[religious brainwash] Lets Sell These People a Piece of Blue Sky Hubbard, Dianetics and Scientology #3/195

I would keep asking questions until they showed genuine emotion about some aspect of their life. Then I was supposed to “bring them to understanding” by letting them know that whatever their problem was, there was a Scientology course that dealt with it. “You’re frightened of dying? Scientology has a course that can help you!” “Oh, yes, Scientology can help you with your asthma!” I was told to say these things, and I believed what I was saying. The course which would help their problem, from obesity to pre-menstrual tension, was always the “Communication Course.”

I would take an interested person to the Mission, and hand them over to a “Registrar” to be given a lengthy Scientology personality test, or a free introductory lecture. I took many strangers into the Mission, and most of my friends. Several started courses, though most drifted away without finishing.

The yellow walls of the Mission were covered with small notices, newspaper clippings about Scientology “wins,” testimonials (“Success Stories”), and Hubbard quotes: “Scientology leads to success in any walk of life,” for instance. The Mission consisted of a course room, an office, a tiny kitchen, a lavatory, and two counseling rooms. The course room could hold about 30 people, but most of the time only a few students were present. The receptionist doubled as a Course Supervisor. In the evenings seasoned Scientologists would arrive to take more advanced courses. Among these were a bank manager and his wife, who held a senior position with the county Health Authority. I also did drills with the managing director of an engraving business, and with an active Quaker.

They were all very encouraging about the benefits they felt they had experienced because of Scientology.

I expected to take a short course in Dianetics, and then start shifting my engrams around. This was not to be. In the quarter century since the publication of “Dianetics: The Modern Science of Mental Health,” Hubbard had allegedly conducted a great deal of research, and the original procedure was now outmoded. A rigidly defined series of steps constituted the Scientology “Bridge.” It was possible to receive counseling for a fee, or to train as a counselor and co-counsel with another student for free. There were several courses involved, but before Mission staff would even discuss the cost, they insisted that I do the Communication, or “Comm,” Course.

The Comm Course is the beginning of most Scientology careers. Hubbard claimed to have been the first person to scientifically dissect communication. The Comm Course drills are called Training Routines, or TRs.⁶

The first two TRs are similar to meditation. They are supposed to help you focus your attention on the person you are talking to. Two people sit facing each other, without speaking or moving. In the first drill (OT TR-0) they sit with their eyes closed, in the second (TR-0) open and staring at one another. These drills are often done for hours without pause, and form part of most Scientology courses. As with meditation, I hallucinated while doing the open-eyed TR-0. My coach explained vaguely that people who had taken drugs often found this. In fact, hallucination is not unusual for anyone who stares fixedly for long enough, but I did not realize this, and was genuinely concerned.

The next step is “TR-0 Bullbait.” One student baits the other, verbally and through gestures, trying to disturb the recipient’s motionless composure. If the student moves, laughs, speaks, or even blinks excessively, the coach “flunks” him. It is presumed that something the coach said or did provoked the reaction, so the drill is restarted, and the coach tries to repeat the earlier stimulus exactly. This is done until there is no reaction from the student.

I was first “bullbaited” by a dour, middle-aged house painter who had little time for a young hippy. In “bullbaiting,” the coach can do anything save leave his chair; so he sat and insulted me, told obscene jokes, and pulled faces until I stopped responding. The idea is to find “buttons” which when pushed force an immediate reaction and, through drilling, to overcome these reactions, allowing a more considered response to real-life stimuli. His main approach was to insist that because I had long hair I must be a homosexual. It took about two hours before I attained immobility in the face of this onslaught. I felt a tremendous sense of accomplishment.

The next Training Routine, TR-1, is supposed to teach the student to speak audibly and coherently, and to teach him to ask written questions in a natural way. In TR-1, the student reads lines at random from Lewis Carroll’s “Alice in Wonderland”; he “makes the line his own,” and then repeats it to the coach.