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Tuesday, May 11, 2010

Scientology: Seeds of Its Own Destruction

With any in-depth and dispassionate analysis of Scientology, it becomes obvious that the organization and technologies of Scientology contain the seeds of their own destruction.

This is almost impossible for a True Believer to understand or detect, but it is clear to anyone who can see and think logically.

Now, I have written about some of this, such as Scientology's Admin Tech, which, while some is workable, if applied fully and exactly as written will effectively destroy any organization.  And there is a great essay on why Scientology's Ethics Tech is so destructive over on Leaving Scientology.

But now I'm talking about how the very structure of the Church of Scientology, as carefully designed by L. Ron Hubbard, made the takeover and subsequent destruction of the Church of Scientology not only possible but inevitable.

Let me explain. 

You see, Ron carefully structured the whole organization of the Church of Scientology around himself.  In all the thousands of policies that he wrote over all those years, there is one huge, glaring omission concerning the very top of the church:  The leader of Scientology and his duties, his responsibilities, how he is chosen, how he is removed, how he is evaluated, are all completely undefined.

Because of this, the leader may never be removed.  There simply is no way to remove the leader.  There is no way within the church to evaluate how the leader is doing.  There are no requirements that a leader must meet.  There are no results a leader must produce.  No one in the whole world has the power or authorization to remove the leader of Scientology.  This, of course, was intentional, since Ron had no intention of ever relinquishing control -- but it was a fatal omission for the church.

Some may believe that there are currently "others" who are really in charge and who could remove the leader, but that simply isn't true in the slightest.  The leader of the Church of Scientology has no boss and cannot be removed.    For more information about that, see Larry Brennan's blog.

The leader of Scientology is fully protected from everything.  Any internal threats or attacks are immediately dealt with, per policy, by the destruction and expulsion of the attacker.  The leader is always assumed fully innocent and any attacker is always presumed horribly guilty.  Any external attacks against the leader are, per policy, met with everything the Church of Scientology can throw against the attacker, both legal and illegal.  No expense or effort is spared in the leader's defense.

The leader's word is law within the Church of Scientology and must be complied with immediately and without question.  The leader can order anything be done and it will be done, no matter how much money or how many people are required.  If it is impossible, the church must still keep trying as long as the leader desires it.  The leader's power is absolute within the church.

The actions of the leader are completely protected by the church.  His whereabouts and actions are secret and carefully concealed by the church.  What the leader reveals is all that is visible, all else is hidden behind many curtains of secrecy created for that purpose.  If the leader commits crimes, lies, fraud and abuse, these actions will never be reported to the police (or anyone).  The leader of the Church of Scientology is protected from any exposure.

The leader of the Church of Scientology has absolute control over all of Scientology, all the money, all the property and all the people.  This is much more than just being very, very wealthy, this is total domination.

In case you are thinking this sounds like a super-desirable job, to an honest person, it really isn't.  Obviously it was perfect for Ron, because it was whatever he wanted it to be.  But now, because the job has no defined duties or limits, all the problems, disasters, failures and chaos of Scientology would end up at that desk.  The job is totally responsible for everything, but no clear limit to what the job actually is or is not.  For an honest person, it would be a horrible position, a complete disaster waiting to happen.

So, what kind of a person would want the job?  Not only would want it but would do anything and everything they could to gain that position?  What kind of a person would feed on chaos and disaster?

Yes, the person most likely to want that position would be a psychopath.  They would only see the unlimited power and wealth and care nothing about the responsibilities.  Who cares about responsibilities, problems and failures when you can just lie about everything?

And that is why David Miscavige took control of the Church of Scientology, the position is perfect for a psychopath.  He just had to have it, and he took it.

But the truth is, if Miscavige hadn't been there and hadn't taken over the leadership position, it is inevitable that some other psychopath would have done so.  Such a cruel and destructive person would be in danger of being found out and expelled unless they got to the safety of the top job of the church.  That is why it was inevitable that it would happen.

The seeds of the takeover of the Church of Scientology by the most destructive person is built right into the way the position of the leader was set up.  Once Ron was no longer able to defend his leadership, the church was truly doomed.
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11 comments:

  1. Is truly doomed.

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  2. A very astute observation, Bill, though might one take it a step further and say that the church was doomed even while LRH was in the seat of power?

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  3. Re: Doomed even earlier?

    In my opinion, that is true, although for different reasons. LRH seemed able to make the whole church structure work -- mostly by force of personality. But the other problems with the various Scientology technologies still doomed the church. It is built on lies, and that is never a good long term business plan.

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  4. Very well stated, Just Bill. I've been talking about this for a while. What you've written is hard for run-of-the-mill scientologists to understand, because of the indoctrination that occurs with LRH being "source" and unimpeachable has transferred over to the next Single Authority Figure. I agree, if not DM, then it would have been someone else.

    If there is any hope that the church is to continue...well...no...there isn't any hope that the church can continue in anything like its present structure. You're right, the church can only self-destruct.

    However, if a group of scientologist want to establish a protestant church of scientology, then they'd better damn make sure there was some way to remove their leadership, should it become corrupt or just tired and stale.

    The nascent Independent Scientologist movement may coalesce into such a protestant church, but whoever puts together their bylaws had better do their homework as to historical patterns of successful churches.

    The extremely difficult task of separating the workable parts of scientology from the unworkable parts would be a daunting task that nevertheless would have to be done for scientology to phoenix itself.

    It remains to be seen, but odds are astronomically against this current organizational pattern being viably reinvented.

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  5. @Just Bruce

    Well said. There is a chance for the independents to create some kind of protestant church -- but, like you, I find that highly unlikely. They would have to be very smart and they would have to accept that Hubbard failed in many ways. Then they would have to figure out, and agree on, how to fix things.

    All that goes so much against Scientology dogma, I am absolutely certain that they can't pull it off.

    Be that as it may be, I am equally certain that anything good about Scientology will be preserved in some way. I doubt anything good will be lost when the Church of Scientology finally disappears.

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  6. Yep. Let's just hope that removing DM won't prove to be as difficult as removing Castro. I think more than a few parallels could be drawn there, hm?

    Maybe the new Int. escapee (John Brousseau) will have enough incriminating evidence to at least forced DM to blow to Columbia or something. Fingers crossed. However, like you say, the church is still stuck with the seeds of its own destruction even if a "reformed church" pops up.

    I loved Alanzo's recent post on this subject:
    http://www.forum.exscn.net/showthread.php?t=17940&highlight=alanzo

    Thanks for yet another great post, Bill. You always tell it like it is.

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  7. oh my god.

    you. are. right.

    whhhhhew.

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  8. "Independent Senator Nick Xenophon has proposed a test which asks groups to demonstrate whether their activities are of public benefit or cause harm before being granted tax exempt status.
    "

    Would love to read your opinion on the possible outcome of this...

    http://www.abc.net.au/lateline/content/2010/s2899026.htm

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  9. Re: Senator Xenophon's bill

    I understand that this bill passed! This is extremely good news.

    Anyone who reads this blog is aware that I am opposed to banning Scientology and opposed to banning books, but this legislation is exactly the way to attack the Church of Scientology. It only asks that they prove they do what they claim they do -- and you know they can't.

    I'd love this type of legislation in every country where the CoS gets tax exemption.

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  10. Do you think Hubbard actually assigned stewardship of the organization to the Broekers, and things would be different had Miscavige not usurped control from them?

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  11. Re: Broekers and Miscavige

    Personally, I don't think Hubbard assigned stewardship to Pat. I don't think Hubbard was really thinking ahead in that way in his final years. He certainly hadn't done any preparation in the prior 34 years, why would he start then?

    But even if he had, there is absolutely no evidence that the Broeker's had the experience, strength or ability to hold the leadership of the church.

    No, even if they had been promoted to leadership, the first psychopath to come along (obviously Miscavige) would have removed them without any trouble.

    Imagine, if you will, any organization who's leadership was so undefined. What would happen? The position would always be in contention until someone took over who was willing to viciously and unilaterally destroy all others. The inevitable result would always be that the most destructive person becomes leader.

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