Basic Principle

Honest People Have Rights, Too

Honest People Have Rights, Too
IN THIS COLUMNWe present a fundamental principle of the religion of Scientology researched and developed by L. Ron Hubbard.

Freedom for Man does not mean freedom to injure Man. Freedom of speech does not mean freedom to harm by lies.

Man cannot be free while there are those amongst him who are slaves to their own terrors.

The mission of a techno-space society is to subordinate the individual and control him by economic and political duress. The only casualty in a machine age is the individual and his freedom.

To preserve that freedom, one must not permit men to hide their evil intentions under the protection of that freedom. To be free, a man must be honest with himself and with his fellows. If a man uses his own honesty to protest the unmasking of dishonesty, then that man is an enemy of his own freedom.

We can stand in the sun only so long as we do not let the deeds of others bring the darkness.

Freedom is for honest men. Individual liberty exists only for those who have the ability to be free.

Today, in Scientology, we know the jailer—the person himself. And we can restore the right to stand in the sun by eradicating the evil men do to themselves.

Who would punish when he could salvage? Only a madman would break a wanted object when he could repair it—and we are not mad.

The individual must not die in this machine age—rights or no rights. The criminal and madman must not triumph with their newfound tools of destruction.

The least free person is the person who cannot reveal his own acts and who protests the revelation of the improper acts of others. On such people will be built a future political slavery where we all have numbers—and our guilt—unless we act.

It is fascinating that blackmail and punishment are the keynotes of all dark operations. What would happen if these two commodities no longer existed? What would happen if all men were free enough to speak? Then and only then would you have freedom.

On the day when we can fully trust each other, there will be peace on Earth.

Don’t stand in the road of that freedom.

Be free, yourself.

Excerpted from Scientology: A New Slant On Life Chapter “Honest People Have Rights, Too” by L. Ron Hubbard.