SCI
page 1 / 6
us 04
---
title: "Understanding Scientology — us-04"
source: https://www.cs.cmu.edu/~dst/Library/Shelf/wakefield/us-04.html
retrieved: 2026-06-28
---
Understanding Scientology, by Margery
Wakefield
- Next
- Previous
Chapter 4
## TRs the Hard Way -- "Flunk for Blinking! Start!"
Public courses on TR's are NOT "softened" because they are
for the Public. Absolutely no standards are lowered. THE PUBLIC ARE
GIVEN REAL TR'S -- ROUGH, TOUGH AND HARD. Comm Courses Are Not a Tea
Party.
-- L. Ron Hubbard, Training Drills Modernized
The re-education process begins with a person's most basic
and important dealings -- the interaction with other humans and the
relationship to oneself. This undercuts any re-education of American
prisoners of war in North Korean concentration camps. Their re-education
was in terms of political loyalties. That was a light task compared to
the revisions the Comm Course makes. TR1 involves a re-learning of how
to talk; with TR2, a re-learning of how to listen; with TR3, a
relearning of how to properly ask a question; and with TR4, there is a
re-learning of how to interact with another. The student's regression to
a childlike and impressionable state is the result.
-- Ford Schwartz, ex-Scientologist
One of the questions frequently asked of ex-Scientologists, usually
by well-meaning but uninformed friends, goes something like this: "How
could a smart person like you get into something as bizarre as
Scientology?" Unfortunately, there is no simple answer to this question.
Involvement in Scientology comes about as a result of a complex
interplay of several ill-defined and esoteric factors, such as mind
control, thought reform and social conditioning.
The process of indoctrination in Scientology is both ingenious and
subtle; the initiate, believing himself to be on "the Road to Total
Freedom," is drawn further and further into the trap.
Yet a close examination of the "process" of Scientology reveals that
there are within this carefully designed system of manipulation and
control some characteristics common to all cults and other forms of mind
control.
How does the mind control within Scientology work? Let us take a
look....
Within Scientology, a new person walking through the front door for
the first time is known as "raw meat." In other words, he is food for
the sharks.
Usually a person comes into Scientology for one of three reasons: he
has heard the testimony of a (Scientologist) friend or family member, he
has read the Dianetics book and become intrigued by its global promises;
or he has come in for a free personality test offered by many
Scientology organizations as a means of attracting "raw meat."
Once inside the front door, the person may take the free personality
test, see a movie or sit through an introductory lecture, but the end
result of all three is the same. After the test, movie or lecture, the
newcomer will be interviewed by a Scientology "Registrar," whose job it
is to get the person registered (signed up and paid for) for his first
"course" in Scientology. For most people, the first course and
point of entry into Scientology is called the "Communication Course."
The way that the Registrar is trained to accomplish this task is
very interesting. He knows that he must "find the ruin" of the newcomer
seated across from him. The ruin can be anything from shyness and
inability to communicate, to marital problems, to addiction to a
substance (drugs, alcohol, food, cigarettes), to a chronic physical
problem such as asthma, or even cancer.
The Registrar knows that once he has succeeded in finding this ruin,
he has the magic ticket to getting the person into Scientology.
If the person has taken the personality test, finding the ruin is
easy -- just take the lowest score on the test and indicate to the
person that this is their ruin, then get their agreement that this item,
whatever it is, is a problem in their life.
No matter what the ruin, the prescription is the same: the
Communication Course. Through this course the person is told that he
will learn to communicate better, become happier, more confident, more
responsible, and more "able." Communication, the universal solvent,
contains the key for overcoming any problem in life. It is not unusual,
the Registrar confides, for people who have taken this course to double
or even triple their income.
Promises are made, anything is said or done to get the person to
sign up for the Communication Course.
There is a reason for this pressure, for the hard sell. It is
because, as the Registrar well knows, once the person begins this
seemingly innocuous introductory course, he will be well on his way to
becoming a Scientologist.
The cost of the course is nominal in comparison with other
Scientology courses. It might be fifty or a hundred dollars. The length
of the course is approximately two weeks, depending on frequency of
attendance.
What the new person does not know is that this introductory course
is booby-trapped; it is a literal mind-control mine-field. It is