This is the second time I've read about this horrible place. In fact 'No More Cocoons' by Jello Biafra talked about something similar happening to someone he knew. From the descriptions in the article, these sound like human rights abuses. The parents seem relieved, though, to have their kids turned into zombies out of sight. I predict a collection of lawsuits twenty years from now.

I heard about this a few weeks ago on NPR, either on Morning Edition or on All Things Considered (yes, I listen to those shows and I really to feel that I have taken in things, all things considered).

Welcome to the new American school of parenting. If you aren't string enough or willing to face up to the resposibility of raising your children, and you have enough money, just send them off to a school where they will be brainwashed and turned into fine upstanding psychopaths.

Institutionalization of youth will only lead to repressed emotion and cause severe mental scarring to those who are subjected to the wills of "adults". These kinds of arrogant, fool-hardy, games of domination are going to backfire. The only regretable thing is that those who are initiating these acts will not be around to fall prey to thier folly. It will be generations before this will be seen as another "Boys from Brazil" or another Nazi School for Arian boys. And that's all this is. Beat them into submission, force dogmatic and automatic survival responses out of them, and call them "cured". It didn't work for treating mentally ill patients in the 1950's and 1960's, it won't work for kids who just need proper role models and guidance from actual adults.

I was raised by my parents, my community, and my relatives. Not television, not the latest pop star. I know what is considered "right" and what is considered "taboo" by our society. Notice I didn't say "wrong". Right and wrong have very limited connotations. Mainly because the shift almost daily. But that's another topic to rant about another time.

I'm done now. I must go ponder this question and organize the guerrilla's for another raid on the "school". We shall liberate these wretches like George Bush liberated Iraq. With the barrel of a gun and a jack boot on the neck of the opressed people.... er, I mean on the necks of the opressors. Or something....

Edited by author 07-03-2003 11:44 AM
daq said:

I'm done now. I must go ponder this question and organize the guerrilla's for another raid on the "school". We shall liberate these wretches like George Bush liberated Iraq. With the barrel of a gun and a jack boot on the neck of the opressed people.... er, I mean on the necks of the opressors. Or something....

daq, I know (think) you're joking here, but if I had the money and the werewithal, I'd be holding the director of that little 'institution' in the sights of an assault rifle while the kids burned the place to the ground and salted the earth it stood on.

Yeah, there are some troubled kids, but they need guidance and education, not the mental torture of Tranquility.

I wonder if some sort of law is being broken here? Or if not, how we could convince our respective senators or congressmen and women that this should be the case?

Just to stir the pot:

What's the success rate of the place?
What's the success rate of "guidance and education"?

20/20 just did an interesting piece on a method of rehabilitating troubled kids. The parents could NEVER be more than 3' away. The kids room is stripped bare. He's not allowed to see friends. If the kid loses his temper, the parents put him in a submission hold for 5 minutes after the kid stops struggling (sometimes taking several HOURS before the kid stops).

The kid they followed wasn't able to be rehabilitated by any other method, but 6 months of this and he was a whole new person.

So the question is:

Which is MORE cruel: Tough but effective cure, or ineffective but nice cures that pretty much guarantee a life in jail plus dozens of victims in their wake?

It's pretty obvious that the prison system doesn't work, so what's the answer?

In the 1980s, I knew quite a few kids whose parents simply couldn't deal with their "punk" outlook and sent them to private rehab and/or mental hospital programs... until the insurance ran out. I vaguely remember that a kid somewhere even created a 'zine about this phenomenon.

Why bitch about the place? It's the "parents" who make it happen. Removing the kids from these parents completely and forever would almost certainly do more good than this "school" will ever do. Either "incorrigible" kids have diagnosible mental illness, in which case they need treatment, or they have abusive/evil parents, in which case the parents need to be dealt with (oops, I forgot: they're rich and this is America). In either case, the "school" is irrelevant.

Wow, DaveW, bitter much?

What about the kids from POOR families? I guess the prison system works fine for them.

Wealthly people might send their kids here as a last resort, but what do poor parents do? They just kick their kids out on the street. I guess you find that BETTER?

Funny how being wealthy has become a crime to some people.

Edited by author 07-03-2003 12:37 PM
If you had told me before I had read this that there were private jails for well-off people to send their reputed hellions to, I would have expressed disbelief. But it makes sense, in a twisted sort of way. After all, having a teen who gets in trouble with the law can be an embarassment to one's reputation. Sending them away to one of the nine facilities that WWASP (how appropriate!) operates allows one to tell one's friends and neighbors that your child is at an exclusive private school. Sure, they won't be able to have fun, or date, or socialize, but they blew their chances of that by acting as if they were individuals, with rights of their own. So what if they hate you for the rest of their lives. They should have known better than to do the things they did.
Maybe this method will become more popular, and cults/affinity groups can open their own schools for troubled teens. Think of the possibilities: you have a bunch of energetic teens, you can train them any way you want, and their parents will pay beaucoups for the privilege!
Anyway, if this place is so horrible, why hasn't a disgruntled former student raised a private army, assaulted the place, and executed the staff? Or at least used that as the plot for a movie?
Seriously, though, didn't people just use to send their brats to military school? Wouldn't that be a good way to make sure they have a career? You know, if you're worried about job security for your kids?

I don't think these are just kids who talk too much in class, or ring doorbells and run away. I think these are the kids who people TRULY fear will kill someone if something doesn't change soon.

I'm all for giving killers big loving hugs and having them instantly change into peaceful, productive members of society. It just doesn't happen that way very often.

This camp doesn't sound all that different than jail, except that it allows the inmate to leave once they are rehabilitated, no earlier, no later. Isn't that what we WANT from jail?

If you cannot afford this school, you can always put boot to butt and give the kid the heave-ho out onto the streets. That's what happens to most kids who cannot be controlled. Just go to any jail and ask around, you'll find LOTS of them there, sucking in that $40,000/year in TAXPAYER money for "rehabilitation", not to mention the victims left in their wake.

Again, I don't think this place is for kids who got drunk at a party and wrecked daddy's car, it's for serious problem children. If this place is a last resort, then GREAT, I'm all for it, it's better than sucking up tax money to keep them in jail where they are sodomized by the other inmates and generally will return within a year of being released.

I'm just very interested in the success rate of this place. Hard to label it "good" or "bad" if we don't know the results.

Take this reporter and drop him into a mental institution and let him write objectively about it. Or a prison. Or a military academy. All of these places are options, and all are equally shocking.

I'm telling you that WITHOUT HESITATION I'd choose this place over being soddomized in a public prison.

Edited by author 07-03-2003 01:04 PM
I don't often post, but I have to on this one.

Most Children sent to places like this aren't "acting as if they were individuals, with rights of their own". They are acting as if they can do anything that they want with no consequences to their actions. This is pretty common in America today and is often reinforced by psycologists.

What places like Tranquility Bay are trying to teach the kids is that if they do good and act as productive members of society, they will have good things happen to them. If they do bad, they will have bad things happen to them and they helped bring it down on them. Some kids just have a hard time accepting that fact. If they don't get it drilled into their heads, then they end up blaming everyone else for all of their problems.

Look at how sue-happy and blame-happy the USA has become. "Oh, I hurt myself by misusing this tool. It can't be my fault. I'll blame the manufacturer." "I had unprotected sex and now I'm pregnant. It's not my fault. I'll just get an abortion and kill the fetus." "I never study or listen in class but I should get better grades. It's my teacher's fault."

I'm not saying that it's not the parents fault either, they probably needed to teach their kids some values before everything got out of hand. These places are hopefully a last resort. It is sad that parents are sending their kids to them for things like "sassing."

Point one is that there is an epidemic of poor parenting among my peers (the 1945-1960 cohort), leading to our children having an epidemic of drug and alcohol addiction, anti-social behavior, and worse. This in turn lead to the development of the boot camps and wilderness therapy endeavors as referenced in the article.

Point two is that there's always been a demand for "save my kid from himself (or herself)". It used to be military-style boarding schools for boys, and (usually) strict religious-based boarding schools for girls. These fell out of fashion in the seventies and most are out of business, as the co-ed wilderness experience arose, to be followed by the boot camp phenomenon.

Point three is that some of the behaviors (such as eating disorders and self-mutilation) seem to be almost contagious. It's hard to describe, but until you have seen a wave of anorexia (for example) spread through a middle school, affecting kids from strong families as well as kids from troubled homes, it is hard to believe.

Point four is humility. Just because you have a strong relationship with your kid does not GUARANTEE that said kid won't try drugs, get addicted, or start acting in a hateful, destructive manner. Sometimes strong intervention is the difference between life and death for a child. You have no idea of the heartbreak a drug-addicted child (say a 14 year old) can cause. Let's say the 14 year old is a graduate of one or more 28-day residential programs--then what do you do? How do you protect the younger children (if any) from their siblings behavior? So not every kid in these programs is there for no reason .

 Point four is, don't confuse Outward Bound
http://www.outwardbound.com/history.html

or The National Outdoor Leadership School

http://www.nols.edu/about/history/

two respected and well-extablished outdoor educational institutions, with boot camps or wilderness therapy programs (although the wilderness therapy programs arouse out of the Outward Bound phenomenon, they are now separate.)


Here's an article on Wilderness Therapy Programs Vs Wilderness Boot Camps

http://www.wilderness-therapy.org/Wilderness/WildernessVsBoot.htm

this seems to be a good site for parents considering what to do with a kid who is in trouble.

http://www.educationoptions.org/programs/

This too seems to be a good site, including the following:

Crisis Intervention For Teenagers - A Family Guide

"Teenagers may be remorseful when they get into real trouble. On the other hand, they may feel so entitled and invulnerable that they will openly defy their parents and even law enforcement."

http://www.educationoptions.org/programs/a...ventionForTeens.htm

Edited by author 07-03-2003 02:59 PM
For a real creep-out, read some of the survivor discussion boards, like http://www.voy.com/58570/

Kids who are looking for others who went through their program (there are many besides Tranquility Bay) to share their experiences with, kids worried about siblings who were taken away early that morning looking for information, parents wondering if the stories are true, other parents and 'successful graduates' dismissing all the attempts at 'manipulation'.

Heartbreaking.

LoveGravy (/m12), this is not my first time reading about
Tranquility Bay. It is not a pleasant place.

I don't think these are just kids who talk too much in class, or ring doorbells and run away. I think these are the kids who people TRULY fear will kill someone if something doesn't change soon.

I'm all for giving killers big loving hugs and having them instantly change into peaceful, productive members of society. It just doesn't happen that way very often.

This camp doesn't sound all that different than jail, except that it allows the inmate to leave once they are rehabilitated, no earlier, no later. Isn't that what we WANT from jail?

Not all the kids there have done anything significant. Ever
have to deal with raising step kids? It is a lot of work,
the children don't have an established relationship with the
new parent, typically feel that the newcomer is displacing
their position, changing things for the worse, has no
authority over them, etc. etc.

Now consider this case at Tranquility Bay:

http://www.jamaicaobserver.com/magazines/t...tranquility_bay.asp

Here's a site with the court testimony:

http://fornits.com/anonanon/docs/wwasp/toc.htm

And for your last point: isn't rehabilitation what we want
from prisons?

Well, it is what I want. I suspect 'we' as a society are
less particular, since we have things like three-strikes laws
that assume rehabilitation is not possible, and since there
is great disparity in the severity of punishments for similar
but slightly different crimes. (Cf drug possesion by drug
type.)

Then there is also the question of how rehabilitation is
achieved.

I'm a follower of Foucault in the belief that how we treat
our prisoners tells the world what we think of the soul.
I recommend Discipline and Punish: The Birth of the Prison
by Foucault for further reading.

Edited by author 07-03-2003 02:56 PM
Yeah, some asshat parent will ship off their kids for putting empty milk containers back into the fridge, but I'd like to think they are the minority.

If, as a parent, the choice came down to either letting the kid die or spend life in prison, or send him to this place, I'd send him there.

The problem with parents, I agree, is that they don't want to take ANY responsibility for raising their kids. If the kid turns out great, it was all of their great parenting. If the kid shoots up a school, it was rock music, or video games. Kids simply aren't given the love that they would have received if a parent stayed home with them, and they are also not given the discipline either.

If a parent does a crappy job teaching their kid right from wrong, social from antisocial behaviour, etc. I don't think a program like this is such a bad idea. Is it brainwashing? You bet! Just as positive reinforcement is brainwashing, just requires more time. When the lesson is urgent and the timeframe to learn it is short, programs like this seem to work.

Anyway, I wouldn't generalize all of the parents with children in this program as being neglectful or lazy. The boy on the 20/20 show suffered brain damage, and the program used to cure him was VERY much like this, and seemed to work. The boy was about 10 years old and the parents could BARELY handle him, physically and emotionally, I cannot imagine they could have done it if the boy was 13 or older.

Sure, the place SUCKS. So does open heart surgery. Sometimes bad things lead to good results. Again, I didn't see any methods discussed that I haven't seen in hospitals and prisons. The 20/20 episode I mention was on on Monday, I think. Watch it and you'll see that the methods used to cure the boy mirror what's going on here.

The descriptions of Tranquility Bay make it clear that this is an institution that *far exceeds* the harshness of treatment and surveillance in prison, and also puts *much* less effort into rehabilitation (the educational curriculum is virtually nonexistant, and accredited teachers are not on hand), or on preparation for the real world, but rather on a creepy, Werner Erhardt-style brainwashing that is the mainstay of cults and Manchurian Candidate PoW camps.

As to the behavior of the kids, at least some of the kids in the article are apparently there because they're anorexic, or because they are afflicted with other mental illnesses, whose best-practices-for-treatment certainly do not include beatings, brainwashing, verbal abuse, and prolonged isolation and immobilization.

I don't think there's anyone among us who hasn't encountered people who were out of control, careening towards an early grave or some other terrible fate. I have an ex-girlfriend who overdosed on heroin in her early 20s and whose ashes were buried in the Mount Pleasant Cemetary when I was 23. Clearly, she had problems. Clearly, her being dead is not preferable to her being alive.

But I don't believe that third-world internment and brainwashing camps, run at a substantial profit, where the very wealthy are invited to send their children, far from the scrutiny of the US government's educational and penal regulators, present any kind of meaningful solution to this.

It's important not to paint this as either being in favor of taking a firm hand in the rearing of children engaged in self-destructive behavior or a total laissez-faire approach. My issue is with *this specific* style form of institutional disciplining, not with the *idea* of discipline.

Edited by author 07-03-2003 03:04 PM
Again, someone show me the success rate of this place compared to other programs before I give it a "Good" or "Bad" stamp.

You compare it to "Manchurian Candidate PoW camps", but that's not quite fair. If I said "They took a knife and slit his chest open, then used a metal device to split the ribs open, while the person was still alive!!!" you could easily confuse that discription between open heart surgery and some Thai torture session, but the difference, obviously, is WHY they are doing it.

If the place wasn't turning out success stories, why would parents pay for it? Wouldn't it be cheaper to send them somewhere else?

Watch a Chiropractor work sometime and tell me that many of his moves aren't exactly the same as you'd see in a torture session. Extreme? Sure. But I'm not ready to call in the special forces just yet.

If you have spoiled kids with YEARS of parents teaching them that their actions do not have consequences, how do you un-program them in a nice way? I still blame the parents for the kids being this way (for the most part).