Hello all, My name is Chip Sinton and I'm a member of NYRA. I sympathize with what you're doing and what you're attempting to accomplish. Both times i've run for Board of Directors in NYRA I've made Behavior Modification Facilities a major campaigning point. I personally think NYRA should be more proactive about these atrocities, but we are trying and trying hard. Bringing to light an ugly truth can be harder than it seems on a web forum though.
I've come here though because i read through this thread and i am frankly appalled. CAFETY is an organization that i empathize with and beleive in its potential for good, but this frankly ridiculous.
1) The first post of this thread, about the annual meeting, the complaining and insinuation that the Annual Meeting was somehow a failure because it was attended by kids is ridiculous. One main reason the industry can continue to grow and suceed is that soceity views teens as deplorable almost-peoples instead of as actual people. We as a nation get worked up over Gitmo when hundreds of Gitmos are going on, but for teens. Its appalling that your opinion of kids would be as event ruining objects.
2) Alexander Koroknay-Palicz is no clown. He may have a sense of humor, a trait seemingly lacking in some here(i won't point fingers, since you guys seem to dislike that) but he is no clown. He is one of the hardest working people in our community. To kick him off your board would be to lose a valueable asset to your fledgling org, a stabilizing assest you could probably use.
3)It is spelled curb. "kick him to the CURB". Kerb isn't even internetspeak, its just dumb
4)You do realize that you're argueing over linking to a link. There are so many better things you could be doing with your time. Do you have a plan on how to capitalize on Mitt Romney running his campaign on child torture blood money? Or how to make the Troubled Teen Industry an issue this coming election? Or is web links and a puritanical membership and board really more important?
5)I don't think you realize the stakes here. Its all linked together. We're the underdogs here. We're splintered from soceity by conditioning and oppression, we're constrainted by cash when fighting an entity that has funds enough to buy off mayors and governors. What we don't need is to break apart as a community, to focus our efforts on making each other weaker. It was said earlier that NYRA had a great structure, a budget, an office. We got all these things by working our way up, by having great intiative, promise, and leadership. At this stage, all organizations need to take advantage of each other and all resources available. It would seem Isebelle made a mistake, but her org still has great information and does good work. To ignore and osctracize people who don't is stupid. NYRA will continue linking to CAICA because it is a good source of information on a little known topic. The organization does productive work, so we ally ourselves. We're in a struggle, and it isn't against each other. Division is suicidal. Tolerance, empathy, understanding is needed. Extremeism, squabbling and zero tolerance is regressive in a community that can't afford anything but progress. NYRA has a position against Zero Tolerance because it is ridiculous. Applied in Schools, by Parents, or in this forum, it is still retarded. We need to work together, not apart.
I urge you to not make a mistake based on personal biases that will direly effect your potential and this community's potential.
