In 2006 New York, which had 140 kids at the Judge Rotenberg Center, tried to ban electric shock therapy for behavior modification. Parents of some of the NY kids at the center sued to prevent the ban from going into effect. The parents won. I suppose that if you had a child that was out of control to such a degree that they were almost always in a drugged state or were destroying your house, attacking people and just flipping out - and they'd been doing this for years and years - you'd be thankful that their behavior improved considerably after spending some time at the center.
But, NY tried to ban shock treatments because they were dangerous and outdated and they were being used as punishment as well as behavior modification. Using shock treatments as a punishment is not supported by most of the scientific community. The lowest shock given at Rotenberg is considered to be twice what pain researchers say is tolerable for most people.
It is a difficult issue. But, we used to give shock treatments to those suffering from all sorts of mental problems. We stopped that years ago. It didn't work in most cases, was dangerous and is barbaric.
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The practices of the Judge Rotenberg Center (and the bill pending to ban them — Massachusetts House Bill 109) play an ironic blues counterpoint to other pending Massachusetts legislation: House Bill
3329 which, if passed, will forbid parents to slap or spank their children.
According to evidence so far about Rotenberg, at least some of its parents borrow shockers from the school for use when their children earn visits home for weekends or holidays (making it gruesomely coincidental that the TIMES ran this piece on Christmas).
If House Bill 3329 passes but House Bill 109 doesn't pass, Massachusetts will find itself in the legally and morally interesting position of permitting parents to electrocute their children but not to spank them.
As an adult with some of the disabilities that get people sent to Rotenberg, I wonder why the TIMES article interviewing current Rotenberg students and parents did not quote any whose connection with
the school had ended. Students subject to shock for whatever displeases the staff may have strong motivation to praise Rotenberg warmly even if they wish they had never heard of the place; parents
may have similarly strong motivation if Rotenberg has inculcated in them the belief that no practices but Rothenberg's could keep their children alive.
Several former students of the school have, though,
made their opinions known: not through the TIMES and (unsurprisingly) not through the school, but through their Internet replies to articles and blogs discussing Rotenberg. The posts of these former students uniformly condemn Rotenberg and describe its practices in the same terms used by other adult critics.
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