TSW, how is manufactured hardship in the form of 'roughing it' honestly worth a damn thing? All it does is build up tolerance to shit conditions, and living in a camp or any other authoritarian school/program/whatever just builds up tolerance to bullshit and either submission, or the skill of faking it until you cna get away (or *gasp* manipulating)
I've been through a TON of shit in my life, especially from the start of 2003 to now. Did it make me stronger? Yeah, in the sense that a bone wont break in the same spot once it heals and scartissue is harder to scrape or cut than something thats all pink and soft. But, building up tolerance to bullshit, getting a tougher skin, and learning to put up with crap doesnt make you a better person, it just makes you able to survive and endure. It doesnt make you a better person than anyone else, but you'd probably complain a lot less than someone whose never been through shit. And you can smugly go "pssh what a pussy/whiner" at the end of the day.
Survival isn't all there is to life. When all you learn how to do is put up, tough it out, tolerate shit, do as told, and generally just wait for the days torment to end so you can find your own sort of grey happiness in the time where youre not being fucked over or working your ass off fruitlessly, you're still not happy. It also doesnt do jack shit for the real issues you might have. Wow, I can shit in the woods, eat crappy food, and live in a tent! What REAL issues did they have? Are those addressed?
I could sit here and pat myself on the back for losing my mom to depression in my tweens, my sisters to my dad soon after in mind and physically at 18, being depressed myself as a child until I grew big enough as a teenager to scare the little shits off so they dont fuck w/ith me anymore, never having much in the way of property, friends, or anything else, never having a father, but its a waste of time.
Wanna know what my REAL problem is? Getting rid of the bullshit that I was brought up to believe, such as "put others before yourself" and "dont be selfish or materialistic". Spending all my damn time caring for others and not wanting anything has left me extremely unmotivated to want anything or do anything. Getting motivated or daring to want anything for myself. Getting a little arrogance and 'self esteem'. I sure as hell didnt get it by just getting a repeatedly tougher skin and nothing but bullshit and a lack of any *REAL* growth and development, which you get when you actually feel good, are accepted, and feel things like affection, pleasure, and love from someone.
And Im slowly screwing my head on the right way and figuring out how to be happy, but my CONTINUING load of bullshit on me and my family's plate isnt making it easy. Plus Im as disconnected from my family as I can be. It feels like I just live with people that look like me most of the time. I REALLY doubt that even MORE of the crap, and being TOTALLY removed from family, friends, acceptance, affection, and good, pleasurable, enjoyable things would help me one iota, no matter how you spin the 'self esteem' I
should feel from 'succeeding' with the artificial, manufacturered 'hardship' and obedience Id have to deal with in a program, camp, or whatever.
I need a damn family, because the one I have is gutted out, dryrotted, dead on the inside, tied up dried up and dead to the damn world, care of my dad, the state of NC's legal system, and a lot of bad luck. Id wager a LOT of those kids in those programs are in the same boat Im in too, except even WORSE, because hey, mommy and daddy just had you kidnapped to get 'fixed'!
If you want to help kids, you need to actually fix the real problems, not make fake ones and fix them so you can manufacture self esteem. Its like making up the 'problem' of gay marriage or the 10 commandments and 'addressing' them (sorta like censorship or wtf Santorum is smoking) to pat yourself on the back. The real problems are still there! The real voids and emptyness is still there in their lives, and you don't fill that by getting mindfucked or putting up with bullshit.
But, hey, I guess if youre better at putting up and surviving and suffering quietly, you dont need to fix it, do ya? 'Cause thats basically what I see the programs REALLY teaching everyone.
We must create an atmosphere where the crooked cop fears the honest cop, and not the other way around.
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/B00006JU7T/circlofmiamithem' target='_new'>Frank Serpico