Has the Scientology hate gone too far?

Great Debates
81

Following up on ElRon, there is no chapter on him in Seekers of Tomorrow, and the Metcalf index has no indication he ever published an article on Hubbard. There is one on the ESFA, in Science Fiction Adventures in Sept. 1953, which I happen to own. It says that Hubbard was at the 1948 meeting, but no mention is made of the religion quote. No Harlan, who would have been 14 then anyway.

BTW, Final Blackout is the name of the after the war story, which was well ahead of its time. The Tuck Encyclopedia shows no books by Hubbard after 1951 - it was too early to get the Daw one.

82

The difference between Catholicism and Scientology (and I’m no fan of Catholicism) is that while the Catholic church has been corrupted and perverted in various ways that only slowly have been and are being rectified, the corruption in Scientology is bedrock, an inherent part of the organization as designed by its founder, and they have no intention of reformation. Scientology theology is kooky but that isn’t why so many people revile them. For Catholic leaders to present their members with pseudo-bills based on investigations into their economic status is insulting, inflammatory and invasive, yes. But if we were talking about Scientology, that bill would have been constantly high with no concern for your material wealth, if you refused it your friends and family would have been told to cut off all contact with you, and if they had caught wind that you were complaining about it in public they would have sicced their lawyers and investigators on you to ruin your life and break your will to protect their image by shutting you up. I’ll grant that at the present time they might be less likely to follow through on the last step, but that’s only because their lawyers and investigators have their hands full dealing with as many “Anonymous” protesters as they can handle. There’s a reason why you see protesters wearing those V for Vendetta masks: these people play hardball. There’s really no comparison to the present-day Catholic church.

83

I guess I missed the edit window, or maybe “guests” can’t edit.

Anyway, if there’s a possibility for Scientology changing it’s ways, it’s only if the Internet enables the volume of force against them to stay sufficiently high and prominent that they can’t restrain it (which is probably likely) and it hurts their membership numbers so badly that they come to the conclusion that their current PR model does more harm than good. There’s no chance of an appeal to conventional morality with them, because the promotion of Scientology is the ultimate ideal - as Hubbard said, “I am not interested in wog morality.” The term “wog”, as Scientology uses it, means a “common, everyday garden-variety humanoid.” In their eyes, the only purpose of a non-Scientologist is to become a Scientologist, and unless/until they reach that point they are worthless.

84

[qyuote]Following up on ElRon, there is no chapter on him in Seekers of Tomorrow, and the Metcalf index has no indication he ever published an article on Hubbard. There is one on the ESFA, in Science Fiction Adventures in Sept. 1953, which I happen to own. It says that Hubbard was at the 1948 meeting, but no mention is made of the religion quote. No Harlan, who would have been 14 then anyway.

BTW, Final Blackout is the name of the after the war story, which was well ahead of its time. The Tuck Encyclopedia shows no books by Hubbard after 1951 - it was too early to get the Daw one.

[/quote]

"Seekers of Tomorrow isn’t everything, you know. And you still don’t seem to have clicked on that Post article I cited above.

There used to be a very well footnoted article on Xenu.com, but it seems to be off the 'net right now. It’s not just Moscowitz and Ellison – several other writers recalled Hubbard saying that, but I can’t recall tyheir names now.

As for “my point” , it’s that, aside from cloaked Scienbtology publishers (especially in recent years), there hasn’t been a lot of republication of Hubbard’s works. He WAS remembered more by the old-school pulp readers than newer readers (which, I suspect, was his reason for writing Battlefield Earth and, later, his Mission: Earth series) That’s not to say that there wrere NO publications of them – I have a few publication by Lancer and Ace of his other stuff, but it’s hard to find, for the most part, and didn’t get republished. I think I’ve seen more copies of his Fear than of anything else of his, and I’ve seen few of them, and all these were late fifties to mid 1960s. That 1970 publication of Ole Doc Methuselah in 1970 was a weird last gasp, and I’ve very rarely seen it.

On the other hand, I have no problem getting copies of works by Gallun and Smith, who were as famous or, possibly, less famous than Hubbard. Their stuff continued to get republished into the 1970s and beyond (The Complete Venus Equilateral, containing ALL the stories, disn’t go into print until 1978 or so). And no matter how much you and I know and like them (step outside, huh? I’ll defend Smith to the inconvenioence), he’s relatively obscure today. So, I think, would Hubbard be, if he hadn’t founded religion.

85

I did, and would have liked to find something written a lot closer to the time.

This is beginning to sound like Moose Murders, which was attended, if everyone’s memory is correct, by about half of New York City. My point in responding to the post that started this was that whether or not Hubbard actually said that, almost certainly Ellison was not there. to hear it. The Moscowitz article on ESFA mostly consists of the names of every big name writer who showed up to ESFA meetings, and Hubbard is only listed for 1948, which would have fit in well with him making the statement then. I only said that I’m not convinced, not that I am sure Hubbard never said it. In any case, he did not found a religion at the beginning, so the relevance of the quote, even if he made it, is not very clear to me.

I’m not disputing the lack of publication of his work. Fear and Typewriter in the Sky were published by Gnome in 1951, so I’d expect them to be more available. I collect Daw books, and I got Ole Doc right after it came out, but you are right, I haven’t seen it much either since then. Perhaps his sf doesn’t get republished because it is a bit fascistic. But his fantasy isn’t. I’ve read all the Golden Age Astoundings, and more than half the Unknowns, and Hubbard was a far bigger name than either Smith or Gallun. I personally think his fantasy is better than any of their stuff (and being a geek I like the VE stories) and Final Blackout is a historically important work. I think there are lots of reasons for them not being available, but quality and him being a minor or failed writer is not one of them.

86

Ellison probably wasn’t there as a professional writer, but that’s no reason to exclude him. He was very well known (even notorious) as a fan and fanzine publisher when he was a teen and not noticeably shy about weaseling his way into the company of the pros.

It’s not all one or the other. Hubbard was looking to create something to sell that would also appeal to John Campbell. But he was very interested in religion from the start, and was a student of Aleister Crowley.

87

You know, its just possible that Harlan was actually there. Before he gained any sort of attention as a writer, he had some minor notoriety as a rabid fan. Science fiction writers of the time were not familiar with the idea of someone actually paying attention to them, let alone slavering devotion. I can readily imagine that they might adopt him as a “pet”.

Harlan is a raving loon with an ego that has its own event horizon. But he brought out Dangerous Visions, and his place in my affections is secure, his personal defects notwithstanding.