“The Revolution Will Not Be Televised” (Gill Scott Heron)
Chapter 12
From There to Now (cont)
Part 5
Meanwhile, back in the land of sugar and honey, beaches, blondes, great weather and Disneyland….. There are spotty gaps in my memory of the end of the 70’s with respect the Los Angeles Institute, the Law Suit, the movement of the Kleinians out of the Los Angeles Institute and into Reiss-Davis, etc. I actually ‘really’ finished my training analysis slightly after the move to Reiss-Davis in 1977. ( My training analysis, although very different and full of impediments from a traditional point of view, surprisingly, was extremely helpful to me. I’m not sure what to make of that. Perhaps the best way to conduct analysis is to take what seem to be obvious principles and add in the reverse now and then. I doubt it.)
Reiss-Davis Child Study Center was and is a well known educational and care giving program. Reiss-Davis began its long life as a home for Jewish orphans. Obviously, it had grown and evolved since that admirable beginning. There was and is a Child Psychotherapy Training Program, which became a focus of the Kleinians.
I was given a title of “Director of Post Graduate Education” at Reiss-Davis, qualifications for which I completely lacked. I was just grandiose enough to accept the position, although not without some ‘encouragement’. While trying to decide whether to accept this post, I was directly encouraged/instructed to take this post by my analyst. In an ‘analytic’ session, while discussing my ambivalence about this situation, I spoke of having talked to Dr. Margolin, the titular head of this project at Reiss-Davis, about taking this job. I was ambivalent for a variety of reasons. Hence, I discussed my ambivalence in analytic sessions. At two points, my analyst said, “But you didn’t say yes”. The second time did it. So I said yes. Forget any analysis of my ambivalence.
I tried hard at this task, was exceedingly boring, organized some seminars, and made at least one very good friend. Dr. Donald Melczer, a well-known British Kleinian analyst came to Los Angeles and Reiss-Davis to conduct a series of seminars and a large number of individual supervisions. I was distantly involved in organizing supervisions conducted by Dr. Melczer and much more deeply involved in the seminar series as was Dr. Hayes with me and the seminars. One of the many aspects of Dr. Meltzer’s visit was that of there being money to fund an honorarium for his visit. It was my job to raise the money to fund the honorarium via sales of tickets to the seminar series. That part of the project worked. Sales were brisk.
Amongst the subjects of these seminars were to be the work of Dr. Wilfred Bion. However, as the actual presentations of these seminars by Dr. Melczer proceeded, Bion had yet to appear as a subject well into the last seminar, much to my chagrin. Toward the end of that seminar, an attendee, having more guts than I, raised the obvious question: “I thought you were supposed to talk about Bion?” Melczer, in response to the questioner, then gave his ‘talk’ on Bion. It was, charitably put, brief. “Ah, the alpha and beta elements.” he said. That was the entire Melczer talk on Bion. The attendees, except for me, seemed satisfied with this statement of no meaning/no content “speech”. I was horrified. If that was a ‘talk’ on or about Dr. Bion, I’d hate to hear a brief comment.
Shortly after the Melczer seminars, I was sitting at a Board meeting of the Child Psychotherapy Training Program at Reiss-Davis. This meeting turned out to be last straw.
The subject of that last, for me at least, Board meeting at Reiss-Davis was the graduation of students from the Child Psychotherapy Training Program. For the most part, that meeting was to be perfunctory, students who had successfully completed all the courses, teaching, supervision and psychotherapy requirements were to be confirmed as graduates. And that is what happened. Well, that is until the name of student John Doe was raised. The rapid conclusion of Dr. Isaacs’, followed very rapidly by all other Board members, but for Jane Hays and myself, was that John Doe should not graduate. “He wasn’t suited to be a child psychotherapist”, said Dr. Isaacs.
I then set the stage for a battle royal, without conscious intent, although I was reasonably certain what would happen. I asked “why?” The answer— “his personality wasn’t satisfactory”. I continued asking questions. (I suppose by raising any questions, the absolute authority required by the senior members of this Reiss Davis group was challenged. I had fallen outside the acceptable range of questioning, if a range for questioning even existed.) I continued, asking about each element of this student’s training. Had this student completed successfully all the required classes, supervisions, required psychotherapy, etc? “Yes” I was told. Had there been any conversations with this student about his suitability as a child therapist or about his personality and possible defects that required changes or special help. “No”, I was told. Did he ever receive any special help in this area? Once again the answer was “no”. This all struck me as the heighth of grandiosity, omnipotence, and unfairness. And I made that clear to the now incensed other Board Members who were present. Therefore, in that closed system, I was no longer a skeptic, but a heretic. I had to go.
Shortly following the meeting I described above (literally a few days later), I telephoned my office at Reiss-Davis. My then secretary and friend, soon to be ex-secretary, told me that the Department of Post Graduate Education had been closed the day before. The Department no longer existed. Gone. Therefore, I was no longer Director. There was nothing to direct. Department and Director gone. Then, very soon, literally a few days later, my ex-secretary and good friend, called to tell me that the Department had re-opened with a new director. I didn’t even get the chance to be fired. So much for the infidel.