The Survivorship Ritual Abuse and Mind Control 2023 Online Conference
Survivor Conference - Saturday and Sunday May 20 - 21, 2023
Clinician's Conference - Friday May 19, 2023
Both conferences will be online.
International Speakers
Please write info@survivorship.org if you would like to get on our conference mailing list.
Conference information is at: https://survivorship.org/the-survivorship-ritual-abuse-and-mind-control-2023-online-conference/
Prices are as low as $50. Please see our conference website for more information.
Conference Speakers
Survivors may want to use caution reading this material or read it with a safe support person.
Researching Ritual Abuse and Mind Control in Art and Literature: One Art Historian’s Journey - Lynn Brunet PhD
The Effects of Social Movements on Survivor Support Systems and Survivor Recovery - Neil Brick
The History of Ritual Abuse and the Effects of Social Trends on the Therapeutic Profession - Neil Brick
How to Create a Successful Recovery Path for Disassociated Survival Skills and DID - Shelby Rising Eagle
The Enmeshment of the British False Memory Society and the British Psychological Society. - Dr. Rainer Hermann Kurz
Child Trafficking through Family Court Proceedings: A UK Case Study - Dr. Rainer Hermann Kurz
Some Evidence-Based Practice Guidelines and Standards Relevant to the Psychological Care of Extreme Abuse Survivors - Dr. Randall Noblitt
Creating Calm - Patricia Quinn
Programmed and Internal Psychological Mechanisms that Perpetuate the Cycle of Extreme Abuse - Ellen P. Lacter, Ph.D.
Lynn is an art historian, artist and survivor of Masonic ritual abuse. She fi
rst began to remember her abuse in her mid-forties but realised that she had been unknowingly making art about it for most of her career as a professional artist. In 1999, alongside her recovery, she began a PhD into Masonic themes and trauma in contemporary art. It was based on the realisation that artists can make disturbing art, often for a lifetime, without realising where it comes from. She was a lecturer in art history and theory at the time, and during the 1990s in my field there was a lot of interest in the relation between art, memory and trauma. Her talk will trace the series of case studies where she has uncovered traces of ritual abuse in the work of some key artists and writers in contemporary art and from earlier in the 20th century.
In 2017 she came across Carl Jung’s Red Book, a magnificent volume containing his disturbing mid-life fantasies along with his own exquisite paintings. She recognised at the first reading that this could be ritual abuse and in 2019 published Answer to Jung: Making Sense of the Red Book. It demonstrated that his fantasies were not entirely original but were based on abusive forms of Masonic rites practiced in Switzerland when he was a child. This talk will be accompanied by a slide show depicting examples of these artists’ work.
Lynn Brunet (PhD) is an Australian art historian, artist and survivor of Masonic ritual abuse. Her research examines the coupling of trauma and ritual in modern and contemporary Western art and literature. In particular, it traces the connection between Masonic and other fraternal initiation rites and complex trauma in the work of so-called ‘tortured’ artists and writers.
The Effects of Social Movements on Survivor Support Systems and Survivor Recovery - Neil Brick
Neil Brick will speak about the history of ritual abuse and the effects of social movements on survivors. He will present historical information regarding the literature of clinicians and researchers. He will describe the effects of social and historical movements on survivor support systems and survivor recovery.
The History of Ritual Abuse and the Effects of Social Trends on the Therapeutic Profession - Neil Brick
Neil Brick will speak about the history of child and ritual abuse and the effects of social trends on the therapeutic profession. He will present historical information regarding the literature and the practice of clinicians and researchers. He will describe the effects of social and historical movements on the clinical field and clinical practice.
Neil Brick is a survivor of ritual abuse and mind control. His work continues to educate the public about child abuse, trauma and ritual abuse crimes. His child abuse and ritual abuse newsletter S.M.A.R.T. https://ritualabuse.us has been published for over 28 years. http://neilbrick.com
How to Create a Successful Recovery Path for Disassociated Survival Skills and DID - Shelby Rising Eagle
How to create a successful path of recovery for DSS (disassociated survival skills) (DID) of Satanic/Ritual Abuse. Topics will include: Understanding our boundaries as a victim. Learning what boundaries are for healthy people. Healthy boundaries. How to recognize toxic shame vs. healthy shame. Self-Honesty guidelines. Learning to see life from different viewpoints for similar situations. Understanding memories. Learning to understand and see what happened in the past and how it affects you today. Creating your life as you want it to be. Healthy boundaries, life skills that work in a positive manner for your happiness. Never give up and always believe in yourself.
Shelby Rising Eagle was born in the SF Bay Area raised in the Mormon Church. Mother was a multi-generational Mormon; father was a convert. She reports both parents participated in satanic worship, pedophile sex ring in the church. She has done over 20 years of recovery work. She is the writer of two books – How Would You Know? & How Would You Know My Whole Story? She owns and operates a Martial Arts School and is a Master in her style of martial arts and now testing for her 6th degree black belt. She is a master gardener and loves growing vegetables and flowers. She does workshops with therapists on working with victims with DID and the recovery process. She practices meditation for centering her life and progress towards a better life. She is committed to helping to up lift others in their recovery work. She teaches that everyone that they can recover and claim their life back from extreme abuse.
The Enmeshment of the British False Memory Society and the British Psychological Society. - Dr. Rainer Hermann Kurz
This presentation builds on an article ‘The Policy Alignment of the British False Memory Society and the British Psychological Society’ published in 2022 by Dr. Ashley Conway and Professor David Pilgrim in the Journal of Trauma & Dissociation. It outlines the exemplary response of the British Psychological Society (BPS) in 1995 to the ‘Memory Wars’, subsequent ‘policy capture’ in 2008 through individuals associated with the British False Memory Society (BFMS), and the ongoing battle to restore a credible position on Memory-Based Evidence. A new BPS Task and finish group is currently working on this difficult topic and is expected to return to the ‘gold standard’ of the 1995 document. The presentation will feature examples where a Discourse of Disbelief derailed proper procedures.
Child Trafficking through Family Court Proceedings: A UK Case Study - Dr. Rainer Hermann Kurz
This presentation builds on a decade-long investigation into two index incidents that led to the transfer of parental responsibility for a toddler boy from a mother to a Local Authority, and eventually adoption by the foster carer in suspicious circumstances marred by procedural irregularities. Index Incident 1, dismissed as untrue in 2013 by a Family Court Judge in Cardiff, concerned the mother’s claim that she gave birth to a baby at age 14 that succeeded from incestuous rape by her father (in the Kingston-upon-Thames area in South-West London), and ‘disappeared’. Index Incident 2, that was also dismissed in the same judicial process, concerned a daytime sexual assault on the toddler boy in broad daylight in a Cul-de-Sac in South Wales. The presentation draws on a 60-minute audio recording describing the two index incidents and information submitted to a document review by complex trauma specialist in the process of preparing an appeal application. The content of the presentation is potentially triggering but provides rare insights into the workings of an Organized Ritual Crime Abuse Network (ORCAN) in the midst of society.
Rainer Kurz is a Chartered Psychologist based in London. Since 1990 Rainer has worked in Research & Development roles for leading test publishers. His PhD dissertation was on enhancing the validity and utility of ability testing. Rainer developed 50+ psychometric tests and authored more than 100 publications. He is a Consultant Editor for Test Reviews at the Psychometric Testing Centre (PTC) of the BPS. Rainer has been investigating complex trauma assessment problems since 2012. He presented 30+ posters on trauma, dissociation and healing at international peer-reviewed conferences that are available here: https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Rainer_Kurz2
Some Evidence-Based Practice Guidelines and Standards Relevant to the Psychological Care of Extreme Abuse Survivors - Dr. Randall Noblitt
We will review the APA’s (2021) Professional Practice Guidelines for Evidence-Based Psychological Practice in Health Care, and discuss its relevance to the care of extreme abuse survivors. We will also critically examine Clinical Practice Guideline for the Treatment of Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) in Adults (APA, 2017) and the ISSTD (2011) Guidelines for Treating Dissociative Identity Disorder in Adults, Third Revision. Included will be discussion of the roles of common factors and empirically supported treatments in implementing guidelines and standards.
Randy Noblitt is a professor of Clinical Psychology at Alliant International University, Los Angeles and a licensed psychologist in Texas. He has evaluated and treated extreme abuse survivors clinically since 1979. He has authored three editions of the book Cult and Ritual Abuse with Pam Noblitt (1995, 2000, 2014). Together they also edited Ritual Abuse in the 21st Century (2008) and they have authored a recent book, Navigating Social Security Disability Programs: A Handbook for Clinicians and Advocates (2020).
Creating Calm - Patricia Quinn
Art making is a form of expression available to all, though many have felt discouraged to continue to enjoy it. It’s sensory and motor aspects engage the reward system of the brain (Kaimal et al 2017). Using art materials can help modulate the survival-oriented mid-brain with the higher cortex which we use to plan, and contextualize experience (Lusebrink 2004; Lusebrink & Hinz 2019). We can use various art materials to bring ourselves into the present and to help focus us on what we want. Using a future-oriented directive to attain a feeling of stability and peace, along with a brief lead in describing stabilizing elements of nature, participants will learn a way to use art for restoring the nervous system.
Patricia Quinn is an artist and art therapist who worked in the fields of psychiatry and addiction for 30-plus years. She’s taught graduate and undergraduate students in art therapy since 1994, and has recently published “Art Therapy in the Treatment of Addiction and Trauma” (Jessica Kingsley Publ., 2021). She has served for the past ten years on the committees and boards of several large mental health agencies that provide addiction, mental health, and developmental disabilities services. She strives to promote awareness of the effects of ritual abuse and complex trauma.
Programmed and Internal Psychological Mechanisms that Perpetuate the Cycle of Extreme Abuse - Ellen P. Lacter, Ph.D.
This presentation will examine the psychological mechanisms that perpetuate the cycle of extreme child abuse, including ritualistic abuse, torture-based mind control, production of sadistic child abuse materials, and sex-trafficking of young children to multiple perpetrators. We will explore many of the ways that the cycle of extreme abuse can be perpetuated: 1) within victims, as in ongoing abuse, abuse re-victimization, psychological suffering, self-injury, suicidality, harmful relationships, re-enactments of psychological, physical, and sexual abuse, etc., and sometimes, 2) by victims, in abuse against others, including abuse of one’s children (intergenerational transmission).
Two mechanisms by which extreme abuse is perpetuated will be presented: 1) externally-applied, calculated, manipulation of victims’ dissociated self-states to control victims long-term to serve abuser agendas, i.e., mind control programming, and, 2) naturally-occurring internal responses that yield long-term psychological symptoms, suffering, and, in some case, harm to others. Finally, we will discuss broad approaches to treatment to break the cycle of extreme abuse.
Ellen P. Lacter, Ph.D., is a California licensed Clinical Psychologist and Registered Play Therapist and Supervisor. She is Academic Coordinator of the Play Therapy Certificate program at University of California - San Diego, Division of Extended Studies. She worked in community mental health settings from 1975 to 1984, and in private practice thereafter. In the mid-1990s, she acquired expertise in the treatment of dissociative disorders and extreme abuse, particularly victims of ritualistic abuse, torture-based mind control, child sex-trafficking, and production of sadistic child abuse materials. She is an activist on behalf of survivors of extreme abuse, based in her website: www.endritualabuse.org.
Survivorship is one of the oldest and most respected organizations supporting survivors of extreme child abuse, including sadistic sexual abuse, ritualistic abuse, mind control, and torture.
Survivorship provides resources, healing, and community for survivors; training and education for professionals who help survivors; and support for survivors’ partners and other allies. The organization helps survivors who may be isolated emotionally or geographically. Through community outreach and training, Survivorship also raises awareness about these difficult issues.
Thursday, April 20, 2023
The Survivorship Ritual Abuse and Mind Control 2023 Online Conference
Woman Reveals How She Escaped A Cult
'If You Talk, You Die': Woman Reveals How She Escaped A Cult By Sophie Lloyd On 4/9/23
https://www.newsweek.com/meet-woman-escaped-cult-cheryl-rainfield-1783011 /meet-woman-escaped-cult-cheryl-rainfield-1783011
describes abuse
....Cheryl Rainfield was 17 when she ran away from home. Born into several multi-generational cults that included elements of Nazism, satanism and the KKK, the award-winning author of Scars uses her books to help others dealing with trauma, torture and abuse.
....What makes me want to be here is my books, and helping other people," Rainfield told Newsweek. "I want things to change. I want other survivors to know they're not alone."
Although only the most sensational stories make the news, Bethany Burum—Lecturer on Psychology and Human Evolutionary Biology at Harvard University—said cults are "more common" than people think.
Burum said a wide range of belief systems fall under the term "cult," from religious zealots to "sex cults."
The tactics may vary, but Burum said that cults exert the same patterns of control, isolation and abuse to keep members in line.
"Cult leaders make it very difficult to leave," she told Newsweek. "Some members might fear violent retaliation. They might track them down and try to bring them back."
Even if a member physically manages to escape, years of mind control can make it difficult for survivors to adapt.
Some continue to believe the cult's messages, while others struggle with intense trauma. This is especially true for victims such as Rainfield, who were born into a cult rather than inducted.
"I think many people fail to realize the power and extent of the influence tactics that cult leaders use," Burum said. "I imagine that this could make it quite difficult for cult members to be believed."
'If You Talk, You Die'
The cult Rainfield grew up in had many overlapping belief systems, such as white supremacy, antisemitism, homophobia and misogyny, and used threats, mind control techniques, rape, torture and murder to keep victims in line.
The abuse was broken down into categories. There was formal abuse, which involved rituals, torture and specific ceremonies, and the ongoing, daily abuse designed to reinforce the cult's "messages."
Rainfield describes these as mind control techniques, designed to maintain the cult's hold over its victims and ensure they didn't reach out for help.
"Things like, 'if you talk, you die,'" she said. "They teach this in so many ways."
Rainfield recalls a traumatic memory as a young child, in which she was tricked into believing the cult had inserted a bomb into her chest.
"They take you in [to a fake operating room], they freeze you with drugs, and the people are wearing scrubs," she said.
"They put you on a [gurney], they show you a scalpel and they cut down the chest and there's blood. It's fake blood, but it looks real to a kid, and there's pain.
‘And they say 'look, we're putting this little tiny bomb in you, and this will go off if you talk.'"
Cult members told the children that if they reported the abuse, they would "blow up." She was also taught that the cult could hear her at all times, which they "demonstrated" with a test of her loyalty.
They put Rainfield in a room with a "nice, friendly" adult who would ask questions about her well-being. If she talked about the abuse, the cult would take her away and repeat everything she'd said "word for word."
"Then I would know they could hear me. There would then be torture because I had talked," she said. "Now I can see through it, but as a kid I thought they were all-powerful."
Since the cult members regularly tortured and killed both animals and people, Rainfield had cause to believe her life was in danger.
Many of the perpetrators were born into the cult, including Rainfield's parents, and were abused themselves.
Rainfield refused to hurt others. She agreed to participate only after being physically forced to, or made to watch other victims be hurt. Sadly, most fellow victims grew up to become cult abusers, continuing the cycle.
"Some child victims chose to hurt others the way the cult wanted them to, which meant they were abused less themselves," she said. "Many cult abusers got pleasure from inflicting pain and abuse on their victims, but they were also tortured and had mind control used on them as children."
Despite the environment she was raised in, Rainfield doesn't understand why her abusers—or anyone—would enjoy inflicting pain on others.
"When I was about 5 or 6 and being raped and tortured on an altar, I made the conscious choice that I would never be like them. I chose to be the opposite of them," she said....
Still, escaping wasn't easy, and it would take years for Rainfield to fully break away from her parents and the cult.I've written a book that is the closest to my experience as a cult torture survivor and of having DID as a direct result of cult torture that my agent has on submission. I'm hoping that it will sell because it doesn't sensationalize cult abuse and did the way so many movies and TV shows and books do. DID is a creative, intelligent way of coping - not just coping but surviving horrendous torture and abuse that the child could not have survived otherwise. I'm so grateful that I could split, that I could break off parts of myself who could handle each of the torture events that I couldn't handle, that helped me stay alive, that helped me keep going, and compartmentalize the things I needed to to keep on living.
Everywhere Rainfield went, her family ensured there was a cult member nearby to watch her, and there were teachers who were involved with the cult at her school.
"My parents had to know where I was all the time," she said. "But to other people, it just seemed as though they were overprotective."
Her parents wouldn't allow her to participate in most extracurricular activities, engage with pop culture or enjoy hobbies like other kids. As cell phones weren't mainstream at the time, she also had no way to ask for help without being caught.
Rainfield showed signs of the trauma physically and emotionally. She was shy, introverted and scared. Loud noises, and even being touched unexpectedly would terrify her, which made her a target for bullies.
Despite the horrific abuse Rainfield endured, the cult and its behavior went under the radar for her entire childhood. From the outside, Rainfield, her parents and her brother looked like a normal—albeit conservative—Canadian family.
Her parents' relationship was an arranged marriage, decided by senior leaders in the cult.
They had friends both inside and outside of the cult, and her mother volunteered at Rainfield's school, made cookies for the bake sale and sang in the church choir. Her father taught Sunday School and was part of the local neighborhood watch.
"That's a huge part of how they continue," she said. "They are very skilled at masking socially."
Her mother and father would act like doting parents whenever Rainfield's teachers would express concerns about her introverted behavior, but when she wrote a story about a child rape victim, a worried teacher called Child Protective Services.
The detective she met was sensitive and kind, and kept asking questions, but understandably, Rainfield was too scared to talk, knowing the punishment that would face her if she did.
Once she turned 17, Rainfield ran away from home. She started working with a therapist who believed her story, and she was diagnosed with Dissociative Identity Disorder (DID).
Although she couldn't have survived the abuse without dissociating, she would initially forget that the group knew where she lived and was continuing to abuse her.
"I've worked hard in therapy to have co-conscious DID, where every part of me is aware of each other [and] to not lose time," she said. "It's a huge part of what helped me get safe."....
"I want to help more people to realize that it happens, that there are so many people hurting," she said. "The more survivors hear about other survivors, they realize that maybe they can get safe and heal too."
Monday, February 20, 2023
The Survivorship Ritual Abuse and Mind Control 2023 Online Conference - May 19 - 21, 2023
The Survivorship Ritual Abuse and Mind Control 2023 Online Conference
Survivor Conference - Saturday and Sunday May 20 - 21, 2023
Clinician's Conference - Friday May 19, 2023
Both conferences will be online.
Please write info@survivorship.org if you would like to get on our conference mailing list.
Conference information is at: https://survivorship.org/the-survivorship-ritual-abuse-and-mind-control-2023-online-conference/
Special Low Prices are available until March 1, 2023.
Prices are as low as $50. Please see our conference website for more information.
Conference Speakers
Survivors may want to use caution reading this material or read it with a safe support person.
Researching Ritual Abuse and Mind Control in Art and Literature: One Art Historian’s Journey - Lynn Brunet PhD
The Effects of Social Movements on Survivor Support Systems and Survivor Recovery - Neil Brick
The History of Ritual Abuse and the Effects of Social Trends on the Therapeutic Profession - Neil Brick
How to Create a Successful Recovery Path for Disassociated Survival Skills and DID - Shelby Rising Eagle
The Enmeshment of the British False Memory Society and the British Psychological Society. - Dr. Rainer Hermann Kurz
Child Trafficking through Family Court Proceedings: A UK Case Study - Dr. Rainer Hermann Kurz
Some Evidence-Based Practice Guidelines and Standards Relevant to the Psychological Care of Extreme Abuse Survivors - Dr. Randall Noblitt
Lynn is an art historian, artist and survivor of Masonic ritual abuse. She first began to remember her abuse in her mid-forties but realised that she had been unknowingly making art about it for most of her career as a professional artist. In 1999, alongside her recovery, she began a PhD into Masonic themes and trauma in contemporary art. It was based on the realisation that artists can make disturbing art, often for a lifetime, without realising where it comes from. She was a lecturer in art history and theory at the time, and during the 1990s in my field there was a lot of interest in the relation between art, memory and trauma. Her talk will trace the series of case studies where she has uncovered traces of ritual abuse in the work of some key artists and writers in contemporary art and from earlier in the 20th century. In 2017 she came across Carl Jung’s Red Book, a magnificent volume containing his disturbing mid-life fantasies along with his own exquisite paintings. She recognised at the first reading that this could be ritual abuse and in 2019 published Answer to Jung: Making Sense of the Red Book. It demonstrated that his fantasies were not entirely original but were based on abusive forms of Masonic rites practiced in Switzerland when he was a child. This talk will be accompanied by a slide show depicting examples of these artists’ work.
Lynn Brunet (PhD) is an Australian art historian, artist and survivor of Masonic ritual abuse. Her research examines the coupling of trauma and ritual in modern and contemporary Western art and literature. In particular, it traces the connection between Masonic and other fraternal initiation rites and complex trauma in the work of so-called ‘tortured’ artists and writers.
The Effects of Social Movements on Survivor Support Systems and Survivor Recovery - Neil Brick
Neil Brick will speak about the history of ritual abuse and the effects of social movements on survivors. He will present historical information regarding the literature of clinicians and researchers. He will describe the effects of social and historical movements on survivor support systems and survivor recovery.
The History of Ritual Abuse and the Effects of Social Trends on the Therapeutic Profession - Neil Brick
Neil Brick will speak about the history of child and ritual abuse and the effects of social trends on the therapeutic profession. He will present historical information regarding the literature and the practice of clinicians and researchers. He will describe the effects of social and historical movements on the clinical field and clinical practice.
Neil Brick is a survivor of ritual abuse and mind control. His work continues to educate the public about child abuse, trauma and ritual abuse crimes. His child abuse and ritual abuse newsletter S.M.A.R.T. https://ritualabuse.us has been published for over 28 years. http://neilbrick.com
How to Create a Successful Recovery Path for Disassociated Survival Skills and DID - Shelby Rising Eagle
How to create a successful path of recovery for DSS (disassociated survival skills) (DID) of Satanic/Ritual Abuse. Topics will include: Understanding our boundaries as a victim. Learning what boundaries are for healthy people. Healthy boundaries. How to recognize toxic shame vs. healthy shame. Self-Honesty guidelines. Learning to see life from different viewpoints for similar situations. Understanding memories. Learning to understand and see what happened in the past and how it affects you today. Creating your life as you want it to be. Healthy boundaries, life skills that work in a positive manner for your happiness. Never give up and always believe in yourself.
Shelby Rising Eagle was born in the SF Bay Area raised in the Mormon Church. Mother was a multi-generational Mormon; father was a convert. She reports both parents participated in satanic worship, pedophile sex ring in the church. She has done over 20 years of recovery work. She is the writer of two books – How Would You Know? & How Would You Know My Whole Story? She owns and operates a Martial Arts School and is a Master in her style of martial arts and now testing for her 6th degree black belt. She is a master gardener and loves growing vegetables and flowers. She does workshops with therapists on working with victims with DID and the recovery process. She practices meditation for centering her life and progress towards a better life. She is committed to helping to up lift others in their recovery work. She teaches that everyone that they can recover and claim their life back from extreme abuse.
The Enmeshment of the British False Memory Society and the British Psychological Society. - Dr. Rainer Hermann Kurz
This presentation builds on an article ‘The Policy Alignment of the British False Memory Society and the British Psychological Society’ published in 2022 by Dr. Ashley Conway and Professor David Pilgrim in the Journal of Trauma & Dissociation. It outlines the exemplary response of the British Psychological Society (BPS) in 1995 to the ‘Memory Wars’, subsequent ‘policy capture’ in 2008 through individuals associated with the British False Memory Society (BFMS), and the ongoing battle to restore a credible position on Memory-Based Evidence. A new BPS Task and finish group is currently working on this difficult topic and is expected to return to the ‘gold standard’ of the 1995 document. The presentation will feature examples where a Discourse of Disbelief derailed proper procedures.
Child Trafficking through Family Court Proceedings: A UK Case Study - Dr. Rainer Hermann Kurz
This presentation builds on a decade-long investigation into two index incidents that led to the transfer of parental responsibility for a toddler boy from a mother to a Local Authority, and eventually adoption by the foster carer in suspicious circumstances marred by procedural irregularities. Index Incident 1, dismissed as untrue in 2013 by a Family Court Judge in Cardiff, concerned the mother’s claim that she gave birth to a baby at age 14 that succeeded from incestuous rape by her father (in the Kingston-upon-Thames area in South-West London), and ‘disappeared’. Index Incident 2, that was also dismissed in the same judicial process, concerned a daytime sexual assault on the toddler boy in broad daylight in a Cul-de-Sac in South Wales. The presentation draws on a 60-minute audio recording describing the two index incidents and information submitted to a document review by complex trauma specialist in the process of preparing an appeal application. The content of the presentation is potentially triggering but provides rare insights into the workings of an Organized Ritual Crime Abuse Network (ORCAN) in the midst of society.
Rainer Kurz is a Chartered Psychologist based in London. Since 1990 Rainer has worked in Research & Development roles for leading test publishers. His PhD dissertation was on enhancing the validity and utility of ability testing. Rainer developed 50+ psychometric tests and authored more than 100 publications. He is a Consultant Editor for Test Reviews at the Psychometric Testing Centre (PTC) of the BPS. Rainer has been investigating complex trauma assessment problems since 2012. He presented 30+ posters on trauma, dissociation and healing at international peer-reviewed conferences that are available here: https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Rainer_Kurz2
Some Evidence-Based Practice Guidelines and Standards Relevant to the Psychological Care of Extreme Abuse Survivors - Dr. Randall Noblitt
We will review the APA’s (2021) Professional Practice Guidelines for Evidence-Based Psychological Practice in Health Care, and discuss its relevance to the care of extreme abuse survivors. We will also critically examine Clinical Practice Guideline for the Treatment of Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) in Adults (APA, 2017) and the ISSTD (2011) Guidelines for Treating Dissociative Identity Disorder in Adults, Third Revision. Included will be discussion of the roles of common factors and empirically supported treatments in implementing guidelines and standards.
Randy Noblitt is a professor of Clinical Psychology at Alliant International University, Los Angeles and a licensed psychologist in Texas. He has evaluated and treated extreme abuse survivors clinically since 1979. He has authored three editions of the book Cult and Ritual Abuse with Pam Noblitt (1995, 2000, 2014). Together they also edited Ritual Abuse in the 21st Century (2008) and they have authored a recent book, Navigating Social Security Disability Programs: A Handbook for Clinicians and Advocates (2020).
Monday, January 30, 2023
Daniella grew up in The Family, then joined the army — where she experienced toxic control, again
The Conversation / By Martine Kropkowski Thu 26 Jan 2023
Daniella Mestyanek Young's first day of military training, she stands among her fellow recruits holding a duffle bag high in one arm above her head.
As she ponders the other bodies lined up in her peripheral vision, all struggling to maintain the same pose, it gradually occurs to her that this feeling — of being owned, coerced, programmed — seems unsettlingly familiar: "Have I just joined another cult?"
This sense of suspicion forms a pattern in Mestyanek Young's life, which she documents with remarkable insight in her memoir, Uncultured, exploring the systems of control in which toxicity can thrive.
Mestyanek Young was born into religious cult the Children of God, also known as The Family. (Not to be confused with Anne Hamilton Byrne's Australian-based cult, also known as The Family.)
Mestyanek Young spent her childhood shuffled from compound to compound in Brazil, Mexico and the United States. At 15, she fled what she would come to recognise as a cult, made her way to Texas and put herself through school and college, eventually graduating as valedictorian and joining the US army, where she served as an intelligence officer.
Daniella Mestyanek Young explores the systems of control in which toxicity can thrive, from within a cult and then the US army.
But this book is not simply a survival story. It's an exposé of the abuse that can run unchecked within cults. It's a story about trauma, a war memoir, a meditation on the difference between culture and cults. And it's a searing indictment of groups that continue to view those who are not men as subservient to those who are.
But at its core, Uncultured is a book about groups. It asks readers to look closely at the power mechanisms at work within the communities we call our own
The Children of God
Mestyanek Young describes her childhood as a third-generation cult member (one of the "children of the children of the Children of God") in chilling detail — but also striking detachment. The cult, also known as The Family, is infamous for its widespread and systematic abuse, especially of children.
The hierarchy cited the proverb, "Spare the rod, spoil the child", to justify its exploitative treatment of children. It subjected children to routine beatings and demanded they remain perpetually available to satiate the sexual impulses of the cult's adults. Mestyanek Young's father was 49 years old when she was born; her mother was only 15.
Even as a young child programmed from birth, Mestyanek Young intuited that something about her world was deeply wrong. At just six years old, already questioning the legitimacy of the Bible, Mestyanek Young was locked in a room and repeatedly raped and beaten by one of the cult's men, a distinguished "uncle".
Despite the cult's coercion tactics, however, Mestyanek Young was able to observe its inner workings from an unusually critical perspective, haunted by a sense that "even though I was the one getting punished, somewhere deep inside I suspected the wrong thing wasn't me".... https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-01-27/daniella-cult-the-family-joined-the-army-toxic-control/101895164
Thursday, December 22, 2022
Amirault case - Gov. Baker withdraws pardon request for siblings convicted in daycare sex abuse case
Bob Ward
December 14, 2022
Amirault’s accusers reveal their faces, and their pain Boston Herald – Boston, Mass. – Peter Gelzinis – Aug 7, 2001
http://web.archive.org/web/20020305205020/http://www2.bostonherald.com/news/local_regional/swif02202002.htm
Monday, December 19, 2022
Harvey Weinstein is convicted of 3 of 7 charges, including rape, in his Los Angeles sexual assault trial
Mon December 19, 2022
Disgraced movie mogul Harvey Weinstein was found guilty Monday of rape and sexual assault against one of four women he was accused of assaulting in Los Angeles – a significant conviction in the second trial of a man at the center of allegations that fueled the global #MeToo movement.
Weinstein, who prosecutors said used his Hollywood influence to lure women into private meetings and assault them, was found guilty of three of seven charges against him.
After weeks of emotional testimony and 10 days of deliberations, jurors in Los Angeles also acquitted Weinstein of one count of sexual battery by restraint against a massage therapist in a hotel room in 2010. They were a hung jury on one count of sexual battery by restraint, one count of forcible oral copulation and one count of rape related to two other women – including Jennifer Siebel Newsom, a filmmaker and first partner to California Gov. Gavin Newsom.
The three charges Weinstein was convicted of – rape, sexual penetration by foreign object and forcible oral copulation – were all tied to one of his accusers, a model and actress who testified the movie mogul assaulted her in a Beverly Hills hotel room in February 2013.
The woman, identified as Jane Doe 1 in court, was the first to testify in the trial.
“Harvey Weinstein forever destroyed a part of me that night in 2013. I will never get that back. The criminal trial was brutal. Weinstein’s lawyers put me through hell on the witness stand. But I knew I had to see this through the end, and I did… I hope Harvey Weinstein never sees the outside of a prison cell during his lifetime,” Jane Doe 1 said in a statement released through her attorney.
Weinstein had pleaded not guilty to all seven charges against him.
“Harvey is obviously disappointed, however hopefully because with this particular accuser there are good ground to appeal based on time and location of alleged events,” Weinstein’s spokesperson Juda Engelmayer said in a statement. “He is grateful the jury took their time to deliberate on the other counts and he is prepared to continue fighting for his innocence.”
Weinstein faces a possible sentence of 24 years in prison for the Los Angeles conviction, according to the Los Angeles District Attorney’s Office. The once-powerful film producer is already serving a 23-year sentence for a 2020 New York rape conviction.
Jurors will return to court Tuesday to consider aggravating factors to help determine the outcome of Weinstein’s sentencing hearing, according to the DA’s office.
Elizabeth Fegan, an attorney representing Siebel Newsom, who was identified in court as Jane Doe 4, said they were disappointed that the jury could not reach a unanimous verdict on the charges related to her client.
“My client, Jane Doe 4, shared her story not with an expectation to testify but to support all the survivors who bravely came forward. While we are heartened that the jury found Weinstein guilty on some of the counts, we are disappointed that the jury could not reach a unanimous verdict on Jane Doe 4. She will continue to fight for all women and all survivors of abuse against a system that permits the victim to be shamed and re-traumatized in the name of justice,” Fegan said in a statement to CNN....