Flag Divisional Directive: Sea Org Children (1976)

FLAG DIVISIONAL DIRECTIVE

Issued from Flag to all Exec Divs

FDD 118 DIV 7 INT

23 July 1976

To: Cont LRH Comms

Cont Ests Execs

LRH Comms SO Orgs

Ests Mgrs SO Orgs

SO Child Care Personnel

From: Estates Asst Flag

Subject: SEA ORG CHILDREN

In 1973, LRH had a lot of attention on the handling of Sea Org children in PAC and the state of the existing Cadet Org at that time.

The following despatch traffic between LRH and LRH Comm US is released with the intention of communicating to all concerned LRH’s intentions and policy regarding the handling of Sea Org children in the PAC area.

In the last 3 years many Sea Org child care scenes have grown and are gradually reaching proportions similar to what existed in PAC at that time.

Separate programs based on evaluation will be issued in the future to get these orders fully implemented in other Sea Org areas. But it is hoped in the meantime that this communication will result in increased ARC and understanding of the handling of Sea Org children.

__________

“Let then have their own space and scene and get healthy and happy with it. Kids are BEINGS not kids. American parents have yet to learn that. I want our kids to grow up.

“…we want these kids to grow up as beings and not as underfoot, unwanted, hysterical ‘children’. I know what I am talking about. It’s better to let them find their own way as beings and attain some value in life and self respect.

“…be sure they have competent nannies who don’t brutalize them and who really think of them as persons and who keep them clean and cleaning their quarters up and getting to and from school and putting in valuable actions otherwise and you’ll wind up with some awful good kids.

LRH – Despatch to LRH Comm US 14 Aug 73

FDD 118 DIV 7 INT
– 2 –

“A bright idea I had was a CO Cadets and division into age groups with group leaders of each group, and a Sea Org school part time. The little shavers on Flag did wonderfully with stable nannies and tutors and really only when they had a SO school as a special part of the action that ran on FOs. They loved it and could then be persuaded over to the three Rs. They all made an AB and were pleased with themselves and felt superior. Even little four year olds. Their school room was all decorated with SO and AB types of items. When that was dropped they felt out of it, gangsterism and crime came in because they were without purpose. The above bright idea is very recent, looking back over times when children have been no real problem. Also people forget that exact HCO PL Ethics has to be kept in especially on children. They have to be hatted. Twice, true Suppressives, though only 5 in one case and about 6 in another absolutely ruined not only the other kids but also every effort to put it to rights and one Org also! By sheer psychotic covert violence.

I get my wins with kids by treating them like people. And those kids there are a big asset actually. But they can be made into a big liability unless the scene is handled.

“Anyway, I’d give them a full Org Board for the nursery and age groups and divisions. And you’d see some order come into it and some real assets come out of it.

“We have the full admin tech to handle any kind of a group. So why should they be miserable and knocked about when they can have their own org and be respected and demand respect from their elders as well and feel proud of themselves. The kid product US is turning out is pretty strange….they’re so LOST. It has taken ME months of not working on it to have kids smile at me and be glad to see me around here, I speak of street kids, very casual. They HATE grown-ups around here. In Cork boys of 10 and 12 are now making up 17% of the violent crimes. So there’s a lot missing in the culture these days. But then we’re making a new culture so why not also grow one?

“The real trick is to get them over to cause without their having to use naughtiness to be at covert cause. A Cadet Org could accomplish that.”

LRH – Despatch to LRH Comm US 25 Aug 73

“This is as far as we have gotten: Parents have dumped their parents hats on SO. SO has consistently dumped its Cadet Hat on parents in PAC (a fact I just recently added up) by using them as a via. The result has been a ruddy old mess of no responsibility on either side — a between two chairs scene. I was glad to sort this much of it out as I have been absolutely flabbergasted when orders to PAC about children went routinely unexecuted. Naturally! They were being dumped

FDD 118 DIV 7 INT
– 3 –

on a no terminal, a via I never for an instant expected anyone would be dumb enough to use. Yet I suppose I could have guessed it as it parallels the American family pattern of have poppa hit because Johnny broke a window because all Johnnies up to 45 (I think that is now the age of majority parents have for their sons) are irresponsible dears that ought to be euthanasiaed.

Now with THIS much seen through maybe one could complete an evaluation looking for other points and maybe actually fix responsibility for the children on proper SO terminals and get something done that is effective, based on what has been effective in the past. And we’d have some fine kids, who also loved their parents.

“It’s a cloudy scene of kids in public schools but really maybe not, of older kids teaching younger ones how to be tough. An effort to put it on a family organization type is going to fail, I guarantee you that.

LRH – Despatch to LRH Comm US 27 Aug 73

“Hey Toby! I just found out why I couldn’t really get the child scene up on Flag and why they got offloaded.

“EVERY ORDER I PASSED DOWN CONCERNING THEM WAS PROMPTLY CROSS ORDERED AT A LOWER ECHELON BY REFERRING THE ORDER TO THE PARENT!!!!!!!!

“I never before had this datum…..

“This was what cost the kids FLAG. I found this in interrogating someone who had been on the lines — it never came up before; it was thought to be totally correct. YOW WOW! It’s a total offload of SO responsibility. As well as a Comm Ev offense to cross order. So this was why nothing could be handled. AND I AM CERTAIN THAT IS THE PAC WHY. It is a cultural aberration.

“Give me the scene, give me the scene, give me the scene! I’ve had losses on this area and I got the why. I knowed there was catamounts in them mountings!

“The only way this can backfire now is counter propaganda like ‘They are costing us our chillun’ or some such nonsense.When we are trying to give them top grade A spunky be-proud-of em offspring!”

LRH – Despatch to LRH Comm US 28 Aug 73 i

“This despatch on children and the message about them may run a bit counter to cultural or group ideas. But they do have to get educated and I see no sign of any organization to do it and it would be months or a year anyway. There seems to be a fear of officials. That’s understandable. But that fear could lead to pulling them in. Only offensive actions handle officials. We must force officials to cooperate and work to handle any such scene. This makes

FDD 118 DIV 7 INT
– 4 –

them feel responsible and important. They don’t want a ‘Officials refuse to cooperate in educating children.’ This will be hard at first. Also hard on the kids. But the way to handle it is special coaching after school and very solid hatting in a Cadet Org USING STUDY TECH. That makes a lot of little geniuses out of them. Also somebody is going to propose a uniform BUT CHILDREN MUST NOT WEAR ONE TO SCHOOL as they’d catch it.

“Enforce the Mission ordered in the message and SEE THAT IT TAKES OFF INSTANTER AND THAT PARENTAL Q and A is STEAMROLLED. Those kids can be adjusted to grade easily enough. But at least a scrap of tutoring unit using study tech will be vital almost at once. So see that that gets into the scene also. There’s a lovely little book on study tech in a basic form. The GO has it. Copies should be available to every child and a unit in the Cadet Org should pound it home even if the org isn’t there yet. IF YOU WROTE A PGM ON THIS ORDER AND COUNTED ITS STATS IT WOULD BRING IN THE SUNDAES. The program is of course ‘Get in Study Tech on the Children.'”

LRH – Despatch to LRH Comm US 15 Sept 73

“However, I have found the why of this scene. Parents bringing children into the S0 dump their parents hats on the SO and the SO instead of taking responsibility dump the hat back on the parents resulting in a totally cross ordered and scrambled scene that no stable organization can be gotten into. I found for instance that every order I issued about children at Flag was at once referred to a parent and not one personnel to whom such an order was issued ever carried it out. This cost children Flag. It is making the trouble in PAC.

“As soon as you have that why some sense can be made out of the scene and it can be advanced toward the ideal. But no ideal was ever stated. This would be competent and well trained children who are a credit to the SO and are resources.

“The tech on this is in the PL about depowering people, by knocking their hats off. PTS research is beginning to reveal that the parents actions in knocking off the child’s hat is a basic of PTS. The weakening results in valence shifts. The answer of course is in hatting PLs. An unhatted child is going to be a juvenile delinquent and an unproductive child is going to be miserable. Pride and sense of value are interlocked into this.

“It also happens that the American way of life runs very counter to child handling and is the basis of American trouble with this part of its culture which will of course eventually destroy the culture as it is built on children.

“Thus we will have a ruddy mess if this scene is not properly handled and evaluated.

FDD 118 DIV 7 INT
– 5 –

“In the finance sphere this is quite a handful. The only way we can afford to handle this scene at all is to let the state share some of the burden. It is not practical at this time to try to run a self-supportive school. Under the heading of resources, then, any grandiose scheme would fail. The why of finance is that we are doing the only effective work in the field yet psychiatrists and psychologists who have no result are dragging in all the billions. We must therefore conserve our resources in order to apply them to shorter term expansion, defense, and, of course, taking over eventually the field and its appropriations. Reversely those children will have a role to play in this and are resources. The Industrial age looks on a child as a non-resource and so will anyone in the SO that is steeped in the culture from which they came. They are sentimentally destructive and think it too cold blooded to look on children as a resource. The end product is that they damage the child by knocking off his hat in a dozen ways. From this we are getting our ‘politicans’ and adult shoes that, if you look at them, are Buster Browns. By firmly holding the line on hatting we can achieve success in the child area.

“This has an awful lot to do with quarters. You do NOT want a School. We cannot afford a million or any part of it.” There is alarm at putting the children in public schools as they are retarded in grade some say. I think all this can be caught up easily. It is not optimum but measured by resource these children must go to public schools and be especially coached to get them up to grade (in which I feel the city would help) and specially coached while in school to make them competent.

“By returning them to proper quarters directly after school, getting them functioning we can overcome this liability and must. Thus there must be a whole program to get these kids into school AND FAST. The term is beginning.

“The quarters you are looking for are quarters for the CADET ORG. It will be a 7 Div Org headed by adults and below exec level manned by children who have actual posts. Its org board must be planned out must be standard. The cross order scene is then solved. No order to a child or about a child must be permitted to go off lines.” Parents must pass any order not to the child but through the CO Cadets who may alter or cut it if off program. Any discipline goes through the Cadet Org. They must every one of them be hatted.

Unless they are signed up SO members the children are used in the galley or estates EPF only. There must be a nursery. There must be QMs on duty as reception. There must be stable personnel — and there only could be if this were to have the status of an org.

“So that is what you are looking for.

“I am just now sending a telex to suggest children be gotten into public school at once.

FDD 118 DIV 7 INT
– 6 –

“You want a dormitory. You don’t have to have areas where parents live with their children. Parents can visit their children and we will make that easy and are already doing so…

“You want quarters where you can have a baby care unit, dormitories, kitchens and moderate space for the Cadet Org desks, auditing and Qual functions.”

LRH – Despatch to Flag Missionaire via LRH Comm US 14 Sept 73.

Msm Mark Britowich

Estates Asst Flag

for

WO Rick Merwin

CS-7

Authorized by AVU

for the

BOARDS OF DIRECTORS of the CHURCHES OF SCIENTOLOGY

BDCS:AH:RM:MB:nt ¹

Notes