If you got into Dianetics and Scientology and knew it wasn't going to produce the results claimed then it wasn't a scam and says much about your character but...
If you got into it with the idea that it would do what it said it would do, which is to truely help people and it doesn't, then it is a scam and your character is that of someone who wanted to help, honestly help, but operated on a lie.
If you got into it thinking it would help, then found out that it didn't but then stayed, then the idea you put forth is correct, but only in that case because if you were lied to and you operated on the lie without knowing it then it most certainly is a scam but knowing it was a lie then it wasn't.
I didn't quite understand the third point.
I approached Scientology because I saw what it did for a friend of mine who had just done the communication course.
He was a bit of a strange guy, but when he came back from doing this course he was incredibly changed.
So I thought, well OK, I'll give it a try.
At the time I was working in a somewhat underground anti-war activity.
So I went into the comm course.
I was just coming off of acid, and there were no OT TRO in those days, so you cn imagine what that was like.
But the book for the course was "An evolution of a science."
I read the book in one day.
And that is what convinced me that this was the place to be. I should add that the Aims of the Church were on the course too.
Before I finished the course, the recruiter talked to me and wanted to hire me.
My reaction was "You want to hire me?" (I had hair down over my shoulders and was a complete hippie).
So I joined staff before I ever heard of auditing.
It was the impression that the book made on me that convinced me that this was the way to a better civilization and a civilization without war. (How sad is that!)
So I was on staff at FCDC.
Now I don't know if you realized how much fun the FCDC thread was on this board.
You should start from the beginning of the thread if you want some real entertainment.
But these were the guys I was on staff with.
It was fun, it was an adventure, and I found myself getting a better understanding of people and life.
Yes the conditions were pretty dreadful at first, but it was the biggest challenge of my lifetime up to that point.
When I saw all the craziness over the years I simply wrote it off as those people didn't quite get it.
And I did see incredible change in the people who were getting auditing and training.
Those things all further reinforced my views.
It wasn't until decades later I read Plato.
And just like the book I read on the Comm Course convinced me that Scientology was the right path for me, Plato convinced me that Scientology was completely wrong.
So just like that I dropped Scientology.
Therefore I didn't have the dilemma that other people had who had to deal with things they saw that tried their conscience.
For me it was simply---oops! This is wrong.
Now you have to remember that I was very naive on personal relationships, or rather, I was insensitive to other people's turmoil.
I didn't go through a crisis of conscience.
Even until recently I was insensitive to the personal turmoil others who are here have gone through.
I still sometimes say things on this board and in life without regard for another person's feelings.
I've mentioned it before, but my wife has said to me "Taj, you understand ideas, but you don't understand people."
I didn't understand what she meant (just kidding)
I have met a lot of homeless people recently, and I converse with them regularly.
You would be surprised, many are veterans, some were prominent professional people, some are petty criminals, one is a seventy-two year old lady.
Many, actually most, have an alcohol problem.
I don't want to reveal too much about who I am, but between my contact with them and the people on this baord I have come to appreciate the human soul and spirit in a way that I had not before.
I can feel things now. I really couldn't before.
Now that I am more aware of what is really important as far as people go, I look back and think of what I could have done for people all these years.
When I was in Scientology I followed my mind but not my heart.
Now I know that the heart is more important and the mind is just for helping the heart to feel.
And that really makes Plato make more sense.
So I look at my experience in Scientology as a deconstructing of myself.
The only thing Scientology did for me was to show me who I wasn't.
Now it is up to me to understand who I am.
That doesn't sound like a scam to me, it was just another journey through life.
The Anabaptist Jacques
