When I say experts, I am talking of the therapists that refer them in the first place - the ones who gain financially from it, I can understand why a parent would trust a person they have paid and who is qualified to do the best for their child's mental health, taken their advice - and the brochures make it all look oh so lovely dontcha think?
I think most parents find out about these programs from program parent referrers, "Educational consultants", the internet, and Tv shows. It shows, in many cases, they purposely neglected contacting professionals
You know how many kids I knew who'se psychologists recommended contacting educational consultants. That industry has a good PR department. It is not exactly widely known that the industry is completely unregulated. Parents assume that these are professionals since they have fancy titles.
and decided that they, as a parent, were apt enough to decide whether their child needed long term inpatient "care". "The professionals" don't lock a kid up for a year or two just because they smoke weed and steal cars. These private programs are more of a private juvenile justice system than a treatment system, because they aren't trying to rehabilitate. They are trying to punish and change behaviors they consider unsatisfactory. That is not how treatment works. Professionals do not send kids to go camping for 10 weeks for anorexia or bulimia. Professionals do not recommend sending a kid to Tranquility Bay for smoking pot and ditching school.
Well what about professionals like those at the Dept of State... who referred me to Benchmark and a shitload of others to WWASP, CEDU, and are currently referring to Aspen schools...
The bitch who referred me... Anne Weiss.. Was very very wise to retire as soon as my dad started to file complaints about her after Benchmark.. Becuase I wanted her fucking head on a spike. I would recommend anybody else who was referred by the DoS to take similar action.
The parents are seeking an option that should not exist, that being the unilateral right to lock their children in a private prison for no legitimate reason. It's precisely the lack of professionalism that leads to this. The entire industry is run by greedy businessmen, staff and program owners trained within the private program industry, and kids who go through it, and end up working for them or starting their own (you know since, they 'know how it all works' and all that :roll: )
Far too well. And i've seen the most abused of em say "if my kid ever needed it, i'd send em to Benchmark".... and i'm just blown over by that... Program kids becoming program parents. In some people, the brainwashing is permanant. Lifton noted it's not common, but it happens... Some people, even after being removed from the thought reform enviornment, never snap out at all. Of course it helps that this particular person still talks to her staff counselor on a frequent basis... These people, who the brainwashing lasts on, for whom program becomes home, are the "queen bees"... off to go start a new hive.
