Difference between revisions of "Talk:Scientology"

Revision as of 15:24, March 19, 2007

I'm new here but know some of the scientology philosophy. The article used to read:

• Scientology is a controversial religion founded by science fiction writer Lafayette Ron Hubbard, based upon his self-help program of Dianetics. Its basic teaching is that all humans suffering comes from repressed traumatic memories, sometimes dating back to previous lifetimes, and that these memories of Xenu can be 'cleared' through a lengthy (and expensive) form of church therapy. Human souls are known as "Thetans".
  I removed the "all" of "all human suffering" because a person might knowingly wish to temporarily suffer, to some degree, in a situation toward a greater good. An example of that would be a minister living in primitive conditions, for example. So "all" human suffering could not be the result of past memories. The article also said something which implied all suffering came from a particular, long past memory which isn't at all what scientology proposes. I removed that word. Also, there are several ways a person can go about the Church's "therapy" and not all of them are expensive. But buying professional auditing can be expensive. Another method is co-auditing with a partner, it is significantly less expensive. A third method is to work within the Church, in which situation auditing is often given as a bonus. Terryeo 18:27, 12 March 2007 (EDT)

Biasing a solid article

User:Vossy has edited the article to produce that Scientology is not a religion, but a cult (as the page reads). There might be rooom to discuss the topic, but there is a good deal of scholarly opinion stating that the Church of Scientology is a religion. Could we have some discussion, please, rather than boldly presenting unattributed opinion ?

Vossy also edited to produce that Dianetics is psychotherapy, i.e. based on his psychotherapy program, Dianetics. May we keep the article simple and neutral, rather than biased ? If Dianetics is to be called psychotherapy, may that be done in the aritle, Dianetics and that article doesn't exist at this moment. So can't we simply say, "Dianetics" without introducing the bias word "psychotherapy"? I'm quite sure the organization which promotes Dianetics does not present it as psychotherapy see: dianetics.org.

Vossy also created, "Dianetics was later expanded to appear more like a religion in order to gain tax benefits". This statement it is not attributed in the article. The Dianetics website does not support such a statement. In general, the statement is more a critical personal opinion than a statement of fact. I don't believe anyone could find any presentation BY Dianetics that ever said it was a religion, nor "religious - like".

Finally, Vossy modified the article to produce, "Scientology has successfully converted a number of celebrities". But both Tom Cruise and John Travolta had been active in Scientology for some long while before making public statements about Scientology. Not to hammer a point home here, but "I am a Scientologist" is a self-declare, not a decree by the Church. It is not a statement of membership nor does it declare a faith, but says, "I find Scientology to be useful in my life". Can we discuss please ? Terryeo 02:17, 17 March 2007 (EDT)

History of the word

In 1952 Ron Hubbard gave a one hour, public lecture entitled, Scientology: Milestone One. In it, he defined the word, he spelled out why he used that particular word, where he was going with the idea and defined the basis of using that word. A google map search yields 6000 + Scientology locations. None of them are connected with the use of the word prior to the Church of Scientology. So why mention the word history in a brief article? Any websearch gives millions of results, almost all are about the Church of Scientology. Any news search gives hundreds (or more) results, all of them about the Church of Scientology. So why a word history study in a brief article ?Terryeo 02:59, 17 March 2007 (EDT)

Significant changes to the article

Several of us have changed the article quiet a bit, the most controversial of these changes will involve the criticism section and the use of xenu.net, also perhaps what calling L. Ron Hubbard a science fiction writer, which he is, and maybe the use of the term religion. I also assume there are other issues that will need to be discussed so lets bring them here. Tmtoulouse 16:55, 18 March 2007 (EDT)

If you prefer, Tmtoulouse. At Conservapedia_Talk#Standards_of_Sources there has been discussion about what sources of information are appropriate to a conservapedia. The discussion is ongoing. I have proposed that Wikipedia's use of personal website as a source of information is inappropriate to a conservative wiki. A good deal of the difficulty at Wikipedia revolves around inappropriate use of reference. I hope our threshold of inclusion here is higher than Wikipedia's. The personal website referenced by recent edits is xenu.net / clambake.org. That personal website says on its front page, DISCLAIMER: I, Andreas Heldal-Lund, am alone responsible for Operation Clambake. I speak only my own personal opinions. So, you see, those references are to a single individual's presentation of his personal opinion. His personal opinions are not peer reviewed, indeed, they might be no better than a notice on a lamp post. He might be a bright critic, he might be a criminal, but one thing, he is individual. I am saying, let us remove any reference, anywhere, to personal website. If the information is good information, it will appear at other sources of information. It cheapens a document to rely upon one man's personal opinion, particularly when that one man (as Andreas Heldal-Lund has), has spent time in jail.

On March 18th, User:Conservative (sysop), User:Tmtoulouse (I am here but I am not, background in psychology and neuroscience), and User:Bturpin, made 18 edits to the article. Conservative and Tmtoulouse seem to have spontaneously found this article as a common target. Yet no talk about this article appears on any of the three user pages. The Bturpin account was recently created, that individual has engaged in only one discussion [1]. How did this seeming unity of mind spontaneously come about ? The collaberation changed the article from [2] (a brief, 13 sentence, two reference links to offical sites), to [3], (a 16 sentence article with 7 referenced links and 2 exterior links). The exterior links (frightening links from years ago that tell how bad scientology is) are presented first so the reader knows what he is getting into and can escape if he wants to. The 7 referencing links point to 3 official sites for the religion (just in case anyone wanted to know anything about the religion). The 4 remaining references are to:

• A CBS story titled "The Sinking of Islam" (but misreprestened by the link element to substantiate, "unfavorable opinions of Scientology are widespread".
• A link proposing there might be some question that Scientology is:
  • Christian in disguise (no Scientology site would ever suggest that, many Scientology links specifially address that and say no).
  • A cult -- this issue is worth discussing because it is an opinion. But the reason for the link is to substantiate (again) "unfavorable opinions of Scientology are widespread" which that link does a very poor job of because it introduces the brand new tidbit of information "Scientology might be Christian". Why introduce that tidbit when Scientology itself says "NO, we're not Christian" and any scholar you are likely to find says "No, Scientology is not Christian"
• A link to a personal website, xenu.net to substantiate and reference that Scientology has been accused (by whom a reader might wonder).
• Another link to the same personal website, xenu.net, to substantiate and reference a myth about alien souls.

I would like this article to present what Conservapedia proposes every article within it present. That is, a clear and easy to understand, brief introduction. Let us not indoctrinate our readers with our own personal points of view, nor hammer them with personal opinion from personal websites. Let us give our readers a foundation they can be certain of. In such a wise our readers can drop a subject, or not, confident they know something about it. Terryeo 19:16, 18 March 2007 (EDT)

The reason it was a common target is because there are very few edits really on this site, so when an edit occurs those of us that patrol the recent changes all collapse on it. No conspiracy or anything, just a function of the current conditions of this site. What information in the current article specifically do you want to see changed? Lets start there. Tmtoulouse 19:19, 18 March 2007 (EDT)

Thank you for the reply. Rather that say a particular information, could we instead address the issue of attribution? Because, if we address attribution the question of "what information" becomes moot, becomes nil and unimportant. The two attributions to xenu.net present information. Rather than say, "hey, what sense does that make", I stated that xenu.net is a personal website, a personal opinion by of one person. Rather than say "let's talk about this information", can we instead get good, substantial attributions ? The reason I say this is because if we do then we will have good information. And if we don't, we'll have personal opinion (one person on a planet of 6.5 billion). I believe what will happen is the "bad" information will be gone if personal websites are not used to support "bad" information. Terryeo 22:08, 18 March 2007 (EDT)

Okay, no more xenu.net so all is copasetic? Tmtoulouse 22:30, 18 March 2007 (EDT)

If information is attributed and referenced, and if those attributions do not point to personal websites, then why would I object? My intention is toward presenting good information in those areas that I know about. By "good", I mean information that a person can have confidence in. Terryeo 23:01, 18 March 2007 (EDT)

K. Spaink, too, [4] is a personal website. The thing is, an individual person has no responsibility for good information. They might post, "the moon is made of green cheese". In that link Spaink explains her point of view and combines it with other opinion and what do we have? Good information, or very biased personal opinion ? Terryeo 23:06, 18 March 2007 (EDT)

Quotes directly from primary sources and other secondary sources. Seems perfectly reliable to me. Tmtoulouse 23:16, 18 March 2007 (EDT)

I removed the link to that personal website and the information it referenced to. One personal website link might be of slightly better quality than another personal website link, One posting on a light pole slightly better than a second posting on a light pole. But neither are much good. Why do you argue for conservapedia and present yourself in one way on Wikipedia, but add in "evil" here on your userpage, and take issue with personal websites here, Tmtoulouse? Terryeo 01:17, 19 March 2007 (EDT)

None of the issues related to me matter at all. I see nothing wrong with the source, as things stand its an acceptable source for conservapedia. Your welcome to ask for admin comment on this. Until then the sourced claim should stay. Tmtoulouse 01:23, 19 March 2007 (EDT)

General points to be made:

• Scientology is a religion. It may be a cult, but it is certainly classified as a religion, in that they believe in the supernatural (Thetans, for example)
• It would be hypocritical not to use xenu.com as some sort of reference. We use CSM, and all sorts of Christian websites when referring to Christianity. It may not be appropriate in some places, but in others, it can reveal the Dogma, the "Kosher" view of Scientology, if you will. As we know, the basis for inclusion is verifiability, not truth (though ideally it is truthful, though Scientology isn't the true religion according to most contributors).
• Whats great about Scientology is, it hasn't splintered off into different branches (like Protestants, Catholics, Baptists, Easern Orthodox, etc.). So if you find a source, chances are it represents the view of all the Scientologists.

Just some general stuff. --Hojimachong^talk 01:45, 19 March 2007 (EDT)

I attempted to merge some of terryeo's edits into the article. Tmtoulouse 02:32, 19 March 2007 (EDT)

We seem to have arrived at a reasonable first and second paragraphs. It has taken some effort :) It is my understanding, however, that Karin Splink's (I write therefore I am) site should not be linked to for the reason that her site presents stolen documents. I don't know all there is to know about the situation, but I have read the documents can not be posted anywhere BUT The Netherland where her site is hosted. In fact, that is the reason her Netherland site carries them. We might be getting ourselves into a legal situation (again, I don't know all there is to know about it) if we link to her site in that manner. Terryeo 03:12, 19 March 2007 (EDT)

I don't see how linking can be a copy right violation, all the information in the article is derived from information that is pretty much with in the public commons. Xenu is probably the most recognized element of the Church of Scientology's teachings. Tmtoulouse 03:18, 19 March 2007 (EDT)

I'm not able to say what public opinion is. I can say that of the thousands of Scientologists and many staff members I have talked with, we have never thought of talking about that. And, I can say that I have never met that "teaching" in any Scientology Church or Mission I have entered. And I can safely say that it is not present in any of the published (to the public) works I own. (I searched) And I own about 95 % of the millions of words the Church has published. But, online, everyone screams bloody murder about it. While, in real life, no scientologist has heard about it. When did that myth supposedly happen? 75 years ago? 75 hundred thousand years ago? 75 MILLION years ago? Terryeo 04:59, 19 March 2007 (EDT)

Its undeniably part of the church's doctrine, the church has said so in various lawsuits. It maybe not an important part anymore but it is certainly linked very closely in the public's mind with Scientology. Have you ever hung around one of Scientology's recruiting tents at a college university? About 1/5 of the people that show up for their "free stress test" will make a snickering remark about Xenu. Its often yelled out by passing pedestrians. I have seen this phenomenon in multiple locations. So I think it meets any criteria we can set for inclusion in the article. Tmtoulouse 11:10, 19 March 2007 (EDT)

From what I recall during my days over to a-r-s Xenu was OT-III material, revealed only after the mark has (donated) spent thousands of dollars. It was in evidence during a trial of one guy named "Fischmann". Sometime between the occurrence of the trial and CoS's attorneys asking the documents be sealed, an enterprising person copied them and distributed them far and wide. Once the order to seal was set ALL these copies were illegal but somehow they managed to get onto the internet. The upshot is that though Xenu is widely known the actual documents are still copyrighted and not allowed to be seen in toto. But, as Groucho Marx pointed out "inside a dog, it's too dar to read. Cracker^talk 11:22, 19 March 2007 (EDT)