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How Scientology works

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Matt Smith:

Welcome to La Trobe University podcast. I'd be your host, Matt Smith and a few years ago, I was walking in the CBD of Sydney when I was approached by two people who said that they wanted to measure my stress levels and tell me about something called Dianetics.

They seemed friendly about it and they also had some science fiction books on their title, which appealed to the geek in me. I didn't take them up on their offer and I was later to find out that they were from a church called Scientology.

Now, Dr. Rod Blackhirst of the School of Religious and Spiritual Studies at La Trobe University has been studying religions and cults for nearly 20 years, and he would probably better interpret my experience.

Rod Blackhirst:

You came across a spruiker for the Church of Scientology. What they usually do is exactly that. They approach people on the street. They offer you a free test testing your stress levels or personality test. And if, as it usually happens, the results come telling you that you're a seriously disturbed individual, they'll then offer you a cure, namely the products offered by the Church of Scientology.

The system that they offer is called Dianetics. It's a system of graded personality self-help types of programs that you pay for and that of the official teachings of that church.

Matt Smith:

Now, none of this sounds like a religion though. Where does the term religion come into it? How are they defining themselves?

Rod Blackhirst:

Yes, that I guess is the controversial aspect of this. In practice, Scientology looks a lot like a system of psychology or self-help, self-development programs but it's packaged as a religion. And according to some people, at least, this is sort of a cynical move on the part of Scientologists to effectively get themselves religion status, which means tax-exempt status and so on.

According to some people, the critics of Scientology and there are many critics of Scientology, what they are doing is effectively running a corporation or a business, but they are packaging themselves as a religion, and that's the controversial aspect.

The question is, are they a religion or not. In some parts of the world, they're regarded officially as a religion and in other parts, not.

Matt Smith:

Well, they were declared a religion in Australia in 1983, is that right? They're exempted as religion here.

Rod Blackhirst:

Yes, that's right.

Matt Smith:

So, what do Scientologists believe in cause I see them being religion. They have to have a belief system.

Rod Blackhirst:

They do. They have a complex belief system that, again, the critics of Scientology say it's somewhat bizarre in a free country like this, it's not illegal to believe in strange or wonderful things. But scientologists believe that essentially you have an inner being, if you like, called a thetan which is obscured by all the draws of many lives and the complexities of living and that one has to clear oneself of all of that draws in order to be fully oneself. Basically, that's what it demands to. Beyond that, they have what you might regard as a science fiction belief in the earth being settled by extraterrestrial beings and so on.

Matt Smith:

Does Scientology have church services?

Rod Blackhirst:

They do, but it's sort of like a technological version of confession, if you like. Catholics go to confession where you sit with the priests and then you clear your conscience with the priest.

What happens in Scientology is that you sit and attach yourself or hold in your hands a gadget called an e-meter, then they'd take you through a series of questions, and then they judge your responses according to what the ratings on the e-meter.

Scientists will tell you that there's nothing really in the e-meter; that it's bogus science. But that's effectively what happens in Scientology. It's a bit like psychoanalysis in some ways.

Matt Smith:

Now, where did L. Ron Hubbard science fiction come into it? He founded the religion, didn't he?

Rod Blackhirst:

He did. He was first off a science fiction writer, L. Ron Hubbard, and the story is that at a certain point, he decided that the stories he was writing were not in fact just figments of his imagination though and not just fictional accounts, but rather that he was, if you like, channelling information from previous lives and from extraterrestrials. He therefore repackaged his science fiction as the official doctrines of what became the Scientology religion.

Matt Smith:

In your view, is it a religion or is it a cult?

Rod Blackhirst:

Sometimes, it certainly behaves like a cult and it's not a question about the beliefs of Scientology, it's about the practices of the organization. And the way that the organization goes about, its business and that's really what attracts criticism and why some people regard it as a cult rather than as a religion. As I said, lots of people believe all sorts of strange things and all sorts of things that other people might regard as bizarre. That's not the issue. The issue is not that Scientologists have a strange belief system. The issue is the way that the organization goes about its business.

A number of people, who have been Scientologists being invoked in the church, have been very unhappy about the way that they've treated. They've been unhappy about the financial treatment of them. They feel that they've been ripped off by the church and people that want to criticize the church are often subject to bullying and legal harassment. That's really what attracts the criticism of the church.

Otherwise, it behaves like a religion like any other, a minority religion, if you like. But some of its behaviour attracts the criticism that's effectively a cult.

Matt Smith:

In the mail last week and this happened by coincidence, I didn't time it or anything like that. I got this notice in the mail asking me, "Are you curious about yourself?" and contained within, and I believed they're from Scientology; they've got the website address. Its 200 questions asking me about myself, "Is my facial expression very rather than set?" is question 110. "Do I ever get ill at ease in disordered surroundings?" That's the question number 142. "Do you turn down responsibility because you doubt your fitness to cope?" is question 107th and this question is about suicide.

Rod Blackhirst:

Yes, a very probing sort of questions. Yes.

Matt Smith:

Yes but what are they doing with that sort of information?

Rod Blackhirst:

And some of the questions don't seem impertinent. Some of the questions seem strange or irrelevant.

Rod Blackhirst:

They're fishing for certain answers, I guess. And what people report from these things, these are often unsolicited; they just present it to in the mail or on the street. The way it works is that they're fishing for certain responses so that they're in the position to tell you have problems. That you have personality problems or psychological problems and that they have the answer to the problems. Step one is to convince you that you need their product; step two is to sell it to you.

Matt Smith:

I assume that they'd be able to infer certain things like, "If I filled out the entire questionnaire, that obviously means that I'm ripe in mind and willing to maybe listen to something like that, if I answered "yes" to a certain amount of questions, then that's something else that they can tell me. It's almost like its profiling.

Rod Blackhirst:

It's profiling, that's right.

Matt Smith:

And it feels a little bit scam-ish, as well. A part of me struggles to see how this falls under religion.

Rod Blackhirst:

That's right. If you filled in these answer, it would provide them with a profile of you and would give them insights into your personality.

And, again, critics of Scientology said that that information can then be used against you, or used to manipulate you, or used to exploit you. I don't think that that always happens, but I think there's enough evidence that there are cases where that does happen.

And one of the reasons why Scientology attracts a lot of odium and attracts a lot of criticism is because it is setting itself up in competition with the mainstream psychology industry; psychology and psychiatry of which Scientology is very critical and of course, people working in psychology and psychiatry in turn are very critical of Scientology.

Scientology claims to present a new deal for people who have psychological or psychiatric problems. People that can't get real help from mainstream psychology or psychiatry, Scientology claims to offer them an alternative system.

Matt Smith:

To anybody who got that sort of thing in the mail or who approached on the streets, would you advice them against?

Rod Blackhirst:

Lots of people fill these out and lots of people don't have any problems with it. It's a quiz and it can be fun. It can be interesting to see how they're going to respond and so on. The main thing I would advise people against is putting out any money.

I have met people who claimed that they've been helped by Scientology, but then I always think that they're more likely to offer a saved as much helped if they'd done a cheap course in yoga, or a relaxation, or something like that.

This is the thing about Scientology. Unlike other religions, you go to your local church or a mosque or a synagogue or anything like that, what they're offering you is cure for yourself for free. Effectively, they might ask for a donation or put some money in the plates but they're not offering you a series of expensive courses.

And that's what Scientology does. Step one is to convince you that you need this help and step two is to enlist you into what a very expensive courses. That's the real issue. If they're offering those courses for free, I don't think they'd be nearly as much problems with it.

Matt Smith:

Without the trappings of being a religion, do you think it would operate as a successful business?

Rod Blackhirst:

Critics of Scientology say, and I think that that's fair enough, to think of Scientology essentially as a corporation, as a multi-national corporation that has a finger in lots of different things and religion is really one of its products. It's really on one of things that it does; it's most notorious for that.

But it's a very wealthy organization, very prosperous and religion is just one of the things that it does. To some degree, some of the things that it does are very laudable; some of the things, it does a charitable work and so on and all of that is good.

The issue is the religion side of it. I'd feel much more comfortable if it wasn't regarded as a religion. I think it's a system of self-help or a system of psychology, not a religion per say but in some jurisdictions it is officially a religion. It has all the benefits that come with being a religion. I think it's a system of psychology and it should be assessed as such, and judged according to how effective it is on those grounds, I think.

Matt Smith:

That's all the time we have for the La Trobe University podcast. If you have any questions, comments or feedback about this podcast or any other, you can send us an email at podcast@latrobe.adu.au. Dr. Rod Blackhirst, thanks for your time today.

Rod Blackhirst:

OK.