|
|
|
Scientology
vs. Orwell's 1984
By
Robert Vaughn Young
There
are disturbing parallels between the book "1984"
by George Orwell and Scientology. Try to substitute
"Sea Org/Dept 20" for "Party".
|
Robert
Vaughn Young, was a member of the Sea Organization for twenty
years, during which time he worked almost exclusively for
the Office of Special Affairs. Both he and his wife were highly
placed personalities, Stacy
Young was the chief editor of the Scientology Freedom
magazine and Vaughn Young had made a name for himself in the
inner circles of Scientology. Both broke out of the cult in
1989 and started speaking out against it in 1993.
On
accepting unreality From George Orwell's "1984"
published in 1949:
|
"In
a way, the world-view of the Party imposed itself most
successfully on people incapable of understanding it.
They could be made to accept the most flagrant violations
of reality, because they never fully grasped the enormity
of what was demanded of them, and were not sufficiently
interested in public events to notice what was happening.
By lack of understanding they remained sane. They simply
swallowed everything, and what they swallowed did them
no harm, because it left no residue behind, just as
a grain of corn will pass undigested through the body
of a bird."
|
RVY
commentary:
This
degree of naivete will be found in other movements and groups,
not merely in Scientology. A difference is that in Scientology,
they enforce the lack of interest in public events and they
continue to increase the amount of unreality that one is to
accept. It is dosed out, which is one of the reasons the "upper
levels" were kept confidential. The matter of "swallowing
everything" can be found in Hubbard's study methods,
where there is no possibility of critical thought or disagreement.
Disagreement means you have a "misunderstood word"
or some other flaw in you. You look up words until you "duplicate"
it, which means the grain of corn slides on through. The difference
is that there is harm in that lack of use of the faculty of
analytical criticism lessens the persons ability to exercise
it.
This
can be shown by finding a long-term SO/Dept 20 member and
asking them questions about issues that have been front page
on the New York Times or on the evening news. They don't know
because they don't read the papers, especially the NY Times.
They don't care because they have
withdrawn and are living off the prescribed diet. They feel
that L. Ron Hubbard has told them how to find truth, so what
else do they need? Hence the same gullibility as in "1984."
On
Lack of Privacy From George Orwell's "1984":
|
"In
principle a Party member had no spare time and was never
alone except in bed. It was assumed that when he was
not working, eating or sleeping he would be taking part
in some communal recreations; to do anything that suggested
a taste for solitude, even to go for a walk by yourself,
was always slightly dangerous."
"There
was a word for it in Newspeak: ownlife, it was called,
meaning individualism and eccentricity."
|
RVY
commentary:
Lack
of spare time and never alone is characteristic of life in
the Sea Org/Dept 20. Solitude is highly suspected. One is
expected to be a "team member." If one wants to
be alone, the Scientology Newspeak that is thrown at a person
is that they are being "first dynamically oriented."
To understand this, one must understand there are "eight
dynamics" in Scientology:
 self
sex
and family
group
mankind
life
universe
theta
or life force
infinity |
While
the public posture is that one is to "balance" these,
the truth is that one lives in the group and if one wants
to take a day off, that is being "first dynamically oriented"
and means one is being unethical, selfish and probably a sign
of criminality.
From
George Orwell's "1984":
|
"A
Party member lives from birth to death under the eye
of the Thought Police. Even when he is alone he can
never be sure that he is alone. Wherever he may be,
asleep or awake, working or resting, in his bath or
in bed, he can be inspected without warning and without
knowing that he is being inspected.
His friendship, his relaxations, his behavior toward
his wife and children, the expression of his face when
he is alone, the words he mutters in sleep, even the
characteristic movements of his body, are all jealously
scrutinized.
Not
only any actual misdemeanor, but any eccentricity, however
small, any change of habits, any nervous mannerism that
could possibly be the symptom of an inner struggle is
certain to be detected."
|
RVY
commentary:
In the
Sea Org, private "berthing" (meaning where one lives)
is subject to inspection at any time, and these are done,
often under the guise of a "white glove." Rooms
are allowed to be locked, providing their authorities have
a set of keys. Inspectors watch for anything unusual that
might be suspicious, e.g., a suspicious magazine, a letter
from a strange person, notes that indicate anything suspicious.
Everything else Orwell describes are inspected and watched
and reports made. If suspicious, the person is called into
"Ethics" which is Scientology's "Thought Police."
One might undergo a "Security Check" which is an
interrogation on Scientology's lie detector, to get at any
thoughts that the person might be hiding from the organization.
Under
this type of scrutiny, one learns to simply not think certain
thoughts and to adhere to the "straight and narrow."
On
Scientology "expansion"
From
George Orwell's "1984":
|
"Day
and night the telescreens bruised your ears with statistics
proving that people today had more food, more clothes,
better houses, better recreations -- that they lived
longer, worked shorter hours, were bigger, healthier,
stronger, happier, more intelligent, better educated,
than the people of fifty years ago. Not a word of it
could
ever be proved or disproved."
|
RVY
commentary:
L. Ron
Hubbard loved statistics and he insisted that Scientology
will only expand, it cannot do otherwise. So at events the
"up stat[istic]s" are shown, with big graphs. The
"expansion" news is given. Nothing else. They will
announce a new country where LRH books are being sold, but
fail to tell them the countries where they were kicked out
or closed down or simply failed.
In the
eyes of Scientologists, every org is booming, every continent
is expanding, every book is selling like mad.
To Scientologists
they are happier and better off than ever before and International
Management has the statistics to prove it. (If you can't make
one of their events, look at their literature, such as "Scientology
Today" or "KSW News" or one of the other propaganda
sheets.) Then again, no Scientologist has anything to the
contrary, which is one of the reasons the Internet is hated.
It is hated the same way the old Soviet Union hated Radio
Free Europe: it is an uncontrolled source of information to
people under control.
That
is dangerous.
On
Big Brother from George Orwell's "1984":
|
"At
the apex of the pyramid comes Big Brother.
"Big
Brother is infallible and all-powerful. Every success,
every achievement, every victory, every scientific discovery,
all knowledge, all wisdom, all happiness, all virtue,
are held to issue directly from his leadership and inspiration."
"Nobody
has ever seen Big Brother. He is a face on the hoardings,
a voice on the telescreen. We may be reasonable sure
that he will never die, and there is already considerable
uncertainty as to where he was born."
"Big
Brother is the guise in which the Party choose to exhibit
itself to the world. His function is to act as a focusing
point for love, fear, and reverence, emotions which
are more easily felt toward an individual than toward
an organization."
|
RVY
commentary:
Hubbard
gets the same praise. Every success is due to his methods
and every mistake or failure is due to someone or something
else. His face is everywhere in Scientology organizations,
just as one finds the leader in other dictatorships: Cuba,
Iran, Iraq, China, the old USSR and Nazi Germany, and for
the exact reasons Orwell gives.
Orwell's
remark about Big Brother not dying even applies to Hubbard
for he didn't "die." His death was unthinkable as
it would have meant the tech did not work. So he merely went
to his "next level of research."
On
"doublethink" f rom George Orwell's "1984":
|
"To
know and not to know, to be conscious of complete truthfulness
while telling carefully constructed lies, to hold simultaneously
two opinions which canceled out, knowing them to be
contradictory and believing in both of them, to use
logic against logic, to repudiate morality while laying
claim to it, to believe that democracy was impossible
and that the Party was the guardian of democracy, to
forget,
whatever it was necessary to forget, then to draw it
back into memory again at the moment when it was needed,
and then promptly to forget it again, and above all,
to apply the same process to the process itself -- that
was the ultimate subtlety; consciously to induce unconsciousness,
and then, once again, to become unconscious of the act
of hypnosis you had just performed. Even to understand
the word 'doublethink' involved the use of doublethink."
|
RVY commentary:
After
nearly 22 years in the cult, I came away puzzled how I could
know the truth and think otherwise. Many people asked me how
it worked but it wasn't until I read "1984" that
I read a description that fit the mindset to move up the command
ladder in Scientology.
This
is what one is encountering with Sea Org/Dept 20 personnel.
One wonders, can they believe this? Don't they know the truth?
Yes and no. It is doublethink, right out of "1984."
And if you tell them this, they will doublethink their way
out of it as self-protection.
As one
moves up the Scientology ladder of command, this is how one
begins to think and if one doesn't think this way, one does
not move up the ladder. One begins to learn that there are
facts being withheld but there are reasons and so one begins
to hold both facts in one's mind while learning to think with
Scientology's "logic." Then one does what Orwell
says, the process is applied to the process so that one if
finally deluding oneself that up is down or black is white.
For example,
one of Scientology's favorite come ons is, "What is true
for you, is true for you," as if a person can believe
what they want. It doesn't take long to learn that this is
true only as long as what you want to believe is what L. Ron
Hubbard wants you to believe. To do otherwise sends you to
their "thought police." Further trouble and - if
you are Sea Org - you are sent to a camp for "rehabilitation,"
a word and a concept that Orwell would have loved.
In the
meantime, the staff member also believes the original promise:
that what is true for him is true for him. This is doublethink.
It is also what one is astounded to see, when one steps out
of it and says, "I was believing WHAT?"
|
