The Troubled Teen Industry (TTI) A live panel discussion with TTI survivors

Each year, the guardianship of thousands of vulnerable youth are signed over to private and for-profit residential programs that lack state and federal oversight. This means that these programs can be established fairly spontaneously and are not required to report what goes on within the facility to the state or federal government.

These programs may label themselves as wilderness, therapeutic, boot camp, or religious programs, and are collectively known as the “troubled teen industry” (tti). The TTI operates out of sight and out of mind, typically in remote locations away from public scrutiny. It is a multi-billion dollar industry that exploits vulnerable youth & their families for profit.

Thousands of cases of abuse and neglect have been reported in the media over the last 40 years. During this time, young people in the TTI have experienced human rights violations, abuse and injustices. These include but are not limited to:

• Seclusion & Restraint: Including seclusion, restraint, isolation, solitary confinement & strict restriction of communication with the outside world including contact with family, mandated reporters, lawyers and advocates. • Unethical & abusive force of Transporting ( kidnaping) young people. • Abuse of Religious Exemptions: Including physical abuse, emotional abuse, racist verbal abuse, neglect, medical neglect, and death • Conversion therapy harmful therapeutic to change another individual’s sexual orientation, gender identity, or gender expression. • Human Rights Violations: Including sleep deprivation, food deprivation, forced feeding, restrictions on marriage based on race, lack of freedom of religion, exploitation of labor and exploitation of traumatic experiences.

During this event we will talk to several survivors of the trouble teen industry and learn why change is necessary to protect our children and youth.

“Conversion therapy harmful therapeutic to change another individual’s sexual orientation, gender identity, or gender expression.”

Other than that the author struggles with English, Conversion Therapy is a legit avenue to exit Gender Dysphoria, therefore it is vehemently opposed by the alphabet soup cabal, because they NEED to have their peculiar psychoses affirmed, and CT doesn’t do that, so they MUST regard it as “harmful,” and progressives (and assistant Democrats) fall right in line in agreement.

As well, what is up with the complaint about interracial marriage being restricted at some of these places? Troubled teens got ZERO business anyplace within a hundred miles of getting married, anyway. EVERY kinda marriage oughta be verboten at these places. Now, I’m not a fan, but I do know there are still a few muddle-headed fringe “christian” sects that cast a jaundiced eye upon interracial marriages. Some of God’s retarded children, but the topic shouldn’t be on the table AT ALL in this context; these youth have got more immediate problems to resolve.

Corporal punishment — meh. It’s a storied debate and I won’t dive in, but it’s a moot point past about 10 years of age anyway. Anybody thinking there are any benefits for adolescent’s down this avenue — that’s a failure.

I’ve no doubt some places in this business are horrid; every service has aspects that invite abuse, but to tar an entire — I mean there must be hundreds of places all over the country and they’ve all now gotta be broadbrushed with this? Is there another video by the same group highlighting a place or places that are “doing it right”? THAT would strike some balance and lend credibility to the contention that they’re about fixing these things so the kids are well-served.

The video — mixed bag. Agree some, disagree some. There’s elements that are clearly abusive — the whole midnight transport intervention thing is ghastly. This whole “home for troubled youth” idea — I just don’t know how you pull that off with more than 1-3 kids at a time without the kids feeling like livestock. Kids in trouble need more positive, individual interaction socializing and working on meaningful things with grounded, well-adjusted adults, and that’s not happening being just another number at some “home” out in the boonies where the “directors” are just farming the foster care compensation system.

I’ve listened to a lot of these stories and one thing that really bothers me is how many of the parents check up on their kids after they are placed into these programs. I’ve heard over and over that on a “Parents day” hardly any if any parents would show up to see their kids. What parent does this? You put your child in a treatment center, in another state and don’t even go visit?

Truth be told it’s more ain’t shit parents than the kids or the facilities.

I think that strikes to the heart of the matter.

Parents can’t take 100% of the blame; peer groups and the ingenuity of kids enables plenty that parents are completely at a loss to control without doing something drastic like relocating the entire family to someplace like Tarawa.

But near-total parental disengagement... one must wonder how long that was going on before things really went south.

My own kids have pushed me to limits where I faced the impulse to just pitch in the towel, but I hung in there, and things are turning out fairly alright; nobody’s on drugs, nobody’s in jail, nobody’s an alcoholic, they’re all pointing their noses toward carving out lives of meaning and personal success. We just kept doing things together through thick and thin. It was lots harder than I thought it would be, and it’s not the vision I had at the beginning, but we haven’t gone to Davey Jones locker.

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