Currently reading
The Art of Fiction: A Guide for Writers and Readers
The Name of the Rose
Ghostwritten
To the Lighthouse
The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire
Gödel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid
Perfect Wrong Note - Learning to Trust Your Musical Self
The Prince
The Varieties of Religious Experience
Twenty Questions: An Introduction to Philosophy
Inside Scientology: The Story of America's Most Secretive Religion
Once I started reading I couldn't turn away. The story of Scientology has it all--good and evil, drugs and violence and a cast of characters and organizations that put any dystopian fiction to shame. If it wasn't so awful that real people get wrapped up in this, it'd make a great movie or tv series.Scientology's "auditing" process is flat out scary. It makes such a strong appeal to the libido dominandi, the lust for power, that people seem willing to overlook all other aspects of the doctrines and history of the religion. You are promised that if you learn, and of course pay for, enough tech you will eventually become a powerful enough Thetan to do anything. Levitate stuff, control people, whatever. Fine. We all know that no amount of auditing is going to get you lifting plates out of the dishwasher without getting off the couch, but apparently (and most dangerously) auditing has enough of a kernel of truth to it to convince people to keep going with it.Eventually you become so enmeshed that it is difficult to leave the 'church' without losing friends, the significant financial investment you've made and all ties a culture that has changed almost every aspect of your lifestyle, your vocabulary not being the least of it. I doubt that Scientology is a net loss for everyone that gets involved, but it seems a lot like cocaine. There are apparently a few people that use it and never get addicted, they just enjoy the highs, but it's not something you'd ever give your kids to see if they're one of those people.