PLEASE NOTE: This page features an article written by Marty Rathbun, a former high-ranking Scientology executive, and is written for an audience of practicing Scientologists. It is the hope of the author to reach these people and present evidence to them of David Miscavige’s crimes and alteration of L. Ron Hubbard’s Scientology.
This re-publication is not an advertisement for any service offered by Marty Rathbun nor is this in any way an endorsement of either his services or those offered by the Scientology Organization.
Scientology Founder L. Ron Hubbard discovered methodologies that can enhance self-determinism, increase freedom of choice, and bring about higher states of awareness and beingness to those who practice them. Hubbard developed a method of confession that includes unconditional forgiveness and results in more able, happy and peaceful beings. Hubbard developed an ethics system that an individual can apply to himself to improve his worth to himself and to his fellows. Hubbard established a form of organizational policy that is predicated on rewarding accomplishment rather than punishing failure. Hubbard set forth many of the fundamental values of Scientology and its organizations in the Creed of the Church of Scientology, The Code of a Scientologist, and the Credo of a True Group Member. Thirty-one factors have been discovered that threaten the continued viability of this vital subject.
One
Scientology has been taken over by a self-appointed dictator, David Miscavige, who has turned the Creed of the Church of Scientology, the Code of a Scientologist, and the Credo of a True Group Member on their heads and instituted the virtual practice of Reverse (Black) Dianetics.
Two
In his quest to attain power Miscavige forcibly removed no less than four Hubbard appointed executives senior to himself, and dozens of Scientologists who had created scores of huge, effective Scientology centers. Miscavige used threat of force and violence in clearing the path to control of all Scientology organizations and assumed the self-created position of Chairman of the Board. He was never assigned by Hubbard and holds a position that was not created by Hubbard.
Three
Since securing his position of power, the statistics of Scientology have steadily decreased in spite of Miscavige’s public proclamations to the contrary.
Four
Miscavige has conducted a campaign to fortify his personal power by denigrating and depowering anyone who personally knew and worked with Hubbard. That includes, but is not limited to, the members of Hubbard’s family. The operation served to consolidate his personal power while immeasurably harming the vigor and image of Scientology.
Five
Miscavige accomplished his coup by commandeering the only line of communication to Hubbard during the last five years of his life, plying Hubbard with embellished and false reports of a dangerous environment to keep him out of communication with Sea Org members and his family. The reports falsely accused Hubbard’s family and lifelong friends of selling out to the enemy and that Scientology orgs had been infiltrated by psychiatric and government interests. He prevented true reports from reaching Hubbard in order to make his actions appear necessary and on policy and to solidify his position.
Six
Miscavige has persuaded those at the top of the Scientology organization that to disclose the secrets of his unconscionable acts would harm the religion and violate “the greatest good for the greatest number of dynamics.” Thus, the truth of what goes on behind the façade of false PR that Miscavige creates is hidden from the vast majority of Scientologists and the general public.
Seven
Miscavige uses confessions of Scientology managers to invalidate, castigate, and embarrass them into acquiescence and silence.
Eight
Sea Org members who voice or even hint at any hesitation to carrying on with his tyranny or supporting his actions, are routinely physically beaten by Miscavige.
Nine
Those Sea Org members who have attempted to correct Miscavige’s off-policy and out-tech actions have been subjected to belittlement, invalidation and false propaganda. They have been silenced through imprisonment and mental and physical duress.
Ten
Miscavige’s abuse of Scientology executives and staff became so extreme and continuous, he resorted to locking all of CMO INT and Exec Strata into a building and called the prison “the Hole.” RTC, CMO/WDC, Gold, IAS, CST, OSA Int and ASI executives and staff have regularly been deposited in the Hole and subjected to Reverse Dianetics, including physical beatings and severe mental abuse for months or even years at a time.
Eleven
Miscavige has run a continuous propaganda campaign attempting to besmirch the good name of L Ron Hubbard. He has consistently given little interest and funds for defending public relations attacks on Hubbard. Conversely, when Miscavige’s abuses come under scrutiny by the media or on the Internet Miscavige spares no money in attempting to destroy the reputations and lives of anyone with the temerity to discuss Miscavige’s conduct. Miscavige’s operations against “critics” include violations of the right to privacy, intimidation, investigations for perceived weaknesses then ruthless exploitation of them, propaganda campaigns, interference with contractual and personal relations, black bag jobs and blackmail. To exacerbate his atrocities, Miscavige justifies his conduct by pointing to some anachronistic Hubbard policy intended to deal with real attacks from the fifties and sixties. Thus, Miscavige perpetuates the notion Hubbard is somehow responsible for his own crimes. He routinely cites alleged things Hubbard once said (in violation of the first policy letter every Scientologist reads when exploring the subject) to justify his brutality against executives and staff members.
Twelve
Miscavige has created a multi-hundred million dollar slush fund called the IAS. For twenty five years it has collected inestimable funds from Scientologists under false pretenses. The IAS has used scare tactics to extract “donations” to “save” the Church from attacks. Meanwhile, Miscavige prohibited IAS from disbursing funds to handle most of those attacks. On numerous occasions, Miscavige and IAS have given Scientology public the false impression IAS was spending tens of millions to sponsor “dissemination campaigns,” while in fact only funding a few ads for a very limited run, until the next campaign was devised. Conversely, the IAS has disbursed exhorbitant amounts for Miscavige’s personal vacations – including many Caribbean diving trips and a five star tour of Scotland (including cases of sampled Scotch being shipped to Miscavige’s residence afterward). When IAS executives balked at Miscavige’s actions, he feigned surprise about the extravagances and had President IAS escorted to the Int base, and locked her up in the Hole for behavior modification.
Thirteen
Miscavige has turned the top end of the Bridge into a dead end: First, he has programmed the Advanced Organizations, including the FSO, to regularly security check pre-O.T.s, and then use their confessions to coerce them into paying more money for atonement, a practice not unlike the Medieval Catholic Church selling indulgences. Second, he has imposed an unwritten code of behavior amongst O.T.s. They are regularly made to conform to correct dress, language, political thought, and even ideas as to how to use their personal time. Said practice is anathema to the very purpose of Scientology, which is to make a person more his- or herself, more insouciant and independent thinking. Third, Miscavige has entered arbitrary “contribution as a Scientologist” requirements mid-levels which can be satisfied by making cash “donations.” Fourth, Miscavige requires pre-OTs to attend his regular propaganda events (see Factors 22 and 23) and are treated as ethics bait until they enthusiastically embrace his projected public image. This enforced acceptance of falsehood makes attainment of OT technically impossible. Thus, Scientology, as practiced in Miscavige’s orgs, is auditing one toward conformity, solidity, lies; in other words, down the tone scale, or, the precise opposite direction to the intended aim of auditing.
Fourteen
Miscavige’s “Ideal Org” strategy has wasted hundreds of millions of dollars of Scientologists’ donations to forward an entirely off-policy action. Hubbard’s Ideal Org policy letter says nothing about building posh quarters. A plethora of Hubbard Policy condemns Miscavige’s “straight up and vertical” method of building an org. Subsidies, particularly those extracted from the public under pressure, to build posh quarters are strictly forbidden by Hubbard policy. Hubbard advised that orgs be built from the bottom up by the elbow grease of local Scientologists, flanked by international management broad public promotion campaigns, growing their quarters only as they expand their delivery and income. Miscavige has hoodwinked Scientology public with the equivalent of a Ponzi scheme, shuttling staff around the world to pose at new “Ideal Org” openings for photo ops, many of whom are then shuttled off to some other org or soon leave for lack of pay. Regardless of the poshness of their quarters, Miscavige’s orgs are doomed to failure (and the failures are legion) because Miscavige has for years forcibly prevented Scientology management from implementing LRH advised pricing formulas to make Scientology affordable to working people, org finance systems that encourage orgs to survive and expand, and staff pay systems that make it viable for upstats to work on staff.
Fifteen
Miscavige’s alteration of confessional (FPRD) technology to, in effect, cancel Hubbard’s fundamental principle that a being can and does make undesirable mental mass and energy disappear by directed attention alone has caused innumerable Scientologists to regress on their paths to spiritual freedom. He has converted a powerful spiritual technology into a tool with which to enforce conformity.
Sixteen
Miscavige’s use of the technology of suppression to impose suppression rather than to accomplish its original opposite purpose, has suppressed countless Scientologists and divided many families.
Seventeen
Miscavige has perverted the practice of disconnection from a voluntary tool one may use to improve one’s life into a mandatory control mechanism. He uses the practice to suppress the free flow of vital, truthful information and to keep individuals toeing the line through threat of losing their loved ones, rather than as a tool to depower actual suppression.
Eighteen
Miscavige’s refusal to allow the entire International Base Crew (including RTC, Watchdog Committee, CMO INT, Executive Strata and Gold) to apply Ethics formulas to rise out of conditions he arbitrarily imposed is a Scientology High Crime. Miscavige has kept the international managers of Scientology in the lowest ethics conditions continuously for nearly two decades by imposing arbitrary requirements for upgrade nowhere covered in policy.
Nineteen
The practice of ordering divorces based solely on Miscavige’s opinion of the spouse, or the fact that he or she is in a different church organization than his or her spouse is antithetical to the concept that true survival can only be attained across all dynamics.
Twenty
Miscavige’s arbitrary policy that makes conceiving a child a crime warranting offload from the Sea Org is contrary to Hubbard policy. It has also spawned a policy that has required countless women to obtain abortions.
Twenty-One
Miscavige’s practice of verbally declaring Scientology staff members suppressive persons while leaving them on posts that affect international Scientology is suppressive to Scientology and Scientologists.
Twenty-Two
Miscavige has co-opted Scientology’s multi-million dollar audio/visual production facility and its several hundred Golden Era Productions staff for the purpose of forwarding his own image and power through Scientology events. He has cross ordered hundreds of Hubbard advised dissemination films and marketing campaigns. This is done under the guise of the importance of international events, yet such events are proscribed by LRH policy. Millions of dollars are spent on these events in order to showcase Miscavige to further secure his power.
Twenty-Three
Miscavige puts on international events that intentionally misrepresent the true state of Scientology. Statistics are manipulated and falsified, video scenes are created that are palmed off as reality and campaigns are routinely unveiled with great fanfare but exist only for the purpose of being announced at the event. The manipulation of truth is skilled and extensive and designed for the purpose of making Miscavige look good. Scientologists wonder at the incredible figures presented on the number of new people coming into Scientology every second, minute, day, week, year, or the incredible reach of people being contacted or the vast numbers of officials and Opinion Leaders who fully support Scientology — yet their local church organizations show no sign of this massive and unrelenting growth. Scientologists who retain enough sanity to spot the contrary facts must suppress such rational thoughts for those who complain are subject to heavy ethics and, if they persist in expressing doubts, expulsion.
Twenty-Four
Miscavige has cross ordered production of the authorized LRH biography. The hired LRH Biographer, who has been paid hundreds of thousands of dollars, instead has worked almost exclusively for nearly two decades on writing speeches for Miscavige.
Twenty-Five
It is policy to never use lies in PR. Yet Miscavige has repeatedly lied, and directed others to lie, when confronted with facts concerning his unethical, abusive behavior.
Twenty-Six
Miscavige has personally enriched himself, living a far more lavish lifestyle than L. Ron Hubbard ever lived, though Hubbard had earned his fortune through his own writings. Miscavige has (by the standards of the Sea Organization) lavish living quarters in various cities complete with chefs and maids, owns or is provided expensive cars and motorcycles, flies exclusively in private jets, has his hairdresser and chiropractor travel around the world with him, and receives compensation that is far, far in excess of any other person on Scientology staff.
Twenty-Seven
Miscavige has enforced an unwritten policy within the Church that his word has become more important than the words of the Founder. Church staff routinely follow the dictates of Miscavige that are directly at odds with LRH policy. His utterances are recorded and transcribed and distributed to staff. He changes the technology of L. Ron Hubbard under the guise of “getting it on Source” and using hidden data lines about what LRH wanted. Miscavige has gradually established himself as the new Source. The biographer of L. Ron Hubbard was recently used to front for Miscavige to journalists who were investigating many of the abuses outlined in these factors. Under Miscavige’s direct orders the biographer of Hubbard (who always eschewed the notion that he was anything other than a man) told the journalists that in his estimation Miscavige, and not Hubbard, “is a God.”
Twenty-Eight
Many veteran Sea Org members have been RPF’d, imprisoned in the Hole, beaten and declared by Miscavige for having the temerity to object to Miscavige cross ordering Hubbard policy.
Twenty-Nine
Miscavige spent over seventy million dollars in Scientologists’ donations for an office building for himself and his personal support staff. Miscavige constantly altered orders for the building during construction, many times to upgrade material and finishes to the most expensive available, ordering the removal and destruction of what had been originally installed. Such profligate spending is contrary to countless finance policies of Hubbard, who was always extremely frugal in the spending of Church donations.
Thirty
Miscavige has created orgs that are the reverse of the islands of succor that Hubbard built during his life and directed be duplicated in his written policies. Prior to Miscavige’s Scientology, orgs were lively, creative, safe spaces where people congregated to share their spiritual experiences. Orgs are now places to avoid for fear of falling victim to crush regging, heavy ethics and modification of behavior.
Thirty-One
Miscavige’s out ethics has gone unchecked for so long that his behavior has become extremely depraved. In recent years he has directed the org that LRH formed to assure the ethical practice of the religion, RTC, to literally pimp and pander for his movie star friends. A number of women have been unwittingly lured into this scheme by being told they were working on a very important project to forward the aims of Scientology. In reality, Miscavige arranged dates with them for his personal friends. This activity was kept secret by violation of the integrity and security of Scientologists’ confessionals, threats, intimidation, and the attempted division of families.
Those who have attempted to put ethics in on Miscavige from within have been ruined personally by Miscavige. Scientology is valuable to the many when studied and practiced in a sane environment. To allow it to be destroyed by the driven greed of a sociopath would be to condone a travesty.
Scientology practiced in accordance with Hubbard’s Code of a Scientologist, Credo of a True Group Member, and the Creed of the Church can contribute something vital to society.
While Miscavige and his minions will no doubt claw, harass, and sue until the end to protect his fiefdom, it would well behoove all Scientologists to re-familiarize themselves with the Church’s creed: “We of the Church believe… That all men have inalienable rights to think freely, to talk freely, to write freely their own opinions and to counter or utter or write upon the opinions of others”, and,
“…that no agency less than God has the power to suspend or set aside these rights, overtly or covertly.”