A critique of AA meetings and an assessment of the nature of addiction.

[HenryRomp]

AA/NA Meetings

I recently accompanied a very dear friend of mine to an AA meeting.
I've long held various prejudices against the organization, but she needed support and it seemed like a good opportunity to assess my opinion of these meetings and see if perhaps I had misjudged them.

I found many of my preconceptions to be correct and the experience reinforced my negative feelings about the group. Now, many might say "it helps some people, if it's not for you, good for you, no need to knock it." I feel otherwise. I believe that AA and NA (and many other groups intended to help people battle addiction) are not only unhelpful for me personally, but actually obstruct and discourage true recovery for all of those who subscribe to their rhetoric.

The main issue I take with these organizations revolves around identity. I hypothesize that addiction is tightly tied into identity. Overcoming addiction involves severing the portion of your identity that is associated with not only the particular substance at hand (i.e. "I am a smoker" or "I am a drinker") but also severing the portion of your identity that is associated with being addicted (i.e. "I am an addict" or "I am incapable of controlling myself").

AA/NA encourages you to embrace this identity. They encourage you to accept and resign yourself to the idea that you are inherently flawed, that you are not capable of enjoying a beer or two now and then without losing all control, that it is beyond your willpower--that you "are" an "addict" and must behave accordingly.

They encourage you to reinforce this unhealthy self-image. Rather than suggesting, for example, that you say to yourself "I currently am drinking more than I would like to" or even "I am suffering from withdraws because I have become physically dependent upon alcohol," they propose that you say things like "I am an alcoholic" and even use a standard format of introduction such as "Jane, alcoholic" or "Jim, addict."

You are what you chose to be in this world. If you identify yourself as an alcoholic who has been abstinent for 20 years, you are still an alcoholic (albeit one that has been very well behaved for a long while). If you identify yourself as a recovered alcoholic, and allow yourself a drink now and then but are very cautious to avoid losing control, you are still identifying yourself as an alcoholic. You are choosing to be a recovered alcoholic, or an abstinent alcoholic, but you are choosing to be an alcoholic.

If you never acknowledge the need to sever that portion of your personality and your very self, you will remain an alcoholic for the rest of your life, regardless of how much or little you drink.

Only when you can truly change your self image and assert control over who you choose to be will you have a chance at no longer being an alcoholic. "I was once an alcoholic, I am not any more." Only when you truly believe that statement will you be free of the shackles of alcoholism.

I have been using the example of alcoholism, but this is my theory of all addiction, and it goes along with a more fundamental belief that man chooses his own destiny and must take full responsibility for all of his actions and even all of his thoughts. You choose who you are. I believe this fully, and from it springs my assessment of addiction. It leads me to hold other opinions some challenge, such as the idea that one choses which foods he likes and does not like, and chooses which people he loves and does not love. Many disagree with these fundamental beliefs and therefore will systematically disagree with a large portion of my opinions; it is a sort of dissonance caused by differing world-views similar to the dissonance I experience when talking to people who harbor religious beliefs.


To use the example of cigarettes and myself, I would phrase it like this: I am a smoker. I am a smoker because I choose to be a smoker. I choose to be a smoker because "being a smoker" is so deeply ingrained in my self image from such a young age that to change myself would require a painful effort so great that it outweighs my fear of and aversion to lung disease.

If ever my aversion to lung disease becomes stronger than my aversion to the pain and effort involved in changing who I am (which might happen, for example, if a close loved one were to be diagnosed with lung disease, or if I myself were diagnosed with lung disease), I would sever that portion of myself and cease to smoke. I can see that my aversion to that pain and effort is greater than my aversion to lung disease, by virtue of the fact that I have not yet stopped smoking. I may never stop smoking, but my core assumption is that if I am still smoking, it is because my attachment to being a smoker is greater than my attachment to being healthy (or even being alive).

Also closely tied in to identity and self image, I see surrounding oneself with others who are addicts and identify themselves as such (recovered or otherwise, clean for 10 days or 20 years) reinforces the image of oneself as an addict. Especially harmful is going to meetings with or spending time with "recovered addicts" who were already part of your peer group and were previously abusing substances with you. Clinging to relationships that had their basis in substance abuse is clinging to the identity you've formed of yourself in which you see yourself as an addict.

Say for example a heroin addict who is entrenched in the false glamor and the appeal of junkie culture. That person thinks of them self as a junkie. They have a peer group that consists of other heroin addicts and holds those folks in high esteem, valuing their opinions and and seeking their approval. If this person tries to get clean, but continues to spend time with the same folks, listen to the same music, spew the same rhetoric, live the same lifestyle; they will fail. To shed the "junkie identity" one must recreate themselves with new values, change the very essence of what they do and do not like and who they are.


In summary, I think that groups such as AA and NA are using the wrong rhetoric and approaching the issue of addiction from the wrong angle; while they are certainly helpful for many many people I believe they could be much more helpful if they focused on guiding people towards a point at which they no longer need to attend meetings, worry about slipping up, think of themselves as addicts, think of themselves as compromised or flawed, think of themselves as recovering or even recovered.

Many folks call addiction a disease, including AA and most physicians. I certainly am aware that people suffer from addiction, and I see how it has properties very much like various diseases, but I do not think that disease is a very effective word for conveying the nature of addiction. Disease implies that "addiction" is something you have; I propose that "an addict" is something you choose to be, and that with enough willpower and motivation you can become something better.

And of course, some people will bristle at that statement, and say that with those words I am blaming the victims, and that it is "out of their control" and that "they have a disease it's not their fault" and so on. Those people will find that they disagree with me on most topics, due to deeper differences in fundamental beliefs about the world. I firmly believe in man's ultimate responsibility for all of his actions, I firmly believe that you chose who you are and what you do.

Now, don't get me wrong, I do not propose that we shut down AA and NA, and I do not propose that meetings of this sort are entirely harmful. Certain people at certain stages may find it helpful to connect with others who have fought the same battles. I believe that the systems and rhetoric used by most of these sort of meetings tend to turn "alcoholics" into "recovered alcoholics" and "addicts" into "recovered addicts." It may sound like semantics, but I feel that a recovered alcoholic is still an alcoholic; for example, many so-called "recovered alcoholics" still are unable to consume even a single beer without losing all control and returning to alcoholism. I say this is not true recovery, and that one should strive towards being a whole, healthy, happy, human being, who has left alcoholism and addiction in their past.

As a final note I would like to point out that I am not speaking as an outsider. I am speaking as an individual who suffered greatly through numerous addictions over the course of three years, starting at a very young age. If there is any inherent genetic tendency towards being particularly susceptible to addiction, I would say it is likely that I have it. Nevertheless, I am not an addict, "recovered" or otherwise, and I will never be one. I am a man who was once addicted.

I am now healthy, free of addiction, and do not live in fear of relapse. I can comfortably be in the presence of substances that once were a major problem for me, and I can drink a beer now and then without becoming an alcoholic. I am this way because I have decided to make it so, and I did so with very little support required, through my own willpower and introspection. I do not count how many days I have "been clean" and I do not consider myself a "recovered addict" and I never went to meetings or rehab programs or spoke to doctors; only twice during the whole process did I feel a need for support and in both instances I needed only to talk to somebody, mostly to vent the about emotions I was experiencing during withdraws.



I hope this inspires some fiery debate. But that's probably wishful thinking, after all, nobody bothers to read a thread this long (except for me, I search for the longest threads I can find and I read them carefully, word for word).

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[im3w1l]

I read it. Can't come up with anything clever to say at this hour though.

[MarKusRomanus]

Wow!  So after 5000+ years of human history with alcohol and drug addiction , all that was missing for those who suffer from  alcoholism and addiction was the insight you have?  Where religion ,medication have psychiatry all failed to help these people with sustained recovery , NA and AA have statistically helped a much higher percentage than all 3 of those.  But people should just be smart enough like you to realize they should just stop identifying themselves as 'addicts' or 'alcoholics'.  
There is a reason that courts order alcoholics and addicts who get into criminal trouble because of drugs and alcohol to AA and NA meetings..statistically it works better than anything else that has ever come along.  Should something else come along that works better (like your brilliant discovery)... they will surely be referring the offenders to that method.  So start a program and make tons of money.. There are 3am infomercials promising the same thing, and I'm sure they cost a pretty penny.

   These 12 step programs are not perfect because they still depend on the person to want to get better and to work at it.  The powerless thing is misunderstood by outsiders and even members of these groups.  "we admitted we WERE powerless over... and our lives HAD become unmanageable.  The Idea is there is power greater than any one individual in a group of individuals with a common focus...and that will work for anything.  When one utilizes that power.. they are not powerless anymore but need to remember that, on their own, they don't have that power.  Self-sufficiency for an individual is almost impossible (you'd eventually go crazy if you were alone long enough) .. but for a group ..it is easy. What worked for you, you should share and see if it works for others.  My guess is that for the majority of people .. it will not.

[Elwar]

There is a very low percentage of alcoholics that kick alcohol through AA. The people I believe it works for is those that value being part of a group that accepts them more than they value drinking. Kinda like people who get involved in a club or community and start to revolve their lives around doing things that will get acolades by the community, whether it is a fishing club and you make sure you make it out every morning before work to try to catch a great fish so that you can tell your community how well you did, receiving acolades and being a "big fish" within that community for your efforts. Or any number of groups where following their process makes you more welcome among the members.

As for whether or not it is an addiction, I read one article that made sense. It said that many alcoholics started drinking when they were a teenager. When you drink alcohol your body treats it like a poison, your body reacts, you may get sick if you have too much, you get hung over as your body has literally been poisoned. If you do this once in a while this is no big deal, but as a teenager who's body is developing, if you repeatedly drink alcohol your body will accept that for some reason you will continue to drink this poison so your developing body changes to accept alcohol not as a poison but as something that your body will tolerate and even need. You will feel good when you drink alcohol and your body will crave it when you do not have it in your system. This is what alcoholics have to live with. People who do not have this type of body chemistry look at alcoholics as weak because they can have a couple of drinks and stop with no problem. An alcoholic has two drinks and his body has taken over and needs more and more and more, the euphoria has taken over.

I have been to a few of these AA meetings with a friend and I am saddened that the meetings are not about taking control of your own body and your life but rather replacing one addiction with another. Every AA meeting will have people drowning themselves in coffee or there are the smoker's meetings where everyone is puffing away at cigarettes as they talk about how they are glad that they have their alcohol addiction under control.

I do not know what the solution is, you have changed your body's chemistry while it was developing. I doubt as an adult you can do much to change it back. Your body is pretty much done developing.

The best thing that can be done is to discourage kids who's bodies are still developing from drinking alcohol. Let them know that they are not just damaging their bodies in the short term but they are choosing a miserable life of being addicted to something that will control them the rest of their lives.

[MarKusRomanus]

What about the millions of people who weren't counted because they independently decided to cut down on drinking? Or people who committed the 'impossible' feat of e.g.: experimenting with drugs, yet still live healthy, respectable lifestyles and somehow managed to avoid becoming homeless bums?

It wouldn't make sense to count those people since such 12 step programs are for people who have tried everything else and have failed... that's who they are for.  People who don't ever get to that point of desperation..well, they never end up walking into a meeting.

[MarKusRomanus]

I have been to a few of these AA meetings with a friend and I am saddened that the meetings are not about taking control of your own body and your life but rather replacing one addiction with another. Every AA meeting will have people drowning themselves in coffee or there are the smoker's meetings where everyone is puffing away at cigarettes as they talk about how they are glad that they have their alcohol addiction under control.

Not entirely accurate but that is symptomatic of AA  because they identify their problem as alcohol.. a inanimate object.. their real problem is addiction.. a mental issue..themselves.  A genetic and/or chemically induced condition of obsession/compulsion.

[smscotten]

I have been to a few of these AA meetings with a friend and I am saddened that the meetings are not about taking control of your own body and your life but rather replacing one addiction with another. Every AA meeting will have people drowning themselves in coffee or there are the smoker's meetings where everyone is puffing away at cigarettes as they talk about how they are glad that they have their alcohol addiction under control.

Not entirely accurate but that is symptomatic of AA  because they identify their problem as alcohol.. a inanimate object.. their real problem is addiction.. a mental issue..themselves.  A genetic and/or chemically induced condition of obsession/compulsion.

Doesn't the book Alcoholics Anonymous actually use the words, "alcohol was but a symptom"? Seems to me that criticism applies to… well, I don't know who but not AA.

As far as the negative self-image associated with calling one's self an addict or alcoholic, I think that's a non-issue. It's basically admitting that they are shitty at drinking. Almost every one of them has spent decades trying to become good at drinking and getting worse at it. At some point one just has to say, "OK, I'm shitty at drinking and I almost certainly always will be shitty at drinking. It's fucking up my life and maybe it's time to admit that I'm shitty at drinking and try to get better at living." In that context, can't you see how maybe having a label that creates the possibility that "maybe someday I'll be better at drinking" would make things worse?

And actually, while society at large may look down at addicts and alcoholics, I find it hard to believe that anyone thinks it would be better to be "not an alcoholic" whose drinking is getting in the way of their job and life than being an alcoholic who doesn't drink anymore.

Finally, get me some statistics on the number of people killed by drivers who were impaired by their use of coffee and/or cigarettes and I'll consider whether it's pathetic that someone might stay sober while chainsmoking and guzzling coffee.

[randrace]

What's so terrible about identifying as an addict? I haven't had a drink in four years, or a smoke in three. Do you think I've replaced those habits with other compulsive behaviors? You would laugh if I told you how many times I checked to see if anyone clicked on the affiliate links in my signature today. That signature has earned me 70 cents a month, and yet I persist. Buy some silver via my signature, you drunks!

Also, you enjoy smoking more than life itself? Have you tried cocaine?

[MarKusRomanus]

It just seems odd to feel the need to criticize a method that has helped 100,000's if not millions of people find a way out of addiction and live good lives.  Every other way to do it has always existed.  Its just a way to do it that works well for many.  People who don't like the idea of a solution being not drinking at all (or not using drugs at all) probably are those who have problems with drinking or drugs , but want to find a way to do it still and control it.  That's been around too!  And it really does not work out too well for most.  If that has worked for you.. well great, but you have to admit that's really not the answer for everyone or else these 12 step programs would have never become so big.  The programs also address the healing and care for spirit.. its not just about avoiding something.

[HenryRomp]

Also, you enjoy smoking more than life itself? Have you tried cocaine?

This appears to be a misunderstanding. I propose that anybody who smokes is more attached to smoking than they are to health and life itself, provided that they are aware that smoking is killing them. I don't want to get too particularly specific about my history with drug use, but  assuming I had tried cocaine, and then stopped, that would be hard evidence that I am less attached to cocaine than I am to my health, money, and general well being. The principle here is that if you know something is killing you, and you continue to do it anyway, that is proof that you value that activity more than your life.

It just seems odd to feel the need to criticize a method that has helped 100,000's if not millions of people find a way out of addiction and live good lives.  Every other way to do it has always existed.  Its just a way to do it that works well for many. People who don't like the idea of a solution being not drinking at all (or not using drugs at all) probably are those who have problems with drinking or drugs , but want to find a way to do it still and control it.  That's been around too!  And it really does not work out too well for most.  If that has worked for you.. well great, but you have to admit that's really not the answer for everyone or else these 12 step programs would have never become so big.  The programs also address the healing and care for spirit.. its not just about avoiding something.

Regarding the portion of your statement that I've italicized, you've misunderstood. Whether you choose to stop drinking or doing drugs entirely, or you choose to try to drink or use drugs in moderation, I believe that the AA system is harmful to any person attempting to overcome addiction and become a healthy individual who takes responsibility for their own actions. AA encourages you to disclaim that responsibility, declaring that you were "addicted" and therefore you were not in control of your own actions. I disagree. I believe every individual is always in control of their own actions and that claiming otherwise is a "cop-out" if you will.

You also state that " has helped 100,000's if not millions of people find a way out of addiction and live good lives."
I disagree. I think that this method treats only the symptoms of addiction without addressing the core problems, namely control of and responsibility for your own actions. If you still need to go to meetings and you still believe that you are incapable of controlling yourself, you have not yet found a "way out of addiction." I think it encourages a mindset which is detrimental to the quality of life of all of it's members, who might otherwise have truly found themselves and came to the realization that they choose each and every one of their actions and are responsible for the consequences. Now, many members may "live good lives" but I don't agree that AA can take any credit for that.

As far as the negative self-image associated with calling one's self an addict or alcoholic, I think that's a non-issue. It's basically admitting that they are shitty at drinking. Almost every one of them has spent decades trying to become good at drinking and getting worse at it. At some point one just has to say, "OK, I'm shitty at drinking and I almost certainly always will be shitty at drinking. It's fucking up my life and maybe it's time to admit that I'm shitty at drinking and try to get better at living." In that context, can't you see how maybe having a label that creates the possibility that "maybe someday I'll be better at drinking" would make things worse?

And actually, while society at large may look down at addicts and alcoholics, I find it hard to believe that anyone thinks it would be better to be "not an alcoholic" whose drinking is getting in the way of their job and life than being an alcoholic who doesn't drink anymore.

Well, if your drinking is getting in the way of your job and your life, then you are likely an alcoholic. Now, I propose that you evaluate why you have chosen to be an alcoholic and reshape your identity (not just call yourself by a different label), adjusting your values to create a situation where you will choose not to drink. In this example you might decide that you value your job and the quality of your life more than you value the relief that drinking alcohol brings you. Clearly, if you are drinking to a degree that it is damaging your life, this is evidence, even proof that you value drinking more than you value the quality of your life.

You also misunderstand, in that my assessment applies equally to people who are choosing to be entirely abstinent and people who are choosing to drink moderately. If you are choosing to be entirely abstinent I still would not advise you to go to AA meetings. They will indoctrinate you with a rhetoric that will reinforce the concept that you "are" inherently "an addict" and leave you with lasting character flaws, whether or not you achieve abstinence or overcome your dependence upon one particular substance or another.

You really hit the nail on the head when you imagine an alcoholic who says "OK, I'm shitty at drinking and I almost certainly always will be shitty at drinking." I equate this to somebody saying "I'm shitty at controlling myself and I almost certainly will always be shitty at controlling myself." And this is the core problem with AA. It does not teach you to control yourself, it teaches you to avoid temptation and accept that you will always be bad at controlling yourself.


I'll respond to some of the other replies tomorrow, it's 1:00am here and I have work in the morning. I would just note here that my initial post is not just a criticism of AA, it is also a criticism of the general concept of addiction. I propose that anybody who appears addicted to something simply values that "something" more than they value whatever that "something" takes away from them. Essentially, I'm saying that there is no addiction, only choices, motives, values, decisions. When you label it "addiction" you reinforce the idea that you are not in control of yourself. This notion is false. You are in control of yourself, and when you convince yourself that you "can't control yourself" you are simply justifying your actions by blaming them on your "addiction."

The whole notion that it is "impossible" to overcome addiction on your own is nonsense. I know many heroin addicts. The one thing they all have in common is that they value heroin more than they value their own well-being. The only ones I have ever seen truly kick the habit are those who decide to value their own well being more than they value heroin. Once you have committed yourself to that decision, the substance is no longer a temptation that you must resist--you go from being a person who wants so badly to do heroin but restrains themself, to being a person who doesn't want to do heroin anymore.

[HenryRomp]

I must clarify further.

If a person wants to quit [substance A] and yet also wants to indulge in [substance A], if they continue to indulge, that is proof that they want to indulge more than they want to quit.

Now sure, changing what you want and how much you want it is easier said than done, but I am declaring that what you want and how much you want it is under your control and that it is the determining factor in how you act.

[HenryRomp]

Wow!  So after 5000+ years of human history with alcohol and drug addiction , all that was missing for those who suffer from  alcoholism and addiction was the insight you have?  Where religion ,medication have psychiatry all failed to help these people with sustained recovery , NA and AA have statistically helped a much higher percentage than all 3 of those.  But people should just be smart enough like you to realize they should just stop identifying themselves as 'addicts' or 'alcoholics'.  
There is a reason that courts order alcoholics and addicts who get into criminal trouble because of drugs and alcohol to AA and NA meetings..statistically it works better than anything else that has ever come along.  Should something else come along that works better (like your brilliant discovery)... they will surely be referring the offenders to that method.  So start a program and make tons of money.. There are 3am infomercials promising the same thing, and I'm sure they cost a pretty penny.

   These 12 step programs are not perfect because they still depend on the person to want to get better and to work at it.  The powerless thing is misunderstood by outsiders and even members of these groups.  "we admitted we WERE powerless over... and our lives HAD become unmanageable.  The Idea is there is power greater than any one individual in a group of individuals with a common focus...and that will work for anything.  When one utilizes that power.. they are not powerless anymore but need to remember that, on their own, they don't have that power.  Self-sufficiency for an individual is almost impossible (you'd eventually go crazy if you were alone long enough) .. but for a group ..it is easy. What worked for you, you should share and see if it works for others.  My guess is that for the majority of people .. it will not.

I do not propose that I have some system which works better, or some method that can be applied to solve addiction. I propose that one chooses (and it is a very personal choice) either to be an "addict" or not to be an "addict."

"But people should just be smart enough like you to realize they should just stop identifying themselves as 'addicts' or 'alcoholics'." -- It has little to do with being "smart" and a lot to do with strengthening your resolve and choosing who you want to be. The confusion here is over my usage of the term "identify." I'm referring to your identity, internally, your self image, not just to the term you use to describe yourself (although, of course, using a term to describe yourself helps reinforce that part of your self image).

[smscotten]

I do not propose that I have some system which works better, or some method that can be applied to solve addiction. I propose that one chooses (and it is a very personal choice) either to be an "addict" or not to be an "addict."

"But people should just be smart enough like you to realize they should just stop identifying themselves as 'addicts' or 'alcoholics'." -- It has little to do with being "smart" and a lot to do with strengthening your resolve and choosing who you want to be. The confusion here is over my usage of the term "identify." I'm referring to your identity, internally, your self image, not just to the term you use to describe yourself (although, of course, using a term to describe yourself helps reinforce that part of your self image).

Whatever. You're doing a great job of convincing me that you are making a bunch of semantic hash out of nothing. Yeah, people make labels. It's called language. You describe something, give it names based on your observation. I'm right-handed but I learned to shoot pool left-handed. Should I reject all this labeling and use my force of will to write with my left hand or shoot pool like a right-handed person? Have I trapped myself in some self-limiting and destructive way if I continue to write with my right hand? Hogwash. Make observations, ascribe labels to help characterize things—yes, even about yourself—and take appropriate action.

You had some sort of unpleasant experience with drugs, decided not to call yourself an addict, and used whatever means to stop doing those drugs while continuing to drink occasionally. Here's a secret: the existence of Alcoholics Anonymous is no threat to you. AA does not say that there is something wrong with you for drinking. You can drink as much as you like.

Me? If I could drink like normal people do, I would. Every day, all day. Except that's not how normal people drink. Normal people have a glass of wine and leave half of it on the table when they leave the restaurant. Normal people have one drink and stop. I have no idea what the point of that is. So I leave it alone. It doesn't matter whether I call that being an alcoholic or call it Roger. Could I learn to have an occasional drink? I will allow theoretically that I could. But given my past history and how completely useless I regard an occasional alcoholic beverage, the reward-to-risk ratio is staggeringly low.

So you think I'm weak minded for not having an occasional drink? I don't give a shit. Do you think I've caused myself some sort of psychological harm by not triumphing over alcohol? That's a fine opinion; it's one I don't share. I have spent a lot of time learning about myself and changing myself. When I watch science fiction movies, I have a good time; I accept that about myself and don't try to change it. When I get up in the morning I don't want to go for a run; I accept that about myself and run anyway. When I drink, I drive in a blackout; I accept that about myself and don't drink. It's not about how limited I am, it's about recognizing who I am and shaping myself into who I want to be.

I run 10Ks and half marathons and do triathlon. I think I know something about the experience of breaking down the barriers of my own willpower. Crossing the finish line in a shorter time than I ever have, or running farther than I ever have before, those are accomplishments that build my sense of self. Learning to ride a motorcycle meant practicing a kind of focus and attention on the road that I can take pride in. Honing my game of chess gives me a sense of accomplishment. Creating and exhibiting artwork gives me great satisfaction.

Learning to drink a beer safely and occasionally? That's not any kind of accomplishment that would boost my sense of self. So I really don't see what I'm sacrificing by not drinking alcohol and I don't have the foggiest clue what you're talking about when you say that I've mentally or psychologically crippled myself by calling myself an alcoholic and quitting drinking.

Edit to add: above I wrote "by not triumphing over alcohol". My continued sobriety, to me, means I have won. I win every day. Your continued moderate drinking means you have won. Good for you, and cheers! I still fail to see how your victory proves your psychological mettle in any way that mine doesn't also.

[smscotten]

You also misunderstand, in that my assessment applies equally to people who are choosing to be entirely abstinent and people who are choosing to drink moderately. If you are choosing to be entirely abstinent I still would not advise you to go to AA meetings. They will indoctrinate you with a rhetoric that will reinforce the concept that you "are" inherently "an addict" and leave you with lasting character flaws, whether or not you achieve abstinence or overcome your dependence upon one particular substance or another.

You really hit the nail on the head when you imagine an alcoholic who says "OK, I'm shitty at drinking and I almost certainly always will be shitty at drinking." I equate this to somebody saying "I'm shitty at controlling myself and I almost certainly will always be shitty at controlling myself." And this is the core problem with AA. It does not teach you to control yourself, it teaches you to avoid temptation and accept that you will always be bad at controlling yourself.

First of all, that's a false equivalence there. Second, check this out:

People have said we must not go where liquor is served; we must not have it in our homes; we must shun friends who drink; we must avoid moving pictures which show drinking scenes; we must not go into bars; our friends must hide their bottles if we go to their houses; we mustn't think or be reminded about alcohol at all. Our experience shows that this is not necessarily so.

We meet these conditions every day. An alcoholic who cannot meet them, still has an alcoholic mind; there is something the matter with his spiritual status. His only chance for sobriety would be some place like the Greenland Ice Cap, and even there an Eskimo might turn up with a bottle of scotch and ruin everything! Ask any woman who has sent her husband to distant places on the theory he would escape the alcohol problem.

In our belief any scheme of combating alcoholism which proposes to shield the sick man from temptation is doomed to failure. If the alcoholic tries to shield himself he may succeed for a time, but he usually winds up with a bigger explosion than ever. We have tried these methods. These attempts to do the impossible have always failed.

So our rule is not to avoid a place where there is drinking, if we have a legitimate reason for being there. That includes bars, nightclubs, dances, receptions, weddings, even plain ordinary whoopee parties. To a person who has had experience with an alcoholic, this may seem like tempting Providence, but it isn't.

(Alcoholics Anonymous, p100-101)

Does that sound like AA is about avoiding temptation?

If you're talking about some stuff you heard someone say at some meeting, keep in mind that's a bit like saying, "Bitcointalk says you really have to buy more WorldCoin or else the whole world economy will collapse and we'll be resorting to cannibalism." Someone on Bitcointalk may have said that (in fact I just did) but it is unlikely that person speaks for the entire website or for the admins of the site. Are there some people in AA who are vocally full of shit? Sure. There are some people on Bitcointalk who are vocally full of shit too. One difference? That AA has a book. It's a book I've read. It has some things I don't believe and some things I do believe. But none of the stuff you're ascribing to AA bears much resemblance to AA.

[HenryRomp]

I'm getting a bit bored of this subject as I've been discussing it at length in person with various people lately, but I will respond to this one critically important line:

When I get up in the morning I don't want to go for a run; I accept that about myself and run anyway.

Wrong. When you get up in the morning, and run, that is proof that you want to go for a run more than you don't want to go for a run.

That is the core of my idea. Your actions expose your values. Perhaps the "I don't want to run" bit is more prominent at the level of conscious thought in the morning, but ultimately, you want to run. If you didn't, you wouldn't.

You don't "go for a run even though you don't want to," you don't "accept that about yourself and run anyway," no. You choose to run, that choice reveals that you want to run more than you want to stay home in bed and relax, or do anything else with that portion of your day.

Similarly, those who say "I want to quit" but continue to use, clearly want to use more than they want to quit. Your actions reveal your values. If you truly want to quit more than you want to use, you will quit, at the very moment that your desire to quit surpasses your desire to use. If you are still using, that is proof that you want to use more than you want to quit.

I propose that the only way to quit is to change what you want. Some people who go to meetings successfully achieve that, others don't. Some people who never go to meetings successfully achieve that, others don't. I argue that meetings generally encourage using terminology and viewing addiction from a particular perspective that is not helpful for those who are trying to change from wanting to use more than they want to quit to wanting to quit more than they want to use.

[MarKusRomanus]

Can't say much more than that I vehemently disagree with your premise. You are only seeing and hearing  what you want to see and hear to corroborate your preexisting negative assessments.  Would you also say that obsessive compulsive disorder can be helped by the sufferer just deciding mot to be a person who is obsessive/compulsive?  Would you suggest to a diabetic that they really are not in need of their medications because they just need to realign their identity to be that of a person who is not diabetic?  Your argument is another twist on the debate of disease vs. not a disease. Addiction as a disease is our current way of viewing the problem and its viewed that way along the lines of a variant of obsessive/compulsive disorder.  It is  amazing how you think that the way it works in these programs is hurting the members by somehow forcing them to reinforce to themselves they are what you think they should be convincing themselves that they aren't.   Yeah, that was a bad sentence, but let me finish up with what is actually occurring... They are gaining power through the group to remove addiction's influence in their lives so they can become whatever they want.  The solution being finding out who they really are after being what they never meant to be for so long.

[smscotten]

I'm getting a bit bored of this subject as I've been discussing it at length in person with various people lately, but I will respond to this one critically important line:

When I get up in the morning I don't want to go for a run; I accept that about myself and run anyway.

Wrong. When you get up in the morning, and run, that is proof that you want to go for a run more than you don't want to go for a run.

That is the core of my idea. Your actions expose your values. Perhaps the "I don't want to run" bit is more prominent at the level of conscious thought in the morning, but ultimately, you want to run. If you didn't, you wouldn't.

You don't "go for a run even though you don't want to," you don't "accept that about yourself and run anyway," no. You choose to run, that choice reveals that you want to run more than you want to stay home in bed and relax, or do anything else with that portion of your day.

Similarly, those who say "I want to quit" but continue to use, clearly want to use more than they want to quit. Your actions reveal your values. If you truly want to quit more than you want to use, you will quit, at the very moment that your desire to quit surpasses your desire to use. If you are still using, that is proof that you want to use more than you want to quit.

I propose that the only way to quit is to change what you want. Some people who go to meetings successfully achieve that, others don't. Some people who never go to meetings successfully achieve that, others don't. I argue that meetings generally encourage using terminology and viewing addiction from a particular perspective that is not helpful for those who are trying to change from wanting to use more than they want to quit to wanting to quit more than they want to use.

I think you've gone into a semantic briar patch about desire and action. In your model there is no difference whatever between waking up and going for a run and waking up and having a conflict of desires that eventually ends up in me going for a run. We can agree on empirically which side won out but from my own experience there is a huge difference between those two days.

The fact is that at any given time any given person has a very wide range of desires, and some of those desires are mutually exclusive of one another. The importance of individual desires changes from moment to moment and, as you point out, one can consciously change one's desires.

It's also true that these desires can be quite hidden from our conscious minds. It sometimes takes a lot of looking to find out what the payoff is that you're getting. Smoking a cigarette rarely produces a change in one's mind that one is aware of, yet the subtle feeling of well-being that it produces is very real. It can be very bewildering to have a conscious desire to quit smoking while your entire brain associates the act of lighting up with the feeling of well-being. I'll gladly admit that this is an example of wanting to smoke more than wanting to avoid lung disease, but from any practical or experiential point of view, it's ludicrous. And in fact, it's not a matter of wanting to smoke being more important that wanting to avoid lung disease, it's a matter of wanting a feeling of well-being more than wanting to avoid lung disease, and a lack of conscious awareness of the connection between the feeling of well-being and the action of smoking.

As a side note, in my opinion, that is why the concept of a higher power is useful. The person-whom-we-will-not-stigmatize-by-calling-them-an-addict has to let go of acting purely in the realm of conscious desires. That power greater than yourself may in fact be yourself, but it has to be more powerful than your conscious awareness. And perhaps that's not so much of a side note as it goes to the "powerless" question. If one is bewildered by the fact that they show empirically that they want something (eg by getting drunk) that they intellectually know that they don't want (eg to end up with a smashed car having killed someone), it is highly useful for them to understand that they don't have to consciously want something in order to want it, and that their conscious will in the moment is insufficient to make themselves want the thing they consciously want more than the other thing. That does not mean that over time (maybe not even very much time) they can't reorient the entirety of what they want in the direction of their values (what they want to want, if you will)—in fact, that admission is what makes such a reorientation possible.

Even if you don't agree with any of the above, you ought to also include that we're talking about mind and mood-altering substances here. If I want to drink just one beer once in a while, I am not necessarily going to have the same set of wants after the first drink than I did before. I think that is a big reason for sticking with the abstinence plan rather than trying to help people along a treacherously slippery path. Someone wanting to use their better judgment and wanting to learn to more consistently use their better judgment is probably well-advised not to indulge in substances that affect judgment, especially if one has a history or habit of exercising poor judgment regarding that substance.

A final note about changing what you want. Again, what someone wants is not singular. Belief that it is singular can lead to that person simply giving up when they have observed a desire in themselves. Changing what you want can take a very long time, especially when what you want is to keep indulging in a substance that changes what you want in the opposite direction. That is why AA seems to put behavior first before desire. People often do not realize or believe that they will be OK if they delay gratification of a desire. If we have to rely on someone changing what they want before they can change their behavior, it may never happen except in a rare few. You may think these rare few are superior to the others and in fact you may be right. But for the rest, there is hope in not picking up a drink even if they feel like they want to pick up a drink. Is that part of the process of changing what they want? Sure.

And the point of that is to go back to: you're misrepresenting AA. Here is what you picked up on in your one hour of contact with AA:

The almost certain consequences that follow taking even a glass of beer do not crowd into the mind to deter us. If these thoughts occur, they are hazy and readily supplanted with the old threadbare idea that this time we shall handle ourselves like other people. There is a complete failure of the kind of defense that keeps one from putting his hand on a hot stove.

(Alcoholics Anonymous, pg 24)

Please note that this describes the problem, not the solution. Sixty pages (many of which contain specific suggestions about actions which will bring about a change) later:

And we have ceased fighting anything or anyone - even alcohol. For by this time sanity will have returned. We will seldom be interested in liquor. If tempted, we recoil from it as from a hot flame.

(Alcoholics Anonymous, pg 84)

I think you'll agree that what is described there is a change in what the person wants. In fact, except for two factors (that they keep the label "alcoholic" and that they abstain rather than start occasional drinking) that seems like just the kind of change you said that someone should have instead of the change that AA wants people to have. So is it possible that your ideas and those put forth by the book Alcoholics Anonymous are actually much closer than you've claimed?

[HenryRomp]

smscotten, I wrote this bit while you were writing your bit. I will post this now and then proceed to respond to your bit in a separate post.

If I could briefly interrupt and suggest a somewhat psychological turn in the discussion... Here, in the politics sub-forum I've heard:

"if A is valued more than B, then C"

mentioned quite often, which is understandable considering that Bitcoin attracts people with money on their mind. However, ordinary people often don't seem to consciously assess value. They just do things, like the Joker Alternatively, they have a different value system which is incomprehensible to others who would rather interfere and try to 'help' them. For example: crazy old pensioner who goes round on his bicycle and seems to live off beer bottle refunds. He goes from bin to bin, collecting other people's trash, and gets a free beer for every 10 bottles returned. The local police probably spent a long time trying to 'teach' him the error of his ways, until they decided that constantly locking up a drunk cyclist was basically persecution if he's not harming anyone, and a total waste of resources on their part.

Given that example, is the drunk old cyclist throwing away his life, not living up to his potential? Or is he living it how he chooses? I guess whether or not he's an alcoholic in the derogatory, pitiful sense, would depend on some deep philosophical factors like: is he desperate or has he asked anyone to actually help change his life? Is he happy with his life? I know I'm not -- I'd much rather be out cycling in this beautiful weather, beer in hand

The drunk cyclist bit will lead to an entirely different discussion, the value system discussion, I'll leave that alone for the moment.

The part where you state "if A is valued more than B, then C" and "ordinary people often don't seem to consciously assess value. They just do things, like the Joker" is of more interest to me.

Ordinary people don't often consciously assess value, but I argue that subconsciously, every decision the make is based upon their assessments of value. Even people who appear to act irrationally, like the Joker, are making choices based upon values. In the case of the Joker, one might speculate that perhaps he values "chaos" more than he values, say, his own life.

If person "X" chooses "A" over "B", person "X" values "A" more than "B". "A" can be abstinence and "B" can be intoxication, or vice-versa.

These beliefs spur from my fundamental world-view. I hold a lot of other beliefs some might like to argue with, i.e. "There is no such thing a selfless action," "Existence precedes essence," "Logic is inherent in the structure of the universe," "mental events are reducible to neurological occurrences," and back on topic here, "one can not only do what he wills, but can will what he wills," in direct disagreement with Schopenhauer.

To phrase it yet another and even simpler way, "If an individual wants to do A more than B, then they will do A rather than B."

See also
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Szasz
I pretty much agree with everything he says, at least everything I've read so far.

[HenryRomp]

Can't say much more than that I vehemently disagree with your premise.

Big surprise. [/sarcasm]

Would you also say that obsessive compulsive disorder can be helped by the sufferer just deciding to to be a person who is obsessive/compulsive? 

Yes. I do not acknowledge the validity of mental disease excepting those with a physical component, such as Alzheimer's. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Szasz

Would you suggest to a diabetic that they really are not in need of their medications because they just need to realign their identity to be that of a person who is not diabetic? 

No, diabetes appears to be a legitimate disease, though it is usually caused by a poor diet and often can be resolved without medication by modifying the diet.

Your argument is another twist on the debate of disease vs. not a disease. Addiction as a disease is our current way of viewing the problem and its viewed that way along the lines of a variant of obsessive/compulsive disorder. 

That's the problem right there. Again, see  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Szasz, I vehemently agree with him.

I'm getting a bit bored of this subject as I've been discussing it at length in person with various people lately, but I will respond to this one critically important line:

When I get up in the morning I don't want to go for a run; I accept that about myself and run anyway.

Wrong. When you get up in the morning, and run, that is proof that you want to go for a run more than you don't want to go for a run.

That is the core of my idea. Your actions expose your values. Perhaps the "I don't want to run" bit is more prominent at the level of conscious thought in the morning, but ultimately, you want to run. If you didn't, you wouldn't.

You don't "go for a run even though you don't want to," you don't "accept that about yourself and run anyway," no. You choose to run, that choice reveals that you want to run more than you want to stay home in bed and relax, or do anything else with that portion of your day.

Similarly, those who say "I want to quit" but continue to use, clearly want to use more than they want to quit. Your actions reveal your values. If you truly want to quit more than you want to use, you will quit, at the very moment that your desire to quit surpasses your desire to use. If you are still using, that is proof that you want to use more than you want to quit.

I propose that the only way to quit is to change what you want. Some people who go to meetings successfully achieve that, others don't. Some people who never go to meetings successfully achieve that, others don't. I argue that meetings generally encourage using terminology and viewing addiction from a particular perspective that is not helpful for those who are trying to change from wanting to use more than they want to quit to wanting to quit more than they want to use.

I think you've gone into a semantic briar patch about desire and action. In your model there is no difference whatever between waking up and going for a run and waking up and having a conflict of desires that eventually ends up in me going for a run. We can agree on empirically which side won out but from my own experience there is a huge difference between those two days.

The fact is that at any given time any given person has a very wide range of desires, and some of those desires are mutually exclusive of one another. The importance of individual desires changes from moment to moment and, as you point out, one can consciously change one's desires.

It's also true that these desires can be quite hidden from our conscious minds. It sometimes takes a lot of looking to find out what the payoff is that you're getting. Smoking a cigarette rarely produces a change in one's mind that one is aware of, yet the subtle feeling of well-being that it produces is very real. It can be very bewildering to have a conscious desire to quit smoking while your entire brain associates the act of lighting up with the feeling of well-being. I'll gladly admit that this is an example of wanting to smoke more than wanting to avoid lung disease, but from any practical or experiential point of view, it's ludicrous. And in fact, it's not a matter of wanting to smoke being more important that wanting to avoid lung disease, it's a matter of wanting a feeling of well-being more than wanting to avoid lung disease, and a lack of conscious awareness of the connection between the feeling of well-being and the action of smoking.

As a side note, in my opinion, that is why the concept of a higher power is useful. The person-whom-we-will-not-stigmatize-by-calling-them-an-addict has to let go of acting purely in the realm of conscious desires. That power greater than yourself may in fact be yourself, but it has to be more powerful than your conscious awareness. And perhaps that's not so much of a side note as it goes to the "powerless" question. If one is bewildered by the fact that they show empirically that they want something (eg by getting drunk) that they intellectually know that they don't want (eg to end up with a smashed car having killed someone), it is highly useful for them to understand that they don't have to consciously want something in order to want it, and that their conscious will in the moment is insufficient to make themselves want the thing they consciously want more than the other thing. That does not mean that over time (maybe not even very much time) they can't reorient the entirety of what they want in the direction of their values (what they want to want, if you will)—in fact, that admission is what makes such a reorientation possible.

Even if you don't agree with any of the above, you ought to also include that we're talking about mind and mood-altering substances here. If I want to drink just one beer once in a while, I am not necessarily going to have the same set of wants after the first drink than I did before. I think that is a big reason for sticking with the abstinence plan rather than trying to help people along a treacherously slippery path. Someone wanting to use their better judgment and wanting to learn to more consistently use their better judgment is probably well-advised not to indulge in substances that affect judgment, especially if one has a history or habit of exercising poor judgment regarding that substance.

A final note about changing what you want. Again, what someone wants is not singular. Belief that it is singular can lead to that person simply giving up when they have observed a desire in themselves. Changing what you want can take a very long time, especially when what you want is to keep indulging in a substance that changes what you want in the opposite direction. That is why AA seems to put behavior first before desire. People often do not realize or believe that they will be OK if they delay gratification of a desire. If we have to rely on someone changing what they want before they can change their behavior, it may never happen except in a rare few. You may think these rare few are superior to the others and in fact you may be right. But for the rest, there is hope in not picking up a drink even if they feel like they want to pick up a drink. Is that part of the process of changing what they want? Sure.

And the point of that is to go back to: you're misrepresenting AA. Here is what you picked up on in your one hour of contact with AA:

The almost certain consequences that follow taking even a glass of beer do not crowd into the mind to deter us. If these thoughts occur, they are hazy and readily supplanted with the old threadbare idea that this time we shall handle ourselves like other people. There is a complete failure of the kind of defense that keeps one from putting his hand on a hot stove.

(Alcoholics Anonymous, pg 24)

Please note that this describes the problem, not the solution. Sixty pages (many of which contain specific suggestions about actions which will bring about a change) later:

And we have ceased fighting anything or anyone - even alcohol. For by this time sanity will have returned. We will seldom be interested in liquor. If tempted, we recoil from it as from a hot flame.

(Alcoholics Anonymous, pg 84)

I think you'll agree that what is described there is a change in what the person wants. In fact, except for two factors (that they keep the label "alcoholic" and that they abstain rather than start occasional drinking) that seems like just the kind of change you said that someone should have instead of the change that AA wants people to have. So is it possible that your ideas and those put forth by the book Alcoholics Anonymous are actually much closer than you've claimed?

You seem to share most of my understanding of the nature of addiction and choice, even if you phrase it differently. I will also acknowledge that I have not read Alcoholics Anonymous and that the only literature associated with the group that I have read is "Living Sober," which was helpful to me on my quest for sobriety, though I found I had to "cherry-pick" my way through it and I feel that if did not take that approach it may have been very harmful to my development.

I am not saying that AA can't help anybody or doesn't help anybody, I am saying that they are fundamentally wrong about the nature of addiction and it shows in their rhetoric, which may stint the development of those who subscribe to it.

You also made mention of a higher power, briefly. I should note that I do not believe in a higher power by most popular definitions, but I contemplate that just maybe, perhaps...

 The "higher power" might be consciousness itself (as in The Self Aware Universe by Amit Goswami), or that possibly all existence consists of various representations of some core essence, in a self-similar manner (i.e. each atom contains the entire universe, as you zoom in it is repeated infinitely, as you zoom out it is repeated infinitely, but perhaps with no individual "scale layer" being exactly the same as the other, rather being equivalent mathematically but represented differently at each scale). In this model I see every element of the universe being representative of all the others and the whole shebang, so that theoretically with enough knowledge about any given atom one could understand the entire universe. Likewise, in this model it does not matter what you study as all knowledge is equivalent, the more you understand about any one thing (say Mahler's Ninth Symphony for example) the more you understand about the universe at large; all understanding is "portable" or "universal" and a complete understanding of anything, whatever it may be, equates to enlightenment.

But anyway. I digress.

[smscotten]

smscotten, I wrote this bit while you were writing your bit. I will post this now and then proceed to respond to your bit in a separate post.

Hey, no rush. I was dreadfully wordy and I understand that such discussions can be tiring.

To phrase it yet another and even simpler way, "If an individual wants to do A more than B, then they will do A rather than B."

I'm about to make a semantic quibble, but I think that it is an important distinction.

A few years back, I was held up at gunpoint. It could fairly be said that I wanted to avoid being shot more than I wanted to hold on to my possessions, so I did surrender my wallet and phone and iPod. I wanted to go for a walk that night more than I wanted to stay safe behind my locked door. It is logically valid to say therefore that I wanted to give away my possessions more than I wanted to stay safe at home. But in common conversation, it really doesn't mean the same thing. It ignores assessment of risk, the possibility of being wrong when predicting the future, and the possibility of factors from outside the equation making themselves known. And the distinction between avoiding a negative and pursuing a positive is not always clear, but can drastically change the meaning.

Take care when you simplify that you are in fact distilling down to the truth and not boiling away important factors. I think you've got a lot of your premises correct but are hitting some snarls when it comes to translating those principles into practical terms. That may account for some of the disagreement you've encountered on this topic.