From International Viewpoints (IVy) Issue 18 - August 1994
See Home Page at http://www.ivymag.org/
The next fifty years, or, is scientology popular?
By Ray Harman, Australia
What made Scientology popular in the first place? As far as I know,
it was a friendly, no-harassment shop run by professionals, who
delivered a Free Course in Personal Efficiency and a free IQ test.
The fact that it was free aroused curiosity!
Up to about 1960, any promising research was issued in HCOB form.
The staff would read it in the morning and start auditing it in the
afternoon. Those were the exciting times! Then the Sea Org was formed.
The secrecy began. The free and friendly atmosphere began to
disappear.
Professional staff, that is, staff who had left other professional
callings to join staff, began to leave staff. Effective PE courses
using Teaching by Agreement disappeared. An act of desperation called
Body Routing off the street began. Any popularity dropped dead and
was replaced by the 'them and us' cult mentality. Thee and me may
mourn the 'good old days' but we are sure glad to be out of what it
has become today.
Popular scientology
So can there ever be a popular scientology in the next 50 years? If
so, how? Ulrich in IVy 16 suggests the press will make it
fashionable. I seem to remember that about 2000 years ago a
charismatic
man had an enthusiastic following - and as time went by his teaching
was altered until eventually there was the Inquisition when people
were tortured horribly, for their own good, you know, to save their
immortal souls ... was this popularity? I doubt it, but there were
millions of followers - too scared, perhaps, not to toe the line!
I do not like to think that the C of S will gain popularity due to
its altered teachings!
Cultural lag
LRH said it takes 50 years for a new idea to be accepted. We are
44 years down the track from the Ninth of May 1950 ... Traumatic
Incident
Reduction is beginning to be accepted by the medical profession, but
it isn't yet a standard tool in psychiatric hospitals. Will it become
so? Maybe we will see psychiatrists using lower Grade auditing by
about AD 2100!
The vehicle which will clear the planet
Will a reformed C of S clear the planet? This seems unlikely -
or as we say in Australia, pigs may fly! Well, how about the
enlightenment
of medicine and psychiatry? This is probably a very long term option,
but not an impossibility. They did take 50 years to accept Harvey's
theory of the circulation of the blood. LRH was critical of doctors
and hated psychiatrists (Psychlos catrists?) Read 'Battlefield Earth'
by LRH. They have almost given up shock treatment now - that's
progress! Let's not blindly buy LRH's opinion but instead look at
their stats and make up our own minds.
The government department of clearing?
Maybe in a century or two, perhaps? As normal teaching practice in
universities, they like to follow the original research line. It's
a pity that only the workable routes are written up. Next century
or so, a university professor will dream up something like R2-12 or
3D Criss Cross, and mess someone up - several people more likely
... perhaps it could even be you or me a couple of lifetimes down
the track! So I think it would be a good idea if the research line
was written up as well as the workable processes.
Independents
Meanwhile, there's us Independents. I guess we'd better continue to
be here, and communicate. Er, yes ... find out what is needed and
wanted, and deliver same? That has a familiar ring to it somehow!