scientology & celebrities

Ripping on Scientology is just as bad as ripping on any other major religion

Wright makes a pretty good case for this in his epilogue imho. the upshot being that maybe we should be harder on all religions lol

― How dare you tarnish the reputation of Turturro's yodel (Shakey Mo Collier), Monday, February 3, 2014 5:19 PM Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

I guess I'll wait to read it for myself to pass judgment, but if so I would be a little disappointed, because that sounds like a cop-out. Scientology certainly seems worse than a lot of other religions to me so far!

tbf they have only figuratively burned people at the stake

oh sure, I mean contemporary ones

I do think there are some nice subtle jabs at psychotherapy in there though

finished reading 'going clear' today. was expecting to find myself gawping at all the space opera stuff but the author presents the material in such a way that the bonkers secret OT stuff seems secondary to the more mundane abuse and everyday suffering. god the sea org sounds so miserable! the musical chairs story!

the points about how ppl in the church have their own language and style of thought (hubbard's style of thought?) is fascinating. this miscavige quote was partic. amazing:

What is a mission? Okay. Well, you have a situation and a situation is defined as a departure, major departure from the ideal scene, and at the bottom of that there's some Y [Why]. Y is defined as an explanation that opens a door to a handling. And if you have actually pulled the strings on the situation all the way down, you will now have a Y, which means that the situation can be resolved. A mission would take a situation, knowing what the Y is, and therefore knowing what exact handling steps are thus possible a result of the door being opened because the Y was found by evaluation, and they would ... operate on what is known as a set of mission orders, and the set of mission orders is an exact series of steps, sometimes consecutive, sometimes not, sometimes they can be done concurrently within each other...These mission orders have an exact purpose to be accomplished, exact major targets, exact primary targets, exact vital targets, exact operating targets; they have listed the means of mission communication, and they have also listed the target date for completion

i mean...what the fuck!!

One of the things that keeps striking me as I get into the second half of the book is THIS IS GOING ON RIGHT NOW. Like every time there's a reference to Million Dollar Baby or Crash or some recent cultural touchstone. Somehow it's easier to believe a fantastic story like this where it's set in the past.

And oh wow, the Cruise stuff -- I knew he was deeply involved but I had no idea about this thing of him basically living like the crown price of Scientology.

I watched 13 min of All the Right Moves the other day and while it was horrible and i had to turn it off, it was weird to see young TC acting like an entitled bratty young guy but not a frothing psychopath.

I just googled miscavige out of curiosity and apparently Rathbun's wife has an ongoing lawsuit against the church for an alleged campaign of harassment

oh sure, I mean contemporary ones

Wright's point is that at their inception, pretty much every religion involved ridiculous claims, violence, social+psychological upheaval and disconnection from the prevailing norm etc.

ie Scientology is in its infancy and is not that different from the state of other religions at their inception. this seems pretty inarguable to me.

You mean the argument that the Harvard dude gets paid to make on behalf of Scientology in the book? I thought that was pretty stupid.

Like as though there's some victorian science style "THE PHASES OF RELIGION" chart where you can point to the "VIOLENT FUCKED UP ABUSIVE INFANCY" stage on the chart.

I mean (1) no, not EVERY religion goes through that stage, and (2) this is a religion that developed in the 20th and 21st century, i.e. in the modern world. We have different standards now. You don't get a fucking pass because you're an infant-stage religion or whatever.

Yeah, and not every religion has a paper trail like this one. Hence: faith. But this stuff transcends faith into the realm of outright obfuscation, blackmail and lies. I can't think of any religion as outright vindictive or litigious toward dissenters. Talk about the banality of evil: CoS will kidnap your family and sue you into submission.

I got this from the library Monday, finished it Wednesday. Probably caused me to swear out loud while reading more than any book in recent memory. So many horrific things that the book doesn't even have time to explore in depth, like the 18 yo girl who tried to leave and instead was held on a ship for the next 12 years.

For all the things that get called Orwellian, the things done to language by Scientologists seem above and beyond, it kind of terrifies me to read these passionate invocations of "tech" and "enturbulation" and "confront."

Naziism had its violent infancy stage like every other religion, etc.

You mean the argument that the Harvard dude gets paid to make on behalf of Scientology in the book? I thought that was pretty stupid.

Wright circles back to this POV at the conclusion and generally validates it

this is a religion that developed in the 20th and 21st century, i.e. in the modern world. We have different standards now. You don't get a fucking pass because you're an infant-stage religion or whatever.

and fwiw I think this is legit, and Wright doesn't give them a pass either.

like sure Xtianity and Mormonism were basically insane in their infancy, but their claims didn't have to withstand scientific rigor etc

what makes scientology unique afaik is that they treat some of their fundamental religious beliefs as copyrighted secrets and outright lie about them.

but yes, doing that isn't as bad as the inquisition or whatever

The original e-meters were Campbells soup cans! Soup Cans! With wires attached!

Wright circles back to this POV at the conclusion and generally validates it

― How dare you tarnish the reputation of Turturro's yodel (Shakey Mo Collier), Friday, February 7, 2014 4:03 PM Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

I feel like you have to turn part of your brain off to validate this conclusion

FWIW I'm basically fine with any religious "truth claim" that operates purely in the world of faith. If you want to believe that thetans inhabit your body, that the world is 73 trillion years old, etc., that's fine with me, as long as you're not allowing that belief to override scientific truth, to operate in the material world, etc. I don't mind people believing in the bible, so long as they aren't using young-earth-creationism to deny basic scientific facts that have actual real-world consequences. I don't mind people believing in the power of unblocking their impedences or whatever to heal themselves, so long as the church isn't denying its members actual medical care.

In other words I don't have a problem with "crazy" beliefs, only with harmful ones. Scientology has its share of harmful beliefs, even putting aside how terrible the actual organization is.

I'm not sure where you're drawing the distinction there

ie between harmful and crazy

I think it's pretty clear

e.g. "Prayer will help me heal" vs. "Prayer is preferable to surgery as a way to treat my son's cancer"

Scientology will "clear" me versus psychotherapy will heal me is probably the big point of contention

The fact that a great number of people are pulled into their church as a life-organizing entity, and that it decries psychology for using the same methodologies that Scientology bastardizes and adds placebos to, is probably one of the more important but harder to prove bits

The majority of people lured in aren't there for the religious bits -- if they're not there as a career-booster in hollywood, they're there for auditing, a community, and the self-help stuff.

That isn't to say that psychiatry and the modern state of prescribing psychological drugs don't have placebos, only that it's incredibly disingenuous for Scientology to place itself in opposition to therapy

Key to the book is the LRH epiphany that there can be no end to the treatment. It's self-help that's totally beholden to someone else. You never get better, because you're never done. You're never "clear." And all the while you are accruing debts - personal and monetary - you cannot pay. I was fascinated by all the machinations involving secret next level instructions or whatever, claims of lost chapters or new courses.

idk christianity has this debt you can never repay called original sin, right

Yeah, but that's made up.

loads of religions have extorted money from their followers over the years, let's be real

would anyone like to purchase some indulgences etc

But they literally hand you an itemized bill at the end, sometimes in the six figures. What other religion does that?

u go to hell if you don't tithe 10% iirc

idk christianity has this debt you can never repay called original sin, right

every Christian denomination, even the Catholic church at this point, acknowledges that salvation is possible outside of its particular sect (except maybe not the JWs). comparing scientology to other faiths on an "eh, they all pull the same hokum" level is really simplistic thinking - all religions are interested in persuading their congregants to remain in the fold & to donate their money, no doubt. and all are interested in insisting on the veracity of their truth-claims. not all charge outright for access to higher levels of truth on a cash-for-truth basis, and almost none will actively make your life miserable if you speak out against them publicly. Catholics did this centuries ago, yes, in a very different way. the comparison is really, really surface-level though

let's not pretend churches/religions are static things. I wasn't saying they are all the same at this current point in time.

almost none will actively make your life miserable if you speak out against them publicly

Romans just fed you to the lions iirc

if anything this stuff makes Scientologists look really archaic, resorting to outdated tactics and acting like modernity never happened

I in no way intended that to be serious, I feel that scientology's economic and social debt scale isn't in any way comparable to any major world religion currently extant, at least to my limited knowledge.

I think the "eh, most religions are vicious and angry at the start, or are even vicious and angry" is a pretty poor lens for viewing Scientology. Yes, religious institutions have their abuses but it's generally seen as a good to route them out, for the most part.

tl;dr I meant that as a lazy zing against the idea, not as an endorsement of it

I read Going Clear and I thought it was great. I had a friend who (before I knew her) was involved with Scientology. She spent about $80,000 and was still on the very lower levels. She doesn't like to talk about it much because she's embarrassed about getting suckered. It's really expensive! And it did not turn her into a famous Hollywood rock star.

Famous, like Kirstie Alley and Jenna Elfman!

Yeah, what exactly is the track record of Scientologists actually getting famous? I don't count Beck, because he only went back to the faith later in life. Do we just not know of them?

Romans just fed you to the lions iirc

umm the Romans fed Christians to the lions dude. (except that didn't actually happen, either. Not sure where you got the "Christians feeding ppl to lions" bit tbrr

oh wait nm I don't know why I thought u said otherwise my bad

I wonder what the deal was with Giovanni Ribisi and Cat Power, i.e. to what extent she got pulled into Scientology too when they were a couple. (She's always seemed somewhat psychologically unstable/ fragile, hence possibly susceptible to this kind of thing. Like other such religious/ cultic/ psycho-philosophical-lifestyle systems, maybe it even "helps" for a while. With addiction, etc.)

Don't Scientos usually mate-- pair up with-- each other? They may date outside the religion, but do they ever marry (or get into long-term relationships) with those outside it?