[ Link here = http://www.orange-papers.info/orange-letters322.html#Amy_S ]

Date: Tue, August 14, 2012 10:12 pm     (answered 19 August 2012)
From: "amy S."
Subject: Bill wilson.

Hi,

Saw your blog/rant about Bill wilson. I have a few questions for you. And some observations.

1. Bill Wilson is dead. He was just a guy. Why butcher a dead guy? What is the point of that? So what if he was crazy? What if I did a paper on your dead friend, parent, or significant other after they died and published it on the internet? That sounds pathetic... a waste of time, doesn't it?

2. So, he was screwed up. Show me one alcoholic who is not a liar, cheat, or thief. Just one. In fact, show me one AA member who won't admit to being a liar, cheat, or thief. That's a bigger task for ya.

3. Isn't it odd how his program has helped millions get sober and stay sober long after he was gone? Maybe it works for some. Maybe it doesn't for others. Would you rather alcoholics not try to get sober? And, if AA weren't around, how could they get sober and stay sober anonymously? Do you think that a true alcoholic can just stop on their own willpower or is medical research just wrong?

4. He stole some ideas, concepts, ghost wrote stuff, etc. Not a secret. Are you trying to give us some kind of revelation here?

5. I am a member of AA. I don't worship wilson or smith. I don't believe any aa member does, but can you tell me how anything you wrote matters? So he did what he did, and it continues to benefit millions around the globe. If alcoholics are sitting in rooms drinking coffe and chewing or smoking tobacco instead of running rampid in the community, what do you care? I am not driving around intoxicated gunning for pedestrians. But, I chew tobacco. That is a crime? I am sober, so what's the issue? That is my personal choice, just as staying or leaving AA is my personal choice. As one aa member stated "you have to feed the good dog, and the bad dog" Chewing is feeding my addict. Or, would you rather I just get loaded and use my car?

6. People in cults have a hard time leaving... given threats, cohersion, etc. I can walk out any time, and any AA member would freely let me go.

7. God. If you haven't figured it out, its about a God that you understand (which is different for everyone). By that standard, you couldn't qualify AA as a religion.

8. If you ever knew anything about alcoholism, you would know its not about drinking. Alcoholism happens when you stop drinking. This was the point Bill was trying to make. We are the bottom of the barrell. We have to live peacefully somehow, because we can't do it loaded, and we can't do it alone without alcohol. So the steps are in place to teach us how to live as best we can, despite our fucked~up~ed~ness. So, if the program helps millions stop themselves from suicide, homicide, pedricide (pedestrians, of course)... why on earth are you upset? We aren't hurting you, your family, your friends. Bill acknowledged he wasn't a saint. Why are you pointing that out after he did? (I am laughing as I write this)

And why, for god's sake, do you even invest time trying to tear apart a dead guy? Reading your thing here is like reading an athiest's paper. Nobody cares and the opinion doesn't affect the lives of... well, anyone.

And for the record, I always offer to buy newcomers drinks. I am not anti~alcohol. I do not care what someone does as long as it doesn't hurt anyone else, or themselves. They can't come back dead, but they can come to the rooms drunk. Does that sound cultish to you? Shit, they can have as much coffee or sugar or tobacco as they want. Doesn't matter to me.

You are telling the truth to a degree. I shrug. It keeps me sober, so what do I care how or why he did what he did? And if I am a member, and I don't care, why the hell do you care?

Just sayin.

Hello Amy,

Thanks for the letter. Now I'll go through your questions one by one:

1. Bill Wilson is dead. He was just a guy. Why butcher a dead guy? What is the point of that? So what if he was crazy? What if I did a paper on your dead friend, parent, or significant other after they died and published it on the internet? That sounds pathetic... a waste of time, doesn't it?

Bill Wilson is dead, but the cult that he founded continues to harm people, and his untruths are repeated many thousands of times every day by a lot of uninformed, misguided people. I'm fighting that.

2. So, he was screwed up. Show me one alcoholic who is not a liar, cheat, or thief. Just one. In fact, show me one AA member who won't admit to being a liar, cheat, or thief. That's a bigger task for ya.

That is the standard propaganda trick of Minimization and Denial. Sick people deserve better treatment than the lies and cult religion and quackery of such a criminal.

By the way, I notice how you stereotype alcoholics as bad people: "liar, cheat, or thief." Like Penn & Teller said in their TV program on A.A.: "Alcoholics Anonymous has no respect for alcoholics." Look here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uU2YliYttnQ&feature;=share

3. Isn't it odd how his program has helped millions get sober and stay sober long after he was gone? Maybe it works for some. Maybe it doesn't for others. Would you rather alcoholics not try to get sober? And, if AA weren't around, how could they get sober and stay sober anonymously? Do you think that a true alcoholic can just stop on their own willpower or is medical research just wrong?

No, "his program" has not "helped millions get sober and stay sober". That is the standard A.A. Big Lie. It's some completely untrue grandiose bragging that is a total reversal of reality. A.A. has a horrendous failure rate, coupled with an appalling death rate. The A.A. Trustee Dr. Prof. George E. Vaillant said that. (Look here.)

Your nonsense about how alcoholics cannot figure out how to quit drinking is just Bill Wilson's lies, declaring that alcoholics must join Bill's cult or else they will die. Alcoholics figure out how to quit drinking, every day:

4. He stole some ideas, concepts, ghost wrote stuff, etc. Not a secret. Are you trying to give us some kind of revelation here?

Actually, the truth about Bill Wilson and the A.A. history is one of the best-kept secrets around. Most A.A. members never hear the truth. You sure won't hear it in an A.A. meeting.

5. I am a member of AA. I don't worship wilson or smith. I don't believe any aa member does, but can you tell me how anything you wrote matters? So he did what he did, and it continues to benefit millions around the globe. If alcoholics are sitting in rooms drinking coffe and chewing or smoking tobacco instead of running rampid in the community, what do you care? I am not driving around intoxicated gunning for pedestrians. But, I chew tobacco. That is a crime? I am sober, so what's the issue? That is my personal choice, just as staying or leaving AA is my personal choice. As one aa member stated " you have to feed the good dog, and the bad dog" Chewing is feeding my addict. Or, would you rather I just get loaded and use my car?

Again, you are wallowing in Minimization and Denial. Foisting an old fascistic cult religion from the nineteen-thirties on sick people is a crime. Actually, it's several felonies, including fraud and practicing medicine without a license. And it's manslaughter when your sponsees die or commit suicide.

You may not worship Bill Wilson or Doctor Bob, but A.A. does. Whose lies are read out loud from Big Book pages 58 through 60 at the start of every A.A. meeting? Whose picture is on the wall at the front of the room, if there are any people's pictures on the wall?

(click on image for larger version)

My 12-Step cocaine-snorting child-raping Internet child pornographer "counselor" also told me not to quit smoking cigarettes in addition to quitting drinking by saying, "If you put too much on your plate, something might spill off."
Fortunately, I had to good sense to ignore his bad advice. I now have 11, almost 12, years off of both alcohol and tobacco, while he has a long prison record and is a registered sex offender. I sure am glad that I didn't listen to him. Good health is such a joy. It's so good to be able to ride my bicycle, even uphill, without getting all out of breath and huffing and puffing and feeling like I'm going to die.

6. People in cults have a hard time leaving... given threats, cohersion, etc. I can walk out any time, and any AA member would freely let me go.

Baloney. Again, that is more Minimization and Denial. Leaving is not easy. You never wised up and left, did you?

Tell me how easy it was after you wake up and learn the truth and quit A.A. and deprogram from the cult. Tell me then how easy it is.

And if you tell me that you can quit the cult any time you want, but you just don't want to, I'll point out that alcoholics and cigarette smokers use the very same excuse for not quitting their addictions.

There are plenty of threats in A.A. — threats of death, threats of relapse, threats of insanity, warnings that people will turn into "Dry Drunks" — if they quit Alcoholics Anonymous. A.A. has lots of slogans like:

• "You must Work A Strong Program, or else your fate will be Jails, Institutions, or Death."
• "If you drink, your fate is jails, institutions, or death."
• "If you leave A.A., your fate is jails, institutions, or death."
• "I've been in jails; I've been in institutions; there's only one more place to go."
• "The bottle, big house, or the box."
• "Death, insanity, or recovery."
• "Always remember the insanity... Be thankful for the pain... But most of all be thankful for the days that remain."
• "The choice I have today is either to be Contented or Demented."
• "It's Bill's way or the you'll get killed way."
• "It's Our Way or the Die Way."
• "Work the Steps, Or Die!"
• "Do The Steps or Die."
• "Share Or Die."
• "Talk Or Die."
• "Change Or Die."

7. God. If you haven't figured it out, its about a God that you understand (which is different for everyone). By that standard, you couldn't qualify AA as a religion.

More baloney. Making up a phoney home-made God and endowing it with miraculous powers and believing that your new "Higher Power" will save your life is the worst kind of superstitious idolatry. What if your new "god" doesn't feel like obeying your orders and granting your wishes and saving you?

And who says that a cloudy-headed, confused, detoxing alcoholic whom you just described as "liar, cheat, or thief" is a wise theologian who can "understand God" correctly? On the one hand, A.A. declares that newcomers cannot think correctly — "Your best thinking got you here" — and alcoholics are "powerless over alcohol" — and they are loaded with sins that they need to confess — and they are "selfish and manipulative and only care about getting high" — but they are suddenly good clear-headed theologians who can pick an appropriate "god" from a myriad of conflicting choices? That is a major contradiction in the A.A. religion.

Also, your claim that A.A. does not then qualify as a religion is ridiculous. Of course A.A. is a religion — it's just a very illogical heretical religion where you can practice idolatry.

And even worse, you assume that everybody will choose a "God" that conforms to A.A. specifications. What if "God" does not wish to restore you to sanity in Step 2, or take care of your will and your life for you in Step 3, or remove all of your shortcomings and defects in Step 7? Well then, you are screwed. God must "work a strong 12-Step program", or else you are dead.

You just assume that "God" will micro-manage the world and do as you wish. If someone believes in Buddhism, where there is no manipulative God who pulls puppet strings and grants wishes and answers prayers, then the A.A. program cannot work. In fact, the A.A. program cannot work with any kind of "God" but the A.A. kind of god. "God" must be a tyrannical dictatorial micro-managing, meddling, string-pulling puppet master or else the 12-Step program cannot work. So you can't have just any kind of God, you must have the A.A. kind of god, or else.

If you believe that God has nothing better to do with His time than wait on you and answer your prayers and grant your wishes and save your miserable ass, then you don't believe in God, you believe in Santa Claus.

8. If you ever knew anything about alcoholism, you would know its not about drinking. Alcoholism happens when you stop drinking. This was the point Bill was trying to make. We are the bottom of the barrell. We have to live peacefully somehow, because we can't do it loaded, and we can't do it alone without alcohol. So the steps are in place to teach us how to live as best we can, despite our fucked~up~ed~ness. So, if the program helps millions stop themselves from suicide, homicide, pedricide (pedestrians, of course)... why on earth are you upset? We aren't hurting you, your family, your friends. Bill acknowledged he wasn't a saint. Why are you pointing that out after he did? (I am laughing as I write this)

That is more double-talk. Of course "alcoholism" is about drinking alcohol. "Alcoholism" is not what "happens when you stop drinking." You are trying to completely redefine the word "alcoholism" as something other than drinking alcohol. You are trying to make "alcoholism" into a "spiritual disease" that is not caused by drinking alcohol. I suspect that what you are really trying to do is push Dr. Frank Buchman's ideas about unconfessed sins as the cause of drinking too much alcohol. And you will probably also try to claim that "alcoholism" is failure to live your life according to Dr. Frank Buchman's crazy occult practices, although you won't mention Buchman's name or admit where Bill Wilson got that insane nonsense. Again, that is another standard cult characteristic, or rather, two of them: Loaded Language and Redefined Words, and secret insiders-only meanings of words.

Failure to practice Dr. Frank Buchman's religion properly is not the cause of excessive alcohol consumption, and Frank's religion is not the cure for alcohol abuse.

The 12 Steps are Dr. Frank Buchman's cult religion recruiting and indoctrination tricks, not something that teaches people how to live well.

The statement that we cannot do it alone is just another standard A.A. Big Lie. Of course we can do it alone. The vast majority of people who successfully sober themselves up do it alone. Both the Harvard Medical School and the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism said that. Look here. The A.A. slogan that "nobody can do it alone" is just another demand that people join the A.A. cult.

This statement of yours:

We have to live peacefully somehow, because we can't do it loaded, and we can't do it alone without alcohol.

...is again stereotyping alcoholics as bad people. Who says that we cannot live peacefully alone without alcohol? Only A.A. members who want us to join their cult — A.A. recruiters who want us to believe that we really need Alcoholics Anonymous. A.A. just never stops talking about what bad, defective, immoral people alcoholics really are. Go read The "Us Stupid Drunks" Conspiracy.

That is another A.A. flip-flop, or bait-and-switch trick:

1. First they will tell you that an alcoholic is just a good person who can't control his drinking, but later they will tell you that an alcoholic is a disgusting immoral selfish evil creature who has a "spiritual disease".

2. The medical-to-moral morph: First, alcoholism is a disease to be cured, and then it is a sin that must be removed by God.

3. First, alcoholics are charming, and then they are disgusting.

Alcohol does not help people to "live peacefully". It tends to make people more violent, so that whole statement about alcoholics not being able to live peacefully alone without alcohol is nonsense.

And actually, yes, A.A. is hurting my friends. Seeing that happen is what got me started on the Orange Papers. (Look here and here.)

Bill Wilson declaring that he wasn't a saint is just another mind game. He alternated between that and hinting that he got a Message from God. So Bill wasn't a saint, but he was a saint. It just depends on which page of the Big Book you are reading.

Saint Bill Wilson posing for a staged "man on the bed" publicity photograph, where he supposedly did miraculous faith healings. Bill liked to brag about drunks being healed by "one drunk talking with another", and that the drunks would then get out of bed, pick up their beds, and walk, just like in the story of Jesus healing the cripple by the pool (John 5:2). Notice the cross on the wall. This photograph was very carefully staged for best effect.

In addition, A.A. members excuse themselves for quite a variety of sins and crimes by declaring "We are not saints", as if that admission suddenly makes it okay to sexually exploit the newcomer girls.

Lastly, you said,

So, if the program helps millions stop themselves from suicide, homicide, pedricide (pedestrians, of course)... why on earth are you upset?

The actual results of the A.A. program are the opposite of what you are trying to assert with that big fat "IF". That is the propaganda trick of "Sly Suggestions" — just suggest that something might be true without supplying any facts to back up the statement. And that is also another reversal of reality. Here are the real results of the A.A. program:

1. The effective A.A. cure rate, above and beyond normal spontaneous remission, is zero.
2. Sponsors do great harm by telling their new sponsees not to take their medications.
3. The historical A.A. success rate was never any good.
   
4. A.A. increases the binge drinking rate.
5. A.A. increases the death rate.
6. A.A. has a really bad sexual abuse rate.
7. A.A. increases the suicide rate.
8. A.A. increases the divorce rate.

Click on any of those items to get the whole story.

Now I'll ask you the same question as I've asked so many other A.A. defenders: Please answer this one simple question that no true-believer Stepper has ever answered honestly: (Can we please have some of the "rigorous honesty" that Bill Wilson bragged about on page 58 of the Big Book?)

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 even several years later? And how many will get their 2-year, and 5-year, and 10-year coins? Ever? How about 11 years and 21 years? HINT: the answers are here and here and here.

And why, for god's sake, do you even invest time trying to tear apart a dead guy? Reading your thing here is like reading an athiest's paper. Nobody cares and the opinion doesn't affect the lives of... well, anyone.

Again, Bill Wilson's evil lives on after him. He was a criminal con artist, not a prophet who saved millions. And people should know that.

And for the record, I always offer to buy newcomers drinks. I am not anti~alcohol. I do not care what someone does as long as it doesn't hurt anyone else, or themselves. They can't come back dead, but they can come to the rooms drunk. Does that sound cultish to you? Shit, they can have as much coffee or sugar or tobacco as they want. Doesn't matter to me.

Offering to buy drinks for A.A. newcomers is very unwise. Hasn't it occurred to you that you may be doing grievous harm to people who are trying to quit drinking, and are very shakey and unsure of themselves? What if they take you up on the offer? You just destroyed someone's sobriety. Will you then insist that they weren't sincere in their desire to get sober, so you aren't to blame?

I'm glad you weren't around when I was quitting drinking. With friends like you, who needs enemies?

You are telling the truth to a degree. I shrug. It keeps me sober, so what do I care how or why he did what he did? And if I am a member, and I don't care, why the hell do you care?

A.A. does not keep you sober. If you are sober, it's because you keep yourself sober. You control your own hands and your own mind and you choose not to drink alcohol. The fact that you waste your spare time by attending the meetings of a cult religion does not mean that the cult is doing anything good for you.

And, you just said that you offer to buy drinks for A.A. newcomers. That sure isn't A.A. keeping people sober. If anybody is sober, it is in spite of your "help", not because of it.

Again, I care because A.A. is a fraud that hurts more people than it helps, and some of those people are friends of mine.

I must thank you for this letter again, because it is such a great example of Cult-think. It's just a non-stop stream of A.A. slogans and misinformation and A.A. falsehoods and A.A. Big Lies. I couldn't make up this kind of stuff if I tried.

Have a good day now.

== Orange

*             orange@orange-papers.info        *
*         AA and Recovery Cult Debunking      *
*          http://www.Orange-Papers.org/      *
**     
**     Therefore we [AA] have the full benefits of the murderous
**     political dictatorships of today but none of their liabilities.
**     Alcoholics Anonymous Comes Of Age, William G. Wilson, pages 105—106.
**     The full benefits of murderous dictatorships?
**     What benefits? Benefits for whom?
**     And what liabilities of murderous dictatorships
**     does Alcoholics Anonymous not have?

[The next letter from Amy_S is here.]

May 16, 2012, Wednesday: Portland, Oregon The Hawthorne Bridge This is one of the oldest operational lift bridges in the USA. Then I saw a really gruesome scene under the bridge: Fire and Rescue Department retrieving a dead body from the river It happens. They fish a few dead bodies out of the river each year. Retrieving a body Retrieving a body What really got me was when they threw the dead body back into the water and sped away. What? They don't want the body? Are they just going to leave it for somebody else downstream to pick up? Then they looped around and came back and rescued the body again. It turned out that the body was a dummy, and they were just practicing their pick-ups. Portland Fire and Rescue boat, going away without the body [More Portland photos below, here.]

[The previous letter from Amy_S is here.]

[ Link here = http://www.orange-papers.info/orange-letters322.html#Amy_S2 ]

[These letters crossed in the mail. Amy sent in the next two letters before I sent off the previous answer, and I wrote and sent that answer before I read these letters.]

Date: Sun, August 19, 2012 1:32 am     (answered 21 August 2012)
From: "Amy S."
Subject:

I am still wondering why you choose to berate an entire spiritual program that has worked for millions of people. Please... at least answer my questions.

1. Over two hundred twelve step programs have started since AA... all still in existance. Therefore, people are staying sober. Why berate something successful?

2. If someone is smoking a cig instead of drinking copious amounts of alcohol and getting into a car~how is that a detriment to you?

3. If members of a group can choose any God they want, come and go freely, and choose which suggestions to follow~ how can the group be labeled a cult?

4. If a sane person were to gather advice, suggestions, and use it in his\her own life, find peace, and then pass the info on to others, that would be acceptable.... but an insane person fighting for his\her life doing the same thing is unacceptable? Does it matter which means I use to save my life, or do I have to "play fair" to meet your standard?

5. If I have a cough for fifteen years, and my doctor tells me I have lung cancer... when I go home and the cough goes away do I still have lung cancer? (Assuming yes... can't the same be said for one who stops drinking? Still an alcoholic? Yes. Wouldn't some form of moral psychology be necessary?)

At least have the decency to answer those.

Hello again, Amy,

Okay, I'll answer them:

I am still wondering why you choose to berate an entire spiritual program that has worked for millions of people. Please... at least answer my questions.

A.A. has not worked for millions. The "millions" number is a blatant lie, one that A.A. never tires of repeating. As I said in the previous letter, I have already discussed and refuted the "millions" number at length, many times, like here: There are no millions saved by A.A.

And there is nothing "spiritual" about Alcoholics Anonymous. Foisting an old pro-fascist cult religion from the nineteen-thirties on sick people and lying to them about how well it works is not spiritual. It is Satanic.

1. Over two hundred twelve step programs have started since AA... all still in existance. Therefore, people are staying sober. Why berate something successful?

The fact that there are many clone 12-Step organizations does not prove or even indicate that they are good things.

Again, you supplied no real actual numbers of people staying sober. A.A. is not successful — it's a total failure. See the previous letter to you for A.A. failure rates.

2. If someone is smoking a cig instead of drinking copious amounts of alcohol and getting into a car~how is that a detriment to you?

You really are reaching to defend your tobacco addiction, aren't you? You just don't want to give it up, do you?

Dying from tobacco is hardly an improvement over dying from alcohol.

3. If members of a group can choose any God they want, come and go freely, and choose which suggestions to follow~ how can the group be labeled a cult?

You don't even understand what a cult is. Giving people the fake "freedom" to choose any name for their "higher power" does not change a cult into a good organization. Go read the Cult Test to understand what a cult is.

Your defenses are irrelevant excuses. To "work a strong program", an A.A. member must "choose" a "Higher Power" who grants wishes and answers prayers and takes care of people's wills and lives for them, and then talks to them in a séance and tells them what to do. That is not freedom.

Then, being able to come and go doesn't make an organization not a cult. You can come and go from Scientology and the Moonies, too. And most other cults.

And the A.A. "suggestions" are not "suggestions". They are demands and instructions. You cannot qualify as a "good member" who is "working a strong program" unless you do all of the Steps, and more.

That is just another bait-and-switch trick: First they tell you that "There are no 'Musts' in Alcoholics Anonymous, only suggestions", but then they will tell you that there are many necessities and musts.

4. If a sane person were to gather advice, suggestions, and use it in his\her own life, find peace, and then pass the info on to others, that would be acceptable.... but an insane person fighting for his\her life doing the same thing is unacceptable? Does it matter which means I use to save my life, or do I have to "play fair" to meet your standard?

That is nonsense. It isn't a matter of someone gathering advice and suggestions. It is a matter of Bill Wilson repackaging and selling Dr. Frank Buchman's cult religion, and that cult religion is a harmful evil thing.

5. If I have a cough for fifteen years, and my doctor tells me I have lung cancer... when I go home and the cough goes away do I still have lung cancer? (Assuming yes... can't the same be said for one who stops drinking? Still an alcoholic? Yes. Wouldn't some form of moral psychology be necessary?)

That doesn't make a lot of sense. I would suggest that if someone quits drinking and stays quit for many years, maybe we shouldn't call him an alcoholic any more. Maybe an ex-drinker, or maybe just a normal person. Or maybe just human. It really depends on your definition of "alcoholic". A.A. uses at least four different definitions of "alcoholic", and mixes them up, which confuses the issue.

The definitions are:

1. An alcoholic is someone who habitually drinks far too much alcohol.
2. An alcoholic is someone who is hyper-sensitive to alcohol, almost allergic to alcohol, perhaps a genetic alcoholic; someone who cannot drink even one drink or his drinking will spin out of control and he will become readdicted to alcohol.
3. An alcoholic is somebody who cannot quit drinking — he is "powerless" over alcohol.
4. An alcoholic is an insane sinner who is full of disgusting character defects and moral shortcomings and resentments and barely-contained anger, and is a prime example of self-will run riot and instincts run wild and selfishness and self-seeking and the Seven Deadly Sins, although he doesn't think so... etc., etc., ...

When I call myself an alcoholic, I usually mean definition 2, and only occasionally definition 1, but never definitions 3 or 4.

1. By definition 1, I stopped being an alcoholic more than 11 years ago.
2. By definition 2, I will always be an alcoholic.
3. By definition 3, I wasn't an alcoholic, because I could quit drinking, and I did. I was not "powerless over alcohol". I even quit drinking without any help from A.A., because I quit drinking two weeks before I was ever sent to an A.A. meeting.
4. By definition 4, I was never an alcoholic. I was always a nice drunk. People liked having me at their parties because I was so much fun to have around when I got high. (But, as one friend said, "Even nice drunks die of cirrhosis of the liver...")

Your "moral psychology" argument is just an attempt to declare that ex-drinkers need Dr. Frank Buchman's cult religion to fix their morals. Again, you are flip-flopping between alcoholism being a drinking problem or a moral problem.

At least have the decency to answer those.

Okay, they are answered.

Date: Sun, August 19, 2012 3:25 am     (answered 21 August 2012)
From: "Amy S."
Subject: Ok, maybe I see your point

Hi,

I guess, as an outsider, you would view AA as... you do. You aren't in it, and from what I gather, you haven't gotton the best feedback. Most of the letters that you posted were hilarious, at best, and mostly~it seems~by people who left the program early on. It seems like you haven't gotton a take on AA from anyone truly sober for any significant length of time. I think, mostly that's because we follow anonymity~ its a personal thing. Very personal.

AA is run by the group. There is no leader, not even with world services. We make decisions as a group. We have no authority. We vote, as a group. We are criminals, addicts, thieves, etc. I mean, what do you expect? Even our founders were sick. We don't deny that. But, it isn't what you say it is... no one has run my life. No one has told me I must or must not do something. Not one person has threatened me in any way (to include working with the pacific group). My sponsor has always been more of a friend, someone I have been able to talk to, and we have always believed that life is more than aa. I hear "AA is not about drinking, but about living" more times a day than I can count.

I was surprised that people were upset that AA'ers were going to bars. We can do that. The book says we can. In no way is that innapropriate. I was at a bar last week. Didn't drink a drop of alcohol. Not a big deal to me, as I do not obsess over alcohol. I have issues with other things, and alcohol is not one of those things... hasn't been for five years.

I have yet to meet a recruiter for AA. Uh, I have never heard of such a thing. I have never been paid a dime for anything AA related. Recruiters just don't exist. We aren't like the army. There is no place to go where we sit and sell anything. We simply talk to people about how we stopped, and stayed stopped. If they want to stop, fine. If not, fine.

I have yet to hear of any sponsor telling a sponsee not to go to college, to stop taking medication, etc. My sponsor suggested I get a job, and go to school. I did both, and my life got better, quickly. Not once have I been yelled at, even when I was yelling (which, sadly, has happened).

AA is all over. Bill himself stated that no person should ever sit and rely completely on AA. It is in his letter on emotional sobriety. We should not rely on aa.We are not to sit in the meeting halls and do nothing with our lives. How do you think we became judges and lawyers and put in position of power? Two presidents were members of AA. We are encouraged to be productive. We are encouraged to rebuild our lives. You seem to loathe that we are in the justice system... yet, you don't seem to understand that alcoholism can hit anyone of any standing. And, if a judge has multiple years of sobrity... through AA... he or she would be much more apt to put people in that program. Do you really believe that judges and lawyers who have time in sobriety got to that level because they were told to sit in AA?

Bill and Bob didn't try to recruit people. They didn't even know what they were doing. The people they spoke with often did not stay sober, but Bill and BOB did. The same applies. I have had more sponsees drink than I can count. Doesn't matter to me. I am not in it for numbers.

It is common among AA for people to drink. We think something like two out of ten actually stay sober. Its those two that actually take suggestions (surrender). Those are the two that rarely fail, as they have followed the path.

Not many people want to put that much work into something... many feel it should magically get better. The steps are actually difficult. Looking at yourself is not easy, not even for non alcoholics. We live in a world of quick fixes, medication, and constant therapy. Not many people want to talk about God.... whatever that is. They want to find the fastest way possible to beat the game. For me, and many like me, I don't want to beat the game. There is no game.

I want to stay alive. I want a better life. Taking a pill every day, going to church, or therapy... those things didn't work. I tried them all. No one came to my house and helped me throw out my alcohol. No one helped me mop the blood off of the bathtub walls, where my head was stuck the night before. No one recruited me into AA. I stopped drinking, and I showed up in meeting halls eleven days later.

You were correct in some of what you wrote. Some people, usually people with less than five years, talk incessantly about drunk stories, and copy sponsors. To people with time, it is annoying beyond belief. We often say fake it till you make it or act as if because they don't know themselves yet. They don't know how to behave. They don't know what the program is about. They don't have a sober history... many come from broken homes, broken families, homelessness, violence, rage, etc. To get to the heart of the problem, sometimes you have to wait until someone is ready to talk about what really happened to them, uncover the anger. It actually takes a long time. Rather than threaten or force them to reveal parts of themselves, its easier to let them do it on their own~ but they need some kind of way to get through the day. Make sense?

Never, ever... have I ever seen any sponsor suggest that a person apologize to an abuser. Not once. I have never apologized to my biological mother because I was angry she gave me up. Never have I apologized to my rapist for my being... all of the millions of emotions and reactions you can think of. Never once did I ever apologize to my father for my resentment that he grabbed me by the throat and thrust my head into a windshield. Those things have never been suggested to me... not once. Some things we don't have a part in. AA recognizes that.

I want to quote Jesus, but I am afraid that you will use it and say "see, its a religion." I was Catholic before I entered AA. I am still Catholic, and I never mention it in meetings because I don't want to scare anyone off (lord, adopted catholic homosexuals are scary to newcomers). But, Jesus did hang out with liars, thieves, tax collectors, and the like. He used fanatical tactics (drink my blood...eat me) to weed out people who wanted the message. There were, what? Tweleve apostles? Not many stayed true to his cause... people ran from his message too. Churches tend to follow suit because of the Gospel. Redemption, to them, is always do~able. Therefore, AA~loaded with misfits and degenerates~ fits right in. They, by default, are not supposed to judge us. Its usually non~religious pro~therapy nutjobs who do.

What they don't realize~ AA is therapy. Cheap, and often entertaining. You don't even have to pay a buck.

The poster you have... regarding Sponsorship and Therapy is hilarious. I saw that on our wall once, as someone had pinned it up in jest. Its as funny now as it was then.

I didn't get sober from reading the book and going to meetings. There was a lot more to it. I also didn't get sober through prayer. Meeting makers don't make it~ some commit suicide. But, those of us who do the Whole program~which is more than the twelve steps~we manage. We aren't forced to make coffee or take out trash. To this day, I have yet to drink coffee... let alone make it.

A.

Okay, now I'll answer those statements:

I guess, as an outsider, you would view AA as... you do. You aren't in it, and from what I gather, you haven't gotton the best feedback. Most of the letters that you posted were hilarious, at best, and mostly~it seems~by people who left the program early on. It seems like you haven't gotton a take on AA from anyone truly sober for any significant length of time. I think, mostly that's because we follow anonymity~ its a personal thing. Very personal.

The fact that I'm not now in A.A. does not preclude me from understanding what is going on in there.

And I have gotten letters from many people, even just recently a 35-year oldtimer (look here), so I get plenty of feedback from all kinds of people.

What you are trying to do there is claim that I don't know anything about "the real A.A.". Oh yes I do.

AA is run by the group. There is no leader, not even with world services. We make decisions as a group. We have no authority. We vote, as a group. We are criminals, addicts, thieves, etc. I mean, what do you expect? Even our founders were sick. We don't deny that. But, it isn't what you say it is... no one has run my life. No one has told me I must or must not do something. Not one person has threatened me in any way (to include working with the pacific group). My sponsor has always been more of a friend, someone I have been able to talk to, and we have always believed that life is more than aa. I hear "AA is not about drinking, but about living" more times a day than I can count.

No leaders? That is mythology. Of course there are leaders. The creeps at the Interchurch Center in New York City run Alcoholics Anonymous from above, and sue A.A. members who publish their own literature and carry the message to poor alcoholics.

The previous leader of A.A. was Greg Muth, and the current chair of the General Service Board, elected in 2009, is the Very Reverend Ward Ewing, Class A Trustee and just retired President, General Theological Seminary, NYC (Episcopal).

You may vote in A.A., but your vote doesn't count for anything. Just try to replace the Chairman or General Manager or Board of Trustees. You can't. A.A. is fake democracy. Your vote controls nothing except how you decorate your local clubhouse.

No one has told you that you must do anything? Get real. That is just another untrue A.A. slogan. There are zillions of things that you must do in A.A.:

• Attend meetings.
• Work the steps.
• Don't drink.
• Surrender.
• Believe.
• Share.
• Don't criticize The Program.
• Pray to Higher Power.

See the file on the Bait-and-Switch stunts of A.A. for lots more:
First they tell you that "There are no 'MUSTS' in Alcoholics Anonymous, only suggestions", but then they will tell you that there are many necessities and musts.

I was surprised that people were upset that AA'ers were going to bars. We can do that. The book says we can. In no way is that innapropriate. I was at a bar last week. Didn't drink a drop of alcohol. Not a big deal to me, as I do not obsess over alcohol. I have issues with other things, and alcohol is not one of those things... hasn't been for five years.

I don't care whether you go to bars. That has nothing to do with A.A. harming sick people with misinformation and cult religion.

I have yet to meet a recruiter for AA. Uh, I have never heard of such a thing. I have never been paid a dime for anything AA related. Recruiters just don't exist. We aren't like the army. There is no place to go where we sit and sell anything. We simply talk to people about how we stopped, and stayed stopped. If they want to stop, fine. If not, fine.

Yada, yada, yada. Bull. Your letters are loaded with recruiting slogans. Your previous letter repeatedly claimed that alcoholics cannot quit drinking alone, and must join A.A. or die. You are constantly recruiting, whether you are conscious of it or not.

I have yet to hear of any sponsor telling a sponsee not to go to college, to stop taking medication, etc. My sponsor suggested I get a job, and go to school. I did both, and my life got better, quickly. Not once have I been yelled at, even when I was yelling (which, sadly, has happened).

What you have not heard does not prove that other A.A. sponsors aren't doing it to their sponsees. I have gotten many letters from people whose tyrannical sponsors did that to them. Try reading some of the A.A. horror stories, here. And especially see this list of letters: Sponsors do great harm by telling their new sponsees not to take their medications.

AA is all over. Bill himself stated that no person should ever sit and rely completely on AA. It is in his letter on emotional sobriety. We should not rely on aa.We are not to sit in the meeting halls and do nothing with our lives. How do you think we became judges and lawyers and put in position of power? Two presidents were members of AA. We are encouraged to be productive. We are encouraged to rebuild our lives. You seem to loathe that we are in the justice system... yet, you don't seem to understand that alcoholism can hit anyone of any standing. And, if a judge has multiple years of sobrity... through AA... he or she would be much more apt to put people in that program. Do you really believe that judges and lawyers who have time in sobriety got to that level because they were told to sit in AA?

Again, you are repeating mythology. What Bill Wilson may have said about how alcoholics must not just rely on A.A. does not change the fact that lots of neurotic people are totally obsessed with A.A. Haven't you seen the people who do two or three A.A. meetings per day? I have.

Two Presidents were members of A.A.? Oh really? Do you mean Presidents of the United States? Which two? Please prove that statement. Historically, it's very important.

If a judge has multiple years of sobriety in A.A., and that makes him sentence people to his favorite cult religion, that judge is breaking the law and should be impeached and disbarred. And now the law says that he can be personally sued for violating the civil rights of the people whom he sentences to A.A.

In the USA, it is against the law to force anybody into any religion. How would you like it if the judge sentenced you to the meetings of Satanists For Sobriety, to learn the errors of your ways?

Bill and Bob didn't try to recruit people. They didn't even know what they were doing. The people they spoke with often did not stay sober, but Bill and BOB did. The same applies. I have had more sponsees drink than I can count. Doesn't matter to me. I am not in it for numbers.

Oh get real. Bill and Bob were recruiting from day one. Haven't you read any A.A. history? Read books like "Alcoholics Anonymous Comes Of Age" and "PASS IT ON". Haven't you seen the Hallmark made-for-TV movie "My Name Is Bill W."? Bill and Bob went recruiting at the hospitals of Akron immediately, within days of meeting in 1935.

By the way, Bill and Bob were recruiting more members for Dr. Frank Buchman's pro-Nazi Oxford Group cult religion while Frank Buchman went to Nuremberg Nazi Party rallies and Sieg-Heiled! Adolf Hitler. They were not recruiting for A.A. in 1935 or 1936 because there was no A.A. then; they were recruiting for the Oxford Group. They believed that Frank Buchman's cult religion was the answer to alcoholism. And they didn't care about Frank's Nazi ways, and neither Bill nor Bob quit the Oxford Group in protest when Frank Buchman thanked Heaven for giving us Adolf Hitler.

A stained-glass window of Bill Wilson and Dr. Robert Smith recruiting Bill Dotson, "A.A. Number Three", in a hospital in Akron in 1935. But Bill Dotson wasn't really "A.A. Number Three", he was really Oxford Group number 8000 or 10,000 or something. "Alcoholics Anonymous" did not exist then, and would not exist until four years later. Bill Dotson and the other new alcoholic recruits went straight to the large Westfield house of T. Henry and Clarace Williams for Oxford Group meetings, where they had to "surrender to God". You can read more about the "surrenders" to the Oxford Group here. The A.A.-council-approved history book Dr. Bob and the Good Oldtimers describes how Dr. Bob and Bill Wilson shoved their Oxford Group cult religion "alcoholism treatment" on Bill Dotson, when he was in the hospital in Akron, Ohio: ... they thought it a good idea to have a preliminary talk with his wife. And this became part of the way things were done in the early days: Discuss it first with the wife; find out what you could; then plan your approach. It should be noted, as well, that the alcoholic himself didn't ask for help. He didn't have anything to say about it. Dr. Bob and the Good Oldtimers, Alcoholics Anonymous World Services, Inc., 1980, pages 82-83. Bill Wilson and Dr. Bob actually felt entitled to shove their own cult religion on other alcoholics regardless of the patient's wishes or beliefs — "for his own good" — the patient didn't get any say in the matter. (That is still the attitude of many so-called counselors.) As you can see, Bill and Dr. Bob were recruiting all of the time.

That is yet another standard A.A. bait-and-switch trick: First, they talk about numbers, and then they refuse to discuss numbers. Likewise, first they claim a great success rate, and then they refuse to discuss the success rate.

It is common among AA for people to drink. We think something like two out of ten actually stay sober. Its those two that actually take suggestions (surrender). Those are the two that rarely fail, as they have followed the path.

What you are saying is that the A.A. program does not work. And surrender to the cult is not necessary for quitting drinking; it's only necessary for becoming a brainwashed cult member.

A.A. does not even deserve the credit for those two success stories out of ten. There is such a thing as normal spontaneous remission. Alcoholics just get sick and tired of being so sick and tired, and they quit drinking and improve their lives. (Just like how you and I did it.) About five percent of the alcoholics wise up and quit drinking and save their lives each year. Then A.A. tries to steal the credit for every sober person who wanders in the door, even when their quitting had nothing to do with A.A. Look here for much more about spontaneous remission of alcohol abuse.

Not many people want to put that much work into something... many feel it should magically get better. The steps are actually difficult. Looking at yourself is not easy, not even for non alcoholics. We live in a world of quick fixes, medication, and constant therapy. Not many people want to talk about God.... whatever that is. They want to find the fastest way possible to beat the game. For me, and many like me, I don't want to beat the game. There is no game.

Now you are trying to explain away the A.A. failure rate by saying that those people didn't "work the program" hard enough. Baloney. The program just doesn't work. Frank Buchman's cult religion is not the cure for alcohol addiction. And the 12 Steps are nothing but Dr. Frank Buchman's cult recruiting and indoctrination practices.

I want to stay alive. I want a better life. Taking a pill every day, going to church, or therapy... those things didn't work. I tried them all. No one came to my house and helped me throw out my alcohol. No one helped me mop the blood off of the bathtub walls, where my head was stuck the night before. No one recruited me into AA. I stopped drinking, and I showed up in meeting halls eleven days later.

No you didn't "try them all". That is another standard A.A. slogan: "I tried them all, I tried everything, and nothing worked until I found A.A." Baloney. You did not try them all.

Did you try SMART? How about SOS or Lifering or Moderation Management or HAMS? Or the Catholic programs like Calix or St. Vincent de Paul? Or the Protestant Evangelist Rick Warren's Christianity-based Saddleback program? The Salvation Army program? The Veterans Administration program? Brief Intervention? Rational Recovery? Natrexone and the Sinclair Method?

For a list of 48 different programs or treatments or methods, and their effectiveness, look here.

You did not try every other way. So how many different ways did you really try?

Then, you tell me that you just quit on your own. Congratulations. Good. You quit drinking without A.A. And yet you write me letters telling me that people cannot do it alone.

So what really happened is, you got good and sick and tired of being sick and tired, so you finally quit drinking. Then you went to A.A., where they brainwashed you into believing that their program worked on you. Which it obviously didn't. You quit drinking before you ever went to A.A. So did I.

You were correct in some of what you wrote. Some people, usually people with less than five years, talk incessantly about drunk stories, and copy sponsors. To people with time, it is annoying beyond belief. We often say fake it till you make it or act as if because they don't know themselves yet. They don't know how to behave. They don't know what the program is about. They don't have a sober history... many come from broken homes, broken families, homelessness, violence, rage, etc. To get to the heart of the problem, sometimes you have to wait until someone is ready to talk about what really happened to them, uncover the anger. It actually takes a long time. Rather than threaten or force them to reveal parts of themselves, its easier to let them do it on their own~ but they need some kind of way to get through the day. Make sense?

What you are describing is the process of brainwashing and indoctrination and conversion to a cult religion. "Fake it until you make it" because "They don't know how to behave." That is just the opposite of "rigorous honesty", of course.

You are describing several standard cult characteristics there:

• 33. Newcomers can't think right.
• 89. Demands For Compliance With The Group
• 90. Newcomers Need Fixing.

Never, ever... have I ever seen any sponsor suggest that a person apologize to an abuser. Not once. I have never apologized to my biological mother because I was angry she gave me up. Never have I apologized to my rapist for my being... all of the millions of emotions and reactions you can think of. Never once did I ever apologize to my father for my resentment that he grabbed me by the throat and thrust my head into a windshield. Those things have never been suggested to me... not once. Some things we don't have a part in. AA recognizes that.

I'm glad to hear that you didn't apologize to the people who abused you. Nevertheless, those are the instructions that other people have received. Just read the A.A. horror stories, here.

Again, your failure to see something does not prove that it doesn't exist. As Carl Sagan said, "Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence."

I want to quote Jesus, but I am afraid that you will use it and say "see, its a religion." I was Catholic before I entered AA. I am still Catholic, and I never mention it in meetings because I don't want to scare anyone off (lord, adopted catholic homosexuals are scary to newcomers). But, Jesus did hang out with liars, thieves, tax collectors, and the like. He used fanatical tactics (drink my blood...eat me) to weed out people who wanted the message. There were, what? Tweleve apostles? Not many stayed true to his cause... people ran from his message too. Churches tend to follow suit because of the Gospel. Redemption, to them, is always do~able. Therefore, AA~loaded with misfits and degenerates~ fits right in. They, by default, are not supposed to judge us. Its usually non~religious pro~therapy nutjobs who do.

The history of Jesus Christ has nothing to do with Alcoholics Anonymous. Do you really think that Bill Wilson was a new Jesus Christ? The founding of the Christian Church was nothing like the founding of Alcoholics Anonymous. The way that you compare the two makes it sound like you think that Alcoholics Anonymous is the second coming of a great religion.

By the way, you said that A.A. is not a religion. So why are you comparing A.A. to the early Christian Church, and trying to say that they are similar? Obviously, you do believe that A.A. IS a religion. That is yet another standard A.A. flip-flop: First, A.A. is not a religion, and then it is.

What they don't realize~ AA is therapy. Cheap, and often entertaining. You don't even have to pay a buck.

No, A.A. is not therapy. In fact, that is yet another A.A. bait-and-switch trick: First, A.A. is good treatment for the "disease of alcoholism", and then it isn't treatment at all.

The poster you have... regarding Sponsorship and Therapy is hilarious. I saw that on our wall once, as someone had pinned it up in jest. Its as funny now as it was then.

I'm not sure which "poster" you are talking about. If you are talking about the A.A. Northern Illinois Area Service Newsletter screed about an A.A. sponsor versus a therapist, it was not a joke. They really meant it. They are that crazy. They published that as real A.A. propaganda, declaring that A.A. was better than a therapist. I'm glad to hear that you also find it insane. It is insane. Unfortunately, that is the quality of advice that you get from Alcoholics Anonymous. The loonies are running the insane asylum.

I didn't get sober from reading the book and going to meetings. There was a lot more to it. I also didn't get sober through prayer. Meeting makers don't make it~ some commit suicide. But, those of us who do the Whole program~which is more than the twelve steps~we manage. We aren't forced to make coffee or take out trash. To this day, I have yet to drink coffee... let alone make it.

Right. From what you have told me, you quit drinking on your own after you got sick enough. Unfortunately, you then went and joined a cult. You really should have gone someplace else instead, like the Ladies' Home Garden Club. You would be better off, and happier too.

The rest of it, about how A.A. doesn't work, and some members commit suicide, is not news to me. That's what I've been telling you all along.

Have a good day now.

== Orange

*             orange@orange-papers.info        *
*         AA and Recovery Cult Debunking      *
*          http://www.Orange-Papers.org/      *
**     When all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail.
**     When all you have is a cult religion,
**        everything looks like a spiritual problem.

[The next letter from Amy_S is here.]

May 16, 2012, Wednesday: Portland, Oregon Carnival rides arriving All of this, the "City Fair", with a carnival and everything, is just part of the next big party, the "Rose Festival", which is the major city party of the year. Like I said, Portland is a city looking for an excuse to party. Carnival rides arriving Carnival rides arriving Carnival rides arriving Carnival rides arriving [The story of the goslings continues here.]

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Last updated 14 October 2013.
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