Treatment Abuse, Behavior Modification, Thought Reform > Straight, Inc. and Derivatives

STRAIGHT books, screenplays, etc.

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misbehaver:
While I recognize the First Ammendment, I can't help but question the motives of some of these projects. Sure, some will be positive, some negative and probably a mix of both. I'm not trying to quell anyone's ability to produce media.

My position is kinda like Jack Nicholson's line from the film "A Few Good Men":
"You want the TRUTH? You can't handle the TRUTH". Many of these books and screenplay projects are written by Straight clients, but the whole idea of rehashing,thus empowering the Straight experience disturbs me. Do we really think most readers want to know exactly what went on in the Program? I think not. I also wonder where the profit margin factors into the equation...

The whole idea reminds of why my vet brothers won't go see a war movie. Haven't we had enough? How can we be expected to let go of this horror if someone wants to exploit it/us once again? Again, please don't think I'm trying to speak for everyone involved or discount some great documentation of life in Straight. Jason

kaydeejaded:
Yeah I do understand your point but the veitnam movies in my opinion aren't for the vets because they do know what happened. The straight stuff will be for those who weren't in Straight so maybe people can realize that this shit happens and not let it happen to their kids. Really people do not beleive they way we were treated, they don't understand it and cannot imagine that it really goes on. I don't really care about them making some money if the ends justifies them means. I hope that it will put some sort of stigma against the places like one big long neverending bad advertisement.

misbehaver:
From kaydeejaded:
"I don't really care about them making some money if the ends justifies them(sp) means"

Would you mind some actual video of the atrocities that occurred in the Program?
This could be evidence of a possible felony.
Projects like we're discussing will be snuffed due to political ramifications. Maybe some Hollywood liberals will run the gauntlet and help us poor Straightlings; while cashing in Bigtime.?

You ask a few Vietnam vets about "the end justifying them(sp) means". It took Robert Macnamara 30 years to admit he fucked up. I won't wait that long. Jason

Antigen:
Hey Misbehaver, Great speaking with you earlier.

I get what you're saying. Not everyone really wants to rehash this shit or expose the private details of their lives to public scrutiny. There are hundreds of thousands of us, though, who've spent some time in these places. Some are inclined to be muck rakers, some are not. I have as profound a respect for anyone's fourth amendment rights as for their first amendment rights.

But anyone who's acting to influence public policy according to Program dogma automagically waives their right to privacy in this particular area of their lives, imho. And anyone who volunteers to engage in public debate on the issue is fair game within the scope of what they decide they want to divulge. I have never gone looking in anyone's background except for public figures. So I'll probably never win a Pulitzer, but I don't have a lot of enemies either.

Thanks for all the kudos about our work. We're trying to pull together all of the documentation we can on people associated with the Program who currently hold positions of public influence and responsibility. I think the people who've given them their confidence deserve a little gratis background check. :wink: Some people find it therapeutic to talk about their experiences with people who's been there. Others find it more therapeutic to talk about their experience to current or prospective employers of these bastards.

Leme make this a long one. For most of the past 20 years, I've tried my level best to forget all about my weird little history and to overcome the neurotic hangover that it left me with. For the most part, I think I was over it some years ago. There were always reminders, but I'd gotten pretty adept at brushing them off as paranoia.

At the same time, I've watched a lot of issues with varying degrees of interest. Homeschooling and public education, for example, and the whole EFF.org thing on crypto export, clipper chip and all the rest. Drug policy has been a growing interest of mine just because it's SO wrong. And, I think, it was also about looking under the bed for the boogie man just to make sure he wasn't really there.

So I've seen all kinds of material from all different perspectives about Ian MacDonald, Wm. Bennette, Daryl Gates and DFAF, Dr. Nehaus bogus research; the lot generally considered to be the most rabid and unballanced drug warriors on the planet. I never suspected that any of these people would have anything to do with Straight till Brother Jeb! introduced his new and improved drug war strategy, now with more coerced treatment for kids.

Now, I remembered that the Bush family had been very cozy with Straight via the Nacy Reagan's holy jihad, which started while King George was VP.

So I contacted some drug policy reformers with what I thought would probably be taken as a classic Southern fairy tail, "Ya'll just ain't gonna' b'lieve this shit!" but I had to start somewhere cause it was freakin' me tf out that this guy in the governors' mansion seemed to be threatening to spread the Program accross the land at my expense.

Turns out, they knew all about it, had even awarded Richard Bradbury Activist of the Year for shutting down the last Straight location in, I think it was, `93. Arnold Trebach, founder of Drug Policy Foundation, had even written a chapter of his `85 book "The Great Drug War", about Fred Collins' experience with the Program. DFAF is Straight, Inc after a couple of name changes, and they generally run Florida state politics. You have some interesting shit goin down around Cincinatti there, I wonder how influential KHK parents are in local public policy?

Holy sheep shit, Batman! All these fuckin years I thought I was just paranoid. Sometimes I think I liked it better that way, when it was just me and the world was more-or-less allright. But now I'm pissed! These sons of bitches are putting my kid through psyche treatment in school (DARE, Peer Counseling), patroling my neighborhood via militarized local law enforcement (Multijurisdictional Counterdrug Taskforce), pushing piss testing in the workplace (also by government subsidy) and feeding Colombia's civil war and the Taliban. It's not my imagination afterall. Every time I step out the door or switch on the idiot box, I'm reminded of the damned Program and it is real.

I'm not real concerned about making right what was wrong 20 years ago. I had plenty of oportunity to sue or protest or do something back then. I decided, instead, to not give the muthuh fuckuhs another minute of my life. I regret that now. I could have used the money as much as the credibility among family and strangers that I might have had if I had won. And I have to wonder whether I might have been able to help save some people all the trouble, so I guess I owe you and your family an apology. Of course, on the heels of that I have to wonder if I had the strength at the time to do anything but grab my ass and run; I might have just broke myself on it and accomplished nothing.

For me, this is all about the present. I enjoy raising hell in a very public way. On a personal level, I need to know the odds on whethter or not the cop in my rear-view mirror or the talking head on tee vee is a true believer; I know that many are not but they're not talking. How come? What might I do to make it more practical for them to speak up? My dad raised me to be extremely patriotic. That means that I'm responsible to get done whatever I think needs doing. Anyone who's skeptical, good. A little skepticism a little earlier on would have saved us all a lot of trouble! If you're disinclined to even think about all this, that's cool too. I know you won't go along with the Program in whatever form, I'm seeking to influence those who otherwise might.

Antigen:

--- Quote ---On 2002-01-29 15:33:00, misbehaver wrote:
From kaydeejaded:
"I don't really care about them making some money if the ends justifies them(sp) means"



Would you mind some actual video of the atrocities that occurred in the Program?

This could be evidence of a possible felony.

Projects like we're discussing will be snuffed due to political ramifications. Maybe some Hollywood liberals will run the gauntlet and help us poor Straightlings; while cashing in Bigtime.?



You ask a few Vietnam vets about "the end justifying them(sp) means". It took Robert Macnamara 30 years to admit he fucked up. I won't wait that long. Jason

--- End quote ---

I'd love to see some actual video. Not at all sure if I'd publicize it, at least not without obscuring some faces. There are plenty of people who might be harmed on some way just by having their face show up in relation to this story.

There's one advantage that we have over the political powers that be; money... or rather need of it. Do you have any idea how much time and effort goes into secureing all of the public funding to sustain the piss testing industry alone? If employers generally knew that the costs in terms of losing good employees, pissing off the ones you don't lose far outweighted the insurance cost breaks and non-existant intended benefits the industry would collapse overnight.

They can squash one story, or five or a dozen as they crop up. But they can't watch the editorial departments of every newspaper and talk radio show in the country all at once. Never mind the Rave scene!

As far as some people making money, that hasn't happened yet so that might be a moral dilema for a future day. But there's nothing morally wrong about being compensated for providing a valuable service to willing customers. If someone wants to publish a book and people want to read it, I hope the author makes a million bucks. At least I know that's one million that will NOT be invested in the political careers of any of these program idiots or their evil schemes.

The ends justify the means? C'Mon, that's what they say about war. There's nothing imoral about writing a book, provided that what you present as fact is fact and it doesn't hurt anyone who doesn't need hurtin'.

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