I have to admit i am not well informed about Scientology. Why do so many people think it is bad???

Question

i am curious. that doesnt mean i am interested in scientology, i just want to know why people think of it badly.

Answer 1

I can show you EXACTLY why people fear and hate Scientology. Though this list is far from extensive, it will show you that Scientology is responsible for an illegal plot to infiltrate the government, brainwashing techniques, mind control camps, attacks on critics, and DEATHS caused by Scientology doctrine and members:

• Operation Snow White – Under this official program, Scientology operatives committed infiltration, wiretapping, & theft of documents in government offices. This program constituted the single largest infiltration of the United States government in history. Among the 11 prominent Scientologists convicted of this conspiracy was Mary Sue Hubbard, the wife of Scientology’s “prophet”.
http://lisatrust.freewinds.cx/scientology/snow-white/index.html
http://en.allexperts.com/e/o/op/operation_snow_white.htm

• Operation Freakout - Their campaign of sabotage & violence against Paulette Cooper, the writer who published her research & findings on several cults, including Scientology. Scientology’s official plan: to frame Paulette, ruin her career & reputation & get her either incarcerated or locked up in psychiatric confinement.
The official plan: http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~dst/Krasel/cooper/frk1.html
Her book: http://holysmoke.org/cos/books/scandal-of-scientology-cooper.pdf

• Fair Game - the Scientology policy detailing how the organization may confront & handle critics & perceived enemies. Here is a direct quote: "Enemies may be deprived of property or injured by any means by any Scientologist without any discipline of the Scientologist. May be tricked, sued or lied to or destroyed.”
http://www.xenu.net/archive/disk/fairgame.htm
http://www.planetkc.com/sloth/sci/Fair_game_ord.html

• Physical & psychological punishment: Scientologists who "break the rules" while members of the "Sea Org" must subject themselves to the Rehabilitation Project Force (RPF), which includes regimes of harsh physical punishment, forced self-confessions, social isolation, hard labor and intensive ideological indoctrination.
http://www.xenu-directory.net/practices/rpf.html
http://www.lermanet2.com/scientology/gulags/BrainwashinginScientology'sRehabilitationProjectForce.htm
http://www.xs4all.nl/~kspaink/cos/rpf/escape_2.htm

• Brainwashing & mind control: Scientology exerts control over its members by means of typical cult tactics, including but not limited to controlling information about internal doctrine & criticism of the organization, severely restricting social contact outside the cult (including the practice of “disconnecting” with any family who question the credibility & trustworthiness of the cult), creating an “us against them” mentality by villainizing a specific out-group (for Scientology, it’s psychiatrists), & claiming all those outside the cult are unenlightened.
http://www.sptimes.com/2006/06/24/Tampabay/The_unperson.shtml
http://www.factnet.org/Books/SocialControl/scs.html#toc http://www.freedomofmind.com/resourcecenter/groups/s/scientology/pignotti/
http://www.cultinformation.org.uk/faq.html#cult

• Violent Kidnapping - Lisa McPherson was a Scientologist, was involved in a car accident & resultantly became mentally unstable. She was kidnapped from the hospital by agents of Scientology, held against her will, refused proper psychiatric treatment & allowed to STARVE TO DEATH.
Video: http://theunfunnytruth.ytmnd.com/
News Coverage: http://www.factnet.org/Scientology/Lisa_McPherson_Scientology_Deaths.html
Website: http://www.lisamcpherson.org/

• Tragic Murder - A CBS “48 Hours” special on Jeremy Perkins, the mentally disturbed son of Scientologist parents who, because of the Scientology doctrine of opposing psychiatry, refused to put him on the anti-psychotic drugs that would have stabilized him & prevented him from killing his own mother.
Video: http://www.scientomogy.com/jeremy_perkins.php
CBS article: http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2006/10/25/48hours/main2124568.shtml
Website: http://perkinstragedy.org

Answer 2

It is generally regarded as having cultish methods,including a form of alleged brainwashing called "clearing". Members are heavily exploited for free labor. Wealthy members are pampered. It actually began as a self-help form of psychoanalysis called Dianetics,which was considered downright hip in the 1950's; even William S. Burroughs was "into" it for a while; probably a lot of the old beatniks were. It was in the 60's when it began to acquire it's current reputation for taking over people's minds and lives. I've had friends however who were Scientologists for a while and say they think it helped them,up to a point. It has a high turnover of membership so to some extent the antipathy is probably not justified,since for most people it is a short-term experiment and essentially harmless; it just got caught up in the media scare about cults back in the 80's. But the reputation persists. Actually,just about every community over 100,000 has a group,so check it out; you won't get hurt. Even if they got you to join you'd probably just drop out in a few months. By a large,the "media saga" of scientology is a good example of much-ado-about-nothing. Or at least very little.

Answer 3

Basically they get false info from incorrect sources and then decide they know what it is and then to "inform" others as they, unlike you , now consider themselves "well informed".
The source of their "information" is deliberately slanted to create a negative impression.
Why this is done in the first place is a whole seperate subject.
Scientology is not the only religion that has been subjected to this kind of operation of false and negative rumor etc.

Anyway since you have the personal integrity to admit that you are not well informed, here is some factual information about Scientology:

Scientology is an applied religious philosophy. When I say "applied" I mean you actually use it in your life to change or improve existing conditions. It is a very practical religion.
All religions if you learn about them have a basic philosphy, but they also have certain dogma, rituals and observances, and a certain faith or belief is required. There is nothing wrong with this, but Scientology is not that kind of religion. It does not intrude on anyones faiths of beliefs in the area of God , the Supreme Being, or the Infinite. This area is left totally up to the indivdual as pasrt of his life. It does not conflict.
You can have no specific religious beliefs and still benefit from it.
And it is only true for you according to your own observation and experience with it.
It is also not a messianic religion. This means there is no worship of messiahs in Scientology. There are no “beliefs” as such because a truth should be according to ones own observation and experience.
The dictionary definition that applies:
Religion: The spiritual or emotional attitude of one who recognises the existence of superhuman power or powers.

The most basic principle of Scientology is that YOU are your own immortal soul, that this is not a "thing" you HAVE but what YOU actually are.
The whole purpose of Scientology is to increase an individual's understanding and awareness of himself. and lifeAnd thereby his native abilities .
When you do this the sphere and zone of his positive influence increases and moves outward into his life, his family ,his friends, his groups and mankind which he is part of.

How this result is achieved is the "technology" of Scientology, which was developed by L.Ron Hubbard after his extensive research and the discoveries he made, about the human spirit. The basic religious philosophy and knowledge of Scientology is very old, going back 10,000 years at least to the Veda or Vedic Hymns from the East. L. Ron Hubbard researched and made new discoveries about the human spirit. He developed technology from these discoveries to apply to increase spiritual awareness and ability.
He completed his research before his death in 1986 and left all of his results and copyrights
to the Church of Scientology along with most of his considerable personal estate, when he died.

He published a book in 1951 to communicate the basic principles he discovered called: " Scientology The Fundementals of Thought"
There are currently over 10 million Scientologists in more than 163 countries world wide. However we are a new religion, only 53 years old.
The true story of Scientology as a religion goes like this:
1. A philosopher developes a philosophy about life and death.
2. People find it interesting.
3. People find it works.
4. People pass it along to others.
5. It grows.

This is just an overview.
L. Ron Hubbard explained fully the theology and technologies of Scientology in more than 500,000 pages of writings, including dozens of books and over 2,000 tape-recorded public lectures.

Answer 4

It's not so much bad as habit-forming. I look at it as more of a disorganized cult than a religion really, and that is just strongly based on the history of how Scientology came to be as well as how they do not let the newer members of the following know the secrets and everything until they reach a higher "thetan" plane. In a nutshell, and this is not supposed to sound as offensive as it looks, many Scientologists believe that a extremely intelligent alien named Xenu carried 1,000,000 uninhabited souls to Earth in a spaceship (that oddly resembles a very modernized plane) to dwell in humans to bring them inner light and peace (for those who wished to seek it that is).

I have to say, I respect Christianity as more of a religion than Scientology (coming from an agnostic), mainly because they let ALL of their parishoners in on the birth of the world and how they believe they came to be where they are today. The Church of Scientolgy just keeps too many secrets, which can make it look VERY shifty.

Answer 5

L Ron Hubbard was a science fiction writer. He and Robert Heinlien, and Arthur C Clark were sitting around talking one day nad Hubbard said that the only way to make good money was to start a religion. He did. If you get involved and ever choose to leave you will be hounded until you have to leave your job, and quite often people have to leave the city they live in. Read up on Hitlers Brown Shirt squads. they used the same tactics.

Answer 6

Look up L Ron Hubbard in wikipedia. You will find more than enough to form an opinion of Scientology.

Answer 7

Because its a bait and switch scam designed to fleece people out of their money. The initial stuff is mundane self help stuff- the weird and wonderful stuff comes later!

Their are books written by ex-members online, and then put into the public domain

Answer 8

http://www.xenu.net/
contains all the information you need.

It's an evil cult designed to make money and nothing else . Its effects on believers are destructive - Check out http://www.lisamcpherson.org/ , a victim of the cult who was starved to death.

Read "the road to xenu" - http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~dst/Library/Shelf/xenu/ - an account of a girl who escaped scientology after 12 years!

The cult's core belief - no, I am not kidding here! - in the words of the founder:

"The head of the Galactic Federation (76 planets around larger stars visible from here) (founded 5,000,000 years ago, very space opera) solved overpopulation (250 billion or so per planet, 178 billion on average) by mass implanting. He caused people to be brought to Teegeeack (Earth) and put an H-Bomb on the principal volcanos (Incident II) and then the Pacific area ones were taken in boxes to Hawaii and the Atlantic area ones to Las Palmas and there "packaged".

His name was Xenu. He used renegades. Various misleading data by means of circuits etc. was placed in the implants.

When through with his crime loyal officers (to the people) captured him after six years of battle and put him in an electronic mountain trap where he still is. "They" are gone. The place (Confederation) has since been a desert. The length and brutality of it all was such that this Confederation never recovered. The implant is calculated to kill (by pneumonia etc) anyone who attempts to solve it. This liability has been dispensed with by my tech development.

One can freewheel through the implant and die unless it is approached as precisely outlined. The "freewheel" (auto-running on and on) lasts too long, denies sleep etc and one dies. So be careful to do only Incidents I and II as given and not plow around and fail to complete one thetan at a time.

In December 1967 I knew someone had to take the plunge. I did and emerged very knocked out, but alive. Probably the only one ever to do so in 75,000,000 years. I have all the data now, but only that given here is needful.

One's body is a mass of individual thetans stuck to oneself or to the body.

One has to clean them off by running incident II and Incident I. It is a long job, requiring care, patience and good auditing. You are running beings. They respond like any preclear. Some large, some small.

Thetans believed they were one. This is the primary error. Good luck."

Answer 9

Best that you can do is check it out for yourself, I personally am not into lables. Just a person doing what it takes to live and let live.

Answer 10

For starters a Science Fiction Writer dreamed it up.