4,537 Comments for Pennhurst State School

i am done talking here because you poeple have no idea

Did I forget to write the part where I said there was abuse at these places? Did I forget to say that there were some awful things going on here? I must have forgotten to say that there was abuse at these places and some downright unattractive things going on here.

Hello, everyone. Guess what? I am going to clue you in on a little secret that I apparently have forgotten to mention here and everywhere else on this site where I have written. There was abuse at these places. Documented abuse. Photographed abuse. Tape recorded abuse. At this place and every other place out there. Including places in your neighborhood. Including this very week. No gasps of horror or outrage please, I can even prove it. I have even seen it.

Now, where were we?

Oh yes:

1. If society doesn't value certain people;
2. And they are sent away where no one can see them because they are of "less value";
3. And society doesn't pay much money for their care;
4. And they pay staff minimum wages to work with them;
5. And they make these staff work long hours and lots of mandatory overtime;
6. And if they don't have the technology to provide habilitative care (which wasn't even developed until the last 50 years);
7. And people treat the caretakers poorly because society doesn't value their charges (who were sent away due to their low value to society, mind you);
8. And the administration, being horribly overwhelmed with hideous amounts of overtime pay to keep the place running because no one wants to work there in the first place because of all the above factors, sometimes retains staff who are known to be abusive because otherwise there will be even fewer staff there (and they then end up between a rock and a hard place deciding whether to keep the abusive staff because otherwise, by firing the bad staff, the staffing ratios will then drop to 1 staff to 100 individuals);
9. And residing there are a large number of people with poor to minimal social skills who are at the developmental level where the highest rate of abuse occurs in the "normal" community;
10. And abuse occurs;
11. And you are shocked and blame it on the people who worked here with all this going on;
12. Then you are a knucklehead.

There were plenty of staff who worked here who did a lovely job under these circumstances. I don't hear anyone commending them, ironically. Everyone would rather poke at the staff who failed under such bad situations. But if you want to blame the people who were put in this situation and failed because they were human, you are missing the thing that will keep this from happening again.

And that is the real tragedy.

Not your individual story about the uncle. That is sad. That shouldn't have happened. It is a very bad thing that occurred.

But it will occur again and again and again until someone who votes starts to understand WHY it occurred. It occurred because we, the people, set up the horrible, terrible conditions under which many good people failed.

If you have a large facility that has adequate funding, a supportive administration, excellent technology, involved professionals, and well paid staff, the amount of abuse goes down to where it is significantly less than seen in the community. So that tells me that abuse is not inherent in people, it is inherent in bad conditions.

Did you know that when people are poor and hungry and have sick children and have few options they are more likely to steal? That's not a shocker, is it? So why is it a shocker to anyone that under bad situations staff are more prone to do bad things? Why chuck stones at the people who worked under these conditions and not the system and culture that engendered these situations?

I don't know. Maybe getting old enables people to see the wider side of life and circumstances. I was young once and things were a lot more black and white. But they were never so black and white that I didn't try to look at everything before I chucked a rock at it.

Staff who hurt people should not continue to work with them. Situations that engender abuse need to be fixed. But if you continue to insist that the evil lies only within the PERSON and not within the SYSTEM, you have condemned everyone else to the same fate as the uncle.

And that is a shame for the rest of the people out there that everyone claims to care about.

cumezekyama? Wuzat? Gawd, all these new words!

Would those very nice hospitals be where we take grandma and grandpa when no one wants to be bothered? Yeah, I hear they're REAL nice!

Listen I don't want to get into an argument but I'm just not understanding the uncle story. Some of the things you are discribing just aren't making alot of sense. Was this guy pretty old when he was "released" because if he had the ability to read and write I'm sure it would have been recognized at some point. They all went to school, the older ones probably attended on grounds the younger ones (when I worked there) off grounds. I saw many who were capable read and write. You have discribed this guy as being prfoundly retarded. I'd sure like to know how grandma changed this guy into what sounds like a mildly retarded person. Just curious.

I'm curious as to why grandma didn't take him in after he was born at Pennhurst? Is it safe to assume that his parents were also retarded?

Well, I can see that staff in the 1900's may
have been unaware of some of the subtlities of modern humane treatment methods, but they would certainly have been aware (I would hope) that outright cruelty and neglect were exactly that. Times haven't changed that much!

And here I thought the painting was of something from the Cthulhu Mythos, but it's actually a gingerbread house on Candy Cane Lane!

Since I have been one of those staff working in a room with 30-40 severely and profoundly retarded men at a state institution, I'd like to throw in my two cents. There are two sides to this story. Lynn, you seem to be speaking up for those staff who cared and tried to do the right thing. And Jodi and Dannie Girl, you seem to be speaking about cruel, even abusive staff. BOTH of these sides exist. In K Building, we had some staff who did their very best for the men they worked with. In my case, I used to take the most nervous, high-strung guys out for walks, so they'd have some peace and quiet and privacy. Other staff did similar things, because they cared. Yet I was openly mocked for taking people out and treating them as individuals. There were all kinds of cruelty in K Building, some perhaps unintentional, but others definately intentional. And if you dared to report even acts of open abuse, you were then targeted and lied about, thus weakening your believability, or even ruining your reputation. Time after time I saw staff transferred or even fired because they spoke up about cruelty. I grew up in Belchertown (the town) and when I went to work at K Building at Belchertown State School, two of my high school's worst bullies had graduated and found jobs at K Building. I also know, from personal experience, that management knew of abuse and looked the other way and rarely helped those brave enough to speak up. In fact, the only times I saw management take a strong stand was when a profoundly retarded woman in an all-female building became pregnant, and when another woman drowned in a bath-tub and staff who were supposed to be monitoring her ward dried her body off with a towel and put her in bed to make it look she had died in her sleep. Both of these situations were not the kind that would have been easy to cover up. These things DID and DO happen. Yes, there are good staff, but we need to know that there are also abusive staff; yes, there are abusive staff. but we also need to know there are good staff. I believe both sides in this discussion need to accept the reality of BOTH sides.

I know of alot of homeless people who like to hang around there. I also know of alot of patients who wonder around town here. There is "Bike Mike", the woman who wears tons of clothing and huge sunglasses with a hat with a large brim (because she can not be exposed to the sun), and there used to be a man who walked around in a suit blazer with a tie and a nice shirt but wore only boxers for his pants. There are more but these people we all know and love around this town. Bike Mike rides his bike to the schools everyday to say hi to the kids.. when i was working at a local K-Mart.. i had the pleasure of talking to the woman.. and then the older man was one that my sister knew. She worked at a local ice cream place and she knew he couldnt have ice cream but only yogurt..and helped him with that.

This is a very beautiful picture Motts.. I was wondering tho...How exactly did you get up that high in the air to take this picture. I have been there once before but I dont remember there being a building there...

Where can these records be found? In the local library? I would like to learn more about this place.

I think that we all have biased opinions being that you are currently a staff worker.. therefore you look more into the lives of the staff.

We are biased in the fact that since Jodi's uncle was in this hospital and beaten..then we feel that it was the government and the staff's fault.

Its obvious we arent going to see eye to eye on this matter...there are too many emotions involved.

I see where you are coming from..but I also stand firm in my opinion.

I dont want to keep coming on here and fighting...So I say lets agree to disagree...

And this, my dear friends, is why helmets were developed.

Jodi, I am not "good" and I am surely not "pure" - I'm not even on the "cleaner" side of life, all sins being totaled and added together over the years. But I do try to look at everyone's life. Not just the people who lived here but the people who worked here and who kept these folks alive. If you aren't old enough yet to know what it's like to have a very low paying job, extremely long hours, a family to take care of, last minute mandatory overtime shifts, 25 to 50+ people to take care of by yourself who have skills at the 1 to 2 year developmental level plus massive behavioral "challenges," minimal support from professional or administrative staff, and a public who, like you, blames them for all the bad stuff that happened and doesn't think to thank them for showing up to do the work that many families were not capable of doing because they didn't also have the resources, then we'll have to wait a few years until you gain the life experiences that will help you understand why this might be a rather stressful job.

If I put you in a room today by yourself with 25 people who have severe to profound intellectual disabilities and ask you to make sure they are all kept clean, well dressed (or even make sure that each of them remains totally dressed for your entire shift), provide even just one meal (making sure the area is kept clean yet no gloves or cleaning solutions can be ingested, making sure the temperature of each food and beverage is in the correct range, follow everyone's eating precaution plans, make sure everyone is seated properly, their adaptive equipment for dining is available, and that their food texture is correct - i.e., pureed vs. ground vs. chopped vs. whole, making sure they all have the correct diet and the correct amount of food, possibly even having to assist people who receive their nutrition enterally), deal with seizures, deal with the multiple minor injuries that will occur because many of the folks don't have the ability to walk without falling, keep the area safe from those who ingest literally anything that is small enough to fit in their mouth, make sure that those who smear feces are cleaned up (because this sometimes occurs at this developmental level), keep apart those folks who don't like each other so they don't get into yet another fight, and then deal with the mounds of paperwork required to document that you have done all this work while keeping a cheerful face and all your patience, then you are certainly a better human being than I am or frankly than almost any person I have ever met.

Those were the conditions at the time. Them's the facts. And other than the fact that our staffing ratios are much better today, them's still the facts. You keep your head about you with all that going on and don't crumble from the strain (especially given that often the true ratio was more like 1 staff to 50 individuals) and I will personally ask the Pope to make you a living saint.

It's easy to criticize others if you haven't done their work. I personally thank God every day for the great majority of the staff I have the pleasure of working with, and I am 1000% positive if you ever got out there and saw what a very difficult job this is you would have just a little bit more empathy for the people who did this and kept your uncle alive so that you are now able to come here and condemn them.

Lynne i would like to say that the staff is to blame...i understand you are a nurse or w.e but you werent a nurse here.. let me ask you if the staff isnt to blame then who is? what is there to figure out these people were abused and mistreated. Dannie Girl left a comment and that was my uncle she was talking about i know the story the staff is to balme they were the ones who treated him like that...i understand you dont treat your patients like that but not everyone is a caring "friend" like you not everyone is good and pure like you..