Discussion
  • Read More
    LordBurleighBrendan O'Connor
    5/30/15 2:44pm

    This is utterly unsurprising, if nevertheless dismaying. I hope the recent increase in attention to addiction in public consciousness will eventually make it clear that traditional methods of treating addiction (especially alcoholism) are woefully inadequate, and that the 100% sobriety paradigm of recovery—which has been questioned by medical research for many decades now—will be abandoned in favor of more widely workable models.

    Reply
    <
    • Read More
      GlenBenettonLordBurleigh
      5/30/15 2:49pm

      First you need to install empathy in a majority of Americans who generally look down on people who suffer from addictions. I don’t think most people tend to help those who they look down upon.

      Reply
      <
    • Read More
      PinballMonsterLordBurleigh
      5/30/15 3:00pm

      I'm not so sure about these other methods you're talking about. Just my perspective as an alcoholic and a data nerd.

      Reply
      <
  • Read More
    MisanthropNicBrendan O'Connor
    5/30/15 4:45pm

    A friend of mine from my NA homegroup is fresh out of a nightmare like this. “Doorway to recovery” in metro Detroit. She’s show me some of the texts sent to her by the head of the entire company:

    ”listen either you fuck me, whenever I want, or your ass is evicted. And I send your judge a report on how you’ve committed every violation possible here.”

    “Alissa and traci both are totally cool about this themselves, so lose the attitude.”

    “Fine, ill see to it you and that ego of yours take a trip up to Jackson for 3-5 years”

    The system is so fundamentally flawed that this kind of sick, manipulative, financially motivated corruption almost seems like it’s by design.

    The B&E charge that the lovely CEO of doorway to recovery made up to try and stick her for, at long last, was finally thrown out last week. And by the grace of God, she’s also made real recovery in the 2 months since she left .

    Scum like him and the people in the article are what Necklacing was created for.

    Reply
    <
    • Read More
      Brendan O'ConnorMisanthropNic
      5/30/15 4:48pm

      Would you mind sending me an email? brendan.oconnor@gawker.com

      Reply
      <
    • Read More
      deuxmittensMisanthropNic
      5/30/15 5:31pm

      Jesus fucking Christ. She has an email trail of this? ...

      Reply
      <
  • Read More
    tito_swinefluBrendan O'Connor
    5/30/15 3:22pm

    This is somewhat related, and an excellent piece about other forms of using drug treatment as profit centers: http://www.wbez.org/news/puerto-ri…

    Reply
    <
    • Read More
      Diana6815tito_swineflu
      5/30/15 3:36pm

      I’m so sick of this! Prisons, schools, and treatment facilities shouldn’t be about profit! I know many people will probably disagree with me on my inclusion of schools. But the profit motive warps everything. We stop working toward the public good (offering a necessary public service) and work toward private, personal gain. Sickens me.

      Reply
      <
  • Read More
    Armageddon T. ThunderbirdBrendan O'Connor
    5/30/15 2:47pm

    Give me your tired, your poor,
    Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
    The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
    Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
    For I shall squeeze mine profit from thee!

    Reply
    <
    • Read More
      commentsectionBrendan O'Connor
      5/30/15 8:16pm

      Not to discredit the good people at the earnest half-way houses, but this type of profiting off addicts isn’t exactly something new.

      Reply
      <
      • Read More
        Blue HazeBrendan O'Connor
        5/30/15 3:18pm

        All “Sober Living” and “Recovery Houses” are scams just like this in my experience. My scant surprise is not that the place described exists, but that no one has written about it sooner - and that it also goes on in NYC.

        Here’s how it works:

        • Rent a house
        • Install bunk beds in every room of the house
        • Call local psych wards, let them know you’re a new “sober living” house, they’ll discharge patients to you who have nowhere else to go
        • Call local outpatient recovery programs, ditto
        • Charge each person at least $500/month rent to live on a bunk bed in a room with 3-4 other people
        • Collect $20,000+/month “rent” in total from tenant’s disability checks while doing nothing to help tenants to “recover”

        I’ve seen this first hand. They are basically warehouses for addicts/mentally ill who have nowhere else to go. The owners/managers are there to collect from tenants’ disability checks and profit from the Medicare/Medicaid fraud that goes along with it.

        It’s a scandal that such places exist. It’s also a scandal that such places have to exist because there is nowhere else for most of these people to go.

        Reply
        <
        • Read More
          Volante3192Brendan O'Connor
          5/30/15 2:42pm

          The people who operate such housing receive $215 for many of their tenants from the city’s Human Resources Administration

          And not one of them will ever have to take a drug test to get that sweet, sweet free government money.

          Reply
          <
          • Read More
            Raw Deal MontyBrendan O'Connor
            5/30/15 2:46pm

            I hope hell has a special place for those that shit on the poor, helpless, and weak. And I hope that special place is Satan’s toilet.

            Reply
            <
            • Read More
              The Ghost of ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ AKA BabyStepsBrendan O'Connor
              5/30/15 2:40pm

              Baumblit needs to be convicted and put UNDER the prison for a LONG, LONG time!

              Reply
              <
              • Read More
                OneFlapDownBrendan O'Connor
                5/30/15 2:44pm

                When pressed for comment, lawyer Joseph LaBarbera said ‘They would have gotten away with it, if it wasn’t for those meddling kids.’

                Reply
                <