Dianetics, L.Ron Hubbard

Bridge, 1950 (1987 revision), 628 pages, C$6.95 mmpb, ISBN 0-88404-279-0

This is how Dianetics begins:

Important Note: In reading this book, be very certain you never go past a word you do not understand. The only reason a person gives up a study or becomes confused or unable to learn is because he or she has gone past a word that was not understood. [P.viii, bold in text]

Okay, so how about the following reasons: A person may give up because the writing style is so redundant that even clear language wouldn’t help. A person might give up because the author himself doesn’t have a clue what he’s writing about. A person might give up because the writing style is juvenile despite (or even because) a pretentious vocabulary. A person might give up because they realize that what they’re reading is total garbage.

I haven’t been shy, elsewhere, in dismissing Scientology as a sham and a cult based on nonsense. The information is available elsewhere for your own edification. But even then, I wanted to give a chance to “The Book” that started it all, Dianetics, in the hope that I may be wrong.

Turns out I didn’t have the slightest clue how much crap is at the foundation of Scientology.

Readers with the internal fortitude to read the entirety of Dianetics will go through three stages. The first is bewilderment, as they’ll try to wrestle with L. Ron Hubbard’s embarrassing writing style. The opening “Important Note” is only a mere warning against the awful prose in which this piece of trash is written. Seemingly written for none-too-bright teenagers, Dianetics is nevertheless sprinkled with pretentious vocabulary that’s as ridiculous as it’s unnecessary. The book contains hundreds of footnotes referring to definitions, but when you see footnotes like “11. craven: cowardly.” [P.205] or “21. harlot: a prostitute” [P.323], it’s obvious that Elron’s just playing at sounding smart. The writing style is even worse; nonsensical phrases are written as if they meant something and then immediately followed by patronizing passages that assume that the audience is a bunch of morons.

Bafflement leaves place to amusement, and it’s not uncommon to encounter passages so insane that they can only elicit laughter. (Merely take the straight-faced citation of Shakespeare as a scientist [P.173] as a particularly incongruous passage) It turns out that according to Dianetics, all can be explained by trauma-induced “engrams”, harmful mental patterns that can be formed even inside the womb. (Allow me to cite once more: “The engram is not a memory; it is a cellular trace of recording impinged deeply into the very structure of the body itself” [P.140, italics in text]) The mind is a computer, and knowing how to debug engrams can set you free. Sounds iffy? It’s even worse in the book: “An engram received from Father beating Mother which says “Take thay! Take it, I tell you. You’ve got to take it!” means that our patient has possibly had tendencies as a kleptomaniac.” [P.281] Hubbard’s tirades against psychologists, hypnotists and “Juniors” are especially amusing, especially when you realise that Dianetics is a brain-damaged take-off on Freudian psychiatry, and the so-called treatment nothing more than a form of ill-guided hypnosis.

But as you go along, amusement will eventually turn to fierce loathing. Hubbard’s view that homosexuality is an illness “extremely dangerous to society” [P.140] is disturbing, nearly as much as his warped vision of society. According to him, it seems that all husbands beat their wives regularly, adultery is widespread (especially for pregnant women), “attempted abortion is very common” [P.211] and women generally do their best to screw up their own children.

Would you trust this man? The real shock of the book comes as you realize that, yes; people actually fall for that stuff. Even without knowing about the ludicrous “Operating Thetan” garbage of higher-level Scientology, people fell for Dianetics, maybe taken by the false impression that Elron was discussing “touchy matters” in a repressive age.

In some ways, Dianetics reminded me a little of Ayn Rand’s Atlas Shrugged, by the way a thick book can convince a lot of people. Where the comparison fails for me is that it insults Rand’s followers: While Objectivists might be selfish and rude, Scientologists are just plain nuts. There’s no real contest which group I’d rather hang with, given the unpleasant choice.

I may be restating the obvious, but Dianetics is one of the most odious books I have had the misfortune to read. Horribly written, devoid of any basis in reality as we know it and an affront to both intelligence and good taste, Dianetics is a masterpiece of crackpot literature. Stay far, far away from this book. Unless you want to double-check what I’m writing, in which case you will quickly realize that the above review barely understates the true insanity of Dianetics. Have fun…