IPT Book Reviews

Title: Other Altars: Roots and Realities of Cultic and Satanic Ritual Abuse and Multiple Personality Disorder  Negative Review
Author: Craig Lockwood
Publisher: CompCare Publishers, © 1993

CompCare Publishers
3850 Annapolis Lane, Suite 100
Minneapolis, MN 55447
(800) 328-3330
$17.00 (p)
 

Description:

This strange 255-page book is divided into three parts and 19 chapters, ending with a highly selective set of references, some photographs, and a selective list of prosecutions.  The book was written by a journalist who is the editor of a periodical called Beyond Survival.  It is basically a free-wheeling selective history of satanic ritual abuse allegations.
 

Discussion:

The author pits Lee Coleman, Ralph Underwager, Elizabeth Loftus, Kenneth Lanning, VOCAL, and the False Memory Syndrome Foundation as the enemies against Gary Stickle (an archeologist who allegedly dug up tunnels under the McMartin Preschool), Ira Reiner (the Los Angeles prosecutor in the McMartin case), Frank Putnam (an MPD expert), Bennett Braun (a proponent of dissociation, MPD, and satanic ritual abuse), and Richard Kluft (editor of the journal Dissociation).  The tone of the book is expressed by a quote from David Sakheim and Susan Devine: "Clinical psychiatry is rarely aided directly in applying a generic body of facts to a particular case."

The author believes his own propaganda and the book contains heavy doses of conspiracy theory and paranoia.  He shows his real motives when he writes of the Omaha collusion involving senators, the FBI, a newspaper, and a black leader.  All of these people were legally cleared.

This book is not recommended.

Reviewed by LeRoy G. Schultz, Emeritus Professor of Social Work, West Virginia University.

Order this book: Out of Print

Visit our Bookstore

  [Back to Volume 6]

 
Copyright © 1989-2014 by the Institute for Psychological Therapies.
This website last revised on April 15, 2014.
Found a non-working link?  Please notify the Webmaster.