Cults

Scientology Is Weirder Than You Think

I always knew Scientology was a little nutty — it had to be with so many Hollywood types involved.  But the Scientology Sea Organization is the caramel nut frosting on the macadamia-walnut cake. According to the official Scientology website, L. Ron Hubbard appointed himself commodore and organized his own private navy back in 1967.  It’s now mostly land-based, but no less bizarre for that. Members wear naval uniforms, are given ranks, and ”live communally with housing, meals, uniforms, medical and dental care provided by the Church.”

Again, according to the official website: “The first Sea Org members formulated a one-billion-year pledge to symbolize their commitment to the religion as immortal spiritual beings. It is signed by all members today.”

The more you study the Scientology Sea Org, the creepier they get.   

 Read on after the break.

Ex-Scientologists have put together a fantastic website devoted to exposing the Scientology cult. Here’s what they have to say about the Sea Org:

• Sea Org members are not permitted to have children while working for the organization. Couples who get pregnant are either pressured to abort the baby, or they must leave.

• Anyone who leaves the Sea Org without permission is declared a Suppressive Person by the Church of Scientology, and is ostracized from family, friends, and loved ones.

• Sea Org members are denied proper medical care. They are not provided health insurance, are not given sick days, and the Sea Org will not purchase their medicine for them. . . Sickness is also treated as the fault of the sick person, because Scientologists believe that the only reason someone gets sick is that they are connected to a Suppressive Person.

• Sea Org members do not have their own phone numbers (unless they are allowed a cell phone), may not watch TV, are not allowed to own a personal computer with internet connections. . .

• Letters that Sea Org members write to their families, and letters that they receive from the outside, are screened by Sea Org censors for “entheta”

• If a Sea Org member commits a punishable offense, they are sent to the RPF, or Rehabilitation Project Force, which is a sort of boot camp for “bad” Sea Org members. People on the RPF may only eat the food left over after the other SO members have eaten, may not speak to a Sea Org member unless spoken to. . .

Here’s a website with personal testimony of coerced abortions among Scientology’s Sea Org.

Check out this recruiting poster from the Sea Org. The few, the proud, the credulous.

Here’s a good resource for those interested in the human rights abuses of Scientology. Lots of personal testimony, including some video interviews with ex-Scientologists, as well as reports of deaths, psychological and physical abuse within the cult.