I suppose it is an issue of perception. I didn?t see punks and brats. I saw teens from broken and/or ?dysfunctional? families who were grieving, who were fearful to the point of rage and/or self destruction, who were confused, hopeless, and helpless ('spoiled'). I saw teens in reaction to possibly never having had their real needs met, to having never been taught anything useful. To refer to them as brats and punks is disrespectful and mocks the real challenges and deficits they have to deal with. It was unethical and wouldn?t fly under any other circumstances.
How might the viewing public have felt and reacted if it had been the parents there and one of the ?staff/counselors? referred to a mom as a hysterical bitch with a shopping addiction? Or one of the fathers as a narcissistic adulterous bastard ? I?m imagining that wouldn?t have gone over real well. The staff with licenses should have them revoked for colluding with this so-called ?therapy?.
If that's not clear enough, how about this scenerio. You're sitting in the therapists office and s/he tells you that you are a selfish bitch and need to get over it. You might not feel like that person has your best interest at heart.
The term was in no way intended to be endearing or complimentary, nothing ?relative? about it. Only in the mind of someone desperately seeking justification. One might expect to hear these terms used by wardens at juvie, but in a 'therapeutic' setting? They have to use derogatory terms in order to justify the austere treatment of these young human beings, both unethical.
How many people were talking about the brats and punks and liars and thieves at the office on Thur? All gathered around the water cooler supporting each other?s sadistic view of the world. Hopefully there was an occasional sane person present to present a different perspective.
And that is why I can say, No, the population hasn?t gone beyond me. In fact, the masses have made little to no movement on this issue. I am not surprised in the least that the phones are ringing off the wall. American generally approved of this form of 'treatment'. And parents are getting more ignorant, and stretched, and lazy, and apathetic. You/they will be capitalizing on that for a while to come, unfortunately. Revel in the sadistic glory honey.
And to add insult to injury, they are tortured, punished, humiliated, and exploited for being who they were conditioned (taught) to be.
FYI, I wasn't a reject. I was on the National Dean's Honor List and dropped out because I grew tired of memorizing and regurgitating useless rhetoric and theories. NOT TO MENTION, I had a son just home from a program who often needed to be 'counseled' til the wee hours of the morning due to the abuse he endured there. The psych industry bundles all his distresses into a nice package called PTSD. He trusted no one, so I became his 'counselor', and he'd tell you that I did a damn fine job. For that alone I should receive an honorary degree. ::deal::
