Date: Tue, February 19, 2013 9:31 am (Answered 20 February 2013) To whom it may concern, I just read your article on AA, and your hate filled views of it. Frankly I think you need to do some research, if you had you would be clear that AA is spiritual not a religious program. Maybe you should look those two words up and see what the difference is. And since you are such an expert you would also understand that the disease if alcoholism causes people to drink, not AA. I can only hope that you understand that the blog that you posted is not only detrimental to active alcoholics but could possibly be deadly.
Hello Maddox,
Thanks for the letter and the opinions. Alas, you are just repeating untrue A.A. dogma.
The distinction between religious and spiritual is meaningless — a false dichotomy.
About the only real difference between the two words is that the religious people
meet in the main church hall, while the "spiritual" A.A. people meet
in the church basement and sneer at the people above them.
And of course I looked up the definitions of those words in the dictionary, like
10 years ago, and typed the definitions into
a web page, here.
Look at the definitions of
religious
and
spiritual.
Especially note the Random House definition: Religious and spiritual are synonyms. And also see Webster's:
Spiritual (Webster's Third New International Dictionary, Unabridged, 1993.) Spiritual is religious. And of course A.A. is a religion. Half of the 12 Steps refer to God, Him or Higher Power who is God. That's the same percentage as the Ten Commandments, five of which refer to God. Claiming that A.A is not a religion, just a "spiritual fellowship" is a deceptive recruiting trick. Actually, it's several bait-and-switch tricks:
Then your next mistake is declaring that drinking too much alcohol is a disease. No it isn't, it's behavior. The act of lifting a glass or bottle to your mouth and swallowing the contents is not a disease. If someone is compulsively drinking too much alcohol, then they may have a mental illness like Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder, which should be treated by a qualified psychiatrist, not by an A.A. sponsor. And then, finally, you closed with the standard A.A. ad hominem attack about killing alcoholics by telling the truth about A.A., addiction and recovery, as if those poor feeble-minded alcoholics will just suffer a brain melt-down if they hear the truth:
I can only hope that you understand that the blog that you posted is not only detrimental to active alcoholics but could possibly be deadly. Congratulations, you made the list, here.
And actually, I get a lot of letters from people who tell me that hearing the truth was
a big help to them.
I got several in just the last few days. Start here: Have a good day now. == Orange
[ Link here =
http://www.orange-papers.info/orange-letters344.html#Peter_F ]
Date: Sat, February 16, 2013 11:31 pm (Answered 20 February 2013)
"Now I can understand how someone who is suffering from Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder can fixate on smoking pot and feel compulsively driven to smoke pot all day long. Such a person needs psychiatric help. The problem is the OCD, not the pot." That's an excellent point. I address a similar issue in another Huffpo column:
Are You Drug Dependent? Don't sweat it — Huffington Post, November 1, 2011:
Peter Ferentzy, PhD
Ah yes, thank you.
And have a good day.
== Orange
Date: Thu, February 21, 2013 4:10 pm (Answered 22 February 2013) Hello again Orange, Recently, when re-examining AA's "Comments on A.A.'s Triennial Surveys" (COTS) report, I noticed something I had never paid much attention to before. I realized that AA had actually calculated its long term ineffectiveness and had shown its terrible retention rate using what it calls the 40-80-90 rule. The COTS report (pages 20-22) explains the derivation of the 40-80-90 rule of member retention. This rule shows that from 1977 to 1989: 40% of those in their 1st year of membership remained as members for one further year 80% of those in their 2nd, 3rd and 4th year of membership remained as members for one further year 90% of those in their 5th, or greater, year of membership remained as members for one further year These numbers were almost constant in the period 1977-1989 and they take into account the growth in the number of members. Those numbers don't sound too bad until we examine the cumulative effect of those retention percentages. If we start off in the 1st year with 100% then by the 2nd year there is 40% remaining, by the 3rd 32% remain, by the 5th 20.5% remain and by the 11th year only 10.9% remain as shown below:
It was clear back in 1989 when GSO analyzed their data that only approx. 10% remained in AA after 10 years. And yet, AA didn't think it was important to let its members and the public know the mathematical facts that it had calculated using its own data.
Of course AA could have gone further and they would have realized how a
little more analysis shows that the retention was even worse:
This 40-80-90 rule takes into account the growth of the membership and
frequency of attendance, etc. However, what it does not take into account
is the fact that due to the high drop out rate during the first year of
membership the total number of newcomers to AA in any year from 1977-1989
was 2.28 times greater than the instantaneous value of the number of
members in their 1st year of attendance. See
The Mathematics of Alcoholics Anonymous Part 2 — Section 2 for an explanation:
http://orange-papers.info/The_Mathematics_of_Alcoholics_Anonymous_-_Part_2.pdf When this is taken into account the membership retention is much lower as shown below:
So, when all the newcomers to AA in a given year are included we find that only 17.5% of them will make it to some point in their 2nd year and only 4.8% make it past the 10th year. What is also shown is that less than half of those in their 2nd year will make it past 5 years. It also shows that only approx. half of those in their 5th year make it past 10 years. Many members with appreciable lengths of sobriety continue to drop out!
Of course some die hard supporters, and AA itself, will defend this data by
saying that membership retention is not the only measure of effectiveness,
i.e., members who discontinue attending A.A. meetings may maintain their
sobriety outside of A.A. and therefore any measure of membership retention
calculates only the lower limit of AA effectiveness with the upper limit of
effectiveness remaining unknown. However, the AA pamphlet "Frequently Asked
Questions About A.A."
"So the A.A. [member] who wants to do everything possible to insure sobriety today will probably keep going to meetings." Since AA specifically forecasts drunkenness, failure and relapse for "most" or "nearly all" of those who do not attend AA meetings then AA cannot claim those who stay sober without attending AA meetings as AA successes. In fact quite the opposite is true — those who stay sober without attending AA meetings are doing so not because of AA but in spite of it. For AA to claim these people as AA successes is not only illogical but clearly hypocritical. Therefore membership retention is the measure of the upper limit of AA effectiveness.
Thanks Orange,
Hello iamnotastatistic,
Thanks for that input. Those are some very perceptive observations and analyses of the A.A. document.
Apparently, the number-fumblers
at the A.A. headquarters were trying hard to put a smiley face on a very bad situation
by claiming that the (few) remaining people in A.A. stay for a while longer.
That's a good point about the common A.A. flip-flop that first, they claim that the A.A. dropouts
are still sober,
so A.A. still has a good success rate, in spite of the high dropout rate,
and then they claim that if you stop going to meetings, you will
invariably relapse and die drunk.
I've heard it so many times.
"If you don't Work A Strong Program, then your fate will be Jails, Institutions, or Death!"
Well, they can't have it both ways.
And they try to claim that the sober dropouts are sober because of something that they got
from A.A. meetings.
Personally, I've also had
A.A. defenders try to claim that because I went to A.A. for three months
twelve years ago, I learned something in A.A. that "helped me to stay sober",
so A.A. is due the credit for my 12 years of sobriety. Not!
I am definitely one of those people who is staying sober in spite of A.A., not because of it.
And of course they never want to do the reverse logic: Conclude that the drop-outs
who relapse do so because of something that they learned in A.A.
But that can actually be true. It happened in my case. I described it
here.
What I learned from a woman at my second-ever A.A. meeting back in 1987
was that I didn't really go into DTs when I quit drinking, not like her;
I wasn't a real hard-core alcoholic like her; I didn't go into convulsions and have to be
tied down to the bed for three days when I detoxed like happened to her,
so obviously I wasn't really an alcoholic, not like her.
Conclusion: Since I wasn't a real alcoholic after all, it was okay for me to have a beer. "Just one." (Famous last words.)
A.A. members really should be more careful in how they brag about themselves in their drunkalogues.
They can make newcomers think that the newcomers aren't alcoholics at all, not like those
experienced old wrecks with the dramatic war stories.
Finally, one thing that the author of the The Mathematics of Alcoholics Anonymous Part 2
didn't elaborate on is the invisible dropouts. As you said, he calculated that the total
number of newcomers was 2.28 times the number observed on the day of a Triennial Survey.
Personally, I think that is very conservative, maybe way too low,
and the true number may be far higher.
The A.A. Triennial Surveys only count the people who are present
on the day that the survey is done, like one day every three years or so.
People who came to some A.A. meetings, and were appalled by what they saw and left
during the previous weeks or months, and didn't come back, don't get counted in the Triennial Surveys.
Those dropouts are missing from the mathematics.
Because there are 1096 days in three years (including one leap year),
I described the mathematics of that more here:
orange-letters181.html#Green
Have a good day now.
== Orange
Date: Wed, February 20, 2013 10:46 pm (Answered 22 February 2013) Hello not once does aa say this is the only way. I argue with members multiple times. It says we have no monopoly in God. It also says alcoholics have been getting since man first started crushing grapes. Hey there are other ways. Yes maybe I just needed a sense of belonging and sense I've been in this program I have friends who I didn't have when I was loaded. Simply I don't really care there are other ways to get sober. A couple of idiots decided to say this is the only way, when our literature refers to a variety of spiritual experiences a book. It says a vital spiritual experience is required to over come drinking, for the real alcoholic. Now 15% of members are real alcoholics described in the book not everyone in aa is a real alcoholic who suffer from the mental obsession, a physical craving, and spiritual malady. There are a lot of things in that book that can be misread. Now bash all you want but I have seen peoples behaviors changed. I've seen selfish asshole go into ministry and move on from aa and these principles which are universal, have changed People's lives and these principles aren't just found in the big book they are found in taoism, Buddhism, Christianity anywhere. Religion can sober up a man. Fishing can sober up a man if he has a spiritual experience every time he fishes I've seen it. I've Watch people's behaviors changed I've seen miracles. Through where they decided oh yeah treat others as I would like to be treated that's in the bible I was told that in grade two. It's spiritual kindergarten, it's a school of life. Now to bash these principles that are universal you are bashing a lot of religions. I understand religion has done a lot of bad things like my people in residential schools, but the big book also said I looked at a few ugly trees and missed the beauty of the forest. You see you may be misinformed. I also don't understand why you feel so important or obligated to write this. I read this last year and threw away a year sobriety cause I said aa is bullshit. After reading you quack off cracking at the lips and I thought I can control my drinking I can have one. Now turns out I am one of those 15 % in the rooms who am an alcoholic, I got loaded ended up with a crack pipe in my mouth lost the house truck job everything within two weeks and went back and realized I was wrong. But hey what ever works for you eh. I suffer from an obsession of the mind meaning yes I obsess over women drugs alcohol the bible but I would prefer to obsess over these principles and doing the next right thing and that doesn't always mean sobering someone up it means kindness and good will towards all men. To understand I have defects and fall short and I will never be perfect. There are other ways aa was never the first and doesn't claim to be that's other people's opinions. Its a better way of living, you find new friends. My life is a testimony to this , I came from the streets from a broken reserve from a bad upbringing , knowing nothing but violence and anger drugs and alcohol. These principles I was taught in aa have helped me, and I could have found these principles anywhere. If you would taken away the drink and drug I would have still been a prick. It taught me a new way of living.
Thank you for your time Sent from my iPhone
Hello Tinoy,
Thank you for the letter. Well, staring at the top:
The new leader of A.A., Rev. Ward Ewing, Class A (nonalcoholic) Trustee and
Chairperson of the General Service Board of A.A., says that A.A. really is the only way:
"We have a powerful spiritual program that works — the only program that truly works for long-term sobriety."
"This is the only way that has ever worked effectively over the long term."
Document available at:
http://www.aa.org/lang/en/en_pdfs/en_rf_finalrep_sept14-16-12.pdf
Now I know all about Bill Wilson's statements that
"We have no monopoly",
and
"We have no desire to convince anyone that there is only one way
by which faith can be acquired."
— As if A.A. was supposed to be an
"acquire faith program", not a quit-drinking program.
But that was just one of Bill's bait-and-switch tricks to lure in the newcomers.
Bill wanted to sound easy-going and broad-minded and tolerant of differing opinions.
But Bill soon switched to declaring that you will die unless you do it his way:
For most cases, there is virtually no other solution.
... you may be suffering from an illness which only a spiritual
experience will conquer. ...
You can read much more about that bait-and-switch trick here:
Also see the Cult Test item:
You are trying to make "alcoholism" into something that is simultaneously a physical disease,
a mental disease, and a spiritual disease. There ain't no such beast.
By the way, mental diseases are supposed to be treated by a licensed doctor, not an A.A. sponsor
or a Voodoo witch doctor.
Sure, so have I. And the people whom I saw get clean and sober did it without the 12-Step religion.
At the same time, I've seen more Steppers relapse than I can count,
so there is no reason for you to assume that attending A.A. meetings or doing the 12 Steps makes
alcoholics quit drinking.
It's wonderful to see people just get a grip and stop killing themselves. Real recovery is beautiful.
It's also wonderful when they wake up and free themselves from a cult.
Religion can sober up a man, or religion can make men wage religious wars and crusades for
centuries, and burn girls and astronomers at the stake.
Religion can improve men's lives, or religion can make men crucify meddling touble-makers like Jesus.
Religion can make men burn crosses and bomb Negro Sunday-schools.
Religion can make people bomb abortion clinics and kill doctors.
Religion can make people wage wars against their neighbors for a thousand years because
of the smallest of doctrinal disagreements, like the Sunnis versus the Shias,
or the Moslems versus the Hindus, or the Protestants versus the Catholics.
Please be very careful in your assumptions about what "religion" does to people.
Mark Twain summed up the situation nicely:
Also,
there are no "Principles" in the 12 Steps.
The 12 Steps are just Bill Wilson's copy of Dr. Frank Buchman's cult religion practices.
Practices, not principles.
Now that is some fine-sounding talk. Too bad it isn't practiced more often. How does that square
with the sexual exploitation of young women that is rampant in A.A.?
And harming sick people by telling them not to take their medications?
Read some of these stories:
And that is called Minimization and Denial. Denial isn't just a river in Egypt.
The abuses and medical malpractice that are going on in A.A. are not just a few ugly trees.
We should not overlook people getting hurt by criminals.
Because a lot of people are getting hurt by A.A. quack medicine and psycho-babble
and heretical religion and fake corn-pone philosophy.
I'm sorry to hear that you are having troubles. I never told you that you should
"just have one".
What I said that that some people can handle drinking moderately, and some cannot.
And it's our job — a critical matter of life or death — to figure out
which kind we are. And those people who cannot drink moderately,
like me, and apparently also you, should never touch alcohol. I never said that
you should just quit A.A. and go back to drinking.
And then I really never said that it would be okay for you to go smoke crack until
you lost everything you had.
I never said that it was okay for anybody to smoke crack.
You are really trying to twist and stretch my words a lot, and make out like I'm
saying things that I am not.
I'm sorry to hear about the troubles that you are going through. But I'm not to blame for
your decision to drink alcohol and smoke crack until you lost your job and your truck and your house.
Have you ever heard the A.A. slogan, "You are just looking for an excuse to drink."?
It sure sounds like that.
Speaking of A.A. slogans, don't you notice how you fulfilled the A.A. teachings?
A.A. teaches that you are powerless over alcohol, and N.A. teaches that you are powerless over
your addiction, and you went out and made those statements into self-fulfilling prophesies.
Now what if they had taught you that you could stop after just having a few?
Where would you be?
Would you please read the web page on The Lizard-Brain Addiction Monster?
That page explains and warns against the kind of thinking that says,
"Oh just a little alcohol and
crack will be okay, and it will feel so good..."
Okay, now we come to the heart of the problem. You should be seeing a psychiatrist who can
help you with your Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder. A.A. sponsors are not qualified or licensed
to treat mental illnesses.
The practices of the 12-Step religion are not good therapy for OCD.
We just covered that above, with A.A. claiming to be the only way.
And yes, Bill Wilson did claim that A.A. was the first and only
thing that works:
But unfortunately that "sobriety" and "new way of living" was
so weak and shakey that all
you had to do was read some pages of a web site and you totally relapsed and threw everything
away. So what good are the A.A. teachings?
Will you relapse again the next time you read something that isn't "council approved"?
You really need to see a good doctor and get some real help. Please.
Have a good day now.
== Orange
Date: Wed, February 20, 2013 4:18 am (Answered 22 February 2013) I was just wondering how you feel about the program call "Celebrate Recovery" wear Jesus is your higher power?
Hello Eric,
Thanks for the question. We were just discussing Celebrate Recovery a little while ago, here:
I have no problem with people worshipping Jesus Christ. But I do have a problem with someone
taking the 12 Steps — the occult practices of Frank Buchman's heretical pro-Nazi
cult religion — and claiming that
they are a "Christian" program of recovery. No they aren't.
As I said in one of the previous
letters, doing the 12 Steps is very close to selling your soul to the Devil in trade
for sobriety.
You can see the file The Heresy of the Twelve Steps
for much more about the huge theological conflicts between the 12 Steps and Christianity.
Have a good day now.
== Orange
[ Link here =
http://www.orange-papers.info/orange-letters344.html#Meatbag ]
Date: Wed, February 20, 2013 7:03 pm (Answered 24 February 2013) I've sent a reply before, but I think it got lost. That, and I did just get my laptop fixed after the blighted thing burned my finger.
Hello again, Meatbag,
I'm happy to hear from you again. I was wondering what happened to you. The last letter
that I see from you is here:
orange-letters336.html#Meatbag2
Anyhow, Claws is a mail client. Ah so. Yes, I finally sort of figured that out. I assumed that it was a computer, not a cat. I think my hearing issues are mostly autism-related, since I've been like that for a while. Although age-related hearing loss does run in my dad's side of the family. As for cameras, I probably need a DSLR. I don't think it has to be terribly fancy, though, considering I'm a beginner. Well, fortunately, used DSLR cameras without all of the newest frills are increasingly inexpensive. Say, what happened to the spider story? I haven't written it yet. I shall have to do that soon, because it's an amusing story, and I've even got photographs. There's a lot of comments I can make on the letters, but I don't feel up to it. I'm fighting off metal fume fever that I got from soldering. It's exactly like a bad cold, except everything tastes like metal. Guess I better wear a mask next time. And stock up on chocolate milk beforehand. Bummer. I'm surprised that I never got that. Maybe it's just that all of my soldering was electronic, with rosin-core solder, which isn't toxic. I will make a comment on Chris's letter, though. Section 14(c) of the Fair Labor Standards Act allows employers to pay disabled employees less than minimum wage. The definition of disability includes alcoholism and drug addiction. Is that what you wanted when you said you should be in the same class as special needs people, Steppers?
Oh yeh. Special treatment, huh? That just goes to show, "Be careful what you wish for,
you just might get it."
Have a good day now.
== Orange
[The next letter from Meatbag is here.]
Date: Wed, February 20, 2013 9:25 pm (Answered 24 February 2013) I was a member of AA for a long long long time and I burned out from it and I have a lot of interesting stories to tell. Some you may not believe. But I assure you I am a very smart and sane person. Not really what I was told growing up or at AA meetings but... LOL. AA is seriously a Cult. I have been stalked and like I said you would not even believe me the shit I have had to put up with because I was vocal about how over the top AA has gotten. It is as plain as the nose on my face that they actually try to brainwash people. More overtly in my case. I hope you don't think I am a total nut. I just want a life without AA or those freaks nosing into my life. Any problem I may have is dwarfed by the problem I have with AA being all up in my business. One of my father's favorite Irish sayings is about how they use to keep kid just a little drunk for a year or two and this would sometimes cure them. " If the cause doesn't kill you the cure will". I would rather die drunk than have to ever go to a meeting and coffee after again. All they do is talk about the new people and everyone else too about how they are not doing to steps right. Well, LOL I'm sorry about my rant but I really think it's a shame what has happened to AA. It use to be kind of light hearted and fun. They are Nazis now... just look west to the Pacific group or the west portland group. I've seen it all. Bye for now, Dave
Hello Dave,
Thanks for the letter. And no, I don't think you are crazy. I've heard similar things
before. So feel free to rant.
About the brainwashing, check out:
Dr. Robert Jay Lifton's description of Chinese Communist brainwashing, here:
The whole country was shocked and appalled that some American prisoners of war in the Korean War
came back denouncing America and praising Communism, so doctors like
Dr. Robert Jay Lifton
and
Dr. Edgar H. Schein
studied what was done to the prisoners, and they wrote pioneering
books about brainwashing and how it works. The interesting thing is, when you compare Lifton's
"Eight Conditions of Thought Reform" (brainwashing) and A.A.'s Twelve Steps, the similarity
is stunning. It's the same darned stuff. So yes, A.A. does brainwashing.
Is it just a big coincidence that 30 years later the Chinese Communists were using
Buchman's techniques for "changing" people to make people into obedient Communists?
It is more than just a possibility that some of Frank Buchman's converts quit
his cult and joined the Communist Party, and taught the Communists
the conversion techniques that they had learned from Buchman.
Oh, and then there was the story of a Moral Re-Armament (the renamed Oxford Group)
member who was a soldier in the Korean War, and who was captured and became a POW in North Korea.
When he was subjected to the Chinese Communist brainwashing, he remarked that it was
just like an MRA meeting.
And also check out
the description of Dr. Edgar H. Schein's book in the bibliograpy.
Even back in 1960, Dr. Schein saw that Alcoholics Anonymous was a mind-control
or thought-reform program. Can you believe it? One of the pioneering doctors who
first studied brainwashing immediately recognized A.A. as a brainwashing organization.
And yes, I enabled you in the forum. Welcome to the club.
And have a good day now.
== Orange
Last updated 8 June 2013. |