a field trip to AA

[threejane]

As a child I loved field trips. In the vernacular of Martha Stewart: Field trips are a good thing. Yet I felt a horrible reluctance to complete a simple class assignment that asked me to attend an AA meeting. How reluctant was I? The first time I tried to go I woke up with the flu. Suppose Freud was right and there are no coincidences. If so, what

Comments

[ankh_f_n_khonsu]

The AA is a cult, and it is generally ineffective in producing addiction-free lifestyles. It's based on the Plymouth Bretheren's model of spiritual accountability. These were the über-conservative Christians of whom Aleister Crowley's father was a member.

[threejane]

Well. It isn't terribly effective (I think I head once it helps 1 in 3 people) but sadly it is one of the more effective strategies that currently exists. I was happy for the people I met yesterday who found it helpful. That counts for something.

[helios137]

I agree that social and environmental factors are accurate reasons for addictions and that judgmental assertions of moral failings are not. The same thing goes with poverty. I am tired of reading/hearing people blame the recession of people who are not morally responsible enough to live within their means.

I think if one can get addicted people to realize that they are not morally deficient, then perhaps they would be less cultish-ness. IMO, it has always been the reformed addicts of pleasure who make the worst judgmental fundamentalists. And it started all the way back with Saint Augustine, the first partier turned saint.

[threejane]

Yeah. His biography makes for very interesting reading.

I wonder if that judgmental attitude comes from not being able to forgive oneself.

[helios137]

I do believe that it does. And also a feeling of unworthiness of God's love or any degree of self-love.