As I see it we need two videos. One would be a 5 - 10 minute streaming video with sound. Let me lead into this.
Way back Richard Ofshe writing in The Light on Synanon wrote that it is almost impossible to put into words the raw emotions that one is placed through while participating in a Synanon Game. And he knew first-hand becasue he has played the Game at Synnaon personally. I want to say that it is impossible for an outsider to realize the shear terror that each and everyone of you kids went through at the Straights. I want to add that I persoanally can feel it, but only slightly, because like any parent I was Gamed by my peers on Monday and Friday nights and also I was Gamed especially harshly at Parents Weekend because I had brought up previously at the compound one Monday night what I had learned about abuses you kids were sustaining. But the parents are peanuts compared to Andy. At 15 Andy was a 6-2, 230 pound solidly build kid who as a Fourth Phasor was the ranking psychologist in my home. One night it was learned by the kids staying in my home that I had drank an alcoholic beverage at our office Christmas Party and though I was beyond the six hour threshold of abstaining before being around a Straight student, Andy attacked me hard. It was a 60 second verbal barrage that seemed like an eternity and I came within moments of kicking him in his groin so threatened I did feel for my life! I MEAN I ACTUALLY THOUGHT HE WAS GOING TO KILL ME, THOUGH HE NEVER TOUCHED WHILE HE HOVERED WITHIN A MILLIMETER OF MY FACE. Now I don't mean I thought he was going to kill me. I mean I was terrified and I really thought that he had lost all controll and was going to try to bash my head against the wall which is what he told me he felt like doing (along with ripping my fucking tongue out of my mouth, and, well you know.) (Later Andy escaped and asked me if he could live with me. I said no but took him to dinner, gave him some money and wished him well. He told me then that he was sorry about the time he had Gamed me but that had he not the others would have brought it up next day at Group and they would be asked- what did Andy do?, and if they said nothing, then the Group would have gone after Andy.)
When Bill , my son, sued Straight his attorney asked the judge for permission to have one of the kids demonstrate spit therapy to the jury. He was going to have this kid spit reapeatedly in his own face while screaming at him at the top of his lungs. Now not even that has the effect of a 30 minute session in front of three oldcomers, or worse an extended session before the entire Group. But it would give a better message that just reading a transcript or hearing a testimony. Anyway the judge would now allow it, but really there is no other way.
See what I'm getting at. We need a volunteer to manage this project. It will have to be done where there are a lot of you kids together. For example, a number of you from northern Virginia. You could all meet at some appropriate location on a weekend and we could stage a Group session. Of course the best time to do it is at the conference this sumer when we could have the most people avaiable for Group. The project manager would see to it that a writer writes a script, that several people are there with cameras to be camermen. That camera angles are planned out and so forth. Then a 30 minute - 60 minute session is taped. The manager and his staff would then work to cull the individual film segments into one 5 - 10 minute segment alterantely form camera angles showing the Groups perspective and then the iindividual phasor being worked on. This would be put on the internet as a streaming video.
Beyond this the project manager or another project manager would work on an hour long documentary film. This film would start with the 5 minute segment and then it would be presented much like my web page. A number of comments form professional people, from writers, from our netizens and their web pages and, of course, testimonials from former students, the gravemarkers and the grieving parents, siblings and friends. We could sell this film for like $10 - $20 bucks and raise funds for our needs and also use it as a promotional for PTAs, the media, etc. Who knows maybe make it on A&E.
On one of my pages has a re-enactment of a chair restraint and also a floor restraint which was put on by Richard Bradbury and shown on local TV down in Florida.
I am very, very serious about this. We need a film to put on the web to help the world know what it is we are all so concerned about. I can not do this. I am working on a major update to my book based on interviews I have conducted with many of you over the last couple of months. This is not going to happen unless somebody steps forwards and takes the job.
Thank you all,
Wes Fager
Oakton, Virginia
