Stinkin' Thinkin'

ftg
Sorry to hear about the community pages being put on hold and I hope they can come back at some point. Would it be possible to consider having some links to other sites that offer information and support for underying emotional and psychological problems that may have played a part in developing alcohol and drug dependence, even though their main emphasis is not on addiction as a stand-alone issue?

ftg,

the Stinkin Thinkin Cold Fusion Reactor Project is still a go, though, right?

science is my life,

speedy

I think it’s better overall to narrow the scope of the site. The community pages were somewhat redundant.

Andym, I didn’t save your wonderful letter!
Agree with spj.

It is a good thing that the site become more focused.

There are many people here who have a lot of justified anger at the way they have been treated. There are many of us that have anger regarding the deaths that have occurred based on misinformation promoted by the AA faith and the recovery industry cartel as medical fact.

We are the torches and pitchforks mobbing a faulty religion that needs to be exposed. I think it is/was inevitable that times would arise when our people have differing viewpoints.

I sincerely hope that this action with focus the energies of the people of this site, that we may direct our energies to exposing the madness of the recovery industry cartel, rather than devouring each other.

As this site grows we are going to have our hands full. The AA faith will do anything they can to shut us up. Many of their livelihoods are jeopardized by the information we expose.

We must be prepared for their actions.

I fully understand your need to simplify your site and holding it close to it’s original intent. I was part of several beyond AA groups in Yahoo four years ago. The continual propagation and repetitive words of both pro AA’ers and trolls wears thin over time. Within a year, I had dropped all Yahoo groups with the exception of Ken’s group, Harm Reduction.

I’ve enjoyed being part of the X Steppers group for over five years. It has close to zero disruption and for those who find a need, they share. I simply hope it continues to attract those who might be seeking both alternatives and those who share past knowledge and experience with AA. It’s also been a great way to process out.

I don’t believe change is possible within AA. To change for AA is to admit they were in error, and this simply won’t happen. I attempted to bring attention to the problems within AA, and was either discounted or ignored. I’ve found an effective path with family, friends, business associates away from the 12 step movement.

FTG- Keepin’ it Simple!
I love it!

All kidding aside, I like the blog better this way; reporting the news and allowing folks to respond. The crusade approach is too akin to the very enterprise I despise.

Speedy,
Is the liquid-fluoride thorium reactor that I have heard about as safe and viable as it’s proponents claim?

@tb, I agree. Just keep posting the news stories, studies. The truth shall set them free. And please, let jd keep posting. That noofy-doof is helping more than hurting.

Massive – It sounds like your attempt to bring some sanity to sexual abuse in AA is going as well as my attempt to ask people to maintain critical thinking skills did. AA members want a magical place where everything (from sexual abuse to bipolar disorder to poor financial management) gets better because God fixes it. If someone with a short time suggests it doesn’t, that someone is bullied. If someone with a long time suggests it doesn’t, then that someone must be going through a hard time because he has lost his faith or that someone is prideful and doesn’t accept God. Either way, the members would rather believe that it is the victim’s fault because that way they can be assured that nothing will happen to them.

After the initial anxiety, I felt tremendously better since I left. I felt like I got my integrity back.

I think it’s a good idea to bring back the focus a bit. It was getting *very* big, and I got the feeling that most people felt their comments were getting buried in the community pages (with the result that they often re-posted the same things back here). And now we’ve got the Neverending Thread, anyone can still start a topic over there.

But I was just looking at the site as it is now, trying to think about how it would strike me as a newcomer and how I would find stuff. I think one thing that might be good to provide is a complete list of all the previous main posts. There’s Essential Reading, but there’s been a lot of really interesting stuff posted here in the past that is not on there and that no-one’s ever going to know ever existed (unless they click on the tabs, I suppose, but I’m not sure how many people do that). I don’t know if this is feasible, or it might just be a complete nightmare to do. Anyway, just a thought . . .

Perhaps the most critical time in the history of any group rooted in shared experience is when their awareness of themselves as an entity generates a momentum that threatens to move them past their original purpose.

Even before Arthur Cain’s article in the Saturday Evening Post, the wagons have been circling to take down AA. With all due respect to the noble posters here, there is not a single thing that I have heard on this blog that I have not heard among AA members in the meeting-after-the-meeting at the local coffee shop. You have discovered nothing we don’t already know.

The question is whether FT will just join the ranks of countless AA muckrackers, or be a voice that is heard above the din. I don’t know the answer, but the restraint that ftg and MA are showing in “reeling things in” argues well for the longevity of ST.

I will continue to follow with great interest.

@mikeblamedenial

A brilliant video that speaks to the need for civility and balance – clearly the result of hard-earned experience and not neophytic agendas. You have my greatest appreciation for your efforts.

Mr AA .. yer full of shit on the”we’ve heard it all” crap buddy. In 16 years and tons of after the meetings and retreats, we never talked about Billy’s 13th steppin, how the preamble is a fuckin lie, the Mayflower Hotel story is bullshit, how Bill was a cripple fuc&$r, how a mistress got 10% of book royalties, and all the rest.. yer smokin somethin pal. Cause it all falls apart for only the most thorughly indoctrinated once you see the thing for real. Only the most fearful losers stay in AA after they know the real story. Can’t live with AA, can’t live without it…. That’s a sad place to be.

@SoberPJ besides the fearful losers you mention there is another species of steppers who have financial stake in the survival of the 12 step industry. These could be owners of rehab centers, sober houses or 12 step therapists. Some of them are true believers and some know the truth of the scam that Bill W. started. I knew a therapist in AA who would hand out business cards after meetings and claimed to specialize in dual diagnosis situations. She would sponsor newcomers and then pressure them to become clients. They see nothing unethical about this and they knowingly push a program that is wired to fail and keep people thinking they are powerless and sick so that they can cash in the misery they helped to create. Those types and the enforcer bullies who work at treatment centers are among the lowest form of lowlife in AA second only to the sex offenders who lurk in the anonymity provided them in the meetings.

hulahoop said I had so many doubts though. The more I attended AA, the more doubts and questions I had. I knew better than to bring those doubts and questions to a meeting because I saw how people who did ask questions and had doubts were treated. Actually, it was seldom rudely. They were loved bombed even more and all testimonials (shares) were directed at them in a strange third person kind of way. They were treated in a way that would make them ever wonder why they had doubts in the first place if that makes sense.

Something I would like to add (forgive me for overposting) – I met a lady named Emma at the meetings where I was a repeat visitor for about a month. She was quite withdrawn. The regulars at the meetings were stunned when she finally decided to share. She finally spoke up at one of the meetings and spoke about how she felt she did not fit in. The entire meeting became about her and how she should volunteer to do more at the meetings – greeting, making coffee, cleaning up – whatever.

For the next couple of meetings I saw her staying after to wash the buffet style coffee pots. Then I didn’t see her again. She would go two meetings a day at the same place. I know because the other members mentioned it. She would be at the 7:00 AM meeting and also the 12:00 PM meeting. God only knows how many other meetings she attended.

I feel badly about her. I even broke the rule of no crosstalk and told her how great I thought the program was and blah, blah, blah. It was truly what I felt at that time.

I didn’t see her at the meeting when I left town. I hope she went on to find something that was more useful to her and would help her more than some useless, batshit, religious bullshit program.

FTG and MA – I have and will continue to enjoy this site. I can understand that things were getting out of hand, and the amount of time it takes for the upkeep of this site was getting out of control. I think that the main thing to remember is that everyone has opinions and that it should be respected and protected. That is the purpose of a Democratic Society and this blog has been run as a Democratic society. AA is also being run as a Democratic Society. Both entities have a different Definition of how a Democratic Society should be run. Democracy teeters on the edge of Free Speech and Censorship. This definition is what is causing the current turmoil between the two, and both sides have people who are very committed in what they have determine to be the correct definition. I don’t know what the correct definition is.

President Obama addressed the Nation today on the problems in Libya where free speech and public opinion is being suppressed by force. The United Nations along with the United States have determined that this is unjust. We may get in another war to protect free speech and opinions. Middle Eastern counties have turned off the internet in some countries to suppress free speech and opinions. The United States wants to pass legislation allowing the President to be able to turn off the internet at will. If you think carefully about it in a macro environment, the United States wants to be able to use the same tactics that it is complaining about other countries using. You have to be very careful that you do not become just like the people you have identified as being wrong.

AA and the Anti-AA groups are battling right now to determine what the Definition of free speech and opinions should be. You have to be careful you don’t become just like the people you are battling. Both sides are trying to enforce thier Definition of Democracy.

Using the free speech that I have on the internet at this time, I am able to express my opinions about AA. I believe in a Democratic Society just like the people I disagree with. The main thing is that we should both be protecting the rights to free speech and opinions without using the tactics we are complaining the other side uses. Unfortunately their will always be people on both sides who go overboard, and try to suppress the free speech and opinions of the other side. I don’t know the answer on how to prevent this. Does anybody?

The other thing about it that occurs to me that the people who write in and say why are you complaining so much have a partial point. They are of course the ones who are trying to stir stuff up, but nonetheless time spent dealing with them is time that could be better spent. Streamlining means less space and time for c***.

Free speech, it means not being arrested / fired for what you say — it doesn’t mean everyone has to let anyone say anything anywhere (as in, on a blog they run). FTG and MA actually have a *very* tolerant troll policy, IMO.

Free Speech in the United States is protected by the Constitution. Unfortunately exercising this right can still get you fired and/or arrested arrested. I have seen in the paper many times when an employee has posted something on a website about thier employer and been fired for it with no recourse. Free speech has also gotten many people arrested.

If you look at the thread on this blog called “Face of Damage done by Rehab Corruption”
you will find the beginning of the story of 14 year old Hillary Transue who made a facebook page about her vice-principal. She was sentenced to 3 months at a Hazelden style 12 Step institution because of it. The judge was indicted years later and her conviction overturned, but she still went to the institution and suffers from the ordeal today.

quick question though, if we wanna communicate with people in a private email, i am kinda wondering how i will do so. but really, i do feel overwhelming compelled to do so at this time. i totally understand that. and i think this means that this blog will get more action, which is great.

@FTG – I know you allow more freedom of speech than any pro-AA blog would ever allow. I agree with you on your policy. The big thing I think here is for people to not take it personally when a rebel AA member comes in and makes personal attacks at the members here. If it is a comment that is changing the subject, just ignore it. Rebel members of a following will do anything possible to disrupt our thought processes. Don’t let them. When you reply to a genuine question that makes sense, do not reply back to the individual poster using thier handle and stoop to the name calling they have (even thought it feels good). Reply back to the AA program as a whole. We aren’t discussing individual posters, we are discussing the AA program.

@FTG – That link also has a link to a browser addon that you can use to completely ignore posts from people you do not want to see. It can either put a big “redacted” sign over the poster, or change the font on the post so small you can’t see it. It has been tested on Firefox and should work on IE. Unfortunately it requires you to program a few things to make it work. I will see if there are any other addons that aren’t as hard to use and get back to you.

For those of you who know a little bit about programming here is a link for an addon that will ignore the posters you do not want to see (your own little delete button):

http://ok-cleek.com/blogs/?p=2149

@sugomom if you’re around here and also violet since you’re talking about e-mail: the address I use for these purposes is the blog address, profacero@gmail.com. I don’t read it right regularly but I do read it (I did just now, and that’s how I know what my community pages messages were).

Sugomom, for what it’s worth (now) — the way I created a different gravatar/avatar for the community pages than on the blog is, I created a different WordPress identity. “The person” I was talking about was the Alanon person you’d mentioned wanting to put in touch with me so I could say no, you’re not crazy, Alanon *is* weird. So, pass that on — I say it is weird and I have confidence in my judgment on this.

Primrose
At the risk of boring everyone else, here’s the letter again. I wasn’t sure if I could still send a message after the closure of the community section:

Dear Father XXX

I am disappointed to hear that your church is allowing Alcoholics Anonymous to hold meetings on its premises. Whilst I am sure that this was done from the best of intentions, I would suggest that an examination of the precepts of this organisation as laid out in its literature and shown by the type of witnessing known as “sharing” in its meetings is incompatible with the Christian faith as understood by Catholics, or indeed any Protestant denominations I am familiar with. It’s bogus “spirituality” has more to do with superstition, magic and occultism than Christianity. As a matter of fact (recorded in AA’s own official biography of him, “Pass it On”) this movement’s co-founder Bill Wilson was an enthusiastic lifelong participant in seances in which he claimed to contact the spirits of the dead.
AA also explicitly encourages the heresy of indifferentism, which suggests that any conception of God (euphemistically downgraded in AA to “higher power”) is as good as any other. Even the absurd notion that people can pray to things like light bulbs, doorknobs or chairs is routinely suggested in AA meetings as a step on the way to abdicating responsibility for one’s own life and trusting implicitly that Alcoholics Anonymous has all the answers one will ever need on how to live one’s life.
You may be surprised to know that Alcoholics Anonymous has very little to say about the nature of alcohol addiction as a health problem, but has a great deal to say about the supposed importance of embracing some very strange concepts concerning the nature of God, the purpose of prayer and the notion that “spiritual diseases” exist. These ideas are not really compatible with mainstream Christianity, although they may share some features with eccentric sects like Christian Science.
Alcoholics Anonymous had its origins in the 1930s in an envangelising protestant sect known as the Oxford Group, run by the Rev Frank Buchman. This movement was highly contoversial, partly because of accusations of deceptive recruiting and religious heresy ( Catholics were actually banned by the Vatican from participating in it) and partly because of the notorious far-right political sympathies of its leader who openly praised Hitler.
The sacrament of Confession, familiar to me as a baptised Catholic is sacrilegiously distorted in AA so that one is encouraged to divulge one’s guiltiest secrets (supposedly with God’s blessing) to an AA “sponsor” whose only qualification to hear them is that he or she has been a drunkard. Such a person is, of course, unordained, untrained, unaccountable and not sworn to secrecy.
This organisation has a morbid and sickly religiosity which is entirely its own and is not compatible with Christianity. To anyone who is involved with it for any length of time it becomes clear that it’s “spirituality” is a matter of making AA itself the central authority and guide in one’s life, not God. This becomes very clear as one hears old-established members talk with undisguised contempt and disdain about the Christian religion, whilst literally giving AA writings such as the so-called “Big Book” (really called “Alcoholics Anonymous”) the same reverence and affording it the same authority as Christians would reserve for the Bible.
AA successfully misrepresents itself to the outside world as a no-strings-attached self -help and support group. In reality it is closer to being a peculiar and exclusive medico-religious cult. Despite its protestations of ecumenical religious open-mindedness, it actually requires beliefs and practices which set it quite apart from any other religion and make it a de facto religion in its own right.
I know quite a lot about this organisation because in the past I had a problem with drinking too much. I am pleased to say that this is no longer an issue, but for a time I did become involved with the movement. However, I was repelled by its heretical religiosity, its dishonesty and the obvious danger of some of its practices to the mentally ill or vulnerable.
I don’t think this movement should be taken at face value, any more than should, say, the Moonies or Scientology (who also run a plausible addiction “recovery” program) . In particular AA’s claim that there is nothing in its teachings that can possibly conflict with a person’s prior religious beliefs needs close examination. I don’t believe that claim stands up to honest scrutiny.
I am not alone in having these concerns. There has for some considerable time been a growing body of criticism of AA in print and on the internet amongst ex-members, mental health professionals, researchers and members of churches about the unaccountable way this movement intrudes a skewed and loaded “spiritual” agenda into supposed help for vulnerable people.
I hope you don’t mind my airing these views. When I first heard of Alcoholics Anonymous I assumed it to be an obviously benign movement, but considerable first hand experience of the organisation and its message has caused me to think differently.

Yours sincerely
etc.

Feel free to adapt according to denomination or add any good points you can think of.

Yes, they’re often pretty shaky on theology. Speedy’s well up on the subject though. I suspect him of being a defrocked Jesuit, but he denies it, of course. They’re like that, Jesuits. Cunning, baffling and powerful.

Hey, Andy. Whilst your letter presents nothing new, it is nicely written and well-presented, so much so that I ported it to the Yahoo boards. Thanks for the keeper.

Thanks Mike, It’s really just intended to prompt discussion and get ministers at least talking about the subject. Mike A’s point about the potential for abuse is very good and another approach worth pursuing. I don’t believe it’s got to the point (yet!) where ALL priests are perverts or terrorist bombers.

I can present convincing arguments regarding AA’s religiosity. Although I can present specific examples, I cannot prove, or even submit credible evidence that it is fraught with perverts, rapists, predators, and pedophiles.

Woops.

http://www.peele.net/lib/faithhealers.html

btw, not sure if anyone read my comment, but i meant, i do NOT have an overwhelming desire to do so… also, i noticed that ftg, prolly jokingly, said she was afraid to log on. and i just wanted to say that both ma and ftg are awesome beyond words… in terms of awesomeness, this blog rates number one. seriously, i think in the past year, i have seen one typo by one of them, an it was fixed within an hour. thanks everyone, for all the awesome amazingly thoughtful, heartfelt comments, too.

Thanks, Andy!

Hi Guys!

Well, I completely understand your reasons for cutting things down. You have a powerhouse here with all your readers, etc. I hope you will keep the blog, though. PLEASE! Your site has changed my life for the better and I know I am not alone. The only thing I am sad about is the community pages, because I really enjoyed being in touch with people personally here.

I would love to continue messaging the folks I’ve grown close to through the community boards. If you would like to stay in touch with me, please feel free to email me at: go go rach go at gmail.com WEAK SUCK PUKES be warned, I DELETE YOUR BULLSHIT without reading it.

Love you all so much.
*STINKIN-THINKERS UNITE!*

wher`d all the AA people go?

A bit disappointed by the deafening silence my earlier suggestion met with btw.

ftg
These are just my own suggestions for online resources that may be helpful. A couple of those most concerned with depression, anxiety and mood disorders helped me a lot. I haven’t included anything about PTSD because I don’t know enough about the organisations which seem to be most prominent, one of which seems to be run by the US government and the other of which appears to have a strong interfaith “spiritual” component. Perhaps someone else may have suggestions:

Depression and Bipolar Support Alliance (www.dsballiance.org)
McMan’s Depression and Bipolar Web (www.mcmanweb.com)
Moodgarden (www.moodgarden.org)
International OCD Foundation (www.ocdfoundation.org)
National Association of Cognitive
Behavioral Therapists (www.nacbt.org)
Albert Ellis and REBT (www.rebt.org)