Blog 5

                John Sweeny’s documentary showed how Scientology deals with critics.  Sweeny showed no interviews with current Scientology members.  The only current Scientology member he talked was Tommy Davies, a spokesperson for Scientology, and all of his encounters with him were confrontations.  Sweeny interviewed many critics of Scientology which exposed ways that Scientology dealt with these dissenters, such as spreading knowledge of the dissenters past crimes.  The documentary shows the perspective of a critic of Scientology, and the critic is dealt with by Scientology.  Scientology’s inner workings are rarely discussed.  This does not mean this documentary was a failure, and should be ignored.  The documentary shows that Scientology works to fight critics and tries to discredit them.  Scientology’s response to this documentary was also interesting.  In their response, Scientology misquoted Sweeny while claiming that Sweeny did not report Scientology ethically. The narrator poses the question, “Why he kept making the accusation?”  The accusation in question was that Scientologists were brainwashed.  The Scientology film then showed a clip of Sweeny yelling at Tommy Davies.  However, Sweeny was yelling about a previous encounter with Tommy Davies.  Scientology’s actions show that it has considerable economic and political power that it wishes to protect.  It reacts quickly to critics and usually with a considerable amount of force.  However, neither documentary shows what it is like to be a member of Scientology, the structure of Scientology, or the ideology of Scientology.

Typologizing Religion is a hard task, because of the numerous attempts already made.  There are many types of religions, but categorizing them is a challenge.  Any typology will have some bias in it.  What a person sees as normal will be influenced by their values.  Also the use of the same terms in the typology influences how others see the typology.  For example, under Stark and Bainbridge’s typology, Scientology is a sect, because it is in tension with the outside and was just created and not the result of a schism.  However, Scientologists would not appreciated being labeled a cult, even if in the specific typology, a cult was not defined to be corrupt or bad.  Even though a typology is very hard to make, it would be very useful.  It would allow religions to be analyzed and compared with more ease.  The “best” typology in my opinion is Stark and Bainbridge’s.  Their typology has clear differences between church, denomination, sect and cult.  This typology avoids using abnormal psychology in the definition of a cult.  Other typologies that use abnormal psychology in the definition of cult show the authors fear of new religions.  The author forgets at one point every religion was a cult.  Cults are not necessarily bad or founded around a mental defect.  I think the typology of world affirming, accommodating, criticizing, and rejecting religions is useful when used in conjunction with the Stark and Bainbridge typology.  The four categories in this typology are related to a category in the Stark and Bainbridge typology.  Most Churches would be world affirming, because they control society and therefore co-exist with it.  Most denominations are world accommodating, because they accept society, but stress a religious life.  Most sects are world criticizing, because they are in tension with the religion they came from and society.  Most cults are world rejecting, because they are exclusive, total institutions and in tension with society.  However, these correspondences are not absolute.  For example, Buddhism in America would be a cult, because it is new in the area, and is in ideological tension with the major denominations that were present in America.  However, Buddhism is world accommodating in my opinion, because it accepts society, but stresses a life coherent with Buddhist principles. Typologies are not absolute and will have their problems; however, they help in comparing religions across time and space.  A single unifying typology is impossible to create for a variety of reasons, but a couple general typologies allow for the best analysis.

Chapters sixteen to twenty five discuss religions that have come from Asia and the Middle East to America.  Since these religions have been transplanted into a new environment, they can all be considered cults.  They all face tensions with their environments, especially those from the Middle East because of the events of nine eleven.  Still these religions are in ideological conflict with the dominant Christian religions.  One Asian religion to come over is Buddhism.  Buddhism is present in several strands, but there are 3 major types.  They all exist in a similar type of organization, with local temples that hold rituals for members of the religion and also teach nonmembers about Buddhism.  The temples are not well organized between each other and rivalries do exist between competing types of Buddhism; however, they do come together on occasion for important events.  This puts Buddhism in both the audience cult and cult movement category of Stark and Bainbridge's typology, because Buddhism offers classes which have little structure to nonmembers, but they offer a structured religion to its members.  Hinduism is similar to Buddhism in its current structure.  There are many that follow American gurus, while there are others that are heavily influenced by Hindu ideology.  Hare Krishna is a cult movement founded in 1966 by Srila Prabhupada.  It was in high tensions with its environment, and moved to San Francisco, where the presence of the counter culture made for a less tense environment.  In the 1970s the religion faced controversy and decreased in size.  To accommodate society, it abandoned its communal living, and changed its main concerns.  This illustrates one way how a cult deals with tension in its environment.  The Unification Church is a cult in America, because it did not form from a schism with a specific denomination.  Its ideology is based on the bible, but also by Sun Myung Moon’s early life in Korea.  Islam has been present in the United States since the late 1800s.  Although Islam shares a common background with Christianity, in America Islam is a cult movement, especially in today’s post-nine eleven environment.  Many people are skeptic of Muslims, and a very tense environment has been created.  Islam is quite large and has been in America for a while, but the extremely tense environment is why Islam is still a cult in Stark and Bainbridge’s typology.  Baha’i is another cult movement in the United States.  It blends many religions, such as Islam and Christianity, but it is not the result of any schism.  Sufism is another cult, because of its small size, its relative youth in America, and its tension with its environment.  Gurdjieff in America is both a client cult and a cult movement.  His movements were a way for people to balance their three intelligences, and therefore the movements were a therapeutic.  However, the methods to achieve this are not offered for compensation.  Subud is another cult movement from the Middle East.  It is relatively small in the US and has no relation to Christianity.  These religions are all cults, because they are new to the United States.  They are all in ideological tension with their environment.  They have had to deal with this tension, and have done so in different ways.  Most accommodate to society, but this is not the only option.

Society consists of interpersonal bonds between people in a group.  It is complex, and essential to the world that we are used to.  The main component of society is social groups.  Social groups are a group of people that share a common identity and a common set of values and beliefs.  Social groups also interact with each other regularly.  They are not a social aggregate, people in the same location at a given time, or social categories, people with a common characteristic.  Social groups are where people perform almost all important actions in their lives.  Some examples of social groups are religious organizations, schools, governments, cliques, and a group of friends.  People can belong to various social groups, and different types of social groups.  The two main types of social groups are primary and secondary.  Primary groups are usually small and have a lot of face to face time.  Secondary groups are larger and more impersonal.  People have a stronger tie to primary groups, because the direct interactions with others in the group allow ideas to be shared more frequently, thus making the social group have a stronger shared set of beliefs.  Also in a primary group the small size allows members to personally know all other members in the group, which contributes to a strong sense of unity.  Secondary groups are usually weaker in comparison to primary groups, because there is less interaction between members.  People in today’s society belong to more secondary groups than in the past.  This started with the development of an agrarian society which created organizations such as governments and religious hierarchies.  Many other types of secondary social groups have emerged.  This had led to people interacting in more secondary groups.  Some claim this has caused more impersonal.  However, I believe the increased number of secondary groups has made primary groups more important.  People appreciated the personal interaction more, and allow their values to be defined by their primary groups.  Social groups are important to the study of sociology, because every organization is a social group and probably have social groups with in them.