I went there, but it was around '94, or '95. Basically, it sucked.
You walk in, and you say, " wow, this place is weird", and then before ya know, they start trying to force you into the weirdness.
You go from feeling like somebody, to feeling like nobody. Your insides are everybody's property. You do degrading work all day, without gloves. Classes are fun, and for an honest person, who isn t out to psychically eat others alive, they are the only refuge. They will change your friend no doubt.. They will brainwash her if she stays. I am sorry to say it, but it is true. It happens over a period of time. You go from being a person of the world, to a person of Daytop.
I don t like dishing out bad news, but if Daytop has it's way, your friend will probably be very different for at least awhile after leaving, and may not even want to have anything to do with you anymore. If your friend resists, then this will probably not be the case, but she has a very hard time ahead of her .
Again, I was there many years ago...
I did pass by though, once since I attended.. I was coming back from a job....LOL... and we tried taking some short-cut, and we got lost, in some bad part of Huntington.. LOL! "wow, we thought, the neighborhood sure gets shitty over here", and then holy shit, after over 10 years, there that fricking building was... Looked exactly the same...
I would guess that it is pretty much the same as it was, though.. This is what happenned...
As we were stopped at a light directly in front of the building, of course, I was staring in... checking it out... Two girls, who honestly, I hadn t even hardly noticed were cleaning front glass, and the steps on the inside.. These 2 who, nothing for nothing, were no feast for the eyes, thought I was looking at them, and so they started like posing and shit...
I was like, " Dude, they think we are looking at them... " We started laughing at them, and they start pulling their pants down a bit, flashing their asses- just like that, while looking aroung, making sure noone could see..
I remember John, the guy I was with, goes, " What the fuck is wrong with these chicks?"
Then all of a sudden, the girls got this terrified look on their faces, and some dickhead tough guy comes walking down..
and the girls, like children reporting their side of a story to a parent, start pointing at us, and exclaiming whatever the hell they were exclaming, and this fucking jerk...
walks down to the front door, and looks at us, and starts waving his finger and mouthin the word "No." to us.
John had to pull away , cause right then I fucking lost it, I was on my way, out the door to kick that MFers ass.
First of all, I ain t no scumbag, who's gonna look at little girls, who are only acting out abd acting all slutty , because they are in a prgram that makes them feel like real romantice love and sexuality are crimes of the highest order.
Second of all, I was not gonna be told what to do by one of these pricks now.
He starts acting all tough towards me, even though I know he was scared shit, as we were pulling away, and then a bunch of other "child-athorities" came running down, and they all jerked eachother off about how it's not worth it.
They were probably saying shit like " It's not worth it. You know how the 'real world' is. You're not like that anymore. You have had a lof of growth.
Judging by everything I saw, I would say it is exactly the same as it was, when I was there. You can judge my reaction, to that wannabe tough guy, and get an idea of how it effected me.
In their minds, "Daytop" is one place, and "the Real world" is another. I hate to tell ya.. But your friend has been forced into a cult, and I am being completly objective, when I say that.
Paul
