Well, I'm kind of up on Wes' research. But I only started looking into it a couple of years ago myself. But here's my take on it.
Straight never actually closed down. After a bunch of law suits, criminal investigations and a lot of bad ink, they were eventually forced to quit using the name, Straight, Inc. But the same people continued to operate the same programs with most of the same clients they had at the time under new names, sometimes in the same facilities.
This is not the first time WWASP has been in the news. A couple of years ago, 48 Hours did a segment on them. Around the same time, a whole neighborhood came to the defense of a kid who had been sent there for shouting at his dad and breaking a car window.
This is probably the most attention WWASP has gotten so far. All the ruckus will probably sap their recruiting pretty well for a time. And they may have to change their name. But, as long as the TOUGHLOVE hategroup and their philosophy are tolerated in our society, parents will continue to find sadistic tyrants willing to kidnap and beat on their kids for pay.
Take a look at some of the parent boards, talk to some of the recruiters and other true believers. There's a market for this stuff. That's the problem. I think this is a sickness in our society that we have to recover from.
The overwhelming majority of people have more than the average (mean) number of legs.
-- E. Grebenik
