YouSaid · the spoken record

Aaron Smith-Levin

lines on the record: 177
first: 2023-02-25
most recent: 2023-02-25
sittings or episodes: 1
sources: podcast

Every line below is reproduced as it was said and linked to the record it came from. Nothing here is summarised or generated. Directory · Search · Corrections

“And I know this guy. The fact that Scientology crushes so much information before YouTube, before, like, I have the only big Scientology channel. And that only got big in the last six months. Okay. So before that, there were channels, there was things, but it's almost like it took a lot of like people felt like it took a lot of bravery and courage to like say something on the internet about Scientology. And so people would pop up and there weren't very many voices. And I was like, I want this to be prolific. I want, I want to be prolific. I want to have 30 or 40 other channels being prolific so that Scientology couldn't possibly successfully control the narrative about it.”
2023-02-25 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #361 – Aaron Smith-Levin: Scientology · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“And I got to tell you, it's one of the reasons I do my YouTube channel. It's one of the reasons I decided to upload every day. I've uploaded every day for the last six months. I just wanted there to be a non-stop flow of information, of any kind in any variety, as long as it's fair and balanced, intelligent, interesting, that Scientologists who stumble upon the internet will go, oh look, someone's talking about my thing. Let's see what they got going on.”
2023-02-25 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #361 – Aaron Smith-Levin: Scientology · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Well, these days they've pretty much, I think, thrown in the towel, but the Scientology middle management was editing Wikipedia so often from IP addresses that were traced back to the Scientology buildings that Wikipedia locked them out from any IP addresses associated with Scientology from being able to edit it. It's like Scientology was so infatuated with trying to control the information. And in the early days of the internet, they had a certain degree of success with that. It's just hopeless these days.”
2023-02-25 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #361 – Aaron Smith-Levin: Scientology · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“They really pushed this thing that Unless you've been in a Scientology organization yourself, or unless you've actually been a Scientologist, you couldn't possibly know the truth about Scientology. If you're only getting information from people who aren't members or former members, then you couldn't possibly be getting the correct information. Now, they don't realize the math there doesn't make sense. If you can find out the true information by becoming and being a Scientologist, then that means you can get the correct information from a former Scientologist because they traveled that path and they got the correct information. So they still create, they try to create this unfalsifiable loop where unless you are personally doing it, you don't have correct information. And you go, well, what about the people who did personally do it? Got the correct information, left and are now sharing that with others. Well, no, those are lies. Well, okay, so just anything you don't like is a lie then. You go, yeah, pretty much. That's kind of how it works.”
2023-02-25 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #361 – Aaron Smith-Levin: Scientology · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Public Scientologist has no restrictions to their access to the internet. They're just not allowed to read anything critical of Scientology.”
2023-02-25 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #361 – Aaron Smith-Levin: Scientology · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“About the subjects you wanted, and you could take it or leave it, that would be fine, it's the fact that it's part and parcel to this entire organization and this entire experience that has, as a part of that experience, taken everything from you, demanding everything from you, controlling who you can speak with, controlling who you can have relationships with, who you have to erase from your life. This is where, and it's hard to place one pinpoint on this is where Scientology goes wrong. It's really hard to do that because the good parts of Scientology and the bad parts of Scientology are all just Scientology.”
2023-02-25 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #361 – Aaron Smith-Levin: Scientology · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Broke, even though you make a lot of money, you're always stressed, you're at the beck and call of these people who seem to run your lives. Like, how a Scientologist feels about their own life, it's very interesting to compare that to how that person's life looks to their non-Scientology family members. I get contacted by a lot of people who've never been in Scientology, but like I got a family member who's really deep and I just, can you help me understand some things? Why is this person's life like this? Why is this person's life like this? So, I don't want to say that Scientologists do not actually, I don't want to say, oh, it's all on their heads. They think they're being helped, but they're really not. That doesn't feel honest, you know? But it's this thing where if Scientology was just for Getting auditing You wanted”
2023-02-25 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #361 – Aaron Smith-Levin: Scientology · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I would argue that what you've just described could be an identical description of what it feels like and what it means to go up Scientology's bridge to total freedom. You are reinforcing to yourself that everything's getting better and better and better, and you'd be like Don't spend time with your family anymore.”
2023-02-25 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #361 – Aaron Smith-Levin: Scientology · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Right. And so auditors are pretty much the ones doing the heavy lifting of what it even means to be a Scientologist. Those guys aren't the ones that you end up having crisis of faith. I mean, doing Scientology auditing, it doesn't require that you just have faith that you believe something. You just have to go through these motions. And Scientologists, one of the reasons Scientologists think this is all scientific is because it's like, I don't care if you believe why this works. I care how you feel at the end of an auditing session.”
2023-02-25 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #361 – Aaron Smith-Levin: Scientology · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“No, as the person receiving auditing. And so my point is as an auditor doing a lot of auditing, you're going to have someone in front of you called the pre-clear is the person in front of you who's getting the auditing, called the PC or the pre-clear. They see over and over and over again these PCs having these sort of euphoric states and floating needles, and I feel great and fantastic. Oh, thanks. You saved my life and like I've always said, if people didn't”
2023-02-25 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #361 – Aaron Smith-Levin: Scientology · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“That's right Right. I would probably argue that auditors are not in a position of having many crises of faith because actually they're usually seeing people for the most part improve in some ways through the process of auditing. Now, auditing can create like a somewhat of a euphoric state. You feel great. You're just blown out of your head. You're on top of the world. I've had that in some of my auditing.”
2023-02-25 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #361 – Aaron Smith-Levin: Scientology · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Exactly. That's a nice little escape hatch to pull on having a crisis of faith. It didn't work. Well, Obviously, it wasn't applied correctly. That's where quality control comes in. Their job is to nitpick. You can always find one thing that wasn't done correctly.”
2023-02-25 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #361 – Aaron Smith-Levin: Scientology · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“So, the effectiveness of the auditing process is one of the things Hubbard says that standard tech, Scientology, they call it the tech, the technology of how to deliver auditing, standard tech, works 100% of the time when applied 100% correctly. Well, that's kind of unfalsifiable, right Anytime it doesn't work”
2023-02-25 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #361 – Aaron Smith-Levin: Scientology · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Scientology would say that Scientology is not about beliefs. It's about application of the techniques of Scientology auditing to improve someone's spiritual awareness and ability. So the belief level of Scientology is pretty much the stuff we've already discussed.”
2023-02-25 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #361 – Aaron Smith-Levin: Scientology · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“To dramatize evil intentions and stuff like that. So even if you're going whole track, looking at all the horrible things you've done, the goal is to find like, well, what happened just prior to that? What was like the prior confusion? And what did you misunderstand just before that and whatnot? So the goal is basically, so Scientologists, after a lot of auditing, are also convinced that they have fixed Reason for any non optimum conduct.”
2023-02-25 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #361 – Aaron Smith-Levin: Scientology · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“So imagine though if you had not only are you looking at someone's being self-critical, trying to identify destructive patterns of behavior in your present life, but what if you really internalize the fact that I haven't only been this way for 40 years? I've been this way for 40 trillion years. But Scientology would argue That as a thetan, you're inherently good. All Thanans are basically good. So the goal of the auditing procedure there would be essentially to figure out, find the moment, find what it was that caused you to make that shift as a being”
2023-02-25 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #361 – Aaron Smith-Levin: Scientology · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“And it goes both flows there, not just things that have happened to you, but things that you've done. So, you know, you could be being asked for. You'd be going back to, I wiped out of civilization. Genocide on this rice on this planet. Oh, yeah”
2023-02-25 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #361 – Aaron Smith-Levin: Scientology · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“So going whole track or deep whole track with high reality, meaning it's not like, oh, I have a fuzzy memory and I'm not sure if it's real. Like your real seasoned Scientologists are like, oh, yeah, I was on this planet at this time circling this star and this is what I was eating for breakfast.”
2023-02-25 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #361 – Aaron Smith-Levin: Scientology · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“People who are seasoned, like they actually like going past life. I hated it. I would make sure I was really good at making my needle float. I didn't want to have some auditor because I never believed in past life memories. So I didn't want to be in that impassable, you know, reach an impass in an auditing session where I was being asked for something I couldn't provide because I knew this auditing session has to end on a good point. But Scientologists enjoy, for the most part, going, they call it whole track. Whole track is past life, going whole track. Your time track. They call it the time track is your whole memory. But whole track refers to anything past life.”
2023-02-25 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #361 – Aaron Smith-Levin: Scientology · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“You're a Scientologist and you're participating in an auditing session, you know that anyone in the organization has the ability to know the stuff that you talk. It's not like, oh my God, I'm only telling my auditor because I think no one's ever going to know. You know that people know, but you also trust the organization.”
2023-02-25 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #361 – Aaron Smith-Levin: Scientology · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“There's no expectation of privacy, but there's no expectation that your stuff's going to be leaked for blackmail either. I mean, You trust the people in the organization.”
2023-02-25 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #361 – Aaron Smith-Levin: Scientology · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Sure. A lot of people find auditing very helpful. I mean, I've heard some describe it as quite thoroughly addictive. Me personally, I never enjoyed getting auditing. That's probably more a function of having been raised in it. And it was never something I wanted to do. It was something that was forced on me as a child. And also I was never, I don't like talking about private secret stuff. You kind of have to want to be an open book. To honestly and thoroughly participate in an auditing session.”
2023-02-25 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #361 – Aaron Smith-Levin: Scientology · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“When you're training on how to use the emeter, there are drills where you practice generating with your mind. Various needle reactions. So there is a drill where you sit there and you consciously try to create a floating needle by recalling happy thoughts. Your happy place, and at the end of every auditing session, you actually have to go to a third party, sit down in front of a knee meter and verify that your needle's floating. Every single auditing session not only has to end on a floating needle, but then you have to go to someone else and have the floating needle verified. Any Scientologist who's a seasoned recipient of auditing knows how to make their needle float at the examiner.”
2023-02-25 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #361 – Aaron Smith-Levin: Scientology · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Can't explain to you how you get a floating needle, but it sure as hell isn't hand sweat, and it sure as hell isn't squeezing the cans.”
2023-02-25 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #361 – Aaron Smith-Levin: Scientology · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“So he says that these things have mass. And when you recall them or put attention on them, you create an electrical flow, which maybe through magnetic fields or whatever, impinges upon the electrical flow of the emeter. And it shows up as a read on the needle. That's how Scientology believe that's why the needle reads. Now, cynics would say the needle only reads on palm sweat and movement. Well, I know that's not true. I can't tell you everything the needle does read on, but I can tell you it's not just moving your hands in sweaty hands.”
2023-02-25 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #361 – Aaron Smith-Levin: Scientology · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“You also have an analytical mind, which is just your conscious memory, conscious recording of everything from present time to the last 76 trillion years. And Hubbard would say that these memories are actually a perfectly detailed recording. I think he says like 56 perceptions or something. And that it's perfect. And you can access that information. You just have trouble doing so. Okay. So he says that these recordings, these mental pictures have actual electrical charge in mass. Now, you asked before is there any actual physics in this? I don't know where are you supposed to store the pictures of your last 76 trillion years that have charge in mass? I don't see it. But Hubbard says it's there. Okay.”
2023-02-25 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #361 – Aaron Smith-Levin: Scientology · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“We're going to keep going earlier, similar, earlier, similar, earlier, similar until I get a floating needle. And that's where I'm explaining it this way. You can see how no matter what the specific auditing session happens to be about, there's still the potential in any auditing session that you're going into past lives. Just because you have to go earlier, similar until you get a floating needle. Okay, now here's how Scientologists think the emeter actually works, meaning why does the emeter work? So we talked before about these mental pictures, right? These recordings Well, we spoke about n grams, just recordings of pain and unconsciousness. Well, Scientology would hold the bad recordings aren't the only recordings that you have. Those are just the recordings in your reactive mind.”
2023-02-25 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #361 – Aaron Smith-Levin: Scientology · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“So now I might go back to check the question. Okay, good. I'll check the question again. Is there anything you're withholding from me? Ooh, if I get another read, we got to go through the process again. Okay. If you tell me, I've told you everything and I don't get a floating needle. I've got to go, okay, is there an earlier similar thing? Have you basically done an earlier similar thing? Is there an earlier similar time you haven't told someone something or is there an earlier similar thing that you did, the thing that you just told me?”
2023-02-25 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #361 – Aaron Smith-Levin: Scientology · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Going to get all the details about that until time, place, form an event. I want to know everything that happened. I want to know all the details. By the way, I'm writing all this down. So I'm taking notes of everything you're telling me that it's a bad thing that you did, that you haven't told me about. Okay, so I'm keeping notes. When you represent to me that you've told me everything there is to tell, I'm looking for the needle to give like a smooth back and forth motion like this. And Scientology calls that a floating needle. That means in Scientology land, we're done with that.”
2023-02-25 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #361 – Aaron Smith-Levin: Scientology · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Yeah. And you can give me any answer you want. There's no way for me to know if you're giving me the right answer, but I want you to give me something. If you say you can't give me anything, I'm going to keep using the emitter until you give me something Okay, so let's say you give me something.”
2023-02-25 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #361 – Aaron Smith-Levin: Scientology · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“No, you don't see the needle. I go, well, what did you think of when I asked you the question? Now, if you've already had a lot of auditing, you know how this goes. It means I got an instant read and we're not going. Move on until this question gets resolved. Okay, so you're going to go, I don't know what I was thinking of, and then I'm going to be like, you know, take a look and I'll help you out here. I'll try to steer you. Okay, so I'm looking to get roughly the same read while you're thinking about whatever. What was that? What was that right there?”
2023-02-25 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #361 – Aaron Smith-Levin: Scientology · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“That's what it's used for, except it's an enforced conversation. So I'll give you a really good example of this. So you're holding the cans. Say, is there anything you're withholding from me? And I get an instant read. And I go, is there anything you're withholding from me? You're going to go, I don't think so.”
2023-02-25 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #361 – Aaron Smith-Levin: Scientology · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Still as you can Comfortable, right? And I'm going to go is there something you're withholding from me. And what I'm looking for is right when I say at the end of me, I'm looking for the needle to dip to the right.”
2023-02-25 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #361 – Aaron Smith-Levin: Scientology · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Yeah, so here's even how just how a Scientology auditor believes it works You're holding the cans. There's a tiny little battery in that emerator that's sending, you're completing the circuit when you pick up the cans, right? So you got a little thing going there. And that needle will respond to your physical movement, but that's not what we want. We want you to sit the hell still so that we can read this thing when I'm asking you questions. Okay.”
2023-02-25 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #361 – Aaron Smith-Levin: Scientology · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“And I'm just changing the sensitivity because when you squeeze the cans, I want to get about a one-third of a dial drop on the needle. The idea is you don't want, if the needle's too sensitive, then every time you shift around in your chair, the needle's going to bounce all over the place. So you're trying to set the sensitivity of this thing. And that's all the knob there on the bottom to the left. That's the sensitivity knob. And that determines just how sensitive the needle is going to be. And the bigger dial is called the tone arm. And that is changing I want to say voltage or current, but I'm not intending I'm going to get one of those words is wrong, right?”
2023-02-25 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #361 – Aaron Smith-Levin: Scientology · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“No, literally, in the beginning of an auditing session, when you're calibrating the sensitivity of the emitter, you do a can squeeze. So I got to squeeze the cans, please.”
2023-02-25 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #361 – Aaron Smith-Levin: Scientology · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“An e meter is a device that just measures the resistance to a small electrical flow, except Scientologists believe that this emeter can be used to simply direct the progress of an auditing session to determine whether the auditing has reached a good satisfactory conclusion. All auditing sessions have to end on a satisfactory conclusion. Like, that's the job of the auditor. You don't just, it's not like, sorry, the session sucked. See you next week. It's not like that. Every auditing session. On a positive note. And if it doesn't, there's corrections to be made. So the e-meter.”
2023-02-25 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #361 – Aaron Smith-Levin: Scientology · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“All Scientology auditing is going to look like that. It's one on one talk therapy. You're in a room by yourself, no distraction, noise.”
2023-02-25 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #361 – Aaron Smith-Levin: Scientology · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“It's very similar to just any other business as far as you're going to have your human resources, you're going to have your sales, you're going to have your accounting, your operations, your quality control. It's just that in Scientology, your operations is delivering courses and auditing. So your operations. And your quality control where most of the activity occurs as far as delivering Scientology. And then you've got your, you'd call it business development, but that's just bringing in new members, right? So the function of Scientology's organization is very Very comparable to a normal business in the normal world”
2023-02-25 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #361 – Aaron Smith-Levin: Scientology · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Everything you need is already being provided for you. You're not here for the money. Working all the time, anyway. It's not like you don't have days off. I mean, you're working all the time. There's not, there's no concept of the weekends. There's no, oh, thank God it's Friday. Friday's just another day.”
2023-02-25 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #361 – Aaron Smith-Levin: Scientology · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Everyone in the Sea Org makes $50 a week Except David Miscavige. And some posts might have a cash bonus incentive structure, but fundamentally their pay is $50 a week. So even the head of a big Scientology organization. Getting 50 bucks a week”
2023-02-25 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #361 – Aaron Smith-Levin: Scientology · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Yeah, you get divorced a lot in the Sea Org. I've known people who get married and divorced three times by the age of 25. Because in this year, getting married is practically like dating. Also, unless you're married, you're living in dorms with a bunch of other people. So, in order to get your own room, you also have to get married. So there's many benefits.”
2023-02-25 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #361 – Aaron Smith-Levin: Scientology · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Only once married. But that's why people get married after like three days. You're like, hey, you, you look. You look all right. Let's get married.”
2023-02-25 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #361 – Aaron Smith-Levin: Scientology · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Sea Org members are not allowed to have children unless they leave the Sea Org, if you're expected to have an abortion and stay in the Sea Org because it's the greatest good for Scientology if you accidentally get pregnant.”
2023-02-25 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #361 – Aaron Smith-Levin: Scientology · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Yeah. Those are the billion year guys. You hear a lot about the billion year contract, the billion year contract. That's the Sea Org. And all of Scientology management, international management, middle management, continental management, and even some lower level service orgs are composed 100% of Sea Org members. You're not allowed to marry or date someone who's not in the Sea Org. You're also not allowed to have children.”
2023-02-25 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #361 – Aaron Smith-Levin: Scientology · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Symbolic, but yes Like, no, it's not a legally enforceable contract They haven't succeeded in enforcing it in any subsequent lifetimes yet”
2023-02-25 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #361 – Aaron Smith-Levin: Scientology · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“The C organization is the most dedicated version, the most dedicated brand of Scientologists. So there's three like echelons of Scientologists. There's public who just live normal lives in the real world and they pay to do Scientology courses and auditing. Then there's staff members who also live in the real world but work on two and a half year contracts or five-year contracts at their local Scientology organization. And then once they finish their contract, their debt is paid or whatever. And then there's the CORG members. These are the guys who sign the billion year contracts. They don't have lives in the outside world. They don't own property. They live in Scientology provided housing. They eat in Scientology-run cafeterias.”
2023-02-25 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #361 – Aaron Smith-Levin: Scientology · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Funny tagline I'm using my videos. I like it, but like it is interesting that an organization That is so hyper capitalist and so money hungry and is known to be very wealthy at its core is run by these group of Siorg members that live a communist lifestyle.”
2023-02-25 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #361 – Aaron Smith-Levin: Scientology · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Some respects, Scientology created a perfect communist experiment in its reorganization. What is it from everyone according to their ability to each according to their need or something like that? Scientology C organization is damn near a perfect communist experiment. Coming from someone who doesn't necessarily know the perfect communist experiment really is because I'm not grew up in occult lex. You can't keep using it as a”
2023-02-25 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #361 – Aaron Smith-Levin: Scientology · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Because they hold that Scientology, applying Scientology, getting people into Scientology is the key to basically saving every spiritual being in existence. You're analyzing what is ethical, it becomes whatever's good for Scientology Comes by definition ethical because anything that's good for Scientology, which is a third dynamic, is inherently good for all the dynamics. So that's where you get The ends justifying the means to do anything possible and use any means necessary to forward the aims of Scientology.”
2023-02-25 · Lex Fridman Podcast · #361 – Aaron Smith-Levin: Scientology · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source