Cried, You Didn't Listen: A Survivor's Expos Reaction Paper

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Cried, You Didn't Listen: A Survivor's Expos of the California's Youth Authority. The paper should be 4 pages in length and should include a brief synopsis of the book. When writing your reaction to this book.

Please concentrate on the topics and questions below:

The impact of abuse on juvenile development.

How the family system affects juvenile development.

How peer relationships and gangs influence juveniles.

Would Dwight's life have been different had he been placed with a relative instead of in juvenile hall?(no separation between child welfare and juvenile justice at this time)

How could the California Youth Authority improve its work with juveniles?

What was your overall reaction to Dwight's story?

Long ago in the dying years of the 17th century, the authors of a satire on human society, called The Roaring Girl, criticized the jail system noting that it was a place that bred criminals rather than reformed them. Abbot's book, I Cried, You Didn't Listen: A Survivor's Expose of the California Youth Authority, is evidence of the truth of this statement. Taken from his family when young, one wonders who is more to blame, - Abbot's family (particularly his parents) who didn't provide him with the needed care or the national system that so cruelly exploited him and turned a naive, innocent child into a hardened, unrepentant criminal.

Dwight Edgar Abbott was only nine when he was taken "under the care" of the California Youth Authority since he had nowhere else to go. Family tragedy forced him to be under the care of his aunt who was drunk and unresponsive and so the neighbors called the police who sent them to different state youth institutions temporarily. Neighbors should know differently!

From there, the book records in graphic detail incidents of abuse perpetrated behind the closed doors of these various so-called Correctional facilities with incidents that include rape to violent assaults from guards and other incarcerated youth. Here and there, human kindness shines through such as the guard who helped him escape from a mental-abuse institution, but mixed in with that, too, is the callousness and unprofessionalism of certain incidents -- such as the psychologist who ridiculed him -- who should not have been employed by the system.

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The book reads as an accusation of California's criminal system in particular and of the nation's in general. One may argue that the story takes place after all in the 1950s and that much has changed since that time, but second-hand experience with the jail system, the notorious reputation of that same system, and reviews of the book have indicated that little if at all has improved.

An employee of the juvenile justice system questions Abbot's account noting that "the author's young exposure to Los Angeles County Juvenile Hall and CYA forever altered his life and how he dealt with others, but at some point, he should hopefully have felt he was accountable for some of his own behavior" (http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/570901.I_Cried_You_Didn_t_Listen). That may be true, but, as Abbot notes, the jail is comprised of criminals and socio-paths and, unless, each is allocated individual and secluded treatment (too complex, expensive, and controversial), the jail serves only as a hotbed of crime where criminals learn from each other how to perpetuate their violence and socially-proscribed deeds and where they are commended for their acts. More so, peer pressure necessitates survival and show of machismo in an environment where differentness and show of weakness can easily endanger one's life. The guards, notoriously demotivated, hardened, and outnumbered, stand for less, in the prisoner's eyes, than the approval that he may gain from his peers. It is they who help him survive jail and outwit his captors (as see with Abbott who only survived due to the fact that and his companion become popular which helps them attempt to escape) and it is peer relationships and gangs, therefore, that have the ultimate….....

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"Cried You Didn't Listen A Survivor's Expos" (2012, October 30) Retrieved June 4, 2026, from
https://www.aceyourpaper.com/essays/cried-listen-survivor-expos-76206

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"Cried You Didn't Listen A Survivor's Expos" 30 October 2012. Web.4 June. 2026. <
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"Cried You Didn't Listen A Survivor's Expos", 30 October 2012, Accessed.4 June. 2026,
https://www.aceyourpaper.com/essays/cried-listen-survivor-expos-76206
   

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