Just discovered this! From ex pupil of Girls school

Discussion of the children's schools in the UK.
Shout
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Postby Shout » Tue Feb 08, 2005 3:59 pm

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Last edited by Shout on Wed Nov 22, 2006 8:44 pm, edited 2 times in total.

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adrasteia
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Postby adrasteia » Tue Feb 08, 2005 5:21 pm

Matthew wrote:Really Adrasteia? Are you sure about that? How would you define 'good' in this context? And 'good' for who?
The cult?......or for their unsuspecting prey perhaps?


I suppose they would have said 'for the good of all'.
So as the rest, a lofy ideal, but empty and corrupted.
They have certainly not reached their aim. This website alone demonstrates that, but there is a lot more evidence.
But these people will support their belief with religious zeal- as this is as important as one to them. I am finding that harder to put down than I think I would should their purpose be malicious.

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Postby StVSurvivor » Tue Feb 08, 2005 6:00 pm

adrasteia wrote:I am finding that harder to put down than I think I would should their purpose be malicious.


Is it really relevant whether or not they are overtly malicious?

How about: insidious, sly, perverted, dark, non-transparent, irrational, out of touch with PLANET REALITY, etc etc etc ?

(Personally, I have reached the conclusion that MacLaren was touched by evil, and this influence inevitably filtered down through the hierarchical ranks) But isn't the most important point that the SES cult have inflicted lasting damage on hundreds, if not thousands of innocent and unsuspecting children and families over the last 40 years?

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adrasteia
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Postby adrasteia » Tue Feb 08, 2005 6:01 pm

Shout wrote:adrasteia - Who the fuck are you?
Despite seeming to have been to St.James and have some knowledge of how SES works I can detect no distress in your postings; they are consistently inflected with a light-heartedness which is quite innappropriate, and now are becoming apologist.

I always attempt to remain 'calm' -for want of a better word- when I post. I think I understand the seriousness of the situation, and have never tried to be light-hearted in inappropriate situations.

Shout wrote:
I don't think you have a mature understanding of how cults and religions operate and the dimension of their influence, as evidenced again in your postings which often address quite irrelevant details.
'Good intentions' are also quite irrelevant.
All cults and religions are concerned with:
1/ Unreality
2/ Pathological self-perpetuation
They are hard to get to grips with because in an unreal system, logically you won't find a real motivation.

My posts always have relevance in my view, although this is obviously not the case for other posters.
I would also agree with any doubts about the range of my knowledge.

Shout wrote:SES have stolen years from the lives of hundreds of people; they fucked me, they fucked my brothers and sisters, and they fucked my parents, but YOU are not going to hear my story.

They have also fucked around with people I know.

shonarose
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Hmm.

Postby shonarose » Tue Feb 08, 2005 9:15 pm

Shout and a different guest,

I am a bit disturbed by some of the recent stuff on the subject of the girls school ? most of which seems to have been written by men, generally along the lines of how deeply brainwashed all the girls were and how this made them into a generation of automatons.

This wasnt any more the case that it was in the boys school - if it were, then why didn?t we all join the SES straight from school?

According to a different guest ?..it would explain why so few girls are here, the method of indoctrination being so thorough that they are still in the grips of the SES. ?

Er, no it doesn?t explain anything of the kind! Don?t go overboard with the conspiracy theories. Perhaps some girls choose to deal with an unhappy childhood by distancing themselves/moving on, don?t want to revisit that time in their life, are not interested in redress, or find this forum too public and aggressive. Perhaps their bad experiences are more general and not so easy to describe in terms of a specific incident. Perhaps they just spend less time surfing the net!

Shout?s posts in particular (in common with Matt Stollar?s posts), seem to reveal a strong misogynist attitude thinly disguised as outrage at the SES? treatment of women.

e.g. ?The girls have no independent ability and so drift into unreal & contrived marriages? or ?Their personalities are so repressed ??? that they really are unable to strike out on their own.?

?The girls are kept separate from the boys from infancy. This (again unnatural) situation works both to weaken both boys and girls ability as people to be strong and individual, and also by not giving opportunity for the girls to discover anything contradicting their indoctrination?

What exactly is being implied here ? that a girl?s only hope for salvation from indoctrination would be to have some kindly boy show her the light? Are boys the only ones who have a natural spark of independence and can think for themselves? - is this just clumsily phrased, or not a million miles away from the SES?s own attitude?

This, interspersed with some very very offensive comments about ?tight cunts? and being ?eager to suck some 'Prep Group' cock?, which could be interpreted as being motivated by the sexual jealousy of a teenager who saw all the girls he fancied preferring older men (a not-unknown phenomenon at that age!) ?? indicate to me that the girls are not the only ones who may be still suffering the effects of a sexist upbringing.

However angry you feel, you need to think twice before you post like this, particularly when you pontificate about something which is actually outside your own sphere of personal experience (i.e. women/girls experience of the school) ? otherwise you risk further alienating those that you are hoping to encourage to come forward.

I also think that your attack on adrasteia is quite vicious. How dare you criticize her for not sounding ?distressed? enough? God forbid that we should all wish that on each other! And why is it that when someone disagrees with you, you fall back on the old (SES!) tactic of patronizingly dismissing this as a ?lack of understanding???

To remove the need for you to ask ?who the fuck are you?? I attended the girls school from 1976-1988.

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Postby a different guest » Tue Feb 08, 2005 10:03 pm

Perhaps some girls choose to deal with an unhappy childhood by distancing themselves/moving on, don?t want to revisit that time in their life, are not interested in redress, or find this forum too public and aggressive. Perhaps their bad experiences are more general and not so easy to describe in terms of a specific incident. Perhaps they just spend less time surfing the net!


Being female myself i would beg to differ. MOST women choose to deal with their problems by sharing them - particularly sharing them with people who have had similar issues. And yes women also do this on the net - widely and publicly. You only have to look at the HUGE number of women specific BB's where women from all over the world get together to share their problems and their pain - and maybe also a few giggles along the way.

but yes - I DO suspect that the bad experiences of students from the girls school are "not so easy to describe".

As for adrestia's post - I do find them odd. Not sure if she is "for" or "against" the SES or just a fence sitter.

Shout - bit tricky to meet up - I'm in Oz. :)

shonarose
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ADG, I am not dissing the sorority!

Postby shonarose » Tue Feb 08, 2005 10:50 pm

I don't mean to say that in general women are less likely to share their problems, I am pointing out that there are many possible alternative reasons why people (of either sex) might not have posted here - reasons which have nothhing to do with successful indoctrination.....

However, it IS a constantly recurring theme both here and on the 'unofficial' yahoo site for St V/J alumni, how keen we all were to distance ourselves, to move on and not to dwell on the events of that time - to the extent of losing touch with our friends and blocking out many memories. The effect of the school experience was to isolate us (particularly when in the 6th form there was a division between those who joined SES & those who didnt). We are not people who share or confide in others easily.

And I am not suggesting that women use the net less than men (although given the statistics about 90% of all net use being searches for porn I think this might be true) but by the time I had left St James I had never touched a computer. They had a couple in the boys school of course, but they were not considered necessary for us! So you see, perhaps we are less likely than the general population to stumble across a site like this....

S.

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Postby a different guest » Tue Feb 08, 2005 11:12 pm

The effect of the school experience was to isolate us...We are not people who share or confide in others easily.


alas another example of the damage the SES schools have inflicted on their students.

and yes, your more detailed explaination is also good reason why so few women from the girls school have posted here.

Can you tell us of your experiences shona?

Call me a bit gender biased - but as horrified as I have been by the boys accounts, it has been of particular interest to me how the girls faired. Perhaps partly sparked by the lack of posts by students from the girls school, but also sparked by becoming increasingly aware of the SES's antique beleifs about women and their role.

and for those new to the board I will explain again why a woman in Au is on these boards. Just briefly I have some relatives who are deeply emeshed in the SES here (and here it is the SOP). Their children go to an SOP school. I became more and more concerned about their involvement in the group - so I stumbled upon this site in my search for info about the SES.

I have been reading and participating on this board for many months now and am deeply concerned and moved by the posts I have seen here.
Last edited by a different guest on Fri Feb 18, 2005 12:10 am, edited 1 time in total.

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Re: ADG, I am not dissing the sorority!

Postby Daffy » Tue Feb 08, 2005 11:35 pm

shonarose wrote:by the time I had left St James I had never touched a computer. They had a couple in the boys school of course, but they were not considered necessary for us!

Actually, although you are correct in saying that the boys' school had some computers, they weren't considered necessary for the boys either. We were in fact discouraged from using them, despite there being several available for use at our building in Eccleston Square.

I remember a conversation with Debenham at the time I was trying to choose from the vast array of 6th form subjects on offer. (Is there an "I'm taking the piss" smiley I can use here?) I pointed out to him that we had several computers already, and two teachers who were proficient in computer programming (Desmond Mottram and an American whose name I forget). Mr Mottram appeared willing to teach us computer science if there was a demand.

I still recall the sneering expression on Debenham's face as he rejected my suggestion with the words, "I prefer to stick to the more traditional subjects". By which he meant, of course, Latin, Greek, Ancient History and the like. All fantastically relevant to the late twentieth century information economy.

BTW, this was ten years before the WWW became a consumer reality - it certainly wasn't to protect us from porn and outside influences! His only motivation appears to have been a desire to stay in his warped Victorian values model of education.

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Postby a different guest » Tue Feb 08, 2005 11:52 pm

and just on the (slightly off topic) subject of curriculum - I've mentioned before the glaring exception from the St James schools of Geography. Gee, along with english maths and history it is a CORE subject - but the SES schools DON'T offer Geography!

The "excuse" is, apparently, because the school is so small. But given that geography is the study of the world around us, including the peole in it and their beleifs, could it be more to do with the SES wanting to limit students exposure to other ideas as much as they can?

I note the primary school here studies australian history, but ONLY the history of white settlement. No mention of 40,000 years of still living culture that proceeded white settlement.

shonarose
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reply to ADG

Postby shonarose » Wed Feb 09, 2005 1:00 am

I think the isolation was probably one of the worst things. There were many occasions when talking amongst ourselves was forbidden. Don?t forget that most of us had no friends outside of the school. Many ex-pupils here have said that when they were singled out by the teachers it was particularly distressing that no one amongst their friends was able to stand up for them. But this was the nature of the system ? you concentrated on surviving day-to-day and were just happy when the spotlight was temporarily on someone else.

I think that children in particular are damaged by injustice ? firm discipline in schools is to be welcomed, but not when this is arbitrarily and irrationally applied (there was no way to know what the rules were, they weren?t written down and often seemed to be made up to suit the ?crime?), so certain pupils would be unlucky and be victimised whilst others got away with much more. I think partly this was due to panic on the part of the teachers, most of whom were not trained ? the only qualification in those days for teaching was that you were a member of the SES.

Yes, the sexism was vile, insidious, unfair, archaic, and so on. It damaged us by limiting the choices, expectations and breadth of our education at St James, but there is no reason that we would automatically take on these beliefs to a greater extent than we did any of the other SES dictates. It did NOT damage us by turning us into brainless dollies. We were not brainwashed into believing this stuff. As with the rest of the ?philosophy?, we were perfectly capable of forming conclusions about its veracity based on our own experience.

However I?m sure these ideas would have been quite seductive and credible for the boys in their teenage years (with their limited contact with the opposite sex) ? especially since they were encouraged to think of themselves as having ?dominion? over women. Some of them have said that they still have trouble relating to women all these years later.

Frankly, girls (who can see the evidence of equality within themselves) are far less susceptible to these ideas than boys.

So its not true to imply that the girls at St James were just waiting to take their place as submissive wives, or that such an upbringing would necessarily leave us feeling inferior to men. But did the boys grow up thinking that women are liars and need to be controlled etc, etc? Then this is an injustice that was done to them more than to us.

In fact I think that realising the pronouncements on the ?woman?s role? were so blatantly wrong probably led us to further question the rest of the ?philosophy? (in private and amongst ourselves, of course). None of us became convinced that all women should wear long dresses in order to avoid the moral degeneration of society. Or that a woman?s intellectual ability and personal worth is less than that of a man.

And, I do not believe that those of the girls/boys who joined the SES were brainwashed into doing so.

I think it was a calculated choice - one which allowed them to continue being close to their friends and family and provided them with a ready made social system, a guaranteed place and status within it, a direction in life, possibly a job as well. It was a path that they chose to take (the easy option, in a way - abnegating responsibility for thinking too deeply or making their own way in life) ? I don?t for a moment think that it was because they had undergone a sudden conversion. And I?m sure that over time they were able to develop the necessary self-delusion to make peace with their decision.

The very fact that (in my class) it was only those few girls whose families were thoroughly SES-entrenched who joined in the end indicates that for the rest of us the SES recruiting/brainwashing methods just weren?t effective!

S.

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Postby Goblinboy » Wed Feb 09, 2005 1:56 am

Adrasteia's approach lends credibilty to this board.

Adrasteia has always struck me as relatively impartial and consistently attempting to bring some evidence-based objectivity to her views. Her analysis of the apparent terms of the enquiry was excellent. She brings what appears to be valuable experience with the St James' environment, excellent analytical skills and a very diplomatic approach. I'd suggest reviewing her posts to better understand where she's coming from and the value she contributes.



adrasteia wrote:
Shout wrote:adrasteia - Who the fuck are you?
...

I always attempt to remain 'calm' -for want of a better word- when I post. I think I understand the seriousness of the situation, and have never tried to be light-hearted in inappropriate situations.

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Postby a different guest » Wed Feb 09, 2005 2:31 am

shona - thanks for sharing your experiences and insights. And at least in your year the girls (amongst themselves) further questioned SES beleifs. But this does seem different from TS's experience where she now says she doubts any of her classmates would back her up on her experiences at the school. The few other girls school posters have also talked of their experiences of being branded liars and prostitutes.

could students experience vary depending just on when they attended and who their peer group was?

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Postby sescaped » Wed Feb 09, 2005 5:28 pm

I attended stj for my entire education and shona's post makes a huge amount of sense to me. I have been annoyed at the characterisation of the girls on this site as the weak, thoughtless, victims.

[quote="shona"]In fact I think that realising the pronouncements on the ?woman?s role? were so blatantly wrong probably led us to further question the rest of the ?philosophy?[/quote]

This was very true in my case. Being young and impressionable I grew up really trusting and loving the philosophy - at the time I saw no negatives in it because my parents were sensible and did not listen to the more repressive aspects of ses advice on child rearing! Nor did I equate the terrible time I was having at st j with the philosophy as i do now. As I grew older and they began to come out with all that crap about women I cannot begin to describe the sense of betrayal and frustration. The picture that they had of the idealised women fitted in no way with how I felt as a women or what I had observed in the women in my family not in ses.
This idea that they had directly effected the education and the opportunities that we had. Although I think this has changed now, in my time at the school there was no provision of any activities outside the academic curriculum except obligatory sewing lessons and hospitality weekends where we learned to cook and prepare for a dinner party!. I used to wish I was a boy at the school with the sailing, climbing, debating clubs and other opportunities that they had. In every situation we were role locked - the boys as much as the girls. Attempts at pushing these boundaries invariable came up with the response that we were doing things in order to have contact with the boys showing the sexual predator instincts "typical" of women - not because we might have interests of our own!!

Despite this growing feeling of frustration and anger I joined foundation group in the vague hope that I might be able to salvage some sense of that childhood trust and faith. I began to realise that in their world view I could not hope to reach any kind of philosophical goal without being married to a man who I completely submitted to and served without thought of myself. This was completely unacceptable to me. There are experiences in foundation group that I feel utterly humiliated by the thought of. In many ways it has taken me many years to reclaim the ideas twisted by ses - for a long time i was completely against marriage - but now i am beginning to be able to see it as a celebration of two people being together rather than a prison.

I don't write much on this site even though i follow it closely because I still feel very confused about my experiences. Even though now i have put as much distance as possible between myself and ses and st j - i find it hard to think about how far i was sucked into it all.

Also want to add voice of support for adrasteia - think your posts are intelligent and well balanced - which is just whats needed.

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Postby grimep » Wed Feb 09, 2005 9:16 pm

Shona, Sescaped - hopefully no-one is meaning to imply that ALL the girls were/are brainless automata unable to resist the SES's hold over them, their friends, their families. Surely it's down to individual personalities and circumstances. I mentioned in another thread "Stepford Wives"... that was certainly how the situation was perceived by us in St Vedast boys.. a feeling that was thrown centre stage when we heard that a young ex-girl who had been married off to some middle aged (at least mentally - I think mid 30s) SES guy had attempted suicide by throwing herself out of a 1st floor window. We KNOW the level of control the SES exerts over personal relationships- that potential couples in the SES seek guidance from their SES tutors, people who are hopelessly unqualified to offer such advice- excepting that they are applying SES values in determining suitability of partners. Please noone pretend this doesn't happen, I've heard of & known personally many cases.

Sescaped.. you said you don't like being characterised as a victim and then go on to give an account of how you were a victim of the system. Or am I missing your point?

There's a very serious allegation raised here which I feel is in danger of being buried: that the SES has subtle mechanisms in place to encourage girls who enter the Youth Group to be married to much older SES men.. their reward for many years of loyalty and service to the school. Even if only one girl a year goes down this route isn't that one too many? As I have said in another thread, if this is true and gets known, either in OFSTED, the NSPCC or the press, it would be Game Over SES / St James. Seriously.

Shona, you said "We were not brainwashed into believing this stuff." "we" means every single girl who was ever a pupil of St James or St Vedast. How can you make such an all-encompassing statement with such conviction? Perhaps you are talking about those in your year and possibly the year above you? Please be more specific. This board serves several purposes, and one very valuable one is that by sharing facts, recollections and information, we ex-pupils can get a more vivid overall picture of the situation at the schools and the SES.

Harriet Somerville stated in another thread: "we were all led to believe we were prostitutes, there for mens pleasure, not our own and to serve and obey them. Our free thought was taken from us and we were discouraged to have any ambition" Well?

Shona, you also stated "And, I do not believe that those of the girls/boys who joined the SES were brainwashed into doing so." Firstly your use of the word "brainwashing" in this context is a bit of a red herring- I'd argue that children can't be brainwashed as to a large extent they are uncarved blocks. Cults / brainwashing applies to adults in that their adult personalities undergo radical and marked changes on entering cults. As for the Youth Groups - are they open institutions that young adults might join out of the blue? It doesn't happen by accident- The schools and structures... intitiation in meditation (relieving you from cleaning duty) ->weekly Philosophy lessons mirroring the adult lectures-> 5th/6th form leading to Youth Group.. it was a reality created by the SES. No literal "brainwashing" but the path was there, and as many others have stated on here, in 6th form the time came when allegiances were split between friends and SES... to stay true to your ideals and try to rid yourself of the bullshit you'd been fed for the last x amount of years or follow the path that your family / tutors wanted and many friends had followed. Sorry to pick on you Shona, and perhaps fundamentally we are actually singing from the same hymn sheet, but at face value I don't buy your line.
Also Shona:- "And I am not suggesting that women use the net less than men (although given the statistics about 90% of all net use being searches for porn I think this might be true)" - you are implying this forum has more male than female posters because we all happened to be online surfing for porn and happened across this by chance.

I am beginning to wonder that given the way backbiting and bitchiness soon surface on here, and valid points are quickly smothered, that there could well be a few SES plants on this forum whose purpose is to mess up rational debate.

A general bit of advice to everyone- you just can't generalise on the subject of sex. One of the benefits of getting older is that through your life experiences of many many people, you realise that everyone is unique, and that sweeping statements about an entire sex are clearly founded on ignorance.


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