Critical Q&A

This week, it’s answers about Miscavige’s shredding, what the Hubbard Management System is all about, street epistemology vs cult exit counselling and a lot more. Enjoy!

(1) As we know, during the Masterson trial there must have been numerous shredding parties at Scientology headquarters and lawyer offices. What are your thoughts on all the recordings of pc sessions? Do you think Miscavidge would ever go all “Keith Raniere” and start recording meetings and everything for posterity? Would they be deleting lawyer videos etc? Letters and emails and files are important but videos can be serious smoking guns too. Just something I thought was interesting, all the digital medias.

(2) Just started viewing your channel. I work with a firm that is using the Hubbard Management System (HMS) and many of my colleagues are Scientologists. I am not nor do I care to be but I believe in the purposes of the organization; given your experience am I going to be a target of being recruited to Scientology. Is using this HMS a negative issue in your mind and is it “veiled Scientology doctrine”?

(3) Have you ever had the chance to read any of LRH’s non-Scientology materials from back when he was still a writer, and if so, what did you think? From what clips you’ve shown on your shows, he seems to have some good ideas (as far as fiction goes) as well as a special talent for worldbuilding, but in my mind is in desperate need of an editor. I’ve given the book “Ole Doc Methuselah” a read, and while I certainly liked it as a pulp sci-fi, I think that Hubbard played a bit fast and loose with his own rules, and was no stranger to the occasional Deus Ex Machina.

(4) Do you see street epistemology as a substitute for cult exit counseling? Are the two techniques equivalent? I’ve been thinking about this for some time now. There is obviously some overlap in that both methods involve questions to stimulate critical thinking about fervent belief. But there are some fundamental, if subtle, distinctions. As I understand it, cult exit counseling has a basis in psychotherapy, while street epistemology is more grounded in philosophy. Some cult exit counselors have raised concerns that street epistemology is not therapeutic, especially when applied to a victim of traumatic abuse like most ex-cult members. I’d like to know what you think.

(5) I wanted to see if you have any knowledge of the “line charge” phenomenon that can happen in auditing. I remember when I was about 12, my dad was getting auditing at Flag and was so “blown out” that he was unable to stop laughing for days! At the time my mom said it was normal, but I felt a little freaked out that my dad was having a phone conversation with me and yet he couldn’t stop laughing for more than a few seconds at a time — and now I think my reaction was more appropriate than I realized at the time. I was wondering what was the actual psychological phenomena behind someone laughing like that? 

(6) I wanted to ask you a question about the OT levels.  Given LRH’s obsession with the number 8 (the infinity symbol as a sideways 8), and the lack of materials for levels above OT8, would any Scientologist make a connection that OT8 should be the final (and ultimate) OT level, and therefore there should not be any levels above it?