Subject: Hubbard and Hitler, by Kim Baker
Date: Sun, 17 Sep 2000 20:33:27 -0400
Message-ID: <ssaobgi9n40593@corp.supernews.com>
http://www.users.wineasy.se/noname/hithub.htm
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REPORT: HUBBARD AND HITLER
A preliminary investigation into the socio-political
ideology of L. Ron Hubbard and Adolf Hitler
by Kim Baker
Copyright 1995
[May be re-distributed for non-commercial purposes]
INTRODUCTION:
A frequent allegation lobbied against the critics of Scientology by
the Church of Scientology is that they are Nazis, attacking the
religious freedom of Scientologists. This led me to have a look at the
writings of Adolf Hitler, to familiarise myself with them in the same
way that I am familiar with the writings of L. Ron Hubbard. I found,
upon reading Hitler's writings, a chill as I noted the similarities
in the various statements between the two men. This is a PRELIMINARY
report, the subject needs in-depth research and investigation, and I
believe there is enough material here for a whole book.
Both Hubbard and Hitler believed in a "super" race - the difference
being that Hitler believed the Master race could be achieved through
genetic control and breeding, while Hubbard believed it could be
achieved by processing out the reactive mind; both men made their
initial money by writing books; both men acquired large mansions from
where they operated; both men had contempt for the "mass" of
humanity; both men believed that they were the saviours of the master
race, and each devised a means towards acheiving the survival of the
human race - Hitler, concentrating on the German people, and
operating politically, Hubbard, concentrating on liberating thetans
from the Marcab conspiracy, and operating spiritually. Both men had a
goal : Hitler, to bring about the survival of the Master race, the
Aryans; Hubbard, to bring about spiritual freedom of thetans, by
turning them into Operating Thetans.
And both men created organisations to ensure the furthering of their
respective goals - Hitler created the National Socialist Party,
Hubbard created the Church of Scientology. Each saw their way as THE
way, and employed "the end justifies the means" to achieve their goal.
The Nazis were fighting for the German race; the Church of
Scientology is fighting to protect "spiritual freedom". This report
does not concern itself with analysing the intentions or correctness
of the stated goals of L. Ron Hubbard and Adolf Hitler - rather, it
concerns itself SOLELY with the "ends justifies the means" mechanism
of ACHIEVING a goal.
JUSTIFICATION FOR LEADERSHIP:
Both Hitler and Hubbard believed that they were exceptional
individuals, who were gifted way above the average human, and had the
vision and ability and therefore, the right to lead, autocratically.
They both believed they were able to see things that the average
human could not.
Hitler: "Most people have no imagination. They can only imagine the
future in terms of their own petty experience. The creative genius
always stands outside the circle of the experts. I have the gift of
reducing all problems to the simplest foundations." (1)
Hubbard: "In all the years I have engaged in research I have kept my
comm lines wide open for research data. I once had the idea that a
group could evolve truth. A third of a century has thoroughly
disabused me of that idea...our technology has not been discovered by
a group. True, if the group had not supported me in many ways, I
could not have discovered it either." (2)
There are numerous other quotes from both authros to further
substantiate this similarity, but since this is a preliminary report,
the quotes will be kept to single ones for now.
HUMANITY AS A GROUP
Both Hitler and Hubbard, in their different ways, appeared to have
the same scorn for the "masses", looking out at the masses as inane,
stupid, animal-like.
Hitler: "So it is only natural that when the capable intelligences of
a nation, which are always in a minority, are regarded only as of the
same value as all the rest, then genius, capacity, the value of
personality are slowly subjected to the majority, and this process is
then falsely named the rule of the people. For this is not the rule
of the people, but in reality, the rule of stupidity, of mediocrity,
of half-heartedness, of cowardice, of weakness and of inadequacy". (3)
Hubbard: "The common denominator of the group is the reactive
bank...so, constructive ideas are *individual* and seldom get broad
agreement in a human group. An individual must rise *above* an avid
craving for agreement from a humanoid group to get anything decent
done. The bank-agreement has been what has made Earth a hell." (4)
This kind of disdain for the group, of course, leads logically, to a
rejection in principle of democracy as a political system - since the
underlying assumption is that people as a group are incapable of being
rational as a group. Both the National Socialist party, and the
Church of Scientology are hierarchical organisations, where
autocratic rule is accepted, and any majority petitions, or voting by
majority, are not acceptable policy. Management is "top-down".
ON DEMOCRACY:
This topic alone, is sufficient for a whole book, comparing the
principles of democracy, as espoused by writers such as Thomas
Jefferson, Alexis de tocqueville, and many others, with the views of
Hitler, Hubbard, and many others, on the subject. For now, the
overlap in Hubbard and Hitlers' views will be identified:
Hitler: "Thus democracy will in practice lead to the destruction of a
people's true values. And this also serves to explain how it is that
people with a great past from the time when they surrender themselves
to the unlimited, democratic rule of the masses slowly lose their
former position; for the outstanding achievements of individuals
which they still possess of which could be produced in all spheres of
life are now rendered practically ineffective through the oppression
of mere numbers. " (7)
Hubbard: "As we could have gotten along without suggestions then, we
had better steel ourselves to continue to do so now that we have made
it. This point will, of course, be attacked as "unpopular",
"egotistical" and "undemocratic". It may very well be. But it is also
a survival point. And I don't see that popular measures, self-
abnegation and democracy have done anything for man but push him
further into the mud...democracy has given us inflation and income
tax." (8)
ON THE NEED TO BE RUTHLESS
Again, the issue of concern, is not whether Scientology genuinely
offers people a means to spiritual freedom, or not - but rather, the
WAY in which it is presented to the world. A goal can be creative, or
it can be destructive, but in either case, is it justified, is it
acceptable to us, as human beings, to condone and accept systems
which do not operate democratically?
Taking this rejection of democracy one step further, we now look at
both Hubbard's and Hitler's need to be ruthless, as the means of
overcoming a threat to their (and humanity's) survival.
Hitler: "We must be ruthless. We must regain our clear conscience to
ruthlessness. Only thus shall we purge our people of their softness
and sentimental philistinism. We have no more time for fine
sentiments. We must compel our people to greatness if they are to
fulfil their historic mission." (5)
Hubbard: "Never let them be half-minded about being Scientologists.
The finest organisations in history have been tough, dedicated
organisations. Not one namby-pamby bunch of pantywaiste dilettantes
have ever made anything. It's a tough universe. The social veneer
makes it seem mild. But only the tigers survive - and even they have
a hard time. We'll survive becuase we are tough and dedicated. " (6)
In both cases, Hubbard and Hitler are talking about survival, and
both see it as being under threat. Thus, the need to be ruthless is
justified.
THERE IS MUCH MORE
There is just so much more to investigate - among other things,
the fact that Hubbard named a "conspiracy of World Bankers", among
whom were named Rockefeller, in his RJ 67; while Hitler spoke often of
the "Jewish conspiracy of World bankers" ; Hitler said that money was
just something that represented confidence in an idea; Hubbard said
that Money is an "idea backed by confidence"; Hitler set up his inner
elite in the Party to keep dossiers of crimes, misdemeanours, and
wrong-doings on EACH other - as a means of securing loyalty, and each
SS officer was a control and check on the other; Hubbard ensured that
senior executives in the Church are Sec-checked regularly, and
records of these are kept in pc folders; Hitler said that in a
propaganda war, one NEVER admits when the enemy is right about
something; Hubbard said "Never defend, only counter-attack handles"...
it goes on and on.
Should anything prevent me from pursuing this research further, I have
left enough clues for others to follow it up. I would urge us to do
so, for I believe we have the root of the problem here - the issue is
not whether Scientology leads to spiritual freedom or not - the issue
is that one man, and a group of his followers, believe it does, as is
their right - but does that right then extend to ensuring the
"survival" of their religion by the policies used against its critics?
Why is it that mere criticism is seen as an attack on "spiritual
freedom"? Should the Church ever make a public statement that it
supports the right of any individual to publically criticize, analyse
and evaluate its policies and actions, WITHOUT FEAR OF ANY
REPERCUSSIONS, I believe we will have come a very, very long way
in addressing the essence of the problem.
REFERENCES:
1. Rauschning, Hermann. "Hitler speaks: A series of political
conversations with Adolf Hitler on his real
aims." London: Thornton Butterworth Ltd,
1940. p. 18.
2. Hubbard, L. Ron. "Keeping Scientology Working Series 1". HCO Policy
Letter of 7 February 1965.
3. Baynes, Ed. "The speeches of Adolf Hitler", London, Chatham House,
1941. p. 784
4. KSW
5. Rauschning, op cit. p. 26
6. KSW
7. Rauschning, op cit. p. 785
8. KSW
9. Rauschning, op cit p. 528 - 529
Recommended further reading:
Hubbard, L. Ron. Organisation Executive Course Vol 0 - Basic Staff
Hat .
Hitler, Adolf. Mein Kampf.
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From: xenu@trial.freedom.net
Subject: Hubbard on Hitler by Chris Owen et al
Date: Sun, 17 Sep 2000 20:36:03 -0400
Message-ID: <ssaog83bt79vc9@corp.supernews.com>
http://wpxx02.toxi.uni-wuerzburg.de/~krasel/CoS/germany/hitler.html Hubbard on Hitler by Chris Owen, Marion Delgado and Cornelius Krasel Preface: This document grew from two postings by Chris Owen (co@romeo-klive.nvg.ntnu.no) and Marion Delgado (fsdhp@aurora.alaska.edu). The postings have been merged; extensions and truncations have been made. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
L. Ron Hubbard on Hitler and the Germans The Church of Scientology has been accusing Germany of being "Nazi" as far back as the 1980s. The current "attack ads" being run in the International Herald Tribune are most unusual; I am unaware of any precedents. It is true that the Church of Scientology and, more specifically, L. Ron Hubbard were scathing about the Victorian and British governments following governmental action against Scientology in the 1960s. In the case of the Victorians, an entire people were condemned: "Only a society founded by criminals, organized by criminals and devoted to making people criminals, could come to such a conclusion [about Scientology] ... The foundation of Victoria consists of the riff-raff of London's slums - robbers, murderers, prostitutes, fences, thieves - the scourings of Newgate and Bedlam... the niceties of truth and fairness, of hearing witnesses and weighing evidence, are not for men whose ancestry is lost in the promiscuity of the prison ships of transportation." ["Kangaroo Court", 1967] However, there was a crucial difference. "Kangaroo Court" is a 48-page limited-edition black-bound volume with a rather fetching gold-embossed, bewigged kangaroo staring out of the front cover. It's nowhere near as high-visibility as a newspaper advertising campaign. So why the different tactics with regard to Germany? Do Scientologists "have something" about Germany? Well, yes, it seems so. A transcript of a 1961 Hubbard lecture strongly suggests that Hubbard had personal views on the subject of the Germans. It boils down to (a) that Hubbard was a Roman fighting Germans in a past life and that (b) Germany has a national problem with "havingness" which makes the country perhaps uniquely prone to neurosis and psychosis. It is probably no accident that this lecture is being re-circulated in leaflet form at this present moment. A large part of the lecture is taken up by a description of "a fellow by the name of Schicklgruber, a house painter". (The Schicklgruber story is something of a historical myth, btw; Adolf was born a Hitler). Hubbard offered a number of explanations as to why Hitler was so unpleasant - one suspects that he might have had his tongue in his cheek when he described, in a 1951 lecture, how baby Adolf was enturbulated by being jiggled up and down in the womb while listening to brass bands going "oompah-oompah-oompah" [sic] at Greater German rallies. Hitler's problem was apparently with havingness, "the ability to reach. Ability to reach equals the ability to have... The pc has to have the idea that he can reach before he can have. It's the idea that he can reach, not the possession. The idea that he can reach, not the action of reaching, which remedies havingness." Hitler had the problem of wanting "to have Earth" but he was unable to achieve this through any means but war, because he had "overts" [hidden moral transgressions, roughly] on the subject of war. Had he not turned to military means, "all [Germany] had to do was sit there and make cameras and putter with the chemicals, and she would practically have conquered Earth because nobody else was interested. But what did he do? He had to get armed men to plunge out against the German borders to wind up with five gallons of gasoline and a small square of Earth that he finally had." This lack of ability "to reach" [to achieve the goal] results in neurosis, psychosis and ultimately insanity, "the feeling that one must reach but one can't reach. One must withdraw but one can't withdraw. If you want someone to feel how it is to be insane, have him get the idea that he must reach but he can't reach... he all of a sudden for a moment will feel the glee of insanity. That's how insane people feel. It is as elementary as that." Stalin was similarly affected by this problem. The real case study, to which Hubbard returned again towards the end of the lecture, was that of the German people. He believed he had been a Roman centurion who had for a time fought in Germania; for his account of his search for his buried treasure in the Med, see "Mission into Time", 1968, or alternatively try Chapter 17 of Russell Miller's Bare-Faced Messiah.
"Let's take a third dynamic example [third dynamic = people] and we have Germany, country of forests. I know, I was there and some of you were, too. And these characters kept trying to come out of these forests. It was damp in there, you know, and all you had was mud huts and it was a kind of blooey. And they kept trying to come out of the forests and go down into the Roman Empire .... And there was an outfit called Rome. And they had some armies and they were pretty good - we were pretty good. And we just made sure these characters could never cross the Rhine. Every time they started to cross the Rhine, we knocked them back across the Rhine. We used to have punitive expeditions go in and burn a bunch of villages just to teach them that they shouldn't cross the Rhine. And they mustn't cross the Danube, and they mustn't cross the Rhine and they mustn't cross the Danube .... The prevented reach carried on as an engram. The prevented reach of the German areas of Europe. The prevented reach. And the German gradually became totally convinced that he mustn't reach Earth. And so he goes to war. 1870, 1914, 1939 .... and everybody [now] seems bound and determined to rearm Germany ... The difficulties one has had with the Germans was restraining the Germans from reaching." [All extracts from LRH, "Havingness, Quality of Reach", lecture given on 31 Dec 1961] It follows from this that the German engram of wanting to conquer the world still exists, and logically that only Scientology can remove the engram. It also strongly suggests that there is more behind the campaign against the "Fourth Reich" than simply the well-publicised opposition of the German Lander to Scientology. Of course, nobody would want to suggest that this lecture is the basic reason behind the ferocity with which the Church has sustained the attack. But its content and the timing of its reissue is possibly significant and goes some way towards explaining the broad nature of the CoS's criticism.
How did Hubbard arrive at his ideas on Germany? If one searches Hubbard's biography to find out where his attitudes toward Germany come from, one finds the following: When in secondary school in Montana, Hubbard had a German principal from Heidelberg who was a strict disciplinarian that some students said had driven Hubbard out of school (but LRH's aunt said he was just restless and dismissed the story). [Bare-Faced Messiah, chapter 2, p. 36] In his second semester in college, Hubbard got an F in German, helping to bring his average down to a D [Bare-Faced Messiah, chapter 3, p. 49]. Hubbard read psychology books during "my German and surveying lectures which bored me intensely anyway." ["The Rediscovery of the Human Soul" (Part 1/2), a scientologist web document.] In addition to not inventing much in either Scientology or Dianetics [cf. "Dianetics: from out of the Blue?" in the Arizona Skeptic, 1991], after all, Hubbard did not invent the term Scientology either. That was done by a German, Dr. A. Nordenholz, who wrote a book entitled "Scientologie" about his science of knowledge. Hubbard saw himself as an anti-German saboteur-hunter saving America by accusing a local German of being a Nazi spy and reporting to the FBI. [Bare-Faced Messiah, chapter 6, p. 87; the letter] Hubbard also saved Alaska later on in the war [Bare-Faced Messiah, chapter 6, p. 91]. In general, he saw himself as a major player in World War II, which he was not. Hubbard believed that German behavioral science and therapy was at the root of psychiatry, and that psychiatry was nothing but torture, murder, and social control masquerading as therapy, everywhere and always even though he at one time asked the Navy to pay or psychiatric treatment for him. An example from HCOPL 20 Nov 1970, "Organization Misunderstoods": "Employing persons of the Leipzig, Germany, death-camp school (psychologists, psychiatrists) to handle personal aberration is like throwing ink in water to clean it up. Governments stupidly do this and wonder why their final product as an organization is riot, war and a polluted planet. The point is not how bad psychology and psychiatry are, but that one does have to handle personal aberration in an organization and these schools were too vicious and incompetent to do so." It is inviting to speculate that Hubbard's anti-German attitudes may have been a combination of his thwarted desire to have been recognized during the war as an anti-[German]saboteur and war hero, his belief that psychiatry, which he saw as ultimately evil, was a German creation, and possibly his inner recognition that he was actually imitating the Nazis. To distance himself - at least to outsiders - he developed an extreme anti-German and anti-Nazi attitude. Hubbard regularly accused those close to him who thwarted his will of being Nazi spies. In particular, he maintained that his second, bigamous wife was a Nazi spy until his dying day. Hubbard advocated teaching the German nation to be altruistic, rendering them powerless forever (Hubbard regarded politeness and modesty as the most destructive traits an individual could acquire - in this process he wanted the Germans to become "too nice" to people low on the tone scale, and therefore, by his teachings, all become physically ill). This was his advice on how to "lick the German nation" and "fix the German nation so you would never have any more trouble with them." [All from the Personal Integrity Course] Ironically, if Germany had more of an Ayn Rand, anti-altruistic attitude to its citizens, Scientology would probably have less trouble with the German government today. Hubbard had a few positive things to say about Germans. He thought that both Germans and Japanese were racially superior to the Chinese, and proved it in Tsingtao [Bare-Faced Messiah, chapter 3, pp. 41-42]. He also said that the Versailles treaty, by disarming Germans, had made them admirable glider pilots. (This notion is apparently widely spread in U.S. glider pilot cycles.) Hubbard also had to say some positive things about the Nazis. Most importantly, he thought they were keeping Germany free of a Communist/psych plot [Manual on Brainwashing]. He thought their invention of the Hitler Youth was brilliant and to be imitated [Bare-Faced Messiah, chapter 19, p. 323]. He shared Hitler's drive for occult powers to help him dominate other men and called him a genius [Bare-Faced Messiah, chapter 19, p. 323, and chapters 6-8. Also, Gerry Armstrong's reports on Hubbard, in and out of Bare-faced Messiah, especially Hubbard's "Affirmations." Many sources have confirmed Hitler's interest in occult powers, and the similarities are brought out in, for example, the "Big Book of Conspiracies"].
What did the Church of Scientology inherit from Hubbard? The Church today still maintains that Germans invented psychiatry in 1897, because their "militaristic ambitions" gave them the "mission" to make "man more inclined to kill his fellow man" and "death more digestible." While admitting that racist and eugenics ideas proliferated worldwide during the 'teens and twenties, it states that "the Germans seemed to embrace these ideas more energetically than most." [CCHR web document on psychiatry as the originator of racism] (interestingly, while this point comes straight out of the teachings of Hubbard, the quotes from German professors in fact resemble Hubbard's writings closely. A German professor said blacks were "useless for employment other than for 'manual crafts'." [CCHR] Hubbard said blacks were too stupid to show up on E-meters. A German professor said blacks, Indians and Chinese were infantile races [CCHR]. Hubbard said the problem with China was "too many Chinks," that Chinese never bathed, that "a Chinaman can not live up to anything [unlike a German or a Japanese], he always drags it down.[BFM]" To give its accusation against psychiatry more weight, the Church of Scientology through its frontgroup, the Citizen's Commission on Human Rights (CCHR) has tried to shift some of the blame for the Holocaust from Hitler to German psychiatrists ["Psychiatrists: The Men Behind Hitler", CCHR] Scientology has come up with some really bizarre things. For example, it was claimed that Judge Breckenridge's decision in a court case came from the German S.S. via Interpol [Heber Jentzsch, quoted in BFM]. Even more fantastic sounds the allegation that "a million-plus American children and 500 thousand German children receive name brand psychotropics from Tupperware bowls in the nurse's office." Since Germany's population is less than half that of the United States, this is a way of slamming American psychiatrists -- then slamming Germany a bit harder as apparently the worst drugger of its children in the world. One reason for the Church's intense hatred of Germany may be the existence of the "Freie Zone" or Free Zone. This group is one of several "squirrel groups" which use Scientology techniques in ways not authorized by the Church's central committee. Since the Freie Zone was initially a mainly German gathering of splinter groups, RTC and Scientology were anxious to use the German police to harrass, persecute and destroy it [Free Zone FAQ]. In one case, German police arrested a framed Free Zone member on charges that she had embezzled Church funds while on staff, but the case was thrown out of court. Furthermore, Scientology's failed attempt to use the justice apparatus to destroy a religious group led German authorities to question Scientology's own standing [Jon Zegel Tape #3 - but later repudiated by the speaker in tape 4 after a "flip" back towards Church of Scientology compliance]. It is possible that this refusal to help destroy the Freie Zone made Germany more of a target than before, especially because Scientologists are very good in coming up with conspiracy theories.
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