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The Church of Scientology: A Dangerous Cult

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The Church of Scientology: A Dangerous Cult.

I find this interesting and significant for the following reasons. The Contatus website bills itself as "The Voice of Progressivism." The site's Twitter page says: "Newly launched! The leading progressive news site effecting social-change."

Contatus - The Church of Scientology: A Dangerous Cult

http://www.conatusnews.com/the-church-of-scientology--a-cult.html#.V_WEtjO8-Rw.twitter

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[SNIP]

We think that the Church of Scientology fits the formal definitions provided at the preface to this article. That is, there is a system of religious worship as ritual, anti-social aspects, unorthodoxy (thetans, Xenu), members related to those sub-definitions, devotion to an individual, segmentation to a sufficient degree to separate from society (related to the “anti-social” terminology), and tends to denote a particular individual (L. Ron Hubbard) and thing (Dianetics, thetans, Xenu, and so on.) Need we say more? Of course, it’s needed. Truisms bear repetition.

[SNIP]

Scientology conducts factious methods – often unmerciful in nature and purpose, which is to defame and dismiss critics through character assassination by any means necessary – to bulwark its religion against dissenters and critics. This is probably the most deplorable aspect of the cult. Its hyper-litigious activities against critics and ex-members is a reflection of this – if someone is bold enough to cast any aspersions against the cult, efforts will be made to indict, demonize, and smear them. (We’ll see. Maybe, we can make a ‘prophesy’ here.). Moral standards are thus set arbitrarily by the dictates of the cult, as cults do. Paulette Cooper is an example. Not only critics, merely forfeiting the religion can lead to a situation in which ‘apostates’ receive (and the doctrine of scientology permits) harassment and smear campaigns against them.


Such factious methods have cruelly fostered a fortress within the religion – trapping people inside it and thus sustaining its number of adherents. It often succeeds in burgeoning its numbers by taking advantage of uncritical thought and, not forgetting, the ‘foot-in-the-door’ phenomena. People become involved in the organization more and more, little bit by little. This can build into the encouragement of disconnection from family and relationships – hence why it’s coined a ‘cult’.

[SNIP]

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