Scientology Power

[The Anabaptist Jacques]

I am getting a little sick of people blaming it all on Miscavige for the way the Church of Scientology is today.

No organization can operate just from the top. Miscavige did not make people agree with him.

They either did or they didn’t.

The way the Church of Scientology is now is the logical consequences of the religion and philosophy of Scientology. How could it be otherwise?

Again, the problem is not Miscavige. He’s a punk.

So why did all these powerful OTs get hustled by a punk?

Because at every step of the way he did their bidding.

He created the atmosphere, just like Hubbard did, that they were special and elite beings, above mere humans.

Miscavige and others wanted power in the Church and OTs gave it to them in exchange for what they wanted.

Power in Scientology does not start at the top and work its way down.

How many people have even met or dealt with Miscavige personally?

Scientology power is a web;
every disconnection,
every KR,
every sneer someone gives to a person who is sick and considered PTS,
every conspiracy theory anyone subscribes to within the Church,
every time some public used clout to gain an advantageous result in an unjust chaplain cycle,
every Scientology businessman who justified underpaying his employees because they were an “on purpose” company,
every nodding of their heads in agreement at ridiculous CCHR claims

all these things is where the power lays.

And this isn’t only done by the people at the top.

It was and is done by the field OTs and others now crying foul because their egos aren’t being stroked anymore.

They went along as far as they did because there was something in it for them.

If Scientology was, as was said “a very useful technology that can produce phenomenal results” people would be beating a path to its door.

People aren't.

These OTs got the leader and the Church they deserved.

The Anabaptist Jacques

 

[SweetnessandLight]

Great Post, TAJ! You're going on golden quotes!

 

[Smilla]

I am getting a little sick of people blaming it all on Miscavige for the way the Church of Scientology is today.

No organization can operate just from the top. Miscavige did not make people agree with him.

They either did or they didn’t.

The way the Church of Scientology is now is the logical consequences of the religion and philosophy of Scientology. How could it be otherwise?

Again, the problem is not Miscavige. He’s a punk.

So why did all these powerful OTs get hustled by a punk?

Because at every step of the way he did their bidding.

He created the atmosphere, just like Hubbard did, that they were special and elite beings, above mere humans.

Miscavige and others wanted power in the Church and OTs gave it to them in exchange for what they wanted.

Power in Scientology does not start at the top and work its way down.

How many people have even met or dealt with Miscavige personally?

Scientology power is a web;
every disconnection,
every KR,
every sneer someone gives to a person who is sick and considered PTS,
every conspiracy theory anyone subscribes to within the Church,
every time some public used clout to gain an advantageous result in an unjust chaplain cycle,
every Scientology businessman who justified underpaying his employees because they were an “on purpose” company,
every nodding of their heads in agreement at ridiculous CCHR claims

all these things is where the power lays.

And this isn’t only done by the people at the top.

It was and is done by the field OTs and others now crying foul because their egos aren’t being stroked anymore.

They went along as far as they did because there was something in it for them.

If Scientology was, as was said “a very useful technology that can produce phenomenal results” people would be beating a path to its door.

People aren't.

These OTs got the leader and the Church they deserved.

The Anabaptist Jacques

Yes, and Scientology is a status cult. You pay for status, and as you move higher through the increasingly bizarre 'levels' you gain a feeling of self importance and 'specialness.' The same is true of IAS, Power, and Ideal Org contributions. Part of the status is the 'right' to mistreat people lower on the ladder than yourself, just as the person higher on the ladder mistreats you. This process is written into every fiber of Scientology. Miscavige is the ultimate 'on source Scientologist.' From his point of view he has done nothing wrong, and his assistants agree. So why does he behave in such a brutal way? He does so because he can. That's all there is to it.

 

[Dark Phoenix]

Great Post, TAJ! You're going on golden quotes!

Bugger, S&L! You've beaten me to it!

As usual, great post TAJ.

 

[SweetnessandLight]

LOL! Great minds think alike!

 

[Mystic]

Yeah, right on, TAJ.

And I see the dark machinations still in progress quite out of the sight of their so-called "OTs", the rank and file fodder of that POS non-church.

I'm not too sure Mr. Rathbun and Dinky Davey aren't actually communicating with one another behind the scenes.

The source of all that schoidt is the Hubbard thing and people's belief in his spews.

HUBBARD, not Dinky Davey. Sheesh.

 

[Student of Trinity]

They went along as far as they did because there was something in it for them.

I know nothing about any of this first hand, but this seems to me to have a ring of truth. The CofS numbers thousands at least, and has been around for decades now. If Miscavige is in charge, it can only be because the CofS collectively wants him in charge.

We've seen a lot of criticisms of Miscavige, calling him "downstat" because CofS membership has crashed on his watch, calling him a "squirrel" because he has revised Hubbard's directives. But if he were simply bad and all bad for Scientology, he wouldn't be there.

What exactly has he done that has been working well enough that the CofS has kept him in charge? Quite possibly, not the things that Scientology says are its goals. But there must be something that Scientology values in practice, that Miscavige has been providing.

What would that be?

 

[HelluvaHoax!]

I am getting a little sick of people blaming it all on Miscavige for the way the Church of Scientology is today. -------(snipped for brevity)------These OTs got the leader and the Church they deserved.

TAJ....Thank you for this outstanding & illuminating post! It defines one of the pillars of support perpetuating the nightmarish authoritarian regime of Scientology.

The characteristic DNA embedded at the core of this nasty group of smiling planet savers is BlameTech. Ron's BlameTech works--albeit at a profound cost.

Pointing a finger:

* Like a drug, produces an instant problem-free euphoria. Both "He robbed the bank, put him in prison not me!" and "My bank made me do it, don't blame me!" are alike, escape mechanisms extraordinaire.

* Is an infinitely-faceted justification that fits, adapts & solves any occasion, transgression, crime, illogic, contradiction or conflict. Considering that it is a free get-out-of-jail card, it is no wonder that it has gained such wide acceptance and use. "Scientology did not work on that person because they are a Psych Case, SP, NCG, Evil, Out-Ethics, PTS, Squirrel, Open Minded, Reasonable, Psych, Darling of the Psychs, Implanted, Plant, 1.1 or a...........'Responsible for Condition Case'." The irony in that last one rather vast!

* Is what Ron did. Blame is KSW. Blame is Standard Tech that always Works. Blame is the RPF. Blame is Sec Checks. Blame is overboarding and chainlockers. Blame is CCHR and Psychs. Blame is Xenu and BTs. Blame is putting in ethics to get tech in. Blame is being blameless. Blame is brutally punishing any human quality, frailty or error that might have caused the money stats to slow--whilst boldly advertising oneself as Mankind's Greatest Messiah.​

Scientologists are cynically trained within a inch of their eternities on the subject of "RESPONSIBILITY". It makes them believe that they are good people because responsibility is romantically re-defined (quite hypocritically) so that one may be showered with praise by others and self for strength of character that is both charitable and noble

But, this indoctrination it is nothing more than the cleverest misdirection imaginable because in Scientology "responsibility" actually means falsely accusing, wrongly blaming and unjustly incriminating anything or anyone that may slow or impede Scientology's conquest of the entire world and its inhabitants. Fair Game, Paulette Cooper and a million other atrocities are not an aberration or coincidence--they are part of the genetic blueprint of Scientology itself.

David Miscavich being blamed by "independent scientologists" for all of its woes is nothing more or nothing less than Scientologists applying what they have learned--to blame.

Scientologists never run short of wrong targets to blame. COB is just a handy one these days.

 

[degraded being]

Yes, and Scientology is a status cult. You pay for status, and as you move higher through the increasingly bizarre 'levels' you gain a feeling of self importance and 'specialness.' The same is true of IAS, Power, and Ideal Org contributions. Part of the status is the 'right' to mistreat people lower on the ladder than yourself, just as the person higher on the ladder mistreats you. This process is written into every fiber of Scientology. Miscavige is the ultimate 'on source Scientologist.' From his point of view he has done nothing wrong, and his assistants agree. So why does he behave in such a brutal way? He does so because he can. That's all there is to it.

I agree. The staus thing is a very important factor. There are "spiritual gains" as lures, but the hiugher up they go the more they find that they cannot achieve superhumaness. They start to deny this, ignoring the evidence. Then status itself is taken as prooof of superiority. Their communities are communities of people who have similar or higher status. Totality facile but that is really what the "upper levels" are about. Everything else in the mix is just there to create the status construct, maintain it and enforce it.

 

[Kutta]

Absolutely right on the button TAJ. And that was me. In it for the promised personal gains, great abilities, making postulates stick etc. Those promises sure did stroke my ego. *Spiritual freedom* - what the hell is that???? No, I was after here and now ability, which boils down to wanting POWER, desiring to be superior to others. Clearing the planet? No way. If I examined my heart I would have admitted that was a completely deluded idea anyway, and not what I was there for. It is all ego driven IMO. Others apparently did have a humanitarian streak and totally believed they were helping to bring sanity to mankind. I can't for the life of me get my head around how that could be thought a possibility, scientology being such small beer in the global scheme of things.

I was in before DM; I bought into it and offered LRH power on a plate over my mind, my independent rational thinking, my intellectual and moral integrity, my creativity, my life. But thankfully, only for a short time.

Even after 30 years of being out, it feels so good to acknowledge this again to myself. I just love giving the fingers to all that balderdash.

 

[nozeno]

How come you didn't seem this smart back in 1973?

Not that you appeared stupid.....but this observation is one of the gooder ones that you've done in this forum in my opinion.

I would argue that your escape from the cult made you more able to see what was going on.

You may now advance to nozeno Qual to attest.

My noodle is floatsam and jetsam. How's yours? Your noodle, that is.

 

[The Anabaptist Jacques]

How come you didn't seem this smart back in 1973?

Not that you appeared stupid.....but this observation is one of the gooder ones that you've done in this forum in my opinion.

I would argue that your escape from the cult made you more able to see what was going on.

You may now advance to nozeno Qual to attest.

My noodle is floatsam and jetsam. How's yours? Your noodle, that is.

I wasn’t this smart back then. Now I have an education.

Education is not just reading books. I thought I became smarter just from reading books.

But random reading of what interests one looses the disciplined approach to a subject that a professional has towards his subject. I learned that in graduate school.

More specifically, what I wrote is the application of Michel Foucault’s ideas about power-relations in society.

I observed all these things over the years living in a Scientology community, but it was Foucault who made sense of it all for me.

My noodle is still cooking. But I‘ve decided to not let it fade away with my best recipes still in me.

The Anabaptist Jacques

 

[Mark A. Baker]

I am getting a little sick of people blaming it all on Miscavige for the way the Church of Scientology is today.

Fair post. I'd quibble on the exact cause of the Co$ being the way it is. LRH ran the church the way he wanted. Too many people went along with him simply because it was LRH. A saner top dog or a saner & more courageous membership could have produced a much better result.

That said, personally I'm not a fan of organized religions. They all cause a great deal of trouble and provide very little real value. I see scientology principles best usage as tools for an applied philosophy.


Mark A. Baker

 

[freethinker]

It's truly the answer to OT's staying with it after knowing that the tech was not going to give them their powers back so they buy them.

 

[nozeno]

I wasn’t this smart back then. Now I have an education.

Education is not just reading books. I thought I became smarter just from reading books.

But random reading of what interests one looses the disciplined approach to a subject that a professional has towards his subject. I learned that in graduate school.

More specifically, what I wrote is the application of Michel Foucault’s ideas about power-relations in society.

I observed all these things over the years living in a Scientology community, but it was Foucault who made sense of it all for me.

My noodle is still cooking. But I‘ve decided to not let it fade away with my best recipes still in me.

The Anabaptist Jacques

Good for you and you know I know what you mean.

Yes we have hidden data lines. Is that sooo wrong?

 

[Axiom142]

I am getting a little sick of people blaming it all on Miscavige for the way the Church of Scientology is today.

No organization can operate just from the top. Miscavige did not make people agree with him.

They either did or they didn’t.

The way the Church of Scientology is now is the logical consequences of the religion and philosophy of Scientology. How could it be otherwise?

...

Absolutely TAJ!

I can understand your frustration with those who seek to blame everything on Miscavige.

Undoubtedly Miscavige has caused a huge number of problems and been responsible for many abuses committed in the name of Scientology over the past two and a half decades.

But, in my opinion, Miscavige is a ‘product of the system’. Hubbard created an organization that mirrored his own character. It was inevitable that a person such as Miscavige would rise to the top and then retain control by methods reminiscent of Stalin, Hitler, Pol Pot or countless other despots.

Every dictator relies on the compliance of their populace. Miscavige could never have maintained his position without many followers carrying out his will. Every one of them will have carried out actions that directly hurt others and been aware of the consequences of their actions. But they did it anyway and continued to do it.

I can understand and sympathise with those who still consider themselves Scientologists, wanting to put all the blame onto Miscavige. Many of them have given everything to their ‘church’ and cannot or don’t want to face the awful truth. This is understandable, but hopefully now that they have shrugged off the first layer of suppression, they can start really looking at the situation.

Axiom142

 

[Student of Trinity]

So if what really keeps the CofS going is a hierarchy of ego-stoking status and guilt-relieving blame of others, has Miscavige somehow made this work more efficiently for more Scientologists?

I can imagine that on the status side, he might well have. His building schemes do eventually give average 'parishioners' nice buildings to be proud of. Perhaps his emphasis on glossy book series and cds and stuff has done the same. He's been marketing status symbols, bringing out more of them at regular intervals, like the World of Warcraft introducing new levels and lewt every few months. Indeed, the CofS resembles an MMORPG in many ways now, with its multiply branching trophy tree. Is this DM's legacy? Was the spreading tree of status symbols already there in Hubbard's day, or did DM actually introduce it? Did he at least initiate a greater emphasis on it, or make it more concrete?

What about the blame side? Has DM in any way made it easier or more effective for the mass (such as it is) of Scientologists to identify culprits for their problems and shed responsibility onto them?

 

[HelluvaHoax!]

So if what really keeps the CofS going is a hierarchy of ego-stoking status and guilt-relieving blame of others, has Miscavige somehow made this work more efficiently for more Scientologists?----snipped for brevity----What about the blame side? Has DM in any way made it easier or more effective for the mass (such as it is) of Scientologists to identify culprits for their problems and shed responsibility onto them?

Miscavige is not as clever or covert as Hubbard. However, both have inestimably vast assumptions of self-importance and control over others.

Like world religions that disagree about the MESSENGERS, MESSIAHS, ANGELS, SAINTS & SON of GOD....they all virtually agree on GOD itself.

Similarly, all Scientolgists agree on Source (God, Ron, Commodore, Savior....).

It is, with rare exception, impossible for a Scientologist to blame Ron for the bad in Scientology and still continue practicing the subject. There are some of this rare breed that make appearances here on ESM in fact. Their thought processes are astonishing to track because when they have derailed on illogic, they seem to gain manic momentum to assert and delusionally believe in "the Tech" at a pitch near hysteria.

By contrast, it is rather easy to dismiss ANYONE that is not Ron.

So, it is DM's post/position that makes him a vulnerable target of blame. That's all.

And, oh yeah, his utter stupidity and hubris to beat people and commit other crimes that are now coming into the light of day.

Sorry "Dave". You are fucked. Buh-Bye mini-messiah.

 

[The Anabaptist Jacques]

Whoever can best find a balance between stroking the egoes of OTs and maintainng the "great chain of being" status while at the same time keeping the slave labor of the Sea Org operating to provide the service to those OTs will end up the leader of this cult of narcissism.

If Miscavige gets ousted by OTs in the field it probably won't be because of what he does to Sea Org members, it will because he didn't keep the OTs in the field happy.

The Anabaptist Jacques

 

[R6Basic]

I wasn’t this smart back then. Now I have an education.

Education is not just reading books. I thought I became smarter just from reading books.


The Anabaptist Jacques

I bet your IQ went up as soon as you left Scn.