CORRECTION

I just had a look at my old blog, mairtin.livejournal.com . I stated, in another correction, that Vaillant of AA Service, inc, found that of 100 members studied 29 were dead within a year. This was in fact over an 8 year period (Still shocking). He found that 5 were sober, 29 dead and the rest drunk. So much for the great success of AA. When you take into account the rate of spontaneous remmision ( 5%) among alcoholics that represents a 0% 'success' for AA. And frankly I would say it was worse, as it appears to me that AA causes death with its constant threats of Die or AA, leading vulnerable people to believe that these are their only options. The fact some (3%) choose death speaks volumns for me about this evil bastard cult called Alcoholics Anonymous!

I'M NOT DEAD OR DRUNK

The AA fruit cakes often, almost always, say that without AA we alcoholics will die without AA meetings. Well I'm not dead or drunk after 8 months without AA. I don't have to be an AA slave, spreading their lies and recruiting some poor bastards. I don't have to be a robot, without an original word, parroting the vomit of some self righteous old fucks who think 'God' chose them. Hey I can also be a little angry too, which is fun. In fact I can feel any way I choose. And tonight I will, as always, sleep soundly... Ah freedom is joy! Freedom from AA; freedom from irrational, nonsensical beliefs.

thoughts

It really is extraordinary the level of sarcasm and put downs in Alcoholics Anonymous.
When a cult drone asked me recently if I was still getting meetings I answered that I wasn't, and that I was no longer a member of AA. I told him that I was finding peace now. His response was, "Sure you're too well for AA." Of course he was being sarcastic but I decided to give a simply, genuine answer: "Yes. That's correct, thankyou, I hope you get out soon too". He said, "I pity you", I laughed, rather like you would when a child says someting cute and innocent. This conversation really reminds me of how much more confident I have become. In AA they tell you not to get angry, yet ironically they're the angriest people I've met to date. Angry people don't frighten me like they used to. This guy found out the hard way. His body language said: 'you beat me. I am humiliated'. Well he humiliated himself. No longer will I suppress who I am for fear of humiliating some weak bully. No longer will the embarrassement of others affect me, except when I choose.
I take responsibility for how I feel; I am not responsible for others feelings. Woo hoo what a burden lifted!!!

SINCE LEAVING THE CULT

There has been a lot of changes in my life since leaving AA. Now I can't say that all of these changes were caused by leaving AA. I cannot always prove this link or if there is a link.
I now communicate far better with people. When in the cult I imagine been different, somehow excluded for 'normies' (AA lingo for non-members). There is no doubt that my childhood contributed to my lack of communication and loneliness, but I feel AA perpetuated this with the constant message: "we're not normal" "Our brains are different". Deep down I always spoke to people with the thought (automatic thought that becomes habit and perhap unconscious), 'Are the AA or not?' And I believed most did not understand me, only AAs understand me. Of course this is nonsense.
I am also more open and a little more trusting. While in the cult I had this secret (being a member) that made me very careful about talking to people, especially relating to booze. Although now I don't blab about AA I couldn't care less if I told someone, so I need not be careful.
One change that certainly is connected to leaving AA is that I don't have the anxiety I used to have about missing meetings. That's gone! And it is a huge relief! It's like giving up smokes: You wake up after a couple of weeks off of the weed and think, 'I need a smoke... wait no I don't! I don't even feel like smoking!' And you then relax.

just some thoughts

I've met a lot of members since leaving the AA cult and openly told them that I have left. You know what is so interesting? None of them asked me if I was drinking! Isn't AA a quit drinking program? (of course not). One member said to me: "Well I am mature enough to wish you well". Imagine going to another self help group; lets say for marriage break ups. I go for a few years, feel very well, then leave and find I now feel strong and happy and free; I meet a person still a member, and he or she says, "well I am mature enough to wish you well". Is there any reason in the world for him or her to not wish me well?
It is meeting people like this guy (who's actually a nice guy), who come out with such statements, that convince me that AA is a cult. They are not interested in people who quit drinking unless they are a member of their organisation. It does not matter if one is sober or not. What matters is that people attend their cult meetings. Their are several members who will not speak to me or greet me at all. Yet when I was a member they talked to me. So you see many don't give a shit about their fellow alcoholics at all. I must state however that there are nice people in AA, and they are still nice to me. They are the people who don't swallow all the bullshit of Bill Wilson. Nevertheless they do not change the philosophy or dynamics of AA group meetings. They do though play their part. They try to change AA with-in. I try, in a very small way, to change AA with-out. I owe it to my dead friends...

CONFESSING

Confessing 'sins' or revealing ones private life to the group is a huge part of Alcoholics Anonymous. This caused me great distress and anxiety. I remember often thinking, 'how will I tell the group this' or 'I have to tell the group this'. I found this very unhealthy and a total waste of my brain power.
Now it is sometimes not good to keep things bottled up, but isn't it best to talk to a non-judgemental friend than to a group of self-righteous people, who believe that God chose them?
Often at very large meetings many of the people will be strangers to each other. Is it wise to confide your darkest secrets to strangers? I think not.

SELF-ESTEEM DESTROYED
The saddest thing for me was to see young people come in, influenced by their sponsors, talk about how horrible the are, and how bad they are, and how useless they are without AA.
"AA saved me"
"I'd be dead without AA"
"AA comes first for me"
"I am nothing without AA"
"I was a horrible person without AA"
I believe these statements come about because of a desire to fit in. It is conforming to the cult. But in time it becomes a belief, and they really do, then, believe that they are bags of useless shit. Well let me tell you something, I am no bag of shit. I give the credit for my recovery first to me and my courage and grit; and secondly I give credit to my last counsellor for guiding me and allowing me to express myself. AA gets NOTHING. ZERO! AA hindered my recovery with its idiotic, anti-intellectual, superstitious bull shit! Hehe!!
One thing I have noticed, to my great joy, since leaving the cult is how well I can relate to people. And when things fail, when I don't get what I want, the disappointment passes quickly. Why? Because I no longer need go to a meeting to regurgitate pain which has already been resolved. If you feel sick and throw up, you feel better, in AA you eat your own vomit again and again and again and again. It is totally unnecessary.

The Power Of Belief

My first realisation that Alcoholics Anonymous was harmful came about through meditation However it was quite a while before I left the cult. There were many realisations to came.
I was thinking about belief, and the power it has over our behaviour. Now I believe that many fears, indeed for me, most fears are irrational.
In AA there is an almost universal belief that cutting back on meetings will lead to a relapse or death. Now it seems for those who have this belief it comes true. It is not uncommon to hear, "I haven't had a meeting in a week, and feel aweful" I'm not getting enough meetings" We all have problems; we all suffer. But in AA they often believe this suffering comes about by not getting enough meetings. They may suffer because they believe this or, equally as bad, they may ignore real problems in life and suppress these problems in the false belief that the cause of the problem is a lack of meetings. Thus more meetings, more of life's ordinary problems suppressed, more fear of missing meetings, more anxiety brought about by suppression, and of course more anger. And then more meetings in the belief that meetings reduce suffering!!
Of course there are members, plenty, with no such belief, but as always it is the more vulnerable and desperate who relaps and die BECAUSE OF AA. It is no wonder a group of psychologist found a high rate of mental illness among members!

Self-love

I read quite a while back a leaflet which was distributed by the Alcoholics Anonymous Services. It wrote of the differences between a sponsor and a counsellor. Of course the sponsor with no training whatsoever in mental health care, comes out on top. I can't remember all of it but I will find it and reproduce here. One thing that stood out was: " The difference between a sponsor and a counsellor is that a counsellor tells you to love yourself and a sponsor tells you to love others"
Utter shite!
This rather slyly implies that a counsellor tells you to love only yourself. Rubbish. Not true. What is wrong with loving yourself and others? Isn't it logical to love yourself first? And if you don't love yourself, what then? Do you think maybe you're just ok? Bearable? Is this vacuum filled with self hatred? Like the self loathing Bill Wilson, who projected that hatred onto alcoholics.
If you don't love yourself nobody else will love you. If you don't respect yourself nobody will either.
I for example was a self loathing person as an AA member, although this improved even in the cult, despite the cult. Now about seven months on I dress better, having more confidence and I know I'm a nice person. I take care of myself because I love myself, but not just myself.
I know longer have to go to cult meetings saying what a shit I am. I can now be proud of who I am, and proud I certainly am. I've got grit and guts aplently! Now I could not say that at an Alcoholics Anonymous cult meeting. There I must give all my hard work and credit to the cult and admit that I've done nothing to deserve it. Yes indeed a lack of self love is an official part of Alcoholics Anonymous! This is perhaps another reason for the seeding, boiling rage beneath the false 'spiritual' face of the indoctrinated AA cult member...
Another one that comes to mined:
A counsellor tells you to love your inner child, a sponsors says he needs a good spanking"
That is so appalling, even for the ignorant AA leadership. Yet again more self hatred. Another example of suppression in AA. Imagine being beaten to a pulp by a parent, or raped, and hearing a sponsor tell to your inner child needs a spanking! I watched a TV program on BBC before where there were four men who'd been sexually abused as children. These men were all hard men and criminals and heavily tattooed. Yet when they spoke of their shocking childhood they seemed to regress into a childlike state: their heads down, twiddling the fingers, weeping like a child. It really moved me. Now an AA sponsor suggest beating that inner child that these men brought to the surface to heal.
The more I analyze AA now, the more it disgusts me. No wonder they say, Utilize, don't analyze! Because when you do analyze you find the truth, which to me is just plain sick!

"TURN DOWN THAT JOB"

I met a friend of mine recently who just left AA because of the nonsense he was being told. My friend is starting a new job soon. The money is great and he is very happy and looking forward to it. His former 'friends' of Alcoholics Anonymous told him to turn the job down, that he was not ready for it. Isn't that outrageous? It is small wonder that many members in this area are self-righteous bums who smoke like trains and waste their lives talking about how grateful they are at meetings!
The amount of unemployed members I've met is shocking. Now these are long time members who advice others to turn down jobs! Ireland has one of the lowest unemployed rates in the world and the lowest in the EU. There is a job for everyone. In fact there are so many jobs that we have to recruit from other countries (making a wonderful multi-cultural Ireland). It is understandable that some don't have the confidence or suffer from depression or low self-esteem, but the big shots who told my friend to turn a job down brag about how well they are!

SUCKERS

I have been to many, many meetings and consistantly I have heard members express their distaste for religion and professional mental health care. It seems odd that they should hate religion for two reasons. 1. They are a religion themselves and 2. Most rooms are given to them by the Catholic church and the Church of Ireland.
My mother tells me that Alcoholics Anonymous is often mentioned in Sunday Mass (so much for attraction, not promotion!). Yet members have the cheek to sit in Church rooms kindly donated, and bad mouth the very people who accept whatever is collected, anything from E1 to E10! What a nerve!
Bad mouthing counsellors too is very common. Yet counsellors regularly advice their clients to go to these meetings. I guess the Churches and Counsellors are suckers!

Cognitive-Behavioural Therapy or CBT

I read recently in the Orange Papers that Dr. Vaillant (The AA quack) of the Alcoholics Anonymous World Service stated that AA was similar to CBT. This is utter nonsense. I am no expert but I know when people feel bad about themselves, when people feel powerless it is not good therapy of any kind.
What I have seen in my nine years in the cult was certainly not CBT. People who are unhappy might say, "I feel happy. I am happy in AA". Now their body language contradicts this. They often look miserable. They often merely say what they think others want to hear. They deny their feelings of sorrow. This is called suppression, not CBT. And this is perhaps why there is so much anger at the meetings. There is often a boiling rage. AAs hate feeling, and rarely express any at meetings in my experience. I cannot believe that our 'good doctor' really believes that meetings are like CBT. Considering that he found the suicide rate among members was appalling, and that AA "was no better" than nothing at all".
It is best I think to recognise our feelings. Sometimes I feel sad but rather than suppress it, it is best to say, 'yes I'm sad, but it will pass. It IS passing. I am sad because.... I will rectify it. I will rise above it'. Isn't that better than saying, 'I am happy' while inside feel rotten?
So many times I have seen people deny their feelings at meetings. You can feel the pain, the atmosphere is full of sorrow. An AA room is like a grey room. Meetings are full of pain, sarcasm, condescension, denial, fake smiles, sniggering. It truly is an awful place. CBT indeed!