In the early eighties with the figurative barbarians at the gates of his Scientology kingdom L. Ron Hubbard wrote a dispatch to his personal services organization, Author Services Inc. (ASI), that stated in sum and substance: a man’s worth can be judged by the stature of his enemies. At the time he was referring to the fact that virtually all major news media, the U.S. Department of Justice (including the FBI), the IRS, and a number of other state, provincial and federal agencies in several countries were in hot pursuit of Ron.
In its context the advice from Ron seemed intended to steady the resolve and nerve of those he had appointed with defending against his formidable enemies. There is some truth to his little axiom. Whether it is honorable to have so many law enforcement agencies after you is another question entirely. Under Ron’s standard, Osama Bin Laden would be more worthy than anyone in recent memory – including Ron himself.
Something I find interesting is the number of people who twenty-seven years after Ron’s death seem to derive their own sense of worth by virtue of obsessively continuing to go after L. Ron Hubbard. More than a quarter century after Ron’s death it seems that an active cult thrives on the central religious practice of spitting on his grave.
Ironically, the members of the cult regularly, blatantly and shameless exhibit many of the behaviors they so indignantly protest in the cult Ron left behind. They engage in thought-stopping, censorship by censure, judgmentalism, stereotyping, ‘ends justify the mean’s,’ etc. You name the cult characteristic they accuse Ron of and they have it down in spades themselves. If someone gives Ron the slightest credit for ever having displayed any human tendency that individual is castigated, condemned and shunned violently. If a member of the anti Ron cult steadfastly pledges allegiance to, and demonstrates it consistently, condemning everything about Ron or the cult he left behind – or even anyone who credits Ron with any act that cannot be characterized as demonic -, why, that member is honored and can be seen to do no wrong. Hell, he could figuratively get away with murder.
The central, most unifying unwritten tenet of the anti Ron cult is that solely by virtue of condemning Ron they are somehow victims and have thus demonstrated honorable behavior. Notwithstanding that while the church of Scientology is renowned for over-aggressive dealings with critics, the most prominent members of the anti-Ron cult have never had a glove laid upon them by Scientology. Most cult members attempt to position themselves with those who have in fact been dogged by Scientology. However, they have also conveniently omitted from the hagiographies they have constructed for their heroes that most of the folks they emulate have sold out to Scientology for hundreds of thousands or even millions of dollars. So, you can add hyporcrisy to the list of cult-like qualities of those obsessing with Ron.
One theme I believe that may have been apparent in Memoirs of a Scientology Warrior is that Ron Hubbard became the effect of factors he could have conquered by application of the very principles he codified. In particular, Ron’s decision to engage with and destroy his enemies resulted in his unhappy demise. It stemmed from his violation of the following fundamental Dianetics and Scientology principle which violation mars the cult of his creation to this day: that which one obsessively resists one becomes. It seems to me that by so aggressively demonizing Hubbard, his enemies have followed suit on that score too.
It makes me think that Ron (and the cult that arose to demonize him and yet wound up mimicking him) should have taken the advice of Lao Tzu to heart when he wrote in the Tao Te Ching that one ought to consider one’s enemy as the shadow he himself casts.
Moving On Up a Little Higher 
Brilliant, Marty. Totally agree.
Awesome. Just awesome.
Yes completely agree Marty, It’s as plain as the nose on their face but they don’t want to see it.
My comment to the “Ron Haters” – My goal, through study and auditing is improving my ability to differentiate. Differentiation leads to sanity, to happiness, to freedom.
Marty wrote: “Ron Hubbard became the effect of factors he could have conquered by application of the very principles he codified.” I had this thought the other day! How many brilliant people this has happened to, I’m sure is legion. Just because one comes up with solutions that are genius, doesn’t ensure he himself with follow those solutions perfectly. I also thought of the 2nd definition of an overt act: ” an intentionally committed harmful act committed in an effort to resolve a problem.” LRH. And, problems he had.
I think the Scientology that has more of the Eastern Philosophy in it is the Scientology I love.
Marty you have used this quote, “that which one obsessively resists one becomes” a number times over the months. I believe the complete quote from the PDC is (though maybe not exact) “That which you fight you become-If you lose”. That makes all the difference.
If the mouse decides he has had enough and kicks the living Jesus out the cat he does not become the cat.
So go ahead and take on your enemy if you choose, just be sure and win.
On the other hand, the reaction to criticise Ron is also a definite reaction to the doctrine that, while in the church, was a dangerous thing to do.
Being critical of Ron meant maybe losing family, friends, money, jobs social life.
These radical suppressive doctrines lend a hand to finally being free to think. And what stands in the road of a relaxed sane criticism are all the years that we bought into that being critical was associated with evil intentions.
These radical thought stopping doctrines can spring load the opposite reaction of seeing Ron as evil, because he made it evil to do otherwise.
Think the fall of the Berlin Wall with thousands climbing a wall and saying F–k off to suppression of free expression.
Nice job Marty!!! I think you hit the bulls-eye with this one. I’ve always thought that so much of this criticism of LRH and Scientology was very suspect since it was so often done by people who were in no way involved and had neither experienced any of the bad things about Scientology or any of the good either and rather than preserving anything of any merit on the subject they seem to wholeheartedly want to see it completely destroyed. It is obvious to me that they are upset that it exists at all. I had previously thought that possibly Tony Ortega was a little more objective about all of this but his review of your book shows something completely different.
Your generalities contain no specifics, Marty.
Would you care to provide a few specifics as reasoned support for your screed? Otherwise no one knows specifically who you are talking about when you refer to the “anti-LRH cult” you are creating. Your generalities can be applied to any enemy you wish to create.
Or are the vengeful emotions you stir up in your readers all you are after?
Is no intellect, and no reasoning, actually wanted or desired?
Alanzo
Hear hear!
How childish. You don’t like it when people call LRH a cult leader, so you invent the “Ron Haters” cult. What a baby. When I was 6 years old this was “I know you are, but what am I?”
If the shoe fits…
If the shoe fits, honey…
There’s the answer then: No intellect, and no reasoning is actually wanted or desired by Marty when he is busy creating enemies.
Alanzo
Marty it seems you will never understand Anonymous. Shame.
Well, that is the problem with being shackled to quotations. The quote you provide may well be accurate, but it is a false datum – whether Ron uttered or God pronounced it. You are also wrong about the cat.
Paul, I never once mentioned Anonymous and never even had them in mind. If the shoe fits…
Alanzo – consider your enemy the shadow you cast.
I do like that idea. It is useful.
So is the anti-LRH cult enemy you are creating your shadow?
Are you shadow boxing?
Because I don’t see a cult there. You really do need to lay out who and exactly what is the cult there. It may feel emotionally pleasing to call what you are seeing a cult, but without clear reasoning on the subject, it can also be a delusion.
So let’s see your clear reasoning with specific evidence to support it, please.
Can you do that?
Alanzo
You never once mentioned anyone specifically. Would you like to clarify here ? Gerry Armstrong ? Tony Ortega ?
I like you Marty I really do and more importantly I’d like to think I understand you but one can’t curse the rising tide for being untidy.
A corrolary of the message is the side discussion I am having with Brian on this thread. The solidity of the universe is created by energy of opposite opposing forces. We don’t have to be governed by them. Let’s not.
Wise words. I must admit I do appreciate Tony O’s input generally, the articles seem well researched and informative on the whole, but some of the choir comments come across as spiteful and churlish – a sort of thinking-man’s ESMB. I can’t quite see the merit or value in continually trying to diss anyone, whether LRH or whoever – it just seems fatuous really.
Only on Chapter 4 of the book Marty but loving it so far…
When I initially read this all I could think was “really Marty….. Really?”
I have to agree with Paul & Alanzo on this one. You’re being way too vague here. Who is it you have a problem with really?
I think it helps to understand something about how the Reactive Mind “calculates”. Being a victim is absolutely the best. Aggressors on the other hand are vilified – UNLESS they have been attacked first (that is: made into a victim. It’s called revenge.) Look at how the media dotes on the “victims” (and how the victims love to talk about what a victim they are) while any aggressor is demonized.
By openly and aggressively attacking Ron opened himself up to PR and media and governmental attack. By his own words he said something like: effectively handle the attack as necessary (you’re the victim) but don’t focus on it and just continue doing your job. Well, he didn’t take his own advice and you can see the result from a reactive society.
Marty, this blog took a sharp turn just after you had a very public blow-up with Steve Hall, Jim Logan and possible others I know not what of.
I now often find an angry vein running through here. Would it kill you to extend an olive branch to Steve and actually move on up a little higher? I believe you are just like the rest of us and hate to lose people around you who you probably considered friends. We all saw the pictures of you guys when you were still talking and sitting around together in Texas having a good ol time. Since then a cancer has metastasized here and it is very evident in the tone.
Call Steve and patch this cluster f **k up! You know in your heart he’s a good guy!
Marty, I can’t help but think there were a great deal of ‘anti’ s expressing their opinion about your book. I know that some of the ‘anti’s dislike me just because I thought so highly of LRH. They don’t even know me. I don’t condone many of the policies LRH wrote in order to defend Scientology but I do understand why he wrote them. Its easy for me to forgive LRH for any transgressions because I knew the kind of pressure he was under and because of all the good things he did. Please don’t take the ‘anti’s too seriously. You have a lot of really good friends who believe in you. Love, Sarge
hehehehehhehehehehehehehehehehe
+ judging by his stuff, I think LRH knew about his shadow. But I guess to know about it, is different from totally un-casting it. Who was he? Who am I? 8 dynamics…who is my shadow? 😛
I liked your post Marty.
I can see why people get upset though if no specifics are used. I think it generally restimulates people and then you have all sorts of originations to handle.
I see this same phenomena (people parroting the leaders views) in almost every group. There is a strong leader and then that leader is surrounded by people who agree with him/her a lot and then they let that person do thier thinking for them.
I like leaders who can allow disagreement without needing to then condemn the person disagreeing.
I find this most provocative, all in the good senses.
In one’s life, there may come a time when he decides he must dance with the devil. That is his decision. It is his decision too, should he decide to subsequently marry the devil. It’s probably much easier than living the experience in such a fashion as to learn and gain judgement.
Gives me pause to ponder the state of affairs should I reach a point where my certainty causes circumlocution in my perception. I probably crossed the boundary of the Great Middle Path.
Spot On!
I think he knows how silly his argument is. Possibly it’s a product of all the O/W stuff he has left over from life in the cult, Maybe someday he’ll be ready to discuss things like an adult. He’s starting to sound like Barbara Schwarz.
Damn Marty, I had things to do today and you had to go and put up another thought provoking post. I agree with One of those that see. I myself have a vast store of knowledge of how the world and the spirit works, but that does not mean I am totally enlightened, just someone well read with a higher than average IQ.We have to make that quantum leap from the head to the heart.I think LRH may have fallen shortin a few areas there, but that does notmean we have to throw out the workable tech. As far as all those unhappy hate mongering people you speak of, I myself would not flow any more energy towards them. You have a much higher purpose than that. Get on with it You certainly have all my support.
QED
Like Zen and quantum mechanics, you know you are getting somewhere when you hit the inexplicable, many times marked by that wonderful word you just added to my vocabulary, circumlocution.
I can see it too. The dichotomies are a bitch – and as long as we fixate on identification (particlarly our own) it becomes a progressively worse bitch.
The cat actually tends to go into the valence of the winner who in this case is the rat.
I am a freaking olive branch. I got plenty of pits to prove it.
Marty, I think you really struck a nerve amongst the “Ron Haters” with this post.
A corrolary of the message is the side discussion I am having with Brian on this thread. The solidity of the universe is created by energy of opposite opposing forces. We don’t have to be governed by them. Let’s not. The dichotomies are a bitch – and as long as we fixate on identification (particlarly our own) it becomes a progressively worse bitch.
Alanzo,
You are being so silly and so childish you are embarrassing yourself. Don’t you have anything better to do?
I can, but I won’t. Feel free to attempt it yourself. A corrolary of the message is the side discussion I am having with Brian on this thread. The solidity of the universe is created by energy of opposite opposing forces. We don’t have to be governed by them. Let’s not.
I’ve heard it said by LRH critics that he had apparently claimed at some time that he was not a Scientologist. The implication of this was that LRH somehow thought he was above all of this and it didn’t apply to him. I don’t know if it is true but I’ve always had the feeling this might have truly been his view
Sarge would disagree, as spelled out in some detail in Memoirs of a Scientology Warrior.
I think he didn’t victimized himself, unlike some describe. His trouble what what would happen to the 3D and 4D. I think he had less case than most -if not all- members of the group, that’s how he could describe Clear, Theta Clear etc. I think one cannot be aware of some spiritual stuff if his thinking is not somewhat free from MEST.
I agree, and have personally witnessed a number of commenters/bloggers use black-and-white absolutism and thought-stopping language in both criticisms and praise of Hubbard and/or Scientology. The use of the label “anti-Ron cult” seems reductive, however, and in line with your earlier thoughts on Judgement. $0.02
Marty, I live in Clearwater fl. Im a liberal who is open to theory of live and let live. But you must admit it is a freakshow that the behavior that the Scientologist’s display in Clearwater.. If you try to talk to them, in a sincere way, you will soon have a security goon in your face with a camera. I think this is why, at least me, think that LRH was a monster, getting these people to shun everybody and walk in lockstep to crazy rantings of aleins clinging to their souls. I’ve never been a scientologist, but do you realize how crazy the alien thing sounds to non-believers?
Marty,
I am looking forward to reading your book. It’s will be about a month before I do that but it I going to get it done. Once I read it I expect I will just have more questions. The history of the church, LRH, Dianetics and Scientology fascinate me. I’ve studied both extensively and was even involved in putting together much of the material for the LRH Lifetime Exhibit in Los Angeles. Like you I’ve met many of the old timers and their stories of the early days are thrilling to hear.
Brian
I look forward to your feedback Brian.
Yeah. Ironically, I don’t think Hubbard would get in your face with a camera if you could have approached him.
I’ll provide the specific example Alanzo demanded.
For the past 3 years or so, on Geir’s blog and previously on The ScientologyForum, Al has derided and dismissed many of my posts using a thought-stopping technique straight out of Lifton’s book about the psychology of Totalism. Namely, instead of responding to and discussing any specific ideas I posted, he has characterized many of my posts as essentially typical scientology-conditioned thinking, not worthy of discussion.
I suppose I could go through and cull some of such responses by him and post the links to them here. But I’m not going to. They are there for anyone to read, a matter of ‘public record’. Many of Al’s posts are a perfect case study of what Marty is talking about in his OP.
I don’t doubt Al learned the basics of this kind of ‘mind – fucking’ while he was a dedicated Scientologist and has now turned it around to use against anyone who does not exactly share his opinion of LRH. It results in a perfect illustration of the the ‘pot/kettle’ phenomenon.
Ive never seen a group who is as anti-social as this bunch in my life. How come they just stare straight ahead and walk rapidly by you? And they are saving the planet?
Yeah, you are right! Technically the funny bone is the ulnar nerve.
So, you called it.
Exactly! Heh-heh
When you see one who is worthy endeavor to immolate him. When you see one who is unworthy examine your inner self. -Khalil Gibran
Jeb — don’t take it personally. They can’t see you. They are having a wild and wooly conversation IN THEIR HEAD with their senior, with the ethics officer, with the bookstore in charge … with potentially a dozen people defending themselves and why they didn’t get their targets done.
They are not happy. They are functionally catatonic and in dire need of sleep, relaxation and food.
Turn this into your own personal challenge. In a friendly voice without any sort of arrogance or make-wrong – say hello or good morning.
(I wouldn’t do it unless someone is alone).
I did this for MONTHS years ago to someone who AT THE TIME was THE senior person on staff. He spoke to NO ONE. And I sat in front of him at meals. Every day I smiled at him and said hello. It took several months and finally he started to smile and say hello.
It won’t necessarily change them one bit, but you’ll start feeling differently towards them and perhaps you’ll see them as people who are locked into a very sad and lonely place — all the while thinking they are saving the world.
Trust me. It’s a real mind-f*** — be happy you aren’t so trapped but maybe you can step back and see where in your life you might be trapped.
Most of us are trapped to a greater or lesser degree … the good news is we have the innate nature to free ourselves IF we can just step aside and start WATCHING our mind …
Good luck 🙂
” At the time he was referring to the fact that virtually all major news media, the U.S. Department of Justice (including the FBI), the IRS, and a number of other state, provincial and federal agencies in several countries were in hot pursuit of Ron.”
So true Marty and so good to see it acknowledged, thankyou! Also dont forget that at least one of those departments regularly broke the law and spirit of the Constitution themselves. This really needs understanding to see where Ron was coming from in his more controversial policies. That is enormous pressure you are referring to, and for a long time. A lesser man would have caved very quickly.
Have got your book and am looking forward to reading it.
I find some of your responses very cryptic and not easy to understand. It would be great if you could answer in layman terms. This is meant as a suggestion.
Edit emulate in place of immolate. please don’t sacrifice them by fire.
I would be put firmly in the critics camp by any CoS member and probably most indies, however if I am in a cult I wonder why I have plenty of money in the bank, a family who loves me no matter my views or beliefs, family and friends I am able to spend plenty of time with, goals and priorities that are all my own, no pressure of any kind to spend any or large amounts of time being a “critic”, and have never been asked or forced to behave in any way against my moral code for the “greater good of the group.” I think you are totally minimizing the word cult by trying some way to apply it to most Scientology critics.
Most “critics” may spend a few hours a week online discussing Scientology, keeping up with current events about CoS, donating to people hurt by the cult & now fighting it and maybe they attended a protest once or twice. It seems almost like a soap opera drama they follow and has almost no impingement on their real life whatsoever. That doesnt fit any criteria for a cult.
The most dedicated critics, who spend large amounts of their lives fighting the CoS are usually ex-members who were directly and tragically hurt by Scientology. ironically enough many never-in critics know far more about Scientology than current CoS members due to the crazy secrecy and mountains of lies spewed by the organization which the kool aid drinkers lap up.
I think you are jumping to wholey inaccurate judgements about critics, based on, I don’t know what other than maybe very vocal message board posters and other online antics. You are applying a label to a large widely diverese group, of whom probably only 30 to 50 are hardcore enough that their activites against the cult impact their real lves. Simply because someone thinks Scientology is a con or doesn’t respect LRH hardly makes them a cult member. The fact is that among “critics” probably 95% have no personal or real life interaction with other critics. The only groups of critics I know who have real personal relationships with each other are ex-members and that mostly comes from them being IN the CoS cult together.
Do you perceive Marty as ‘having a problem’ with someone, anyone? I don’t read his post that way. I read it as the fruit of observing things the way they are, objectively and non judgmentally. The fact that some object seems to me to say more about them, than about him.
Do you think there is no subgroup of people in the world or society who cultivate anti LRH sentiment? That no-one publicly demonizes LRH in outspoken ways?
Or created a few more I daresay. Deftly done sir.
Blow jobs shouldn’t be enforced. How would you like if it someone came behind you, and suggested you blow someone else for their benefit?
Rod, yourpost is another perfect example of Totalist dismissal tactics. Also called by some, ‘ad hom’.
In case you haven’t read between the lines, there are people out here who think:
1. Everything bad that happened to Marty, was (a) ridiculous, (b) unimportant, (c) deserved.
2. Everything Marty did to others was (a) very important, (b) very bad, (c) irremediable.
And you want him to go over there on bended knee and deliver a blow job?
Have a little mercy.
T.O.
“Your generalities contain no specifics, Marty.”
Har-dee-har-har-har! 🙂
Oxymoron much, Al?
It’s David Miscavige’s hat to order people to:
“Go suck cocks on Hollywood Boulevard!”
Don’t bypass him.
T.O.
Another “jedi mind trick”, Paul? Mention the characteristics of an observable type or subgroup of person and make more of them magically appear? Wow, Marty, you gotta teach me how to conjure like that!
OK, I’ve finished the book and I have to say, it’s a fascinating read. First of all, for an old-time public Scientologist like me, never privy to the inner workings of the organization, it stitches together a coherent picture from events and facts that in isolation often seemed mysterious and conflicting. It also includes some things I had never thought to ask, such as how Mark Rathbun became ‘Marty’, out in the west Texas town of El Paso. And I have to say, Marty has had one very interesting life.
As you might expect from a memoir, much of the book is a first-person narrative, Marty’s journey as seen through Marty’s eyes. Some people apparently expected (or wanted) something different. Tony Ortega wanted a crime potboiler, full of incriminations and mea culpas. Wise Beard Man wanted something similar, but with details of specific Fair Game campaigns that might provide closure to specific individuals.
Neither is likely to get the book they want. Regret is just not a big part of Marty’s makeup. My impression, reinforced by his story, is that he tends to meet life’s challenges head on, at full speed, incorporating his fresh bruises and insights on the fly in manner that is more integration than reflection. By the way, Scientology doesn’t get the credit for that. Those qualities were evident at age five, and probably much earlier.
To those who fault Marty for being the way he is, I’d just like to point out that many, many people experiencing what Marty has lived through would long ago have succumbed to apathy. But not Mr. Rathbun. In the words of William Henly, his head is bloodied but unbowed.
And Marty, at the end of the book you do make a compelling case for “graduating” from Scientology. So, as promised, I give you 10 out of 10.
Thank you Sarge, for this much needed breath of fresh air. And you too Marty. I could not agree more with your post. The constant LRH bashing has long since gotten old, boring, depressing, you name it. I happen to be midway through one of the more recent LRH course lectures. Every lecture is so revealing of the real man and how much he cared about people; how strong was his intention to help. And the tools he left DO help; wonderfully and often amazingly so.
For all you naysayers, you will never shake the certainty of those of us who audit, or have audited, professionally. Never, ever. You can howl all you want about how the emeter does not work, or whatever your particular “make nothing of” happens to be. It all falls on deaf ears to those of us who KNOW better.
None of this is to paint LRH as a god or to condone every single thing he wrote or did. I had disagreements with many of his policies from Day One. But I still know what I know about what his real intentions were regarding people, and how powerful are the tools he left behind.
Sunny, isn’t it totally obvious that Marty posted quite explicitly about a certain sub-group within the overall ‘critical community’? That he is referring specifically to the “Totalist critics”?
Have you read his new book? It is quite objectively critical of LRH.
It flabbergasts me that so many people read something in the post that Marty didn’t write, that is just not there….
By the way, that is called ‘straw man’, when you misrepresent what a person said then argue against it, as though he said it.
Hi Marty. Another nice post. I broke down and ordered the book when they dropped the price 3 bucks so I could cover the shipping and handling. Thanks. Seems you have attracted a good number of the regulars from the Underground bunker. I doubt it will last. I think your communication is not solid enough for many of them from the comments I am reading. But I think you have become more real to them and that’s a good thing.
“I find some of your responses very cryptic and not easy to understand”
That’s because they don’t make any sense.
Point taken on your three post Oracle but where does simply application of the ARC Triangle come in? Is there any room for communication?
Anything I may have put to Marty I would put to Steve aswell……get together and sort out the upset! Is it really that crazay a thought?
Independent Scientology needs both Marty and Steve.
KFrancis, i personally have not come accross the quote you metion, but i have read the one about obsessiving resisting, then becomming that thing.
I think the key there is the word “obessive.” If its appropriate and doable, i think its fine to go after your enemy. But when one can’t control the impulse one way or another, this is the abberative situation..
Yes, Marty I agree with Tony, your book is well understood and a great read… but here on the blog, lol… I, too don’t get this thing about the dichotomies… please write an article on it so to expand your time, it’s too condensed of a meaning in the message, cryptic as Tony described it… Remember, misunderstood words?
By the way I just read your first TR 0 drill and it comes across perfect being on the ceiling and having that last. That’s great. The book is a great read really.
Lol
Anti-Ron Cult. Brilliant. But as one of my fellow “cult” members pointed out over at Tony’s, we prefer acronyms, so from here on out will call ourselves ARC.
“We are cognizant of the many who will decry our methods as parallel to those of the Church of Scientology. Those who espouse the obvious truth that your organization will use the actions of Anonymous as an example of the persecution of what you have for so long warned your followers.
This is acceptable to Anonymous. In fact, it is encouraged. We are your SPs.” – Message To Scientology
And if you keep treating us like wogs, degraded beings, and SPs, Marty, we’ll keep being your SPs. Wishing what you might call Cultega away is just as futile as OSA “handling” Anon like they said they would in March 2008 (the OSA that you helped organize and train, Marty).
Self-organizing a pity party with a looped soundtrack of Magazine’s “Shot By Both Sides” is beneath you, Marty. Your dignity survived the Toxic Midget. But, somehow, it can’t survive a bunch of snarky people who want nothing more than for you to keep damaging RCS like you’ve been? Stop playing the Butthurt Sonata and get back to playing what I consider the most interesting Long Game in the battle against RCS, a process that includes your self-discovery. It’s a grandmaster-level class in progress.
Oracle, is whoever picks up the phone first is guitly of giving a BJ?
What ever happened to being bigger than the situation and not having your pride all wrapped up in being the one to reach out to an old friend?
You are really OT – cause over everything, including me.
Wonderful! The perfectly oxymoronic exchange of posts! 🙂
Also, a perfect example of “dichotomy”. No sound of one hand clapping, here. Which comes first, the chicken or the egg?
Tony, an abstract statement can act like a Rorschach blot. Each person reads or sees in it something from their own psyche.
That’s why Marty says, If the shoe fits, wear it, but does not name anyone specifically. He is not holding any Comm Ev, here.
It is like ethics – only the person himself can say whether the shoe fits. No one else can. If someone tries to, it becomes ‘evaluation’ and is resisted or accepted, but in either case it usually does not further the person’s growth.
That’s also why the analyst’s “interpretation” in psychoanalysis was rarely if ever helpful to the analysand.
Brilliant observation Marty.
I like to think of things in terms of the Nobel Eightfold Path, where in practice it is actually Right view, Right intention, Right speech, Right action, Right livelihood, Right effort, Right mindfulness and Right concentration VERSUS WRONG view, WRONG intention, WRONG speech, WRONG action, etc.
The fact that you have surpassed the microcosm created by LRH and yet continue to use the valuable technology he created to help others speaks to nothing more than your ability and desire to truly help – and that is a big something in my book.
Let the critics wail and strut and posture all they want – what the fuck are they doing to truly help the individual man?
@bkellyusa, have been consistently critical of Ron. And for sake of clarity I would like to say what experiences gives me that right so that I do not fit in the catagory you outline.
1) my wife got fired from TWO jobs( Scientology Chiroprators) because they found out I was an sp.
2) My life long friend would not allow me to record in his pro studio in 1983/83 because I was an sp and most of his clients were scientologists. He was afraid they would close down his business.
3) He was also afraid of loosing contact with his Sea Org daughter if they found out we were connected. So by by best friend:-(
4) I was scoring music for an internet social site and everything was going fine until it was discovered that one of the producers was a scientologist. He discovered I was an sp and caused the entire corporation to restructure so he could not stop projects like that anymore.
I was never asked back to continue the project.
5) I was fired from a job in which I was an electrician because the owner found out I quit the church and he was afraid he would not be able to go up the bridge with me around. So he apologized and said he wish he did not have to fire me but he had to.
The source of the suppression was Ron, his writings, and the fear that HE instilled in us.
Pointing out the source of suppression is the way to handle suppression. Ron Hubbard caused suppression in my and friends life.
To equate the pointing out of that suppression with cult mentality is not how to handle suppression.
People have a lot of charge having their personal lives threatened by suppressive rules created by one man.
But it is an unpopular proposition to consider by some that L.Ron Hubbard caused untold suppression in the family, work place etc. But he did.
Yet I agree with you Marty, it is basically all smoke and mirrors. And being fixed in hating anything or anyone is an unwitting revelation of some deeper personal issue.
On the other hand, standing up to suppression is not simply a shadow of the observer.
When you were fighting Collete, that gun was no shadow of your unconscious projected on the screen of space. That was his projection looking to take you out. And solving that issue is not done in therapy or philosophy. It is done by being heroic and not giving a shit what people say and getting the job done.
It is ok to be critical of Ron and still see the truths in scientology. In fact to see the truth of Scientology I think constuctive criticism is essential.
Is no-one worthy of immolation? 🙂
“Too emulate or to immolate, that is the question…..” which is being applied to LRH….
Oh, brilliant Marty. Absolutely brilliant.
There are millions and millions of people in the world who have to struggle to suppress the biggest belly laugh of their lives when hearing about your idol and guru, LRH. A big percentage of these folks live very successful and very happy lives and have never even heard of your guru. They have happy families, jobs they love, fulfilling social lives and they have never even heard the name L. Ron Hubbard. How is this possible? How is it that people all over the world have successful lives having never even heard of your silly “tech”?
Well Molly, I guess it would all depend on your definition of “successful lives” now, wouldn’t it?
YOU are vile…
No Valkov it was not I who generalized but Marty. His post did not name anything specific other than “critics.” When I think of even the most hardcore, dedicated critics they still fail to meet any definition of a “cult” because they aren’t even an organized group. The most zealous are usually individuals who may have “supporters” but nothing that comes close to the tightly bound, strictly controlled and organized group that defines a cult. Hell, organizing critics is akin to herding cats. I think calling any critic group a cult is terribly inaccurate to say the least and is a great injustice to those who suffered in real cults like the CoS.
I think a better description might be to say some ex-members who become critics might lapse into the same type of ” group think” that they were guilty of in the cult. But the CoS itself has ensured most critics remain highly indivdualistic and avoid any structure or organization because doing so gives the cult to much of a target. The CoS has prevented any critic cult spin offs and instead bred opposition like anonymous – which prides itself on having no central leadership and encourages local based action and individuality.
Just a quit thought on this quote “However, they have also conveniently omitted from the hagiographies they have constructed for their heroes that most of the folks they emulate have sold out to Scientology for hundreds of thousands or even millions of dollars”, Marty, thanx so much for not selling out for the million dollar settlement as hush money. Many of us out here in cyberland understand the temptation and sacrifice that you have endured to maintain your integrity. Your critics such as Bunker, ESMB, or Ortega, have never had a million dollar bribe to contend with!!!! Marty, you have nads of steel and a so far uncompromised integrity. I ordered your new book and cant wait to read it!!
Somewhat unfair as I know you personally, and I know what kind of tolerant and forgiving person you are. You, would pick up the phone and call, and disregard the treason. You would reach out the person rock slamming on you. You would calm the dog that bit you. You would go into the prison to forgive the man that burnt your home down and shot your dog. You would go into prison to forgive the man that shot you and left you for dead. If someone smacked you on the left cheek, you would offer up your right. I get it that that is your way and how you roll. Quite unique. You don’t bother much with forces.
That said, That the “Independent Scientology” is already an entity, like the “Church of Scientology”, that “needs”, is already a frightening indicator to me that a new new cult has been born.
I can tell you what we have needed for Marty for:
Fundraising to bail people out of legal overwhelm.
Escape assistance from the Int Base.
Him and his wife sitting in Texas taking the heat and abuse for years so Trey is freed up to give people like you and I our L’s. And similar situations all over the planet.
To give testimony and dispositions for the oppressed and ripped off spilling out onto the street with an OSA gang and P.I.’s on their trail backed by billions to finance legal costs.
To make clears.
To repair cases.
Th answer questions and sort out confusions which make the 3rd dynamic easier to bear.
For people to lean on because they have come unglued.
To make OT’s.
To fly to Germany and bridge with the government so Independents would have a screaming chance over there.
To conduct the noisy investigation he took upon himself to do for two years while we merely read the reports.
To establish rights for Independents.
To make the space safe out here for people to audit.
To dispell the illusions and fraud perpetuated by the Church.
The create platforms for people to stand on that were left for squashed and dead.
To pass on his story so we can can live in a better life than the one we found ourselves sitting in when we left the Church.
What I Don’t need from Marty, is to go suck Steve Hall’s dick after Steve viciously turned on him in a rock slam, and, acting like a full blown reactive mind himself, threw up Marty’s ” past ” here on this blog in an effort to unmock him and set him up for a public execution.
What I don’t need from Steve Hall is more attempts to start a bloody civil war out here between Scientologists by publicly fair gaming everyone in the Freezone as “spokeperson for the Independents”.
Which lead to viscous attacks on Marty. And undermine him sideways.
I don’t what you think I need Steve Hall for. I was out here with a full digitized tech library (courtesy of the Freezone) and getting through my OT levels, while Steve Hall was still working as a volunteer at the Int Base.
What I wasn’t doing was communicating openly or sharing openly and were hiding while on service.
I realize you a “Father Mulligan” type and remain curious about life’s manifestations without regard for qualifications.
But not everyone can co exist with these kind of conditions, where someone you knew as a friend, is suddenly replaced by someone who wants to destroy you. This is another dynamic of religion you speak of. Not everybody can stomach this.
Espi,
When has Marty treated you and yours “like wogs, degraded beings, and SPs, Marty, we’ll keep being your SPs.”
Do you need enemies that badly, that you have to cast Marty in that role whether he actually fits or not?
Not to imply that I am not aware that a “Who” is re stimulating Steve Hall.
I have given this some thought myself. L. Ron Hubbard is the most trained and hatted OT in the universe if ever there was one, because he wrote the tech for everybody. And it is true, that L. Ron Hubbard DID SAY in his writings (I am not sure the exact wording but…) that anyone armed with this tech to a certain level could have no conceivable enemies. OK. So they WHY didn’t HE just make arrangements to MEET these enemies and say “Excuse me, but I would like to return your immorality to you and the knowledge along with it of how to never lose it again”. The only person that would turn down such an offer obviously would have to be a REAL SP, which of course, there is very little at the moment anyone can do too much about. 🙂 Perhaps L. Ron Hubbard was PTS to some degree and to a lesser degree PTS to some of his own tech. 🙂
My apologies for type I meant IMMORTALITY not immorality. 🙂 Bad me! 🙂
Molly… we love your direct way, just saying.
As for happy lives without LRH tech… well, it’s not about that. Scientologists and Scientology aren’t interested in merely ‘improving lives’ so people are happy… in fact ‘happy’ isn’t even a goal. They want to make you ‘free’ and ‘clear’. How and why is rooted in ‘body thetan exorcism’… they are convinced of a strange and convoluted alien history that makes them believe they are imprisoned and therefore feel held back, miserable and distraught… and then feel the need to ‘free’ themselves. Most people don’t feel this way, and the story is childish and ridiculous to them (us), but these people are so convinced of it that they think they need to convince others what is wrong with them too. It’s all rubbish, and only a certain type of person is attracted to it or falls for it. Those that have issues with their self-esteem, or self-contentment – seekers of airy fairy understanding of life (instead of just living it). They are more interested in connecting to inner understanding than engaging with what is going on around them.
It’s a placebo effect at best, and I have no problem letting them have it, so long as they understand that the rest of the world expects honesty and evidence if they want to try to convince us it is anything more.
Beat me to it.
Umm…I think her definition of a “successful life” is having a happy family, job you love, and a fulfilling social life.
We are ARC
All of your Supertramp, Foreigner 8 tracks Tapes
Are belong to US
Resistance is FUTILE
You will be asstimulated
I don’t think Marty created a single Ron Hater. He might have caused them to coming screaming into the light but that is all.
Sarge,
You said it all for me.
Who is @kellyusa?
Addicted to dirt … gotta get their daily fix of it. Don’t tell these denigration junkies you are receiving fantastic benefits using Scientology as withdrawal symptoms set in triggering inval & negation circuitry.
For them, stuck-on-the-track ‘victimhood’ does in fact go on for all eternity and they’ll still be posting the same natter 2 decades from now. Yawn … they can wallow in their misery all they like. Considering some of the very highest levels of the bridge frees oneself from his track, these DBs are drowning in it. Let MEST wanna-be be MEST.
Lawrence,
I believe you may be confused. Is this the quote you are referring to?
“If one knows the tech of how to do something and can do it, and uses it, he cannot be the adverse effect of it.” –LRH
Sunny V., one of us seems to be hallucinating.
I just went back and re-read Marty’s entire post and he does not even use the term “critics” in it, except for once, and that was in reference to how the CoS was overly aggressive towards critics.
The folks he is referring to are characterized by him in this paragraph and the very next one in more detail, and nowhere does he refer to them as “critics” or “the critics”. He simply didn’t use the word at all ! He referred to “people”, not “critics”.
Marty wrote:
“Something I find interesting is the number of people who twenty-seven years after Ron’s death seem to derive their own sense of worth by virtue of obsessively continuing to go after L. Ron Hubbard. More than a quarter century after Ron’s death it seems that an active cult thrives on the central religious practice of spitting on his grave.”
This is why characterized your post as a “straw man” response.
To imply that Marty is intolerant, or handicapped by ego, in any capacity, is a huge wrong item put forth on this blog.
He has had open house policy with EVERYONE. Critics, Press, governments, anons, reporters, lawyers, Scientologists, Christians, Scientologists in good standing, declared SP’s, anti Scientologists, you name it. He has not EXCLUDED ANYONE from his space.
But when you take a nap in your own home, and wake up with a knife in a back, and your wallet laying empty on the floor, it is time to ask one or more of the guests to leave. If they haven’t already blown onto someone else’s couch (or blog or web site).
You owe that to your spouse and pets.
Also, Sunny V, your first words in your response to me are “No Valkov it was not I who generalized but Marty.”
So I went back and re-read my original response to you, and LO! I did not, in it, refer to you as “generalizing” in anyway, shape, or form. I did not use the word “generalize” at all, as a matter of fact.
So, grrl, you be trippin’??
Well,….. I think you know I consider you a friend.
I’ll just say ……possibly what I suffer from in this instance is a bad case of naive …….and leave it at that.
Still all the best to you….K
No. It is a reference about Class XII auditors. Not that one. 🙂
YOU are as preachy and judgemental as T.O.is ‘vile’, having grown up by herself on the streets of New York from an early age.
Is it ‘nature’ or ‘nurture’? Who is to blame? Who is the ‘victim’?
Do you go to church? Would your communion accept, for example, a known or suspected prostitute as eagerly as it would anyone else?
Just wonderin’
Of course he didn’t ‘create’ any by making this post. And the actual hard-core “Ron Haters” are being a bit shy about posting here. I think what we are seeing here is something else. I think it is mostly honest people who have doubts and are trying to sort things out.
I think Marty’s book, to the extent any of them have read it, and now this post, are rocking some of the data they have accepted as ‘stable’ and that’s what we’re seeing posted.
The more invested one is in a stable datum, the more confusion is likely to start blowing off as factual truth is discovered.
What better place for it to happen, than on this blog?
Hubbard didn’t always communicate to everyone with something that had to do with them. But people were compelled to wrap themselves around it in some way whether it had anything to do with them or not. They weren’t allowed to choose. They weren’t allowed to “take it or leave it”. And the body of knowledge shifted from “interesting information” to “the gospel”.
So? Marty isn’t preaching “the gospel”. If he says something you can’t think with, guess what, here’s the good news. That is allowed! The same way you don’t have to think with everything the waiter says when he reads off the menu specials.
Oh, then it is perfectly acceptable. After the first five seconds you could care less and even if you don’t know what “CARPACCIO CIPRIANI with INSALATA CESARE and COCKTAIL DI GAMBERETTI” is, it is not a big deal and you are forgiving to the waiter. You don’t bother dragging a dictionary with you to the restaurant, because you are going there for a good time. You don’t make a scene because the specials are “cryptic sounding” to you.
Do you say to the waiter, “You aren’t making any sense!” Do you look at your fellow diner and say, “He’s not making any sense.”
Fuck that, you go for the antipasti platter and move on.
Not every exchange with Scientology or a Scientologist has to be as serious as a heart beat and as meaningful as the gospels.
If the grass is greener on the other side, why isn’t your ass parked over there instead of right here? Go hang with the ” very successful and happy that have never heard of L.R.H. or Marty Rathbun or Scientology”. I agree. They are there. Why aren’t you with them? Surely they would welcome you into such tribes?
bkelly, I think Arthur Miller’s 1953 play “The Crucible” maybe relevant here. The play is ostensibly about the Salem witch trials in the 1600s, but may have been inspired by the HUAC and McCarthy anti-Communist “witchhunts” of the 1950s.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Crucible
Did you mean “ass-stimulated”?
Jeez, “return your immorality” made perfect sense to me! 🙂
Molly, with your unique gifts to spread cheer and happiness, motivate people towards success, I imagine anyone of those “Happy Successful” tribes would consider you quite an asset.
I read it the same way, WS.
Scientology is not particularly designed for that demographic. Those people don’t need it and it is a waste of time trying to push it on them.
But, people living successful lives have at times been interested, not because they felt they needed it themselves, but because they felt they wanted to help someone else. One has to be motivated in that direction to go to all the trouble of learning how to audit others.
EO, it is my sad duty to inform you that downstream of here, one of your very own, a “Captain Howdy”, has posted something quite possibly vile.
https://markrathbun.wordpress.com/2013/06/01/cults-enemies-and-shadows/#comment-267039
Please go check it out and take morally corrective action as needed…..
Hi Valkov,
I usually find your posts very clear and understandable. I find this about as vague as some of Marty’s replys. All I am saying is if you want to be in communication with someone, answer them with an attempt to be duplicated. Vague answers create hazy communications and misunderstandings which lead to upset and lower ARC. Don’t get me wrong, I think some of what Marty says is absolutely brilliant and very understandable.
If you want to have a battle of ideas you have to be clear about what you are saying. If you aren’t then I suppose you lose.
I’m sure many Monsanto executives have successful lives then.
We’re totally at cause over you, Marty… just look, three posts from you in a row all whining about our opinions/observations/criticisms… how embarrassing for you. Quick mate, the delete button is there somewhere…
I think it’s normal that if you create an organization that has amongst its purposes to lie to people and make you a perfect man, more honest people will start pointing out the lies and tell the truths that the organization omits.
LRH was wrong when hes said that a social personality will omit the bad and forward the good news. That’s a stupid personality, the one that will flow propaganda. A social personality will tell things like they are: the good news to emulate and the bad to avoid or correct.
But the basic mistake is not in the fanatics pro LRH or anti LRH, and not even in the lies told by LRH or his cult.
The basic mistake has been, on the part of LRH, to put himself above the search of truth. What was supposed to be a science of the mind needed not an authority and a personality cult of its founder.
Alexander Volta (but so any scientist) is remembered for his discoveries not for his personality. Why? Simply because he didn’t lied about himself or told he was better than others or that he was the only ‘source’, to have his discoveries accepted by people. He was a true scientist and a true researcher. For the same reason LRH was not.
LRH tricked people into believing that a science of the mind needed him to be the ‘authority’, the sole ‘source’. He went on instructing its followers to rewrite his past to exaggerate his achievements and erase his shortcomings with religious blindness.
This is the recipe of a holy war, not a honest and sane attempt to advance of mankind’s knowledge. Lies make that war persistent.
Huge relief. I’ve always liked Kahlil Gibran, but for the life of me I couldn’t recall an ironic sense of humor (or even a streak of total wild sadism) featuring prominently in his work.
Ouch! You got me there! I’m hurting bad!
Oracle, kudos to you for this summary of what Marty has done and continues to do. No one can say it like you!
Marty, I am very worried to see your response to Tony Ortega’s review of your book.
I follow your blog and I really thought you had made some good progress recently.
With your first two blog entries following Tony’s review I felt some level of understanding for your emotion, since I know how upsetting it can be when hard work is criticized.
However, you seem now to be sinking ever deeper into a pit of self-pity, hatred and accusation. This is a path which you know will lead to ever more destructive thinking.
Before you let bitterness cloud your mind and judgement even more, I think you need to give yourself a bit of a shake.
Remember, you are a controversial figure, dealing with a controversial time in a controversial subject. This was never going to be a book which would please everybody.
Take a shower, take a walk, take Mosey off for a nice weekend somewhere. Clear your head. Why not give Tony Ortega a call? Go for a beer with him. His opinion clearly matters to you. Have an off-the-record conversation with him. Tell him why you think he’s wrong, let him tell you why he thinks he’s right. Get it off your chest, before you become irrevocably embittered by this.
And then keep writing, which you clearly enjoy.
Get it right Marty. The quote is “WHAT YOU RESIST YOU BECOME, IF YOU LOSE.} Not what you resist you become.” yOU KNOW Mary Ron left you and others in charge of various areas of Scientology. You and other utterly failed to KSW in your own area and from those failure debacles resulted. Now you decRy out of all of these injustices which you supported during your time on staff (by you own admission.) Now you pretend to “make amends”. Give me a break!!!!
“Let the critics wail and strut and posture all they want – what the fuck are they doing to truly help the individual man?”
In answer to your question… How about getting State laws enacted to ensure that there are no more victims of Narconon (how many deaths has it been now?)… or, cooperating with the Feds to raid and prosecute for the insurance and credit card fraud done by Narconon… or, supporting law suits to stop the mandatory abortions for OSA… or, shining a light on child abuse within the cult so that childhoods are protected and suicides are eliminated… or, publicizing the Idle Morgue rip off and cases like the Garcias to help stop the con… or, writing about the heartaches and tragedies of disconnection (like Karen) so that others may see… or organizing a campaign to stop Kerry Kennedy from lending her name to COS’s Artist for Human Rights… Shall I go on? We do a little more than wail and strut. What have you done to help fellow man from the abuses of the Co$?
Hey, Enthralled, it has been a few hours since this near fatal wound I have suffered from your worthy causes to clean the Earth. I have recovered enough, and reformed enough through your judgments, to make place in my heart to consider your well being and noble purposes.
If I do not live until the morrow, I just want to indicate, I got a read and an itsa, from you, on the phrase, “blow jobs”.
These words conjured you up. Gave you life and purpose to strike out at me. Beware! Beware of the words “blow job”. Clearly these words have a power that propels you forward to STOP! Stop and condemn those words!
Perhaps one day, one way, you will clear yourself from the powers these words have upon you. Beware of words that cause you “stand up”
(pun) and be counted!
Because in this arena, the power of words and the reaction it brings, is very telling to those that know the power of words.
“Blow jobs” is an item for you. Someone could make a tailor made assessment list on “blow jobs”.
I am not tech trained. I am a mere P.C. who decided according to person experience. But it might go something like.
Have a blow job ever been denied you? _____
Have you ever denied a blow job? ______
Blahdy blah blah.
Things like that.
An auditor could work it out for you.
I meant to be so passive, but you took it as so aggressive, jumping into the sink hole you created for me to fell in.
I am concerned for your naivety.
You DO want to stand tall, correct? Above the others?
I can tell you from personal experience, it is not possible to stand tall while giving someone a blow job. Or really, if it is a good blow job, you can’t stand up straight while getting one.
There are certain sacrifices one must make in life, to remain proud and tall.
If you have issues on any flow, any flow at all, on blow jobs, this will ruin your life. It will prevent you from standing tall.
Do seek assistance to overcome the effect these words have on you.
Someday, up the road, you will be free from me. And the Scientology.
You are keen in your observations Marty. Most people are not “loners”. They can not just pick up a book and read. If it isn’t a rock concert they don’t want a ticket. It is all about “the crowd”.
The “IN CROWD” or the “OUT CROWD” or the “PRO CROWD” or the “ANTI CROWD” whatever, if it isn’t a “crowd” or “group” it has no real value.
There are so many people that are absolute strangers to themselves, because they are not comfortable being alone with themselves. Thinking for themselves, deciding for themselves, learning for themselves. They have no value unless they are part of a cult. Or a group.
Some people feel they have no meaning with out these identifications.
I don’t know what to say about the anti Hubbard cult. Except that for some people, it is easier to confront kicking a man that has been dead for several decades than looking in the mirror. For some people, they would rather confront a dead man than them self. That is so sad on so many levels I can’t bring myself to attack them.
You care, a lot more than I do. Your caring and continued efforts to reach and lift others up , in spite of the reactions and attacks, is quite a ways above my own willingness for responsibility. I don’t think I understand your burden. I have some little sense of forces.
You have walked for years in shoes that no other people have walked in.
Me too, but not in the committed way backed with love you have for other people.
I grew up inner city ghettos, but I would not have known the brutality possible between humans, had I not explored the occult and the supernatural. I had to see it for myself to understand my own inner comforts.
The mean spirited in the “Scientology” theater make the the East Side of Manhattan look like Disney Land.
This is the most viscous, abusive, sadistic culture I have wandered through on Earth. The fanatics and their opposing forces.
Yet, you still care. To be there and share.
I just don’t know how you continue to make yourself emotionally available through this social intercourse.
Anyone who has a heart, could see it.
That knowledge alone is very, very depressing.
Because of the feeling people put out that you still, still, must contribute to them. The NEEDS and NEEDY you can never satisfy.
And it doesn’t put a dent in your universe.
Do you know how many others have walked this path, and been devoured?
Yet, here you go forward.
I sit and ask myself, after years of spending reason to find myself spent. If not now, then when? It gives me this feeling of being in the wrong place at the wrong time.
But this apathetic resignation doesn’t seem to break your stride.
Ans the time doesn’t seem to bother you.
You deserve a bow.
Hubbard deserves a bow.
You came up with some realities that were rejected. What was so better I ask myself?
I am sorry this universe is so very fucking unrewarding. For people that offer some new way.
I mean, there are people out here that have CHILDREN, because of their exploration in Scientology, that will not even admit they have children because they walked this road? And they curse “Scientology” to their own kids. Knowing, those kids wouldn’t even be here if they had not walked the halls of Scientology? And they curse Hubbard. That is for real. They regret the experience that bought their children into this world.
And they lay this on their KIDS. That is some heavy shit to take on from “clients”.
They not only claim, to be victims themselves.They lay it on their kids and everyone around them that a new reality victimized them all. We were all victimized by a different reality.
Yet, you and Hubbard get out here and take on people like this.
What if nobody ever created a new reality? And we were all stuck in, let’s say the year 1495.
Is that even human like? No. It is not human like to never change. Otherwise there would still be cave men.
Yet, the protest about any new reality is monumental.
And in Scientology because it attracts people that CARE, we fold under the protests.
Stay, I say. Stay in a reality where there is no change and no inconvenient truths. Because your weight to drag you forward is on charity. I will never get repaid for my efforts as you stab me to death all the way over the city line into a different reality. You are stuck in a win. Where nobody matters. That is a real win win situation and I have been there. “I don’t matter and nobody matters.”.
And that is the heroin of social intercourse that keeps people happy and protective of all that they know.
And if you interfere with that, they will tear you up and suck your blood dry.
And, you just keep on communicating like they all matter.
You have outdistanced me.
They have convinced me, they do not matter.
Ouch Ouch Ouch. You sure kicked ass and took names! Why you, dangerous violent commander of forces and all that is holy and right! Hallelujah Brother! You have bought order into all that has been unholy here on Marty’s blog! Where did you leave your business card for this crowd to shift over onto your front porch?
Huh? No place to contact you? No Name? What the fuck?
O.K., that was so fucking 1.1 of me……..at my best 1.1.
Like “Happy successful people” would welcome someone parked in HATE on the tone scale into some “happy” situation? That is why it is floating here in the gutter. Like, to bring the tone level from HATE to cheerful, to embed it into a “happy successful” tribe is like turning alight switch? And like, I had to point that out as an obvious truth? That I admit was 1.1 at it’s best.
Sarge, love your comments!
And I’d just like to add; Unless one walked a mile in LRH’s moccasins, how on earth would one qualify as a critic of what he endured and the decisions/mistakes he made?
I don’t know of anyone who lives in the real world (an insane prison planet) who could always and consistently practice what he preached. At the same time, who in history made a better or more effective attempt at it than LRH?
Publius, you said: “For all you naysayers, you will never shake the certainty of those of us who audit, or have audited, professionally. Never, ever. You can howl all you want about how the emeter does not work, or whatever your particular “make nothing of” happens to be. It all falls on deaf ears to those of us who KNOW better.”
Well stated and I concur. And that includes those Scientology Critics who are so obsessed with OT III materials. Aside from the 20%ers who would appose any self betterment, maybe the reason there are others that are so enthralled is because this incident is on their case as well. Otherwise, if its so unreal or untrue why all the obsession to invalidate? Those of us who audited that incident with an emeter and saw the needle and TA and experienced the case gain are never going to be dissuaded and are the only one’s qualified to comment. And that goes for every other auditing level and training skills on both sides of The Bridge.
The one huge solice that can be taken for all of us practicing Scientologist is, try as you might (Anti Scn/Critics) YOU CAN’T KILL AN IDEA THAT IS TRUE. So no matter the eventualality of The Co$, Scientology will always be here and available to those who seek the benefits of its workable technology of spiritual freedom.
KFrancis, you said, “Point taken on your three post Oracle but where does simply application of the ARC Triangle come in? Is there any room for communication?”
Only if you, yourself desire it. -code of honor
I see your point Scott. The millions of people living happy, productive, good lives, most of whom have never heard of scientogogy, or who have heard of the long con and react by pointing and laughing, simply need some auditing and instruction from the 10,000 or so of you true believers. Brilliant, Scott.
Tony, I can appreciate the sentiment. Marty tends to answer a lot with one liners due to the volume of communications he is handling. I too would like to have a more elaborate response. But I don’t think it will happen for practical and stylistic reasons. I do not think his responses are intentionally cryptic. That would create broad arcx’s. But sometimes we would like more information. Like you, I prefer things spelled out. I am an old head on old shoulders. Oh well, it is what it is. I don’t expect it to change due to volume, if nothing else.
If your definition of “successful” is wealthy, then you have a point. By your standards, DM also lives a very “successful” life.
But, as you well know, that’s not the type of success I am referring to.
Successful , as in white picket fence and bmw in the drive way . ok , nothing wrong really with that .But happy? that “s delusion when put in the same sentence as “a big percentage”.
Marty’s post is nothing but an accurate observation and a correct indication in my views.
Ok, that is fair and it may be applicable here. I guess the question then is, when has the “petty ARC X” tipped over into a situation so severe it has to be reclassified into a code of honor issue. One of these can be repaired fairly easy and the other becomes much more difficult if you believe your honor is actually on the line.
Maybe the only ones who can answer this are the direct participants in the dustup through their contemplation of how much loss (if any) is going to have to be experienced as a consequence of letting your friends just disappear into the wind.
I have to say, I experience great regret for the casualness I showed in letting people disappear in my life because I was too self absorbed to see them.
Hmmm… Don’t know that one. Perhaps a Class XII will weigh in.
Steven and Publius – + 100.
Having read the book I fully understand why anyone tightly holding a position on either extreme is not satisfied. To one side he didn’t say the required amount of “bad” about the subject or LRH and to the other side they may feel he didn’t say enough “good” about the subject or LRH.
News for all – Marty told his own story, his own observations and his own opinions. His integrity is to himself and what he knows to be true for him. That is as it should be – after all, it is a “memoirs” and not a thesis of opinion or summation.
If any hard line anti or pro will actually read the entire book for what it is then the answers to their questions will be found. If they are not found then more reading and more books are needed. If they have never experienced the gains from auditing, training or applying the materials of the subject of scientology that is their missing subjective reality.
The basic truth’s still remain true. Most of the bickering is about subjective conclusions done without observation of these truth’s. Even the insistence that Marty was flawed due to whatever is kept their only by their insistence of what they “think” he should have written and comparing to that. Again, shadow boxing with the shadows created by the boxer and not by another.
Tony,
I think that the responses from Marty that you characterize as “cryptic” and not easy to understand are merely an expedient for Marty. In order to save time, Marty’s replys often contain a deeper meaning in fewer words.
Remember, Marty has to moderate this blog and reply to those posts he feels compelled to. In order to avoid long-winded explanations of concepts in his replies, Marty tends to keep them as short and to the point as possible by using his broad vocabulary as well as correct semantics, syntax, spelling and grammer.
I’m sure that he is not being intentionally cryptic in doing so. I’m also sure that he is more concerned with bringing about a conceptual understanding in the reader by using precise language to communicate his thoughts than he is with givng the readers M/U’s. He (as I do) probably takes it on faith that anyone interested enough to read what he writes, can certainly take the trouble to clear ay words they don’t unsderstand.
Iamvalkov, thank goodness he ain’t no list one RS’er! 🙂
So are you saying that as beings of awareness we all can pierce the veil to, all that is, regardless of the techniques used? That there are as many paths to enlightenment as there are beings in the world today and everyone holds the ticket to eternity within? That salvation is the personal responsibility of each of us and to act upon the responsibility of another would be considered some sort of spiritual crime? That we should all have the freedom of exploration and only through that freedom can we find that reality that is true for us? That through the nature of our being, we already hold the truth of existence? That no one can lead us to the truth because that path would only lead to their own?
Firstly — kudos to Oracle — she’s on a righteous roll!!
Secondly, I’ve been pondering this subject of Anti-LRH critics — and have come to my OWN conclusion. Those Anti-LRH critics who were ONCE in the Sea Org – were themselves ALMOST one for one – aggressive, mean-spirited, would do ANYTHING, short of murder, to get “their” product.
In other words — they are indeed a mirror image of what they claim was wrong with LRH.
Not one of those anti-LRH critics are my friends today and when I started to encounter them on the message boards – those who would post with their real names – I was always appalled that their own self-reflection was so poor they didn’t see what arrogant, self-serving meatheads they once were.
Time has changed some of them. They are now living good lives, with families, money in the bank etc., but they steadfastly refuse to acknowledge that in some part their success today comes from what they learned as managers IN the Sea Org.
ALSO — this is somewhat mitigated by those Sea Org members who were basically BORN into the Sea Org. They didn’t SEEK scientology and thus those who left have a different take on it. Those who have stayed are almost beyond reaching.
Those that left got a damn good hushmoney settlement OR their wealthy family welcomed them back ONLY once they denounced LRH. And just like someone on disability, they damn well better remain Anti-LRH if they want the family dough to keep rolling in.
There ARE exceptions to the above I’m sure … however, they aren’t all over the message boards, Ortega’s board or others ranting about LRH and now, since he hasn’t sufficiently condemned LRH, (or condemned him at all) – Marty.
Christine
Thanks Marty. When reading Tony Ortega’s blog I see some-
one who has taken a lot of time to do research and invests
to get an accurate view of the church’s atrocities. But when
it comes to LRH Tech Tony is sorely lacking in his research
(to put it mildly). His following are pretty vicious in just wanting
to see the church die and LRH Tech vanish. In many cases
it just seems to me they are feverishly goading in a party of
frivolously dissing anything that has to do with Ron and his
research and products. To me it is very glib and immature.
Like they have this idea that they are part of a following that
killed off a church, which will go down in history as such.
Guess it comes down to who is intent on destroying and
who is investing their time and efforts to build and create
and toss unworkability to the side but keep what works.
So it deals with intention. I do agree that Tony has attracted
something that can be characterized as a cult.
Observation: for Ron/against Ron, Agree with Marty/disagree etc are positions people have arrived at through their experiences and how the mind defines them.
I still see in this blog the default approach of judging the character of those whose views differ.
For example, Marty gets personally attacked when he states something true for him by some. And I also feel personal pinches from Marty to those people who are being critical of him.
Some here may think I am a dweeb but that is ok. I love the line from Terry Cole Whitiker “what you think of me is none of my business.”
So here is a suggestion for those with issues with Marty: don’t attack him persoanally. Use reason to address ideas and dialog about philosophies, talk about real injustices, flaws in approaches. If you disagree with him, make a good argument based on positions that you can articulate. Don’t attack him personally.
And from time to time I also read some personal judgements by you Marty towards your detractors.
I haven’t gotten that approach from you Marty even though I have been a loose and juicey critic. I believe Marty has been tolerant of my annoying apostasy because I try to address ideas and not persons.
What great understanding could occur if people could see the goodness in each other while in heated debate.
Win the argument with balanced and reasoned ideas. Targeting peoples character as a default method of argumentation is an unwitting revelation of a bankrupt position.
Diverse positions are what is great about life. Demonizing people who differ in opinion can be squarly placed at the doorstep of the well read and claydemoed policies of Ron.
Diverse opposing opinions are not attacks. Diverse opposing opinions are our opportunity to practice tolerance, love, humanity, decency, balance, even mindedness, contol of anger/resentment, ego etc, while at the same time speaking up for and defending principles we consider worthy of civilized argumention.
I hope my intention is received in the spirit intended.
Hey Jeb, I can’t really argue with your take on the behavior in Clearwater.
But while the “alien thing” no doubts sounds crazy to non-believers, it’s odd that I never hear anyone talk about how crazy the “Jesus thing” sounds to non-believers:
Immaculate conception
Walking on water
Creating food out of thin air (parable of loaves & fishes”
Bringing a dead body back to live
Last but not least, having his own body brought back to life
I figured this was a bunch of fairy tales at age 14. Yet millions if not a few billions either subscribe to these myths or, more importantly, accept them as “OK” simply because they’ve been around for 2000 years. There aren’t many who go around thinking “how crazy that all sounds”, even if they themselves are non-believers. Why? Because they’re used to it; it’s been around all their lives.
I would argue that the “alien thing” has a lot more chance of being true than do the myths of many other long-accepted religions and belief systems. Simply on the rate at which Kepler is finding new planets – it is beginning to look as though planetary formation is a natural consequence of star birth. There are likely to be billions of planets in this galaxy alone. The probability of intelligent life – “alien civilizations” – increases with each new discovery.
This is not to suggest that any of this constitutes “proof” – only that the core idea of alien life – and therefore, alien civilizations, with plenty of “crazy”, reality-bending history, at least from our perspective – is not so terribly far-fetched.
It came from an issue of Source Magazine I received.
I think the reason that critics attack SCN and LRH as generalities isn’t that we are not responsible for it. That’s for me true from the most bitter enemy of SCN to the most pro-SCN SCNist on earth. The thing is, the way I see it, that although it wasn’t meant to harm, some used it to harm, so then it died so that it wouldn’t harm any more. If doesn’t matter whether it’s true or not that LRH was/wasn’t the devil. If it gets sorted out, then it will no longer be attacked.
*responsible=i meant cause
One can say that there are bad people out there that want SCN down and fight it etc –like I was told in the COS.
But why did SCNists postulate and experience that downfall?
I never said he had to. To me it just makes sense.
It doesn’t have to be more elaborate. Just understandable.
Exactly. 🙂 I know that L. Ron Hubbard was a cool guy otherwise I would not have read his books. I have been to Clearwater, and I know people that currently still live there that I communicate with from time to time, but I have always preferred to DISTANCE myself AWAY from the group located at 210 S. For Harrison Avenue in Clearwater, Florida for that exact reason. Including eating in places AWAY from the downtown area. I have seen fist fights erupt (small mob scenes) on the sidewalk between church members and public less than 2 blocks up the street from the Fort Harrison. My memory serves me correctly, and it is NEVER the people who’se business it is to be walking down those streets, that start the trouble. I have only seen church members challenge local citizens about “What they are doing there and why?”. Fights can erupt in Clearwater and have if a member of the church should approach someone and say “You are not welcome to walk past the front of my business on the sidewalk because you are not a church member”. If that church member was to physically try to enforce such a “policy” it would be even worse, as I just said a few seconds ago regarding the street brawl type scene. I do not think L. Ron Hubbard would ever have then, or ever so do so now, tell somebody that, to get the point across that he was a Scientologist. 🙂
See how easy it is to work that tone level!
The Oracle, wow, all of this needed to be said and it was said with great emotion. You care, you care a lot or it would not have been said.There isn’t one paragraph more important than another…it is so true on so many levels. I feel ya!
To give a better example, most restaurants or diners in America have a policy that is just as effective verbally as it is in writing. It is called “NO SHOES, NO SHIRT, NO SERVICE!” Does anyone recall this or own or work in an establishment where it is felt that this policy may not apply for the most part? 🙂 When has anyone ever put up a sign (verbal or in writing) in a public place “NO DONATION, NO AUDITING, NO TRAINING, NO SERVICE!”. If you said no one except Noelle North, you are probably correct! 🙂 And even she can be considered a little off in nature, because she is a public that tried to enforce this policy physically on other public she knew or did not know personally! 🙂
Thanks Tony. OK, basically what I’m saying is that I think Marty’s post is not necessarily an attempt to communicate with anyone in particular.
He just observes that he is surprised at how many people, 27 years after LRH died, seem to make a practice or ‘cult’ of regularly reviling LRH’s name, often without having known him at all. He then describes some of the characteristics of these people, how they practice thought-stopping on others, promote black-and-white thinking, etc. They actually do many of the things we find so objectionable about doctrinaire church Scientologists.
These are all observable characteristics, yet for some reason it causes reactions and the reactions are individual. That’s why I liken the post to a Roschach blot – it brings out of people whatever is in their own minds. The responses are often not really sequitur to his original post.
I take your point about the arising of misunderstandings, but in a way that is exactly the issue, When others fail to understand something that is said, they have some responsibility for that, too. Perhaps they need to read what is written more carefully, for starters, to see if the person is really saying what they think he is saying at first glance. If people don’t do this, their first reply is often to a “straw man”.
“The Straw Man fallacy is committed when a person simply ignores a person’s actual position and substitutes a distorted, exaggerated or misrepresented version …”
It maybe unintentional. It can be due to simply misunderstanding what the person is actually saying, but assuming one does understand.
The responsibility to duplicate – who does that fall upon?
Isn’t that always the answer of the scientologists. Were no crazier than anyone else. I’m a skeptic of any religion,. But I dont see any other religions hiding their belief systems til they get thousands of dollars from the saps. I believe if your religion makes it able for you to feel good about living life, go for it, I don’t care what it is. But i have yet to hear a scientologist that has gone clear, which I guess is your version of happiness. I know religions tithe 10% of their income, but Im guessing in COS its much higher. Scientologists don’t seem to question LRH, the way other religions don’t question god. To anyone outside of the COS, Hubbard seems like a nutcase, similar to JIm Jones.
Do you feel compelled to defend Marty at every turn? All I was asking for is a response that makes sense to me. I don’t want to have to read every book he recommends or any of them for that matter for a response that makes sense.
Hey Valkov,
I wasn’t talking about his main post. I said that I liked that one.
My comment was regarding his reply to my comment. I would assume that his reply would be to me and should in my mind be directed to me.
He did answer me in the next main post and I understood the response.
Valkov, you said “Perhaps they need to read what is written more carefully, for starters, to see if the person is really saying what they think he is saying at first glance. If people don’t do this, their first reply is often to a “straw man”.
I understand this (except for the straw manpart)and somewhat agree with you.
My idea is that on a blog the communication should be at a layman level. If the blog is for specialists then that would be different. The truth is if his audience is for people who want to study all of the books he suggests and if this is sort of a tutorial class then his viewership may drop to those that want that. I am not interested in going that deep anymore.
If Marty gives me a response and I don’t understand it, I will tell him and he can clarify it if he wants to or he can tell me to read this or that book if he wants to. It is up to him.
I am just making a suggestion.
I think it’s kind of funny that people run to his defense as if he is being attacked or something. All I asked is for the response to be understandable to me at a layman level.
Hi EO, I’m surprised to see you here, considering what you posted on Tony’s blog just a dew days ago, referring to Marty…..
“EnthralledObserver • 4 days ago −
The fucking hypocrit! How can the arsehole even type that with a straight face and any sense of integrity when the fucker just BANNED me from commenting!
He is un-fucking-believable!”
That would have been around Thursday, 30 May. Today is Sunday, 2 June. I’ve seen plenty of posts here by you, since last Thursday…..
If everyone was like you there wouldn’t be any conflict. To begin with.
Yes, it’s easy to be vile, isn’t it?
Two thumbs up. To address the man only, rather than the argument he is making, is often the ‘ad hom’ logical fallacy. It must be said, sometimes the character of the man speaking is relevant, but most often it is not. The usual example is, “If Hitler told you that 2+2 = 4, would you automatically dismiss or disbelieve his statement?”
I guess from these responses you are not going to answer my question, but instead drop innuendos through choosing to argue with others. So far you’ve accused me of ‘make wrong’ communications, acting like a guru, running a tutorial course, and being cryptic – all the while blowing the comm cycle where you claim to simply be honestly telling me that you don’t understand something. I guess the list of accusations will just keep growing while you q and a from the comm cycle you initiated.
Yet you told T.O. she is “vile”, a few posts upon this thread……
Thank you Carol. Pardon the wordiness. I could have just said, Hubbard’s real crime, and Marty’s real crime, is that they made themselves and others matter, in a word where nobody is really supposed to matter very much.
Marty, I must have missed the question you asked Tony that he apparently didn’t answer but, for what it’s worth, I got that Tony was coming from a sincere place in his various comments.
And your point?
It’s not even about the Scientology or the tech. That the truth. Look at the anti Hubbards that don’t even have any interest in finding out about it.
Anyone, anyone on this planet, that makes themselves and others matter, accumulates a cult of assassins stalking them. That is why we have secret service agents and body guards.
The issue I have with Miscavige, is that what he is selling, is the idea that nobody matters, but him.
Well Thank You iam. Not that I complain about my circumstances growing up in the world. It is my work ethic to start at the bottom and work my way up. Surest footing. 🙂
Wow, your keyboard has empowered you! Who knew the world could be ruled and dominated from a keyboard? You GO buddy! I have two teenagers here tracking with you!
OK Tony, I misunderstood this. I owe you a ham sandwich. 🙂
Sorry, I wasn’t clear. I realize that you are referring to other exchanges too, but in this particular thread as regards his saying you were cryptic, I didn’t see his comm as dropping innuendos or as intended in any other way than as an interest in understanding what you were saying. Then he acknowledged that you had answered his request in the new blog post.
I don’t disagree with most of that. I think folks should ask for clarification when they feel they need/want it! That’s good communication. That is not to say they will always understand or agree with each other, either. 🙂
And Tony, I didn’t feel you were attacking him. I was just trying to convey my understanding of what he wrote, so no problem there….
Amazing how people can expend so much effort and time divining intentions behind words. Any thoughts on the original piece?
My view was based on his words, actually.
And my comment on the blog post was the second one: “Awesome. Just awesome.” That was sincere too. 🙂
I meant the second one at the top of the thread.
Since we are being direct and calling them the way we see them, I guess it’s OK for me to say this is the most delusional take on what the ‘tech’ actually is, and what it is based on, that I have read in quite a while.
But that is OK, because, as you say, “different strokes for different folks”.
However, coming from someone who has previously posted that she has no interest or inclination to actually read/listen to, ie ‘study’ in even a cursory way, scientology tech materials, I am left wondering whose evaluations and opinions about the ‘tech’ you are actually conveying.
Who are you being a mouthpiece for, EO?
How many State laws have you gotten enacted lately? How have you supported these lawsuits you speak of? Etc.
In simple words, how do I know you are not just blowing self-righteous and supercilious smoke?
I’m not saying you necessarily are doing that, but this is the Internet, after all, and how do I know you are not?
At least perhaps post a petition link or something to show it’s not all bullshit on your part.
Or as some say, DOX or STFU.
He was right about me being vile. Great insight, but he hasn’t even scratched the surface. I am morally debased, depraved, and despicable. Of little worth or account. And I mocked it all up. That’s the way I roll. Because of the immense freedom I find in that. The smallest of debts I have to carry.
But you see, even in this lowly livingness of mine self, how he is angry because he thinks I owed him more?
He is a she, T.O.
And yes, what would life be without depravity?
I have gone clear, long since. It’s not my “version of happiness” or anyone else’s I know. That is not what it is all about. Just to set the record straight, since you seem to be fairly clueless. I won’t put you down too hard, though, since it is true that many things have been said and written about the state of Clear and many of them are wide of the mark relative to what it really is. But what it really is, is really valuable (IMHO).
You know, since I was a kid, it never mattered to me what folks “outside” of whatever I was doing thought. I don’t need validation from “experts” and I for sure do not need public opinion on my side, in order to stick to a given path. I have confidence in my own powers to observe.
I’ve questioned LRH plenty, too, so you are way off base on that one. Not entirely, though – I agree, there are many who do, but also many who don’t – primarily those who decided to test it out for themselves and found out it WORKED for them and others to whom they applied it.
I just thought it was funny that she called you ‘vile’ for using ‘blowjob’,, then over on Tony’s blog she talks like a sailor about Marty –
“He is un-fucking-believable The fucking hypocrit arsehole….the fucker just BANNED me from commenting!”
And it wasn’t even true.
Hi Marty,
My responses were to Valkov.
To answer your question from the next post of yours, no, I haven’t read any of your suggested reading. I have read your two earlier books.
I am giving you feed back and I guess I will stop it as it isn’t going anywhere and I really get that you don’t want it.
I used to feel that I totally knew where you were going. Now I don’t. I won’t try to fix it anymore.
If you ever care to try to repair it you can call me or email me and we can do it off line. I’m sorry if I have annoyed you , it really wasn’t my intention.
With swiss cheese. 🙂
Ok. The reason I ask is that a) I recommend them to help people get out of ingrained cult think, b) I think you wouldn’t find my utterances so cryptic if you took even some of the recommendations, and c) I think your time is far better spent reading some of those recommendations than reading my blog and getting upset with my evolution.
Accusing you of running a tutorial isn’t that bad is it? Accusing you of being cryptic is not crime or super bad inval. Accusing you of being a Guru?? Ok, I can see how that might be invalidative. I apologize for that one. 🙂
Make wrong? That one isn’t that bad either.
I didn’t really “blow” the comm cycle anymore than you do when you don’t answer questions.
It’s cool. I won’t bust your balls anymore. I realized I was just manifesting some upset I had with you. You can do whatever you want. You paid your dues more than most. I shouldn’t have held you up to a higher standard or had expectations for you. That isn’t fair of me.
Sorry I couldn’t live up to those standards of yours.
Maybe giving up a cult is also giving up wanting a hero. You do a pretty good impression of one though… You wore that white hat real good.
The Oracle, Right on!!
Absolutely with Swiss cheese. On rye? With what kind of mustard?
Damn I’m making myself hungry!
The Ron Haters are beginning to make LRH look very wise for being so concerned about critics of the church. Many of these people are not seeking justice — they just want blood. The fact that they seek blood more so than a fair accounting of LRH, both his accomplishments and his shortcomings, says all you need to know about their motivations.
I agree Iamvalkov, those who put humans in ovens and do live psychiatric and medical experiments on them wins the right to be in a different catagory.
Those with a taste for cruelty and violence need to be isolated from mankind, not given the honor of respectable and heated dialog.
I have never called Ron names. I only address his writings. I have disagreed with Marty from time to time but never attacted hime personally. I discuss ideas that people have. Sure, we may have judgements about personhoods while we are discussing these ideas, but they don’t find their way to the mouth. This is a practice in civil society.
Not attacking personally is also an issue of self control. It is easy to default to initial emotional reactions and feel “how dare he say that to ME!” or “you are wrong and an idiot for having that view” or ” he is a wog” or “he is a Scientologist.”
Souls must connect with souls to resolve conflict. The only way to do that is with mutual respect and dialog based on ideas not negatively focus on the personal characteristics of those we disagree.
AND IF YOU EVER CHALLENGE ME AGAIN IAMVALKOV, I AM DISCONNECTING FROM YOU!!!!!!!
Just kidding:-)
” We are so hard on our heroes. We judge them by standards we would never apply to ourselves. Our heroes, wearied by their own huge efforts that most of us are incapable of and stung by the slings and arrows from our common enemies, have their work made even tougher by constant criticism from their friends in the peanut gallery. We project onto them all of our hopes, which adds more weight to their burden.
When our heroes fail to live up to our unrealistic expectations — and all of them WILL fail to live up to our expectations — we should lift them up and love them. Everyone does better if they’re loved.”
Brian wrote:
I discuss ideas that people have. Sure, we may have judgements about personhoods while we are discussing these ideas, but they don’t find their way to the mouth. This is a practice in civil society.
This is a great point, Brian, and a skill that I try to employ – failing many times but I keep trying, anyway. Maybe some day I’ll get better and better at it. I recognize it as part of “right speech”.
I hope that you do not think that my post was attacking Marty personally. I did my best to attack the weak points in the structure of Marty’s argument and pwn the playa with a badass rejection. I think I did an awesome job at that.
I love your posts, Brian. You present a great example of how to do it right.
Alanzo
Brian,
I give your post 2 thumbs up because I like and agree with it, and you feel I challenged you???
I think I may give up on the Internet as a viable medium of communication!
At least on the blog commenting part of it.
Calling me clueless is typical of scientologists. Your smarter and more informed than anyone else. Typical COS arrogance. What the hell is clear if it isn’t happiness? If your not happy with your life, what is the point of taking all the abuse and telling your secrets to some nerd with a lie detector? Oh, good for you, you have powers to observe. I guess I don’t have them. Only people in a cult can observe.Unfortunately for you, all that you observe is bullshit.
I don’t know if LRH did a fine job of dealing with the COS 3D. Policies sometimes seem harsh, but I think back then they were kinda harsh where they should (to very destructive people). Some said it wasn’t like that. I just don’t know, so I shouldn’t judge.
Nevertheless, one is free to go to the Church and straighten it out, if he thinks it is so easy 😛
Calling what Publius thinks “bullshit”, as he calls you “clueless”, this is “pot/kettling” both ways isn’t it? A real enlightened discussion!
I think the next post, about “Dichotomies”, is relevant here.
jeb, have you read Marty’s new book? It answers many of your questions about Scientologists.
Iamvolkov I was kidding with the CAPS. Sorry about that. I did not feel challenged. Texting really is a treacherous medium.
Alanzo, Believe me I am working on being a good communicator all the time as well. What I write about is also my ideal, my practice. I have not perfected my communication skills either.
I did not single you out. I was making a general statement based on how emotional things can get here.
There has been so much betrayal of trust. I can understand why emotions get fired up.
I just wanted to remind people of respect for each other. To see the good while the mind and emotions get stirred up.
Here’s some more from the charming, gracious, and knowledgeable Enthralled Observer. I queried on Tony’s blog, about her claiming she had been ‘banned’ by Marty a few days ago, inspite of having several posts published here after the date she claimed she had been banned….
Here’s her reply to me:
EnthralledObserver
“You are rather smug, condescending and ignorant… Why don’t you confirm it with Marty? It wasn’t an exaggeration or ‘fib’… it was completely and utterly the truth. AT the time I wrote that message, I was banned from making posts. i.e when I wrote one it did NOT go into the moderation wait list, it just disappeared instantly… it doesn’t even GO to Marty when you are banned. So I guess this answers my question – YOU have never been banned, as you have no clue what I was talking about when I said I was banned. I’m not talking about Marty deleting my messages one by one… I’m talking banned, albeit temporarily as it was, but I had no inclination how long I would be banned for AT THE TIME I WROTE THAT MESSAGE.
Get it, ya ignorant prick?”
Can you imagine being married to this person, or being one of her children?
Man, this whole thread has been an eye-opener for me. I am shocked at how many Ron Haters and people with absolutely no history in the Church of Scientology are participating in this site.
One need not have been a Scientologist to protest it’s ongoing abuses. That’s like saying one has no right to protest Monsanto because they never worked there. I assure you nobody has a copyright on the truth.
The tragic for me is when one is a Scientologist and then one day he ‘wakes up’ and goes on and on about how Ron made all those terrible things (through him) 😛
I doubt if the Ron Haters are protesting any other abuses by any other group other than LRH and Scientology and certainly not on the level they are protesting LRH and Scientology. It’s clear that it has become an obsession with some people. I can easily think of twenty-five other issues that are more worthy of their concern. I also don’t think they want to see Scientology corrected. Instead they want to see it destroyed. That sort of fanaticism is what got Scientology in trouble to begin with.
“The devil made me do it”
There’s truth in what you are saying Mr Kelley. There are many ills in the world today. We live under a government at war with its own people. Impure food, impure water etc. These issues are huge. As a member of Occupy Oakland and a Black Block Anarchist there are few more keenly aware of what you are saying than I sir.
Compared to that the abuses of corporate Scientology are a tempest in a tea pot. Much ado about nothing. But if by way of understanding I may impart the words of the late Milton Berle to you as a way for you to understand what the “Ron haters” are doing “You gotta choose your spots”.
So let the debate rage on. It means so little to so few.
Meanwhile I’m lacing up my boots. I’ll be in front of an org as I am every week, cutting Miscaviges funding.
Best of luck to all 🙂
For a complete outsider who has no idea what the whole thing is about, it is understandable to hate LRH. For a person who got into SCN and experienced it badly, and left, it is also understandable. For a person that for years used it against others, it’s just too whatever. You tell them “hey, you know, LRH didn’t write you should dump your wife because she is connected to somebody who is connected to somebody who once heard somebody talking bad about SCN”. The reply is “you are brainwashed”.
The most ‘on source’ and ‘on purpose’ SCNists I have met, are mostly in the COS. Do you agree? Yet, it is only an apparency. They say Ron said this and that and they do other things. They aren’t pure tech’ and stuff like that. That’s bull…
They follow others who claim to know the tech better than them. There’s that hierarchy: The older ones and higher in terms of status ‘know better’ and can ‘correct’ you. I know hardcore (and critical of non hardcore) staff who never opened an LRH book –just their hat’s PLs. Usually, the newbies immitate the older ones. And that’s how most are so on ‘source’ and yet so abberated from the core-basics of SCN. People who apply this stuff, think they apply LRH. They victimise, they get victimised, they witness other victims and they think it’s all alligned with LRH. Then they blame LRH for their experiences or they go on doing what they do forever. Add to that the alteration of some tech and the invalidation of non ‘standard tech’, and the cut and paste of the OT Bridge and I don’t know what else, and you have this…thing…and it’s all Hubbard’s fault of course.
As Marty pointed out, SCN was meant to strip a person of his valences, yet in my org I was seeing a single valence repeating over and over. I don’t know whose valence it is. It had some bitchy, critical attitude, some ‘superiority’ (we are the right ones, we know, you save the world, you are abberated, wog blah blah), some weird considerations about SCN (never found in SCN texts) and low acceptance level –just pretended acceptance level. I took that valence too, to a degree. But I didn’t take it thoroughly enough to become completely blind over the fact that I had taken it from there, and that I shouldn’t had. I would say it’s a suppressive valence, and a very destructive one for a person who wears it. But it is a valence, and it isn’t attitude and considerations based on LRH’s stuff.
I got to agree with you there, Paul.
We do judge heroes by standards that we would never apply to ourselves…
It’s entirely too easy to be an armchair critic.
Marty’s blog, for instance does a great service by making readers think.
And if someone just doesn’t want to take the time to think or better yet, reflect…..There’s always “well why not just criticize him for something?”
Marty says, “read the book” for a reason.
I to agree. There are probably 1000 other concerns more important than the cult of scientology. But when you live in Clearwater, and cannot even walk down the streets of your city without being hassled by people with walkie talkies and cameras gettting in your face and asking what you are doing, it seems pretty important to me, Then you get on the internet and try to see what these people are all about, It blows your mind. Squirrel busters, the Headlys story about escaping the church, ESCAPING A CHURCH, crazy con man racist, homophobe leader, lie detectors, errr, auditing meters, money, money, money and more money, alein space ships, displaced aliens, aleins clinging to your souls through many lifetimes, interment camps for children, the hole, forced abortions, private detectives, fair game, $40 a week salaries, communal living with guards watching every move, a ship with people stuck in the bilge with toothbrushes to clean it. disconnection from family and friends, murder, buying off judges and other officials, a dwarf as COB who physically abuses high level officials by slugging and slapping them,dousing them in a lake,but lives in a mansion with a huge staff who caters to his every whim. i can go on, but I think you get my meaning.
No problem. You may not be a Scientologists but at least your opinions and concerns are tied to personal experiences. The guys that concern me are the ones that hate the entire subject and want to see it destroyed but have had no real contact with the church or it’s teachings. More troublesome is that these guys are the fanatic haters of Scientology.
The real story is that most of the craziest stuff went on at the top where it could be hidden. The rank and file members while certainly exposed to water down versions of this stuff we were mostly outside of all of this. In 35 years I never met David Miscavige or LRH or most of the top brass for the church and they certainly had no real influence over me. The management people I did meet over the years; people like Heber Jentsch and others were very nice people. Same as most Scientologists.
I think we need to put all of this in perspective. As I say most Scientologist are very nice people and almost entirely motivated by the strongest desire to help others as well as themselves. That is the biggest reasons why so many people have put up with so much bullshit over the years. We hoped for peace at the end of all of these battles. Our trouble was that our leaders choose to make enemies out of their own soldiers.
Ultimately we want to help people and we knew that we could and that is what is most important to know about the vast majority of Scientologists. As it is you can’t possibly think it was just for the opportunity to work night and day seven days week for little or no pay and all the stress you could possibly handle. .
Paul,
You are coming in loud and clear brother!
Also, I thought Anonymous were autonomous individuals who did not have a “spokesman”.. Yet you seem to be speaking for Anonymous as a group.
ORLY?
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