Treatment Abuse, Behavior Modification, Thought Reform > CEDU / Brown Schools and derivatives / clones
My story.
mikehunt:
--- Quote ---On 2004-06-13 21:48:00, shanlea wrote:
"OK. YOu are right. I don't understand, but I accept. We all got our own journey.
Still, you are articulate and funny, what if you wrote a dark comedy about your experience?
Also out of curiosity, do any of your CEDU friends view CEDU similarly or were they brainwashed? Laura? Hell?"
--- End quote ---
well, some of my "friends" at cedu m.s. were fairly brainwashed... actually, i had a few friends that i knew faked it really well.. but i don't think they told anyone; those middle skool kids were hardcore snitches. it's not something we really talked about, it was kinda like don't ask, i won't tell. the more i think about it, the more fakers i can remember. they were really good, well, some were not so good, but did it anyway. but, on the other hand, there were those poor kids who were particularly susceptible to their harsh demands. it depended on the past experiences of the kids; those who were just there for petty shit like fighting with their parents, who didn't understand how that much about human nature and social engineering, who usually got sucked in... these were usually younger kids. but then there were those who'd had some serious social issues (drugs, gang involvement, etc) before cedu, even really young kids, these kids were better fakers. toward the end, there were a lot more of these petty-shit kids, and a lot of them got duped. fortunately, i didn't fall into it at all (not even the inclination to fake it... damn, that just reminded me of something they used to tell us: "fake it till you make it. did you guys ever hear that one? i'm sure they knew a lot of these kids were faking it... but they didn't really care because they knew that they'd have internalized the shit.)
anyway, some of these kids weren't bright enough or advanced enough not to get brainwashed, but others were pretty convincing that they did. the middle skool was pretty intense; these kids would take the whole brainwashed thing, and even faking it, to a whole new level.. you'd never hear a high skooler scream at you about tucking in your shirt. and when these kids got brainwashed... like whoa.
most of the people i chilled with at the high skool were defiant and rebellious, the others were chameleons... they did what they felt they needed to do to get out. i think there were a couple truly brainwashed kids at the high skool (and i think they had really fucked up lives at home, like environments) but i can't really remember too many (then again, i can't remember a lot of those kids off the top of my head) and i wasn't friends with them; they were the people who'd jump down my throat about my bad attitude and behavior!
so, basically, all of my friends think the system is screwed like i do, but from very different perspectives. honestly, i think the chameleons end up werse than the rebels in the long run... like, we just had a miserable time while at the skool, but we'd resist. the others, well, they'd have to go along with it and pass it on... for some people, that's truly traumatizing.
shanlea:
How'd you end up rebellious and graduating? I remember when I was there, by the time you got up to the upper levels you were pretty much beaten into submission, it seemed all the upper level kids either faked it through or really brought in to the system. It seemed the staff made a point of breaking down the rebellious ones, usually during a propheet or wilderness trip the person would be "saved."
mikehunt:
my last full time was like 3 weeks before graduation. i don't know how i made it out... i guess i had just been there so long that they finally realized that i wasn't going to do anymore than i already had (which really wasn't much.) honestly, i remember transferring to the high skool on challenge (like level 3/5) and i don't remember moving up again. perhaps i did move up at the closing of my summit (my last full time kept me from going through it with my peer group; i had my own personal 1 day werkshop) and maybe i moved up once with my peer group, but i really don't think i did.
so, uh... yeh.. they figured that i was a lost cause and let me go. that was my goal; mission accomplished.
_________________
laura solomon
cedu vet. 1996-1999
RIP[ This Message was edited by: mikehunt on 2004-06-14 12:52 ]
shanlea:
Gosh, laura, I feel so stupid. I really thought everyone totally bought into all the stupid rules and mind trips. I thought there was something wrong with me for not... I never questionned that anyone was faking it. I don't know how you survived rebelling. I knew after the Truth propheet that I would be broken into submission if I stayed because they didn't tolerate anything but total capitulation. When I got there, my whole focus was to blend into the woodwork and stay dirt-free. The only dirt I had was knowing I HAD to split before whatever was left of me was smashed. But even then I was totally unprepared to deal with the real world after that insulated crap. I trusted NO ONE.
I wonder how much CEDU has changed since then. It seems like the changes were largely cosmetic. We didn't have therapists. I wouldn't have trusted them anyway if they told CEDU everything.
YOu know I resented my team leaders most because they were full of shit and saw how they manipulated me and my parents and could never get there facts straight, screwing up my story for their own purposes, but I never went further than Vision to fully experience other staff, except in raps.
Unlike you, Pam (never my family head) was totally cool to me especially when I had table time; she just sat and talked about different stuff; she never condescended or exaggerated or used things against me later, like Jim and Laurie did. I was in one rap where she let this total BULLY from hell rip a person to shreds for being too smiley(a new staff member--someone's spouse who was trying to be supportive and was one of the few bright lights there). This bully that CEDU nourished had carte blanche to basically humiliate a really nice person just for kicks. I was sickened. I was hoping Pam would rein her in but she unleashed her.
Was Pam's husband there when you were at CEDU. He really humiliated me unnecessarily for giving guys hard ons on purpose by wearing tight pants. The reason my pants were tight was because I gained 20 pounds and my parents didn't send me anymore clothing that fit. He ripped me to bits in front of guys in a pretty graphic way. It was all sports to him. I think his name was Mark W. Does he still work at CEDU with Pam?
I often wondered what the kitchen staff thought of all of us. THey've heard the gamut. [ This Message was edited by: on 2004-08-01 20:32 ]
Hell on Wheels:
Restrictions..... whee, what fun they were. Sit like a jackass and watch all your buddies having a decent time, while you had to write about how being deprived of a pair of Nikes at age 10 led you down the path of sin :grin: To answer a previous question, most of my friends view CEDU similarly. Even some of them who were totally brainwashed and into the system. Seems like those people were the ones that had the hardest time adjusting to being free. They would immediately go back into old patterns. While those of us who hated the system didn't go so far astray, mainly because we hated CEDU, and really didn't want to give anyone an excuse to send us back. And yes, of all the kids that left CEDU that I knew, I am one of the angriest.
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