ST. GEORGE, Utah — An in-depth report in the September issue of Reason magazine sheds light on abuse allegations surrounding a Utah anti-porn “treatment program” and other “troubled teen industry” re-education camps.
Penned by Hallie Lieberman and titled “Inside an Abusive Anti-Porn Camp for Teens,” the report explores the question, “Is sending kids into the wilderness really the best way to keep them off Pornhub?”
Lieberman spoke with people sent by their families to STAR Guides Wilderness Therapy, a St. George, Utah-based business that bills itself as “the country’s premier wilderness treatment program for teens with technology, pornography and sexual addictions.”
STAR Guides’ literature claims the camp “provides a specialized ‘unplugged’ environment to reset and re-balance the physical, mental and spiritual health of youth.”
Under the guidance of what the business describes as “highly trained therapists and professionals,” STAR Guides claims to offer a safe haven for youth who may be “working through sensitive pornography or sexual issues along with trauma, free of fear, embarrassment or shame.”
Businesses such as STAR Guides Wilderness Therapy, founded in 2013, are part of a booming “troubled teen industry.” Among STAR Guides’ nonscientific claims about watching porn are that it is “rewiring” the brains of teens, and that it “causes kids to contract sexually transmitted diseases, to molest other kids, and to devalue ‘monogamy, marriage and child rearing.’”
The program’s marketing materials also warn, “When pornography addicts try to quit, they experience the same type of withdrawal symptoms as drug addicts.”
More in Sync With Religion Than Science
These pseudoscientific claims squarely line up with claims made by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, which dominates public and private life in the state of Utah, where STAR Guides is based.
“Many of these programs have religious roots or overtones,” Lieberman writes. “While STAR Guides claims it is not religious, it is an offshoot of Mending The Armor, a Mormon anti-porn group owned by STAR Guides’ organizational parent, Therapy Associates. Mending The Armor’s website says their goal is to ‘assist youth in eliminating the use of pornography, masturbation and other unwanted sexual behaviors,’ and to do so it says they must believe in God and Jesus Christ.”
After speaking with six former attendees of STAR Guides, reading years of Utah’s inspection reports on the organization, consulting the r/troubledteens subreddit — where many survivors congregate — and interviewing experts, Reason has disclosed disturbing allegations about specific incidents at the re-education camp and about the general atmosphere and culture of the program.
The Reason report includes testimony from a gay man who was sent to STAR Guides by his Mormon parents when he was younger. He recounts being driven, along with other teens, into the middle of the Utah desert.
“They opened the door and dumped us out,” he tells Lieberman, who notes that “a group of teens from the program was waiting to meet them — some of whom, he later discovered, were prone to violence.”
“I saw more blood and fistfights and violence and threats and you know, all kinds of crazy shit while I was there, than my entire life combined,” the survivor adds.
According to reports from Utah’s Department of Health and Human Services on troubled teen camps, Lieberman reveals, kids have been held in “miserable and abusive conditions.”
An Obsession With Teens' 'Sexual Histories'
At night at STAR Guides, the report adds, “there were sessions around the campfire, where the team members would make the teens share stories of their sexual experiences. Many of the staffers weren’t much older than the campers, and often had degrees in fields unrelated to social work or therapy. Once a week, licensed therapists would visit and talk with each camper for an hour.”
The teens were made to fill out a “sexual history” workbook daily, “listing their sexual experiences and answering questions like ‘How many times are you masturbating a day?’”
According to a survivor, “the staff would then share information from ‘studies’ that claimed ‘porn degenerates your brain and desensitizes you to human connection.’ Such claims are also posted on STAR Guides’ website, which says that teen porn use can lead to ‘a decrease in ability to maintain focus and concentration,’ causing kids to do poorly in school. It also claims that teen porn addiction leads to ‘multiple failed relationships’ in adulthood, because addicts ‘prefer pornographic images and the fantasy of sexual acts more than the real act itself.’”
STAR Guides Wilderness Therapy did not reply to Reason’s request for comment.
To read “Inside an Abusive Anti-Porn Camp for Teens,” visit Reason.com.