Cruise Controlled
A look under the hood of Scientology. Prepare to spend hours. Fascinating stuff. Or, just read the abridged version -- a 1991 Time Magazine story by Richard Behar. Courageous guy, considering the creepy stuff that happens to anyone who says or writes anything critical of Scientology:
Strange things seem to happen to people who write about Scientology. Journalist Paulette Cooper wrote a critical book on the cult in 1971. This led to a Scientology plot (called Operation Freak-Out) whose goal, according to church documents, was "to get P.C. incarcerated in a mental institution or jail." It almost worked: by impersonating Cooper, Scientologists got her indicted in 1973 for threatening to bomb the church. Cooper, who also endured 19 lawsuits by the church, was finally exonerated in 1977 after FBI raids on the church offices in Los Angeles and Washington uncovered documents from the bomb scheme. No Scientologists were ever tried in the matter.For the TIME story, at least 10 attorneys and six private detectives were unleashed by Scientology and its followers in an effort to threaten, harass and discredit me. Last Oct. 12, not long after I began this assignment, I planned to lunch with Eugene Ingram, the church's leading private eye and a former cop. Ingram, who was tossed off the Los Angeles police force In 1981 for alleged ties to prostitutes and drug dealers, had told me that he might be able to arrange a meeting with church boss David Miscavige. Just hours before the lunch, the church's "national trial counsel," Earle Cooley, called to inform me that I would be eating alone.
Alone, perhaps, but not forgotten. By day's end, I later learned, a copy of my personal credit report -- with detailed information about my bank accounts, home mortgage, credit-card payments, home address and Social Security number -- had been illegally retrieved from a national credit bureau called Trans Union. The sham company that received it, "Educational Funding Services" of Los Angeles, gave as its address a mail drop a few blocks from Scientology's headquarters. The owner of the mail drop is a private eye named Fred Wolfson, who admits that an Ingram associate retained him to retrieve credit reports on several individuals. Wolfson says he was told that Scientology's attorneys "had judgments against these people and were trying to collect on them." He says now, "These are vicious people. These are vipers." Ingram, through a lawyer, denies any involvement in the scam.
During the past five months, private investigators have been contacting acquaintances of mine, ranging from neighbors to a former colleague, to inquire about subjects such as my health (like my credit rating, it's excellent) and whether I've ever had trouble with the IRS (unlike Scientology, I haven't). One neighbor was greeted at dawn outside my Manhattan apartment building by two men who wanted to know whether I lived there. I finally called Cooley to demand that Scientology stop the nonsense. He promised to look into it.
After that, however, an attorney subpoenaed me, while another falsely suggested that I might own shares in a company I was reporting about that had been taken over by Scientologists (he also threatened to contact the Securities and Exchange Commission). A close friend in Los Angeles received a disturbing telephone call from a Scientology staff member seeking data about me -- an indication that the cult may have illegally obtained my personal phone records. Two detectives contacted me, posing as a friend and a relative of a so-called cult victim, to elicit negative statements from me about Scientology. Some of my conversations with them were taped, transcribed and presented by the church in affidavits to TIME's lawyers as "proof" of my bias against Scientology.
Among the comments I made to one of the detectives, who represented himself as "Harry Baxter," a friend of the victim's family, was that "the church trains people to lie." Baxter and his colleagues are hardly in a position to dispute that observation. His real name is Barry Silvers, and he is a former investigator for the Justice Department's Organized Crime Strike Force. (RB)
The most amazing thing to me was the story behind Scientology. Read it for yourself, and the comment below should will make a lot of sense to you:
What? You thought it was a stupid story?Well so do we. However, this story is the core belief in the religion known as Scientology.* If people knew about this story then most people would never get involved in it. This story is told to you when you reach one of their secret levels called OT III. After that you are supposed to telepathically communicate with these body thetans to make them go away. You have to pay a lot of money to get to this level and do this (or you have to work very hard for the organisation on extremely low pay for many years).
We are telling you this story as a warning. If you become involved with Scientology then we would like you to do so with your eyes open and fully aware of the sort of material it contains.
OT3 in Hubbard's handwriting Most of the Scientologists who work in their Dianetics* centres and so called "Churches" of Scientology do not know this story since they are not allowed to hear it until they reach the secret "upper" levels of Scientology. It may take them many years before they reach this level if they ever do. The ones who do know it are forced to keep it a secret and not tell it to those people who are joining Scientology.
Bravo, Amy. It's great that Scientology is getting some of your anti-religious attention.
Also: Be VERY CAREFUL with internet research on Scientology. They Google-bomb... i.e., they artificially inflate the rankings of pages they want us to see. When reading their critiques or defenses, try to find sources linked by people you trust. As we saw with Cruise and Lauer the other day, their capacity for control freakage is unbounded.
Crid at June 26, 2005 9:06 AM
I don't see how Scientology is any better or any worse than any other religion out there. There's a very thin line between a "cult" like Scientology and a "religion" like Christianity. I find it funny that American society preaches tolerance for Islam and acceptance of Christianity, but encourages ridicule of Scientology.
I predict that Scientology will continue to adapt until it, like Mormonism, becomes tolerated by the mainstream. After all, all religions are businesses, and they're always looking for ways to broaden their customer base.
Jason Ginsburg at June 26, 2005 9:41 AM
Thanks -- I do know that. Here's a bit on their efforts to take the site I linked off the 'net.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Clambake
PS I consider Scientology more a cult than a religion. Very creepy. Worse than a religion.
Amy Alkon at June 26, 2005 9:53 AM
Christianity uses irrationality and fear to promote itself as well. Creeps me out. Oh, am I going to hell because I don't believe in Jesus? You been to hell? You know anybody who has? So, how do we know there's a hell? Because some big fairytale book said it exists? How much saner is this than Hubbards wacky outer space tale?
Amy Alkon at June 26, 2005 9:54 AM
Amy, that link's now broken. Worked before. Guess the Scientologists got to it.
little ted at June 26, 2005 4:38 PM
Which link is broken? Both the wikipedia and the xenu links worked for me now.
Amy Alkon at June 26, 2005 8:20 PM
Jason, some of the big differences are...
-Christians, Muslims, and Mormons will generally give you their holy scriptures for free. Scientology charges lots of money.
-Lawyers from "Christianity" will not come to your house and sue you if you publish a story saying that Jesus isn't God, or that the epistles of Paul might not have been actually written by Paul.
-Jesus Christ and Mohammed are not on record as saying that the best way to make money would be to start a religion. Jesus, by all accounts, was a pauper from birth through death.
-The Bible, the Koran, and the Book of Mormon all evince a certain degree of writing skill, unlike "Battlefield Earth."
LYT at June 27, 2005 1:14 AM
LYT, whatever the sins of Scientology, you can find far worse in Christian history. Is the greed exhibited by Scientology unknown in Christianity? Can Scientologist lawsuits hold a candle to the Inquisition or the Crusades?
My point is that Christianity, early on, must have seemed every bit as wacky as Scientology does to us today. And it has certainly has a darker history. Islam, of course, is no prize either. By studying history, one can easily see how Scientology, if managed properly, would have the potential to become as established as any religion.
When I refer to management, I mean to imply that religions are just different forms of business. Some businesses are managed very well so they can adapt to changing times and tastes in order to expand. Other businesses have poor management and so they fizzle quickly. This is true for religions as well.
Only time will tell if Scientology is managed well enough to adapt and expand. But it's certainly done well so far with celebrity endorsements.
Jason Ginsburg at June 27, 2005 8:00 AM
Jason,
I was raised in a right wing xtian cult. I know what a cult is. And in my opinion, Scientology fits the bill.
With all due respect, have you ever been on the inside of a cult looking out, feeling trapped, living in fear, having people stake out your house, monitoring your conversations, attempting to control everything you do right down to where you live, who you dance with, date and/or marry, how or if you have sex, what you drive, how much money you give them, whether you take medication, what you eat, etc.? Have you seen friends die of cancer because they were told not to go to the doctor? Have you seen women, beaten by their husbands, told by a minister that they need to be more "submissive"? Have you ever had your self-esteem systematically and daily de-constructed? I would submit to you that until you have the experience, you cannot truly know. Remember that shooting backing in March, in Wisconsin? Terry Ratzmann? The Living Church of God? Guess what? My family is in that cult, an even more fanatical offshoot of the one that they raised me in.
I do agree with you that some forms of xtianity are cults; most religion is cultic (is that a word?) by nature of what it is. But there are some out there that are extremely damaging, painful, and difficult to extract oneself from.
Of course, I could be wrong. But based on my personal experience, I. Don't. Think. So.
Goddyss at June 27, 2005 10:20 AM
Well, I don't think it's quite fair to compare the Inquisition and the Crusades to anything modern created in a society that's theoretically way past that, but even if you do -- those didn't represent the totality of Christianity, and would likely have been frowned upon by the religion's founder, one Mr. J. Christ, Esq.
Whereas Scientology acts as one, in absolute accordance with the rules laid down by L. Ron Hubbard. And demands lots of money before they'll even tell you their creation myth.
LYT at June 27, 2005 11:39 AM
I don't mean to compare Scientology, in its present state, or other obscure cults to mainstream Christianity as it exist now. That would be comparing apples & oranges.
But I can easily see how something like Scientology could evolve into something like Christianity. And in today's modern world, such an evolution could happen relatively rapidly - within the span of a few centuries.
Scientology obviously has many negatives and should be avoided like the plague, but when you consider religious history as a whole, it fits right in, both with minor cults that faded away and with major religions that continue today.
All I'm saying is that it's hypocritical for religious people to cast stones at Scientology. For example, I find LYT's latest post on this subject amusing in that he tells us what Christ would've thought about Medieval Christianity. The truth, LYT, is that Christ is whatever people have made him and can be used, and indeed has been used, to justify any purpose. But if you think you know Christ so well, then tell me, LYT, where was he when so many people were doing so many horrible things in his name?
Jason Ginsburg at June 27, 2005 12:40 PM
I used to volunteer with the Cult Awareness Network on their education series. If anything in this world is a cult, $cientology is a cult.
There's absolutely no doubt about it; just look at how the members behave.
Richard Bennett at June 27, 2005 12:53 PM
Hey I just met you in starbucks and i find your work Funny. I am glad i have met you and you really know how to make reading FUN! I just read your article on Scientology and i have to agree with you on that.
Margo at April 19, 2006 2:05 PM
Hey, thank you - and it was a pleasure!
Amy Alkon at April 19, 2006 2:17 PM
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