I was going to write Dear Greg, but even titles seem it be m

[GregFL]

We know very little actual facts..only that the press said it was from a diploma mill.  This could or could not be factual.

[GregFL]

On 2005-10-05 04:21:00, Anonymous wrote:

"greg, it does seem to exsist today (ft lauderdale college). if i read the webpage correctly its a part of FMU. i googled it but had to go several pages into the search to pull references to it



http://64.233.167.104/search?q=cache:sQ ... lege&hl=en



not sure if that link will work or not.



http://www.rgs.uci.edu/rig/school_codes/florida.htm



and that link will show an assigned school code for none other then fort lauderdale college. not sure if its really apart of fmu or not, or really still functioning or not, but this certainly makes me think its still out there"

No, I really checked. Ft Lauderdale college was assumed by Florida Metropolitan University. Look at your first link...

I think the first anon did what you did, saw a link but then he laughably tried to use it as a weapon of diversion and humiliation without checkng it out.  For instance, Ft. Lauderdale College has a dead phone number and a dead link, and no listing with the state, but FMU does. FMU has taken over Ft Lauderdale college  almost 10 years ago.

Those links aren't accurate I am afraid.


The questions remain however...

was Ft Lauderdale College the place that awarded Art his honorary doctorate? It seems one anon poster seems to think so, in spite of the "art institute" nonsense which apparently was not or never  affiliated with Ft. Lauderdale College.

What were the circumstances surrounding it?  (supposedly a seed parent arranged it according to one anon post).

If it was Ft lauderdale college, were they accredited to award Doctorate degrees? Accredited to award Any degrees at all in 1972?

If there was a ceremony, who attended? was anyone here there?

If it was, was  Ft lauderdale college a diploma mill in 1972 or an accredited institution?

If it wasn't Ft Lauderdale college, who was it?

Does anyone have the correct answers?


Still waiting...

[Anonymous]

The name was Fort Lauderdale University. I am sure that is the exact name that read on the diploma hanging in his office. The honorary doctorate degree I beleive was in "social sciences" or "human sciences."

[GregFL]

See how this gets convoluted?

Maybe it was  "Ft. Lauderdale University", an entirely seperate entity than all these others being bantered around.

there is no record of a "Ft Lauderdale University" Anywhere that I can find. That doesn't mean there wasn't an entity issuing diplomas with that name...

Do you know anything else about this?

[Anonymous]

It should have at least been licensed with the state of Florida to have its doors open for business. Whether or not it was accredited at the time is another story since it has to be regionally accredited by Southern Association of Colleges and Schools (or SACS) for it to be considered an accredited U.S. school. Respected accreditation can be a relative term, however, since some people knowingly pay for a degree and feel they have the right to its title, especially if said person does in fact already possess the knowledge to practice that someone else with an accredited degree possesses. Of course, there are several fields that would not accept an unaccredited degree for hiring purposes. To conclude, the fact that the school is licensed to award degrees is not synonymous to regional accreditation.

[Anonymous]

You can search SACS accreditation here:

http://www.sacscoc.org/meminfo.asp

[landyh]

On 2005-09-22 15:47:00, Antigen wrote:

"Well how come the Seed, Straight and the other spin offs are the only ones to do this? Why don't they do strip searches in hospital settings? Surely they have the same desire to keep drugs away from their patients, don't they?



So... one time out of how many thousands of kids humiliated? And you sincerely think that's justified?



That's the problem here, I think. You guys are just obsessed w/ drugs the way the puritans were obsessed w/ witchcraft. Very like that, in fact.

 

The government of the United States is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian religion.
--John Adams, U.S. President

"

Ginger,
One time? As i wrote elsewhere I was strip searched on my second time at the Seed. It took five guys to do it. I was 12 years old and if anyone got hurt physically it was the guys doing the search. I had a bag of weed in my underwear. John is on the money that this started because people did try to bring stuff in.  As to not being strip searched in county jails that is simply not true. I know this for a fact from personal experience. My sister and I talked this weekend  about our experience at the seed and we were in complete agreement that niether one of us ever saw anyone purposely hurt physically or even accidentally. Again being strip searched was somewhat traumatic  but I made it the difficult situation it was. Given the way I fought they would have had to go out of there way to keep from hurting me. I was hanging from the toilet partitions trying my best to kick the shit of them. Yet they did no more than restrain me. On the subject of JaLong I thing it is horrible that you had to endure facing your abuser as you did. But is there some implication that this was somehow the kind of thing the seed did to help with there conditioning efforts. I would imagine that you and your abuser were the only people who knew what happened. Please JaLong my intent is not at all to minimize your trauma as I had my own I understand the deep wounds that accompany it. But does anybody wonder where this rapist made the changes in his life that made him repentent? Is there nothing positive in that? I have to keep repeating apparently that those of you that see the seed in a totally negative light are just as blindly deluded as those who see it as a panacea. Can't we acknowlege that it was a little of both and call it a day.   [ This Message was edited by: landyh on 2005-11-28 23:10 ]

[JaLong]

Landyh,
Thanks for the comments. It was very many years when the guy truely apologized. I had called him and told him how he had f'd up my life. He cried, I cried, and I forgave him. Yes, I'm sure we were the only ones there, except for his sister who was also on staff knew. I have some fond memories of the seed. Especially the friends I made there and still have. I have been re-united with more form this site. The way I look at it, I took what I needed from the seed to continue on with my life, and let the rest go. Yes, I needed counseling, and still do. Yet so is life. I really enjoyed going over to the GUY'S house down near Bayfront Hosp.
I feel we all go through trials in our lives, and as long as we learn something from them- that is all that matters.
Take care,
Julie

[cajun75]

Landyh,

I want to thank you for bringing your thoughts and memories of the seed to this forum. I think I truly put the whole experience behind me once I left. I did not think about it much, yet I don't know if I intentionally just blocked out the whole experience and that was just the mechanism I used to deal with it or not. I brought this up to me Dad and he said the seed tought me to take responsibility for my life. I tend to disagree with him as how can a child take responsibilty for his own life without being tought kindness, unselfish love, and character from the ones who love them. I think I just coped with the situation, went through the motions, and was glad to just leave. I still think my father had some responsibilty for my actions as I was just reaching out for attention. For my situation, you do not leave children at home, leave town for a week at a time, and excpect 14 and 15 year olds to take responsibilty for themselves. I am speaking for myself and my brother. I would never dream of doing that to my children. I think as I grew older, I did take responsibilty for my life but responsibilty begins at home at an early age from nurturing parents. I never got that as a child. I think the experience has tought me to be a kind and caring person, but it took me a long time to realize this as I struggled to know myself. I was bitter after leaving the seed and was just determined to make it on my own. It has been only in the last few years that I have reconciled the differences and ill feelings I have had regarding my parents. It took self realization and learning to know myself and a strong belief in God. I can say that I was not mistreated while I was at the seed. I went into the Seed in February 1975 and I was not strip searched and I don't know when they started this. My brother who was also there says the seed saved his life. I think everyones prespective and circumstances are different as I do not feel as though the seed saved my life.

Kind Regards,

Chuck

[Antigen]

Again, Landy, I know their intentions were and are good. But, like all zealots and insular groups, they often do a lot of harm believing that their cause justifies a bit of trauma.

I know it started out as a voluntary thing. That alone probably made a world of difference. People went there and submitted to whatever requirements Art and Hap and Mave laid down or they voluntarily did not.

But people get carried away. People especially get carried away in an environment where no natural dissent is tolerated. Predictably enough, it got worse and worse to the point where, in Straight, they were talking parents into committing little kids preemptively; because they were making friends who made the parents nervous or because they snuck a beer once from Dad's cooler. Those kids were strip searched and coerced into confessing a drug habit or a druggie attitude that would eventually lead to a habit that would eventually lead to a heroin addiction and undignified death on skidrow.

Now think about the total environment in the Seed on your second time around. If they hadn't strip searched you, then what? You might have pulled out a bag of sticky sometime later. Then what? Do you think the whole group would have been brought down by the sight of it? Or is it more likely that whoever was around would have snatched it outa your hand and reported you for it? The strip search wasn't at all necessary to protect the group from drugs. However, it's known to be a very effective means of disorienting and dominating a person.

Then we come to find out that the gateway theory was entirely bogus anyway. Pot, the one drug they could almost count on almost all teenagers to have tried, is just not that dangerous.

Like I said, they lied a LOT. Not so much to others as to themselves.

A multitude of laws in a country is like a great number of physicians, a sign of weakness and malady.


--Voltaire, philosopher (1694-1778)

[landyh]

On 2005-11-29 06:20:00, JaLong wrote:

"Landyh,

Thanks for the comments. It was very many years when the guy truely apologized. I had called him and told him how he had f'd up my life. He cried, I cried, and I forgave him. Yes, I'm sure we were the only ones there, except for his sister who was also on staff knew. I have some fond memories of the seed. Especially the friends I made there and still have. I have been re-united with more form this site. The way I look at it, I took what I needed from the seed to continue on with my life, and let the rest go. Yes, I needed counseling, and still do. Yet so is life. I really enjoyed going over to the GUY'S house down near Bayfront Hosp.

I feel we all go through trials in our lives, and as long as we learn something from them- that is all that matters.

Take care,

Julie"

Thank you also for your comments here. I have to say too that I did read in your posts that his apology while at the seed seemed to you to be insincere. Sounds like maybe he had reached the point of being ashamed which isn't quite the same as being sorry. It is hard for me to think of abusers as positive in anyway but I suppose if there still out there I would rather mine to have found there own healing. At the very least that they don't continue the same patterns of abuse to this day. I am so glad that you were able to confront at least one of your abusers though it is tough for me to sympathize with the fate of the other 4 guys.
Sounds like you found some healing there. I'm working on it. Cheers!

[ChrisL]

The healing is in both sides; asking for and the act of forgiving...I recently reached out to someone by writing them a letter, asking for their forgiveness, even if I never hear from them, and I told them in my letter it was not neccesary, I still felt better, somehow in someway by giving up that old grudge, defense, resentment, whatever you want to call it, I felt better inside (& not just a relief of guilt, because I really had nothing to feel guilty about) I felt that by asking for forgiveness I had also forgiven them...after 25 years...