March 27, 2005

63 Days. In the 80’s, "boot camps" for troubled teens became the new treatment dejour for parents at their wits end. However, after numerous allegations of severe abuse, untrained staff and several deaths, these camps came under much scrutiny. Steve Cartisano ran the most notorious of these camps, called Challenger Foundation. Alli was 15 when she was kidnapped from her bed and taken to Challenger. 63 Days is the story-in-progress about her brutal experiences there, her subsequent escape and the aftermath.
posted by kimdog 19 years ago
  • Oh my god. What a story.
  • That is a deeply distressing tale.
  • Wow. Variants on the whole teen behavior camp/prison story pop up a lot on the Internet, but for some reason I'm riveted and horrified every time. Thanks for the link.
  • This is going to take a while to read properly. / settles in to relax. Thanks.
  • I think this is the first Monkeyfilter post that has made me feel sick.
  • I'm not even reading this. That kind of shit makes me physically ill.
  • These boot camp stories are always so hard to read. I remember something linked on MeFi - can't get to it now, jrun run run yahoo - about how they're still going on, but in other countries like Mexico where they're not as regulated.
  • I'm still trying to get through these links. These stories are too awful. How could you agree to have your kid, no matter how messed up, forcibly transported without any prior knowledge to one of these places?
  • Stories like these mess with my pacifism. Is it wrong of me to want to get a few people together and remove Mr. Cartisano for a little rugged camp treatment of our own?
  • kimdog, what a collection of links. These stories will haunt me for a long time.
  • Rorschach: I'll go along for the fun. Can I be called Horsehair? Pleeze. Pleeze!
  • Creepy and oh-so-compelling. Has this been made into a movie yet, complete with revenge-fantasy ending? It should be. btw: dejour -> du jour
  • The comments on the blog mention possible book and movie deals.
  • I guess you could say Holes was the movie. But then, I thought it was farfetched that a camp like that could exist without government supervision, just another product of Louis Sachar's imagination. This is so damned sad. I'm going to be fascinated with these stories for a long time.
  • Hi, Miss A! ps - nunc scio tenebris lux.