A Quote by Frances Farmer

For eight years I was an inmate in a state asylum for the insane. During those years I passed through such unbearable terror that I deteriorated into a wild, frightened creature intent only on survival. And I survived. I was raped by orderlies, gnawed on by rats and poisoned by tainted food. I was chained in padded cells, strapped into strait-jackets and half-drowned in ice baths. And I survived. The asylum itself was a steel trap, and I was not released from its jaws alive and victorious. I crawled out mutilated, whimpering and terribly alone. But I did survive.
I can't believe I survived, not only my life, but I am still playing football 'cause half of those eight or nine years I don't even remember.
When I was a child, I felt at times that I had been born into an insane asylum, that much of human life appeared to be an insane asylum. It was bewildering.
The only victory that really counts in prison is survival. But survival means more than simply being alive. It's not just the body that must survive a jail term; the spirit and the will and the heart have to make it through as well. If any one of them is broken or destroyed, the man whose living body walks through the gate, at the end of his sentence, can't be said to have survived it. And it's for those small victories of the heart, and the spirit, and the will that we sometimes risk the body that cradles them.
I survived this torture which left me paralyzed for years. That's what that night was all about, mutilation, more than violence through sex. I really do feel as though I was psychologically mutilated that night and now I'm trying to put the pieces back together again. Through love, not hatred. And through my music. My strength has been to open again, to life, and my victory is the fact that, despite it all, I kept alive my vulnerability.
And we passed through the cavern of rats. And we passed through the path of boiling steam. And we passed through the country of the blind. And we passed through the slough of despond. And we passed through the vale of tears. And we came, finally, to the ice caverns.
The insane asylum on Blackwell’s Island is a human rat-trap. It is easy to get in, but once there it is impossible to get out.
Very few species have survived unchanged. There's one called lingula, which is a little shellfish, a little brachiopod about the size of my fingernail, that has survived for 500 million years, but it's survived by being unobtrusive and doing nothing, and you can't accuse human beings of that.
I do not oppose the insane asylum - but I abhor and condemn the cutthroat system that robs man of his reason, drives him to insanity and makes the lunatic asylum an indispensable adjunct to every civilized community.
There isn't really precedent for asylum seekers' being criminally prosecuted at the border before they've had a 'credible fear' hearing. You come seeking asylum. Seeking asylum is not illegal.
For some time, destitution has been a harsh reality for asylum seekers, migrants, and refugees who are unable to access mainstream accommodation and support. Delays in the asylum and appeals process can leave them in limbo for years without money, shelter, and advice.
I chose the name "Padded Room," because, when I'm in the booth, it would be the padded room. When I'm in the booth, I can say a lot of things and speak about a lot of things that normally I wouldn't be able to speak about to a friend or to family or to a crowd. A lot of times, the things that I say, if you had to categorize it, they would probably call me nuts or crazy. So, you add that aspect of "The Padded Room," which would be almost like an insane asylum.
To go into acting is like asking for admission to an insane asylum. Anyone may apply, but only the certifiably insane are admitted.
The world sometimes feels like an insane asylum. You can decide whether you want to be an inmate or pick up your visitor's badge. You can be in the world but not engage in the melodrama of it; you can become a spiritual being having a human experience thoroughly and fully.
I could be dead or something even more tragic could have happened, but by God's grace I am still alive. I was hooked on Crystal Meth for eight years and did it every single day, all day long. I honestly have no idea how my heart survived or how I didn't suffer multiple overdoses, I don't get it.
The point of asylum is not to declare to the world what country you think is the pinnacle of civilization. The point of asylum is to find a country that's both willing and able to protect you from political persecution. In no way is asylum an endorsement of a country's politics, laws, or values.
Most of the people who are coming to Australia by boat have passed through several countries on the way, and if they simply wanted asylum they could have claimed that in any of the countries through which they'd passed.
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