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The Basics Hot

November 04, 2012    
 
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The Basics was a re-re-release of basic LRH books coupled with lectures at greatly inflated prices. An entire CD manufacturing line was installed at Golden Era Productions despite the fact that CDs were already obsolete! CDs cost Golden Era Productions 12 cents each to produce. They were in turn sold for 10,000% of their cost (100 times their value). Note: a normal manufacturing mark up is 100%. Considering Scientology's humanitarian objective and its non-profit status, what should have sold for a couple of bucks, sold for $120. But it's even worse than that. CDs were already obsolete when the Basics were released. instead of costing $0.12 per CD to product, and a few dollars per book, it all could have cost zero and simply be downloaded directly to smart phones, iPods, Kindles, etc.

The ONLY reason the release was not handled in an on-purpose fashion was pure financial greed. As a result the full Basics package was priced at around $3,000 and thousands of packages were sold, so many that many people simply left the Church in disgust and threw their books into the trash where they wound up in landfills.

David Miscavige has several times re-released LRH books and each time it was done with an explanation that mistakes in transcribing made previous versions no good. Now of course we know even these latest books have turned out to be missing elements. So they will have to be redone again one day — hopefully after David Miscavige is gone. And then they should be released on Kindle and through download for as cheap as possible to enable more people to be able to afford them.

The correct purpose for pricing is that price that enables the organization to survive while also enabling a maximum number of people to obtain the information.

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I strenuously object to the way Miscavige promoted the idea that anyone reading LRH's books before the Basics came out must have had MUs (allegedly the transcriptionist's). The fact that Ron was alive then and would surely have been aware if the books were not what he intended cuts no ice with Miscavige. I don't buy the argument that Ron never reviewed his books after they were published. I believe the real reason for the Basics was so that Miscavige could position himself as a savior and establish his control over Scientologists.

But absolutely the worst thing Miscavige did was to eliminate the inexpensive DMSMH paperback. The reason was supposedly that Dianetics deserved more than to be presented in a cheap paperback. But that cheap paperback was many folks' first introduction to Dianetics and Scientology. People who will buy an $8 paperback at a fair or on the street would never consider paying $25 or $35. Miscavige totally cut Dianetics' reach into the society.
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Reviewed by Jenni September 12, 2014
Top 50 Reviewer  -   View all my reviews (5)

My Views on the Basics

I strenuously object to the way Miscavige promoted the idea that anyone reading LRH's books before the Basics came out must have had MUs (allegedly the transcriptionist's). The fact that Ron was alive then and would surely have been aware if the books were not what he intended cuts no ice with Miscavige. I don't buy the argument that Ron never reviewed his books after they were published. I believe the real reason for the Basics was so that Miscavige could position himself as a savior and establish his control over Scientologists.

But absolutely the worst thing Miscavige did was to eliminate the inexpensive DMSMH paperback. The reason was supposedly that Dianetics deserved more than to be presented in a cheap paperback. But that cheap paperback was many folks' first introduction to Dianetics and Scientology. People who will buy an $8 paperback at a fair or on the street would never consider paying $25 or $35. Miscavige totally cut Dianetics' reach into the society.

Where I stand on key issues

I am a
Independent Scientologist
The leader of the Church of Scientology, David Miscavige, is a...
Suppressive person (sociopath)

Pros and Cons (optional)

Pros
The Basics program did get more people reading the books, which in and of itself was a good thing.
Cons
The over-emphasis on being a "Basics completion" distracted Scientologists from their own programs.
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In hindsight I have had to watch the demise of the church I really thought I'd spend the rest of my life in and it saddens me. One man aided by deluded others have destroyed the vehicle to which delivered the holesum phiosophy of L Ron Hubbard.
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Reviewed by fcdcclassof74 September 20, 2013
Top 50 Reviewer  -   View all my reviews (3)

Issue of Responsility

In hindsight I have had to watch the demise of the church I really thought I'd spend the rest of my life in and it saddens me. One man aided by deluded others have destroyed the vehicle to which delivered the holesum phiosophy of L Ron Hubbard.

Where I stand on key issues

I am a
Independent Scientologist
The leader of the Church of Scientology, David Miscavige, is a...
Suppressive person (sociopath)

Pros and Cons (optional)

Pros
Truth through exposure is in my most humble of opinions necessary.
Cons
Unfortunately David Miscavidge is guilty of going off the rails on the ninth dynamic-MONEY as per the Communication lectures.
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I myself gained a lot by the Basics. The studying of one tape after the other was giving me a certainty of the way LRH was and thought. Actually to have studied the Basics gave me the ability to find out what of the CofS-activities was truely per LRH and what not.
When I encountered suppression / attacks / manipulative talks to do things differently, they couldn´t get me anymore, since I KNEW that the things, they wanted to convince me of, was NOT LRH. It didn´t matter to me anymore if I could quote the precice HCOB or HCO PL, I just KNEW: LRH´s approach would have been totally different. So the Basics helped me a lot to de-PTS from the Church :-).
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Reviewed by Chris from Germany November 21, 2012
Top 50 Reviewer  -   View all my reviews (7)

Intensive Basics-Study helped knowing LRH too good to stay deceived.

I myself gained a lot by the Basics. The studying of one tape after the other was giving me a certainty of the way LRH was and thought. Actually to have studied the Basics gave me the ability to find out what of the CofS-activities was truely per LRH and what not.
When I encountered suppression / attacks / manipulative talks to do things differently, they couldn´t get me anymore, since I KNEW that the things, they wanted to convince me of, was NOT LRH. It didn´t matter to me anymore if I could quote the precice HCOB or HCO PL, I just KNEW: LRH´s approach would have been totally different. So the Basics helped me a lot to de-PTS from the Church :-).

Where I stand on key issues

I am a
Independent Scientologist
The leader of the Church of Scientology, David Miscavige, is a...
Suppressive person (sociopath)

Pros and Cons (optional)

Pros
By the Basics-Movement many also old Scientologists were brought to the point to stick their nose into LRH-Materials, maybe for the first time ever, maybe again after a long time of not having studied anything.
PCs who have studied a lot REALLY make it up the Bridge much faster, since they know what they have to look for in session, and the study-time itself can help blow masses already.
Cons
Those who owned LRH-Materials before were told to throw away the former "squirrel-editions". I myself have not owned too many books, even less lectures before, but those I had I´ve not thrown away. The former books have helped me to become a Scientologist - they are at least good enough for others to become Scientologists, too. For the sake of FDSing it is also vital to keep an "old" copy, no matter if the former edition was more or less "standardly".
So the throwing away of old materials made no sense - and the reason why became more and more obvious to me: The Basics-movement was indeed a lot money-motivated, for sure not by all involved in it, but...
When the Basics are a MUST before any Academy-training, as it is now, then it is definitely a stop to making Auditors. Fortunately I have been an Auditor BEFORE I studied my Basics, so I had good benefits from the Basics rather than a stop, but this doesn´t, of course, apply to the majority of people.
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At the end of 2007 I did a word-by-word, page-by-page comparison of the 2007 edition of Scn 8-8008 and the 1989/90 edition. People were assuming that DM had screwed up Hubbard's works and the reissue was purely a money grab, but no-one had presented any actual evidence. So I eyeballed a new book for myself and meticulously started to go through it, recording my findings.

The presentation in the 2007 edition is much flashier, although the white paper it too bright for easy studying. Because of the weird spacing and borders, trying to OCR (optical character recognition) that edition is impossible, although one shouldn't be doing that anyway. :). The chapter headings and sub-headings are a dog's breakfast in the earlier edition, and look fine in the 2007 edition.

There are a few minor changes, where the newer version makes *less* sense than the older. For example:

(Old edition): (p.34) "The higher the frequency, the shorter the wavelength is considered to be on the gradient scale of wavelengths. The lower the frequency, the longer the wavelength is considered to be on a gradient scale."

New edition: (p.32) "The larger the number, the lower the wavelength is considered to be on the gradient scale of wavelengths. The smaller the number, the higher the wavelength is considered to be on the gradient scale."

After three chapters of microscopic examination, I wrote: "OK, I think I've compared enough in these three chapters to make some general comments. If you are a serious Scientologist, who uses this book for reference, whether a churchie or not, my opinion is that you should get this new book. Buy it on eBay or something if you don't want to pay the CofS directly. The earlier copy is very different in places, with different meanings, not just different words. The omitted passages may appear later in the book, or they may not, but I am not talking about those passages particularly.

What I find very interesting seems to be exemplified by that quote about wavelengths/frequencies. The prior edition is much more clear than the revised edition, where Hubbard garbles the terms. No way would diehard SO members [actually DM personally, I later heard] revise it like that unless it is genuinely true to the original dictation!

Overall, there are many minute changes with regard to punctuation, but (in my opinion), all for the better in regard to making the text more comprehensible. If DM had wanted to worsen the text throughout, he wouldn't have done all that. So, counter-intuitively, generalizing from the actual hands-on examination I did do, I will assume that the 2007 books are actually closer to what Hubbard dictated than earlier editions.
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2.0
Reviewed by Paul Adams November 11, 2012
#1 Reviewer  -   View all my reviews (47)

Financial rip-off, no question. But editorially?

At the end of 2007 I did a word-by-word, page-by-page comparison of the 2007 edition of Scn 8-8008 and the 1989/90 edition. People were assuming that DM had screwed up Hubbard's works and the reissue was purely a money grab, but no-one had presented any actual evidence. So I eyeballed a new book for myself and meticulously started to go through it, recording my findings.

The presentation in the 2007 edition is much flashier, although the white paper it too bright for easy studying. Because of the weird spacing and borders, trying to OCR (optical character recognition) that edition is impossible, although one shouldn't be doing that anyway. :). The chapter headings and sub-headings are a dog's breakfast in the earlier edition, and look fine in the 2007 edition.

There are a few minor changes, where the newer version makes *less* sense than the older. For example:

(Old edition): (p.34) "The higher the frequency, the shorter the wavelength is considered to be on the gradient scale of wavelengths. The lower the frequency, the longer the wavelength is considered to be on a gradient scale."

New edition: (p.32) "The larger the number, the lower the wavelength is considered to be on the gradient scale of wavelengths. The smaller the number, the higher the wavelength is considered to be on the gradient scale."

After three chapters of microscopic examination, I wrote: "OK, I think I've compared enough in these three chapters to make some general comments. If you are a serious Scientologist, who uses this book for reference, whether a churchie or not, my opinion is that you should get this new book. Buy it on eBay or something if you don't want to pay the CofS directly. The earlier copy is very different in places, with different meanings, not just different words. The omitted passages may appear later in the book, or they may not, but I am not talking about those passages particularly.

What I find very interesting seems to be exemplified by that quote about wavelengths/frequencies. The prior edition is much more clear than the revised edition, where Hubbard garbles the terms. No way would diehard SO members [actually DM personally, I later heard] revise it like that unless it is genuinely true to the original dictation!

Overall, there are many minute changes with regard to punctuation, but (in my opinion), all for the better in regard to making the text more comprehensible. If DM had wanted to worsen the text throughout, he wouldn't have done all that. So, counter-intuitively, generalizing from the actual hands-on examination I did do, I will assume that the 2007 books are actually closer to what Hubbard dictated than earlier editions.

Where I stand on key issues

I am a
ex-Scientologist
The leader of the Church of Scientology, David Miscavige, is a...
Suppressive person (sociopath)

Pros and Cons (optional)

Pros
Counter-intuitively, the text seems to be closer to what Hubbard dictated than older editions.
Cons
Gigantic money-grab. Obviously DM isn't interested in getting Hubbard's words out to the world.
Was this review helpful to you? 
Very ambivalent about the Basics. On the one hand, having the full sequential set of books and lectures is really great for a purely theoretical study of the subject. This does not make auditors, however, but it is interesting. On the other hand, finding out that there were several alterations and key omissions, is very disappointing. (A good example of this is in the Phildelphia Doctorate Course lectures, where Hubbard spoke of a world without a remedy for Scientology being worse than Orwell's "1984" - which has been omitted from the 2007 Basics version, and thus the point Hubbard was making is lost, if you do not know what he originally said). Speaking to old timers who still possess the original L. Ron Hubbard books and lectures, one has a sense of loss of authenticity, and thus not a true study of the subject.
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3.0
Reviewed by eagle November 11, 2012
Top 10 Reviewer  -   View all my reviews (23)

Alterations

Very ambivalent about the Basics. On the one hand, having the full sequential set of books and lectures is really great for a purely theoretical study of the subject. This does not make auditors, however, but it is interesting. On the other hand, finding out that there were several alterations and key omissions, is very disappointing. (A good example of this is in the Phildelphia Doctorate Course lectures, where Hubbard spoke of a world without a remedy for Scientology being worse than Orwell's "1984" - which has been omitted from the 2007 Basics version, and thus the point Hubbard was making is lost, if you do not know what he originally said). Speaking to old timers who still possess the original L. Ron Hubbard books and lectures, one has a sense of loss of authenticity, and thus not a true study of the subject.

Where I stand on key issues

I am a
ex-Scientologist

Pros and Cons (optional)

Pros
It is nice to have it all in sequence, and it is nice to be able to study the subject in a sequential manner to get a theoretical overview.
Cons
Alterations, dammit! Very disappointed that there were alterations and omissions, so one does not have the somplete original work by L. Ron Hubbard, but a synthesized version of it.
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