title: Therapy Gone Mad: The True Story Of Hundreds Of Patients And A Generation Betrayed
author:  Carol Mithers 
description: Calling psychology a "perfect window to a country's soul," freelance journalist Mithers documents the little-known but sorry story of Feeling Therapy, a psychotherapeutic movement whose original aim, following Arthur Janov's Primal Scream theories, was to deal with complaints of "numbness." Feeling Therapy was an outgrowth of the human potential movement that swept the nation in the early 1970s, and its charismatic leaders, Joe Hart and Riggs Corriere, built their success on the proposition that people had become estranged from their real selves. Their cure was to strip away layers of socialization and defenses, until patients were as unintellectual and "open" as children. The techniques they used--brutal, nasty and protracted--relied on amateur therapists to inflict feelings of worthlessness on the mainly young patients who moved into the Center in L.A., becoming part of a new "family." When the Center closed in 1980 amid multiple lawsuits, the judges in the cases ruled that the plaintiffs (who realized some $7 million in judgments) had been the victims of an abusive cult, whose leaders were motivated by greed and the quest for personal power. Hart was stripped of his license to practice psychology; Corriere turned to corporate counseling. Mithers had access to diaries, letters and court papers and interviewed many of the patients, who give graphic accounts of their treatments. As the documentation of a seemingly benign movement gone awry, this expose is engrossing. <BR>Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.
zlib_text: Dedicated to “the next generation”- my nieces Jordan Teresa, Taylor Stephanie,
  and Madison Sophia
  
  
  The first time any man’s freedom is trodden on, we’re all damaged.
  
  
  \- Captain Jean-Luc Picard, “The Drumhead”
  
  
  Rights! Rights! I’m sick to death of hearing about rights!
  
  
  \- Commander Bruce Maddox, “The Measure of a Man”
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ## CHAPTER 1
  
  
  “I hate you, Counselor.”
  
  
  Deanna Troi betrayed no outward reaction to this vitriolic outburst. It was,
  after all, part of her job, allowing herself to be the focus of her patients’
  unguarded emotional releases, and then to help them recognize and redirect
  them in healthier ways.
  
  
  She had to admit, though, it was still jarring to hear such blunt invective
  from this particular patient. “Data, I know you don’t really mean that,” she
  told him in a quiet, soothing tone.
  
  
  Data’s expression almost instantly shifted from anger to regret. “You are
  correct; I do not.” He turned his head and looked up directly at her. “You are
  one of my dearest friends