Provo Canyon Staff Member speaks out

[Anonymous]

I used to work for PCS and would like to vouch for the stories about thought control, cruelty, excessive violence, drug injection, and so forth. I never saw anyone seriously injured there though. I would like to tell another side to this tragic story--the corruption of the employees. The system corrupts the most wide-eyed idealist. Believe me, I was one before I worked there. I am starting to excorcise the demons, but I am not the same man I used to be. You are taught, modeled, trained, conditioned, and challenged to be unreasonably punitive. The whole objective of the organization is to cripple courage, individuality, and security in the self of the child.

I started there trying to be kind to the boys I worked with, but they had been conditioned to see that as weakness and would walk all over me and take advantage of me. After that, I began the horrifying metamorphisis from a soft-hearted, compassionate sort into a Cheney-like punitive sort.

It broke my heart again and again to see these tender aged young men treated like they were the scum of the earth. And there is a constant flow of foulness in everything from language to attitudes.

One day when one of the young men was being particularly belligerent towards me, I got the Senior-On in there and we forced this boy to the ground. Because the boy had hurt my feelings, I felt pleasure in seeing him taken to the ground. That was the first time that I had felt full-on sadism in my thought process. It was then that I decided I couldn't work there any longer. The place is despicable, dehumanizing to student and staff, and it needs to be closed! There has go to be a better way to help struggling kids.

[BuzzKill]

Please consider filing a report with ISAC
http://www.ISACcorp.org

Also, If you don't mind; Please fire me off an email. I'd like to "talk" with you about something I'm working on.
I will never do anything to deprive you of you anonymity.
BuzzKill@alltel.net

[Nihilanthic]

I really hope you are not trolling.

If you really did work there provide some sort of evidence, (paychecks?) and go tell the damn media.

Dr. Phil just sent a girl off there. Time is certainly not on her or her family's side. I also suggest you talk to ISAC about legal representation becuase PCS might try to sue you.

Good luck.

Vain are the thousand creeds that move men's hearts, unutterably vain, worthless as wither'd weeds.
--Emily Bronte

[cherish wisdom]

This is the story of a woman who spent her entire teenage years at Provo Canyon School. Those who were employed there could do more to end this type of maltreatment......

I was only thirteen years old when admitted to PCS. They said I was just touring it. Then as soon as I was behind closed doors they put me in a room with a woman whom I have never met before. She told me I was staying there and couldn't say goodbye to my mom. I was pretty scared. At the time I was a rebellious teen girl, with an attitude. By the time I left there I was an adult. They diagnosed me with an illness I am sure doesn't even exist. They called it oppositional defiant disorder. They forced me to speak of things painful to the thought let alone the tongue. My therapist had me admitting to things I had never done. He had a way with words. I was punished because of a physical ailment. I was unable to bend at the knee so I couldn't bend over to clean the bottom of my shower. I sat on the investment unit for a long time just because I was impaired. I saw things I never should have seen at thirteen. Suicide attempts, unexplainable psych illnesses. Feces rubbed on the floor and walls ,constant screams and cries in the night.(I heard dial nine in my sleep for years after leaving there) I am from Las Vegas and almost 8 years ago I was sent to PCS as a guinea pig for an insurance company thinking of covering the program on their rehabilitation policy. I smoked pot. And at 13 not very often. I was not crazy. My mother was misinformed about my treatment. In fact it seemed there were always secrets. I left there in February of 1997. I was too scared to leave my house until November that same year. Nine months I sheltered myself from the world. Trying to hide from the world I viewed in there. I saw things at that young age that most people living full lives never see. In the end being around the older girls only educated me of the drugs I had yet to conquer. After my nine month hibernation I emerged only to hide the pain I felt, the shame I felt. Everyone treated me like I was crazy I figured why not act the part. Besides that, from the day I was admitted to PCS and to this day now, I am different. I!

 think differently. I was an outsider to my peers, with memories that made me somewhat queer. I was quiet and withdrawn. I didn't think anyone would even begin to understand. I kept quiet. It ate at my soul.  I let my self-esteem run my life for the next 5 years. I battled a massive addiction to methanphetamines. Hell, I fought with addiction to everything. I was finally incarcerated into a state facility. I didn't need it, but I deserved it. I did not deserve PCS. I am and have always been a strong willed leader of a person. I have a kind soul and a genuine heart. No one will ever be able to take that away from me again. No one will ever coerce me to believe otherwise. Today I am a mother of a 2 year old little girl. I don't have the perfect life but I try everyday. I still think of those screams I still remember the girl who pulled out her hair whenever she got mad. I bet they have forgotten me. (the staff and counselors). I believe they admitted me there for money and knew I was an average brat of a girl.

If you want to get together in any exclusive situation and have people love you, fine- but to hang all this desperate sociology on the idea of The Cloud-Guy who has The Big Book, who knows if you've been bad or good- and CARES about any of it- to hang it all on that, folks, is the chimpanzee part of the brain working.
--Frank Zappa, American musician