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room. There is also a life-sized bronze bust of Hubbard near the
entrance to the room.
In the back of the room, Mary observes students sitting in pairs,
facing each other and staring silently into each other's eyes. Another
pair of students are staring at each other in the same way, but one of
the students is saying obscene things to the other. Mary feels
uncomfortable about this, but she doesn't want to say anything because
she is new on the course and she thinks that although some things in
this class seem strange, she must make an effort to understand what is
happening. Besides, it doesn't seem to be bothering anyone else.
Mary, like all of us at times, has a tendency to devalue her own
perceptions and feelings in favor of the perceptions and feelings of
others. She doesn't want to cause trouble or make a scene.
At 10:30pm (this is an evening course), the Supervisor calls out in
a loud voice, "That's it. End of course. Gather up your materials and
prepare for after-class muster."
There is a flurry of noise and activity as books are closed and the
students in the back of the room pull their chairs up to the tables in
the center of the room.
Mary is given a piece of graph paper and she is shown how to graph
her "stats" (statistics) for the night. She adds up the points of all
the items she has completed on the checksheet and marks the total on her
graph.
Then the Supervisor asks the students to share their "wins." Various
students volunteer to give their testimonies about what they have
learned this night on the course.
The Supervisor announces that there is a new student on the course.
She introduces Mary. Everyone claps as Mary blushes. Mary has never been
applauded before for anything she has done. The Supervisor asks Mary to
share her "wins" from her first night on the course.
"Well," Mary begins, "it's all very new to me. I hope I'm going to
learn a lot here. It just seems different at first. But everyone has
been very friendly, and I'm looking forward to learning what this is all
about."
There is more applause. The student on Mary's right puts his hand on
Mary's shoulder. "Welcome," he says approvingly, looking directly into
her eyes and smiling.
On the way out of the building, several students stop Mary and tell
her how glad they are that she is on the course. "You'll really like
it," they assure her. "And this stuff really works, you'll see!"
In her car on the way home, Mary feels some stirring of hope as she
thinks about her husband. Maybe this will help us, she thinks wistfully.
Certainly nothing else has. As she thinks back over the events of the
night, one thing seems to stick in her mind. Everyone in Scientology
seems so friendly. And happy. They seemed genuinely happy. Maybe there
is something to Scientology after all....
Mary has just taken her first step toward becoming a Scientologist.
As the newcomer to Scientology begins the Communication Course, he
or she learns that in addition to the bulletins, the course consists of
a series of drills, called "training routines," designed to train a
person to "communicate better." What the person does not know, or even
suspect, is that these drills are actually a sophisticated set of mind
control processes designed to convert the newcomer into a confirmed
Scientologist.
In the first training routine, called "TR-0" for Training Routine
Zero, two students sit in chairs facing each other, knees almost
touching, and they look into each other's eyes without blinking for a
prolonged period of time. If either student blinks, moves, twitches, or
has tearing of the eyes, etc., he or she will be flunked and told to
restart the drill.
During TR-0, a student may hallucinate, and will almost certainly
experience some sort of
dissociation; however, the drill is continued until the student can
effortlessly maintain an unblinking stare with his partner.
In the second training routine, called TR-0 "bullbaited," the
students do TR-0 as in the first drill, but one of the two students must
"bullbait" the other and "flatten his buttons." In other words, the
student is to say or do anything at all to make the other student react,
and then flunk the student for reacting. This drill is continued until
each student can confront anything the partner says or does without
reacting.
In doing TR-0 "bullbaited," students commonly use explicitly sexual
material to provoke a reaction. This can include physically touching the
student. Verbal abuse is also condoned in this drill, with the
justification that such abuse occurs in life and in "auditing," and the
student must be prepared to "handle" it.
Aha! Suddenly a hidden agenda has appeared on this course, and it is
surprising that so few students on the Communication Course recognize it
when it does occur.
The person coming into Scientology has been sold the Communication
Course to solve problems in his life. Yet, the wording in the
instructions for the TRs, or training routines, suddenly makes reference
to the fact that the new student is doing these drills to become more