out that he had never been to a Church of Scientology and he had never met or spoken to a Scientologist. His only source of data had been nasty Internet web sites.

After two hours of finding out what his objections were and handling them with factual data, the man apologized for his earlier attitude and utterances. He now knew some facts, whereas before he had known only rumors.

They parted on friendly terms. He was no longer antagonistic toward Scientology and my friend had found a new friend.

So, the moral of the story is: don't blindly believe everything you read on the Internet. Find out for yourself and make up your own mind.