Criticizing Islam Successfully to People Who Don't Want to Hear It
Sunday
1. not all religions are the same
2. not all religious doctrine should be free from scrutiny
3. there is a useful division we can make between the political teachings of a religion and the religious teachings of that religion
In case you don't know about Scientology's Fair Game policy, here it is in a nutshell: It is a written doctrine of the Church of Scientology that enemies of Scientology are "fair game" and may be (in the words of the founder of Scientology, "deprived of property or injured by any means by any Scientologist without any discipline of the Scientologist. May be tricked, sued, lied to, or destroyed."
This policy has been carried out by the Church of Scientology many times, often destroying peoples' lives, and Scientology's criminal actions (and its written policies supporting those actions) have often been documented in court. You can read more about it at Wikipedia: Fair Game (Scientology). Also, you can find good information about it at the Scientology Critical Information Directory: Scientology's "Fair Game" Doctrine. And also check out the Suppressive Person Defense League: Scientology’s Suppressive Person Doctrine.
Islam has successfully gathered a cloak of protection around it, making it difficult to talk about this subject with many people. People don't have the same knee-jerk defense of Scientology, and yet many of Scientology's teachings are similar to Islam's. So learn something about Scientology, and when you meet resistance when talking about Islam, switch to talking about Scientology.
Once you've made some good points, come back around and make the same points about Islam. I think you'll find this a powerful new strategy.
Read more about using this idea here.
20 comments:
Citizen Warrior,
This actually sounds like a pretty good idea. In some cases at least, I can imagine that this would work. Did you come up with the idea yourself?
By the way, I don't think any religion or belief system should be free from scrutiny. If it can't survive any scrutiny, than it definitively needs to be looked at carefully.
Thanks, Damien. Yes, I came up with it myself. I just finished reading a biography of L. Ron Hubbard and was amazed at how similar he and Mohammad were.
Citizen Warrior,
what were some of the similarities between the two men that you found out about?
Here are some of the differences I remember noticing:
1. They both started their own religion. I don't mean that a religion sprung up to preserve their teachings; I mean they themselves started the religious organization.
2. They were intensely opposed to criticism of themselves or their religious doctrines.
3. Made their followers believe that even criticial thoughts about the founder or the religion was a sin.
4. Encouraged their followers to see the world as "us" and "them," considered "them" to be enemies, and recommended physically attacking or weakening the enemies.
5. Started out with rather peaceful teachings, and then gradually escalated the teachings into more and more divisive ideas with open hostility to non-members of the religion.
6. They both reserved their strongest hatred toward those who were once members of their religion and who then rejected it (toward apostates).
7. They both behaved like sociopaths. A sociopath has no empathy for other people, feels no remorse or guilt, and is focused mainly on "winning."
8. They were both very clever.
9. They were both capable of evoking strong loyalty in their followers.
10. They both violated the "laws of the land" at will.
11. They were both proponents of deceit.
Citizen Warrior,
I assume that you meant to write the word "similarities" instead of "differences." None the less that's interesting, and rather disturbing. Basically, if what you're saying is true, and Hubbard had thought he could have gotten away with it, than there's a strong chance that he would have turned to violence to force the country as a whole as well as the people around him to follow him, much like Mahmoud did when he was able to do so.
Yes, similarities. Oops.
Yes, Hubbard had no problem encouraging violence in his followers, and he used military language and military structure in his religious organization.
Hubbard actually tried to take over several countries in his lifetime! The dude had balls.
Citizen Warrior,
From what you said, it sounds like Hubbard may have been insane.
By the way, I sent your idea to Pastorius, and he posted it over at the IBA. He really liked your idea to use the similarities between Islam and Scientology to get people to listen to criticism of Islam.
Thanks, Damien.
I thought of a few more similarities:
12. Both Hubbard and Mohammad were megalomaniacs. They wanted to rule the world.
13. They both made a lot of money by ripping off other people.
14. They both established the rule that if you are a member of the religion, you can't believe in anything else. The religion was total and exclusive.
I've been reading the Koran for the second time. I think it is even more of a torture to read the second time than it was the first. But while reading it, I thought of a few more similarities between Hubbard and Mohammad:
15. They both encouraged their followers to devote their lives to the religion because that was the only way to save mankind from a terrible fate.
16. They both spurred on their followers with promises of great happiness for those who exerted themselves for the cause. And threatened them with warnings of great suffering for those who slacked.
17. They both exempted themselves from the rules they laid down for their followers.
18. The official religious doctrine changed as the personal circumstances of the founders changed.
Suppressive Person Defense League
….Despite U.S. federal officials’ extensive knowledge of Scientology’s espionage activities against the government, and their awareness of Scientology’s criminal conspiracy to deprive SP class citizens of their civil rights, in the early 1990′s the U.S. decided to cease opposing the organization, …
I think I hear you saying… If Scientology doesn’t get us, then Islam will? Unless we stay on watch? Or maybe Islam will get us first? This is really sad.
Having been a SciFi fan back in the “50s with most of Hubbard’s SciFi books, I picked up a copy of Dianetics and after the first 5 or 6 pages, trashed it. Never bothered to finish reading it. I just laughed and thought to myself, “Nobody is going to believe this trash!” But not only did people believe it but spent mega dollars doing so. I believed then and still do, that when someone or some group want to change words in our language, to mean something entirely different, to disguise the purpose of the use of words, something is seriously wrong. This is exactly what the Muslims do.
Hubbard started Scientology as a joke, just to prove he could do it, according to some of my SciFi author friends, and he laughed his head off all the way to the bank. Somewhere along the line he started taking himself seriously. Or else he picked up on Islam and started running with it just to see how diabolical he could get.
So tell me, why aren’t we as animate about stopping Scientology as we are about Islam?
k ohana
NOT ALL "Religions" are "Religions":
http://www.nmatv.com/video/618/What-Islam-Is-Not/
K Ohana,
The reason I'm not devoting much time to stopping Scientology is that there are a LOT fewer of them, the culture doesn't protect them, a lot of people already know about them, and they do not behead people.
Islam is just a much bigger and more pressing concern.
Robert Laity,
I'm glad you want to help, but your reasoning on this is flawed. You seem to think that just because something is a religion, its benign or at least apolitical.
Scientology is a religion and based on everything that is written here, I would say that there are some aspects of Scientology that clearly are not benign at all either.
Islam is a religion as well. religion is not inherently benign.
Having political aspects, doesn't make it any religion any less of a religion either. The Pharaohs of pre Islamic, pre Christian Egypt were once worshiped as gods. If Islam is not a religion, what is it? If its not a religion, that would mean that its followers are not acting in accordance with a religious belief system when they do what Islamic text tells them to do. If that's true, please explain to me how this was not motivated by religion either.
Aztec human sacrifice
Also in those cases when left wing organizations in America have done the right thing and opposed the actions of Muslims trying to subvert our constitution, its tended to be when Muslims were clearly violating the establishment clause. In other words when they were trying to merge church and state, or their case, mosque and state.
ACLU accuses MINNESOTASTAN Islamic charter school of intimidating witnesses
I never knew Scientology was so devious! I mean, I knew it had its sinister aspects and I have always had the feeling that Tom Cruise is somehow controlled by them ... but the Fair Game policy is something else!
It's a really good idea to talk about Scientology and Islam together.
Could also point out that Scientology always rushes to sue its critics, while groups like CAIR sue Islam's critics and the OIC lobbies to have all criticism of Islam silenced. In an earlier age, of course, Muhammad just killed his opponents. Hubbard never stooped that low!
I don't know if you've ever watched it, Citizen Warrior, but there is a Christian channel called ABN at abnsat.com which is devoted to exposing Islam. They often engage in debates with Muslims and have live call-in shows. They did an episode of a show where they talked about the similarities between the revelations of Joseph Smith, founder of the Mormons, and Muhammad. The similarities were astonishing. They didn't make the comparisons in order to criticise Mormonism,(which as far as I know is basically a peaceful, moderate kind of faith); they made them with the aim of showing Muslims that Muhammad's 'divine' experiences were not at all unique, and don't poing to his prophethood at all, as Muslims would have us believe they do. It's probably useful viewing if you talk to a lot of Muslims.
Thank you. I don't talk to a lot of Muslims. I concentrate on talking to the undecideds among non-Muslims:
Focus on the Undecideds
That's where we can have the most impact with the least resistence on this issue.
Damien, Islam is NOT a Religion.
What Islam is NOT:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VEXWjlgJ83E
Scientology is a philosophy which can be used to address trauma and aspects of life, whilst the Church of Scientology (Co$) is a religion currently run by the Church of Spiritual Technology (CST)- CST is a corporation Just google.
There are many thousands of Scientologists who refer to themselves as Free-Zone or independent scientologists who are no longer members of the Co$ and who continue using the technology of both Dianetics and Scientology. These free zoner's are currently the Co$'s most outspoken foes. I would encourage you to refer to the Church of Scientology and not just Scientology. Doing otherwise would be equivalent to referring to Jehovah Witnesses as Christians.
That's a good point. Yes, I should refer to the Church of Scientology from now on. The organization that applies the "fair game" policy.
I cut my investigative teeth on studying Scientology before the more pressing dangers of Islam became apparent. So I suggest, Citizen Warrior, you not take seriously the suggestion to distinguish between the Miscavige controlled ‘Church’ of Scientology and those who left this organization –the Free Zoners.
These ‘Independent Scientologists’ object to the running of the business under Miscaviges brutal behavior but they cling to Hubbard as avidly as before, as well as promoting his useless ‘Tech’. “Scientology is a philosophy which can be used to address trauma and aspects of life…" Calling Scientology a philosophy would mean calling Hubbard a philosopher. Addressing trauma and aspects of life can be done elsewhere more effectively -far away from the clever madness of Hubbards imagination.
Another similarity between Scientology and Islam is their founders’ propensity to plagiarize.
In an interesting article on Salon.com, the author says this:
The church adopted its scorched-earth policy toward critical journalists back when Paulette Cooper published “The Scandal of Scientology” in 1971; she was subsequently slapped with 19 lawsuits, as well as subjected to a harassment campaign with the stated intention of seeing her “incarcerated in a mental institution or jail.”
http://www.salon.com/2013/01/17/going_clear_scientology_exposed/?utm_source=scribol.com&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=scribol.com
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