[vhawk01]

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"Cult" is probably too strong a term. Twelve step programs seem to be effective for some people, and as such should be given credit, but AA people tend to be annoyingly dogmatic, and many seem to believe that their way of dealing with alcoholism and other addictions is the only way, which is certainly not true.

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Effective for some people, but grossly ineffective in general. Its not like there are significantly better alternatives, but AA has a dismal success rate.

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if there are not any signficantly better alternatives maybe it is best to not berate the lack of success of AA. I used to go to AA and agree it is cultish, I never bought into that mindset and it scared the hell out of me the first few times I was sent there (like the first 4-5 years off and on). Eventually I learned to view the cult mindset for what it was and not be bothered by it rather than being repelled by it, so was able to find the program very useful.

The cultish vibe did scare the hell out of me but there is no reason to think you have to be assimilated to the cult borg mindset there in order to find a few useful friends there for support or to find it useful to be reminded that there are others in the world who have problems like yours who are now much better off.

I have not been to an AA meeting in years. I used to have a major drinking problem, like major. I now drink on occasion, like an average of probably 1 drink every month or 2. When I was in my late teens and early 20's I could not stop drinking, I drank twice as much as the next heaviest drinker out of all my friends and was probably the drunkest person whereever I was at.

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Your post basically just confirms all of my views on AA. You managed to take some things (friends, etc) from the meetings, but in general the concept of AA is disturbing and ineffective. You managed to overcome your drinking more IN SPITE OF AA than because of it, and I think that is the case with a lot of alcoholics. Since every alcoholic ends up going to AA at some point or other, on their way to recovery, there are bound to be a certain number of successes. But would you consider yourself an example of a success for AA? I won't speak for you, since I have no idea what your situation really is, but from your posts so far in this thread, I would say definitely not.