On 2003-05-25 09:17:00, Anonymous wrote:
"Yes I really believe that drugs are THAT big of a problem in our society. I you are wrong statistically on population drug use since the 70s. In all the criminology, psychology, and law classes I have taken at the university, they have all gone into great detail showing that drug use has steadily increased in our society. In addition, to increased number or users they are used more often and are about 5 times stronger than those used in the 70s. Yes it is a big problem, anyone who would drugs arent, is either uninformed, uneducated or strictly naive when it comes to drugs. Its a harsh reality when its someone you love.
So then, what? Go ahead and kill the kid cause he was going to die anyway? His brain could use a little washing? Look up from those books for a while and look at what is going on around you. Drug use has possibly risen, some, but not a whole lot. But you're missing the point. All the fear mongering propaganda about how certainly destructive certain drugs are just doesn't mesh with the fact that most people who use those drugs as kids simply do not grow up to be skidrow junkies.
More to the point. Most of the kids I went to school with and who used licit and illicit drugs recreationally went on to college and/or happy marraiges and careers and are living decent lives now. Not so for most of the people I met in Straight. Even though most of them were your typical spoiled rich kid, just like the ones I knew before. The Program messed them up profoundly.
If our survival insticts as humans are so much stronger than I believe why has the war on drugs been ever increasing. Why does our government spend billions on the drug war, and billions on rehabiliation centers, which by the way have a small percentage of succesful results.
Good question. The definition of insanity, being what it is. Simple answer? Because you're still buying into it, sucker! You should know, if you're planning a career in law enforcement, that prohibition does not work. It never has and never will. You'll be asked to take an oath to uphold the constitution and the laws of your jurisdiction. Then you'll be immediately ordered to break your oath.
Drug abuse is a personal, spirital, possibly medical problem. It is not a crime as defined by out Constitution, which engenders personal responsibility, liberty and government protection ONLY from crime by others to a nonconsenting other.
Most addicts have relapsed within 3 years of a rehab center. People with a drug addiction at a young age have an 80% chance of having the same problem and worse as an adult. Statistically that doesnt give my brother or any other troubled kid that much of a chance.
So.... then why are we torturing him? And how, exactly, do you think torturing him now will make his life any easier later?
Please think about exactly why you believe WWASP is effective. The only basis I know for those claims are their own advertising and anecdotal stories of recent graduates. Ask them for long term outcome studies. Not just synopsises or citateions. Take a look, if you can get them to show you (which I doubt), at the actual studies and methodologies. If you're familiar at all with clinical research, you'll crap when you see what they're hawking as legitimate research.
Honey, I know you're a true believer and you love your brother. But, if the editorial board of the NY Times and (a few years back) the Washington Post can be sumarily duped, so can you. You're being taken for a ride.
I do not agree with demoralizing people but how sure are we that these accusations are true.
You just couldn't make this stuff up. One after another after another kid, and often parents, keep coming back with similar stories. Hell, even the parts that the Program supporters don't deny speak volumes to those of us who have been through similar Synanon based programs. You think it's a petty thing to be screamed at, scrutinized, deprived of sleep and, all the while, not allowed to talk to anyone or even smile at your fellow 'students' for a number of months? Just go and try it for yourself.
And remember (asif anyone could forget for a moment) the consequence of failure may well be being made to kneel on a hard surface for a number of hours. Try that for 20 minutes. Right now. Just get down on your knees on a hard floor and try and remain motionless for a full 20 minutes. Can't do it? Then you're being rebellions, sister! A couple of people will come and put you face down while they pull your arms backward up toward your ear till you see things their way and try again.
Most of these allegations come from students that were there for a short period of time and were unable to finish the program.
Not true. That's just what the salesmen told you. Graduates take a little while to come around. Most are somewhat scrambled in the head for awhile. All are fearful of being sent back. But, eventually, just about anyone you ask who's been out for awhile will tell you how it was.
Here's another interesting experiment. Try and get a complete contact list of families who have been out of the program for, say, the last 2 years. You figure they've got, what, about 5k kids at a time so they ought to be able to give you about 10k names, right? You'll find that they won't give. The last thing in the world they want is for former students to get together and compare notes. They have no alumni committee, no reunions, no way of contacting old friends from "school". As a matter of policy, it is frowned upon. Contacting people who left the program is strictly forbidden.
Lady, you're dealing with a cult. Wake up and smell the coffee.
I know that he was given many opportunites to change with all sorts of professional help but when someone doesnt want to change, no therapists or doctor (which my father is) is going to do that for someone. It is a matter of will and only the individual can have that.
There's only one way to change a kid's behavior against their will.
Break his will. That's what these programs do. If drug use is so certainly destructive and it's only the rare lucky one who escapes junkiedome, then how do you reconcile the known fact that over half of high school kids use illicit drugs while only a rare few ever come into the kind of trouble that you attribute to drugs?
Oh by the way, after being picked up from Dundee Ranch after 5 weeks, he spoke nothing of abuse. Yes, he wasnt fond of the food but other than that there was minimal expected complaints. He went completly willingly to Ivy Ridge. My brother is no quite one and would have been screaming his head off if he was terrified of another school. While this may not be the school for everyone it is right for others. Thats the parents decision. Im so proud of the success that he has made thus far and I support and love him completely. If these programs can help him, I support them also.
A suppportive sister
"
If my father, a priest and a cop had come into the Program and asked me to my face if I wanted to leave, I would have thought it was a trick and told them no. Years after I got out, my dad asked me why I'd never told him before what had been going on. I was surprised at the question. I told him "Dad, because you would have turned me in." He knew that was true.
The right of self-defense is the first law of nature; in most governments it has been the study of rulers to confine this right within the narrowest possible limits. ... and [when] the right of the people to keep and bear arms is, under any color or pretext whatsoever, prohibited, liberty, if not already annihilated, is on the brink of destruction.
-- St. George Tucker, Judge of the Virginia Supreme Court 1803
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Ginger Warbis ~ Antigen
American P.O.W. 10/80 - 10/82
Straight South (Sarasota, FL)
Anonymity Anonymous