#Susan blake from santa monica ca movie
#Susan blake from santa monica ca full

Newcomers were first interviewed by Synanon leadership to gain entrance into the community. Practices Įntrance into the Synanon community required a strong initial commitment.

#Susan blake from santa monica ca movie

Robert Altman hired members of Synanon to be extras for the gambling scenes in his movie California Split. The film director George Lucas needed a large group of people with shaved heads for the filming of his movie THX 1138 and hired some of his extras from Synanon. Men were given forced vasectomies, and a few pregnant women were forced to have abortions. īeginning in the mid-1970s, women in Synanon were required to shave their heads, and married couples were made to break up and take new partners. The 'Game' was presented as a therapeutic tool, and likened to a form of group therapy but it has been criticized as a form of a ' social control', in which members humiliated one another and encouraged the exposure of one another's innermost weaknesses. Ĭontrol over members occurred through the 'Game'. He later founded AREBA, the oldest surviving private addiction treatment centre in the United States, as well as Daytop Village, one of the world's largest therapeutic communities. visited in 1962, lived there in 1963 and wrote a book about his experiences. The New York psychiatrist Daniel Casriel M.D. Professionals, even those without drug addictions, were invited to join Synanon. Outsiders were permitted to attend the 'Synanon Game' there as well.Ĭhildren were reared communally in the Synanon School.

Later on, Synanon acquired a large building that had been the home of the Athens Athletic Club, in Oakland, California, and then transformed it into a residential facility for Synanon's members. In 1967, Synanon purchased the Club Casa del Mar, a large beachside hotel in Santa Monica, as its headquarters and a dormitory for those undergoing treatment for drug addiction. In 1959, Synanon moved from their small storefront to an abandoned armory on the beach. This became a successful enterprise that for a time generated roughly $10 million per year. The Synanon organization also developed a business that sold promotional items.

The program was based on testimony of fellow group members about their tribulations and urges of relapsing, and their journeys to recovery.

#Susan blake from santa monica ca full

Synanon began as a two-year residential program, but Dederich soon concluded that its members could never graduate, because a full recovery was impossible. The origins of the name 'Synanon' are not entirely clear, with some claiming it to be the result of a group member slurring the words 'symposium' and 'seminar' and others simply describing it as a portmanteau of 'symposium' and 'anonymous.' He was said to have coined the phrase 'today is the first day of the rest of your life.” After his small group, called 'Tender Loving Care', gained a significant following, Dederich incorporated the organization into the Synanon Foundation in 1958. Dederich, after taking LSD, decided to create his own program to respond to their needs. At the time of Synanon's founding, those suffering from drug addiction were not always welcomed into AA because their issues were considered significantly different from those of alcoholics. Synanon was founded in 1958 by Charles Dederich Sr., a member of Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) from Santa Monica, California.

However, an offshoot of the group remains active in Germany.

The group ultimately became a cult called the Church of Synanon in the 1970s.ĭescribed as one of the 'most dangerous and violent cults America had ever seen', Synanon disbanded in 1991 after several members were convicted of offenses including financial misdeeds, evidence tampering, terrorism and attempted murder. Originally established as a drug rehabilitation program, Synanon developed into an alternative community centered on group truth-telling sessions that came to be known as the 'Synanon Game,' a form of attack therapy. in Santa Monica, California, United States. Synanon, originally known as Tender Loving Care, was a new religious movement founded in 1958 by Charles E.