I have talked to a lot of people who have claimed that they faked their way through and didn't get brainwashed.....and then a few minutes of retrospection and these people who didn't get broken down start to cry as they realize that they had, in fact, slid down this slippery slope mentioned by the OP. They often will admit that they were damaged by this but didn't realize it after thinking about post-program incidences where program thinking hobbled parts of their lives.
And when you get out, there are certain things that actually can be useful in recovering from the trauma of the program. Unfortunately, these tools that could be of aid to us were made into tools of torment and torure so we naturally have an aversion to them. Psychotherapy, self-analysis, the steps, serenity prayer, god, church, discipline, responsibility etc. are all things that are useful to people who need some psychological guidance when problems arise. But we associated these tools with evils of the program and avoided them like the plague. Because these tools (and songs) had been made into implements of torture, we wanted nothing to do with them and self betterment subsequently fell by the wayside. Just another reason we couldn't seem to right ourselves when down on our luck. Try to be a carpenter in a world of carpenters after you have been tortured with a hammer; try driving nails with your shoe and see how well you do in life. That is life, post-program.
I don't think anyone gets out unscathed, whether they think so or not.