Going Clear

Going Clear: Scientology and the Prison of Belief was one of the most interesting documentaries we have watched this semester. It tackled a subject that many people are familiar with but don't really know the details of. Personally, I liked learning about the history of L. Ron Hubbard and how the religion came to exist. I also like having a better understanding of what the actual belief system behind scientology is. I was less interested in the question of whether scientology was a business or a religion. I think the answer is pretty obvious.
Anyone who steps back and looks at the actual beliefs of scientology, as they do in this film, should be able to identify that it is all a hoax. L. Ron Hubbard was literally a struggling science-fiction writer who needed a new idea to support himself financially. After he wrote a particularly outlandish piece of science-fiction (Dianetics), and developing something of a cult following, he developed a way to monetize this set of strange theories he had created. L. Ron Hubbard locked Scientology behind a paywall, and made it clear that the more his followers paid, the more access to "knowledge" they would be granted with.
If you think about it, selling religion isn't any revolutionary concept. In the 16th century, the Catholic Church fell out of favor with many of it's followers for selling indulgences; essentially a reprieve from sin, for a price. In that way, one could argue that all religions are a business to some extent. As stated previously, I'm not so concerned with whether or not scientology is a business, but more so with the fact that it is a scam created by sociopaths who draw in their followers and make it extraordinarily hard for them to leave.