So, I am going to try to say why I think identifying this terminology is integral to motivating any real change. It is true that there are linkages to cults, gulags, mind control, thought reform, synanon, and other factors that just don’t get examined very deeply within mainstream society. I went to Cedu and it certainly would be fitting to find words that portray that experience. The last suggestion I heard was ‘detainee’. It’s not like I don’t relate to that word, but the fact is that these programs are currently accepted institutions in our society as therapeutic communities. We can call them cults or gulags, and it may be a more accurate description in many cases, but it won’t make it true out in the world. The same goes for if we use words like ‘hostage’. It’s not like we can’t talk about it that way in many circumstances, but we can’t deny that the generally accepted language holds that these are therapeutic communities, and as distorted as that may be it makes it real and that is what I’m trying to respond to.
The real situation that is created from the TTI (which I truly believe is becoming a global epidemic) is kind of like this. Take 2 identical prisons. In one the person is called a prisoner, if they say they are imprisoned they will be told they are right. In the other ‘prison’ it is not called a prison and the person is not identified as a prisoner. If they say they are imprisoned they will be told they are wrong, and that it is their choice to be there. As bizarre as it is this is the very commonly occurring context in the TTI in which the program becomes a living paradox for it’s … (I hope my word makes sense) Projectipants.
My view is that the TTI functions by hiding behind the veil of ‘therapy’, but when you begin to apply therapeutic terminology the definitions just don’t add up. It is something is relatively new in it’s current evolution, it’s full of vague, distorted definitions of itself, and it’s full of unique phenomenon that are undeniably real and distinct but have no name. I want definitions, if they want to give them or not.
Projectipant is not a real word, yet, but it is a real thing, and it was made real by them creating this previously unreal context. It is impossible to deny that there are projectipants in programs, there is no way to tell who is genuinely choosing the therapy for their own personal growth and who is just going through the motions due to the variety of motivational factors utilized. It does not matter if you don’t want to do it, you are in therapy and you can’t escape that scrutiny. These insinuations that projectipants have developed ‘personal life goals’ and achieved ‘individual autonomy’ or were ‘failures’ in therapy are a blatant denial of reality.
I know I sound like a parrot here, but I think Projectipant has a useful and proper function in today’s language.
Projectipant- One who is viewed as a patient, and participant in therapy, as a result of projection from the therapeutic environment which has control over him.