Ever wonder where the famous
Scientology "purpose of a lawsuit is to harass'' quote comes from ? It's in the
red volumes. Or used to be ...
- The set of red volumes published in 1991. Volume III covers the years
1955-56. On pp. 40-66 is reprinted a lengthy article called "The Scientologist,
a Manual on the Dissemination of Material." This article first appeared in
"Ability, the Magazine of DIANETICS and SCIENTOLOGY from Phoenix, Arizona",
Major Issue 1, published "circa mid-March 1955". The version of the article that
appears in the 1991 red volumes contains this famous quote :
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| The DEFENSE of
anything is UNTENABLE. The only way to defend anything is to ATTACK, and if you
ever forget that then you will lose every battle you are ever in engaged in...
|
-
- However, the 1991 version does not
contain this even more famous quote from the same article :
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| The purpose of the
suit is to harass and discourage rather than win.
The law can be used very easily to harass, and enough harassment on somebody
who is simply on the thin edge anyway, well knowing that he is not authorized,
will generally be sufficient to cause professional decease. If possible, of
course, ruin him utterly. |
What Hubbard was discussing in this passage was
the measures that can be taken to prevent people from using Scientology
materials outside the church, e.g., to deliver unapproved auditing services.
Hubbard claims the public needs to be protected from incompetent practitioners,
but his real concern was loss of income, and loss of control over Dianetics and
Scientology movement, as had previously occurred in New Jersey.
Why was the "purpose of a lawsuit'' quote deleted
? The passage has caused
much bad publicity for Scientology in the past. The unexpurgated version of that
section of the article was filed as Exhibit G in the Fishman
Declaration (reproduced below). The nastiest bits were bracketed in the
filed version, so the court could see the evidence that Scientology's
aggressively litigious nature was part of its official doctrine.
Altering Hubbard's writing is one of the highest crimes in Scientology. But
the cult routinely edits his work by discovering that an offending passage was
actually written by some nameless "suppressive person" and inserted somehow into
Hubbard's text prior to publication, usually as part of a "plot to destroy
Scientology." There must have been an awful of lot of these suppressive persons
working in the Hubbard Communications Office, because there have been a lot of
changes over the years, but it seems these persons only get discovered when
there is inconvenient text that needs to be disposed of.
This article, still odious despite the minor deletion, has been cited in
various legal filings over the years, including the Fishman Declaration, as
"Magazine articles on level 0 checksheet." Here's an explanation of where this
mis-identification comes from. Each Scientology course begins with a checksheet
that lists the materials to be read and the exercises to be done on that course,
in the order in which they are to be undertaken. "Level 0" is the first level of
the academy course, i.e., the first level of auditor training. In 1968, the
Hubbard College of Scientology, a branch of the Church of Scientology of
California, published a 100 page booklet called "Magazine Articles on Level 0
Checksheet" that contained eight articles from Ability magzine and the Journal
of Scientology. This booklet was apparently part of the auditor curriculum at
one time, but it does not appear at all in more recent (circa 1990) versions of
the academy levels, at least in the checksheets I've examined. According to
Professor Steven Kent of the University of Alberta, who has studied the
Scientology cult since 1986, "This item is required reading in the 1991
'Department of Special Affairs, Investigations Officer, Full Hat' course.
Elsewhere in this same magazine article, Hubbard discusses what to do if a
Scientologist encounters legal troubles. Again, an aggressive, even vicious
response is urged. Is he crazy to be concerned about ``arrest for the practice
of Scientology''? I think his concerns about legal trouble were well-founded,
but he's distorting the situation in which an arrest would be likely. The
practice of the Scientology religion is not illegal. But practicing medicine
without a license is. And so is making unjustifiable medical claims in
advertising material -- which is precisely what Scientology got into trouble for
a decade later, when the FDA seized hundreds of E-meters. Even in this article,
despite his worries about legal trouble, Hubbard boldly states that physicians
and psychologists cannot cure mental or psychosomatic ills; only Scientologists
can do that. He wants to practice medicine and psychotherapy, but he knows it's
dangerous to do so openly.
Hubbard's prohibition here against prescribing vitamins is curious, because
one of the fundamentals of his Purification Rundown is dangerously high doses of
Niacin. Obviously he did not take his own advice. Yet he's so concerned about
being charged with illegally practicing medicine that he warns against even
recommending diets. Inconsistency is one of his hallmarks, and the alternation
within this one document between sweeping claims and paranoid defensiveness is
definitely in character.
This same magazine article is incorrectly cited as just "Level 0 Checklist" in
the Emmons Report, an extensive multi-volume report on Scientology produced by
Lt. Ray Emmons of the Clearwater Police Department in the mid 1980s. Below is an
excerpt from that report :
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The SCIENTOLOGY
organization exploits every opportunity to hide behind their so called religious
status. This posture is epitomized by a SCIENTOLOGY document entitled, Level O
Checklist.
In the Level O Checklist, instructions are given to SCIENTOLOGY
members who are approached by medical doctors while these members are attempting
to employ SCIENTOLOGY methods and practices to patients in hospitals and nursing
homes.
The Instructional Guide states the SCIENTOLOGY member is to claim
religious status when approached by a medical doctor if the doctor is disturbed
or displeased with the SCIENTOLOGISTS administering medical treatment to the
patient.
If the SCIENTOLOGY Member is arrested, a lawyer will be provided
immediately and a suit is to be instituted in excess of $100'000 against the
doctor and anyone else that it might be advantageous to sue for violating the
SCIENTOLOGIST'S first amendment rights in practicing religion on the patient.
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