Member-only story
Why not Spare the Child?
The troubled teen industry is propped up by religious exemptions for schools and treatment centers.
When I first heard about the troubled teen industry, I wondered how such a thing could be legal. From rampant medical neglect, teens are subjected to a myriad of abuses in this industry. Some teens are even drugged, restrained, or forced to reenact traumatic events in their lives as part of a therapeutic process. Communications with their families are heavily monitored and, in some cases, prohibited altogether. Luckily, some state legislatures are putting forth an effort to regulate the troubled teen industry.
Recently created state laws in California, Utah, and Oregon aim to mitigate the harm that these institutions can do. For example, Utah law requires teens in residential treatment to have unrestricted access to communication with their families. The state also implemented increased inspections and reporting of uses of chemical restraints and/or seclusion to the Utah Office of Licensing. However, this does not mean that these policies are always enforced fairly and consistently or that the troubled teen industry doesn’t exploit legal loopholes.
Many troubled teen industry (TTI) institutions brand themselves as Christian, which enables them to avoid being subject to state regulations…
