The author provides a very good, documented exposé of a topic that receives almost no coverage in mainstream media. The government refers to these "therapeutic" programs for troubled adolescents only as "residential treatment programs". Others have referred to them as a practice of coercive persuasion and thought reform, or simply brainwashing. On rare occasions reports filter through to the media that teenagers have died in these programs. Despite this, no real study of their safety and effectiveness has been carried out. The programs have their origins in research conducted by the CIA. Need I say more?
Physical and psychological abuse is built into many of these programs by design. According to several different experts on the subject, the exhaustion and pressure that is induced by sleep deprivation, hunger, fatigue and emotional manipulation, "unfreezes" the psychological framework. Through this orchestrated crisis, a new identity is instilled by manipulating the environment and the emotions of the subject to an extreme degree until the "changed" mind of the subject has undergone "re-freezing."
