L Ron Hubbard on The Apollo

How Hubbard Lied: ReDefining “Individuation” Like It’s A Bad Thing

What if being a Scientologist was never a really a disease in the first place that you needed to “recover from”? What if it was just one part of your own much longer spiritual journey that taught you many important lessons, and from which you emerged stronger and wiser than ever?

How would you know?

religious persecution

Religious Persecution of Minority Religions by Dick Anthony

The metaphor of ‘brainwashing’ is best understood as a social weapon for religious persecution which provides a “libertarian” rationale for the suppression of unpopular social movements and belief systems.

anti cult movement

How the Anti Cult Movement Harms Ex-Members

Adopting the beliefs of the anti-cult movement dramatically changes the views and attitudes of those who experience a loss of faith. Those changes have a profound effect on how Exes make sense of their own past. So we must ask: How helpful is the ideology of the anti cult movement in making sense of your life?

The Brainwashing Myth

The Brainwashing Myth by Rebecca Moore

The brainwashing myth Rebecca Moore, San Diego State University Nearly 40 years ago, my two sisters, Carolyn Layton and Annie Moore, were among those who planned the mass deaths in Jonestown on Nov. 18, 1978. … Read more

Steve K. D. Eichel

A Critical Discussion with a Cult Counselor

Anti-Cultists Steve K. D. Eichel and Stephen Hassan had a conversation with me about cults and brainwashing on my Facebook Page. Here’s how it went.

Eileen Barker

Cult Expert, London School of Economics Social Science Professor Eileen Barker Submits Herself to the Gearty Grilling

Why do anti-cultists reject science so much? When they call a social scientist a “shill” or a “quack”, where is their quantitative data that disputes the work of that social scientist? I have never once seen them offer any scientific data to dispute the results of any of the scientists they wish to discredit with this juvenile name calling character assassinations.

Cults of Anti-Cultism by Anton Shupe et al, 1980

This is a paper written in 1980 on the AntiCult Movement, as it existed when the authors estimated when it was 10 years old. Can you see any differences in the AntiCult Movement today? _______________________________________ … Read more

The Capture Stories, Escape Stories, and Atrocity Stories of Anti-Scientologists

Sociologists who study the issues surrounding minority religions have identified 3 types of stories that form a socially-constructed narrative of a leave-taker’s experience inside their former group. These types of stories are not unique to Ex-Scientology. They have been found to occur as common coins passed around by those who leave, assuming a role which sociologists call “the apostate role”.

Scientology Religion

Is Scientology a Religion? Leah Remini Now Says It’s Not

When you look at the cosmology of Scientology from the viewpoint of social science – its rituals such as auditing, training, dissemination, and its clearly religious teachings on the thetan, the mind, and even Xenu – it is inescapable that Scientology is a religion.

Life After Scientology

A Study List for Life After Scientology

Your assumptions can be quite insidious. You must study the actual subjects that Hubbard “spun” for you – from sources completely independent from L Ron Hubbard – so as to challenge your own assumptions, separate out Hubbard’s installed ones, and inspect them for their weaknesses.

scientology vs antiscientology tribalism

Binded and Blinded By the Tribal Mind

Once I’d spotted that my thinking was tribal, I was no longer consumed by my tribe’s survival. I resented that the tribe had taken over my thinking. I could finally see the eclipsed and thoughtless cruelty of my former tribe.

When Prophecy Fails

Cognitive Dissonance – More About

Jeff Hawkins wrote a post a few years ago detailing much of the basics behind Cognitive Dissonance Theory, and I am very grateful that he did, as this theory is fundamental to understanding not only … Read more