Treatment Abuse, Behavior Modification, Thought Reform > Daytop Village
DAYTOP Did Me Great Harm in the Long Run
psy:
Oh, I could pick it apart piece by piece and comment on it, but one of the most telling things for me was this comment:
"Maybe it is not possible to form your own identity or a real picture of yourself unless you also get the picture of what you look like to the world. Well, that is a new assumption. In psychoanalysis that assumption isn't made. What you look like to other people isn't taken into account."
Maslow assumes that people don't already have a "real" picture of themselves, and that the group can tell you who you are. This thinking is prevalent throught the full gamut of programs. How many times did I hear "You don't know who you really are. You're just wearing a mask". It gives an excuse to attack a person's self concept (and values) and replace them with those of the group.
"you people will be the graduates who will be running places like this somewhere else in the future"
Sadly, this was accurate.
There is a revolution going on. There are some spots which are more growing points than others; but they are all growing in the same Eupsychian direction, that is in the direction of more fully human people. This is going on in education as well. I think that it would be possible, if we got together and pooled all the experiences, bad and good, that we could all pool together, to take the skin off the whole damn educational system. But we could also rebuild it. Well, this is explosive because it demands a human reality, human needs, and human development, rather than a sort of traditional heritage from a thousand years ago which is outdated.
And this is the human potential movement in a nutshell. that's a section of the passage to reflect on.
What he said was that "I place upon my patients the fullest load of anxiety that they can bear." Do you realize what that implies? As much as they can take, that is what he is going to dish out, because the more he can dish out, the faster the whole thing will move.
Maslow seems to interpret any change as progress. That's certainly not always the case. People attacked will break down and conform to the group. This can be psychologically scarring in the long run, as people learn they can only see "themselves" through the eyes of others (among other ways). I'm sure many in program felt they lost their sense of self. Is this self discovery? No. It's the dissolution of the self.
SEKTO:
In addition to O'Brien's book, I in the last couple of months have also read Help At Any Cost as well as So Fair A House.
So Fair a House, now that's an interesting book.
I read it as a window into a long-gone place and time when people in general were much more naive and trusting than we are today.
Dederich even says straight out in it (I'll find the citation later) in the transcript of Casriel's recorded interview, that he was trying to build a cult around himself and that he deliberately surrounded himself with a "bunch of dummies" who would do whatever he wanted, and then placed them on the newly-incorporated Synanon's Board of Directors. That's right, he called the first Board of Directors a bunch of dummies.
So not a lot of good fruit has come from the the figurative tree that Dederich planted, to put in mildly.
He was a grade-A nut, an involutional narcissist, emulator of L. Ron H. and in general a deluded pseudo-messianic madman.
It's amazing to me that he built such a following for so many years.
To me, an interesting man to study however.
I mean, though he was very intelligent, he wasn't even particularly charismatic; by all accounts he was a gruff, belligerent, loudmouthed and physically disfigured control freak.
Have you ever seen the documentary film TC Pioneers, psy?
And now for my evening constitutional. More later.
Anonymous:
What is next? Who cares about what someone said 40 years ago. Get a life and get off those damn meds.
Anonymous:
--- Quote from: "SEKTO" ---Two things about DAYTOP I remember quite well:
First, I'll tell of a Jewish lesbian "counselor" (DAYTOP grad from NYC and unqualified armchair psychologist) and self-described "diesel dyke" (that is not a homophobic comment from me, that's actually how she described herself to us) who we had there that I'll call "Marcia." I used to dread going into the encounter groups that Marcia would run, as she was especially confrontational and vicious in her approach, to the point of being sadistic about it. She'd encourage us to scream at and verbally abuse one another. She'd make fun of me relentlessly, telling me how phony and plastic and shallow that she thought I was. She'd encourage the others to pitch in and tell me how weak I was too. I remember when I made it to "coordinator" (the top of the DAYTOP chain of command) and she was teaching me how to conduct "haircuts" she'd tell me I that I was "too soft" with my counseling approach and encourage me to yell at people with the intent to shame and humiliate them. She, in effect, was teaching me how to verbally abuse my peers. She once humiliated me in front of the entire "DAYTOP family" in morning meeting by making me dance around in a silly fashion while everybody laughed at me. And all in the name of helping me to "overcome my issues."
The second thing that I remember really well was the periodic visits by The Monsignor, and how we'd all have to meet together and he'd pat us all on the head, one by one, like little kids or pets or something. He'd never walk up and shake your hand like a grown-up, he'd pat you on the head like you were a cute four-year-old. I always found that to be weird and inappropriate.
They'd verbally abuse and humiliate us, a bunch of teenagers, and teach us to do the same to one another. Incredible.
If there are any good things I remember about DAYTOP they'd be: the fact that I made friends for life there; two of my best friends are DAYTOP grads and they're doing well, we used to party like mad but they are sober now with wives and kids and good jobs. Also, at least in DAYTOP they taught me how to identify, get in touch with, and appropriately deal with my feelings. It was genuinely therapeutic and beneficial in some respects. So it wasn't all bad, just mostly bad, and the residual effects of all that verbal abuse and degradation and groupthink indoctrination remain with me and negatively impacts my psyche to this day. It took me fifteen years or so to figure out that DAYTOP, the "drug treatment program" was a front for an abusive Catholic cult group. It blows my mind.
Can I tell you anything about DAYTOP in those days? Any questions or comments?
--- End quote ---
feel free to name the abusive counselor by name. Don't be discourgaged by the trolls- that's what they're trying to do to you. I enjoy your writing very much.
thank you
Anonymous:
The Truth will set you free.
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