Author Topic: Good Friends/Reunions Only  (Read 12379 times)

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Offline Antigen

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« Reply #30 on: December 08, 2005, 03:54:00 PM »
Having thought about it for just a couple more minutes, there's just one more thing I'd like to add.

I'm guessing that those frat boys, at the time, being quite impaired themselves, probably told themselves that my participation in their party was more or less consensual. I had, after all, voluntarily taken the invitation to join in their St. Paddy's Day celebration and gladly accepted the first drink they offered me. It was, from their point of view, more or less just some good clean fun. Naughty, bad, out of bounds to be sure. But not sick, sadistic or really profoundly wrong.

I understood and accepted that then and, if I ran into any of them now, would probably not be filled w/ rage. I might even feel a little sorry for the, too. After all, I wasn't hurt by the whole thing anywhere near as much as people say all rape is always profoundly destructive. Relative to the rest of my life's circumstances at the time, it was a very minor event.

But there's a difference. Like the rest of us, I'm sure those boys grew up. And, unless they're authentic and incurable assholes, by now they must know they owe me a sincere apology.

Yes, I can accept that some of you had a great time mind-fucking whoever landed up in group. And I can easily understand, given the circumstances, how back then you had no clue that it was wrong, no concept of the damage you were doing. But now? NOW? How fucking DARE you step to me and, for all intents and purposes, tell me to shut the hell up with the complaining and let you guys wax fondly nostalgic about the good times ya'll had mindfucking little girls and little boys.

No, sorry. Sick is sick.

We can easily forgive a child who is afraid of the dark. The real tragedy of life is when men are afraid of the light.
--Plato

Hands that help are far better then lips that pray.
--Robert G. Ingersoll, American politician and lecturer

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Offline Anonymous

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« Reply #31 on: December 08, 2005, 04:02:00 PM »
Quote

< Who was gangbanged on St Paddy's day??? What???? :cool:  :cool:
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Offline Ft. Lauderdale

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« Reply #32 on: December 08, 2005, 04:53:00 PM »
Please kick this Anonymous into oblivion.  

Thank you in advance.
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Offline Antigen

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« Reply #33 on: December 08, 2005, 04:58:00 PM »
Quote
On 2005-12-08 13:02:00, Anonymous wrote:

Who was gangbanged on St Paddy's day??? What???? :cool:  :cool: "


I was. I had run from Straight for the second time. So I knew full well what the stakes were if I got caught. I'd wandered around for a couple of weeks on the highways (no, not being a hooker, just your run-o-the-mill hitchhiker) when I decided to go see my brother. I thought maybe he'd have a friend somewhere who would be willing to help me stay hidden while keeping body and soul together till the magic birthday.

Took me 3 full days to hike down to So. Florida. Florida is, I'm convinced, the coldest state in the union.

Never did hook up w/ my brother. Spent some hours hiding out in the bushes at the end of the street, ate some fruit off the neighbor's tree, took a nap and waited to try and catch my brother at home w/o my dad. Finally decided I didn't have the courage or it wasn't worth the risk of getting caught and sent back. So I took my happy ass back the hell out of Florida. I think I landed up in Massachusetts that time. Hard to remember.

If people are good only because they fear punishment, and hope for a reward, then we are a sorry lot indeed.
--Albert Einstein, German-born American physicist



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"Don\'t let the past remind us of what we are not now."
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Offline Anonymous

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« Reply #34 on: December 08, 2005, 06:12:00 PM »
Florida can be a cold place. Sometimes I think every asshole in the worls is down here
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Offline cleveland

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« Reply #35 on: December 08, 2005, 06:51:00 PM »
Ginger, I can only say that your story is painful, shocking and sad, and that this is a pain that so many women I have known share in some way or another.

Abuse has many, many forms and faces, and we are all of us guilty at some point of hurting one another. And even our best efforts to be good can turn out poorly.

No wonder you are mad. I think you have used some of your anger to fuel the work it takes to maintain and run this site, and I am grateful that you have chosen to do so.

I agree with you that the current treatment of adolescents is all wrong, and unfortunately, a lot of it was based on the Seed.

But I also see that there are posters here who have a largely positive memory of the Seed, and I find it hard to think that the original intent of the seed was evil. I think that anything as powerful and coercive as the seed was can lead, and maybe will always lead, to abuses. But I can't argue with someone's positive feelings - you can't argue feelings. I hope that we will have respect for feelings as well as for facts - in the end, truth will be revealed and that's what healing is all about as far as I am concerned.

I heard someone say that there is no such thing as 'closure' when it comes to human feelings, that our experiences enclose one another like the rings of an onion. That makes sense to me. We can only assimilate, but the pain and joy of our experiences will be with us forever.

Anyway, I guess it seems weird to add it to this post, but happy holidays - again - to everyone!

Walter[ This Message was edited by: cleveland on 2005-12-08 15:54 ]
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Offline landyh

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« Reply #36 on: December 08, 2005, 07:33:00 PM »
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On 2005-12-08 15:51:00, cleveland wrote:

"



But I also see that there are posters here who have a largely positive memory of the Seed, and I find it hard to think that the original intent of the seed was evil. I think that anything as powerful and coercive as the seed was can lead, and maybe will always lead, to abuses. But I can't argue with someone's positive feelings - you can't argue feelings. I hope that we will have respect for feelings as well as for facts - in the end, truth will be revealed and that's what healing is all about as far as I am concerned.


Walter[ This Message was edited by: cleveland on 2005-12-08 15:54 ]"

I was there in the beginning and have stated numerous times that it didn't start out as coercive or abusive in any way. Ginger has even been willing to acknowledge the possibility. It just wasn't the way so many of you who came later remember it in the beginning. I got to go back and see for myself how it had changed. The problem Ginger when you want to talk about the facts is you have to realize that in regard to The Seed there was a fluidity within the facts that was inexorably affected by time and space. For all intense and purpose we are not even talking about the same place even if it still had the same name.
There really shouldn't be any disagreement. I saw what it was and what it had started to become. Sorry guy's but both sides are right if taken in the correct context of time. Those are the defensible facts.
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Whatever thou put his hand to do it with all thy might\" King Solomon

Offline GregFL

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« Reply #37 on: December 08, 2005, 08:15:00 PM »
Landy, it is because of this forum that we understand that the seed was an idea that developed and dramatically changed in short periods of time.  We all know that.

What still surprises me tho is the dogmatic way some seed supporters get riled at any criticism of the beloved cult, even in the face of the harm it caused so many people, and even when those people acknowledge that the others had a positive experience.

Can't we discuss the seed as an event in our lives without taking it personally?  Is that possible?
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Offline landyh

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« Reply #38 on: December 08, 2005, 10:32:00 PM »
Quote
On 2005-12-08 17:15:00, GregFL wrote:

"Landy, it is because of this forum that we understand that the seed was an idea that developed and dramatically changed in short periods of time.  We all know that.



What still surprises me tho is the dogmatic way some seed supporters get riled at any criticism of the beloved cult, even in the face of the harm it caused so many people, and even when those people acknowledge that the others had a positive experience.



Can't we discuss the seed as an event in our lives without taking it personally?  Is that possible?



"

I agree Greg and i was trying to say that in my own roundabout way.:wink: I was fortunate in one way to have actually personally experienced at least some of the changes from what was a positive force  to something darker and definitively different. I can see the facts of my experience as being non-exclusive of the experience of others but when we exclude the possibiity that the sum of our  own experiences at the Seed may not equal the whole of its parts we seem to slip into a form of discord that argues to no purpose. If any of us fail to balance the truth in a way that requires us to stand back from the limit or our own contact with the program then we gain nothing of value. Doggedly clinging to a narrow percection on either side is equally pointless. I have never found stretching my own viewpoint to be of damage to its origins.
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Whatever thou put his hand to do it with all thy might\" King Solomon

Offline Anonymous

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« Reply #39 on: December 08, 2005, 10:34:00 PM »
greg, this happens on both sides of the issue. both sides get riled up and both sides take it personally at various times. also everynow and then both sides admit that maybe something on the other side is just a bit true.
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Offline Antigen

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« Reply #40 on: December 09, 2005, 08:32:00 AM »
Well, again, good intentions? Of course the original intent was good. Believe it or not, I still believe that the staff who run the current incarnation of the Seed have only the best of intentions. They belive, as we once did, that these kids are too crazy and mixed up to speak for themselves--that they must be forced to come around from their insane notions and see that they're living in paradise. And so the beatings will continue until the crying stops.

I know people have fond memories from the Seed. People also have fond memories of Straight. There's at least one former staffer who I knew from Sarasota who can't seem to comprehend how we all saw things so differently from what he remembers. He never wittnessed any abuse, only consequences.

Do you see how and why it's dangerous to leave that kind of pleasant delusion alone? Landy, I saw the Seed change over a very short time even from my low to the ground and at arm's length perspective. And I saw more changes when I got to St. Pete and Sarasota and more still over the two years I was in Sarasota. How did that happen, man? How did such an altruistic ideal become so horrid? Well, for one thing we were never allowed dissent. If someone asked you how you were doing, there was only one acceptable answer; a convincing and entheusiastic "GREAT!"

If you bought that fiction and actually believed that everybody felt GREAT all the time, I'm sorry to tell you that you got punked. But don't feel too badly, you didn't suffer half so much as those of us who practically shit ourselves for years afterward every time some kind soul made that query of us not knowing our history.

If we only allow complaints and no positive stories, who will ever understand how good people could take part in these horrid act? That's actually one of my big beefs w/ the media and other outlanders' attempts to cover this story. The way they paint it, their audience is looking for some lurching monsters who don't exist. But if we only allow the positive and leave out the unpleasant details, well that's just as distorted.

In my opinion, if anyone wants to have a one sided conversation about this topic they'll have to carefully screen participants and spend a good deal of time and effort monitoring and moderating the convo. That's not gonna happen here.

Mean time, anybody asking the rest of us to please quit spoiling their fond fantasies w/ inconvenient truths is going to get a loud, entheusiastic and well deserved raspberry from me.

The most fundamental fact about the ideas of the political left is that they do not work. Therefore we should not be surprised to find the left concentrated in institutions where ideas do not have to work in order to survive.


--Thomas Sowell

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Offline Antigen

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« Reply #41 on: December 09, 2005, 08:41:00 AM »
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On 2005-12-08 16:33:00, landyh wrote:

 For all intense and purpose

 :rofl:

I just caught this. Yes, things changed gradually, imperceptibly. I would imagine that, one day, someone used the phrase "for all intents and purposes". Then someone picked it up, probably a staffer who no one dared correct, and they said "for all intense and purpose" and it went unchallenged. Somewhere down the line, it morphed into "for all intensive purposes". As far as I know, that has remained unaltered in the cannon of Program lingo lo these many years.

But do you see my whimsical point here? Where dissent and dissagreement are not welcome and encouraged, we're bound to magnify errors.

I know you believe you understand what you think I said, but I'm not sure you realize that what you heard was not what I meant.



---Richard Nixon



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Offline Ft. Lauderdale

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« Reply #42 on: December 09, 2005, 12:15:00 PM »
I'm so sorry to hear of the bad experiences that happened to you.  That really must have been a terrible thing to live through & I do feel sorry for you.  It also did not happen at the Seed and you seem to have a hard time explaining certain things.  You never went through the seed program and blame the seed for everything that happened to you in your life.  That is my opinion.  

But that gives you no excuse to say that anyone that had a good experience with the seed was in your words "mind fucked".  I never "mind fucked" with anyone and I resent that whole tone and personally find it quite offensive.  

Actually if anyone is stuck in the past.  It appears to be you.  This whole thing is getting old fast.  I think you love to hate and you want to hate.  I guess you kinda get off on it.  Why else would you rip to shreads anyone that has anything good to say about their experience.  I quite frankly have had enough of your crap.  It just repeats itself over and over and over.  I really hope you some day come to terms with your issues.  You definatly have them weather you want to see it or not.  I wish you well.  I think you really need help.  I hope you get the help you need.  

[ This Message was edited by: Ft. Lauderdale on 2005-12-09 09:26 ]
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Offline marshall

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« Reply #43 on: December 09, 2005, 12:19:00 PM »
--quote----

"Where dissent and dissagreement are not welcome and encouraged, we're bound to magnify errors."

-----------

And that's exactly why I think the organization(s) are at fault more than the individuals who may have been a part of it. From sociology we know that people tend to behave in crowds in a different way than as individuals. I think the same is true of people in organizations of various sorts. Any group, culture or organization that discourages dissent or disagreement tends to go bad at some point, however good the original intent was.

Many political pundits have made this point in regards to the current administration. The president has surrounded himself with people who are reluctant to disagree with him, so any tiny error becomes magnified instead of corrected. I see the same phenomena over and over in studying different religous organizations. It's the whole problem with authoritarian structures.

Until the final confrontation, it seems no-one was willing to criticize or question Art's judgement on anything of significance. The same applied to staff to a lesser extent. No-one who was a mere group-member could challenge or question any rap leader or staff. The whole thing was founded on that top-down authority. Any mistake at the top was conducted and magnified downward.

Once upon a time, a man and the devil were walking down the street. They watched as someone walking ahead of them reached down and picked something up. The devil began to laugh with delight whereupon the man with him asked what the person had picked up;
Devil: "Ah, that person just found Truth."
Man: "Truth?, I would have thought that would be very bad for you. Why are you so happy?"
Devil: "Because I'm going to help him organize it!" :smokin:

It's how we got from 'love thy neighbor as thyself' & 'judge not lest ye be judged' to the inquisition and bashing infants heads upon rocks to save their souls.
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Truth, being limitless, unconditioned, unapproachable by any path whatsoever, cannot be organized; nor should any organization be formed to lead or to coerce people along any particular path. You must climb towards the Truth. It cannot be \'stepped down\'

Offline Anonymous

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« Reply #44 on: December 09, 2005, 09:18:00 PM »
Hey Maggie, Greg, Ginger, KJ, Thom, CLevland & the rest of all you crazy wonderful people!

You gotta admit it's all in the way you look at it!

My house is still a pile of rubble, but me & my family were & are OK!

I am still commuting 2 hours each way to work, but I am glad to have a job, HEY a New Job too!!!

I am all alone (& lonely) in a place that now seems unfamiliar, but I am thankful to have the love & support of family & friends & the people I have been able to re-connect with thru this site

You get the idea, I would be most happy to take a boat ride with all of you, because you know what?
Every day above ground is a good day...

Happy Holidays & Love you guys!!!!

Chris
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