Interested in Hell Camp? You Should Read Up on Synanon
AKA the cult that spawned the troubled teen industry
A few weeks ago a friend texted and asked if I was watching Hell Camp, the Netflix documentary focusing on the Challenger Foundation, a Utah wilderness therapy program founded in 1988 by Steve Cartisano, which claimed to reform rebellious children by teaching them survival skills*. I haven’t watched the documentary but having been through wilderness survival therapy am familiar with the tactics, because the way most troubled teen facilities treat their charges can be traced back to the drug rehabilitation program Synanon.
Synanon was this residential treatment facility for heroin addicts founded in 1958 by a former alcoholic named Chuck Dederich, a concept which, from the outset, sounds sketch AF. In Synanon, addicts lived under a rigid hierarchy. Members were isolated from the public, had their movements restricted, and were forced to take part in rigid physical training. They were severely punished for not complying with the group.
I first read about Synanon in Maia Szalavitz’s Help At Any Cost: How the Troubled Teen Industry Cons Parents and Hurts Kids, but during the 70s, Synanon was profiled in Life and Time, was lauded on TV and was the subject of a movie, and even made an appearance in Joan Didion's essay The White Album.
Dederich discovered that one of the most effective ways of ensuring compliance from members was to have them talk about themselves in group therapy sessions. These were called "the game." During the game other members verbally humiliated each other, confronting each other about their character defects, a process founder Chuck Dederich (who was connected to many troubled teen facilities, including CEDU) later admitted was brainwashing. Syanon operated under the principle of making love and freedom contingent upon good behavior, a concept now known as tough love.
Law enforcement officials and politicians visited the program, seeking to replicate its methods. Before Synanon was exposed for having only a 10% success rate, before it was reported that many of its adherents had taken their own lives, hundreds of copycat programs were established. To this day, many residential teen treatment facilities base their methodology upon Synanon's principles. Buyer beware.
The above image was from this Mother Jones article by Maia Szalavitz on Synanon.
(Spoiler alert: The Challenger Foundation was shut down in 1994 due to allegations of extreme abuse and the death of one of its charges, but Cartisano followed the industry playbook and went on to establish other facilities under a different name).
Recommendations:
Watching: I thought Poor Things was hysterical! I’m also loving Donald Glover and Maya Erskine in Mr. and Mrs. Smith.
Reading: Loving Anna Gazmarian’s Devout, which is now available for pre-order. Also enjoying How to Live: Or a Life of Montaigne in One Question and Twenty Attempts at an Answer. Currently finishing an interview with Ijeoma Oluo for Electric Literature about Be a Revolution.
Listening: I really love Erika Wennerstrom’s (Heartless Bastards) album Sweet Unknown. Everyone should listen to Be Good To Yourself. Honestly though, kind of in a musical rut, and would appreciate any suggestions:)