does this sound at all true?

[TheWho]

On 2006-01-24 11:52:00, Anonymous wrote:

"

On 2006-01-24 11:41:00, Anonymous wrote:


"

On 2006-01-24 10:43:00, Anonymous wrote:



"So, let me see if I'm getting this right.  You want to know what the kids think about the program, right?  You've said that.







How does that reconcile with the incontrovertable fact that when these kids  (or former staff members for that matter) do speak up and say your program harmed them or you ripped them off, they get a nice visit from the Sherriff's deputy or a process server notifying them that they're being sued by you for spaeking out?







You want to hear feedback, but not anything negative or you sue.  Pretty disturbing."

If someone is soliciting your opinion and you give it you cannot be sued.  Whoever told you this is blowing smoke."

Really now?  How about Marla, the HLA Special Education teacher who was so distressed about the mistreatment of kids at HLA that she was compelled to quit her job?  When she posted her opinions, she was immediately sued.



How about Overlord?  He posted his opinions and was immediately sued.



That's two in the past 3 months.



Ginger, help us out.  Please post the links once more for the demand letters you received from HLA.



Blowing smoke?  No, INCONTROVERTABLE FACT as stated earlier.  You seem to not understand that lawsuits come with PAPERWORK."

Not what I was talking about:

First -- Did they solicite you for your opinions?  Say in the form of a survey?

Second -- Did they request that you post your opinions?

If you answer "No"  you can be sued.

Typically feed back is private and is requested to be returned to the school (not posted for the public to read)

[Troll Control]

I think the point here is that you people don't want to hear anything negative at all.  

When you solicit it and it's not to your liking you just shitcan it because it doesn't support your pre-drawn conclusion.  

If it's unsolicited you immediately sue.

The way you try to control information coming out of HLA gives a lot of people the willies.  Parents are right to have reservations about a place that so tightly controls information that they immediately sue people for saying what is demonstrably true knowing full well that these people will be forced to capitulate becasue they don't have the financial resources to fight the machine.  

It's like a poker game where you use the big stack to bully the short stack into folding even though they hold what would be the winning hand.  They just can't take the chance to slug it out.  They have families and children to provide for so they can't take the risk to stand up for principles.

I think there's something inherently wrong about the way you deal with information that reflects poorly on you hucksters.

[Anonymous]

On 2006-01-24 12:55:00, Anonymous wrote:


Second -- Did they request that you post your opinions?



If you answer "No"  you can be sued.



Typically feed back is private and is requested to be returned to the school (not posted for the public to read)"

Is this still America?  I mean, I realize its getting rather difficult to tell wit W. & Co. running things but I think its still legal to post your opinions about pretty much anything and everything.

[Antigen]

I wonder how much it costs each time they sue one of these kids or their parents? I mean, just lately, blogging on the troubled parent industry has really taken off. The stuff is all over Yahoo, Myspace and a bunch of other sites. And, unlike Fornits.com or heal-online.org, those are huge companies w/ thousands or even hundreds of thousands of customers; many of whom give bogus info upon establishing their accounts. This is a new element into the game play. Prior to this new development, I guess it was pretty easy to keep track and just smack around anybody who went to the considerable trouble of publishing the old fashioned way.

So, how much time and money will it take to keep the lid on this now? Or, more to the point, how long will it take the industry to discover that they're so hopelessly outnumbered they can't possibly keep up?

Don't hate the media. Become the media

--Jello Biafra

[TheWho]

On 2006-01-24 13:26:00, Dysfunction Junction wrote:

"I think the point here is that you people don't want to hear anything negative at all.  



When you solicit it and it's not to your liking you just shitcan it because it doesn't support your pre-drawn conclusion.  



If it's unsolicited you immediately sue.



The way you try to control information coming out of HLA gives a lot of people the willies.  Parents are right to have reservations about a place that so tightly controls information that they immediately sue people for saying what is demonstrably true knowing full well that these people will be forced to capitulate becasue they don't have the financial resources to fight the machine.  



It's like a poker game where you use the big stack to bully the short stack into folding even though they hold what would be the winning hand.  They just can't take the chance to slug it out.  They have families and children to provide for so they can't take the risk to stand up for principles.



I think there's something inherently wrong about the way you deal with information that reflects poorly on you hucksters.  
"

DF _ You can take any position you want and that is okay.  The original point was that businesses need feed back from their clients so that they can improve i.e. make more money, bring in more people.  If, as you say it means ignoring their faults and negative feed back, It is their perogative to do so.  But if they do it will not serve them well in the end.
If Honda ignores all their negative feed back it is their down fall.  But why would we care, it gets a bad reputation and we put our money else where.

It is not treated like a poker game and never will be.  It is not gambling, they need a gauranteed profit margin and to know who is happy and who is not.

[Antigen]

On 2006-01-24 14:24:00, Anonymous wrote:

It is not treated like a poker game and never will be. It is not gambling, they need a gauranteed profit margin and to know who is happy and who is not.

Right, guaranteed profit margin. More than that, though, they need guaranteed absolution.

Look, we happen to be in the HLA forum on the Fornits server. But we could be talking about any organization that identifies with the toughlove approach to troubling teens. This practice of putting down dissent and maligning the critics is rampant and goes all the way back to the beginning. Here's an excellent example of that from Art Barker all the way back in `74.

"Today the Seed, Tomorrow the world"



"These are New Times"
by Eleanor Randolph, 9/6/1974


former comic Art Barker says he will turn your drug-crazed kid into a dream teen. Others say his program, The Seed, practices the brainwashing of the Future.

http://fornits.com/wwf/viewtopic.php?to ... &forum=8&4

And it gets worse. Far worse. I have to tell ya (in case you hadn't noticed) it just chapped my ass when I found out what you people are doing to OverLordd. WTF!!! He's not even a candidate for your "salvation". He's a good kid, hard working, intelligent, putting himself through college and then off to serve this country in the armed forces. He is the epitome of what you austensibly turn bad kids into. Instead, you go an threaten what you already know is important to him (cause he told you, right here in these open forums) just to get him to shut up.

You may tell yourselves and each other that you had reason to fear this kid. And you'll reenforce that specter till it becomes an echo chamber and you all actually believe it. But any objective observer sees a bunch of paranoid freaks picking on a very decent young man. I feel I owe it to him to demonstrate that some Americans can and will keep the homefires burning while he's off figuring out how fucked up our foreign policy is and how to set it right.

And the similarities don't end there, either. Isn't Len a former skidrow drunk turned salvation huckster, just like Art and Chuck Dederich? But you're not so far gone as that yet, either.  Chuck Dederich wound up doing some time behind an attempted murder. He ordered some of his entheusiastic supporters cut the rattles of the tail of a rattle snake and put it in the mailbox of a lawyer who had been winning cash settlements and custody battles on behalf of former employees.

It's not too late to turn things around, admit your flaws, make amends and turn over a new leaf.

Never attempt to teach a pig to sing. It wastes your time and annoys the pig.
--Unanimous

[Troll Control]

Isn't Len a former skidrow drunk turned salvation huckster, just like Art and Chuck Dederich?

I think you're thinking of Rudy Bentz, the drunken killer and former Headmaster at HLA.

It's not too late to turn things around, admit your flaws, make amends and turn over a new leaf.

Sounds good, but I'd advise not to hold your breath.  These people aren't going to change anything of their own volition.  Once they lose a couple of lawsuits and have to payout huge damages their hand will be forced.  

Until then, everyone is going to have to dodge the process servers because these freaks are out for blood.  They don't want just to silence critics, they want to ruin them by whatever means they have at their disposal, whether that's a lawsuit or frightening, threatening anonymous phone calls in the middle of the night.

_________________
"Compassion is the basis of morality."

-Arnold Schopenhauer[ This Message was edited by: Dysfunction Junction on 2006-01-24 15:00 ]

[SHH]

Um Ginger? Where do you make up some of this stuff??? LOL....Len is no former skidrow drunk. He has been a professional in the education business for literally over 30 years. First with public school systems and then later with private schools. He owns 3 schools. One of them is a traditional day school. The others are HLA and Ridge Creek. I think he is on the board of some other schools and foundations as well. He is involved in alot of organizations in Atlanta too. He has been a consultant and psychologist(licensed AND properly degreed) since 1975. Former skidrow drunk? Um, no. That is not accurate information. I know what you are trying to do. But its not factual information. It is your opinion and hope that he was that. But, he is not.

I know you are trying to lump him into the group of other founders of places such as the Seed and Straight and CEDU, but, he hasnt ever worked for those organizations and you are spreading rumors to benefit your cause, and they are untrue and that, is unfair to the people trying to get facts. They dont want rumors, they want factual information.

[SHH]

I didnt think about that Dysfunction. Maybe she is thinking about Rudy. I had read the story about him and the vehicle manslaughter charge, so maybe Ginger got confused between Rudy and Len. Rudy Bentz hasnt been associated with HLA since probably late 1995 or early 96.

[Troll Control]

On 2006-01-24 15:04:00, SHH wrote:

"Um Ginger? Where do you make up some of this stuff??? LOL....Len is no former skidrow drunk. He has been a professional in the education business for literally over 30 years. First with public school systems and then later with private schools. He owns 3 schools. One of them is a traditional day school. The others are HLA and Ridge Creek. I think he is on the board of some other schools and foundations as well. He is involved in alot of organizations in Atlanta too. He has been a consultant and psychologist(licensed AND properly degreed) since 1975. Former skidrow drunk? Um, no. That is not accurate information. I know what you are trying to do. But its not factual information. It is your opinion and hope that he was that. But, he is not.



I know you are trying to lump him into the group of other founders of places such as the Seed and Straight and CEDU, but, he hasnt ever worked for those organizations and you are spreading rumors to benefit your cause, and they are untrue and that, is unfair to the people trying to get facts. They dont want rumors, they want factual information."

Settle down.  It's already been corrected.  

She just confused Len with another "founder" who was a skid-row drunken sot with a penchant for driving drunk and running folks over with his vehicle.

Nobody's spreading rumors.  It's an honest mistake because Rudy is often referred to as a "founder" of HLA.

[TheWho]

On 2006-01-24 15:06:00, SHH wrote:

"I didnt think about that Dysfunction. Maybe she is thinking about Rudy. I had read the story about him and the vehicle manslaughter charge, so maybe Ginger got confused between Rudy and Len. Rudy Bentz hasnt been associated with HLA since probably late 1995 or early 96. "

1996,  He eventually went on to start-up Swift River in Massachusetts, which has a good reputation, well, so far anyway. HaHa

[TheWho]

*****  And the similarities don't end there, either. Isn't Len a former skidrow drunk turned salvation huckster, just like Art and Chuck Dederich? But you're not so far gone as that yet, either. Chuck Dederich wound up doing some time behind an attempted murder. He ordered some of his entheusiastic supporters cut the rattles of the tail of a rattle snake and put it in the mailbox of a lawyer who had been winning cash settlements and custody battles on behalf of former employees.

It's not too late to turn things around, admit your flaws, make amends and turn over a new leaf.

*****

I have no idea what you are talking about, who do you think I am?  I am talking about boosting profits by reacting to feed back from former students via a survey.  I had indicated that there was more positive feed back from those who graduated than those who pulled out, which stands to reason in any situation or school.  I dont think it is anything new.
If you dont know what you are putting out or processing how can one improve the process or program?

I dont know those people Len, charles etc. I dont know how that would tie in to this at all.  You must be mixed up with another thread.

[Troll Control]

I will point out though that is disingenous to insinuate that Len has no connections to places like CEDU.

As an EDCON he sent many kids to abusive behavior mod centers like CEDU and RMA.  I worked with a guy at HLA who was sent by Len to RMA in the late 80's.  

All of his hand-picked startup staff came directly from CEDU itself, like that scumbag Rudy.

So, he is intricately connected to these other folks from these other abusive programs and he made a small fortune sending kids to these places where they were horribly abused.  Ideologically, he is the same as those poeple.  To say otherwise would be belying the facts.

By the way, anon, Swift River is, to this day an unlicensed, unaccredited treatment center based on the highly suspect methodology of behavior modification.  Successful?  At making money, yes.  At treating psychological problems?  Not hardly.

[Anonymous]

On 2006-01-24 15:26:00, Anonymous wrote:

 I had indicated that there was more positive feed back from those who graduated than those who pulled out, which stands to reason in any situation or school.

Well duh!  If they pulled out then they were obviously dissatisfied.  

But that's not what you said before.  You said that the kids who graduated did better (according to the surveys) than kids who pulled out.  Without some kind of clinical, unbiased and long term study how could you possibly know?

[Antigen]

On 2006-01-24 15:26:00, Anonymous wrote:

 I am talking about boosting profits by reacting to feed back from former students via a survey.

But we've already established that they don't seek feedback from the students, only the parents. And Joe has made it more than clear that they agressively pursue parents, former clients and former employees who speak about the place with out permission.

How `bout it, kids! Have any of you been asked to fill out a survey?

And I know who you are. Want me to say? Or you can. Doesn't matter. I think anyone w/ enough interest in this discussion has probably figured it out. The only question remains why? Why do you feel the need to insinuate yourself into the lives of others while hiding your own identity?

Locate the blind spot in the culture--the place where the culture isn't looking, because it dare not--because if it were to look there, its previous values would dissolve.
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1561769118/circlofmiamithem' target='_new'>Terence McKenna