Treatment Abuse, Behavior Modification, Thought Reform > The Seed Discussion Forum
Some insight(s)
John_FtPierce:
Thanks Greg, and not to forget Ginger (Antigen).
I posted a very positive post. I can see that there are others who
also feel very positively about their experience as well.
I think that there have been bad things related to the seed. I think
that maybe there were some abuses. Hopefully just with the parents,
not staffers. But I think that as any "institution" grows in size,
things are not as well defined, not as well monitored, ... , whatever.
Abuses occur everywhere. For better or worse, they do occur. One can
look at almost any intuition and see them. I work for a university.
I see some people who are abused unfairly by the university, I see
others who receive preferential treatment. This is a fact of life.
** To those who may have been abused by unusual circumstances at the
seed, *I* personally apologize. **
I would hope that people can see past this, see past trivial things.
Yes, the damn peanut butter and jelly sandwiches were horrible, the
seats uncomfortable. Yes, things were regimented and controlled.
Yes, there was "peer pressure" within the seed. Yes, too many, many
things.
But, at least for me, there was so much more.
I don't think "the seed saved my life". I wasn't that kind of person.
I probably wouldn't have dyed had I not been to the seed. But, it did
change my life, and as I said earlier, for so much the better.
However, I have done a great amount of researching, reading the web,
all over. And it does seem to me that some of the other drug rehab
institutions were not like the seed. It is difficult not to believe
that Straight was pretty bad, even if I only believes 0.01% of what
I've read. I am somewhat upset that the seed is seen as the
predecessor of things that might be as bad as I suspect.
I think that the seed and all of its founders, creators and staff had
nothing but the best of intentions. Maybe these intentions were still
swirling with the idealism of the late 60s: "we are going to change
the world". I'm older now and have seen that idealism many times in
my life. While I don't believe in it as much as I use to, I still
hope and dream that it comes true as much as ever.
-- John
Antigen:
--- Quote ---On 2005-08-05 14:34:00, John Underwood wrote:
The irony here, of course, is that many of your postings suggest and allege excessive fervor, while personally we were accused on a regular basis, by parents, of being ?too soft.?
--- End quote ---
I think the more salient irony here is that you guys didn't know what the hell you were messing with either.
Let's start w/ the first and most impotent rule. Where the hell was that when you were telling my 14yo brother that his dad didn't love him enough to come to open meetings? The truth of the matter is that you assholes didn't like his attitude when you gave him the ultimatum to sever ties w/ all of his best old friends or to make himself scarce while his sons were in the program.
I remember that night. I remember him cussing up a storm over how that damned professional alcoholic was happy to take his money and food donations and then have some smart assed 16yo druggie kid try to tell him how to live. Do you guys remember ever having ham and bologna? Remember those spice encrusted turkeys at thanksgiving? Thank my dad. All that good grub, plus cash donations, came from my dad and his friend, Lou DiFasio. You can even ask him if he's still alive. He was still living in Pompano when we moved up here 3 years ago.
Did you know that, while my dad wasn't allowed to attend open meetings, he was sitting out in the parking lot? I spent a few evenings out in that old orange grove star gazing w/ him. And I must say, it was a much better investment of my time than what was going on in that smoke filled open meeting room.
But you have NO idea what your lies did to my brother. He believed you, John! "Poor Tommy, even though his own dad doesn't love him enough to get w/ the program, he's still working hard to overcome his (non-existant) drug problem. But we love him, don't we group?" No, evidently you did not. Not unless he bent to your rules and to your beliefs, even about himself and his own blood. It was conditional; that's not love!
Then there's the rather notorious, pettite teenager w/ the $1k/day drug habit? John, if you really were a heroin addict when you showed up, I guess you might have known what a rediculous lie that was. Did it never occure to you to even wonder why no one ever challenged that?
And how about the 90% success rate? Or was it 99%? :rofl: Pulled right out of Art Barkers ass, that one was! Of course, that's one aspect of the Program that I can believe was taken right out of AA.
I guess honesty is only important when you're grilling a 14yo for the torrid details of their sex life and private thoughts in front of a rather intimidating group of peers, huh?
I recognize that some people have fond memories of their involvement w/ the Seed. However, I also recognize that many of those fond memories are based on total bullshit.
My memory of those years are all about having to pretend I just loved the Program and all those open meetings and even the after meeting marathons at the back booth at Denny's. The reality is that, after I hit the age of around 11 or 12 or so, I was terrified every single week that I wouldn't be going home after open meeting. Can you imagine what it's like for a kid having to keep that to myself? I couldn't confide in anyone because having a bad attitude about the Seed was, certainly, a druggie attitude that would require treatment.
Oh, and that's not all. Same for wearing makeup or anything close to stylish clothing, having friends my own age was also verbotten. Remember, 90% of all teenagers are druggies, therefore teenage friends are probably druggie friends, therefore ..... well I had an extremely lonely childhood. By the time I got free and looked up my allegedly druggie boyfriend, he was already a freshman at Berkeley on a music scholarship. But then, his parents weren't insane. When my mom tried to convince them that their son needed a program, they ignored her.
Why do I feel the need to rain on your parade? Simple, really. You paint such a rosey picture of the whole thing that, unless those of us who know the other side of the story speak up, we wind up w/ Brother Jeb! building $100M worth of what he believes is juvenile drug rehabilitation centers where juvenile judges can compel kids to confess to drug problems they don't have.
I know your intentions were good. Never doubted that. But you just seem to be completely blind to the damage the whole thing has done. Sorry, The Seed was not unique. It was, just as Bobby DuPont promised, an attempt to replicate the Synanon method throughout the land. I just don't want my grandkids to have to live under the cloud of fear that I did when I was a kid. So I think it's worth hurting you guys' feelings.
Remember, honesty is the first and most impotent rule. And no, my brain never needed a good washing.
The world is so exquisite, with so much love and moral depth, that there is no reason to deceive ourselves with pretty stories for which there's no good evidence. Far better, it seems to me, to look death in the eye and to be grateful every day for the brief but magnificent opportunity that life provides.
--Carl Sagan
--- End quote ---
_________________
Ginger Warbis ~ Antigen
Drug war POW
Seed Chicklett `71 - `80
Straight, Sarasota
10/80 - 10/82
Anonymity Anonymous
return undef() if /coercion/i;
Nihilanthic:
:nworthy: :nworthy: :nworthy:
First they ignore you. Then they laugh at you. Then they fight you. Then you win.
Gandhi
--- End quote ---
cleveland:
OK, I am weighing in.
I have very fond memories of the Seed, and I have harsh memories as well. No, the hard seats and the soggy sandwiches didn't kill me, and I was glad to have some discipline. What hurt, was realizing that the 'love' I was promised was conditional upon my acting a certain way, which required me to be less than honest. Yes, it was good to have a 'good attitude;' no, it was bad to not be able to live my life to be the person I am. I lost many years at the Seed to trying to follow a path others had laid out for me - I gained some other things that I also can't ignore. The Seed harnessed my sixties idealism (OK it was the seventies!) but didn't give it free reign. That was were it fell far, far short for me. And as to all those friends I though I had - few of them, few of them, truly cared for me, with the exception I can say, of a couple I have been in touch with here. And oh my god, did I need friends. It would have been nice to have kept them. Seven years of my life and so little carried over.
Life is complex, and the Seed tried to make it all simple. It did fail in some ways, Suceeded in others. What remains for me is the ideal of trying to be good and love others, but I had that when I came in and I had to find ways to regain it when I left the Seed. I felt betrayed and lost when I left the Seed, as if I had failed. I had not, I needed to see that.
I am glad for the postings here. There is so much more I want to say because none of this is adequate. Apparently I am somewhat bitter and unresolved, but I don't think greatly so. I am a happy guy today, I can tell you that. I learn from all of this. It was my youth.
Anonymous:
--- Quote ---On 2005-08-06 12:55:00, John_FtPierce wrote:
"Thanks Greg, and not to forget Ginger (Antigen).
I posted a very positive post. I can see that there are others who
also feel very positively about their experience as well.
I think that there have been bad things related to the seed. I think
that maybe there were some abuses. Hopefully just with the parents,
not staffers. But I think that as any "institution" grows in size,
things are not as well defined, not as well monitored, ... , whatever.
Abuses occur everywhere. For better or worse, they do occur. One can
look at almost any intuition and see them. I work for a university.
I see some people who are abused unfairly by the university, I see
others who receive preferential treatment. This is a fact of life.
** To those who may have been abused by unusual circumstances at the
seed, *I* personally apologize. **
I would hope that people can see past this, see past trivial things.
Yes, the damn peanut butter and jelly sandwiches were horrible, the
seats uncomfortable. Yes, things were regimented and controlled.
Yes, there was "peer pressure" within the seed. Yes, too many, many
things.
But, at least for me, there was so much more.
I don't think "the seed saved my life". I wasn't that kind of person.
I probably wouldn't have dyed had I not been to the seed. But, it did
change my life, and as I said earlier, for so much the better.
However, I have done a great amount of researching, reading the web,
all over. And it does seem to me that some of the other drug rehab
institutions were not like the seed.....
I think that the seed and all of its founders, creators and staff had
nothing but the best of intentions.
--- End quote ---
the entire teen help industry has commonality running thru it. The idealism of the seed was not based on 60s free love and "changing the world" but rather more on a egocentric movement to stop drugs at any cost, damn the collateral damage. This attitude and treatment modality existed thruout the united states by the time Art "invented" these techniques..only surprise suprise, they were already in full force and being practiced on children at CEDU, Elan and other treatment facilities that predate the seed. How art learned of them is stil a mystery even if he or his top staff was not connected directly to the synanon. The premise that art conjured up all these techniques out of thin air is erroneous and downright disengenious. Also, the assertion that it was all AA is also patently false. AA NEVER locks you up involuntarily, uses "come down on you by your "peers" techniques and makes you publicly confess to your crimes and sins and puts toilet seats around your neck. These are TC modalities pure and simple.
Never forget that the vast majority of those lovey dovey staff members were imparting their "gift of love" on basically 12-17 year old PRISONERS, not on a bunch of kids that voluntarily signed up to change the world. Don't forget that this love included not even allowing these little children to have their backs touch their chairs, 105 degree extended heat with only occastional water breaks, prohibition of the children to even let their mind wander for a moment without the threat of severe punishment, to withold family affection, decent food and freedom of bowel and urinary movement until "they got it" as you apparently did on your first or second day at the adult age of 22.
This idealism of the staff would have been just fine if it wasn't done in a coersive abusive non- voluntary environment. It was. All the flowery posturing aside, the Seed was a personality cult that with the blessing of misbeggoten parents, inprisoned and then practiced crude behavior modification on children including sleep deprivation, food deprivation, witholding of bathroom priviveldes, fear and intimidation, threat of inprisonmnet and loss of family for non compliance.
You wanna change the world? Start by looking inward at what really occured during the 6 years you were there, and apologize to the people that were harmed instead of blaming them for "not getting it". Stop hiding behind all this "saving lives" mumbo jumbo and own up to locking little kids up, terrorizing, humiliating, degrading, love bombing and ostraciizing them from their family. then, when all was said and done, cutting them off from their new "family" when they tried to assert independence and free will. Oh how easy it must be for someone of strong will that entered this environment in their 20s and quickly rose to the top to bash the now adult attendees of this cult who were once harmed little children held against their will without really trying to understand the harm that occured. You guys forced little tiny children under the guise of "saving their lives" into involuntary hero worship of a little egomaniac asshole and his handpicked croonies and now you bash them 30 years later for "not getting it".
As far as the testimonials, you can set up a website and get positive feedback on any cult. No surprise there.
The seed was a cult. Every cult has "positive" goals and paths one can take mixed in with the love bombing and behavior modification techniques. Big deal. The seed didn't invent "honesty, love and awareness" but instead bastardized these terms into something barely recogizing their true intended meaning.
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