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HAROLD'S JOURNAL
Editorial Comment By RWL - 11 May 1989
We're Pretty 'Clear' On That!
We have this terrible urge to refer to the writer of the above letter as "Duffy Duck", but we won't, simply because we feel a certain sympathy for individuals so taken in by the ruse of Scientology. Beyond that, personality is not at issue, no more than is qualified and appropriate drug rehabilitation, or freedom of religion.
What is at issue is the long and spurious reputation of Scientology. Documented in print since the imagination of the first "Thetan.".
"Old articles,"
he calls them, without refuting their accuracy. As old as Scientology
itself. And as new, too. Scientology's own magazine, The Auditor, in it's
February 1989 edition further confirms our opinion. "Trained Scientologists
to staff huge Oklahoma facility," brags the headline of one article.
And yet with straight face they tell us there is no connection.
Americans will tolerate practically anything one chooses to believe in the name of religion, if they are convinced it is a religion to begin with. Scientology is science fiction. Unlike religion, it was science fiction at its conception, albeit good enough science fiction that the naive amongst us began to believe it was real science.
Only when the scientific community in mass began to debunk it did it decide to become a "religion." And that, my friends, is why it has been so poorly tolerated in spite of the legal manipulations it has undertaken to make it look like religion. It remains what it has always been. Science fiction. Accepting the occasional abuse of religious freedom is still preferable to limiting religious freedom.
Scientology is a successful business enterprise. It accepts people who are, or think they are, in trouble. Often it even relieves them of their real or perceived problems as it allows them to brainwash themselves down the unending path of L Ron's "unique methods and technology."
Narconon is simply one of many methods Scientology uses to get their "technology applied broadly in the society," as The Auditor gently puts it. Hubbard said it more bluntly in a 1960 Communications Order to his followers: "It is a maxim that unless you have bodies in the shop you get no income. So on any pretext get the bodies in the place..." If the "shop" can offer a service, like drug detox, along the way that will be paid for by insurance or some other third party, then so much the better.
We have little doubt
that the Narconon drug detoxification methods work as well as any other
dry-out clinic. We find it interesting that L. Ron Hubbard claims patent
to food, exercise, and vitamin therapy. We'll concede sauna baths may
be his own idea. And we will give him full credit for the "counseling
and training" sessions that go along with it.
What is unique about Hubbard's methods is not that he feeds his patients, or exercises them, or gives them vitamins. The "unique" part is that his counseling and training methods dissipate dependency on drugs while creating dependency on Scientology. And maybe that's not all bad, if only they were straight forward enough to admit it.
It would be interesting to know how many Spanish Narconon patients were Scientologists after their treatment. That would tell us an awful lot more than cure rates. We suspect the number is about 69.2%.
These are some of our concerns about Narconon and Scientology. But in a fashion true to their historical reputation and background, they have failed to address them, and instead resort to calling our citizens drug racketeers "in favor of a drug ridden society..." for questioning their motives.
It's a duffy... I
mean daffy world they want us to live in, we're pretty "clear"
on that.