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Date: Thu, March 14, 2013 7:11 pm (Answered 19 March 2013) Sent from my iPad
Hello Paula,
I just answered that question a couple of times, so I'll refer you to the answers
here.
Have a good day now.
== Orange
Date: Sun, March 17, 2013 7:14 am (Answered 19 March 2013) So i was looking for a topic for the meeting this morning and ran across your article on why aa doesn't work. I ask people all the time if they have seen those fad diets on television, you know the ones, the south beach, p90x, body for life, the juicing thing. Usually they say yes. Then I tell them that not a single one of them are fad diets. They ALL work. I mean the proof is right there, beautifully sculpted bodies, fat people that are now thin. You really can't object. However, if you rad the fine print you get the rub; results not typical. Well, the simple reason why the results aren't typical is that most people don't follow the program or those who do, stop after a fashion and return to their old self. AA is no different. There is no magic other than doing the next right thing makes life flow so much better. prayer and meditation are simply a means to get into that flow. If a person stops working their AA program or has never really worked it, they drink again. it really is that simple. God or the universe removing my obsession with smoking is in fact a bonifide miracle in my book. More so than removing my obsession witth alcohol. Just FYI. Kevin
Hello Kevin,
Thanks for the letter.
When you claim that only people who "work the program" to your satisfaction really count,
you are using the logical fallacy and propaganda trick that is called
Observational Selection,
also known as "Cherry Picking".
By the same illogic, someone could claim that Satan-worship has a 100% success rate as a program of sobriety:
"Just worship Satan, and always do our Satanic practices instead of drink alcohol,
and you won't have a problem with drinking. NEVER have we seen a person fail,
who has THOROUGHLY followed our path."
But of course that doesn't mean that the Satanic program is any good for the average people who don't want to join
a cult religion.
This line
assumes facts not in evidence:
Baloney. There is no truth to that. I stopped going to A.A. meetings 12 years ago, and I still have almost 12 1/2 years
of sobriety now.
And in fact, the vast majority of the sober people do not go to A.A. meetings, and never did:
You believe that God is doing special favors for you, even while he ignores the plight of little sick and starving brown and black children in other countries:
God or the universe removing my obsession with smoking is in fact a bonifide miracle in my book. More so than removing my obsession witth alcohol. Just FYI. Your belief is only evidence that you believe things. I also quit smoking over 12 years ago, but I won't be so egotistical as to claim that God waits on me hand and foot and does special favors for me. Have a good day now. == Orange
[ Link here = http://www.orange-papers.info/orange-letters349.html#Kevin2 ]
Date: Wed, March 20, 2013 4:28 am (Answered 21 March 2013) The only thing you diod in this reply is put words in my mouth. I didn't say, "people who "work the program" to your satisfaction really count"n never would. I couldn't give a rip how anyone else works their program. The FACT is that those who work a program daily, HONESTLY, stay sober. Those who don't don't. When I stop doing it DAILY, I will most certainly drink because I'm an alcoholic.
Hello again, Kevin,
No, I did not put words into your mouth. You said,
AA is no different. There is no magic other than doing the next right thing makes
life flow so much better. prayer and meditation are simply a means to get into that flow.
So who decided whether people had "followed the program"? Who decided
whether they "did the right thing"? Well, you did. It wasn't Genghis Khan,
or Napoleon, or the Pope, or Jesus. It was you. You decided that the people who
drank didn't work the program right, and those people who abstained from drinking
did work the program right.
Then, by that false logic, you could declare that 100% of the people who were sober worked the Program right.
And again, you are judging people now, even while you deny doing it:
And how do you decide whether those people are working the program HONESTLY? You pass judgement on them, even
while you say that you don't "give a rip how anyone else works their program."
You decide that those who are drinking are not working the program HONESTLY, while those who don't drink
are working the program HONESTLY.
God is doing me no special favors as again you like to attribute. I prayed and meditated and followed a PROGRAM of smoking cessation and because I FOLLOWED a program and continue to FOLLOW a program I remain smoke free. You declared that it was a miracle that you quit smoking. "God or the universe removing my obsession with smoking is in fact a bonifide miracle in my book." A miracle is an event where God or Jesus or somebody with supernatural powers breaks the laws of physics and makes something impossible happen. So who or what performed your miracle for you? Was it God or Jesus or Gandalf? And how did you talk that being into doing you a big favor and making you quit smoking? There is no magic to AA nor is God MAGIC fairly land. There IS a right way to live and a wrong way and the effects of living the right way can be felt almost immediately. Now that statement sounds reasonable. That rules out A.A. of course. The practices of Dr. Frank Buchman's evil cult religion are not the right way to live. If you're an alcoholic then I can almost guarantee that you are drinking or will shortly. I KNOW this because I am an alcoholic and I know how it goes.
Wrong again. Yes, I'm an alcoholic, and I have well over 12 years of sobriety now. I also don't take drugs
or even smoke cigarettes. I have 12 years off of them too. And no, I'm not going to relapse soon.
And no, I don't need A.A. or the 12 Steps to keep me sober.
What you are demonstrating now is the standard cult characteristic,
84. You can't make it without the group.
And the A.A. answer to that Cult Test question is here:
84. You can't make it without the group.
I use AA to keep me sober. I am not beholden to AA and AA asks me for nothing, so how does that make them a cult? Kevin
You use A.A. to keep you sober? But you just said that A.A. does not have any magic. Only right living counts.
You can just as easily do the right living without belonging to a cult religion.
I also use right living to keep me sober, and that's why I don't join crazy cult
religions, or do their mind-bending practices, or lie to newcomers to recruit
them into the cult, or tell sick people that A.A. has a never-fails cure for what ails them.
Have a good day now.
== Orange
Date: Mon, March 18, 2013 9:13 pm (Answered 21 March 2013) Kenneth A. posted in Orange Papers Please share if you are a harm reduction HAMSTER!
Photo attachment:
Reply to this email to comment on this post. Thanks for that. That's good.
Date: Wed, March 20, 2013 10:05 am (Answered 21 March 2013) Hello Terry, I hope that you and all your friends, feathered and otherwise, are doing well. As I irregularly dip into the pool of knowledge provided by various Buddhists I keep encountering the word "compassion". With a nagging thought, the likes of which can only be prompted by omission, I dd a word search of the pdf file of the Big Book provided by AA.org. Yeah, just as I thought, "compassion" is to be found nowhere in the Big Book or the Twelve&Twelve. The saddest thing is that I wasn't surprised at all... Yours, Mat R.
Hello Mat,
Thank you for the letter and the good wishes.
And thank you very much for a really revealing observation. Somehow, the idea of searching for
compassion in the Big Book never occurred to me.
And you are quite right. Not one reference to compassion? There are all kinds of lectures about how
you must join A.A. or die, and lots of raps about how disgusting those alcoholics are, but no
compassion at all.
Oh well, have a good day now.
== Orange
Date: Thu, March 21, 2013 12:55 am (Answered 22 March 2013) It's been a couple of years since I've written you and I'm coming up on five years sober. The last three being entirely without AA. After a couple of years of meetings and having never done one single ridiculous step, the light bulb went on and I realized AA had nothing to do with my sobriety. It is indeed a cult whose motto should be, "Misery loves company. Keep coming back!" When I encounter the few friends I made at meetings that are brainwashed enough to keep going back, they always ask — with raised eyebrow, "How are *you *doing?" And while I'd like to say "better than you" I take the higher road and just say "fine, thanks." I know deep down they truly believe I will fail and die because I'm not working a good program. Which brings me to the reason I'm writing. I just read a letter you received from "Kevin" who wrote:
"If a person stops working their AA program or has never really worked it, they drink again,. It really is that simple." "Kevin", I'm here to tell you...You. Are. Wrong. I never really worked it, stopped going entirely and I have never been happier or felt stronger about remaining sober ON MY OWN. In fact, I work a wonderful one step program...Step One — Don't drink!...It really is that simple. You fool. I enjoy your work Orange. Have a great day.
Warmest Alohas,
Hello Tom,
Thank you for the letter. I have to agree. The funny thing for me is, when I meet the people
whom I used to know from A.A. and N.A. meetings, or from the "treatment program", I hear that
most all of them have relapsed, so they aren't too eager to lecture me about how to stay sober.
When I met her on the streets years later, my former floor
manager in rehab housing told me that out of my entire treatment center class
of well over 100 people, I was the only one who had not relapsed.
I only know a few people from those days who are even still going to meetings. Most have decided
that it's a waste of time. I recall one old guy sitting in the lobby explaining why he doesn't
go to meetings any more:
"I've heard all of their stories so many times that I can recite
all of them. I just don't need to sit through any more of that."
Have a good day now.
== Orange
Date: Thu, March 21, 2013 2:39 am (Answered 22 March 2013) Mr. Orange,
Stumbled on your site a couple of weeks ago and have thoroughly enjoyed it.
I thought it was just me!
I was forced by court order to check myself into a rehab facility and then
AA meetings for a year as part of a probation plea for my second DUI.
DUI the 1st and I lied all the way through the alcohol/drug evaluation,
secured the services of the best lawyer in town, who had the charge reduced
to Reckless Operation, and done. Done. And all this for only $4500.00. It
was never going to happen again.
I hated it.
I hated it.
I started drinking again as soon as I cleared from the Department of Adult
Probation. Worse than ever. No dope but twice the booze. Binge drinking
now. It wasn't pretty and I could safely say it was the worst period of my
life.
I finally had enough when he told me I had to rewrite my 4th step. He told
me I wasn't being brutally honest enough. And I quit and then, in less than a month I quit drinking. Almost as soon as I quit going to AA!
I was watching the movie Little Big Man. Caught it late on a Friday night
on a cable channel. Drunk, of course. Are you familiar with it? Dustin
Hoffman, Faye Dunaway...anyway.
I basically had the same type of experience as you did, Orange. I made up
my mind I was NOT going to die like this. Sorry this went on so long. Keep up the good work.
Timothy
Hello Timothy,
Thank you for the letter, and please don't appologize for the length. It's a great letter, and
wouldn't have been as good if you cut it shorter.
I can only agree. It's a national tragedy, the nonsense and heretical religion that gets passed off
as "treatment" for drug and alcohol problems.
And then to sentence people to such quackery and cult religion is not only illegal,
it's unConstitutional. And it's also counter-productive. Alcoholics Anonymous
drives people away from recovery.
It also drives them to drink.
And congratulations on getting your life together and kicking the addictions.
That's great. But of course you already knew that.
It is more than a coincidence that you quit A.A. meetings and quit drinking and
drugging at the same time. I've heard so many people say that A.A. meetings made
them want to drink. And I've experienced it myself. I would leave A.A. meetings
thinking about getting a fifth and really tying one on, when I had been fine
before going into the meeting. Fortunately, I only thought about it, and didn't
really do it. But I was thinking about it. I could taste it in my throat already.
And N.A. meetings made me think about getting a load of dope and getting really
high. Funny how that works.
Here are some letters that complained about the same problem:
Have a good day now.
== Orange
Date: Sat, March 23, 2013 5:36 am (Answered 25 March 2013) I joined AA in 2006 after a divorce and some destructive drinking. I didn't stay long. The jargon and the stepford wives feeling I got drove me away for another year. In 2007, I was lonely, and since I have a positive history with the Search For God meetings through the ARE, I went bak to AA. All of my friends, even my young daughter, told me they didn't think I was an alcoholic. I told them I needed the spiritual support of a group to stay sober. That year I was mostly hit on by older men. I never connected w the females, although I did try. I could only attend noon meetings since I have a disabled son who requires total care, so that was part of it. I left. Off and on I would return, but I felt bad that I just never caught on to the correct way to "share". I didn't attend enough meetings to really get it. Reading through your site validates what I was thinking. Fortunately, I could never swallow what they were pushing. Looking forward to reading more.
Carolyn
Hello Carolyn,
Thank you for the letter. I am glad to hear that you have your eyes open and are
seeing what is happening. And I hope that you are feeling better now.
By the way, I got the same "wrong sharing" thing too. When I went to
an A.A. meeting many years ago to pick up my 6-month sobriety coin,
I "shared" that I was really happy to
be sober, and that being healthy felt so much better than being sick.
I got subtle frowns because my sharing was not negative enough. They wanted tears
and confessions and misery and me moaning about how bad I am and how good my sponsor
is. (I didn't even have a sponsor.)
Isn't it really very odd how they didn't want to hear a happy success story?
I wonder if what they really want is to hear that everybody else is just as bad as them.
Oh well, have a good day anyway.
== Orange
Date: Mon, March 25, 2013 8:06 pm (Answered 28 March 2013)
thank you...i am a 12 step survivor too...i was arrested (on false charges)
by a group of 12 steppers in new york's westchester county... to force me
out and silence me...ten years later i attempted to return to my home town
and was stalked and almost arrested again. my life certainly changed when
i joined their twisted little cult and i hate them with every fiber of my
being (sorry if thats a little raw...this subject kicks up alot for me)
Hello Mark,
Thank you for the letter. I'm sorry to hear about your troubles. I hope things are getting better
for you now.
So have a good day.
== Orange
Date: Tue, March 26, 2013 1:38 pm (Answered 28 March 2013) I have read you papers and agree with much of what you say. That being said I go by the adage whatever works is ok. One size does not fit all. Everyone is able to decide for themselves which way they want to handle their lives and problems, be it AA or any venue that works. That being said you are counter productive in that regard. No one knows who you are or what your real agenda is. Do you drink? Do you believe that people have the right to choose which path they wish take? Everything is relative regarding recovery if that is their goal. There are no absolutes. The biggest problem I have is that recovery has become an industry sold by various corporations to make money. There are so many variables regarding this issue. Perhaps we should meet some time an discuss it over a few beers. Martin
Hello Martin,
Thank you for the letter.
I agree that everyone should be able to choose his own path or method of recovery.
What is not okay is having lying frauds selling fake cures.
How would you like it if you discovered that some grinning con artist was selling your mother quack
medicine for a serious illness?
The propaganda trick you are using in your letter is called
Escape via Relativism,
as in, "It's just one opinion versus another, and any opinion is just as valid as any other."
Not so. Some opinions are based on facts and evidence, and some opinions are based on superstition, ignorance,
and stubborn refusal to see the truth.
You said,
That is wrong, completely, totally wrong. There are lots of absolutes, like "Two plus two equals four."
The answer is absolute and will always be four.
The answer will not be three or five if that's what you like.
And whether somebody is dead or healthy is not just a matter of your opinion versus my opinion.
And there certainly is such a thing as harmful quack medicine. Cyanide koolaid is not a cure for the
common cold. Colloidal gold is not a cure for cancer.
And there are solid facts regarding recovery, including the fact that Alcoholics Anonymous is a fraud, quack medicine
and cult religion
that hurts more people than it helps. Even a Trustee of Alcoholics Anonymous, Dr. and Prof. George E. Vaillant,
found that A.A. did not cure anybody, but it did raise the death rate in alcoholics.
And he proved that while he was trying to prove that A.A. works.
You can read the whole story
here.
And here is a list of methods of recovery where Prof. William Miller and his crew
at the Center for Alcohol, Substance Abuse and Addictions at the University of New Mexico
rated various methods of recovery:
Lastly, telling the truth about the real failure rate of A.A. is not "counterproductive".
Telling people the truth, so that they can make informed choices, is a good thing to do.
Oh, and your question, "Do I drink?" is actually irrelevant to a discussion of whether A.A. works
as a cure for alcohol abuse or alcohol addiction.
Nevertheless, I'll answer your question, and the answer is, "No, I don't drink at all.
None whatsoever. I have over 12 years of continuous unbroken sobriety now, and I did it without A.A."
If you wish, you can read all of the details of the story
here.
You can find all of the autobiographical information there.
So, no, we won't meet and discuss it over a few beers. Been there, done that, and those days are gone
forever.
Have a good day now.
== Orange
[ Link here = http://www.orange-papers.info/orange-letters350.html#Martin_L2 ]
Date: Thu, March 28, 2013 5:13 pm (Answered 30 March 2013) Ok, I'm listing you under the category of you are smarter then I thought you were. But so am I. You originally interested me because I read your manifesto and even though I'm not a manifesto guy agreed with most of it. The individual that I find more intriguing then you is Stanton Peele. At least he doesn't hide under a mask. That being said I stopped drinking a number of years ago then started again socially. I am comfortable with that. I found that people change and have the ability to take control of their lives as they mature. I also believe that 12 step AA for fee based recovery programs are big business that are taking advantage of an opportunity to make a big buck at the expense of the people they are allegedly pretending to help. When there is money to be made business will come out of the woodwork to try and capitalize on it. You Should probably have a cocktail once in a while, it probably won't kill you. Thanks for the reply. Martin
Hello Martin,
Thanks for the reply.
I don't have a "manifesto". I'm simply laying out the facts.
I do not hide behind a mask. I use the pen name Orange because I've been using it for so
many years that some people know me by no other name. My birth name is Terrance Hodgins
and I live in rural Oregon west of Portland, and I've said that on my web site many, many times.
I already pointed you to
all of the
autobiographical information. That isn't hiding behind a mask.
I've revealed a huge chunk of my life story there.
I agree that having so-called "treatment centers" selling the 12-Step cult religion as a cure for the
"disease of alcoholism" is a criminal racket.
I totally agree that "people change and have the ability to take
control of their lives as they mature."
That explains the entire apparent A.A. success rate. A.A. merely
steals the credit for those people who were going to quit drinking anyway.
A.A. does not cause people to quit drinking, or keep them sober.
Lastly, no I should not have a cocktail now and then. Apparently you don't understand that some people
have a genetic or psychological disposition to addiction to alcohol, and those people should never drink alcohol.
See the book
SOS Sobriety, The Proven Alternative to 12-Step Programs by James Christopher,
and especially check out the interview with Dr. Kenneth Blum, titled
"The Fickle Gene". Blum discovered
one of the genes
that appears to contribute to alcoholism, and perhaps also a
tendency towards drug addiction.
By the way, I've already tried moderate drinking, and it did not work for me, because it never stayed moderate.
But total abstinence is easy for me to do. See:
How did you get to where you are?
Oh, and what would be the goal of me having a cocktail now and then? To make me care less?
To make me cool down and stop telling the truth? To readdict me? What?
Have a good day now.
== Orange
Date: Tue, March 26, 2013 5:55 am (Answered 28 March 2013) First, I would like to apologize in advance for any misspellings and errors. English is my second language. I still reading your page and looks very interesting. A couple of year ago, I lost someone very dear to me to a cult. I been wondering, is the information given by you on the page is of your making? Are they your conclusions? Your background is on this kind of subjects? Are you a cult survivor?
Thanks,
Hello Ismael,
Thank you for the letter and the questions. I'm sorry to hear about the friend that you lost to a cult.
Yes, those things are insidious, aren't they?
The answers to your questions are, yes,
the Cult Test
and the writings about cults are of my own creation. I studied a lot of books about cults for many years, and I also
had a lot of personal experiences with cults back in the nineteen-sixties and -seventies.
Now I never got hooked into a cult and gave it my mind and my soul — so I'm not a cult survivor in
the bad sense — but I learned a lot about them.
At that time, many phony gurus were coming over here from India and Japan and Korea, and many more
phonies and fake gurus were popping up in the USA, and I checked out all of them that I could because I was very
interested in new-age spirituality. Back then, I didn't know how many of them were cults.
I thought that those new groups were just wonderful
new-age Eastern religions, something new to explore.
So I innocently wandered from one to another, learning, and seeing what they were about.
But somehow, I never quite "married" one, and gave it my heart and my soul. Or my mind
and my life. Something would feel a
little "off", so I would just wander down the road to another one.
Or sometimes it was just chance, because I moved on and couldn't get to a group any more.
Little did I know what grief I was avoiding.
It was 10 or 20 years later before I learned how many of them were really cults.
The list of books about cults is in the "Cults" section of the bibliography here:
Have a good day now.
== Orange
Date: Mon, March 25, 2013 8:57 pm (Answered 28 March 2013) Kenneth Anderson posted in Orange Papers
Hi Ken,
That's good. Thank you.
== Orange
Date: Wed, March 27, 2013 8:04 pm (Answered 29 March 2013) Its been Many years since Iv had any AA contact , I can attribute my salvation to the orange papers . Most of all a orange . You opened my eye's to the cult and emboldened me to step out of the AA bubble and applied myself to life again . If I can be of any service to you this would be a good way to repay my debt . Years of working on other men's issues has made me cynical and I do wish to return to the roots of my Enlightenment . Thank you Joseph
Hello Joseph,
Thank you for the compliments. I'm glad to hear that you are doing well.
So have a good day now.
== Orange
Date: Thu, March 28, 2013 2:08 am (Answered 29 March 2013) Hi Folks,
10 years ago and after hospital trips, this 34yr old was scared and desperate, the
internet still pretty hopeless
and my local herbal detox centre This was only suggested for my first few visits ,the centre applied for a funding application. one of the conditions was to force people to go to aa or na,so along we went..... only to see grim,white knuckled corpses telling me how good it was to be sober. the white knuckle corpse was celebrating his 50th, from shitscared to deathly scared in an instant, I was asked to share and just walked out, I rolled what looked like a ciggy and waited to be taken back... That was my intro to aa,I kept going back for something to do...I could control the situation in there...by saying nothing,remembering when I mentioned hospital I meant the Psych unit...where after the suicide attempts saw me face to face with a prominent Psychiatrist.....no more than a meter apart.. Can you see why I chose aa? With baggage already packed (haha) I moved from Canberra to Sydney and the socially depressed western suburbs where Wesley Mission had dry housing and programs designed to stop the drinking,this housing was an umbrella to WM and run by bornagains or your fundamentalists. AA wasn't pushed, however, favour was found if you attended.... so, being a control freak and after the previous guy lost interest, I took over, dimmed the lights, used oil burners and around the outside, the chairs nice and cosy, the newage music helped as well, I wanted a campfire feel and it worked, it allowed people to open up. To cut a long story shortish, I told these cunts to get fucked, I'd sold my house previously and bought in Sydney city and needed something more. I did a few meetings and decided my life was in greater danger walking at night to the meetings (yep,I know some excuses) and started drinking again, bloody lovely city to get pissed in BTW and after 2 years of this and another trip to detox, this was at St Vincents Hoz in Darlinghurst and where I saw a leaflet to do some cognitive therapy... a little more drinking and then the desperate phone call that changed my life, it was to the SMART program................................... So, after 6yrs of CT and a year on my own, I'm a very pissed off over aa and their lies. I started reading the OP some time ago, now I feel I must devote some time to at least make people understand the erroneous nature of aa.. They will need to kill me to stop me. Richard.
Hello Richard,
Thank you for the letter. I'm glad to hear that you are doing well now. And I'm also glad
to hear that you are interested in spreading the truth. Welcome, come on in, the water's fine.
So have a good day now, and a good life.
== Orange
Last updated 19 April 2013. |
