From International Viewpoints (IVy) Issue 4 - December 1991
Scientology And Comparable Data
By George Hay, England.
(As secretary of the British Dianetic Association Ltd., sent the first
invitation to L.R.H. to come to the U.K. Attended the first lecture
ever given by him over here, and worked thereafter in London and St.
Hill Orgs at different times, and as an independent auditor. Was
declared for - as far as he could make out - following Ron's 3D
policies. Ed. IVy.).
I think it was Ron Howes, the first Clear - I mean, the -first- first
Clear (Spring 1952.), not the early Clears 'authorised' by Hubbard -
who said that in going Clear there came a moment when you looked back
and saw your whole life as a single incident. In that fashion, it may
be useful to look at Scientology as a single incident on the life-
track of Planet Earth. But then, what would be the comparable data by
which one could understand it? I have no recollection of having heard
of or read of this being discussed, either within Scientology, by ex-
scientologists, or by the authors of works attacking the subject. The
matter of context simply seems to have been ignored. There was perhaps
one exception, or the beginnings of one, when I passed a note from
within the Org to L.R.H. suggesting it might be useful to look at the
history of the Jesuits in terms of Loyola's 'processes', the
applications of which were powerful enough to alter the world history
of their time. Hubbard agreed that the matter should be looked into,
and asked me to do it. Given the hours I was putting in at that time,
this was beyond my powers then, and when the Orgs and I parted company
I had little inclination to follow up the notion. In fact, however, if
we consider the growth of all main late-autumn culture religions, one
sees that they follow certain laws of development. Seen from within,
they appear as matters of individual and group struggle: seen from
without they are as predictable as - well, say the growth of
dandelions. I can only assume this has not been picked up on because
most scientologists are not that interested in history.
Let's take just one comparable case - the rise of the automobile.
Before the time of Henry Ford 1, the motor-car was seen as a craft
object for the rich, something comparable to the yacht. Then along
comes Ford, a man obsessed with the idea that Everyman not only could
but -should- be able to afford one. Cheap transport, one might
truthfully say, was Ford's religion. Anyone who cares to read Ford's
books on his work - I say, 'books': it is more likely that they were
transcriped from dictation, as often with Hubbard - will be amazed at
the resemblance of the two mens' styles. Who cannot remember reading
L.R.H. texts on organisation, for example, and then saying to himself,
"But -of course!- It's so obvious - why didn't I see this myself?" And
the men who read what Ford set out experienced the same sensation.
"But of course!" And the more you look into this, the more uncanny the
resemblance seems. Ford believed that the automobile should be
available to all. To turn that belief into reality, he fought the most
desperate battles against just about every Establishment one could
think of. The unions hated Ford, because by increasing wages, he
undercut their power. The bankers hated Ford, declaring him a
Communist: the tale of his self-financing is an epic. Hubbard, now,
believed that a practical way of liberating the minds of men should be
available to all, and, as we all know, he also evolved self-financing
systems and fought bitter battles with the medical and legal
professions and with governments the world over.
Hubbard is generally presented as some sort of solitary sacred
monster. Not so. What he was, was an example of a type, a type that
arises in every expanding commercial culture; the type of the shrewd
exploitative engineering mentality who serves as a servo-mechanism to
that culture's driving imperative. Look into Roman history, and you
will find the same types at work, and I am convinced that research
into history of comparable periods in Egypt, China, where ever, you
will find the same manifestation at work. To understand these men, you
have to see them, not, as I say as inexplicable geniuses - though
geniuses they certainly were - but as life's solutions to their
nations' problems.
Of course, as Hubbard himself pointed out, all solutions turn into
problems in the end. The automobile industry has become frozen into a
fixed mould, and cheap transport is slowly throttling the planet,
destroying culture as it goes. Similarly with scientology, as we know.
(Hubbard himself intuited this quite early on: read the closing
passages of his science-fiction serial, 'The End Is Not Yet', if the
Orgs are ever rash enough to get it republished).
A fascinating story! Think about it....