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A Struggle Inside AA

There is no evidence belief in ANY higher power helps you fight addiction and I would argue it absolutely hurts you.
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No Evidence? I'm not the biggest fan of AA or NA. I'm in a situation where I have to go to meetings. But it's pretty obvious that people get sober in AA and NA because they work the steps. Part of working the steps is believing in a higher power. How can you argue with that . . .
 
I do agree that AA is pretty much a religion. It's a way of living life. Alot of christian tones as well in my opinion.

I would like to read your sources nekken that talk about the success rates of AA.

It pretty much sucks to be forced into AA. It will only work if the person wants it to work. The program has been keeping people sober ever since it started in the 30's. No denying that. Sure there are many people who relapse, stumble in and out of AA. Plently of people do with any other rehab or program.

I think the best thing to keep one sober is something constant. Not just a one time rehab. AA provides that, and it's FREE.

I have alot of problems with AA, it's annoying at times. But it WORKS!!!!! I believe most people can sober up forever by working the steps. It's not the only way to achieve sobriety, but it is A WAY. It's just a tried n true method.
 
And if you are a drug addict/alcoholic, I really don't think it's fair to judge the program until you have done the program completely and honestly.

But life ain't fair in many ways . . . .deal with it.
 
Any decentralized organization whose component branches are independent are going to run a gamut from 'traditional in structure and function' all the way to 'off the fucking deep end'. That's sure been my experience of the other big almost-religion that's alcohol free: Freemasonry.

It's a shame that such a group should sully the good name of AA. But as an organization with no central authority, there's not a whole lot that can be done about it, except getting the word out. It's not as if Midtown has bought a franchise that can be revoked.
 
n4k33n, have you ever hung out with the old-timers? The people with 5-10+ years of sobriety? Seems like you only see one side of AA, or you hang out with chronic relapsers . . . .
 
The Harvard Mental Health Letter, from The Harvard Medical School, stated quite plainly:

On their own
There is a high rate of recovery among alcoholics and addicts, treated and untreated. According to one estimate, heroin addicts break the habit in an average of 11 years. Another estimate is that at least 50% of alcoholics eventually free themselves although only 10% are ever treated. One recent study found that 80% of all alcoholics who recover for a year or more do so on their own, some after being unsuccessfully treated. When a group of these self-treated alcoholics was interviewed, 57% said they simply decided that alcohol was bad for them. Twenty-nine percent said health problems, frightening experiences, accidents, or blackouts persuaded them to quit. Others used such phrases as "Things were building up" or "I was sick and tired of it." Support from a husband or wife was important in sustaining the resolution.
Treatment of Drug Abuse and Addiction -- Part III, The Harvard Mental Health Letter, Volume 12, Number 4, October 1995, page 3.
(See Aug. (Part I), Sept. (Part II), Oct. 1995 (Part III).)
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In his book on the treatment of alcoholism, Dr. Sheldon Zimberg surveyed the literature for reports of spontaneous remission of alcoholism:

Spontaneous Remission in Alcoholism

A number of studies have found that a small percentage of alcoholics improve to the point of remission of problems associated with alcohol consumption. Bailey and Stewart (235) interviewed alcoholics after three years without treatment and found that about 27 percent of the former patients denied alcoholism. Cahalan (268) in a national drinking practices study noted that drinking problems decrease in men after age 50 and the amount of alcohol consumed also decreases. Cahalan, Cisin, and Crossley (11) in another national survey of drinking practices found that about one-third more individuals had problem drinking in a period before their three-year study period than during the study period itself, suggesting a tendency toward spontaneous remission of drinking problems. Goodwin, Crane, and Guze (269) found that on an eight-year follow-up with no treatment about 18 percent of the alcoholic felons had been abstinent for at least two years. Lemere (238) reported long-term abstinence in 11 percent of untreated alcoholics over an unspecified interval. Kendall and Staton (236) reported 15 percent abstinence in untreated alcoholics after a seven-year follow-up. Kissin, Platz, and Su (203) reported a 4 percent one-year improvement rate in untreated lower class alcoholics. Imber et al. (10) described a follow-up of 58 alcoholics who received no treatment for their alcoholism. It was noted that the rate of abstinence was 15 percent at one year and 11 percent after three years.
In sum, the preponderance of these studies suggests that a spontaneous remission rate for alcoholism of at least one-year duration is about 4-18 percent. Successful treatment would, therefore, have to produce rates of improvement significantly above this probable range of spontaneous remission.
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The key sentence is the last one -- for a treatment program to claim success, it would have to produce recovery rates greater than the usual rate of spontaneous remission. Alcoholics Anonymous comes nowhere near exceeding a 4 to 18 percent per year recovery rate.

Personally, I find the 18 percent number to be far too high to believe. (At that rate, 85% of all of the alcoholics in the country should have recovered in just the last 10 years. Obviously, that has not happened.) I agree with R. G. Smart, who calculated a spontaneous remission rate for alcoholism of between 3.7 and 7.4 percent per year. As a simple rule of thumb, the middle value of 5 or 5.5 percent per year is quite believable. Still, the claimed success rate of Alcoholics Anonymous does not even exceed that much lower rate of spontaneous remission.

Link
 
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Fried Man said:
n4k33n, have you ever hung out with the old-timers? The people with 5-10+ years of sobriety? Seems like you only see one side of AA, or you hang out with chronic relapsers . . . .
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My boss has 19 years sober with AA. My very good friend has 6 years. A couple other good friends are in their 2nd year. I still hang out with 1 friend whos a chronic relapser, but I'll support her to the very end. I'm very happy for them, but their successes aren't representative of the program as a whole.
 
Fried Man said:
Tripdoctor, I must defend AA because it does work. Like they say, "it works if you work it.
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My program is guarunteed to work and it "works if you work it"
Step 1: Don't Drink
step2: See step 1

Sorry to be sarcastic but the real truth is that AA doesn't work. Statistically speaking their success rates are terrible . AA is also a highly manipulative environment that involves traditional cult tactics to promote and continue the group, AA is a warm fuzzy meme. Clearly, AA purports to be a program for behavioural modification, how can they claim any successes if silly little disclaimers are perpetually chanted that if you don't get your "spiritual experience" then you didn't do it right (It works if you work it). Worst of all is that it's now common practice for courts to mandate attendence at meetings like AA. That's a blatant violation of a freedom of religion not to mention a big copout and these sham AA resources could be provided legitimately by more effective resources if the AA thing hadn't cornered the market.

More power to anyone who gives up alcohol (4 years for me on sept 7) by any means includeing AA but I think that common knowledge should be amended to understand that AA is far from an effective solution and greater resources should be expended to find better solutions.
 
See my problem is not with AA/NA itself it's with being FORCED to go by the court. I totally respect that AA/NA can work for some people, and I think it's great that you're always guaranteed a place to go, need be. The only thing is I feel the desire to stop using truly lays within. I know AA/NA can offer great guidance to some people who really have struggled and dont know where to go. And every case is different. For me, I DIDN'T want to stop using drugs, I wanted to stop going to jail. That leaves me in a very rough spot when I'm forced into a room of NA/AA. And I think the problem with NA/AA now adays is so many people are forced to go that it makes it more difficult for people who are going for themselves. And when people are appearing to work these steps but their intentions aren't totally for the program, i think it hurts otherpeople and gets passed along...

I have not gone back to an NA meeting and only go to AA now when at a local NA meeting, my girlfriend was approached by a guy in the room and was offered by him for her to have sex with him for money and all the heroin she could want. I wasn't present at the time, but this guy I've seen around the rooms previous. He claims he has 10 years clean. He sponsors people , and he preys on all the young girls. That is a total sin and disgusting, and this is a guy who is "helping" other addicts along.
 
Theres actually a book on fighting this:

Resisting 12-Step Coercion: How to Fight Forced Participation in AA, NA, or 12-Step Treatment

thestantonpeelea


Stanton and his colleagues respond to the overwhelming use of coercive referrals to substance abuse treatment (read "12-step treatment") in the United States with a primer on the legal, ethical, and clinical aspects of such treatment. The authors find that the empirical basis for claims that 12-step treatment is useful is weak at best. Important research has found no benefits — or even negative results — from assignment to AA and related treatments, and certainly other treatments are at least as effective. Moreover, a personal resolution to participate in a particular treatment is an important component in effective therapy.

From here, the authors review legal and ethical issues surrounding compulsion to go to 12-step groups. A number of higher courts have made clear that government-agency or court coercion to attend AA violates the first amendment's separation of church and state, since AA has uniformly been found to be religious in nature (both the legal and factual basis for this finding are part of this book). A separate chapter evaluates chemical dependence treatment in terms of current standards of medical informed consent, and finds such treatment highly deficient in this regard. The strange, sad case of G. Douglas Talbott, the founder and past president of the American Society of Addiction Medicine, is discussed. Talbott, who for years has been criticized and sued for force-feeding the 12 steps to physicians, was recently found liable for malpractice and fraud in an unfortunately typical case of American substance abuse treatment.

Finally, the authors summarize their material in a ready-to-digest form for submission to policy makers who are considering making people go to AA or related therapies. Since court challenges are a last resort, the authors instead suggest gently informing decision-makers that such policies are unwise and illegal. Effective alternatives are outlined and discussed, along with references to alternate support groups. This book is a critical aid for combat in the emerging war over treatment as a part of intrusive and punitive drug and alcohol laws, which are made to seem more palatable by the inclusion of treatment provisions, but which are actually even more coercive and repressive than simple punishment for using drugs or drinking in ways that AA doesn't like.

Link
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That's an interesting read... How do I tell the people on Drug Court who will incarcerate me as failing to comply with probation that their forcing me to go to meetings is illegal. :) Every week when I go before my judge, she asks me if i have a sponsor, if i have a homegroup, if i'm working the steps. My probation officer checks my NA/AA signature card. My 3 nights a week of Outpatient are based around 12-steps and going to meetings.

Hipocracy at its finest, gotta love the age we live in.[
 
I have a friend that was a girl that was trying to be sober by going to a meetings and two of the old timers invited her to his apartment and basically raped her (after making doing some strange 'addiction chants'), she stopped going but was too afraid to tell the police or anything.
 
n4k33n said:
This is just the standard AA response and avoids the issue completely.

I've been to over 150 meetings, had a sponsor, been exposed to the full AA program in all aspects. My best friends are regular members. I've given the program a fair chance and watched it for years when I was in and out of rehab. Now I'm clean, and I was only able to do it by breaking from the program completely and going to a rehab without this or any other religious program. This freedom is what allowed me to get clean.

I could write books on the subject, but my personal experience with AA/NA has demonstrated a few facts to me.

1. AA is religious - Regardless of doublespeak and rationalizations its obviously a religious organization. Even if you gave them the benefit of the doubt and don't equate "religion" with "spirituality", they still organize and distill your spirituality into a system, which is the same end. If that doesn't make it painfully obvious, do some research on the history of AA on the internet. Their aim is pretty clear. Even the supreme court agrees! If prodded I will add to this.

2. AA doesn't work - Most research puts the success rate the same as spontaneous abstainers. One paper demonstrated its harder to get clean on your own after being exposed. The success rate is abismal. Its popularity as a treatment doesn't demonstrate its efficacy.

3. AA ruins lives and kills people - The vast majority of people I know in AA (and I know quite a few from different backgrounds, states clean times [1day-20 years], drugs, etc. They are quite across the board. The program has brainwashed my friends to think they are completely powerless over their actions. Soon, watching their friends in the program relapse constantly, they eventually fall to the same fate. Now they're powerless and hopeless. AA is a black hole of sad stories all the way to basketball diaries style horror.

The program teaches everyone that theyre not special and everyone follows the same cycles. Powerless hopeless people who now think that the gutter is the end will make it a self fulfilling prophecy. I just saw it happen again to my best friend in February. So many others have dont it, that its true impact and importance are lost on the group as being natural progression. They're addicts, after all, its what happens. "relapse is part of recovery"

The all or nothing abstainance only rules create this harm. Measuring life in days instead of happiness. When people relapse, they end up relapsing HARD compared to a "natural relapse". This has also been demonstrated in studies. These relapses end up killing people and causing collateral damage.

This policy is so careless and without regard for individual human life. This shit is so entrenched that it will never be questioned. It would be like questioning the virgin birth. Its part of AA dogma now.

4. On a societal level, AA reinforces addiction. - AA has created a recovery monoculture based on religious principles. Although a certain percentage likes AA and it works for them, it fails for the vast, vast majority. But not only do they leave still drinking, they leave thinking they are powerless to a "disease" which they can only cure with meetings that don't work for them. This is creating a permenant self described "addict" population where before there was only a fraction.

I'll start with that. When I have time later today I'll cite my sources on those claims.
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This is a Brilliant post dude, deserves to be quoted again .
 
dude...ppl at AA pressuring you to sleep with other members??
shit son, i need to join that one.
when i was in AA it was like...old ladies and shit
 
What a complete lack of info

Opinions are fine but they should be informed.
The essence of the steps is not to find "GOD" persay.
The idea truly is to recognize that we are not the only ones in the universe- being that most addicts/alcoholics have a tendency to be fully self- absorbed and selfish.
We clean the wreckage of our doings and address fears that prohibit us from functioning normally in society in the steps. As that process happens we begin to see that we are not stuck in this shitty fucked up world anymore that we had created in our heads, we begin to participate in the world. That is the "higher power." It is specifically stated numerous times in almost every meeting that there is no requirement for a god or religious affiliation.
14 yrs of AA and I still today don't really believe in "god." I believe that I function better when I remove the bullshit from my head and function like the rest of society- in that I see a lot of joy or euphoria and that to me is spiritually moving.
For the people bitching about it (drug court etc etc) You fucked up. You got arrested you did something you weren't supposed to do. You acted like a social degenerate and are concerned about the consequences imposed on you? How about not fucking up in that manner and subjecting yourself to the law? It makes you sound twice as sick and stupid. Man up- quit the shit and get on with your lives. The vendetta against other organizations is really just simply a way of avoiding any responsibility for your irresponsibility.
Grow up.
 
big a said:
For the people bitching about it (drug court etc etc) You fucked up. You got arrested you did something you weren't supposed to do. You acted like a social degenerate and are concerned about the consequences imposed on you? How about not fucking up in that manner and subjecting yourself to the law? It makes you sound twice as sick and stupid. Man up- quit the shit and get on with your lives. The vendetta against other organizations is really just simply a way of avoiding any responsibility for your irresponsibility.
Grow up.
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Yeah they got caught but they're being forced to "work" something that has not been proved to be anymore successful than not participating in it. Being a "social degenerate" is not a prerequisite for a drug arrest. As for breaking a "law",right it's a law but it's a law that's unconstitutional and goes against basic human rights. I don't see the big deal in breaking an unjust law.

Who are you to judge someone's personal decision and to tell them to grow up?
 
big a said:
For the people bitching about it (drug court etc etc) You fucked up. You got arrested you did something you weren't supposed to do. You acted like a social degenerate and are concerned about the consequences imposed on you? How about not fucking up in that manner and subjecting yourself to the law? It makes you sound twice as sick and stupid. Man up- quit the shit and get on with your lives. The vendetta against other organizations is really just simply a way of avoiding any responsibility for your irresponsibility.
Grow up.
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Wow, you were so high on your little spirituality trip that you totally misread what I wrote regarding drug court that I really can't hold you to such an ignorant statement. There is no complaining for me as to what i've done. It's being forced to believe in something that I don't believe in. Go find someone randomly on the street and FORCE them to go to NA/AA and work steps. And then when they reject it, go on and on about god and spirituality and your 14 years and how they need to man up and grow up.

You must be so far along in recovery that you forgot you might have at one point done something illegal whether it be purchasing or using drugs, because if not, why the fuck are you on this message board? So to go and attack me for getting caught is nothing more of a sign of the BETTER-THAN mentality you obviously learned in your little 12 step rooms.

Sure, maybe I should have just taken the easy way out and taken my prison sentence, that would be manning up too right? Or go on blindly never questioning anything, not using intellgience to try and come to an understanding of things, instead of following on blindly from a group of people who think they have such a greater purpose than the next man in society.

By you coming on here and attacking people instead of trying to create dialog just proves pretty much everything everyone said in these posts. BTW, isn't your philosophy attraction rather than promotion? Because the shit you're promoting makes AA/NA not look attractive at all. 14 years clean? Might be time to go hit your steps again buddy cause you're certainly not doing your fellowship and justice..

And I said many times I don't have a problem with NA/AA I have a problem with being forced to go.... but judging by your ignorance and a lot of ignorance I see around the rooms, it makes me even more bitter about my situation. Thank god i'm where I am and not where you are though.
 
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