Yeah, you really just don't know what you're talking about, The Who.
The point is that so-called "RAD" is diagnosed based on a syndrome of symptoms. Normally this is how diagnoses are formed, but in the case of "RAD" the problem is that the "syndrome" is made up of other readily treatable, known and quantifiable psychological disorders. Each case of diagnosed "RAD" is merely an amalgam of individually treatable psychologial maladaptions to psychosocial stressors (like emotional, physical or sexual abuse or neglect). The entire idea the "RAD" is a unique, consistently identifiable and diagnosable set of common symptoms is, in and of itself, a farce.
This fact, coupled with the indesputable truth that there is no valid "attachment therapy" (in point of fact, the practitioners of "AT" routinely psychologically damage patients and often actually murder them during "treatment" - a point easily verified by simple research).
I can understand your ignorance in this matter as your education and experience in this area is exactly ziltch.
Here's what Pat Crossman, an LCSW researcher of the pseudoscience of "attachment Therapy" has to say about it:
Attachment Therapy
The last decade has seen a sharp rise in the number of cases of gross child abuse, some resulting in death, by or under the direction of "psychotherapists"--many unlicensed or delicensed, who practice a form of pseudotherapy called Attachment Therapy (AT).
AT is a growing, multi-faceted and as yet underground movement for the treatment of children who pose disciplinary problems to their parents or caregivers, in many cases adoptees or foster children. These children are diagnosed as suffering from Reactive Attachment Disorder (RAD), a failure to attach with the current caregiver due to early trauma.
The only cure (according to AT) is to "reparent" the child, thereby supposedly obtaining the desired attachment and total obedience of the child. Reparenting methods include eye contact on command, physical restraint, the infliction of pain and terror, and the induction of regression.
AT burst on the public scene in 2000 with the news of the death of a ten-year-old girl, Candace Newmaker. Candace was suffocated during a brutal, 70-minute videotaped rebirthing psychodrama in Colorado that was conducted to make the girl more satisfactory to her adoptive mother.
The places The Who represents would obviously be interested in AT, as it requires only unlicensed or delicensed quacks to perform. Conveniently, these are the very folks who staff the vast majority of the TBS/EG/Wilderness programs he routinely pimps on this site.
The overarching idea here is that RAD is a spurious dx, AT is a spurious and dangerous endeavor that often results in maimed and dead babies and children. Take it for what it's worth, but you can bet your ass none of my kin will ever be subjected to this deadly form of quackery.
Another gem from Crossman that adequately sums up the TBS/EG/Wilderness industry and it's proponents like The Who:
Theories of medical and psychiatric management based on ignorance or pseudoscience can be dangerous, even in the hands of good people. It is said that George Washington was bled to death by four devoted and honest physicians. Bloodletting and purging were acceptable methods of curing diseases at that time. Those who survived were appreciative and would recommend it to their friends. We don't do this any more, because we now understand the true function of blood. Neither do we condone exorcisms to flush out evil spirits. This is because we now know better. Ignorance is forgivable. But sometimes, in certain personalities and at certain times, ignorance is accompanied by a terrible arrogance, even charisma, that condones and justifies cruelty as a method for achieving the desired results--which in all such cases is control.
Ignorance + Arrogance + Desire for Control = Maimed and Dead Children.
Sound familiar to anyone?
