(17) Scientology and NXIVM - Parallels and Plagiarism
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.
This is the seventeenth post in a series that examines the book Scarred: The True Story Of How I Escaped The Cult That Bound My Life by Sarah Edmondson.
I recommend reading these posts in sequential order and have listed them in order to make reading them in order easy.
Unless noted otherwise, all quotes used in this series are from that book.
"Rational Inquiry. Perfect taught, is a way for an individual to explore their inner workings, either on their own or with the support of a coach, to figure out where the inconsistencies in their beliefs lie." (Scarred page 44)
This is remarkably similar to several practices in Scientology and the one that's most obvious is called False Data Stripping.
False Data Stripping is a procedure that is done and usually has a person assigned a twin.
Ronald Hubbard, Scientology founder
The use of a coach or twin to help someone is present in both NXIVM and Scientology.
Having new members work with a twin is ingenious in that it gives them access to a person at the same or nearly same level of cultic indoctrination and they often have similar behaviors and attitudes. By encouraging or advancing the more malleable and obedient members this models submission to the authority of the group as the preferred behavior within the group.
The False Data Stripping procedure has several steps but they inevitably lead to the new members seeing the ideas in Scientology as correct and any that conflict with the new system as false by definition.
The EM (exploration of meaning) procedure has been described as extremely similar to auditing in Scientology by cult expert Rick Alan Ross. It is similar to the auditing used in Dianetics and has several similar concepts which can be explored in depth by comparison of the basic Dianetics DVD that has the basic procedure against the EM procedure itself.
In fact, much of the procedure looks like Dianetics with just a few terms changed. The belief that errors in thinking in the past could be linked to similar events with negative emotions or pain in them and disrupt current thinking is a fundamental to Dianetics and the idea of reexamination and experiencing the events now as a cathartic technique now is also a foundation of Dianetics.
ESP discusses "Operating Systems" which sound quite similar to the "Engram Bank" or "Reactive Mind" and "Analytical Mind" of Dianetics and Hubbard used the computer metaphor to describe his "technology" as removing a held down seven in math calculations much as NXIVM "technology" is described as something that would remove the effects of childhood errors in thinking and "upgrade your programming."
There is a wealth of similarities just in these computer based metaphors alone.
Another notable one is that NXIVM promised to permanently remove stimulus response behavior and Dianetics also made the same promise.
In Dianetics stimulus response behavior is described as coming from the (fictional) "reactive mind" and if it's eradicated via Dianetics procedure then of course all irrational behavior is promised to disappear permanently.
Both NXIVM and Scientology notably claim to be the only group that can do this with their unique technology.
Keith Raniere, NXIVM leader
"In my case, ESP was instantly helpful. The power of NXVIM's curriculum, which Nancy called the " tech," made it easier for me to look past the chintziness of the presentation. I wondered: if that EM, the exploration of meaning, could bring peace to one small issue in my life, could it work for more than that? I was curious and hopeful enough to keep a somewhat open mind." (Scarred page 45)
In my opinion the EM has an origin in hypnosis and Nancy Salzman quite likely never explained that in fine detail.
I am going to say a little about hypnosis here, because the experience Sarah Edmondson just described sounds remarkably similar to several descriptions I have found in my own examination of the subject and my own experience in Scientology.
In hypnotic techniques a subject may feel euphoria and be open to suggestions and become submissive to and dependent on a practitioner over time.
I recall after undergoing several Scientology techniques (that only after leaving Scientology did I discover to be hypnotic) did I too overlook the fact that the Scientology organization was a dump in a bad neighborhood and most of the staff looked like derelicts who wouldn't be able to rub two nickels together.
The fact is as I have described before most people in the West are not used to the fact that hypnosis can produce euphoria and trance states that are open to suggestions and highly vulnerable to manipulation.
We simply do not usually get this information in our education and we really should. Margaret Singer described this quite well in her book Cults In Our Midst.
Here are a few links on the subject of hypnosis and its use in Scientology.
- Insidious Enslavement : Study Technology
- Basic Introduction to Hypnosis in Scientology
- Pissed It's Not Your Fault !!!
- The Offensive Defensive Technique
- The Critical Factor
Hypnotist Volney Mathison (inventor of the E meter) explicitly described in his book Creative Image Therapy hypnosis being used over and over for hours as a covert way to mentally enslave someone.
Here is the quote:
"At this point, nearing the end of this book, the writer reluctantly presents a negative warning. There is extant a pseudo-scientific system of something or other wherein the patient is required to create and duplicate arbitrary systems of mental images that are autocratically selected for him by the operator. Worse still, the patient is forced monotonously to perform interminably-duplicated trivial physical motions, such as touching a certain exact spot on the table, over and over and over, sometimes for hours.
Bluntly, this is a powerful and effective technique for covertly inducing hypnosis. By the duplicated command the subject is caused endlessly to duplicate mental image patterns wherein he is OBEYING the operator, explicitly, time after time after time. The subject is sooner or later reduced to such a zombie-like state that he will thereafter obey the operator's every other covert or indirect command. These covert and indirect commands are presented to the subject in the form of take-it-or-leave-it "suggestions"--to buy every book, take every expensive "course", attend every convention or conference staged by the operator. The victim at long last finds himself penniless, in debt, and much more ill and troubled than ever before.
The seizure of the intense attention of an intended victim by monotonously duplicated little acts is the technique of the rattlesnake as he fascinates a bird. The snake sways back and forth, holding the victim's gaze, causing it to look from side to side, keeping its attention captive by this duplicative technique of fascination. A "fatigue point" eventually is reached. The snake's prey is thereby immobilized, psychically and physically--and devoured."
(From The truth about the Fraud called Scientology)
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