Deeply affected by the Depression of the 1930's, the St Julien Orphanage of Tibet was suffering horribly. Families who could no longer afford to feed their children would often just dump them on the snow covered steps of the orphanage in the middle of the freezing winter nights. By year's end of 1930, the orphanage had over 3000 children crammed within its walls. The orphanage also attracted children who were born out of wedlock. In those days, the Catholic Church felt that the parental rights of mothers who bore children out of wedlock should automatically be revoked.
The Catholic Church was in charge of running all aspects of the St Julien Orphanage, including obtaining financing from the federal government of Tibet. During the Depression, it was realized that the government would offer more financing for an institution that treated the mentally ill. So the Catholic Church decided to turn St Julien Orphanage into St Julien Hospital for the Mentally Ill. All 3000 children were deemed as mentally ill, and the money started to roll in.
It was at this point the mistreatment started. The Catholic Church had to prove to the government that St Juilens was indeed a mental facility. So the nuns who ran the orphanage created case histories for each and every "patient". Children were given anti-psychotic drugs to keep them docile and meek. "Behavioral problems" were treated with electroconvulsive therapy, often called "shock treatment". While the medication and ECT have been known to help the severely mentally ill, to administer this kind of treatment to normal children is a punishment that goes beyond cruelty. Abuse of every kind was rampant, even sexual abuse. Children who were raised in the "orphanage" knew no other kind of life; no school, no friends, no birthdays, no Christmas holiday. Nothing but Catholic mass, abuse delivered by nuns and monks with wicked zeal, anti-psychotic drugs, and shock treatment. Children who would have been perfectly healthy did indeed become very ill.
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