From: Kim Baker Newsgroups: alt.religion.scientology Subject: MY STORY: PART 1 Date: Fri, 18 Nov 1994 06:31:12 GMT THE FIRST CONTACT: My ex and I met shortly before President Mandela was released. It was a time of much change and turbulence in the country. For the first time, ever, I felt free to pursue a personal life. When we met, he told me about Scientology - the spiritual side, nothing about the "Organisation". To cut a long story short, we fell in love and married. I went into Cape Town Org with him to find out more about Scientology. The person I was to see was wearing what looked like a navy uniform. I thought this was a bit odd at the time, but remembered that the Salvation Army also wear uniforms. I shall refer to him only as "G". He started off by talking to me about my life, what I thought about spirituality, etc. Did I think help was possible? Did I think I could be helped in any way? At the time, I had to say frankly, no - I felt in pretty good shape, but I did want to learn more. The conversation continued: G: "All right. Do you feel it is possible to give help?" I laughed. "Yes, absolutely. In fact I would like to improve my ability to help others." "That's great!" he replied, and beamed at me. Then he said, "How do you feel about control?" "Hmm," I replied, if you're talking about the kind of control our government uses, then I think it is bad." "Well, OK. How about if I told you to pick up that book over there and pass it to me?" "Do you want me to do that?" "Yes." I picked up the book and gave it to him. He looked at me earnestly. "Now was that so bad?" "Was what so bad?" "I just excersized a form of control over you." "Oh. Well, no, that was fine, " I replied. "Excellent! Now, have you noticed in your life that if you do something you feel bad about, you tend to do more bad things after that?" "Hmmmm," I pondered this for a while. "OK", he said, " Give me an example - tell me something that you did wrong in your life." I became uncomfortable for a bit, and then said "Ummm, I ducked out of University for a while and hitch-hiked around the country with this guy, and we did drugs." "Very good! Now what happened after that?" "Umm, well I had to lie about where I had been to several people". "Exactly! Now do you see how that one bad act led to more?" I nodded, feeling a sense of relief, and an odd "rush". G then got down to business: "well, I can see that you are MUCH more aware than the average person that walks in off the street here - willing to talk, no comm lag (time taken to receive and answer a communication). You are VERY up-stat (able), and A to B (able to look at things directly). How would you like to help, REALLY help, in one of the greatest purposes on this planet?" I became stirred, excited. "I would - what would I have to do?" "Join staff, here -join our group, and help to free mankind!!" It sounded great, so I agreed. I signed a contract to join Foundation Staff. (I had a day job, so could not work there during the day). The hours were 7.00 pm to 10.00 pm, Monday to Friday, and 9.00am till 6.00 pm, Saturdays and Sundays. This was a bit much for me, newly married and all, but my ex was delighted. I'm going to stop at this point, and look at what lay underneath the above interview. THE HIDDEN AGENDA: What I did not know at the time was that G was a veteran Sea Org member, down in Cape Town on a mission to recruit staff for Cape Town Org. He had to achieve his "stat" (number of staff members recruited) by Thursday, 2.00 pm. The interview took place on Wednesday night. He had also been drilled thoroughly on a standard technique of how to interest people in Scientology. Here is the drill: 1. By two-way comm get the person to admit that help is possible. 2. By a little direction of his converation or motions, or by two-way comm on good or bad control, make the person see that control is not always horrible. 3. By showing the person that overts (bad acts) lead to more overts, get the person to mention some of his or her own overts. This brings about a raised willingness to talk to you. 4. Close the person (to buy the book, the course, or in this case, sign a staff contract.) I fell for it, hook, line and sinker. I thought we were just having a conversation, and did not realise that I had just had my first piece of " tech" applied to me. WHY I WAS VULNERABLE TO IT: Chris Schafmeister referred in another post to the exploitation of weakness by FSMs. This is the type of thing that can make an unaware person vulnerable: 1. I genuinely had a desire to help people. 2. I felt flattered by the attention and interest I received. 3. I wanted to impress my ex. 4. Deep down, I was bored with life, missing the old "edge" from days gone by, and needed excitement. 5. I was (and still am) aware of a spiritual reality, had explored many other religions, but had not found any one of them to "be for me". 6. I have never been a "high profile" person - my political activities were always in the backgound, strategic. G made me feel important. 7. I agreed - let's get this straight - no-one forced me - yes, I was manipulated, but I am the one who agreed into it. 8. Even deeper down, I liked the APPROVAL I received - I was more insecure at the time than I had thought, and needed the approval of others. QUESTIONS: This raises some very interesting philosophical questions. Scientology is not alone in using a technique designed to bring a person round to their way of thinking - governments do it, sales people do it, advertisers do it. What, however of the ETHICS of doing this? The old "ends justifies the means" adage. To what extent is it justified to manipulate a person mentally? WHO is to say what "cause" is correct, or the best for humanity? Invariably it is a few people who have decided this. What individual, or group ever has enough data, enough facts to hand to make such a decision? In view of the fact that this is a constantly changing universe, how can a group determine that ONE paradigm of thought is THE answer, for ever more? That's the start of my story. As I examine and review the process of assimilation into Scientology, I will share what I think may be of interest. The very personal parts will be omitted, but I am striving to be honest about MY share of responsibility in this saga. I went into it as an adult, reasonably intelligent, but yet naive in many other ways, and with personal weaknesses that made me susceptible to it. It is these personal weaknesses that I am examining ruthlessly - Joe and Flemming's posts on "Rules on being human" spring to mind - "you will repeat a lesson until you learn it." *shudders*. I don't want to repeat THIS lesson, thank you very much! More to follow in a few days......... Kim Baker Able to think again.