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Hubbard and Far-Right politics

I don't know if anybody has mentioned it, but something has to be mentioned about Hubbard's like or simpatico-ness with far-Right ideas. It's my understanding that on one version of the tone scale Hubbard has Fascists slightly above Communists. I'm not saying that Hubbard was an ideologue of some strain of crypto-Naziism, but rather that the man had tendencies toward authoritarianism, and politically that style of thought manifests itself in the groups like the John Birch Society, the various groups Lyndon LaRouche has run, the Minutemen, and scads of like-minded groups in Europe, Africa, and Asia (too many to mention.)

In many ways Hubbard reminds me of the Italian writer and aristocrat Julius Evola (1898-1974.) Evola was involved in a lot of occultic research, but before that he had been involved with the Italian Futurist movement, which was an art movement of the early 20th century revolving around speed, power, youth, violence, and technology. Many members of the Futurist movement later became members of the Italian Fascist party, seeing the ideals of the party as extensions of Futurism. Evola never joined the blackshirts or the Grand Council of Fascism, but he was considered a fellow traveller, and long after Fascism exited the Italian political stage he was writing his crypto-fascist books and secretly supporting neo-fascist terrorist groups in the early 1970s during the "Years of Lead" when the far-Right was fighting the far-Left. Of course there are people who will say that Evola was not a fascist, but I would say that his politics actually starts where Fascism runs out: a state where tradition is enshrined, where politics and religion are the same thing, an anti-populist, un-democractic place, run by priest-aristocrats. The closest thing I can think fits Evola's scheme would have to be the Aztec or Mayan empires.
 

Ted

Gold Meritorious Patron
I don't know if anybody has mentioned it, but something has to be mentioned about Hubbard's like or simpatico-ness with far-Right ideas. It's my understanding that on one version of the tone scale Hubbard has Fascists slightly above Communists. I'm not saying that Hubbard was an ideologue of some strain of crypto-Naziism, but rather that the man had tendencies toward authoritarianism, and politically that style of thought manifests itself in the groups like the John Birch Society, the various groups Lyndon LaRouche has run, the Minutemen, and scads of like-minded groups in Europe, Africa, and Asia (too many to mention.)

In many ways Hubbard reminds me of the Italian writer and aristocrat Julius Evola (1898-1974.) Evola was involved in a lot of occultic research, but before that he had been involved with the Italian Futurist movement, which was an art movement of the early 20th century revolving around speed, power, youth, violence, and technology. Many members of the Futurist movement later became members of the Italian Fascist party, seeing the ideals of the party as extensions of Futurism. Evola never joined the blackshirts or the Grand Council of Fascism, but he was considered a fellow traveller, and long after Fascism exited the Italian political stage he was writing his crypto-fascist books and secretly supporting neo-fascist terrorist groups in the early 1970s during the "Years of Lead" when the far-Right was fighting the far-Left. Of course there are people who will say that Evola was not a fascist, but I would say that his politics actually starts where Fascism runs out: a state where tradition is enshrined, where politics and religion are the same thing, an anti-populist, un-democractic place, run by priest-aristocrats. The closest thing I can think fits Evola's scheme would have to be the Aztec or Mayan empires.


The far Left has its own fixed ideas, methods, and authoritarianism. Hubbard gave lip service to values from either side that suited his purposes and ends.

His unit pay system is Communistic in theory and practice. His Commodore self was the nobility or elite. The staff were no better than serfs, unless they were producers of big money, then they became, for a time, like knights. The SO is a Nazi outfit. The RPF is the equivalent of a WWII death camp minus the actual broken bodies. There is no Democracy in Scientology. It's Hub-Way or the Highway.
 

LA SCN

NOT drinking the kool-aid
The far Left has its own fixed ideas, methods, and authoritarianism. Hubbard gave lip service to values from either side that suited his purposes and ends.

His unit pay system is Communistic in theory and practice. His Commodore self was the nobility or elite. The staff were no better than serfs, unless they were producers of big money, then they became, for a time, like knights. The SO is a Nazi outfit. The RPF is the equivalent of a WWII death camp minus the actual broken bodies. There is no Democracy in Scientology. It's Hub-Way or the Highway.

On joining staff at CCI in the mid 1980's, I under went major culture shock.

To read the PR fluff Scn was a world beater, the best thing since corn flakes and the wheel; Hubbard was a genius and had invented everything of import to modern man and would save him from the scrapheap of existence.

Yet we couldn't keep the place in light bulbs and toilet paper. Staff life was an impoverished slavish drudgery.

I remember thinking how the PR line matched up with the Soviet News Agency Tass and Izvestia newspaper and the staff life was like that of a Communist state, complete with its own KGB - the RTC.

Hip, hip, hooray?
 

Veda

Sponsor
At first glance, in the 1950s and 1960s, it seemed that Hubbard was anti-communist, and some people, thinking that, sent him anti-communist literature attempting to be helpful. Consulting his own writings can be informative.

Excerpt from 1960 HCOPL 'Department of Government Affairs':

"If attacked on some vulnerable point by anyone or anything or any organization, always find or manufacture enough threat against them to get them to sue for peace...

"The goal of the Department [of Government Affairs, renamed Guardians Office, then renamed Office of Special Affairs] is to bring the government and hostile philosophies or societies into a state of complete compliance... This is done by high level ability to control and in its absence by low level ability to overwhelm. Introvert such agencies. Control such agencies."

Hubbard used his own 'Propaganda Tech ' on others, including his own followers, to such an extent, that quoting his comments in lectures (and assorted inspirational writings to Scientologists) can be confusing to some who haven't decoded "trickster" Hubbard's methods. During the 1950s and 1960s, the "public" "hated" communists, so Hubbard made a point of being vehemently and publicly anti-communist, and sought to identify his perceived enemies as communists or communist sympathizers.

However, Hubbard could vary his approach if it seemed advantageous to do so. He even briefly instructed that Scientology be identified as anti-Capitalist.

In a 6 October 1965 (broadly circulated) 'Executive Letter' Hubbard announced, "McCarthyism has many faces. It is still abroad today."

And in another (non public) issue, 'Enquiry Rumor UK' of 9 February 1966, Hubbard (privately) explained, regarding a pending Enquiry in Britain:

"The news that some Lord is going to ask a question in the House as to 'why the Health Minister here does not conduct an Enquiry into Scientology like in Melbourne'...

"Planning would be if any more is heard of this:

"Get a detective on that Lord's past to unearth the tidbits. They're there
.

"...We refuse to discuss or describe Scientology. As near as we come is, 'Well, Scientology isn't like psychiatry. In psychiatry they think adultery is a cure for ---' You get it. Curve every answer with answers that make lurid press to psychiatry's cost. Papers by policy want only Blood and Sex - so give them psychiatry's and they'll print it. Further, couple the words psychiatry with Capitalism - allege that psychiatry is the Capitalist's tool. A Conservative opened the attack in the UK and found the Press beating the drum for us."

When this approach did not prove effective, Hubbard quickly resumed his prior long standing tactic of calling his enemies "communists."

Then, by 1971, with the USA Vietnam war becoming increasing unpopular, and Scientology's membership, and potential membership, becoming younger, Hubbard switched to calling his enemies fascists and Nazis.

L. Ron Hubbard explains how to use propaganda (to push the "hate" and "love" "buttons" of "wogs") in 'Battle Tactics' of 16 February 1969:

"The only safe public opinion to head for is they love us and are in a frenzy of hate against the enemy, that means standard wartime propaganda is what one is doing... Know the mores of your public opinion, what they hate. That's the enemy. What they love. That's you."

And another piece of Scientology tech, from Hubbard's 'Black Propaganda' of 12 January 1972:

"The objective is to be identified as attackers of popularly considered evils. This declassifies us from former labels. It reclassifies our attackers as evil people."

And from 'Ron's Journal 68':

"...And the general attack line is along the line of human rights; yes human rights...

"Now I'll give you a clue on how this is handled, somebody comes up to you he's hostile - he's hostile to Scientology and he says to you and he says 'na na na na' and you say why are you against human rights and uh and if you know anything about human rights like the universal declaration of human rights, United Nations - that sort of thing you know if you know something about this subject you just follow it right straight up - in other words you don't defend Scientology, you just attack along this line of human rights, you see...

"Tell him or her ...uh ...the hostile person the hostile press line uh...for instance a newspaper writes an article on how bad Scientology is - any Scientologist reading this should run right to that newspaper and demand: Why are you against human rights?...

"Whereas an attack on Scientology is actually an attack on human rights - anyone making an attack on Scientology is an attack on human rights...

"Each time Scientology is attacked, we build into society, if you do this, we'll build into society an actual stimulus response mechanism whereas an attack on Scientology is an attack on human rights".


The patterns are there for all to see.
 
I was afraid that people would start making facile comparisons between the Sea Org and living in the USSR, etc. My point in creating this thread was to focus on Hubbard himself and how close the guy was to fascism, and how many of the religious cult leaders have ties to fascist movements (William Dudley Pelly of the Silver Legion, who later formed a New Age group called Soulcraft*, comes to mind) or are of an authoritarian rightist bent.

__________________________________

* One of his followers was George Hunt Williamson, who was involved with George Adamski the flying saucer contactee....he was allegedly there when Adamski saw a "Venusian scout saucer" land in the desert and Adamski spoke to the pilot, a blonde blue-eyed Nordic fellow named Orthon.

[I wrote this comment while Veda was posting and it was not aimed at that person, but at the previous two replies.]
 

Freeminds

Bitter defrocked apostate
Left/right politics is a concept that is probably losing coherence, although it worked reasonably well in Hubbard's century.

If we can't really agree on whether Hubbard was like a Stalinist (purges, gulags, secret police...) or like a fascist (similar vices...) perhaps we can still agree that his ideal was a totalitarian system - but only if he could be the head of state.

Fortunately, his daydreams greatly exceeded his abilities, and his system of paranoia and misery was only ever foisted upon about 75,000 people.

Which is almost 75,000 too many. Some of them deserved what they had to endure in that madhouse (Wally Hanks, Jan Eastgate...) but not many.
 

Mick Wenlock

Admin Emeritus (retired)
you are making a distinction between "fascism" and "communism" which is not really valid. Fascism is not "right" wing any more than "communism" is left wing.

Both are totalitarian systems which involve total government control of the means of production and the consumers (population).

Within its perimeter Scientology is organized as a totalitarian system as well. Not every cult is but Scientology with its Hubbardian ideas of various competing power groups each enforcing various aspects of the central core falls into it.

Hubbards training/experience in organizational theory was exclusively military in nature. he ran no businesses, his only youthful organizational endeavors were universal failures as were his original dianetics organizations - despite making large amounts of money they went bankrupt. That's why he created the most inefficient organizational "systems" in the world.

The trouble with using 'right wing" and "left wing" is that it is using the seating arrangement of an 18th century revolutionary French assembly as a template for discussing politics. Like Hubbard's dreck it does not work.


I don't know if anybody has mentioned it, but something has to be mentioned about Hubbard's like or simpatico-ness with far-Right ideas. It's my understanding that on one version of the tone scale Hubbard has Fascists slightly above Communists. I'm not saying that Hubbard was an ideologue of some strain of crypto-Naziism, but rather that the man had tendencies toward authoritarianism, and politically that style of thought manifests itself in the groups like the John Birch Society, the various groups Lyndon LaRouche has run, the Minutemen, and scads of like-minded groups in Europe, Africa, and Asia (too many to mention.)

In many ways Hubbard reminds me of the Italian writer and aristocrat Julius Evola (1898-1974.) Evola was involved in a lot of occultic research, but before that he had been involved with the Italian Futurist movement, which was an art movement of the early 20th century revolving around speed, power, youth, violence, and technology. Many members of the Futurist movement later became members of the Italian Fascist party, seeing the ideals of the party as extensions of Futurism. Evola never joined the blackshirts or the Grand Council of Fascism, but he was considered a fellow traveller, and long after Fascism exited the Italian political stage he was writing his crypto-fascist books and secretly supporting neo-fascist terrorist groups in the early 1970s during the "Years of Lead" when the far-Right was fighting the far-Left. Of course there are people who will say that Evola was not a fascist, but I would say that his politics actually starts where Fascism runs out: a state where tradition is enshrined, where politics and religion are the same thing, an anti-populist, un-democractic place, run by priest-aristocrats. The closest thing I can think fits Evola's scheme would have to be the Aztec or Mayan empires.
 

Freeminds

Bitter defrocked apostate
It's not unknown for new-agers such as UFO 'contactees' to have far-right leanings. Maybe it's because the world of the conspiracy theorist is so simplistic that totalitarianism seems 'right'. Knowing (at least on some level) that their wacky alternative systems of government will never actually be put to the test, the knee-jerk reaction is all they ever need to 'understand' and 'solve' the problems of the world.

David Icke also demonstrates far-right politics, with links to the Christian Patriots and the US militia movement. In a conference against gun control in Nevada, he appeared with Kirk Lyons, the white nationalist lawyer who represented the Ku Klux Klan.

You'd expect the new-agers to be all "peace and love" but their leader figures are actually much more complex, and manipulative.
 

Ted

Gold Meritorious Patron
Another great talk by Bill Whittle. The only thing that would have made it better for posting here would have been a show of L. Ron Hubbard the fictitious, fabricated alpha male positioned against the actual L. Ron Hubbard beta male.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oCWv87Zz62k
 
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