The sex aspect now coming into memory like an angry ghost! I don't know if you were writing from an RMA experience, because actually having sex at Cedu CA meant you weren't coming back, at least during the late 80s/early 90s. They didn't play lightly with that - it was so much of their control mechanism - the purgation of our hormones.
I absolutely remember with painful clarity of feeling - that sex was considered the dirtiest, most self-debasing activity you could permit yourself to do - that it came out of "thinking"; that it was not healthy or normal - that the impulse to normal, age-appropriate sexual experience was disgraceful and really quite sinful, and that it had to be shared publicly in the raps, and purged.
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There were four cases of the sex agreement being broken that I remember when I went to Cedu. 2 of those cases I remember in partcular. 1 of the 4 was sent to Ascent never to return and the other 3 were put on full-times. Times must have changed a bit during the periods we attended b/c as I recall staff foamed at the mouth drooling over the opportunity to make a public example of those who broke the sex agreement. I'm surprised to hear you say if you broke the sex agreement "you were not coming back." (What do you mean by that? Did they go to Ascent and/or another program?) The Cedu I remember really took advantage of such a situation to make a point to everyone else. Not only do I remember how brutally those people got it in raps, but everyone seemed to get reprimanded. I particularly remember *a staff* yelling till she was red in the face at every guy in a rap addressing us as though guys were 100% responsible for initiating sex every time. Just because two people broke the agreement ALL the guys got battered. She blew up on us saying .."Don't even think of touching my girls." As well she would project her issues with abortions onto us, which was very uncomfortable and of course there was no defensive measure you could take. I, like most, never broke the sex agreement there yet I recall having to sit there and be talked to as though I did.
*I don't know what my deal is but I feel like if I mention a staff's name they will come to haunt me or something.*
On that note Liam, Mann is NOT Rudy Bentz.
" For many years I asked members of T-groups (group therapy) to engage in a "top secret" task in which they were asked to write, anonymously, on a slip of paper the one thing they would be most disinclined to share with the group. The secrets seem to be startlingly similar, with a couple of major themes predominating. The most common secret is a deep conviction of basic inadequacy- a feeling that one is basically incompetent, that one bluffs one's way through life. Next in frequency is a deep sense of interpersonal alienation- that, despite appearances, one really does not, or cannot, care for or love another person. The third most frequent category is some variety of sexual secret." - 'The Theory and Practice of Group Psychotherapy' by Irvin D. Yalom
Anyone remember getting asked, "What's the one thing you just can't tell anybody?"
I do know exactly which female staffer you're talking about with the abortion issues, Awake.
I wish some people had just kept their mouths shut about some really sick stuff noone needed to know. Nobody's fault - the filters were all stripped away. It never put my friendships with them into doubt, but I never knew quite how to handle it.
In one of my first raps, a girl got reemed by someone in her dorm about excessive pubic hair shedding that clogged the shower drain. This poor girl was so humiliated and I felt so bad for her, but I didn't have the courage to stick up for her and tell the bitch off. Of course, I sort of picked up on the fact that taking her side against the indicter wasn't the way things were done around Cedu.
Alright, I don't know why I still have fear for saying the names of the staff I was portraying. I actually feel a bit pathetic for still feeling scared of saying the names of those people that made me feel so afraid. Mann = Guy Bonano, Sandy = Bradi Elliot, and Jessie = Jamie ? (don't know last name). I let Pam Abell get away with a "rap pass" this time but she had her moments.
Also, I thought I'd say a few words about "
honesty". This word was perhaps the most powerfully re-defined word at Cedu. It really meant, "
disregard your boudaries". To be
honest meant to give up all your
deepest secrets, publicly betray yourself, and openly opinionate on others behaviors no matter how personal the topic. I don't hold it against anyone (except staff, b/c I think they did it to set an example) for not being able to know whether or not they crossed this line. However I was not prepared to handle all of that. And concerning my portrayal of "the rap" I STILL had to hold back on some of the atrocities that I remember there. The lack of ethical/therapeutic boundaries there is absolutely mindblowing to me.
Robert Jay Lifton was one of the early psychologists to study brainwashing and mind control. He called the method used thought reform. From an analysis of two French priests who had been subjected to brainwashing, he identified the following processes used on them:
Assault on identityAspects of self-identity are systematically attacked. For example the priests were told that they were not real Fathers. This has a serious destabilizing effect as people lose a sense of who they are. Losing the self also leads to weakening of beliefs and values, which are then easier to change.
GuiltConstant arguments that cast the person as guilty of any kind of wrong-doing leads them to eventually feel shame about most things and even feel that they deserve punishment. This is another piece of the jigsaw puzzle of breakdown.
Self-betrayalWhen the person is forced to denounce friends and family, it both destroys their sense of identity and reinforces feelings of guilt. This helps to separates them from their past, building the ground for a new personality to be built.
Breaking pointThe constant assault on identity, guilt and self-betrayal eventually leads to them breaking down, much as the manner of the 'nervous breakdown' that people experience for other reasons. They may cry inconsolably, have convulsive fits and fall into deep depression. Psychologically, they may effectively be losing a sense of who they are and hence fearing total annihilation of the self.
LeniencyJust at the point when the person is fearing annihilation of the self, they are offered a small kindness, a brief respite from the assault on their identity, a cigarette or a drink. In those moments of light amongst the darkness, they may well feel a deep sense of gratitude, even though it is their torturer who is offering the 'kindness'. This is another form of Hurt and Rescue, albeit extreme.
The compulsion to confessHaving being pulled back from the edge of breakdown, they are then faced with the contrast of the hurt of potential further identity assault against the rescue of leniency. They may also feel the obligation of exchange in a need to repay the kindness of leniency. There also may be exposed to them the opportunity to assuage themselves of their guilt through confession.
The channeling of guiltThe overwhelming sense of guilty and shame that the person is feeling will be so confused by the multiple accusations and assaults on their identity, that the person will lose the sense of what, specifically, they are guilty of, and just feel the heavy burden of being wrong.
This confusion allows the captors to redirect the guilt towards what ever they please, which will typically be having lived a life of wrong and bad action due to living under an ideology which itself is wrong and bad.
Reeducation: logical dishonoringThe notion that the root cause of their guilt is an externally imposed ideology is a straw at which the confused and exhausted person grasps. If they were taught wrongly, then it is their teachers and the ideology that is more at fault. Thus to assuage their guilt, further confession about all acts under the ideology are brought out. By mentally throwing away these acts (in the act of confession) they also are now completing the act of rejecting the whole ideology.
Progress and harmonyThe rejection of the old ideology leaves a vacuum into which the new ideology can be introduced. As the antithesis of the old ideology, it forms a perfect attraction point as the person flees the old in search of a contrasting replacement.
This progress is accelerated as the new ideology is portrayed as harmonious and ideally suited to the person's needs. Collegiality and calm replaces pain and punishment. The captors thus contrast in visible and visceral ways how wonderful the new ideology is as compared to the sins and the pain of the old ideology.
Final confession and rebirthFaced with the stark contrast of the pain of the past with the rosy glow of the future that the new ideology presents, the person sheds any the final allegiance to the old ideology, confessing any remaining deep secrets, and takes on the full mantle of the new ideology.
This often feels, and has been described by many, as a form of rebirth. It may be accompanied by rites of passage as the person is accepted and cemented into the new order. The rituals will typically include strong statements made by the person about accepting the new ideology fully and completely, swearing allegiance to its leaders. Saluting flags, kissing other artefacts and other symbolic acts, all solemnly performed, all anchor them firmly in the new ground.
See also
Robert Jay Lifton, Thought Reform and the Psychology of Totalism, W.W. Norton & Co., Inc., 1963.
Conversion techniques• Breaking sessions: that pressure a person until they crack.
• Changing values: to change what is right and wrong.
• Confession: to leave behind the undesirable past.
• Entrancement: open the mind and limit rational reflection.
• Engagement: that draws a person in.
• Exhaustion: so they are less able to resist persuasion.
• Guilt: about the past that they can leave behind.
• Higher purpose: associate desirability with a higher purpose.
• Identity destruction: to make space for the new identity.
• Information control: that blocks out dissuading thoughts.
• Incremental conversion: shifting the person one step at a time.
• Isolation: separating people from dissuasive messages.
• Love Bomb: to hook in the lonely and vulnerable.
• Persistence: never giving up, wearing you down.
• Special language: that offers the allure of power and new meaning.
• Thought-stopping: block out distracting or dissuading thoughts.
http://cafety.org/index.php?option=com_ ... &Itemid=35If anyone thinks that these methods were not used against students at Cedu please comment.
