Interesting read about seminars at ISAC corp.

[BuzzKill]

This lack of choice is something I have often tried to stress when discussing the Seminars.
Its very important to understanding how the program "works".
I have also often advised Program Parents bragging on how great their grad is doing to wait five years. I don't know why, but it seems to take, on average, five years for the conditioning to break down to the point the person can start talking.
As for the Parents and their seminar - they do not really have a choice. They are compelled to attend Discovery; and if they are the average parent, they leave Discovery quite devoted to the program and very likely to continue with the rest of the Programming.
But your right - they can walk out, and some do, and those ones will pull their kid soon as they get out the door.
And you right that the parents version is a much watered down version of what you went threw. They are told so: This is nothing compared to what your kid is doing. The kids are told so: The parents don't do anything near this intense - they wouldn't stand for it. At least my kid was told that.
The seminars are the key.
It has to be understood what they ARE.
Then it is understandable how the program can continue to continue, despite the abuse and neglect being common knowledge.

[Deborah]

Hey KC,
Why not contact Sally J. Raphael and ask her to put you on, five years after the fact. (That is, if she still has a show- don't watch daytime TV)
I would think that she owes that to her viewing audience. These talk show hosts need to be pressured to present all perspectives, otherwise they are guilty of colluding with the deception.
I'm sure there are some other survivors that would go on as well.

[kcadams1980]

Yes, it does take a long time for the layers of brainwashing to really break down - I understand the parents are manipulated to a very high degree as well, I suppose I'm just a little bitter.... The most disturbing part of all this is how much it can damage families & tear them apart across "program" lines.  The irony is sick & twisted, but for many of us who "graduated" the program (and fully indoctrinated ourselves into the system) and later (years later) come to realize what we really went through - our relationship with our parents can be irrevocably damaged forever! Hmm, weren't the seminars/program supposed to bring the family back together?? What happened?

[kcadams1980]

Deborah,
She doesn't still have a show, btw - and I DID attempt to do what you're talking about, two years or so ago.  I didn't really want to go on her show (I was still very conflicted about my feelings & afraid of my parents' reactions), but I wrote a very long & detailed email to the show explaining my state of mind back then and pleading with them not to refer anymore "troubled teens" to a WWASP program.  They had an entire section of their website devoted to the "troubled teens" topic, in which their was a listing of treatment centers, boot camps & wilderness programs (etc.) as a resource for parents of said teens.  Three guesses who was at the top of that list! World Wide, naturally.  Anyhow, I was a bit surprised, but no one from the show ever responded to my email.  One would think that if you found out you were referring kids to an abusive program that you'd at least take their link of your site, right?

[BuzzKill]

//Hmm, weren't the seminars/program supposed to bring the family back together?? What happened?//

Indeed. And you know, they even go so far as to encourage divorce if one spouse is non-supportive of the program. They encourage cutting off any relative who is non-supporting.
Why?
Well, I suspect b/c the non - supporting person might be successful at getting threw the programming; and they can't have that, as that would loose them students/money. If they need to shatter a family to keep the cash flowing, then so be it.

//One would think that if you found out you were referring kids to an abusive program that you'd at least take their link of your site, right? //

One would like to think - but your forgetting how blind people can be when it puts money in their pocket to be blind. I expect Sally was getting paid to advertise; maybe even paid for each enrollment as a result of her endorsement.

[Anonymous]

On 2004-09-26 10:36:00, BuzzKill wrote:

"//Hmm, weren't the seminars/program supposed to bring the family back together?? What happened?//



Indeed. And you know, they even go so far as to encourage divorce if one spouse is non-supportive of the program. They encourage cutting off any relative who is non-supporting.

Why?
<

Because it's a cult. That's one of the first things cults do to their new recruits-- force them or manipulate them into cutting off all contacts with the "un-enlightened", who didn't have the "great privilege" of going through the glorious Program.

[Nihilanthic]

::bump::

Recent talk about cultyness in programs, and I dug this thread up.


Cultyness doesnt require spirituality or theology.

the war on drugs is but one manifestation, albeit a very dramatic one, of the great moral contests of our age -- the struggle between two diametrically opposed images of man: between man as responsible moral agent, 'condemned' to freedom, benefiting and suffering from the consequences of his actions; and man as irresponsible child, unfit for freedom, 'protected' from its risks by agents of the omnicompetent state.
--Thomas Szasz

[Anonymous]

I as the some people call it, opt out of the Discovery seminar. I would ask why they were so long, what do we do in the seminar? and no matter what I asked, the answer was, your going to love it, when are you going? Which one are you going to. I went to the one in....never any answers. As my suspicions kept growing and other things had come up, I finally a few days before I was to leave found information on the seminars. Then I continued to find more information about the programs. People should be given the correct information so they can make a personal choice whether they want to be subjected to this type of seminar. I am being very nice about calling it a seminar.

[Nihilanthic]

The thing is, people cant be told exactly what a seminar is and be expected to actually go through with one!

Think about it. Who the hell is going to willingly submit to a bunch of mindgames that belong in a BDSM club or terrorist interrogation, and even THEN the legality of it is challenged!

Ugh.

When a religion is good, I conceive it will support itself; and when it does not support itself, and God does not take care to support it so that its professors are obliged to call for help of the civil power, 'tis a sign, I apprehend, of its being a bad one.
--Benjamin Franklin, American Founding Father, author, and inventor

[Anonymous]

http://fornits.com/wwf/viewtopic.php?to ... orum=44&17