They are equally effective as cold turkey. They require you to believe you are not responsible for your own actions and behavior. Which basically means they control you through doctrine. They are cultish.
There are much better organizations who can actually help.
They require you to believe you are not responsible for your own actions and behavior
That right there is my problem with organizations like AA. You cannot solve your problems without first realizing that you - and ONLY you - are responsible for yourself.
You cannot solve your problems without first realizing that you - and ONLY you - are responsible for yourself.
Completely agree.
I looked up from AA.
This first step states, “We admitted we were powerless over alcohol and that our lives had become unmanageable.”
Absolute rubbish. I admire the effort made to help people overcome their problems, but giving them an excuse for it right out of the gate is a bad idea. To me, anyway.
Even the atheist version of AA has something similar but they leave "god" out of it.
Unfortunately many people are truly powerless and won't solve their own problems. Look around you today. Anyone still wearing a mask and people who got the poison shot are subject to mass mind control. These people, while not alcoholics, necessarily, simply are feeble minded and react to media suggestion. They are not in control of their own thoughts. They look to others to tell them what to do. These same people also are subject to diffusion of responsibility. That is, they won't take responsibility and assume other people are going to do it. The "Q" phenomenon was a good example of that. "Trust the plan"
They are not powerless. They simply refuse to use their own power and instead choose to blame anyone else except themselves.
There are plenty of other examples of people being the sheep that most people are.
That is how religion works also.
Its also very effective for a large percentage of the population. Im not sure at what intelligence level personal responsibility becomes a factor for people, but I'm fairly certain it's somewhere above average.
That is how religion works also.
Religion works because you're exposed to its precepts at a very young age, before you have acquired the wisdom and experience to question what you're being told.
AA and NA have the same precepts you have to accept. Part of the problem is "religion" is taken to mean only Christianity, when really it just means a system of beliefs -- a "set of axioms" in mathematical terms. Most often these religions-in-all-but-name use innocuous "truths" as their basis, i.e.: "what happens between consenting adults is no one's business"
Anyway, as an example: in AA/NA you confess your sins to large groups of people, while (specifically) in Catholicism you confess your sins to one person. So what's the difference?
For that to be true, it would require a lack of converts above the age of possessing critical thought.
But that's not the point im addressing. The basis of nearly every religion is that you are controlled by a higher power and everything that you do or that happens to you is a result of this higher power. Not yourself. The example i am most familiar with is Catholicism. If i were a catholic, i could see your wife, lust after her, stalk her and rape her, kill her and bury her body - all horrible things. Then i could stroll into confession, tell the priest what i have done and have him forgive me for my sins, absolving me of all of it and i could just walk away from the responsibility of it all. Because the higher power is responsible. Not me. But the same logic applies to everything. And the the human mind's strong rationalization skills uses religion as a coping mechanism to deal with the terrible things we make decisions to do. That is why religion works. It creates a way for you to stop blaming yourself and a start blaming someone else for the fucked up shit you do.
Maybe organized religion, sure.
I like the definition of religion as a SET of beliefs regarding origin, destiny, purpose, and morality. In that paradigm, everyone has a religion. Some are just less "organized" ;)
12 steps say you ARE responsible for your own life and actions. That using alcohol to change perception of reality only leads to despair and dereliction.
It can be very cultish. But it is free to attend. Grassroots organized. And anonymous.
What other organization offers free, anonymous, autonomous help?
"I am powerless..."
Step one, declare you are not responsible for yourself.
They are a cult which does not help anyone except themselves.
I am powerless over ... my actions. And life owes me what i want. Yup. Says it right there in the AA bible.
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