Thursday, December 29, 2022

(1) Scientology and NXIVM - Parallels and Plagiarism part 1 an introduction

 Scientology and NXIVM - Parallels and Plagiarism




Influences on NXIVM beliefs and practices, sourced from Natalie et al (2019), rendered in the mode of W.S. Bainbridge, e.g. Bainbridge 1978. |NXIVM teachings drew upon diverse influences, including Ayn Rand ("parasites"), L. Ron Hubbard ("suppressives"), Milton Erickson's hypnosis, Isaac Asimov's science fiction, Rudolf Steiner, Tony Robbins, and neuro-linguistic programming. NXIVM incorporated elements of multi-level marketing and practices from judo, with colored cloth for rank and bowing.



I was in Scientology for twenty five years, so I have some familiarity with the doctrine and practices of that group.

I left Scientology in 2014 and spent many hundreds of hours trying to find out what Scientology actually is and does in addition to what people are taught while members of the group. It is not an exaggeration to say that I have had some degree of communication with hundreds of ex members and examined a significant amount of material on the true history of both the organization and the founder Ronald Hubbard.


Ronald Hubbard, Scientology founder


I also have been fortunate enough to get to question and gain excellent advice from cult experts, most notably Jon Atack.

I have been able to read several dozen books on the topic and these include several biographies of Hubbard and ex members as well as many books on hypnosis, cognitive dissonance theory, psychology, cults, abusive relationships, human predators, critical thinking, rhetoric and related topics.

 I also have explored the subjects Hubbard most likely plagiarized his techniques from including again hypnosis, the occult, psychology and many, many others. It is safe to say after finding hundreds of ideas that Hubbard almost certainly plagiarized that he likely never had an original thought in his life. 

I have since leaving Scientology established Mockingbird's Nest blog on Scientology and had between that platform and the Ex Scientologist Message Board and Facebook and Quora published over five hundred posts on Scientology and related topics and had likely a million views of these posts.

I am familiar with writing about Scientology and thinking about it.

I watched The Vow (documentary series on NXIVM) seasons one and two and had heard from several people that NXIVM likely has techniques plagiarized from Scientology among many, many other sources.

I listened to a podcast in which ex Scientologists Mike Rinder and Leah Remini interviewed ex NXIVM member Sarah Edmondson.

He remarked that he read her book Scarred and started taking notes on similarities or ideas likely plagiarized from Scientology (I do not remember his exact words).

Mike Rinder said he was just writing note after note after note and eventually just gave up.

I had noted that in my own efforts to untangle myself from the web of lies in Scientology that for me personally finding the sources that Hubbard likely plagiarized ideas from in their original forms was extremely useful, you could even say it was absolutely necessary for me.

Only when I devoted many, many hours to looking at the subjects and their original forms did I realize that what was actually happening in Scientology wasn't what Hubbard claimed at all and in fact he knew what he was trying to achieve because in rare moments he both publicly and privately acknowledged his true intentions and his knowledge that his techniques in their earlier forms were designed to achieve those intentions but by hiding their origins he hid his intention as well as the fact that he didn't create these methods and they were not beneficial but harmful frauds that others abandoned in many cases when they realized they are not helpful and not ethical. 

This took away the false genius attributed to Hubbard because being a prolific plagiarist is far less impressive than being a genius who comes up with hundreds and hundreds of original ideas and methods that have millions and millions of words of doctrine. 

I realized that it is quite likely that if someone familiar with Scientology and cults as a subject in general were to read Scarred it's quite likely they could find ideas and techniques used in NXIVM and Scientology.

I believe that reading Scarred and compiling and comparing such a list could create a useful resource. It would be useful for some ex members of both groups in my opinion.


Keith Raniere, NXIVM leader

Some NXIVM members would see Keith Raniere as a plagiarist con man in his own right and some ex Scientologists could see the same predatory behavior in both men and cast aside any illusions that Hubbard was altruistic or even honest.

I believe that the general public can benefit by seeing what similarities exist between these groups so they can see that ultimately all cults have the same foundation, a relationship based on lies, coercion, and abuse.

I read the book Scarred and immediately saw what Mike Rinder was talking about. I started out and took notes on similarities and likely plagiarized ideas and found example after example after example. On several pages in a row I found four examples per page for long sections of similarities strong enough to seriously consider as repackaged or slightly altered Scientology concepts or practices. 

That's a lot of examples and I frankly think it's worth the time and effort to document them and elaborate on the subject. 

I am not an expert on NXIVM and if I was I could probably provide a far deeper and more thorough explanation for this. As it is I can hopefully provide enough to help people and start a deeper and ongoing examination of the two subjects and their relationship. 

I would love to see this carried on with activists and survivors of both cults along with cult experts and believe all these people have different and useful things to contribute to this effort. 

In the continuing series of posts on Scientology and NXIVM I hope to provide the information on Scientology, NXIVM, and cults and cult leaders in general to help to start a discussion of these issues that others can contribute far more than I can to and for it to help people to understand the cults and recover from their pernicious influence. 






Scientology and NXIVM - Parallels and Plagiarism

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