Book review: 'Inside Scientology' by Janet Reitman

Although the compelling, well-researched book lacks blockbuster revelations, it mostly delivers on Reitman's promise of an "objective modern history" of the church.
Kim Christensen
kim.christensen@latimes.com
July 4, 2011
http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/news/books/la-et-book-20110704,0,6684792.story

Small wonder that L. Ron Hubbard had the creative chops to parlay his 1950s self-help system, Dianetics, into a worldwide religion — and a very lucrative one at that. Hubbard was, after all, a science-fiction writer, a dreamer, a charming teller of tales and the inventor of much of his own history: He fabricated or embellished aspects of his military service, education and personal adventures, not least of them his purported run-in with a polar bear in the Aleutians.

His most famous invention, of course, was Scientology, a controversial religion-without-a-deity that has its own "technology," galactic story line and quirky vocabulary. It teaches that spiritual freedom — the state of "clear" — can be reached through one-on-one counseling known as auditing, aided by a polygraph-like device called an "e-meter." The sessions, along with extensive training courses, can cost Scientologists hundreds of thousands of dollars.

That Scientology has endured for six decades, attracting generations of devotees despite a legacy of secrecy and widespread allegations of intimidation and abuse of its own members, is in itself remarkable. Then again, as Janet Reitman demonstrates in "Inside Scientology: The Story of America's Most Secretive Religion," the church has always found a way, through a "combination of flexibility and mystery" to morph with the times: In its early days in Los Angeles, it reached out to free spirits and hippies, later to celebrities and, more recently, to African Americans and legislators.

Reitman's book, which grew out of an article the Rolling Stone contributing editor wrote for the magazine in 2006, is a well-researched and compelling read, especially for those who start with little knowledge about Scientology, Hubbard or his successor, David Miscavige. While it lacks blockbuster revelations, it mostly delivers on Reitman's promise of an "objective modern history" of the church.

Intertwined with the church's history is that of Miscavige, who spent his teenage years as one of Hubbard's cadre of young aides. He was 25 when he assumed control in 1986, when "LRH" died as a paranoid recluse on a ranch in Creston, Calif., under investigation by the IRS. Miscavige went on to be instrumental in ending "the war" with the IRS and securing the tax-exempt status that deemed Scientology a church, a financial boon.

Sometimes called "the pope of Scientology," Miscavige in the book lives up to previous reports depicting him as a small but intimidating leader, an occasionally unhinged little tyrant alleged to have frequently whomped his top execs. He is said to live much higher on the hog than anyone else, including the elite "Sea Org" members posted to Scientology's international headquarters, or "Int," a former resort near Hemet. Even his beagles, Jelly and Safi, who wore "tiny blue sweaters with commander's bars," fare better than people who have signed billion-year contracts with the church: "Miscavige was known to make his staffers salute the dogs, who held ranks higher than those of many people on the base."

Much of Reitman's material is culled from, and duly credited to, earlier works including Hubbard's own writings, books by his critics and newspaper stories stretching from the Los Angeles Times' groundbreaking series in 1990 to the St. Petersburg Times' multi-part exposé in 2009.

But Reitman obviously has done her own extensive legwork too, digging deep into the details of the death of Lisa McPherson, a "clear" Scientologist who suffered a mental breakdown and died after 17 days in isolation in the church's care in Clearwater, Fla., its spiritual headquarters. Nearly 16 years later, her death is still a rallying point for Scientology's critics.

Reitman also offers up the insights of members from the church's past and present, giving the material a fresh feel and sense of fairness. She balances high-ranking defectors' eyewitness accounts of oppression, abuse and escape with the observations of practicing Scientologists who come across as believers but not robots — and ask some pretty good questions of their own.

"All the people who've come out and told the press these things were in a position to do something about it — to change things," said Natalie Walet, a young Scientologist who doesn't excuse the abuses. "Instead, they stood there and watched. Why?"

It would be easy to deride or dismiss many of Scientology's more eccentric elements, such as the long-held secret story of Xenu, the evil tyrant leader of the "Galactic Confederation." Only after reaching an advanced level are Scientologists taught that he killed his enemies with hydrogen bombs 75 million years ago and then captured their souls, or thetans, and electronically implanted them with false concepts. These altered thetans later glommed on to human bodies, the story goes, causing spiritual harm and havoc for mankind.

Even Tom Cruise, the most famous Scientologist, "freaked out" and was like, 'What the …?''' when he learned of it, according to one former member. But in a nice touch of fair play, another ex-member reminds readers that more mainstream religions also have stories that require a long leap of faith. Water into wine? Raising the dead? How plausible are those?

Hubbard made many claims during his life, but parting the Red Sea was not among them.

Strange Disappearances at the Cursed Devil’s Gate Reservoir

http://www.weirdus.com/states/california/unexplained_phenomena/devils_gate_reservoir/index.php

This dry, brush-filled flood channel in Pasadena is appropriately named. It’s the scene of some truly diabolical events.

The grim story begins on August 5, 1956, just a few miles east of Devil’s Gate. That day, Donald Lee Baker, a 13-year old Azusan, went for a bike ride with Brenda Howell, 11, from Fort Bragg, who was visiting relatives next door. They headed for the San Gabriel Reservoir that Sunday morning, and were last seen alive that evening.

When they failed to return on Sunday night, their frightened parents notified police, who called out an all-points search for the missing children. Azusa police, Los Angeles County Sheriff’s deputies, and hundreds of volunteers combed the suburbs and foothills of the San Gabriel Valley, while Navy frogmen plumbed the 60-foot depths of the reservoir. The only traces of the children found were their bicycles, and Brenda’s jacket.

Donald and Brenda’s disappearance was unsolved until thirteen years later, when a man named Mack Ray Edwards confessed to kidnapping and killing the pair, along with three other children. Edwards, who had helped build Southern California’s freeways, had hidden his victims’ bodies by planting them in highway land that he would pave with asphalt the next day. Convicted and sentenced to death at his own request, Edwards cheated San Quentin’s “Green Room” by hanging himself in his cell in 1970.

But two other young victims are still unaccounted for today, having disappeared in this area under even stranger circumstances. On March 23, 1957, eight-year old Tommy Bowman was hiking on a trail above Devil’s Gate with his family, when he ran a few yards ahead of the others, rounded a corner…and disappeared.

When Tommy’s family searched the brush and repeatedly called his name to no avail, a 400-member search party was sent out, complete with helicopters, mounted patrols, bloodhounds, and professional wilderness trackers. After scouring the entire area for a week, hacking through chaparral and delving crevices and holes just off the trail, the search was called off. Rumors of kidnappers and child molesters were thoroughly investigated, and discounted. Tommy’s disappearance has never been explained or solved.

Yet another child followed Tommy into oblivion just three years later. Six-year old Bruce Kremen was on a hike with his YMCA group not far from where Tommy Bowman vanished, when he began to tire and fall behind the others. Thinking the boy was winded by the exercise and the high altitude, the group leader told Bruce to return to the camp––in plain sight just 300 yards away––and rest. The adult leader then watched Bruce walk the length of the wide, marked trail. When the boy was just yards away from camp, the man rejoined the other children.

But something got Bruce Kremen in those last few steps between the trailhead and the camp. He never made it back, and was never seen again.

Again, a massive search party tore the region apart. Again, there was no evidence of kidnapping or molestation. And again, the San Gabriels claimed a young victim, leaving no clues, no suspects, no remains––and no solution to the cases to this day.

The brutal murders of Donald Lee Baker and Brenda Howell, and the eerie disappearances of Tommy Bowman and Bruce Kremen, led some people to speculate that a curse or jinx hung over Devil’s Gate Reservoir. Much of this speculation centered on the activities of one John Whiteside (Jack) Parsons, co-founder of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory and resident of nearby Pasadena.

Parsons, a brilliant, self-taught rocket scientist whom Werner von Braun called the true founder of the American space program, was also a first-rank occultist. A devotee of Aleister Crowley’s teachings, Parsons joined the infamous English occultist’s Ordo Templi Orientis society in 1941, quickly taking over the group’s Agape Lodge in Los Angeles.

Parsons’ mansion on South Orange Grove Avenue in Pasadena became the center of Southern California occult bohemia in the 1940s. Notorious for its semi-public “sex magick” ceremonies, chez Parsons was for awhile the home of ex-Navy officer and science-fiction writer L. Ron Hubbard. Parsons saw Hubbard, the future founder of Scientology, as a natural magician, and worked with him in a series of strange rituals designed to create a “moonchild”––a sort of anti-Messiah that would overthrow Judeo-Christian civilization, and lead Earth into a new Aeon.

The rituals, which took place in the Southern California outback in late 1946, were said to have opened a portal to another dimension that’s since been a point of entry for all sorts of strange entities. Some occult authors have hinted that the portal is in the Devil’s Gate region, and that the negative energies and beings that pass through it are responsible for the murders and disappearances.

It’s as good an explanation as any other for these tragic, tantalizing events and enigmas.

Kool Website of the Week: GoldenAgeStories.com

http://www.goldenagestories.com

Robalini's Review: Whatever the merits of Scientology, L. Ron Hubbard was sure one hell of pulp writer. Check out this site for a treasure trove of resources for fans of Hubbard's classic pre-Dianetics fictional yarns...

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