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Messages - str8tohell

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1
Straight, Inc. and Derivatives / Opiophile
« on: September 25, 2005, 01:42:00 AM »
gotta get back to the roller skates. When I was about eight or nine, I was nuts about skating, I grew up in Scotland and we didn't have much in the way of roller rinks, so I skated everywhere, school, the corner store, friends houses, anywhere I had to go I was doing it on my wheels. They were my first choice in transportation. I had these really cheesy blue boot ones that had these bright stripes of yellow, white and red. I was totally embarrassed by the style but I was spun, so I wore them everyday anyway. I got my new shoes every year at the start of school term and my Mom picked me out these really awful shoes. Any chance I had I would get out of the dreadful shoes and into my skates. I used to hide my shoes in a bush near the school and one day I got back there on my way home, and the shoes were gone. My world was shattered I knew that when I told my Mom what I had been doing that she would take away my skates! I hit rock bottom. Looking back I just can't believe the things I would do just to get my fix, that speed on the wheels! My past was a misery of addiction, I couldn't get through even a short walk home from school with out using (my skates)In retrospect I should never have been allowed to run as it is just a gateway activity, from there it's just a short way to skating and then it's either recovery or death. I have managed to survive through these many years with out my skates by working my program and living one day at a time. If it hadn't been for the steps and the guiding hand of Straight I would surely be dead now.

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Straight, Inc. and Derivatives / Y'all okay in the hurricane path there?
« on: September 01, 2005, 06:30:00 PM »
Anon', sorry to hear that you've lost your house if there?s anything that you need let me know. Do you have all the clothes, food, any other basics that you need? I'm in TX if that's any help. I have a surplus of stuff! I've lived in NOLA most of my life. Most of my friends are still missing. I was certainly not condoning the rampant senseless violence. But, are you really shocked or even  surprised? NOLA is a fucked up violent town to begin with. What I was saying is that the general public seems to be focused on the looting rather than on what the fuck can be done to help. The media instead of pressuring the admin. to get it's ass into gear are droning on and on about the looting. It is going to take a lot more than the charity of the American people to get NOLA back on track. What's more this is the kind of thing that we pay taxes for. After 9/11 there was a call out to all medical, police, search and rescue, and fire workers, they were asked to come quickly to NY to aid in the rescue and clean up. There was looting then also but that was rarely mentioned and it stopped quickly, partially because of the immediate response from the rest of the country. Why haven?t there been governmental requests for aid workers? Indeed as the anon poster mentioned there haven?t even been supply drops. The media?s preoccupation with the craziness is fostering an us and them feeling. Most people who are watching from the safety of their living rooms are thinking how horrific these looters are. Who needs to help these types of people. It is going to make the recovery from this devastation just that much harder. I get the feeling that this would be handled very differently had it been Cape Cod that was under water. Who in the government is really all that worried about losing 9th ward, the St. Thomas projects or even uptown?  How can there be any shock at the anarchy in the streets when the government is having so little involvement? That does not mean that I think that it?s a good thing, or that I wouldn?t want it to stop. I am simply not surprised.

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Straight, Inc. and Derivatives / Y'all okay in the hurricane path there?
« on: September 01, 2005, 09:04:00 AM »
Looting electronics seems a bit pointless since they aren't gonna have power for months. Not to mention most of their homes are under many feet of water. What's more where?s the real harm? Every store owner will be protected by their insurance (required ins.) Also the business owners having had the means are long gone from there, they wont be back for quite a while. There are possibly thousands dead, and there are close to 500,000 people homeless, nobody should be worrying about their god damn profit margin. The tent city idea is unfortunately very likely to happen. I think it would be a great good idea for those who will be forced to live like that to get any tools that will make their lives easier. Camping  in the south coastal areas can be hellish at this time of year. Disease will run rampant in a section of the population that can least withstand it. NOLA has some of the poorest populations in the nation. I spent many years living in 9th ward hell there. Many of these people have never been out of the city before. Parts of N.O. barely resemble the America that most people know. It's going to make everything much more difficult. Some of these people have spent their whole lives struggling to barely get by, and now what little thay had worked for is gone. I think tempers will be high. We will be very lucky if all the violence is restricted to a little theft. Hell there are armed marauding gangs in NOLA at the best of times. Having said all that if there is anybody out there who has just escaped please let me know if there is anything that I can do to lend a hand.

4
I completely understand. Although I didn't feel like there were two people, I felt like there was just one really crazy constantly changing person whom I didn't know. I didn't even remember who I had been before the place. The violence and rage took a hold so strongly that it was as though I were walking around a mine field, only I was the mine! I felt like I couldn't control my actions, but I didn't really want to either. It was as if rather than a personality spilt I'd had a complete split in my conscience. While I was keenly aware of the wrongs that were done to me, I didn't care what I did to myself or others. I kind of went what I live to call the GG Allen route. If I could make my daily life as hellish as possible then what they did there might simply become normal. Up untill the mid 70's PTSD was usually missdiagnozed as schitzophrenia, it still is in my opinion. One of my best friends from there has been diagnozed as a schitzophrenic but I don't think that they were right. In the DSM hand book for PTSD it is clear however that PTSD can develope into the fracturing of personalities. There is a big difference however. PTSD is diagnozed by symptoms, you only have PTSD as long as you have enough of the symptoms to meet the guidelines. Schitzophrenia however is always there symptoms or not. I believed for a very long time that I was 'just insane' Many people feel this way after traumas. There's a feeling of not being able to control your own mind, with PTSD at least there is some hope that the control can be found again. As you clearly discovered. I switched myself of in straight and then I lost the switch!!! My anxiety, paranoia and rage made me unable to be either the person whom I had once been or to even become a person whom I liked.It has taken a very long time for me to find the things that I enjoy. When you know yourself so little you don't even know what you like to do or what you want your personality to be like. Good luck with that but, know that lots of people feel or felt the same way.

5
Straight, Inc. and Derivatives / HAVE WE FAILED?
« on: August 30, 2005, 09:57:00 AM »
very nice, thank you. was it also you who put the great link in on the long term studies thread? I am expecting to actually do my Phd. thesis on the history of PTSD/effects of war and torture through out mainly the 20th century. Most people who write about it do so from a solely clinical stand point. I have more personal insight in to the matter! I feel like I finally got my head into better shape and then my body started kicking my ass.  :flame: Interesting stuff.

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Straight, Inc. and Derivatives / HAVE WE FAILED?
« on: August 30, 2005, 09:22:00 AM »
I'm actually going to Scotland (I don't like England that much either)There are a lot of reasons.  As a citizen I am entitled to free medical care ( a huge expense for me here, I have Fibromyalgia and a long list of other problems) I can finish my education for close to free. I just left UNM where I was studying History. With the political climate as it is at the moment it was very difficult to raise any criticism of the US govt. New Mexico has all of it's National Guard over in Iraq. Another big reason is the involvement of the Bush clan with the Semblers et al. One other thing is that I have always felt that there is a much great expectation of personal freedom in the UK than here. Prison is seen as a last resort there, not as a growth industry. Children are rarely locked up for any reason in the UK. Ideally I would prefer to stay here, but,  the direction that this country barreling towards  frightens me. The separation of church and state is becoming less well defined and there are torturers running the government. If I were a citizen of America I would stay to fight for the values that this country stands for. As it is however I can be arrested and held by the military without trial, defense, or just cause. Thanks to the patriot act, I can simply be 'disappeared', my family doesn't even need to be informed. We've all done that before and the results weren't exactly favorable for most of us. I don't think that it's at all likely that I would be locked up after all Scotland isn't exactly known for it's terrorists, but I never thought that a place like Straight could exist either. I'm a writer and a historian and as such I want to write about my experience in Straight and after. I don't want to censor myself out of fear of recrimination. I can do more for the kids who are still in those places if I am elsewhere. I am partially running away with my tail between my legs, but only so that I can get to a safe distance to run my mouth. I would not suggest that this would be the right thing to do if I were an American, after all dissent is one of the basic necessities of any democracy, especially America's. This is just what I must do. I don't think that Britain is so far removed from America in a lot of political areas, but there is more of a public forum on political issues. Words like feminist, liberal, socialist or union are not dirty words there. My personal standard of living will improve by my move there to, although in the long run I will make less money, fortunately for me money is a low priority. I hope someday that I will feel better about the American future. My husband is American and I would love to raise children here if the political climate were different. Speaking of climate, I'd much rather be hot as hell, sitting out on my porch in the middle of nowhere Texas, than freezing my ass of in the wet and dark of Glasgow. Bet you didn't expect a ten page thesis!!! It's just a complex issue for me. BTW you have to pay to park at Mass General too!! Let's see if I get blasted as being 'un-American' which I'm not, the gov sucks though

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Straight, Inc. and Derivatives / dallas/richardson, 87-88
« on: August 28, 2005, 09:23:00 PM »
I think it was 90

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Straight, Inc. and Derivatives / how many...
« on: August 28, 2005, 06:53:00 AM »
How many straight kids does it take to change a light bulb?

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Straight, Inc. and Derivatives / "Re-acculturation Center"?
« on: August 28, 2005, 03:05:00 AM »
Ahh yes another way to put it is re-education camps, sound familiar. Although wasn't the US government damning the Russian and Chinese gulags at the very time that we were locked down? There's a great book called 'Fear no evil' writen by a Russian refusnik Natan Sharanski. The book really opened my eyes to several key points, firstly that there are many people whose governments employ these tactics, secondly many of us found our own ways to rebel even if it was simply in our heads, and lastly but posibly more importantly all my thoughts of I should have done this or I should have done that were so unrealistic for one simple reason, we were children. No mater what we thought at the time our minds were still vulnerable. We had not fully become the people that we were going to be. We did not have the mental defences of a full grown adult. Most of us lost sight for at least a while that what they were doing was insane.

10
I don't know of any specifically about Straight but since many of their techniques are listed in the requirements for some thing to be called torture there has been a lot of research done with that. There's even a torture survivors center (in Minnie?) who collect tons of info. Also long-term affects of PTSD have been documented in America since the civil war (it was called de'costas sp? syndrom and thought to be a heart disease) although it's combat related. PTSD has been studied extensively including it's effects on the second and third generations!!!!  Having been abused as a child also opens the doors for many purely physical ailment, cervical cancer for women, migraines, TMJ, fibromyalgia, and just about any stress related illness too. Of course the real kick in the ass for a drug treatment center, the abused are more likely to become drug addicts, alcoholics, workaholic, you know -holics, substitute whatever you want. Last but not least dead buddies. I'm fairly sure the average thirty something hasn't lost count of their dead friends

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Straight, Inc. and Derivatives / dallas/richardson, 87-88
« on: August 28, 2005, 02:06:00 AM »
a little while after the time that ya'll were in a girl named Laura Butterworth was there, she was a shortish girl with blond curly hair, kinda country, I heard that she is dead but it wasn't a real reliable source, I just wondered if anybody knew her or knows her.

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Straight, Inc. and Derivatives / HAVE WE FAILED?
« on: August 28, 2005, 01:44:00 AM »
I'm from the UK. I'd been here a very short time before I was locked up.... what a freak out,and I thought that culture shock was weird

13
We seem to be looking at straight as an individualized issue, it's not. It's part and parcel with the disintigration of the countries codes of morals. Yes, America has committed worse attrocities on the grand scale although rarely towards those who they deemed to be citizens. Until now torture was not state sanctioned, regardless of Bush's denial. Much less the torture of children. It goes hand in hand with the fact that there are over 2 million people behind bars, that veterans are looked at as crazy and no good, and that anybody who is not a good god fearin patriot ought to be taken out back and shot/lynched. Straight will not and should not be seen as a lynch pin in American history but as a symptom of the moral compass of a nation. Wow, I really sound like I hate this place but I do not, I love America and most of the Americans that i know, but its government well.....

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Straight, Inc. and Derivatives / HAVE WE FAILED?
« on: August 28, 2005, 01:11:00 AM »
I'm leaving America partially because I see this as a systemic problem. Especially with the current administration. I never thought that I would leave but here I am leaving.  Once I am back in my home country I will be contacting Amnesty International. They do not allow people to become active in problems in the countries that they live in, as a safety measure against reprisals. I am also wondering what exactly international laws are on holding a foreign national in a place like Straight, be sure I will find out.  I do feel like we are letting down those who are there now. I don't know what I can do but I want to try. I have been out for 15yrs 10 of which I spent running below the radar, out of fear and craziness. I want to at least get some recognition that there is a problem, then maybe from there something can be done. The problem is that they broke many of us so badly that we have fallen through the cracks or tried to forget.

15
I spoke with some of the lawyers who took on straight and was told that they were sort of set up like cell organizations and that when each individual center was shut down they 'got rid of their files' and so I was s.o.l. cause I couldn't prove anything.

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