Scientology's Insidious Influence Revisited (4)

 Note: this is the fourth post in a five part series looking at this topic. The entire series is also available as one post. I recommend reading the posts in order as they refer back to one another regarding information covered already. 

Here, I want to look at what a Scientologist does and believes during their indoctrination. I want to focus on a very particular part of the indoctrination. 

Hubbard lecturing Scientologists in the late 1950s (Channel 4 Television, “Secret Lives – L. Ron Hubbard”)

I am going to offer a little information on the general methods used in Scientology indoctrination for context, so you can see what is in the mind of an individual Scientologist and what they are doing while being indoctrinated.

This is not meant to describe everything that occurs in Scientology or everything that occurs in the indoctrination or even everything that happens to a person in a Scientology course room. Far, far more is involved in the entire range of techniques used in Scientology in general and in the course room in particular. 

I am going to try to cover just enough to make the information understandable in context. 

First off in Scientology a person can take courses and staff members are required to take courses and the public are strongly encouraged. Sea Org members are also required to take courses.

But in Scientology indoctrination one cannot study materials like in a high school or college. No. In those places one can disagree with teachers or references. That's not acceptable in Scientology indoctrination.

In Scientology one must use a series of techniques called "Study Technology". In study technology or study tech, one is assumed to only disagree with the materials if one has a "misunderstood word", meaning a word or symbol you don't fully understand. 

Now, to even begin learning about Scientology one is required to use the techniques in Scientology to examine Scientology. If you buy a course you are required to act as if Scientology principles are true and use study tech methods to examine the methods themselves. 

Study tech is extremely different than the methods used in schools or in independent study or in merely reading things, taking tests, and writing papers and reports. 

This is vital to understanding Scientology. 

If you just imagine people reading in a Scientology course room you are missing the crucial difference between study tech and actual study. 

Here's a series of quotes from Hubbard that outline some basic concepts in study technology:

The First Barrier – Lack of Mass

A student who encounters this barrier will tend to feel squashed, bent, sort of spinny, sort of dead, bored and exasperated. He can wind up with his face feeling squashed, with headaches, and with his stomach feeling funny. He can feel dizzy from time to time and very often his eyes can hurt.

The Second Barrier – Too Steep a Gradient

There is a different set of physiological reactions which occur as a result of this barrier. When one hits too steep a gradient, a sort of confusion or reelingness is experienced.

The Third Barrier – the Misunderstood Word

Going past a word or symbol for which one does not have a proper definition gives one a distinctly blank or washed-out feeling. The person will get a "not there" feeling and will begin to feel a nervous hysteria. These are manifestations distinct from either of the other two barriers.

Have you ever come to the bottom of a page only to realize you didn’t remember what you had just read? That is the phenomenon of a misunderstood word, and one will always be found just before the material became blank in your mind.

HCO Bulletin of 25 June 1971 (revised 25 November 1974),

"Barriers to Study" Ron Hubbard

In the Scientology Handbook a simple version of Hubbard's study tech is presented with his method 3 word clearing presented as Basic Word Clearing. It's a foundation of how a Scientologist approaches indoctrination and the materials he studies.

Basic Word Clearing

Basic Word Clearing is the method of finding a misunderstood word by looking earlier in the text for a misunderstood word than where one is having trouble. This is the most basic method of Word Clearing used in Scientology.

A student must know how to keep himself tearing along successfully in his studies. He should be able to handle anything that slows or interferes with his progress. He applies the Study Technology to assist himself.

A student who uses Study Technology will look up each word he comes to that he doesn’t understand and will never leave a word behind him that he doesn’t know the meaning of.

If he runs into trouble, the student himself, his study partner or his instructor (in Scientology called a Supervisor) uses Basic Word Clearing to handle anything that slowed or interfered with his progress.

Waiting to become groggy or to “dope off” (feel tired, sleepy or foggy as though doped or drugged) as the only detection of misunderstood words before handling is waiting too long. If you have ever seen a student falling asleep over his book, then you have seen dope-off. Long before that point, someone should have made the student look for a misunderstood word. The time to look for the misunderstood word is as soon as the student slows down or isn’t quite as “bright” as he was fifteen minutes before. It is not a misunderstood phrase or idea or concept but a misunderstood WORD. This always occurs before the subject itself is not understood.

Basic Word Clearing is done as follows:

1. The student is not flying along and is not so “bright” as he was or he may exhibit just plain lack of enthusiasm or be taking too long on the course or be yawning or disinterested or doodling or daydreaming, etc.

2. The student must then look earlier in the text for a misunderstood word. There is one always; there are no exceptions. It may be that the misunderstood word is two pages or more back, but it is always earlier in the text than where the student is now.

3. The word is found. The student recognizes it in looking back for it. Or, if the student can’t find it, one can take words from the text that could be the misunderstood word and ask, “What does _____ mean?” to see if the student gives the correct definition.

4. The student looks up the word found in a dictionary and clears it per the steps of clearing a misunderstood word described above. He uses it verbally several times in sentences of his own composition until he has obviously demonstrated he understands the word by the composition of his sentences.

5. The student now reads the text that contained the misunderstood word. If he is not now “bright,” eager to get on with it, feeling happier, etc., then there is another misunderstood word earlier in the text. This is found by repeating steps 2–5.

6. When the student is bright and feeling happier, he comes forward, studying the text from where the misunderstood word was to the area of the subject he did not understand (where step 1 began).

The student will now be enthusiastic about his study of the subject, and that is the end result of Basic Word Clearing. (The result won’t be achieved if a misunderstood word was missed or if there is an earlier misunderstood word in the text. If so, repeat steps 2–5.) If the student is now enthusiastic, have him continue studying.

Good Word Clearing is a system of backtracking. You have to look earlier than the point where the student became dull or confused and you’ll find that there’s a word that he doesn’t understand somewhere before the trouble started. If he doesn’t brighten up when the word is found and cleared, there will be a misunderstood word even before that one.

This will be very clear to you if you understand that if it is not resolving, the thing the student is apparently having trouble with is not the thing the student is having trouble with. Otherwise, it would resolve, wouldn’t it? If he knew what he didn’t understand, he could resolve it himself. So to talk to him about what he thinks he doesn’t understand just gets nowhere. The trouble is earlier.

Zeroing In on the Word

The formula is to find out where the student wasn’t having any trouble and find out where the student is now having trouble and the misunderstood word will be in between. It will be at the tag end—the last part—of where he wasn’t having trouble.

Basic Word Clearing is tremendously effective when done as described here. From the Scientology Handbook based on the works of Ron Hubbard

I will now present a brief quote from Ronald Hubbard in which he states that:

CONFUSED IDEAS

"Whenever a person has a confused idea of something or believes there is some conflict of ideas it is always true that a misunderstood word exists at the bottom of that confusion."

End quote Ronald  Hubbard

That quote is from a bulletin entitled Confused Ideas written on 31 August, 1971.

Here are several more excerpts from it:

"Every green body of students will argue and fuss about ideas or confusions in the directions or material they are given to read.

They will generate weird ideas and erroneous concepts of what the text says. They do wrong things and say the text said to. They ask strange ideas of their instructors. They clamor for “clarifications”.

And at the bottom of all this is simply misunderstood words.

There is not also misunderstood ideas. There is only the misunderstood word which breeds, then, huge towering wrong ideas.

A misunderstood word breeds strange ideas.

end quote, Ronald Hubbard

 

You can see that the materials are not open to discussion or criticism or anything like that. You are to accept and agree with them and remember every definition of every term used, whether a regular English term or one of the thousands and thousands of Scientology terms, no exceptions.

 

 So, Hubbard claimed "misunderstood words" are responsible for confusion and a misunderstood word will always be found before one became blank or "Going past a word or symbol for which one does not have a proper definition gives one a distinctly blank or washed-out feeling. The person will get a "not there" feeling and will begin to feel a nervous hysteria." and "Have you ever come to the bottom of a page only to realize you didn’t remember what you had just read? That is the phenomenon of a misunderstood word, and one will always be found just before the material became blank in your mind."

So, this is a lot to take in. Hubbard has a student believing in his three "barriers to study" and looking for signs of them constantly while on course. 

I want to point this out so it is clear that if a person in Scientology indoctrination, a "student" is looking for feeling "squashed, bent, sort of spinny, sort of dead, bored and exasperated. He can wind up with his face feeling squashed, with headaches, and with his stomach feeling funny. He can feel dizzy from time to time and very often his eyes can hurt." and to see if "a sort of confusion or reelingness is experienced." and "a distinctly blank or washed-out feeling. The person will get a "not there" feeling and will begin to feel a nervous hysteria."

I also want to point out that in Scientology indoctrination a person is not only constantly looking for these phenomena but trying to remember which are associated with which of the three barriers because the techniques to handle each one are different! 

It can take a long time to memorize which phenomena are allegedly caused by which alleged barrier!

So, the person in a Scientology course room is not a normal person reading books and course packs and listening to taped lectures. No, they are a nervous wreck hunting for misunderstood words and a lack of mass and skipped gradients. 

So, they have extreme anxiety as they try to avoid getting a checkout or a spot check in which they are asked to define a term and fail! It is a disaster!

In addition, the person must act as if any confusion or disagreement with the materials studied in Scientology is because they must not understand the materials. Always. 

Now, acting as if you believe something and behaving as if it was true is something that has been studied.

I am again going to quote Leon Festinger from his book A Theory of Cognitive Dissonance: "There is evidence in our data that once a change in behavior has occurred, a change in beliefs is likely to follow. (Page 121)"

Margaret Singer in her book Cults In Our Midst provides a tremendous amount of essential information regarding cults.

First a quote that struck me instantly. It reminded me of an analysis of Scientology written by a class XII auditor. She said Hubbard's writings can seem contradictory and paradoxical. That is actually intentional.

"The more complicated and filled with contradictions the new system is and the more difficult it is to learn, the more effective the conversion process will be." (page 67) Margaret Singer

The contradictions serve to thoroughly confuse Hubbard's victims and help to increase their suggestibility. With hundreds or thousands of contradictions in millions of words of doctrine the effect is compounded by unimaginably immense repetition.

 "In cultic groups, the individual member is always wrong, and the system is always right." (page 68) Margaret Singer

This is a key component of cults - the individual always must submit to a position as an intellectual subordinate to the group, doctrine or leader. A relationship based on mutual respect and human rights has no place in a cult. The leader is always above any accountability and without humility or compassion. The system is always totalistic and without means of reform and progress. If it lacks these qualities it fails to be cultic.

"You affirm that you accept and understand the ideology by beginning to talk in the simple catchphrases particular to the group. This "communication" has no foundation since, in reality, you have little understanding of the system beyond the catchphrases." (page 69) Margaret Singer

This is particularly relevant to Scientology as Hubbard used many thousands of new words. Many of which are the opposite of their original meaning or used to state something the exact opposite of the truth to hide Hubbard's intentions and crimes. He used phrases twisted and turned to fool people. Many of his terms lack clear meaning because he uses far too many new terms with reference to one another and multiple contradictory definitions. The amount of terms and definitions to attempt to learn and coordinate is simply overwhelming and often absorbs so much of the cult member's attention that clear understanding and thought are severely inhibited.

 "Loading the language. As members continue to formulate their ideas in the group's jargon, this language serves the purpose of constricting members' thinking and shutting down critical thinking abilities. At first, translating from their native tongue into "groupspeak" forces members to censor, edit, and slow down spontaneous bursts of criticism or oppositional ideas." (page 70) Margaret Singer

Of all cult methods this may be the one Hubbard focused on the most. With his extensive new language drummed into his victims' minds through extreme repetition. The beliefs within the language replace the Scientologists' own. And often nearly entirely replace critical thinking.

Getting almost complete control over cultists' minds is one of the main intentions Hubbard had in his chosen methods.

By continuosly adding new terms and concepts and redefining old ones with explicitly contradictory definitions Hubbard tried to perpetually maintain the overwhelming confusion cult members usually experience when first joining a cult. This is compounded by Scientology's extensive decades long indoctrination process. It keeps the translation process ongoing rather than temporary. This helps to heighten confusion, anxiety, and suggestibility.

 "One international group, for example, has dictionaries for members to use. In one of these dictionaries, criticism is defined as "justification for having done an overt." Then one looks up overt and the dictionary states: "overt act: an overt act is not just injuring someone or something; an overt act is an act of omission or commission which does the least good for the least number of dynamics or the most harm to the greatest number of dynamics." Then the definition of dynamics says: There could be said to be eight urges in life...." And so, one can search from term to term trying to learn this new language." (page 70) Margaret Singer

Obviously to any veteran Scientologist this refers to Scientology and Hubbard's methods of defining new terms with mountains of others in never ending chains of words to look up.

 "Now, when you engage in cooperative activity with peers in an environment that you do not realize is artificially constructed, you do not perceive your interactions to be coerced." (page 76) Margaret Singer

Hubbard knew this and used the already loyal group members habits to persuade new members that Scientology was reasonable and normal for people to participate in.

 "In other words, you will think that you came upon the belief and behaviors yourself." (page 76) Margaret Singer

And as a key element to covert persuasion Hubbard made sure Scientologists consider the conclusions he wants drawn to be their own and to then base further and further ideas that agree with his to be independently and objectively decided.

 This helps to make the victims highly unwilling to examine these ideas.  And the behaviors he ruthlessly demands through his doctrine are very clearly accepted or rewarded for compliance and entirely condemned for noncomformity. 

But in Scientology the cult member cannot admit this and so habitually denies the totalitarian nature of the cult and is caught in an almost inescapable bind of progressive submission and further behavior in compliance with Hubbard's doctrine.

"Peer pressure is very important to this process:

If you say it in front of others, you'll do it.

Once you do it, you'll think it.

Once you think it (in an environment you do not perceive to be coercive), you'll believe that you thought it yourself." (page 76) Margaret Singer

Now, this is a lot to take in. The idea that a person, Ronald Hubbard, could convince people to look at his words as infallible and see any disagreement or confusion they have or any criticism and recognition of contradiction in his materials, particularly contradiction between the ideas he expressed and other ideas he himself expressed, as due to a lack of understanding in the people themselves is an extraordinary claim.  

But, everything we have seen so far supports it.  

We saw in cognitive dissonance theory how contradiction can create anxiety and confusion and mental discomfort.

We saw how confusion can be used in hypnosis.

We saw that hypnosis is a state of heightened suggestibility and that people who are confused can seek information to grab onto to end the confusion and mental discomfort, and importantly in trance logic, a hypnotic state, one has increased tolerance for contradiction and is more suggestible.

We also saw that the people who "study" Scientology are required to act as if the doctrine is infallible and any difficulty is due to "barriers to study", meaning flaws in the student, never the materials.

Leon Festinger and Margaret Singer noted that behaving as though something is true can lead to believing it and thinking you reached that conclusion independently. 

But there is one more thing to address: did Ronald Hubbard intend to use his study tech and misunderstood word idea to confuse and control people? Did he try to implant ideas in their minds? 

Fortunately for us, I believe he left ample evidence in that regard.