# American 'trouble' teens kidnapped and taken to detention camp in Jamaica **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [July 8, 2003, 11:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-trouble-teens-kidnapped-and-taken-to-detention-camp-in-jamaica/186976 "2003-07-08T11:55:05Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![MC\_Master\_of\_Ceremonies](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/bb73d2/32.png) [@MC\_Master\_of\_Ceremonies](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MC_Master_of_Ceremonies)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2003, 11:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-trouble-teens-kidnapped-and-taken-to-detention-camp-in-jamaica/186976/1 "2003-07-08T11:55:05Z")
> [@](#): > > When most children first arrive they find it difficult to believe that they have no alternative but to submit. In shock, frightened and angry, many simply refuse to obey. This is when they discover the alternative. Guards take them (if necessary by force) to a small bare room and make them (again by force if necessary) lie flat on their face, arms by their sides, on the tiled floor. Watched by a guard, they must remain lying face down, forbidden to speak or move a muscle except for 10 minutes every hour, when they may sit up and stretch before resuming the position. Modest meals are brought to them, and at night they sleep on the floor of the corridor outside under electric light and the gaze of a guard. At dawn they resume the position. > > This is known officially as being ‘in OP’ - Observation Placement - and more casually as ‘lying on your face’. Any level student can be sent to OP, and it automatically demotes them to level 1 and zero points. Every 24 hours, students in OP are reviewed by staff, and only sincere and unconditional contrition will earn their release. If they are unrepentant? ‘Well, they get another 24 hours.’ > > One boy told me he’d spent six months in OP. > > I didn’t think this could be true, but it transpired this was not even exceptional. ‘Oh no,’ says Kay. ‘The record is actually held by a female.’ On and off, she spent 18 months lying on her face. > **[The last resort (part one)](https://www.theguardian.com/education/2003/jun/29/schools.uk1)** > > When you have a teenager on the rampage, who are you going to turn to? In America, parents send their troubled offspring to Jamaica's Tranquility Bay - a 'behaviour-modification centre' which charges $40,000 a year to 'cure' them. Decca Aitkenhead,... :eek: For fucksake what kind of parent would do this to their children??? The head of the camp sounds like a right nasty piece of work and what’s more he has absolutely no professional training, before he got involved with the organisation he was a pissing petrol pump attendant. I’d like to know if the parents who do this could be prosecuted under US law and if it’s ilegal under Jamaican law. ---
**Author:** ![Evil\_Captor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/f17d59/32.png) [@Evil\_Captor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Evil_Captor)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2003, 12:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-trouble-teens-kidnapped-and-taken-to-detention-camp-in-jamaica/186976/2 "2003-07-08T12:39:47Z")
A lot of Internet sexual bondage fantasies pretty much parallel the Tranquillity Bay experience, except that OP would definitely involve being tied down. I suspect that the program’s treatments come more from the twisted mind of its originators than from any real consideration of the needs of the inmates … er, students. (The fact that the students aren’t allowed to masturbate is a dead giveaway in this regard.) I’m sure the program works … what they are doing is systematically breaking the wills of the students via torture (which is what OP is) confinement and relentless indoctrination. (The family self-criticism events sound like they came directly from the Red Chinese. All in all, a very sick situation. ---
**Author:** ![MC\_Master\_of\_Ceremonies](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/bb73d2/32.png) [@MC\_Master\_of\_Ceremonies](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MC_Master_of_Ceremonies)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2003, 12:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-trouble-teens-kidnapped-and-taken-to-detention-camp-in-jamaica/186976/3 "2003-07-08T12:56:27Z")
It reminds me of something out of the Ipcress Files. ---
**Author:** ![Gorgon\_Heap](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/f475e1/32.png) [@Gorgon\_Heap](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gorgon_Heap)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2003, 1:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-trouble-teens-kidnapped-and-taken-to-detention-camp-in-jamaica/186976/4 "2003-07-08T13:06:55Z")
Oh. My. God. I really think I’m going to throw up. This is maybe the single most awful thing I have ever read. Nazi Germany was pretty sick, but the Jews and Poles didn’t send their own kids to the camps. I am so utterly sickened I am at a loss for words. ---
**Author:** ![Aspidistra](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aspidistra/32/3894_2.png) [@Aspidistra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aspidistra)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2003, 1:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-trouble-teens-kidnapped-and-taken-to-detention-camp-in-jamaica/186976/5 "2003-07-08T13:37:45Z")
Have a look in [GD](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?threadid=194757) for more on this ---
**Author:** ![vibrotronica](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/a9a28c/32.png) [@vibrotronica](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/vibrotronica)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2003, 4:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-trouble-teens-kidnapped-and-taken-to-detention-camp-in-jamaica/186976/6 "2003-07-08T16:56:54Z")
I’ve been lurking in the GD thread and thinking about what I would do were I sent to the camp. I think I would say or do anything it took to get sent back home. Then, at the first opportunity, I would run away and never have any contact with my parents again. ---
**Author:** ![Blalron](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/35a633/32.png) [@Blalron](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blalron)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2003, 7:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-trouble-teens-kidnapped-and-taken-to-detention-camp-in-jamaica/186976/7 "2003-07-08T19:49:28Z")
If they were holding me down like that, I’d shit my pants so they’d have to either let me go, or they’d tolerate the smell while I get a nasty case of diaper rash. ---
**Author:** ![msmith537](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d9b06d/32.png) [@msmith537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/msmith537)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2003, 9:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-trouble-teens-kidnapped-and-taken-to-detention-camp-in-jamaica/186976/8 "2003-07-08T21:49:44Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Blalron \* > If they were holding me down like that, I’d shit my pants so they’d have to either let me go, or they’d tolerate the smell while I get a nasty case of diaper rash. \*\* Weren’t you the same person who sent their kid to a similar camp in this thread: [http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?threadid=194757&perpage=50&pagenumber=1](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?threadid=194757&perpage=50&pagenumber=1) I think it’s naive to send a child to a camp that magically turns :mad: into 🙂 without expecting a little :eek:. I don’t get “boot camp” concept anyway. Why would I want to send my unruly kid to a camp that will IMPROVE HIS PHYSICAL CONDITION AND MAKE HIM RESISTANT TO PAIN AND TORTURE? I would think that it would be better to send him to lazy fat camp so he turns into a big pathetic veal and becomes too weak to resist and too fat and unattractive to party and hang out with the “cool” crowd. > [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by vibrotronica \* > I’ve been lurking in the GD thread and thinking about what I would do were I sent to the camp. I think I would say or do anything it took to get sent back home. Then, at the first opportunity, I would run away and never have any contact with my parents again. Oh…I think I might be able to have contact with my parents a few more times…MUHAHAH! MUHAHAHAHA! MUWWAHAAAHAAHAAAA!!!.._whew_ and so on and so forth… ---
**Author:** ![kung\_fu\_lola](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/f4b2a3/32.png) [@kung\_fu\_lola](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kung_fu_lola)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2003, 9:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-trouble-teens-kidnapped-and-taken-to-detention-camp-in-jamaica/186976/9 "2003-07-08T21:49:52Z")
I’m with **vibrotronica**. Any parent who would allow their child to get to the point that they would supposedly “need” this kind of treatment, has been grossly negligent. It’s parents’ job to socialize their kids, and in order to justify this kind of treatment, they would have had to have ignored them for quite a while at the beginning of their lives. ---
**Author:** ![Guinastasia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guinastasia/32/5751_2.png) [@Guinastasia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guinastasia)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2003, 10:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-trouble-teens-kidnapped-and-taken-to-detention-camp-in-jamaica/186976/10 "2003-07-08T22:16:27Z")
**msmith537** =that would be **BMalion** , not **Blalron**. ---
**Author:** ![Sofa\_King](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/58956e/32.png) [@Sofa\_King](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sofa_King)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2003, 11:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-trouble-teens-kidnapped-and-taken-to-detention-camp-in-jamaica/186976/11 "2003-07-08T23:13:17Z")
I’ll just point out something I’ve mentioned many times in the past. When I was a kid I ran with a pretty ill-behaved crowd. Just as I got into high school it became fashionable for parents to ship off their kids to rehab programs at the first sign of drug or alcohol abuse. My parents were going to do the same to me. This is a personal observation, but it’s one so striking that I hope some of you parents out there will consider it: _all_ of my friends who were sent off to those programs are in worse shape today than I am. They have less lucrative and less interesting jobs; they have problems with authority; they tend to drink more; for some reason, nearly all of them dabble in the use of cocaine–none of them did before they got shipped out. Some of them devolved into serious drug abuse and criminal activity and I’ve lost contact with them. _Every female I know_ who went through those programs was sexually molested while in the program. From the horror stories we heard from our scarred friends who came back, we knew how terrible those programs were while we were still kids. I will never regret running away from home the day I learned that my parents had the same thing in store for me–I honestly think it allowed me to become the reasonably happy person I am today. Those kids who went were just the same as I was, and the same as my other friends who have gotten over their rebellious adolescence and moved on to better things. They are not the same today, and they’re not the better for their experience. I’m warning you because I’ve seen it first hand. ---
**Author:** ![Blalron](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/35a633/32.png) [@Blalron](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blalron)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2003, 11:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-trouble-teens-kidnapped-and-taken-to-detention-camp-in-jamaica/186976/12 "2003-07-08T23:24:26Z")
I think I’ll write to my congressmen about this. How could it possibly be legal to ship your kids against their will overseas to inhuman “behavior modification centers”? If it is legal, something needs to be changed. ---
**Author:** ![Ben](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/df788c/32.png) [@Ben](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ben)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2003, 1:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-trouble-teens-kidnapped-and-taken-to-detention-camp-in-jamaica/186976/13 "2003-07-09T01:20:36Z")
So, _now_ can I complain about how scary our culture is becoming? ---
**Author:** ![Ben](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/df788c/32.png) [@Ben](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ben)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2003, 1:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-trouble-teens-kidnapped-and-taken-to-detention-camp-in-jamaica/186976/14 "2003-07-09T01:34:32Z")
BTW, Sofa King, I really want to thank you for sharing that with us. “Fix-your-teen” programs have been a long topic of interest for me, even though my parents never considered putting me in one. (But I’m always interested in movies like “Disturbing Behavior” and all those John Saul books, which I promise you I only listened to on book-on-tape because I had to do a long drive…) Having heard about them tangentially and seen the metaphorical version in fiction, it’s good to know what the real ones are like. ---
**Author:** ![Evil\_Captor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/f17d59/32.png) [@Evil\_Captor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Evil_Captor)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2003, 2:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-trouble-teens-kidnapped-and-taken-to-detention-camp-in-jamaica/186976/15 "2003-07-09T02:56:21Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Sofa King \* > **_Every female I know_ who went through those programs was sexually molested while in the program.** Not surprising at all. In fact, I’m surprised that there haven’t been more allegations along these lines. When you make people so vulnerable, it attracts predators, and it brings out the predator in people who didn’t start out that way. If has been claimed, the inmates at Tranquillity Bay are never alone by themselves or with a single staff member supervisiong them, they may be relatively safe from molestation. But if they’re left alone or with just one guard, as in the OP maybe, then they’re vulnerable to predation. ---
**Author:** ![kaylasdad99](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kaylasdad99/32/3398_2.png) [@kaylasdad99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kaylasdad99)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2003, 7:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-trouble-teens-kidnapped-and-taken-to-detention-camp-in-jamaica/186976/16 "2003-07-09T07:14:46Z")
Couple of points I found wanting in the story: What medical services are immediately available? They don’t mention whether there is a staff physician. The article was reticent on the subject of racial/ethnic diversity among the, uhh, _student body_. Might not have been any. What about their relgious diversity (if any)? And what religious practices are the “sudents” permitted to observe/retain? I’d kind of like to see a cite on the California court case that is said to have deemed it a parent’s right to enroll his/her child in such a program. That shrink didn’t come off as being especially independent. The _Guardian_ readers who discussed the story didn’t seem to have paid much attention to the points above. So I went to the WWASP web site to have a look around. Their FAQ’s don’t mention any of it (big surprise, huh?). Thought I’d check out their BBS to see if the parents discuss these questions among themselves. Uh-uh. You have to have a kid enrolled with them to even lurk. Not a big deal, I _suppose_, but I was kind of creeped out by the whole sense of “you must commit yourself irrevocably to our dark deeds before we can allow you to know us more fully.” In fact, having read that _Guardian_ article, and _then_ tried to penetrate some of WWASP’s mysteries, the whole site creeped me out. I think I’ll go surf for some free pornography to clean out my brain. ---
**Author:** ![Ms2001](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ms2001/32/18463_2.png) [@Ms2001](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ms2001)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2003, 7:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-trouble-teens-kidnapped-and-taken-to-detention-camp-in-jamaica/186976/17 "2003-07-09T07:49:05Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by kaylasdad99 \* > **What medical services are immediately available? They don’t mention whether there is a staff physician.** According to [Nick Violante](http://fornits.com/anonanon/docs/wwasp/violante/) and some other former inmates, the staff nurses are incompetent. Mr. Violante had a tumor on his face, but he wasn’t allowed to see a dermatologist for weeks–by which time it had grown worse and worse, thanks to the nurse’s constant “advice” that it was a zit and he should pop it. There are other accounts at that site of severe acne and a scabies outbreak going untreated. ---
**Author:** ![MC\_Master\_of\_Ceremonies](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/bb73d2/32.png) [@MC\_Master\_of\_Ceremonies](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MC_Master_of_Ceremonies)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2003, 9:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-trouble-teens-kidnapped-and-taken-to-detention-camp-in-jamaica/186976/18 "2003-07-09T09:58:50Z")
Actually **kaylasdad** , a slight nitpick the article is in the _Observer_ not the _Guardian_ which is owned by the same newsgroup but has a different staff (though there is some cross over). The Guardian appears Mon-Sat and the Observer is published on Sundays only. ---
**Author:** ![Lynn\_Bodoni](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e47c2d/32.png) [@Lynn\_Bodoni](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lynn_Bodoni)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2003, 10:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-trouble-teens-kidnapped-and-taken-to-detention-camp-in-jamaica/186976/19 "2003-07-09T10:22:32Z")
I did a little Googling last night, and what I read scared me. I read the official Tranquility Bay site, and I read what some of the former victims had to say about it. Apparently, the staff at TB are untrained and incompetent _at best_. The staff knew that the parents would not approve of many aspects of their program, and covered them up. For instance, according to one former inmate, when parents visited a child in this place, the parents and child were served food from a nearby hotel or restaurant (can’t remember which) rather than the usual student fare. There are simply too many details like this, the staff KNOWS that they are not providing the service that the parents thought they were getting. Whether a behavior modification camp is appropriate for any child is not what I’m going to discuss here. Perhaps I’ll talk about it in the GD thread. But if only a small portion of the reports of the former inmates of these camps is true, there is no possible way that the episode was a positive influence on the teens’ lives. I don’t know which horrifies me more, the physical danger the kids were in, or the mental abuse that they suffered. ---
**Author:** ![Tansu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/67e7ee/32.png) [@Tansu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tansu)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2003, 10:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-trouble-teens-kidnapped-and-taken-to-detention-camp-in-jamaica/186976/20 "2003-07-09T10:37:30Z")
I don’t have the words to express how bad this is. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-trouble-teens-kidnapped-and-taken-to-detention-camp-in-jamaica/186976.md?page=2)