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.

The Man Who Defined "Cool"

Isaac Hayes was the epitome of cool. It wasn't just his deep sexy baritone, his brilliant musical compositions, the magnificent "Shaft", the fact that he was the first African American Composer to win an Oscar for Best Musical Score or even the fact that he was a King in Ghana. It was more than all that.

Some people are tall, some are small, some are happy, some sad, but Isaac was cool. I saw him perform a few years ago with a large band. There were guitarists, drummers, horn players, saxophonists and more. They were all great musicians. They had played several numbers with other performers and the audience had enjoyed the performances, but when Isaac stepped onto the stage they all became cool.

The horn players stood differently, more relaxed, more laid-back, more ... cool. It was the same with all the rest: the way the guitarist strummed, the rythm that suddenly began to come out of the drums, the way the backing vocalists swayed as they sang into their microphones - they were all just so darn cool.

And when they played "Shaft" and Isaac conducted, we in the audience began to feel cool too. It was infectious!

So, to summarize, Isaac Hayes was cool incarnate.

He left his body yesterday and to those of us who believe in the existence of the human spirit, we know that although his body has stopped funtioning, Isaac is not gone. So we wait in eager anticipation for the cool to return.

Lots of Scientology News

The Scientology Today news site has tons of new stories about Scientology from all over the world.

There are several new stories there about everything from a drug education event in New York to volunteers helping people in disaster areas.

The site also has an "About Scientology" section that answers a huge pile of questions. It's a great site to browse.

Civil Rights Erosion

Some articles showing that slowly but surely our civil rights are being eaten away:

• US Border Agency Says It Can Seize Laptops
• Travelers' Laptops May Be Detained At Border
• Death Cab's Chris Walla: Threat to Homeland Security?

If this bothers you then tell your congressman or woman to support the The Engel/Paul “Securing Our Borders and Our Data Act”.

If this doesn't bother you then wake up.

New Videos

There are a couple of new videos out about Scientology and its founder L. Ron Hubbard. You can find them on the Scientology Video Channel:

• L. Ron Hubbard Founder
• Inside a Church of Scientology

Or you can see them on YouTube:

• L. Ron Hubbard: Founder
• Inside a Church of Scientology

They are pretty cool. You might learn some things you didn't know before about the religion and the guy who started it.