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"THE WORST OF MADMEN IS A SAINT RUN MAD" Pope

Saturday, March 22, 2014

Inherited Guilt

What is the glue that holds an AA group together? An outsider might innocently assume that it's a sound mixture of fellowship, support and acceptance based on a common bond. These things certainly exist in Bill Wilson's society, but in themselves, they are truly only bi-products of the 12 step group in action. Even the strongest of such ties in AA are easily severed.

A good example of so called fellowship, support and acceptance in AA is "love bombing". Love bombing is the act of conspicuous outward affection among members. In the meetings, one will experience many hardy handshakes, hugs and well wishers. More often than not however, when that same member questions or acts against the 12 step protocol, even in minute details such as the proper way to pray, he or she can just as easily become the target of corrective action, gossip and outright ostracization. So sadly enough, fellowship, support  and acceptance do not form AA's foundation...not even one small corner of it, despite what co-founder Bill Wilson wrote in his "Big Book":

"We are like the passengers of a great liner the moment after rescue from shipwreck...The feeling of having shared in a common peril is one element in the powerful cement which binds us." AA's "Big Book" page 17

Sorry, it's just not so. I can tell you with 25 years experience within the groups, that when someone hits rough waters in AA, he or she had better be a good swimmer.

So what keeps the group unified?

Inherited guilt. All members agree that they share the same incurable disease, which is classified among culters as a moral deficit. Furthermore, this disease can only be addressed through the 12 steps. This is a tenet that must be embraced by anyone who expects success within the group. It is the only concept that would keep anyone coming back to the groups; AA is viewed by most members as an ongoing necessity, not a social club.

So where did this disease come from?

Most steppers believe that at some point in each of their lives, they had a misguided reaction to an unwelcome circumstance, which set them astray on a path of no return; a decision that planted the seed of their disease of alcoholism. This reaction may have been the result of a larger than life event or it may have barely shown up on their radar. It may have been a horrific violation wrought upon them at a young age that dealt their hand or it may have been a simple snub that turned them sour and twisted their fate. Some, perhaps not able to recall any specific traumatic events in their past, say that they "crossed an invisible line" into alcoholism. Long term members often claim that they had this disease long before they discovered alcohol. (They were conditioned by AA to believe so anyway.) Regardless of individual theories as to how this elusive demon virus is contracted, the unanimous acceptance of the unique and incurable condition is what ensures AA's survival. AA's program of abstinence based living is placed firmly into the context of this belief, and abstinence is absolute if this mystical illness is to be conquered. Sobriety by any means other than AA surely cannot be legitimate in the eyes of hard line steppers. Moderate drinking is the devil's idea.

To underline this disease concept, seasoned AA speakers love to beat themselves up for dramatic effect for their audience. It convinces their fellow drunks and public alike that they really "work their program" and that the program works when one accepts his lifelong illness: "I'm as sick as they come!" "I was the worst of the worst!" "I had the morals of an alley cat!"  and the famous "I'm always one drink away from a drunk, but I found AA."  What classy, clever self-loathing! What spiritual beacons! Listeners sit in awe at the humility and honesty that rolls off the speaker's golden tongue. These pastors of the program command the pulpit and pound their chests to glowing accolades, in a manner that is anything but meek. They are showmen and die hard culters,  in high demand around the AA speaker circuit. They are the pretentious pillars of AA society. They are the perfect product of the 12 step machinery. There is nothing truly spiritual about AA, and the behaviour of many such members proves it.

Bill Wilson was a member of the Oxford group, a Christian movement of his day. Bill borrowed many of their convictions for his own cult, one of those theories being that all of one's troubles originate from his moral shortcomings and defects of character. Bill didn't stop there, as he went on to elaborate that the the dark nature of the alcoholic is so deep seeded that it is permanent and requires life long maintenance-12 step maintenance to be specific. Bill contends that the disease of alcoholism is both a "physical allergy" and a "spiritual malady". In that respect, there are two "diseases" in Bill's alcoholic! Bill also tells us that all of the alcoholic's troubles are entirely of his own making. If he was abused, he made the decision to internalize and isolate as a result, and thus become emotionally stunted and progress into alcoholism. If she was unsettled by a rift in the family, she equally made the decision to go her own way in life, and find herself ultimately lost in a bottle. The member may not even remember such an experience, although he is almost always assured that he did in fact have one! On top of that, he ought never analyze nor try to sort through any pain inflicted on him that may have altered his life; he must only and always see how he hurt others. He alone is the problem.

There is literally no end to the variables that deem one a diseased soul. AA is highly reckless in its penchant for generalizing and cattle herding the masses of problematic drinkers in order to force them into the cookie cutter. And in catering to the disease concept, the 12 steps amount to a constant cycle of surrender, confession, repentance and pretentious servitude to other alcoholics. Nothing less, nothing more.


Let's establish one thing here: alcoholism is the act of habitual excessive drinking, period. It is an action, not an illness. Physical and mental illness may well follow for the hard drinker, but not without the alcohol!

There are many reasons people drink...as many reasons as there are brands of booze. If someone is affecting their health or their loved ones with their drinking, the answer is simple: stop! And seek the specific help needed to deal with underlying trigger emotions if that is the case. We are not evil, immoral creatures for the most part. Most of us don't want to hurt our loved ones, and if we are, we'd like to stop doing it. AA would have one believe that their disease is preventing them from not hurting other people, and that on their own they are powerless to change that. More specifically, as it's engrained in newcomers across the board, without AA they are powerless to change that. It's all well and fine, they say, if you belong to a church or you see a therapist, but never forget that true freedom is found at the AA tables! Cult conditioning. Research has trumped Bill Wilson's house of cards ten times over. But as far as the archaic AA system is concerned, you walked into the meeting, and for that fact alone you qualify for their cure. No further analysis is needed and none is ever undertaken; start accepting the program.

12 steppers toss around many cliche phrases, one of them being: "Keep an open mind". (to their program) This is one of many contradictions found in the groups. Nobody offers a newcomer an open mind as they corner him and label him diseased from day one, without any investigation into the individual's specific circumstances. AA has no ethical business telling people who are already beating themselves up and looking for answers, people they know very little about, that they have this strange "moral deficiency" and that the only way to salvation is 12 steps! I've never once seen a newcomer turned away by a group because he or she didn't seem to fit the mold of their incurable condition. Trust me, they will make you fit.

As I mentioned in a previous post, I may think I'm having a heart attack, and thus get to a hospital. But no doctor in his right mind is going to strap me to a gurney and cut my chest open without first confirming my condition!

Bill Wilson, in etching out his Big Book gospel, successfully created the "disease" of alcoholism that is still widely accepted as such today. Bill's misguided concept was made official by the AMA in 1956, despite no physical or medical evidence, then or now, to show us what this disease looks like.



On top of that, countless clinical studies have proven AA's disease theory to be a hunch at best. People overcome their addictions in many ways. Alcoholics Anonymous sits at the bottom of that list as far as real success stories go. We will explore the research in depth in upcoming posts.

In 1945, AA's Grapevine magazine published a survey containing 36 questions. This survey was targeted only at AA members. The results, when returned and tallied, seemed to prove that alcoholism is no doubt a disease and nothing less. Of course, only AA members completed the survey...members who had already accepted Wilson's doctrine. 60 of the 158 returned surveys were discounted, for either being incomplete, having multiple responses to one answer questions or being written by women. So, from 98 AA members, no women, no outsiders or no medical experts, the disease of alcoholism was confirmed, just as Bill Wilson had discovered it! Bill Wilson-a man who was not a medical practitioner in any capacity, who like many of his day, saw women as inferior, who skimmed money from the early AA groups, who was an adulterer and a dabbler in illicit drugs, masterminded a disease concept that sticks to this day.

"We are like men who have lost their legs. they never grow new ones." 
Big Book page 30

Bill's big book also tells us that this disease is progressive, as people who stray from AA often end up in far worse shape than when they first encountered the cult. Of course they do; in labelling oneself as a defective product, a diseased human being, the burden of guilt when one leaves AA almost always grows into progressively problematic drinking; the individual accepted a self-fulfilling prophecy! As a result, the guilt is drowned in the familiar fashion-the bottle; there must be some relief, if even temporary! And when such a person believes that his or her troubles arose out of  moral shortcomings, they are wholly destitute. They're also programmed to believe that disconnection from the 12 steps is a symptom of their illness: denial.

The age old 12 step saying, in regards to its program: "Take what you like and leave the rest." is but a thin veil over a bait and switch operation. You must weave yourself to the tie that binds by accepting your hopeless condition, or you will surely end your days in a hospital, a prison or a cemetery.

Lies.

Upon entering AA, make no mistake, you're inheriting Bill Wilson's guilt.




3 comments:

  1. What an absolutely stunning and ON POINT entry! Thank you.

    " Regardless of individual theories as to how this elusive demon virus is contracted, the unanimous acceptance of the unique and incurable condition is what ensures AA's survival. AA's program of abstinence based living is placed firmly into the context of this belief, and abstinence is absolute if this mystical illness is to be conquered. Sobriety by any means other than AA surely cannot be legitimate in the eyes of hard line steppers. Moderate drinking is the devil's idea."

    "Moderate drinking is the devil's idea..." And that sums up their warped mentality and is absolutely harmful thinking which keeps people from finding an empowered, educated and safe way to drink if they choose to drink.

    AA tries to rob us of FREE WILL and choice even though most people believe that God gives us FREE WILL. Is AA more powerful than God that it should have us "give our power over" to it?

    That is why people relapse and binge; because they come to really believe that they are POWERLESS. It is a dangerous and harmful concept to most human beings of normal intelligence, character and constitution.

    It take a certain kind of mind set to be "helped" by AA and 90% of people are NOT of that mind set.

    Thank you for this post. Powerful. Insightful...Badd ass...

    http://12stepsback72.blogspot.ca/?zx=20a4667fc69bffad


    ReplyDelete
  2. Thanks for reading! You're dead on about members being conditioned to be "powerless" It
    truly is a dangerous concept as you mentioned. I wish that society as a whole would begin to see what truly goes on within the cult.

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  3. illbefree1...checked out your blog...great writing! We need information like yours to help people see beyond AA's whitewash cult activity!

    ReplyDelete