THE ORANGE PAPERS
A series of pages about Substance Misuse Recovery Programs, Real Recovery.
and Analysis of Alcoholics Anonymous.
An Online Book by "Orange"
"There is a principle which is a bar against all information,
which is proof against all arguments and which cannot fail to keep a man
in everlasting ignorance — that principle is contempt prior to
investigation."
HERBERT SPENCER
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The above famous misquote1
was put in the Big Book by William G. Wilson,
in Appendix II, "Spiritual Experience",
in the back of the second and third editions.
Bill Wilson was trying to imply that we should not dismiss his
"spiritual cure for alcoholism" without first trying it.
That is curious, because in 1864 Herbert Spencer was actually arguing against
fundamentalist religious beliefs and dogmatic blind faith,
and in favor of Charles Darwin's new theory of evolution.
Nevertheless, that quote sounds like good advice.
So let's really, honestly, investigate Alcoholics Anonymous,
without rejecting criticism of A.A. before investigation of
all of the facts...
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What is the REAL A.A. success rate?
Out of each 1000 newcomers to A.A., how many will pick up a one-year sobriety
medallion a year later? Or ever?
And how many will get their 2-year, and 5-year, and 10-year coins?
How about 11 years and 21 years?
HINT: the answers are here
and
here
and
here.
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Report broken links , vandalism/defacement or copyright issues to [email protected]. Terry/Orange - If you're still out there and want access to edit this site and take over the email account, just send me a note and verify yourself via Twitter and I will hand you the wheel. This site does not need donations, a small annuity pays for everything in perpetuity.
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CONTENTS:
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Pro-A.A. Propaganda, analyzed:
- A.A.-Booster Pseudo-Science: Spirituality: The key to recovery from alcoholism
- More A.A.-Booster Pseudo-Science: The Spiritual Dimension of Healing
- More Big Lies — A.A. Propaganda As Usual
- More A.A.-Booster Propaganda: the book
Cults: Faith, Healing, and Coercion, by Marc Galanter
- Five more fake-science AA-booster papers
- More A.A.-Booster Propaganda: The Cybernetics of Self
- The International Journal of Mental Health and Addiction
totally discredited the faked Humphries-Moos study that supposedly showed
that A.A. works better than Cognitive Behavioral Therapy.
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More pseudo-science and deceptions:
Lee Ann Kaskutas,
"Alcoholics Anonymous Effectiveness: Faith Meets Science".
- Dr. Harry Tiebout: The First Fascist Mad Scientist of A.A.
- Answer to a George Vaillant Speech
- The Recovery Propaganda Machine, part 7
- A reply to Kris Best's articles in the Lafayette Examiner
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- An Alternate View On Recovery:
- The Cult Test, and Alcoholics Anonymous as a Cult
-
The Religious Roots of A.A. and the Twelve Steps
- Introduction and Table of Contents
- Bill Wilson Writes The Steps
- Frank Buchman
- The Religious Tenets and Doctrines of Buchmanism
- The Cult Characteristics of the Oxford Groups
- The "First Century Christian Fellowship" Campus Crusade in the 1920s
- Hobnobbing With The Nabobs
- My God How The Money Rolls In
- Partying with the Nazi Party
- The Oxford Group Morphs Into MRA
- The Years Before the War: Appeasing Hitler, and Apologizing for Hitler
- Invasion of Poland, WWII starts in Europe
- A Slogan a Day Keeps The Thinking Away
- Pearl Harbor, The USA Is In It Now; You (Not Me) Can Defend America
- Dodging the Draft
- Sam Shoemaker Quits
- What Is Fascism? How Fascist Was Frank Buchman?
- The War Years: On the Road Again
- Henry Ford and Anti-Semitism
- After The War, Trouble With The Catholics
- Frank Buchman, Anti-Communist, Union-Buster, Spiritual Strike-Breaker
- Homophobia and Gay-Bashing
- Partying in a Fairy-Tale Castle
- Death of a Salesman, Peter Howard Takes Over
- The Last Hurrah: Up With People
- Obscurity
- Bill Wilson Gets Religion (And Drugs) And Sees God
- Bill and Dr. Bob start A.A.
- William Birney's interview of Frank Buchman for the New York World Telegraph
- Reinhold Niebuhr's "Hitler and
Buchman" article
- Rev. Ironside's Sermon On Buchmanism
- Review of Garth Lean's book, On The Tail of a Comet
- Footnotes
- Bibliography
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Letters, We Get Lots of Mail...
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Auxillary and Supporting Documents
- Definitions of Some Commonly-Used A.A. Words
- How to use Worldcat to find books
- The Stock Prospectus for the 100 Men Corporation
- Works Publishing Financial Statement, June 1940.
- Original Big Book assignment of copyright to Works Publishing, Inc. document.
- Bill's 1941 Memo (PDF) about bringing more money into the A.A. headquarters.
- Cleveland, 1944: Clarence Snyder's objections
- GSC51 (pdf) == AA GS Conference report from 1950, where Bill Wilson helped himself to even more money.
See a discussion of this document
here.
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Bill Wilson's Last Will and Testament, leaving ten percent of his estate
to his favorite mistress, Helen Wynn, and the other ninety percent
to his wife Lois.
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Lois Wilson's Last Will and Testament, where the royalty money
for all of Bill's books leaves the A.A. fellowship forever.
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Original Works Publishing Company name change document, page 1.
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Original Works Publishing Company name change document, page 2.
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Original Works Publishing Company name change document, page 3.
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Bill Wilson's royalty agreement of 1963 with A.A.W.S., Inc.
- Henry Parkhurst's handwritten outline for the Big Book (.pdf file)
- 1941 Letter Bill W. To Dr. Bob.jpg == Comment on this document here.
- 1941 Letter Bill W. To Dr. Bob 2.jpg == Comment on this document here.
- 1945 Bill W. to Gerig.jpg == Comment on this document here.
- Henrietta Seiberling's letter
- A letter from someone who knew him: Tom Powers, the co-author of Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions was a crazy scheming lying child-molesting con-man who never stopped drinking.
- What Is The Oxford Group? (PDF) by "The Layman with a Notebook"
- H. A. Ironside: The Oxford Group Movement: Is It Scriptural?
- H. A. Walter: Soul Surgery. A manual for the Oxford Group cult religion.
- I Was A Pagan, by Vic Kitchen. A manual for the Oxford Group cult religion.
- Leonard V. Harrison 1946 Statement, disagreeing with
Bill Wilson about how A.A. should be organized
- Original 1940 A.A. Pamphlet by Larry J (pdf)
- First Alcoholic Foundation Pamphlet (pdf)
- Judge John T.: The "We Are The Chosen
People" Idolatry
- The Common Sense of Drinking,
by Richard R. Peabody. A 1930s look at drinking.
- Dr. Arthur H. Cain: First Harper's and Saturday Evening Post articles critical of A.A.
- The Nation on A.A.:
"Alcoholics Anonymous, the Dangers of Success", 1964.
- Testimony of Chuck C. before a U.S. Senate subcommittee
- Bill Wilson's speech at Dr. Bob's Memorial Service
- Bill Wilson's testimony before the U.S. Senate, 1969.
- Tiebout: The Act of Surrender
in the Therapeutic Process
- Tiebout: Direct Treatment of a Symptom
- Tiebout: The Ego Factors
in Surrender in Alcoholism
- Tiebout: Surrender Versus
Compliance In Therapy with Special Reference to Alcoholism
- Robert Warner's page, "How A.A. Steals Your Soul"
- A Cult Called AA by Paul Roasberry
- S.O.S. Europe's Description of a Cult
- Berkeley Revive's cult description
- Totalism in Today's Cults by Jan Groenvald
- Paul Diener on
A.A., the Oxford Group and the
British Fascists at Oxford in the 1930s
- Paul Diener's
letters to the Addict-L mailing list.
- More inconsistencies: More of the propaganda trick of inconsistency
- A pamphlet by A.A. members, criticizing the leadership
- Unnamed AA2 Group File from the Midwest, pre-2005, A.A. propaganda about recovery
- 2011_Marcus_Chatfield.pdf,
Marcus Chatfield's interview with William White about Straight,
the child-abusing "rehab" program
- Grant of Authority: A.A. General Manager Greg Muth authorizing
the German A.A. organization to sue A.A. members who were publishing their
own translation of the old out-of-copyright first edition of the Big Book
- Spirituality versus Legalism in Alcoholics Anonymous, by
Charlie Bishop, Jr. — About the lawsuits over expired and invalid copyrights
- A lawyer's opinion to Greg Muth, declaring that the 400 multilith
(mimeograph) copies of the Big Book that Bill Wilson made and sold were
not a problem to the copyright. Of course the lawyer maintained the fiction that the copies were all stamped
"Loaner Copy", which they were not.
- Changing the Fellowship of Alcoholics Anonymous, One Conference At A Time
— a document complaining about how the A.A. headquarters has made unauthorized changes to A.A.
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Letter from Gordon M. Patrick, former Trustee Emeritus of the General
Service Board, to Dr. Elaine McDowell, PhD
Chair, General Service Board, requesting that his name be removed from all Alcoholics Anonymous literature
because of spiritual shortcomings of A.A.
- Remaking A Man; One Successful Method Of Mental Refitting,
by Courtnay Baylor of the Emmanuel Movement, Boston, 1919 (Note that Courtnay Baylor treated Rowland Hazard,
who supposedly learned from Dr. Carl Jung
that religious fanaticism was a cure for alcohol addiction.)
-
The_Mathematics_of_Alcoholics_Anonymous_-_Part_1.pdf — Analysis of the mathematics of Alcoholics Anonymous, using A.A.'s own published documents
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The_Mathematics_of_Alcoholics_Anonymous_-_Part_2.pdf — Analysis of the mathematics of Alcoholics Anonymous, using A.A.'s own published documents
- A spreadsheet about the Foxhall Group's retention rate
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1989_Membership_Survey_Form_Blank.pdf ; Size: 244 k
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2007_Membership_Survey_Form_Blank.pdf ; Size: 58 k
- Commentary on the Triennial Surveys (from 1977 to 1989), A.A. internal document number 5M/12-90/TC
- Historymetaphor.pdf, by Peter Ferentzy and Nigel Turner,
a history of the debate about whether problem gambling is literally a disease, or only metaphorically so.
Much is also applicable to alcohol abuse and A.A.
- A magazine article from 1954: Alcoholics Anonymous:
No Booze But Plenty of Babes
- 12 Steps To Nowhere by J. Timothy Hunt
- More Pseudo-Intellectual Bull: The_Cybernetics_of_Self by Gregory Bateson, and an analysis of it.
- A paper by the World Health
Organization in Europe which states that both 12 Step facilitation and Alcoholics
Anonymous are ineffective
- Here's an interesting study from Germany in 2007 that concluded that
"The present study was unable to show an advantage of self-help group [AA]
attendance in reducing relapses compared to the control group."
THE IMPACT OF SELF-HELP GROUP ATTENDANCE ON RELAPSE RATES AFTER ALCOHOL DETOXIFICATION
IN A CONTROLLED STUDY.
http://alcalc.oxfordjournals.org/content/42/2/108.long
Also see the discussion of it here:
https://www.orange-papers.info/orange-letters406.html#Iamnotastatistic
- Report: The Scientology recovery hoax
called "Narconon" doesn't work either.
- A.A. finances:
- A.A. finances for 2004
- Response to above letter from former A.A. EDP manager: the A.A. headquarters is filing false financial reports with the IRS
- more discussion of finances
- Use Guidestar to investigate the General_Service_Board
- More on A.A. headquarters finances
- links to A.A. financial reports
- More on the A.A. finances
- International Cultic Studies Association Cult Checklist
- More humor:
- Do You Think Too Much?
- A 12-Step program for the dead.
- A letter to the editors of the WSWS about Frank Buchman's Fascist leanings
- An autobiography written for SOS
- A History of Agnostic Groups
in Alcoholics Anonymous: Part 1 By Roger C
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This web site, all of these pages
and all of this information was suddenly totally erased
without prior warning or notice, or explanation,
on Sunday, April 20, 2003, by Geocities.Yahoo.Com,
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Read the story here.
Join the Blue Ribbon Online Free Speech Campaign!
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The censors and the book-burners are at it again.
Now my email is
Blocked by AOL!
Wednesday morning, December 28, 2005, I answered an email
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Footnotes:
1)
Michael has done a lot of research on that quote, and he found that it actually came
from William Paley, not Herbert Spencer. See Michael's paper here:
Survival_of_a_Fitting_Quotation.pdf
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Acknowledgements:
Copyright 2016 asserted by A. Orange on orange-papers.org [Mirror on the Wayback Machine establishing asserted copyright]
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