BEWARE THE DIANETICS BAIT-AND-SWITCH FRAUD!!

Scientology has been described as a "Bait-and-Switch" fraud. This has a definite meaning in US law. It describes a fraud where a person is seemingly sold one thing only to find out that it is another and more expensive thing and so they pay more than they would have paid had they known what it was all about. Scientology is the definitive example of this. It starts out with Dianetics, a supposed science of the mind that will greatly improve a person's thinking and health at a seemingly reasonable cost. People are attracted and begin working to achieve the "State of Clear." When they achieve that, they're then told that they are "at risk" and must move at all speed to the more advanced level of OT III, parting with thousands of dollars all the while. When they reach OT III a great secret is told them. That is that they are full of the souls of space aliens murdered 75 million years ago and to achieve spiritual benefits they must pay to have them removed. The processing at this level costs $400 per hour. The whole of the Scientology "religion" is a continuous bait-and-switch fraud with the whole purpose of extracting the maximum amount of money from people.

Bait and Switch: how it works

The main premise of Dianetics is Hubbard's "discovery" of the "reactive mind." The following is from Dianetics' own website:

"Ron Hubbard discovered that the mind has two very distinct parts. One of these that part which one consciously uses and is aware of is called the analytical mind.This is the portion of the mind which thinks, observes data, remembers it and resolves problems. It has standard memory banks which contain mental image pictures, and uses the data in these banks to make decisions that promote survival.

However, two things appear to be but are not recorded in the standard banks: painful emotion and physical pain. In moments of intense pain, the action of the analytical mind is suspended and the second part of the mind, the reactive mind, takes over."

The object of Dianetics is to free you from your reactive mind. Once the practitioner realizes that "I mock up my reactive mind," he attains the state of Clear. As you can clearly see, Dianetics presents the reactive mind as a genuine factor in your mental makeup.

By realizing that the reactive mind is merely a figment of your imagination, you may continue on to the next level.

From the Dianetics website:

"Clear is a state that has never before been attainable in man's history. A Clear possesses attributes, fundamental and inherent but not always available in an uncleared state, which have not been suspected of man and are not included in past discussions of his abilities and behavior."

"The Clear enjoys living to a very full extent. He can stand up to situations which, before he was cleared, would have reduced him to shambles. The ability to live well and fully and enjoy that living is the gift of Clear."

"Clearing someone is erasing his reactive mind. All the misery man experiences is contained in the reactive mind."

This is the bait. Reaching the state of Clear is represented as being the solution to all your problems. But, wait...here comes the switch!

Having learned that your reactive mind is just a product of your imagination, you are then urgently pushed to the real moneymaker for Scientology...the Operating Thetan levels. Here's their definition of OT;

"It is called, in Scientology, Operating Thetan. The definition of the state of Operating Thetan is knowing and willing cause over life, thought, matter, energy, space and time."

Being "cause" is defined as being in control of. Here, they are offering you ultimate control over mass, energy, space and time, also referred to as MEST. You, too, can achieve this exalted level, for about $400,000!

Tom Cruise, John Travolta, and Greta von Sustern are all Operating Thetans. If they can control the physical universe, you must wonder why Tom Cruise wears braces on his teeth, and why Greta von Sustern recently underwent cosmetic surgery on her eyelids. Can't they use their OT powers to correct crooked teeth and drooping lids? Shouldn't John Travolta be able to handle that little weight problem with Scientology?

But wait... didn't they claim that achieving the State of Clear would make all your problems disappear?

That's the switch! For, in the OT levels, you learn that the source of all your problems wasn't your reactive mind at all! You're actually infested with the spirits of dead space aliens called Body Thetans. Only Scientology can help you remove them, for a price!

Dianetics Cures Disease?

This is from Dianetics' own website. The claims of cures are fraudulent, unfortunately, true believers are likely to forgo legitimate medical treatment in favor of this quack therapy.

http://dianetics.lronhubbard.org/page67.htm "Tested on a series of 270 unselected cases, the new science produced 270 rehabilitated people, people who had been suffering, in the field of psychosomatic medicine, from arthritis, asthma, coronary difficulty, allergy, sinusitis, migraine headaches and many others, and on the mental side, from psychoses, neuroses, compulsions and repressions."

But wait, there's more! In a recent account of a protest against Dianetics' false medical claims, ex-Scientologist Gerry Armstrong wrote, "We took with us Hubbard's Bulletin of 24 April 1969RA, revised 20 September 1978, entitled "Dianetic Use," which is very useful for demonstrating some of the fraudulent claims the cult makes for Dianetics. This issue is still published by Scientology in the bound "Technical Bulletins" so the cult cannot legally argue that they don't make these claims anymore. Included in them is the always risible, but nevertheless criminal, claim that Dianetic auditing raises IQ about a point per hour. These are the excerpts we used to show that Dianetics, which the Scientologists were promoting, is practicing medicine and a fraud:

[Quote] The basic use of Dianetics is to make a well body and to augment physical treatment.

Any injurious experience can be erased by Dianetics. It is very easy to use and if one wants people well and happy it should be used at every occasion.

Recovery from disease under treatment is speeded by Dianetic auditing. Where the incident of the break is, with any chain, run out, a broken limb will heal (by x-ray evidence) in two instead of six weeks.

Chronic, which is to say, long-term illnesses cease when audited by Dianetics and then medical treatment which was earlier ineffective.

Whole classes of "mentally retarded" children have been made more normal by teachers in London County Council schools using relatively unskilled Dianetics.

Tiredness, unwanted sensations, bizarre pains and aches, bad hearing or sight also routinely respond to Dianetic processing.

The sickness and death rate of persons who are part of Dianetic groups is only a small fraction of that of other groups.

Pilots audited with Dianetics, by a test involving a whole squadron, went without a single even minor accident for the following year.

Scientists audited with Dianetics have greatly improved intelligence.

Dianetics raises IQ as a side product to usual auditing, at a rate of about one point of IQ per hour of processing.

Withered limbs, skin blotches and rashes and even blindness and deafness have all responded to Dianetics.

Possibly the point which counted most against Dianetics in the early attacks on it was that it did a vast array of things. The truth was, it actually did them. When you have the answer to the human mind as in Dianetics, of course anything caused by the mind can be remedied.

[End Quote]

This is just the tip of the iceberg where Scientology is concerned. Here a couple of other lies:

NARCONON: A Scientology front group targetting drug addicts "The Narconon® Program has a 76% Graduate Success Rate backed by our solid guarantee that if any graduate of our program relapses within six months of graduation we will readmit them at no cost!" --from http://www.drugrehab.net/ See www.narconon-exposed.org for a contrasting viewpoint.

L. Ron Hubbard was a war hero who cured himself with Dianetics techniques after being wounded in World War II. See www.ronthewarhero.org for a well-researched version of his military career based on his Navy records. Hubbard's name has been included on websites which expose phony war heros and veterans.

Dianetics is a gateway to Scientology. The auditing you undergo in Dianetics collects information which is saved to be used against you, should you ever become a problem for the group. There are many cases of peoples' deepest secrets, divulged under a Scientology "guarantee" of confidentiality, being broadcast by the organization to discredit and smear their reputations. Spend a week reading www.xenu.net. It really is worse than you can imagine!

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