By Professor Rod Janzen
Chuck Dederich--a former Alcoholics nameless member who coined the word "Today is the 1st day of the remainder of your life"--established Synanon as an cutting edge drug rehabilitation middle close to the Santa Monica seashore in 1958. Synanon developed speedy into an experimental commune and "religion" that attracted hundreds of thousands of nonaddict contributors and used to be strongly devoted to social justice and innovative schooling. Over 25,000 humans have been contributors of Synanon at a number of instances, together with jazz musicians Charlie Haden and Stan Kenton; supporters of the crowd integrated Senator Thomas Dodd, comic Steve Allen, and psychologist Abraham Maslow. In its later years, notwithstanding, the gang grew to become fascinated about hugely publicized violent actions--including placing a rattlesnake within the mailbox of a Los Angeles-area attorney--making the group's identify synonymous with paranoid cults.Based on huge basic assets and interviews with former individuals, the increase and Fall of Synanon explores how the establishment advanced within the context of yankee social, political, and financial traits. Historian Rod Janzen argues that the group's downfall resulted from participants giving an excessive amount of strength to Synanon's charismatic founder and a small staff of top-level affiliates. Media recognition excited by the group's cultlike actions, neglecting the community's major successes in drug rehabilitation and social integration. Janzen's in-depth research of Synanon serves as a desirable case research of ways substitute societies can switch through the years and the way the final public's reactions to such societies can shift from tolerance to stances of worry and lively competition.
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Extra resources for The Rise and Fall of Synanon: A California Utopia
Sample text
The word by-pass described the way in which self-actualized individuals transcended existing ways of belief and action. ” Maslow’s “Eupsychian” utopia required a selected subculture made up of “self-actualizing people and their families . . ”25 Synanon wanted to become that people. The by-pass enjoinder to let the wizard “come out” was not easy for everyone to comprehend. The board members Reid Kimball and Jack Hurst gamed the founder at one meeting about their “uncomfortableness” with this idea, sharing feelings of personal inadequacy.
The cold-turkey debilitation, a central part of coming off drugs, was usually completed in two to three days. Sitting or lying in public areas, newcomers writhed in painful agony on the “kicking couch,” where they were given food and water, backrubs, a bucket to vomit in, and round-the-clock emotional support. Addicts were not congratulated upon expiation of their physical symptoms. Instead they were given work assignments, from housekeeping to auto repair, in order to promote the development of social responsibility.
An old-timer remembered Wilt Chamberlain playing volleyball with residents at the Santa Monica house. 55 Dodd was so impressed after visiting the commune that he arranged for members to testify before his Senate Subcommittee on Juvenile Delinquency. A number of ethnically mixed ex-addicts told their stories in the Old Senate Office Building. Other politicians took an interest in Synanon as well. The former California governor, now Oakland mayor, Jerry Brown remembered accompanying his father, Goveror Pat Brown, on a visit to the Santa Monica house in the mid-1960s.
