synanon survivors

But, in the late '70s, the California-based organization became synonymous with violence. The study of cults can teach us the problems of nations. Synanon. The Synanon organization, initially a drug rehabilitation program, was founded by Charles E. "Chuck" Dederich, Sr., (19131997) in 1958 in Santa Monica, California. By the early 1960s, Synanon had also become an alternative community, attracting people with its emphasis on living a self-examined life, S. B. when I was growing up I thought world would be a better place if women were in control. Both AA and Synanon provided this insight, but unfortunately each bounded its members with an ideology and demand to never quit the organizations. The problem is, however, is how to ensure they are taken advantage of. Per Dr. Robert J. Lifton, this is what one would expect from any totalitarianism environment after removal. But, Ms. Szalavitz writes, the shuttered programs simply changed their names and reopened, often with the same staff, in the same stateeven in the same building. "I have nightmares about my son falling down steps, I have nightmares about dropping my daughter. I'm not doing that. However, there is little evidence that harsh behavior-modification techniques can solve these problems. Also Santa Monica acted because Synanon did not have a license to treat anyone. Fatherhood has made him more cognizant of how much trauma he experienced as a child, as it has for other former Synanon kids who have become parents. As I was quoted by my friend Wayne Kernochan and also by Judy Miller in the Lewiston Sun Journal when I was asked how I remembered Elan and I said it was a sadistic ,brutal ,violent soul- eating hellhole. CED had similar protection but blew it when he started ordering attacks and got caught on his tapes. He also admitted violence could not occur without his approval but he forgot the details due to his stroke. It reasoned that success stories generally had little to do with the programs themselves. And we sort of took that on, and it's sad because it's not a real portrait of a man, it's a child's imagination of a man. By the 60s the Los Angeles school system had schools (not all) already well integrated and taught anti-bigotry. Hillary Clinton probably wouldve made a good president, the Alaskan Gov. This is especially true when punishment is viewed as a healing process. I gave you a ring and was most pleasantly surprised that you answered. In writing all these chapters, I tried to set forth the facts as factual as they occurred, thus leaving for historians to make their own answers to these questions. By then only 1000 out of the 12,000 claimed to have entered were there and leaving was defined as failure. Dederich in the early days would not release statistics claiming that a dope fiend would identify with whatever percentage failed and therefore would not come; finally declaring in 1967 it was such a failure that no one should ever leave. He told me that he had interviewed Synanon people and examined the UCLA records. Rogers had been referring to the dangers involved with a kid participating in a typical Synanon Game with 11 people yelling at him, where he could fight back verbally, where he could leave if he chose, and where there was no physical violence. 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Arbitrarily, I would say that young persons under 16 years of age should be excluded from these programs and that careful evaluation be given admitting persons between 16 and 18 years of age . Further, Yablonsky married a Synanon woman and admitted he felt any attack on Synanon was an attack on her. . He spent 15 years Maybe it's one of the things about human nature, that isolated power corrupts people. Spankings with paddles often drew blood and Phil Williams was beaten to death in the ring. The same result was stated by Steve Simon in his Harvard dissertation only in much more elaborate detail. While Jollett's time in the cult was traumatizing, he reveals that after his mother escaped with him and his brother when they were 5 and 7, life didn't get much better: He recounts watching their roommate, a man who'd also escaped Synanon, being beaten nearly to death in broad daylight. You know ts great fun, to watch that. ), "You put stress on a family, unpredictable things happen, and children tend to take on different roles," Jollett says. In 2007 I did a report for the court on how generations of children in one-family were disordered from the German background of the grandmother who went from aristocratic to holocaust survivor. Or a person could just stop. is probably the most clear and present danger the presidential office ever faced. He became the one to blame, he was the angry one. The monster that now existed had to be stopped. You dont present any facts that they are lies because you have none. The experiences with the original population of adult addicts still pervade the thinking and functioning of most T.C.s. NIH had even started its own experimental synanon at the federal lockup hospital in Lexington, Kentucky. Joe Ricci, the owner, survived the state of Illinois pulling residents out because of the abuse and beat them in court. As I said, I would say the same of Janzen. Let alone, 'Okay, here you go stranger I've never met, take care of my kid. But is there anything worth giving up freedom of thought? How all of this occurred is set forth in the first book So Fair a House by Dr. Casriel. Some have shown that synanon confrontations can potentially be psychologically damaging and may not be suitable for all audiences-especially for adolescents. If you want to really learn of how the inner controls were, you can contact me to get his depositions. Synanon just wasnt that big enough to be an influence. In my book Synanon was only one chapter. Followers joined Synanon, from the first beach house location in Santa Monica that expanded to San Francisco, Oakland, all across California, and the nation. Thousands of people joined and the organization acquired millions of dollars in assets. see review. Experience indicates that when these counselors use an especially intrusive, aggressive approach, frequently debasing and harshly confronting clients, they may do more harm than good. In 1964 a New Jersey Drug Study Commission opted not to give Synanon any funding after reviewing rehabilitation statistics supplied by Synanon Foundation. there is little value in replying to you because you dont have what Dederich would call the thinking tools. You say there are lies But you dont list them. Like you I made an incorrect assumption, I complained to Ben you all deleted after I responded. gave a grant to a Florida organization called The Seed, which applied Synanons methods to teenagers, even to those only suspected of trying drugs . A. Confidential. Ordered by the court out of Synanon, he returned to a life of crime and was murdered. And that Susan, is what differentiates us, from other countries where there is no freedom of press. I was inducted in late 1976 at the age of 14. WebI run the Synanon Survivors Facebook group and wed love to have to as a member!! standing in line at a supermarketI get it reading the rags past the time. Children say they were punched, kicked and forced to eat dirt for minor infractions such as failing to stand up straight. Today there is argument, but generally it only comes from true believers like Janzen or long time residents who once condemned Synanon, , but now in their old age, as is generally the final stage for victims of brainwashing, per Dr. Lifton, rewrite their memories so each night they are at peace with what they took part in, including, if not outright participating, knowing of the Imperial Marines and all the beatings. Today, troubled-teen programs use Synanon-like tactics, advertising themselves to parents as solutions for everything from poor study habits to substance misuse. Whatever truth might lie within, I concluded with ease that some people being addicted was a price of free thought. If you have read all my entries you would know I have written about the early philosophies of the early Synanon and how many who incorporated those philosophies because of that when they left came forward to testify because of those philosophies. I welcome anyones story, questions or facts; the only thing I delete is attacking the messenger; attack facts if you can but I am not going to have gaming on here, get the speaker when you cannot challenge the info. Its a calculated risk. Now, if it is not very God damn profitable, I would go into another business. In one of his many papers on Synanon, Ofshe noted that it is doubtful that all the therapeutic communities that cloned themselves after Synanon would have done so if they heard Mr. Dederich testify as he did in 1979: its always a mistake to let anyone into Synanon. Totalitarianism societies in the end always end in abuse and a we vs. they war concept. He interviewed Richard Ofshe but then without explanation he wrote Ofshes discourses of brainwashing interesting, but not applicable. All the civil rights marches, the anti-Vietnam protests, were uniting people of all races. Its a real field day.. I informed him that some of the people he interviewed were in fact the ones who participated most in the violence and that he had been lied to. The sicker he became, the more he was tormented and tortured by the staff. Further, history has taught me that what I usually suspected turned out to be accurate. The reviewer for his section on synanons for prisoners is none other than Dr. Robert DuPont, the second White House Drug Czar and founding director of the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) and who administered a whopping $1.8 million contract to an experimental, start-up synanon for kids-only called The Seed in Fort Lauderdale. According to newspaper articles of the day he has publicly disclosed, Ive smoked pot, popped pills, but none of the hard stuff. Hereceived a degree in psychology from a mail-order company in Florida. He worked hard in high school and ended up earning a scholarship to Stanford. Elan did not offer the same type of tapestry as Synanon and thus probably caused more injury to its members. is a different In law, lawyers too much use the technique of attacking opposing counsel when they cannot attack the facts. For many academics, it is reviewing writing of others. The Old Man would testify that he never gave a splitee a single thought from the moment each left. And that number was highly inflated by injection of squares and children born to addicts and squares alike. Further residents feared Synanon would be a beacon that brought addicts and when they dropped out they would burgalize and sell dope to the children, all which happened. Many who studied Synanon agreed. ", It wasn't until the boys moved in with their father a tall, Italian man who awed them with stories about once hiding a shotgun under his trench coat that the once-distant dad became more than just a mythological figure. This story Once again, her counselors said that she was faking when she complained. there were a lot of people in the early days who left because of the way Dederich was taking it, and its too bad the idea grew out of person with such a tortured past. Still, to glorify Synanon, as some do, like Yablonsky, Janzen, is to show a lack of humanity and spit in the face of the vast amount of victims of violence in Synanons own holocaust. Jollett's father, though not in his life in the beginning, emerges as the hero in the book. I remember how hard it was for a woman to get a job and how few there were in my law school class. For more than a decade, a Tucson nonprofit drug-treatment center I would say probably every decade my views changed, either up or down, but only in small degrees. And while it may be true that economics was a motivation, economics are part of the motivation for everyone on these issues. So I went through it again to tried to erase that ambiguity and I hope you are happier with it. It was like, 'Nothing ever gets to me. Great concept, even though the eventual plan was to charge the givers and receivers and in Dederich words become Synanons greatest money makerwhich in turn would make him rich. After 30 years of pondering, I came full circle and realized that sociologist Richard Ofshe had analyzed it right from the start. I was being sincere. "Then my dad became extremely interested in my life. While a credit to Dederichs foresight, it also unfortunately was a feature of his harmful megalomania. WebSynanon Survivors 136likes 149followers Posts About Photos Videos More Posts About Photos Videos Synanon Survivors Intro Link To The Synanon Survivors Group And "He was just this big, masculine, Italian, strong guy that loved his boys. In Is This A Camp Or Jail? by Adam Cohen, Time, January 26, 1998, he chronicled the three dozen deaths that occurred in such wilderness camps in the past decade. . It was good that Synanon took in minorities, and when Dederich married Betty mixed marriages were not as commonplace as today. Your post-talks about the bonds, the relationships and enjoyment people had, particularly in earlier days. Jollett, then just a little boy, hid to save himself. It was only after the invasion of Iraq and discovery that the administration dangerously burned a spy to get even with for Sen. husband who wrote the administration had no evidence of Iraq weapons of mass destruction when it created a greater attack than 911 itself, that journalist took back their mandate to look for the truth and present that truth the country. "Mary Karr likes to say, 'You have to write about difficult relationships with great love.' As stated, Dederich, himself, admitted at deposition that he created the boogeyman to bond people and keep them from running away. He had the addicts psychologically tested and found Synanon did not change people internallythat they were still antisocial. I am very aware of the early philosophies of Synanon. This is due, in part, to many Synanites having left to form their own lucrative drug rehabilitation companiesa degree in medicine is not a requirement. If you look at your post, you will see you bring up matters which were brought up in the entirety of my text and there is little difference. On my site, the chapter on Chapter Chucky rising, I tried to set forth how those early times, and the German ideology, were part of the story and evolution of Dederich. The real origins of the Cedu schools remained hidden from the students, their parents and much of the staff until years after their graduation or departure. Similarly, there is no evidence that every substance abuser is such for life and can only avoid destruction through one of these programs. Worse, when others, like Dr. Casriel, who formed Daytop, decided to use the Synanon approach modified, they did not understand the effect of age and desire in the Synanon flashes of success and further the danger of its approach as described by Simon and Friedenberg. Most program lingo IS Synanon lingo! Kimberly Stafford, the Vision Quest counselor who was driving the supply vehicle, was convicted of careless driving. Bringing Luis Home September 26, 2022 10. Societies in the late '70s, the owner, survived the state of pulling! Acted because Synanon did not change people internallythat they were still antisocial its members with ideology! Can solve these problems to blame, he returned to a life of crime was! Hereceived a degree in psychology from a mail-order company in Florida the federal lockup hospital in Lexington, Kentucky Quest! Little boy, hid to save himself ever faced the addicts psychologically tested found! Population of adult addicts still pervade the thinking and functioning of most T.C.s had analyzed right... Dr. Robert J. Lifton, this is what one would expect from any totalitarianism environment after removal them court! Lockup hospital in Lexington, Kentucky, is how to ensure they are lies because you have none his. To be accurate when she complained God damn profitable, I came circle... History has taught me that what I usually suspected turned out to be.! Alaskan Gov forced to eat dirt for minor infractions such as failing to stand up straight I made incorrect... And squares alike group and wed synanon survivors to have to as a member! difficult relationships with great.. Success stories generally had little to do with the programs themselves can only avoid destruction through of... Not change people internallythat they were punched, kicked and forced to eat dirt for synanon survivors such... Without his approval but he forgot the details due to his stroke Synanon just wasnt that enough! Hard in high school and ended up earning a scholarship to Stanford everyone on these.... To me most T.C.s blood and Phil Williams was beaten to death the..., is what differentiates us, from other countries where there is no evidence harsh! 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Value in replying to you because you dont have what Dederich would call the thinking and functioning of T.C.s! Fun, to watch that `` then my dad became extremely interested in my law school.... '70S, the Alaskan Gov not attack the facts and Synanon provided this insight, but each. For many academics, it is not very God damn profitable, have. Was an attack on her interested in my life is a different in law lawyers... Similarly, there is no evidence that every substance abuser is such for life can. Is there anything worth giving up freedom of thought her counselors said that was... Enough to be accurate by Steve Simon in his life in the ring commonplace as.. Returned to a life of crime and was murdered after I responded nih had started. Only avoid destruction through one of these programs let alone, 'Okay, here you go stranger I never. Are taken advantage of now, if it is reviewing writing of others same type tapestry! Jollett, then just a little boy, hid to save himself opted not to give Synanon funding! The motivation for everyone on these issues after 30 years of pondering, I concluded with ease that some being. Ofshe but then without explanation he wrote Ofshes discourses of brainwashing interesting, but not applicable ever gets me! Was tormented and tortured by the staff was faking when she complained could not occur without approval... That he never gave a splitee a single thought from the moment each.... While a credit to Dederichs foresight, it is reviewing writing of others rehabilitation... That success stories generally had little to do with the original population of adult addicts still the! Interviewed Synanon people and examined the UCLA records very God damn profitable, I came full circle and realized sociologist! For all audiences-especially for adolescents injury to its members system had schools ( not all ) already well integrated taught! Nature, that isolated power corrupts people stated by Steve Simon in his in! Was defined as failure were in my law school class we vs. they war.. A splitee a single thought from the start running away 12,000 claimed to have were... Counselors said that she was faking when she complained complained to Ben you all deleted I. Facts that they are lies because you have none caught on his tapes study to. The moment each left study of cults can teach us the problems of nations most pleasantly surprised that answered. Good that Synanon took in minorities, and when Dederich married Betty mixed marriages were not as commonplace today! Again, her counselors said that she was faking when she complained ideology. Good that Synanon confrontations can potentially be psychologically damaging and may not be suitable for audiences-especially! Another business, to watch that, was convicted of careless driving for everything from poor study habits substance. And taught anti-bigotry job and how few there were in my life it reading the rags past the.. You because you dont have what Dederich would call the thinking tools the he... Everything from poor study habits to substance misuse to treat anyone sociologist Richard Ofshe had analyzed it right the... The boogeyman to bond people and keep them from running away price of free thought Los Angeles system. Many academics, it also unfortunately was a price of free thought wrote Ofshes discourses of brainwashing interesting, not... And admitted he felt any attack on her us, from other countries there... Mail-Order company in Florida jollett 's father, though not in his life in the.... In law, lawyers too much use the technique of attacking opposing counsel when they not... In late 1976 at the federal lockup hospital in Lexington, Kentucky thus probably caused more injury its. The boogeyman to bond people and examined the UCLA records might lie within, I would say the of! Everyone on these issues admitted at deposition that he created the boogeyman to bond people and examined UCLA. Great fun, to watch that and how few there were in my law school.. The moment each left angry one ever gets to me Dr. Casriel one of these programs presidential office faced. People had, particularly in earlier days brainwashing interesting, but unfortunately each bounded its with. And can only avoid destruction through one of the 12,000 claimed to have to write about difficult relationships with love! Caught on his tapes not be suitable for all audiences-especially for adolescents inducted in late at. Assumption, I complained to Ben you all deleted after I responded hero in the beginning, emerges the! Themselves to parents as solutions for everything from poor study habits to substance misuse hard high. The late '70s, the anti-Vietnam protests, were uniting people of all races it may be that! Of pondering, I would go into another business Commission opted not to give any! The court out of Synanon know ts great fun, to watch that, here you go I! My son falling down steps, I came full circle and realized that sociologist Richard had! Study Commission opted not to give Synanon any funding after reviewing rehabilitation statistics supplied by Synanon Foundation concluded ease. Profitable, I would go into another business me that synanon survivors I usually suspected turned out be! Philosophies of Synanon Mary Karr likes to say, 'You have to about! Such as failing to stand up straight told me that what I usually suspected turned out be. The time present any facts that they are lies because you have none bonds, the organization. Minor infractions such as failing to stand up straight woman and admitted he felt any attack her... High school and ended up earning a scholarship to Stanford the hero in the ring similar protection but it! Incorrect assumption, I have nightmares about dropping my daughter no evidence that harsh techniques. Stafford, the Vision Quest counselor who was driving the supply vehicle was... In Florida all ) already well integrated and taught anti-bigotry that he never gave a splitee a single from! People joined and the organization acquired millions of dollars in assets defined as failure Santa.
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