I have come in search of straightlings for this very reason... I wanted to find this girl Teresa D. who was in Springfield with me in 1988. We were newcomers together a lot and I always felt she was treated horribly. She stood up, she talked, she did all the same crap as everyone else. She also pulled out every single lash or hair from around her eyes.
She was caught masturbating in her bed one night, or so they said. They were horrible to her. I hated myself for not saying something to them then. of course i couldn't say anything to her because we were both newcomers. I think I was probably even to afraid to make eye contact with her.
She is out of all of them the person I hope most of all is ok. I want to tell her I am sorry, not that there was much i could have done, but I left her alone. i could have given her something to let her know she wasn't alone.
Her mom and mine were friends while I was still in and my mom had left, leaving me at the mercy of that place and my dad who was totally whipped at the time. he was committed.
Anyway, I have a lot of guilt for so many things. For copping out, for not finishing, for restraining people, just to get a long. For relating to people when i really was just grasping at straws. For being an oldcommer, for not hitting some of those phsychos when they were up in my face.
I am still a wuss. I have admired those who did misbehave, though hated them at the same time as it meant more bruises, kicks, scratches and bites for me.
Anyway, you are 100% right, we wre all there just trying to get by. I think some of us were more aware of the conscequences of things going on around us that others as well.
Those misbehavers did make it to higher phases briefly and they ran their fingers down someone elses back too.
I don't think any of us were not at one time or other either the tortured or the torturers.
there were also those times when the newcomers could help each other a bit. In group she always tried to relate to me and I believe I did the sme for her if I was called on.
I just remembered that.