How To Be An Unperson
Just extricate your brain from the clutches of the Scientologists. Robert Farley writes in the St. Pete Times:
Religions have always penalized those who betray the cause.Catholics excommunicate, barring the wayward from church rites. The Amish, Jehovah's Witnesses and some orthodox Jewish sects shun their nonconformists.
In the Tampa Bay area's burgeoning Scientology community, members abide by a policy considered by some religious experts extreme: Scientologists declare their outcasts "suppressive persons."
Another Scientology policy - called "disconnection" - forbids Scientologists from interacting with a suppressive person. No calls, no letters, no contact.
An SP is a pariah. Anyone who communicates with an SP risks being branded an SP himself.
Scientology founder L. Ron Hubbard wrote the policies four decades ago, church leaders say, not as a tool to oust members but to provide those going astray with a mechanism to return to the church's good graces. That aligns with Scientology's tenets of improving communication, strengthening relationships.
But SPs who have felt the sting and other church critics say the suppressive person policy is a sledgehammer to keep marginal members in line - and in the flock.
Whatever Scientology's motivation, its suppressive person policy results in wrenching pain, say a dozen SPs interviewed by the St. Petersburg Times.
Some have gone years without seeing or talking with sons, daughters, mothers, fathers - all of whom abide by Scientology's no-contact requirement.
For a Scientologist thinking of forsaking the church, the decision is grueling: stay in or risk being ostracized from loved ones and friends.
Be sure to go to the link and read all the sad stories of people separated from their families and friends.
I know what that's like. I grew up among the Jehovah's Witnesses, but my mother and brother were not required to shun me when I left, because I was never officially baptized into the faith. (You can't be "disfellowshipped" unless you've pledged yourself to the religion through baptism first.)
You can still be branded a "bad association" though - an "elder" will actually get up and announce it to the congregation, and people aren't supposed to associate with you. You can be branded a bad association for all kinds of infractions, such as smoking, for example, or hanging out with "worldy" people. ("Worldly" usually refers to people on the "outside" who live an "immoral" lifestyle, but can mean anyone who is not a Jehovah's Witness.) That didn't happen to me, because I didn't do anything to get publicly denounced - I simply stopped going. But I remember it happening to one girl, after they found out she had a "worldly" boyfriend and had been having sex.
The effect this has on kids is that they become so socially isolated from the rest of the world, it becomes very hard for them, if they do manage to break away, to fit in with the rest of society. It's not as extreme as what the Mormons do to the young boys they weed out (in order that the old farts get all the young wives to themselves), but it can be pretty hard for a kid who has gone through his whole life being brainwashed into a sect to start functioning normally. They tend to be very naive and inexperienced for their ages, lack social skills, and have all kinds of hang-ups.
Generally religions like that tend to attract some pretty messed-up people anyway, though.
Pirate Jo at June 28, 2006 8:32 AM
> Generally religions like that tend to attract
> some pretty messed-up people anyway,
> though.
Exactly! I think Scientology is built on one insight: There are lots of people who are very argumentative, but still socially needy. Hubbard figured out how exploit their natural snottiness while making them feel loved.
But it's hard to feel too sorry for people who get sucked into this. The problem isn't simply that these folks aren't humble. It's a kind of cowardice to think you can move through life in a secret society without making lonely, difficult refinements to you own personality... And patient, improvised accommodation to the spirits of others. What else are we on this planet to do?
So imagine the thousands of them that are few years into Scientology before they realize that they've been had... They're living out there in the compound, they're financially beholden to Tom Cruise, they've never made peace with a free economy the way other people have, and the "auditing" sessions have sharpened the worst aspects of their character to the point of reflex. And if they try to get out, the COS will fuck with them in a big way.
But they didn't sign those million-year contracts to be nice to other people, did they? They did it because their own needs were being met, and Scientology promised them a way to exploit others.
Fuck 'em.
Crid at June 28, 2006 9:45 AM
I know that a lot of people get into the Jehovah's Witnesses as a way to compensate for something they didn't get during childhood - namely, a feeling of inclusion, belonging, and unconditional love. But it becomes an "us vs. them" mentality, where "we" (the favored people of God) will survive Armageddon, but none of "them" will.
There is definitely a lot of envy involved. They love the parts in the Bible where God promises to deliver the world to the "meek" or where it says it's easier for a camel to get through the eye of a needle than it is for a rich man to get to heaven. There you have it - validation for your wretched lot in life! Those wealthy, attractive, successful people with all the neat stuff must simply be evil! And if their success proves they are evil, then your lack of success must prove you are good. If people from messed-up backgrounds can't re-engineer themselves to function successfully among other people, they can at least feel superior in their own mediocrity.
I remember as a kid when I'd get dragged along on those door-to-door proselytizing missions, the JW's would go through a nice neighborhood and pick out which houses they'd live in once the heathen unbelievers died at Armageddon. None of them could manage to afford a house like that through their own efforts - indeed, most of the ones I knew worked nights as janitors in order to avoid contact with "worldly" people. (The joke is that the religion is full of people who have closets full of suits but clean floors for a living.) But that didn't stop them from wanting what those "materialistic, worldly" people had, anyway.
Pirate Jo at June 28, 2006 10:12 AM
C-U-L-T. That's how it's spelled.
dea at June 28, 2006 10:21 AM
The psychology of cults is a pretty interesting area of study that I've never had the time to explore. But this looks like an interesting place to start:
http://www.freedomofmind.com/
Lena at June 28, 2006 10:23 AM
Also, nitpicking:
> Religions have always penalized
> those who betray the cause.
1. Sometimes, not always.
2. You say that like it never happens in other sectors, like industry, finance, education or warfare.
Crid at June 28, 2006 10:33 AM
You've got to check out the comment (from somebody named something like "Diamondille") about what one has to go through in Scientology after "hurting a friend" -- at the link below:
http://www.advicegoddess.com/archives/2006/06/the_unfunny_tru_1.html
Amy Alkon at June 28, 2006 12:39 PM
Here are a few interesting scientology links:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=JUvv-BM7zg0
A youtube link to a Scientology "orientation" video (part 10 of 10...the links to the earlier episodes are on that page). Creepy, but especially so when the "guide" compares NOT being a scientologist to "blowing your brains out."
[sarcasm] Nice. [/sarcasm]
And another link that has an interesting presentation of Scientology:
http://theunfunnysequel.ytmnd.com/
jnichols at June 29, 2006 6:46 AM
My apologies. After reading more closely, I noticed that you (Amy) had already linked the 2nd of my links in your comments. Mine were from Digg, and I missed the "unfunny" part entirely.
jnichols at June 29, 2006 6:49 AM
What amazes me is that people with small brains, like Cruise, come to believe as truth what a second-rate scifi writer made up only fifty years ago.
If you read his writings you can even tell that he evolved his storyline and embellished. It's not like he had or even said he had revelations, just that he thought these things up.
Oligonicella at June 29, 2006 10:32 AM
So, if you join Scientology, leave without going throught the security checks, no Scientologist will ever speak to you again? If I can get that promise in writing, sign me up!
Patrick at June 30, 2006 12:18 PM
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erection pill at February 20, 2007 8:26 AM
According to Richard Clarke, the former White House counterterrorism chief, Bush was so obsessed with Iraq that he failed to take action against Osama Bin Laden despite repeated warnings from his intelligence experts.
Danial Liddie at December 21, 2011 12:57 PM
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