| (May Newsletter 2003 - page 3) * Medical experiments and procedures without their consent * Involuntary sterilization of women * Punitive shock treatments * Frontal lobotomies The state apologizes for their behavior, which greatly diminished their ability and willingness to accept their fellow citizens (civilly committed persons) for their own unique qualities. The state also claims that institutional care for persons with developmental disabilities has been scientifically demonstrated to be detrimental to people’s basic development, including social development, development of self-determination, and the development of the basic skills of daily living. Citizens For Reform certainly hopes that the state also recognizes that the institutional care of sex offenders is detrimental to their basic development, since they have been confined for 10+ years without anyone being released. Many of the above-mentioned abuses in the ambiguous H.F. 812 apology continue to exist within the MSOP, which confuses members of Citizens For Reform. How can the state apologize for their abusive actions while it continues to abuse another class of persons (sex offenders) in many similar ways if not more refined ways? Residents of the MSOP continue to suffer the following: * Experimental treatment (i.e. breathing in ammonia) * Aversive treatment * Isolation * Breaking of familial bonds * Being considered deviant individuals * Being considered subhumans Many of the abuses within the MSOP are more refined today (psychological abuse perpetrated in a number ways). The treatment residents receive at the MSOP are strikingly similar to that described by Dr. Edgar Schien’s book, The Torture Cure: In Some American Prisons it is Already 1984, Jessica Mitford; Harper's, August 1973. Dr. Schien describes techniques, such as coercive mani-pulation and psychological isolation of prisoners, as being implemented through such practices as the fraying or outright destruction of social bonds and their emotional support structure these bonds support. The practice described above includes relationships between prisoners/patients on the inside, as well as their family members and friends on the outside. The reasoning for this torture is linked to a powerful coercive mechanism related to the varying degrees that we ALL perceive our existence as human beings from what is reflected back to us by those living beings we come into contact with. The goal is also accomplished through isolation and other forms of sensory deprivation, psycho-logical disorientation, and pervasive surveillance - all of which have a significantly negative affect on the human psyche by reducing the sensory feedback, which is vital to one's well being. The MSOP uses this as a weapon to induce "cracks" in a resident’s mental defense system. These mental "cracks" can then be filled with the MSOP's treatment schemata to their choosing. Some resident’s have been put in complete isolation and deprived of almost all sensory stimulation. In many cases, every effort has been made to weaken the residents’ internal defenses and heighten their susceptibility to the influences of treatment. If residents participating in the Phase program respond to treatment by abandoning their attitude of individuality, they are granted privileges in the form of increased work hours, privilege cards, increased visiting hours, and numerous other privileges. However, if residents do not respond to what treatment staff consider to be treatment or behavioral expectations of a particular Phase level, their psychological torture continues by being deprived of the very limited privileges they have "earned" or been granted by their being docile and uncritical. Other forms of sensory deprivation can be seen in the meting out of punishment for an institutional rule or policy violation, which for the most part, are infantile and degrading. (Ex: 30-60 days work deprivation for putting ones timecard in the wrong box.) Keep in mind that patients' ages range from approximately 21 years of age to 70+. Ed Schein and co-editor Irving Weschler also wrote that Sensitivity Training methods "fit into a context of institutional influence procedures, which includes coercive persuasion in the form of thought reform or brainwashing, as well as a multitude of less coercive, informal patterns." (Note: Many of the practices within the MSOP are strikingly similar to the methods described here as well.) It was defined as a three-stage process involving "unfreezing," "changing" and "refreezing". 1. "Unfreezing" physically removes the person from his accustomed routines, sources of infor-mation, and social relationships, then undermines the normal social support structures, humiliates the individual so that he sees his old self as unworthy and supposedly motivates him to change. The process was later compared to those methods employed by the Chinese Communists in their attempt to inculcate Communist attitudes into their youth or prisoners. 2. "Changing" was defined as directing the person towards learning new attitudes, quite often through coercion. 3. "Refreezing" was defined as "…the integration of the changed attitudes into the rest of the personality..." In reality, Sensitivity Training is invalidation of the individual through the refuting, denying, degrading or discrediting of anything he considers to be a fact or a certainty -- for example, a principle of moral conduct. The inevitable disorientation that follows is then used to force another person's or group's point of view or set of values onto the individual. In practice, it destroys individualism, moral judgment and personal responsibility. |
| * Aversive treatments * Isolation * Breaking of familial bonds * Considered as subhuman organisms * Considered as deviant individuals |
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