Words Like Locusts Flew From Her Fingers

Scientology

If you’ve googled me, you’ve probably noticed a bunch of Scientology references connected to my name. Do a Google groups search on “Rebecca Hartong” and you’ll find HUNDREDS of them!

Let me explain.

First of all, I AM NOT A SCIENTOLOGIST. I’ve never been a Scientologist. I cannot imagine a world in which I might be tempted to become a Scientologist. I find Scientology to be exceptionally dumb.

I only became aware of Scientology in a more than peripheral way back in about 1993 when I first got on the internet. Back in the day, before there was a World Wide Web (yes, children, there was a time before the Web), I started posting to the Usenet newsgroup alt.religion.scientology.

But I’m getting ahead of myself. Let me start at the beginning…

Before I got on the internet, I was a member of AOL. I remember when AOL’s big announcement was that their membership had reached 150,000! Heh, heh… Anyway, I had been reading the mental illness support group posts on AOL and noticed that there were some people posting who were shriekingly, irrationally opposed to any of the modern treatments for mental illness. What kind of person could oppose drugs and therapies that have been scientifically proven effective?, I asked. Several of the long-time members of the discussion group filled me in: Scientologists.

It turns out that Scientologists have some really peculiar ideas about mental illness. First of all, they don’t believe a person’s mind is connected in any way to his brain. They believe your mind is part of your “thetan”. A “thetan” is sorta-kinda like a “soul”. They’ve got this whole bizarre thing worked out where supposedly, people’s “thetans” are actually disembodied space aliens that are just wearing “meat bodies” while they’re here on earth.

Psychiatrists and psychologists, according to Scientology, are agents of an evil space overlord guy by the name of Xenu.

I swear to god–I’m not making this up. (Note, though, that members aren’t taught about this aspect of Scientology until after they’ve spent many thousands of dollars. It’s part of their super-secret upper level teachings, dontcha know. And here you get to learn about it for free! Such a deal.)

Supposedly, 7 billion years ago, Xenu transported all of the ‘thetans” to earth after having subjected them to all kinds of strange tortures. The insane “thetans” glommed onto these “meat bodies” (you know…your body) and–because they’re crazy–the “thetans” have mistakenly come to believe that the “meat bodies” are their actual selves. Psychiatrists–agents of the evil overlord, Xenu–perpetuate this mistaken notion by treating the “meat body” with drugs when, according to Scientology, all that’s really needed is for the “thetan” to fully realize his true nature.

Scientologists believe they can accomplish this through a process called auditing. In auditing, the subject holds onto a couple of cans that are connected by wires to a crude lie-detector type device called an e-meter. The “e” in e-meter stands for “engram”. Engrams are the supposed mental blocks that prevent a “thetan” from understanding his nature. During auditing, the auditor asks the subject (often called a “pre-clear” because he’s not yet clear of engrams) a very long series of questions. The subject’s reactions to these questions are observed on the e-meter and the auditor determines from them whether any progress is being made.

The whole thing is unbelievably complicated and stupid in ways that you truly couldn’t imagine. Only an insane person could have come up with it and…HEY!..guess who?: L. Ron Hubbard.

I could go on and on, but I’ll spare you. L. Ron Hubbard wrote volume after volume of weird junk connected to Scientology and its predecessor, Dianetics. It’s just the goofiest shit you’ll ever read in your life.

Scientology is idiotic and a colossal waste of time and money, but the great majority of people involved with it are just dumb schmucks who don’t know any better. On the other hand, the organization’s leadership is responsible for some pretty despicable acts–including the perpetuation of Hubbard-created rituals and policies that have directly led to at least one person’s death. Certainly that’s a very bad thing, so don’t get the idea that I think Scientology is all just harmless numb-skullery.

Anyway. So, I became interested in this Scientology business. Once I got online, I started posting to alt.religion.scientology and remained a pretty active member of that group for 5 or 6 years. In recent years my interest has waned. Part of it is that I’m simply busy with other things. Another factor in my disengagement from “Scientology criticism”, though, is my gradual realization that a good many of the Scientology critics I was seeing on alt.religion.scientology (a.r.s.) were at least as crazy or misguided as Scientologists themselves. One of the absolute requirements for protesting something like Scientology is that the criticisms must be factually accurate. On a.r.s. there were (and probably still are) way too many people who were willing to believe and perpetuate any negative story they’d heard about Scientology without having confirmed the story’s truth.

Ive got a problem with that.

So…. that’s what the whole thing with Scientology is all about. If you’ve got a few years and a bundle of cash to burn, check it out. Uh…don’t ever give them your real name or phone number, though.