Let's Sell These People a Piece of Blue Sky: Hubbard, Dianetics and Scientology (36 page)

The first Advanced Organization opened aboard the
Royal
Scotman
, to deliver these OT levels on New Year's Day, 1968. It was soon
transferred to shore in Alicante, and thence to Edinburgh. The Advanced Orgs
(or AOs) were, and remain, the only Church Organizations to deliver the
Operating Thetan levels. From the beginning, AOs were supposed to be run solely
by Sea Org members.

Meanwhile, a Scientology magazine published an interview
with an unlikely convert
¹⁸
William Burroughs, author of the
controversial
Naked Lunch
, had trained as a Scientology Auditor, and was
a Grade 5, or “Power,” release. Burroughs said: “I am convinced that whatever
anyone does, he will do it better after processing [auditing]” Burroughs later
became Clear number 1163, of which he said: “It feels marvelous! Things you've
had all your life, things you think nothing can be done about - suddenly
they're not there anymore! And you know that these disabilities cannot return.”
¹⁹

Burroughs’ enthusiasm for Scientology did not last, and his
later work is peppered with abstruse attacks on Scientology. He even wrote a
book called
Naked Scientology
.

Scientology magazines were filled with news and photographs
of smiling musicians, authors, models, dancers, doctors, and scientists who
espoused Scientology. Jazz composer Dave Brubeck's son went to Edinburgh to
persuade a friend to leave the dreaded cult, and ended up joining the Sea Org.
²⁰
Actress Karen Black waxed lyrical about the benefits of auditing to other
Hollywood stars. Bobby Richards, who orchestrated the music for
Goldfinger
,
said “I always get much more out of Scientology than I expect.”
²¹
Scientologist Richard Grumm worked on the Mariner space program.
²⁰

In this climate, Hubbard decided to prove the validity of
“past lives” by taking the
Avon River
on a tour of the haunts of his
previous incarnations. The “Whole Track Mission” was recorded in the book
Mission
into Time
. Hubbard would make a plasticine model of an area before sending
in a team to verify his predictions. They allegedly opened sealed caves, and
found there what Hubbard had predicted. A variety of legends sprang out of the
expedition. Among them that Hubbard was relocating caches of gold he had hidden
in former life-times, especially as a Roman tax-collector (it has been
suggested that his earlier trip to Rhodesia was to recover the fortune buried
in his incarnation as Cecil Rhodes). Far more exciting, and less widely known,
however, is the space-ship legend.

During the “Mission,” Hubbard showed the crew some notes
about their next destination. It was a hidden “space-station” in northern Corsica,
“almost at the junction of the mainland and the northern peninsula and possibly
slightly west of the island's meridian,” according to one member of the
“Mission,” where a huge cavern, hidden among the rocks in mountainous terrain,
housed an immense Mothership and a fleet of smaller spacecraft. The spaceships
were made of a non-corrosive alloy, as yet undiscovered by earthlings. Only one
palm print would cause a slab of rock to slide away, revealing these chariots
of the gods. The owners of this machinery not only knew about reincarnation,
they had even predicted Hubbard's palm print.
²²

Tales about this discovery were rife among Sea Org members.
Hubbard was going to use the Mothership to escape from Earth. The ship was
protected by atomic warheads. It awaited the return of a great leader, and
there were rumors about the Space Org. On the day Hubbard was to be put to this
final test, the Mission was abandoned because of the trouble the Scotman was
generating with the port authorities in Valencia. Hubbard never returned to
collect the Mothership.

The
Royal Scotman
had been asked several times to
shift its berth. The ship's Port Captain steadfastly refused. What the
Scientologists call a “flap” occurred, and the authorities, probably
exacerbated by this quite usual display of Sea Org arrogance, had to be
placated. A new captain was appointed, who did well for a short while, until
the Scotman dragged anchor and nearly ran aground. Commodore Hubbard stayed on
the
Avon River
, promoting his wife, Mary Sue, to the rank of Captain,
and giving her command of the larger ship. The fleet moved to Burriana, a few
miles along the Spanish coast, for repairs to the
Royal Scotman
. This
time the
Royal Scotman
ran aground. The Commodore gravely assigned the
ship, and all who sailed on her, the Ethics Condition of Liability.

For several weeks a peculiar spectacle could be seen
travelling up and down the Spanish coast
²³
: a ship with filthy gray
tarpaulins tied about its funnel. Every crew member wore a gray rag. It is
rumored that even Mary Sue's corgi dog, Vixie
²⁴
wore a gray rag
about her neck.
²⁵
Mary Sue suffered the long hours, the poor diet
and the exhausting labor with the rest of the crew. Finally, the
Royal
Scotman
rejoined the
Avon River
in Marseilles. The crew paraded,
sparkling in new uniforms, and the Commodore held a ceremony to upgrade the
ship from Liability, so ending the “Liability Cruise.” Soon after, Hubbard
moved with his top Aides to the
Royal Scotman
, which became the Flagship
of the Sea Org fleet. Scientologists called it simply “Flag.”

In 1968, Hubbard's Ethics was put into action with the
chain-locker punishment. The chain-locker is “a dark hole where the anchor
chains are stored; cold, wet and rats,” to quote one ex-Sea Org officer.
²⁶
The lockers are below the steering in the bowels of the ship. A tiny man-hole
gives access, and they are unlit. When a crew-member was in a low enough Ethics
Condition, he or she would be put in the chain locker for up to two weeks.
²⁷

John McMaster says a small child, perhaps five years old,
was once consigned to the chain locker. He says she was a deaf mute, and that
Hubbard had assigned her an Ethics condition for which the formula is “Find out
who you really are.” She was not to leave the chain locker until she completed
the formula by writing her name. McMaster says Hubbard came to him late one
night in some distress, and asked him to let the child out. He did, cursing
Hubbard the while.
²⁸
Another witness claims that a three year old
was once put in the locker.
²⁹

Another Ethics Condition had the miscreant put into “old
rusty tanks, way below the ship, with filthy bilge water, no air, and hardly
sitting height ... for anything from 24 hours to a week ... getting their
oxygen via tubes, and with Masters-at-Arms [Ethics Officers] checking outside
to hear if the hammering continued. Food was occasionally given in buckets,” according
to a former Sea Org executive.
³⁰

The miscreants were kept awake, often for days on end. Their
food was lowered to them in a bucket, and they ate with their hands. They
chipped away at the rust unceasingly. As another witness has tactfully put it,
“there were no bathroom facilities.”

While these “penances” were being doled out, the first
“overboard” occurred. The ships were docked in Melilla, Morocco, in May 1968.
One of the ship's executives was ashore and noticed that the hawsers holding
the Scotman and the
Avon River
were crossed. He undid a hawser, and
found himself grappling with the full mass of an unrestrained ship as it
drifted away from the dock.
³¹

Mary Sue Hubbard ordered that the officer be hurled from the
deck. There was a tremendous crash as he hit the water. Ships have a “rubbing
strake” beneath the water-line to keep other ships at bay in a collision. The
overboarded officer had hit the steel rubbing strake! The crew peered anxiously
over the side waiting for the corpse to float to the surface.

The bedraggled officer was surprised when he walked up the
gangplank and found the crew still craning over the far side of the ship.
Fortunately for Mrs. Hubbard's conscience, and the failing public repute of
Scientology, the officer concerned was not only a good swimmer, but also expert
at Judo. Most fortunate of all, he had seen the rubbing strake, and the
explosive crash was caused when he thrust himself away as he fell. For a short
time, overboarding was abandoned.

It is difficult to comprehend the stoicism with which some
Scientologists suffered the Ethics Conditions. It is remarkable even to many
ex-Scientologists. It is even more remarkable that most Scientologists have
probably never heard of the chain locker, bilge tank or overboarding
punishments. Scientologists were used to Hubbard's auditing techniques, where
they did not question the reasoning behind a set of commands, but simply
answered or carried them out. Many spent their time trying to keep out of
trouble, or, when trouble unavoidably came, getting out of the Ethics Condition
quickly by whatever means they could.

Most Sea Org members accepted these bizarre practices out of
devotion to Hubbard. It is impossible to add to these stark details a convincing
picture of Hubbard's charisma. The Sea Org saw themselves as the elite, the
chosen few, who would return life after life to rejoin their leader in the
conquest of suffering. Hubbard released religious and military fervors in his
disciples.

In East Grinstead the farce of Scientology Ethics, and its
applicability in dealing with non-Scientologists, continued with a petulant
letter to 22 local businesses
³²
:

As a result of a recent survey of shops in the East Grinstead
area, your shop together with a handful of others, has been declared out of
bounds for Scientologists ... These shops have indicated that they do not wish
Scientology to expand in East Grinstead and we are, therefore, relieving them
of the painful experience of taking our money.

The banned “shops” included a solicitor's firm. Another
business was “highly commended” for displaying Scientology books, in the face
of local criticism.

Hubbard's Public Relations and Ethics “technologies” began
to rebound in Britain. In July 1968, the British government finally made its
move.

1.
   
Hubbard, Introduction to Scientology Ethics.

2.
   
News of the World, 28 July 1968; Evans, p.88; author interview with
witness.

3.
   
HCOPL “Conditions Awards and Penalties”, 27 September 1967.

4.
   
Sunday Mirror, 24 December 1967.

5.
   
Author's correspondence with Hana Whitfield.

6.
   
HCOPL 6 October 1967.

7.
   
HCOPL of 18 October 1967.

8.
   
Garrison, Playing Dirty, p.75.

9.
   
Foster report, paragraph 216.

10.
 
Sunday
Mirror 18 November 1967.

11.
 
see
5.

12.
 
Foster,
paragraph 216.

13.
 
see
5.

14.
 
The
People, 18 February 1968.

15.
 
Articles
of OTC.

16.
 
CSC
v Internal Revenue Commissioner, ruling of 24 September 1984.

17.
 
Author's
interview with former Sea Org executive, OJ Roos.

37.
 
The Auditor no.32,
p.5.

38.
 
The Auditor no.39.

39.
 
The Auditor no.39.

40.
 
The Auditor no.37.

18.
 
see
5.

19.
 
Author
correspondence with Hana Whitfield; author interview with a former Sea Org
executive.

41.
 
The Auditor no.43.

20.
 
Cyril
Vosper, The Mindbenders, p.178.

21.
 
Author's
interview with former Sea Org executive.

22.
 
ibid
;
Tonja Burden affidavit, 1982.

23.
 
Author
interview with McMaster, May 1984.

24.
 
Author
interview with former Sea Org executive. There is disagreement about the age of
the youngest child put into the chain locker. There is, however, no
disagreement among the witnesses to the fact that children were put in the
chain locker at Hubbard's order.

25.
 
Author's
interview.

26.
 
Author's
interview with the subject of the overboarding.

27.
 
Copy
of letter; also Sunday Express 14 July 1968.

Chapter twenty

“I find it almost incredible that a
Minister and his civil servants should be so reckless as to publish a White
Paper and to seek mercilessly to expose the Scientologists. It will certainly
advertise them even more widely and give them the fame they want.”

—Richard
Crossman,
The Diaries of a Cabinet Minister

On July 25, 1968, Kenneth Robinson, the British Minister of
Health, made a statement in Parliament about Scientology. Having called it a
“pseudo-philosophical cult,” he reminded the House of his earlier pronouncement:

Although this warning received a good deal of public
notice at the time, the practice of scientology has continued, and indeed
expanded, and Government Departments, Members of Parliament and local authorities
have received numerous complaints about it.

The Government is satisfied ... that scientology is
socially harmful. It alienates members of families from each other and
attributes squalid and disgraceful motives to all who oppose it; its
authoritarian principles and practice are a potential menace to the personality
and well-being of those so deluded as to become its followers; above all, its
methods can be a serious danger to the health of those who submit to them.
There is evidence that children are now being indoctrinated.