A Narrow Critique of Scientology Ethics Technology

introduction-to-scientology-ethics-hardcoverOne of the benefits of Hubbard’s Scientology ethics technology is to provide a way to structure the analysis of problems in your life, and to think up solutions to deal with them.

One of the problems with Hubbard’s ethics technology is that his structure is designed to always put the interests and goals of Scientology, and the artificial personality of “Scientologist”, ahead of all other considerations and circumstances. With his Ethics Technology, L Ron Hubbard created a structural analysis tool that is designed to come up with the same solutions no matter what the problem is.

Providing some kind of structure to the analysis of problems is good because we, as human beings, have biases, and emotional upsets, and other obstacles that many times keep us from coming to the best solutions. The problem with the structural analysis that Scientology ethics tech provides, however, is that the structure is rigged to trap you.

FOR EXAMPLE: Among MANY other problems, the structural tool of “the greatest good for the greatest number of dynamics” gives your own self-interests (the first dynamic) 1/8th of the weight of all the other dynamics.

And since all Scientologists are taught to believe that Scientology will save all mankind and every other dynamic in the universe – the solutions you come up with using this analytic structure, over time, will always favor Scientology’s interests over your own. Over time, and over many applications of Hubbard’s ethics tech, your own goals will be devalued, and all of Scientology’s goals will be over-valued.

Since the structure of the analysis itself is flawed, then when you apply this structure, so will your solutions be.

It’s good to have access to a non-biased problem-solving technology which can be used to come to unique and workable solutions for each individual problem.

I found one that is a step up from Hubbard’s Ethics technology. And so I’d like to suggest it to you as something to evaluate, and to contrast and compare with Scientology ethics.

The idea of a structured analysis to problems is covered well in a very good book by a former CIA analyst named Morgan Jones. He provides 14 different tools you can use to structure the analysis of problems – business or personal. With these, you can make sure that your own biases, emotions, and other human obstacles will remain at bay during the problem solving process.

The book is called “The Thinker’s Toolkit”. I highly recommend it.

Now don’t get me wrong – Scientology ethics tech, when I first learned it – gave me great hope.

It gave me the idea that if I was ethical, then I could be happy. It also introduced the idea of “conditions” in life, and how they have certain characteristics. All these assumptions from Hubbard’s ethics technology are able to be questioned – as long as you are not a member of the Church of Scientology seeking to remain “in good standing” – and should be. But they are a good simple start to the activity of structured problem-solving to improve the conditions in your life.

When I was first introduced to it, I began applying Scientology ethics, and it worked like a bomb. It contained many extremely valuable lessons for me. It produced huge benefits right away and it really turned me around personally. So I will always be grateful to myself that I was smart enough, courageous enough, and enough of an independent thinker, to walk into a Scientology mission and to learn that technology and use it to improve my own life.

The problem I found, after may years of ethics training and as an ethics officer and staff member, was that Hubbard took the ideas of ethics that were first talked about in Aristotle, in Utilitarianism, and elsewhere, and he turned these into a way that he could use to control the minds and lives of people from whom he wanted ALL of their money and anything of value that they had. Hubbard’s ethics tech became a deeply intrusive game for him to reach into and exploit the spiritual vulnerabilities of people who only wanted a better life for themselves.

Some of the basic messages of Scientology Ethics tech are valid. But as with so much Scientology technology, Hubbard got you to accept these valid messages early on, and then he began twisting things to his own advantage.

It is too bad that Hubbard was so corrupt.

Otherwise, he would not have been ruled by his own greed, and he could have simply let other people prosper.

For an even better and much more detailed critique of Scientology Ethics Technology, see Jefferson Hawkins’ book: Closing Minds: How Scientology’s “Ethics Technology” is Used to Control Their Members

closing minds by jefferson hawkins