A curious reaction

Marty posted a blog entry in response to a new St. Petersburg Times article about a WISE-affiliated company accused of paperwork fraud. (WISE is the World Institute of Scientology Enterprises, an organization that licenses Scientology founder L. Ron Hubbard’s management system, the “Administrative Technology.” I used to work at a WISE company, by the way; that was the beginning of my Scientology education.)

What’s of interest to me is not the article, but the way Marty reacted to it.

“The Times took the lazy, low road on this ‘investigation,'” writes Marty. “They take a couple of LRH quotes out of context and position them as the why for the criminality… If the LRH quotes…had any bearing on the company’s criminality (ALL RECENT) then where was the Times twenty years ago?”

I clicked Marty’s link to the article expecting to find some really damning Admin Tech quotes. (Goodness knows there are a lot!) Instead, I found this:

Hubbard preached that managers keep a keen eye on statistics and not worry about coddling employees.

“However one tries to coat the pill, there is no substitute, in an executive, for the ability to get the crew to produce,” he wrote. “The fire-breathing product officer will be followed and supported when the wishy-washy old pal guy will be stepped all over in the rush to follow the real leader.”

The only way for an organization to survive is to grow, said Hubbard, who also devised a system of “ethics” in which unproductive employees could work their way out of conditions called “danger” and “nonexistence.”

That’s it. 104 words out of a 2,800 word article. And nothing that blames the company’s bad behavior on LRH.

So why is Marty so adamant? Why is he suddenly down on the SP Times — a paper he loved and lauded when they featured him in their Truth Rundown series ?

The answer, I think, is that Marty knows the truth about the Admin Tech. See, the Admin Tech is where LRH pretty much explains how the Scientology scam is run. Granted, it’s written so as not to disabuse the True Believers – read my blog entry Hard Sell for more on that – but it’s plain that the Admin Tech is all about spreading the word and making money.

That’s fine for a secular business, but it’s not so fine when you realize that it’s how LRH ran his “religion.”

As a former Scientology exec, Marty Rathbun should be very familiar with the Admin Tech, but many of his followers (those who were public Scientologists and not staff members) aren’t. And from what I’ve seen in the past, Marty is keen to keep it that way. You rarely see Admin Tech quotes on Marty’s site, and posting a quote from the Admin Tech in a comment is a pretty sure-fire way to get it censored.

I’ve always suspected Marty fears that if his followers start reading the Admin Tech, they are more likely to see Scientology for what it really is. And he’s probably right.

Now, if the article really did attempt to blame NTC’s troubles on the Admin Tech, I’d say that Marty had a point. I know the Admin Tech fairly well, and I can’t recall anything that encourages fraud – in fact, most of the admin tech is pretty sensible, if a bit close-minded. The article does seem to use NTC’s alleged illegalities as a reason to talk about Scientology’s ties to the business community.

Of course, Church-going Scientologists see that as a good thing. Most WISE business owners will be pleased to talk your ear off about their success with LRH’s Admin Tech. Used properly, it makes a lot of money for those who use it – including the Church of Scientology.

And that’s what makes Marty’s reaction so interesting. Perhaps he is just illustrating Scientology’s black-or-white mentality: The article talks about LRH’s Admin Tech; the article is negative; therefore, the article is anti-LRH entheta.

But Marty seems so eager to avoid the subject of the Admin Tech, that I can’t help but think there’s something else going on. I can tell you that the Admin Tech is the reason I’m not a Scientologist. Perhaps Marty’s afraid that his flock might feel the same way.

Am I reading too much into this?

Read the original articles here:

• SP Times article: Scientology founder’s tenets drive Pinellas title company, under fire for rapid document processing
• Marty Rathbun’s blog entry

UPDATE: Great quote in a comment from Marty:

“They [the SP Times] received so much grief from the church for the Truth Rundown series they have been a weird sort of propitiation band since. At the expense of LRH and the tech. This article is really the work of Miscavige. Throw LRH under the bus so as to divert attention from Miscavige.”

Get that? According to Marty, this article is a way of kissing up to the Church. If the first two sentences weren’t so delusional, the last two would be laugh-out-loud funny. Marty’s lying makes me angry, but at times like this, I really do feel sorry for the guy. I honestly do.

ML,
Caliwog

Another gem from the Marty h8rs

The following is a quote from a pro-Church, anti-Marty site:

Scientology is doing what LRH says should be done. If you do what LRH says then you are a Scientologist. And conversely, if you are a Scientologist then you do what LRH says to do in any given situation.

Ladies and gentlemen, the prosecution rests.

And you know what the really funny/really sad part is? Scientologists – whether they be Church-affiliated or independents – will read the above quote and think there is nothing wrong with it whatsoever.

Original post here.

ML,
Caliwog

Aaron Saxton: Summing up Independent Scientology

Aaron Saxton is one of the more controversial figures in the protest movement, and while our approaches may differ, I find that he and I are in agreement on most of our opinions concerning Scientology. Aaron posted the following as a comment a few days ago, and it’s one of the best summations of Marty Rathbun and his Independent Scientology movement I’ve seen. Whether you like Aaron or not, I think you’ll appreciate what he has to say. Here’s Aaron:

Where Marty will fail to measure up is in the simplest of his stated goals and aspirations. Once his followers realize that he can not deliver, they will start to fall away – not all though.

Marty has buried himself a hole he can not logically get out of, and has adopted MLK philosophy to explain the lack of facts “On faith alone…” Once the glossy appearance of this statement wears thin, his followers will see some of the most obvious downfalls of Marty:

1. He states that [David Miscavige] has altered nearly all the tech – with this comes a subtle promise to restore it. Yet Marty is no more in possession of the “correct tech” than anyone else. He didn’t memorize all the alterations, had no access to archives to know the correct tech, and per his own statement received his “full understanding of the glory of LRH” upon the ship in 1994/1995. This is when the tech was severely altered. So on correct tech, he simply can not deliver.

2. Marty has stated he will show DMs crimes. But he hasn’t stated he would show the Churches crimes. Why is that? He wants DM gone and nothing more. The Church has many crimes, but DMs hands are very clean and he can not be tracked to any of it, DM made sure of that. The result is that Marty would have to take down the Church and indict himself and Mike Rinder if he goes to the authorities on any real crimes. There is a possibility of jail time – murder is open ended. The other aspect of this is that Marty may go to jail. So rather than tell media, John Travolta or Lisa’s family the truth, he won’t because getting DM to him is more important – and he wants the Church to survive. The other thing is that Marty has no data on any of DMs crimes because DM is a smart SOB and that is a fact.

3. Marty states he will get you real results with Scientology. He can no no better or worse than any FZ [Free Zone] movement – and he knows this. What makes him better? He is not in possession of the corrected tech, and he is no better at applying it than anyone else. I know Otto Roos, and Otto would eat Marty alive when it comes to tech. Marty is like a kid playing with a ball compared to the worlds greatest pitcher when we compare these two. Otto was LRHs personal auditor, literally created the L rundowns himself and was around personally with LRH so he knows the tech COLD and better than Marty could ever wish to. Sadly Otto is on OT XII and I can still see the biggest outpoint – NO FUCKING ABILITIES.

4. Marty wants his people to think he is the one to lead. But he isn’t for several reasons, a. He isn’t leading anything other than a rabble of followers. b. Marty can not even give straight information when asked, so he is of no use legally to anyone. If you are of no use legally then I guess his assumption is that postulating will stop DM.

5. Marty constantly points out that DM made everyone do everything evil. This is a plain lie. Every ex-Scio bar one or two up on the boards that confesses to being an asshole or having mistreated anyone blames the mindset they got from Scientology and almost none have ever met DM for more than 30 seconds. I guess this is like saying if Hitler never existed, then there would never have been any atrocities – or that if Hitler was assassinated, then the Concentration camps would have been shut down. It was not a man but an ideology computated with false reasoning and lies that got people to do what they did. Marty will have you believe the world can suffer from one man when logic and the ability to admit you were wrong can clearly show it is all about where 5,000 SO members learned to be assholes – LRH. Messengers are the popes of Scientology, closest to Ron and they were all pricks not because they were bad people, but that is because that is how they were taught – by confidential advices and orders from Ron that makes you an asshole. This is why DM got created and why he used Messengers to take over from LRH – LRH taught them well.

6. Lastly, Marty is a dictator. There is no democracy in Scientology or the Sea Org and Marty displays this clearly. He will not be part of a committee or put anything out there for a vote unless he agrees with it first. Marty is no more free of the horrors he experienced in the SO than most. He is a dictator trained, and he will act like one. No one is above Marty. He rules and you obey. Period.

Aaron Saxton

Screamin’ Squirrels: A reminder of what we’re up against

I’d like to thank one of the Church-backed Marty h8r sites for publishing an LRH quote I haven’t read before:

“Whenever we’re really winning, the squirrels start to scream. You can tell if somebody is a squirrel. They howl or make trouble only when we’re winning.” – LRH, Signs of Success

This is a classic LRH technique to keep his people from reading criticism: Short-circuit their thinking. Someone has raised a legitimate point against Scientology? Quick, head ’em off at the pass! Tell people why they are saying what they are saying, so people won’t listen to what they are saying.

And the reasons why are always the same: Because the people doing the complaining are inherently bad, or because Scientology is doing well and they don’t like it.

This is one of the reasons why I consider LRH to be an evil genius. It’s a major barrier to protesting: We can’t get our message across because LRH conditioned his Scientologists not to hear us. It’s a very effective tactic, and LRH should be proud.

Lucky for us, though, this tactic falls apart the moment somene decides that they can think for themselves. That’s why Scientology goes to great lengths to prevent this from happening – whether its LRH warning of the dangers of entheta, or David Miscavige sending people to Scientology’s in-house prison camp, or Marty Rathbun censoring the comments that show the holes in his and LRH’s logic. (Incidentally, the aforementioned Marty h8r site also censors comments. A=A=A – a Scientologist is a Scientologist is a Scientologist.)

And that’s why we need to keep pounding out our message. Sooner or later, people realize that the truth is being hidden – hidden by Hubbard, hidden by Miscavige, hidden by Rathbun. When they’re ready to listen, those of us who are truly free will have lots for them to hear.

ML,
Caliwog

Lulz alert!

In last Saturday’s post, I talked about this video. Ready for a laugh? Fast-forward to 5:00 or so, and you’ll hear Marty speculate that when the copyrights on LRH’s books expire, non-Scientology publishers will be falling all over themselves to print them.

“There would be publishers all over the place reprinting these books and doing it on their own dime,” Marty says.

“Right. Yeah. Of course,” replies his parrot Mike Rinder.

Right, guys. I’m sure that given the success of the movie Battlefield Earth, real-world publishers will be dying to get their hands on classics like Have You Lived Before This Life.

ML,
Caliwog

On-source sleaze – and a challenge to the Indies

A couple of weeks ago, Marty Rathbun posted what he says is a leaked program outlining a Scientology operation to shudder ex-Scientologist Chuck Beatty into silence. Targets of the program include signing Beatty up to get sleazy material sent to his house and having someone befriend Beatty to find out if he has child porn on his computer, then reporting him to the police.

Marty’s flock of sheep responded with outrage — 450+ comments, many condemning the Church’s acts, and rightfully so. Obviously, if someone really is a child pornographer, jail is where they belong. But to accuse someone of being a pedophile is about as low as it gets. (I’m guessing Mr. Beatty is innocent. He gave Marty permission to post the accusations uncensored, so I doubt he has anything to hide.)

Assuming this program is genuine*, how could Church leader David Miscavige do such a thing? One could say it’s because he’s an evil little troll bent on world domination.

One could also say he was simply doing what Scientology founder L. Ron Hubbard said to do.

Here are quotes from some of the LRH policies that justify the Church’s alleged actions against Mr. Beatty (all sourced from pre-1986 tech volumes):

“These people who attack [Scientology] have secrets. And hidden crimes.” — LRH, HCO PL 18 Feb 1966, ATTACKS ON SCIENTOLOGY (Continued)

“This is the correct procedure: 1) Spot who is attacking us; 2) Start investigating them promptly for FELONIES or worse using our own professionals, not outside agencies; (…) 4) Start feeding lurid, blood, sex, crime actual evidence on the attackers to the press.”

“The way we will eventually stop all attacks from here on out is by processing the society as follows: (1) Locate a source of attack on us. (2) Investigate it. (3) Expose it with wide lurid publicity. Don’t worry about libel… select targets, investigate and expose before they attack us.” — LRH, HCO PL 25 Feb 1966, ATTACKS ON SCIENTOLOGY (Additional Pol Letter)

“When such agents act or sound very suppressive, get them investigated, find the scandal and attack… such people also have crimes in their background that can be found. Find and expose them.” — LRH, HCO PL 26 Dec 1966, ADMIN KNOW-HOW PTS SECTIONS, PERSONNEL AND EXECS

Chuch Beatty was attacking, so he must have crimes. LRH’s assignment: Investigate, find the most lurid crimes possible, and expose them. Those were LRH’s express instructions. And LRH’s “tech” must be followed to the letter.

* There are holes in the story. Biggest one: The Wayback Machine shows that a “truthaboutbeatty.org” site was ever set up. Regardless, there is no doubt that Chuck Beatty was seen by the Church as an enemy. Even if this program is not legit, it is indicative of the type of actions the Church has been known to take against its enemies.

MY CHALLENGE TO INDEPENDENT SCIENTOLOGISTS

From your comments on Marty’s blog (at least, the ones that weren’t censored), you clearly abhor the actions taken against Mr. Beatty as much as I do. Now that you have seen the LRH “tech” behind those actions:

1) Will you join me in condemning L. Ron Hubbard for writing policies that condone such evil, invasive, and mean-spirited acts?

2) In his preamble, Marty talks about reforming the Church of Scientology “by foremost following the policy of its Founder.” Will you join me in asking Marty if he includes the Founder’s policies such as those I’ve quoted above?

ML,
Caliwog

Oops! Scientologists aren’t as dumb as Hubbard thought they were

Marty Rathbun has been using the term “radical Scientology,” a phrase intended to remind people of the “radical Islam” movement responsible for so many senseless and tragic deaths around the world.

I’m sure I’m not the only one who finds this in bad taste, but we can also find it in a policy written by Scientology founder L. Ron Hubbard:

“Associating the attacking group’s activities with reprehensible groups in the past by using familiar descriptive words will be found very effective. For example, if the word “white” has been made hateful to the public by some past criminal group we use “white” in our descriptive terminology concerning the group that is attacking us and whom we are investigating. “Psychiatric blood sports” is an example, blood sports being lately very much derogated.” — LRH, HCO PL 17 Feb 1966 PUBLIC INVESTIGATION SECTION

Unfortunately, like much of Hubbard’s technology, this doesn’t necessarily work. Case in point: this entry on Marty Rathbun’s blog, with a headline that promises, “Independent vs. Radical: More differentiation.” The blog entry has a lengthy quote from an LRH lecture which basically discusses whether mankind is a product of the physical universe or the physical universe is a product of mankind. Scientology believes the latter, and the quote goes on to say that if the Scientologist and his auditor don’t both desire more freedom, auditing won’t help the Scientologist come to that realization.

The quote is an interesting concept, to be sure, but it doesn’t really do much to differentiate Marty’s brand of Scientology from the Church’s. And you can tell by the lack of comments – around sixty. Most of Marty’s posts get a couple hundred affirmations from the flock, often more. Marty won’t post comments that say “What the fuck are you talking about?”, so when less than 100 chime in, that usually means the post didn’t even make sense to the faithful. (Don’t worry, Indies; this time, the problem isn’t you.)

According to LRH technology, this blog entry should have received lots of attention, because Marty used a descriptive word that is hateful to the public in his headline. The tech is never wrong, so the problem must be Marty. Were this an organized Church activity, since the comments stat crashed, Marty would have been sent to “cramming” to find his MU – the word in LRH policy that he misunderstood.

Of course, those of us who aren’t Scientologists know this is nonsense. This is a “filler” blog entry in which Marty cuts and pastes an LRH passage (really, Marty, you couldn’t even delete the extra line breaks between paragraphs?) instead of writing something of substance. It wasn’t well thought out, the headline has little to do with the subject matter, and using the word “radical” actually widens the credibility gap. But that’s what happens when you rely solely on LRH tech.

The bottom line is that people aren’t as stupid or gullible as LRH tries to tell us they are. Even Marty’s sheep don’t always respond like sheep.

ML,
Caliwog

Tips on using the Censored by Marty section

My Censored by Marty™ section now has nearly fifty comments that Marty Rathbun won’t allow his followers to see. I have no doubt there are more. A lot more.

Some suggestions for using the section:

• If you think your comment is censorship material*, copy and paste into a Word doc and/or take a screen shot. That makes it easier to post here (and the screen shot makes for nice dox).
• Post a follow-up comment on Marty’s blog with a link to your censored comment here on the Caliwog Blog. (The date/time line has the direct comment link.) That’ll get censored too, but that way Marty knows he can’t keep the truth away from everyone.

* More on censorship material: Let’s be fair. If you post something that says “MARTY YOU’RE JUST A BIG LYING ASSHOLE,” of course it’s going to get censored. You really don’t have to try that hard. All you have to do is ask questions or point out how the Church activities about which he is complaining have been going on since before the days of DM. Best is when you can point out that DM’s actions are in accordance with LRH policy. Post anything like that, and Marty will do his best to make it disappear.

Except he can’t, because we’re here.

One thing Marty Rathbun has in common with David Miscavige and LRH: All three think/thought they could run from the truth. Let’s keep the pressure on Marty to be honest — and let’s make sure his followers know they aren’t getting the full story. Scientologists generally drop out of Scientology when they figure out the truth. I want to have the same sort of resource for Independents. They may not all want to look, but when they do, we’ll be ready.

ML,
Caliwog

The Scientology scam in sixty seconds

Scientology’s worst enemy is the truth. I love you, Angry Gay Pope.

ML,
Caliwog

The censorship continues!

I had yet another comment censored by Marty Rathbun. I added it to my Censored by Marty™ section, but I thought this particular one merited its own blog entry, because it illustrates (yet again) how Marty and the Independent movement are trying to re-write history.

I was responding to Marty’s post Gnats and Losers, in which Marty claims a Church member came to his house to harangue his wife and she chased them away. Marty says that during the years he was in the Church supporting David Miscavige:

“We also didn’t have years of virtually all Scientology resources engaging in forcible, life ruining extortion for the most OFF POLICY, OFF SOURCE, and destructive anti-Scientology programs imaginable.”

I quoted that and responded:

“Wait a second, Marty – weren’t you working for the Church when Mark Bunker had people picketing his home and giving flyers to his neighbors saying he was a religious bigot? Remember, Mark had videotape running (http://www.xenutv.com/blog/?p=594). And what about Paulette Cooper? Wasn’t LRH at the helm when that little bit of mental torture took place?

“Oh, and speaking of Mark Bunker… you guys really should always have a video camera at hand.

“I’m sure you won’t post this comment, Marty – don’t worry, I’ll run it on my site 🙂 – but good on Mosey for chasing these guys down. Despite my disagreements with you, I still think the Church’s harassment of you is despicable. You may or may not believe this, but I despite the Church just as you do, and their behavior towards you (and others) is one reason why.

“ML, Caliwog”

As I expected, my comment was censored. Apparently, inconvenient truths still count as entheta!

To be honest, I’m not 100% sure whether to believe Marty’s story, though I’m hesitant to accuse him of making this stuff up because it makes me sound like a slimy Church lackey. And we’ve all seen the creepy airport spy video posted by the Church (labeled as an anon), so we know Marty’s being followed. Still, reports of harassment against Marty’s wife always rally the troops – especially after a nonsensical post that doesn’t get many comments – and one wonders why there is no video or a shot of the guy in the first photo getting into the car. And Marty isn’t exactly known for his honesty; LRH did advise his followers that it was OK to lie (or tell an “acceptable truth”) for PR purposes. Regardless, I have no doubt that the Church has been sending people to harass Marty, Mike and their wives, and I stand by my statement that such behavior is despicable and wrong.

Remember, if you have a comment that gets Censored by Marty™ be sure to add it to our collection. And whenever you think that Scientology can be reformed by high ranking ex-members, just remember… leopards don’t change their spots.

ML,
Caliwog