Fred Newman is a controversial philosopher, psychotherapist, playwright and political activist. He received his Ph.D. in analytic philosophy and foundations of mathematics from Stanford University in 1962. For over 30 years he has had a private psychotherapy practice in New York City, although lacking conventional credentials in the field. Along with developmental psychologist Lois Holzman, who has written a number of books with and about Newman, he is the creator of Social Therapy, a type of group therapy involving theatre, improvisation, and political activism, which he advocates as helping clients learn how to develop beyond their self- and societally-imposed limitations and improve their mental health. Newman considers himself a Marxist, and has utilized a mixture of Marxist, logical positivist and post-modernist ideas to critique the effects of the capitalist system on human personality development. Stanford redirects here. ... 1962 (MCMLXII) was a common year starting on Monday (the link is to a full 1962 calendar). ... Flag Seal Nickname: Big Apple Location Location in the state of New York Government Counties (Boroughs) Bronx (The Bronx) New York (Manhattan) Queens (Queens) Kings (Brooklyn) Richmond (Staten Island) Mayor Michael Bloomberg (R) Geographical characteristics Area     City 1,214. ... Lois Holzman is a cofounder with Fred Newman of the East Side Institute for Group and Short Term Psychotherapy and the Institutes current director. ... Social therapy is an activity-theoretic practice developed outside of academia at the East Side Institute for Group and Short Term Psychotherapy in New York. ... Activism, in a general sense, can be described as intentional action to bring about social or political change. ... Marxism is the political practice and social theory based on the works of Karl Marx, a 19th century philosopher, economist, journalist, and revolutionary, along with Friedrich Engels. ... In economics, a capitalist is someone who owns capital, presumably within the economic system of capitalism. ...

Proletarian or revolutionary psychotherapy is a journey which begins with the rejection of our inadequacy and ends in the acceptance of our smallness; it is the overthrow of the rulers of the mind. (Preface to Newman's Power and Authority: the Inside View of the Class Struggle (1974)).

Newman's use of left-wing language has been criticized by some observers across the political spectrum who see it as a way to draw idealistic youth into Newman's organizations. Newman, long influenced by the tradition of "third-period" communism (the Comintern theory in the early 1930s that Social Democrats rather than Fascists were the main enemy of revolution), has consistently directed his main political attacks against the Democratic Party. In addition, Newman and his followers have been criticized by the Anti-Defamation League, the American Jewish Committee and prominent politicians such as Senator Hillary Clinton for making what are widely seen as anti-Semitic statements. In politics, left-wing, political left, leftism, or simply the left, are terms which refer (with no particular precision) to the segment of the political spectrum typically associated with any of several strains of socialism, social democracy, or liberalism (especially in the American sense of the word), or with opposition... The Comintern (Russian: Коммунистический Интернационал, Kommunisticheskiy Internatsional – Communist International, also known as the Third International) was an international Communist organization founded in March 1919, in the midst of the war communism period (1918-1921), by Vladimir Lenin and the Russian Communist Party (Bolshevik), which intended to fight by all available means, including... Democratic Party may refer to one of many political parties of diverse political orientation: Democratic Parties United States—Democratic Party (United States) Albania—Democratic Alliance Party, Democratic Party (Albania), and Democratic Party of Albania Andorra—Democratic Party (Andorra) Australia—Australian Democrats Benin—Democratic Party (Benin) Bosnia and Herzegovina—Croatian Democratic... The Anti-Defamation League (or ADL) is an organization founded by Bnai Brith in the United States whose stated aim is to stop, by appeals to reason and conscience and, if necessary, by appeals to law, the defamation of the Jewish people. ... Hillary Clinton Hillary Diane Rodham Clinton (born October 26, 1947), was First Lady of the United States from 1993 to 2001, as the wife of President Bill Clinton. ... Wikipedia does not have an article with this exact name. ...

Although Newman and his followers have claimed that such criticism is part of a Democratic Party plot against independent politics, some of the strongest criticism of the Newman group's alleged anti-Semitism has come from inside the independent movement--from Jesse Ventura and Donald Trump (formerly of the Reform Party), from Tom Golisano (former gubernatorial candidate of the New York Independence Party) and most recently from the New York State Executive Committee of the Independence Party, which in September 2005 expelled from its ranks several Newman followers on grounds that their anti-Semitism was tarnishing the party. Donald John Trump, Sr. ... The Reform Party may be: Estonia - Eesti Reformierakond Gibraltar - Gibraltar Reform Party United States Reform Party of the United States of America, formerly led by Ross Perot. ... 2005 (MMV) was a common year starting on Saturday of the Gregorian calendar. ...

Newman taught at several colleges and universities in the 1960s. He has been influenced over the years by Karl Marx, Ludwig Wittgenstein, and Russian psychologist Lev Vygotsky, who wrote on the zone of proximal development (ZPD). The ZPD, existing in a social-cultural context, identifies the range between a child's abilities without assistance, and the child's abilities with assistance. Newman worked with his colleague Lois Holzman, a developmental psychologist, to try to incorporate this idea into Social Therapy as a way of understanding the mechanism of emotional growth and development in a group context. In 1993 Newman and Holzman co-authored Lev Vygotsky: Revolutionary Scientist. Karl Heinrich Marx (May 5, 1818, Trier, Germany – March 14, 1883, London) was an immensely influential German philosopher, political economist, and socialist revolutionary. ... Ludwig Josef Johann Wittgenstein (IPA: ) (April 26, 1889 – April 29, 1951) was an Austrian philosopher who contributed several ground-breaking works to contemporary philosophy, primarily on the foundations of logic, the philosophy of mathematics, the philosophy of language, and the philosophy of mind. ... A psychologist is a scientist who studies psychology, the systematic investigation of the human behavior and mental processes. ... Lev Vygotsky Lev Semyonovich Vygotsky (Лев Семенович Выготский) (November 12 (November 5 Old Style), 1896 – June 11, 1934) was a Soviet developmental psychologist whose work received widespread recognition in the Western world around the 1960s. ... Lev Vygotskys notion of zone of proximal development (зона ближайшего развития), often abbreviated ZPD, is the gap between a learners current or actual level of development determined by independent problem-solving and the learners emerging or potential level of development. ... Lois Holzman is a cofounder with Fred Newman of the East Side Institute for Group and Short Term Psychotherapy and the Institutes current director. ... Social therapy is an activity-theoretic practice developed outside of academia at the East Side Institute for Group and Short Term Psychotherapy in New York. ... 1993 (MCMXCIII) was a common year starting on Friday of the Gregorian calendar and marked the Beginning of the International Decade to Combat Racism and Racial Discrimination (1993-2003). ...

Newman has embraced Vygotskian teaching although Vygotsky himself never formally practiced psychotherapy. Nevertheless, Vygotsky's groundbreaking work in the areas of developmental psychology and psychopathology are used as the basis for core subjects at Harvard and many other leading graduate psychology programs.

Social activism

Newman founded a collective called Centers for Change (CFC) in the late 1960s after the student strikes at Columbia University. CFC was dedicated to leftwing community organizing and the practice of an evolving form of psychotherapy which Newman would refer to circa 1974 as "proletarian" therapy, subsequently adopting the name Social Therapy. CFC set up clinics and briefly ran a small alternative high school. Newman steered many of its members to Lyndon LaRouche's National Caucus of Labor Committees (NCLC) in 1973-74. LaRouche was also using psychotherapeutic concepts in his political theories and had attempted to destroy other leftist groups via Operation Mop Up, a series of violent attacks in 1973 directed primarily at the Communist Party and the Socialist Workers Party. The alliance between CFC and the NCLC began after Mop Up ended, and Newman and his followers are not known to have participated in subsequent NCLC violence. After a brief disastrous attempt at merger with the NCLC, Newman and his followers left to found the International Workers Party. The 1960s decade refers to the years from 1960 to 1969, inclusive. ... Columbia University is a private university whose main campus lies in the Morningside Heights neighborhood of the Borough of Manhattan in New York City. ... Community organizing is a process by which people are brought together to act in common self-interest. ... Defunct California Proposition 64 North American Labour Party Party for the Commonwealth of Canada Parti pour la république du Canada U.S. Labor Party Lyndon Hermyle LaRouche, Jr. ... Defunct California Proposition 64 North American Labour Party Party for the Commonwealth of Canada Parti pour la république du Canada U.S. Labor Party The National Caucus of Labor Committees (NCLC) is a political cadre organization in the United States founded and controlled by political activist Lyndon LaRouche, who... 1973 (MCMLXXIII) was a common year starting on Monday. ... The International Workers Party (IWP) is supposedly a secretive Marxist political organization founded by controversial organizer, playwright and psychotherapist Fred Newman. ...

In 1979 the Newman group launched the New Alliance Party (NAP). This entity publicly espoused positions less radical than those of the IWP, which continued to operate in secret. The NAP brought Newman's ideas to a much broader audience and ran election campaigns all over the country. By the mid-1980s, Lenora Fulani had become the NAP's chief public spokesperson, while Newman gradually transformed himself into a behind-the-scenes type of leader. This page refers to the year 1979. ... The New Alliance Party was an American political party formed by psychotherapists Fred Newman and Lenora Fulani. ... Lenora Branch Fulani (b. ...

In 1986, Newman ran for United States Senator from New York and in 1990 for New York State Attorney General.[1] 1986 (MCMLXXXVI) was a common year starting on Wednesday of the Gregorian calendar. ... The United States Senate is the upper house of the U.S. Congress, smaller than the United States House of Representatives. ... This article is about the year. ... See also Attorney General. ...

Playwriting

Newman was also the Artistic Director of the Castillo Theatre, which since the mid 1980s has produced over 100 plays written by him and other post-modern dramatists. Some of Newman's plays -- those with an alleged anti-Jewish slant -- have been sharply criticized by the media and by groups such as the Anti-Defamation League (ADL). For instance, he writes in "No Room for Zion" (1989) regarding an alleged shift in Jewish sentiments in the 1960s: The Anti-Defamation League (or ADL) is an organization founded by Bnai Brith in the United States whose stated aim is to stop, by appeals to reason and conscience and, if necessary, by appeals to law, the defamation of the Jewish people. ...

From the West Bank to the West Side of Manhattan, international Jewry was being forced to face its written-in-blood deal with the capitalist devil. In exchange for an unstable assimilation, Jews under the leadership of Zionism would "do-unto-others-what-others-had-done-unto-them." The others to be done unto? People of color. The doing? Ghettoization and genocide. The Jew, the dirty Jew, once the ultimate victim of capitalism's soul, fascism, would become a victimizer on behalf of capitalism, a self-righteous dehumanizer and murderer of people of color, a racist bigot whom in the language of Zionism changed the meaning of "Never Again" from "Never Again for anyone" to "Never again for us--and let the devil take everyone else."

Newman's Castillo Theatre plays on other topics have sometimes received positive reviews. His "Sally and Tom" about the slave-master relationship of Sally Hemings and Thomas Jefferson was described in 1999 as "a diamond in the off-off-Broadway rough" by Christian Science Monitor critic Ward Moorehouse III. Several of his plays, including "The Myth of Psychology" (not to be confused with his book of that title), have been performed at American Psychological Association conventions. Thomas Jefferson (April 13, 1743 N.S. – July 4, 1826) was the third President of the United States (1801–1809), principal author of the Declaration of Independence (1776), and an influential founder of the United States. ...

On December 6, 2005 Newman stepped down from his position as Castillo's Artistic Director as a result of controversy over a six-part investigative series the previous month on NY1 News (a cable TV news channel). The programs contained segments of an interview with Newman which the interviewer characterized as defending the right of psychotherapists to have sex with their patients. Castillo and its parent charity, the youth-oriented All Stars Project, embrace Newman's therapeutic approach in their work with adults, teenagers, and children as young as five. Journalist Dennis King has alleged that in the 1980s and 1990s, PR entities, a law firm and a newspaper controlled by Newman and the IWP defended high profile child abusers such as the Branch Davidians, Kodzo DoBosu and Tony Alamo--and that Newman's newspaper defended the North American Man-Boy Love Association (NAMBLA).[2] December 6 is the 340th day (341st on leap years) of the year in the Gregorian calendar. ... 2005 (MMV) was a common year starting on Saturday of the Gregorian calendar. ... NY1 (pronounced New York One) is a twenty-four hour news channel available exclusively to cable television customers within the five boroughs of New York City and nearby Bergen County, New Jersey. ... The Branch Davidians are a religious group originating from the Seventh_day Adventist church. ... Tony Alamo, from a tract left on a car windshield Tony Alamo (born 1934 as Bernie Lazar Hoffman), a controversial American preacher, singer, entrepreneur and evangelist. ... A NAMBLA logo. ...

All Stars and Castillo continue to be run by Newman's longtime partner Gabrielle Kurlander and other longtime supporters and therapy patients of Newman, some of whom live with Newman and Kurlander in a communal townhouse in Manhattan.[3] [4]

External links

For More Information on Newman

• Eastside Institute for Group and Short-term Psychotherapy
• The Social Therepay Group
• West Coast Center for Social Therapy
• Atlanta Center for Social Therapy
• DC Center for Social Therapy
• Castillo Theatre
• All Stars Project
• Committee for a Unified Independent Party
• Performing the World

Newman's Collaborators

• Lois Holzman, PhD

Anti-Newman

• Ex-IWP.org
• Journalist Dennis King