Most of the thrust of the message is that we are utterly powerless over everything, and of course our Higher Power is the One who has all power...that’s all well and good, however the kind of activism we engage in here on FR is pretty much frowned upon, didn’t you notice? Socialism and tolerance of anything and everything is the zeitgeist of the movement...I’m so conflicted by it all, the contrast of Ayn Rand and Bill Wilson, that I’ve mainly been doing it on my own the last few years, and don’t go to meetings much anymore except as a safe harbor from the raging seas of life...but as we all know, a ship was not meant nor even made just to sit in the harbor, as Sarah Palin pointed out.
Individualism is utterly squashed in AA, however independent thought and creativity are the hallmarks of free-market capitalism that is so vilified in the rooms. Though many AA’s don’t realize it (many are unfamiliar with literature other than the program’s and related works), they are engaged in anti-capitalist socialism—any ideas that go counter to, or even in the least depart from, the program dogma are poo-poohed, laughed at, scorned, shouted down, etc...the groupthink is complete. I beleive that mostly it is the terror of the idea of relapse that keeps so many as slaves to the ego of Bill Wilson...
I’m so conflicted by it all, ...that I’ve mainly been doing it on my own the last few years, and don’t go to meetings much anymore except as a safe harbor from the raging seas of life .... Though many AA’s don’t realize it (many are unfamiliar with literature other than the program’s and related works), ... the groupthink is complete.
***That echoes my experience (but not my strength nor hope). I got so tired of the badmouthing of Christ that I found it necessary to limit my exposure to the program and made up for it by church involvement. I’ve had growth on the spiritual side but what I miss is that “identification” one gets with others in a meeting. There is a recovery movement at my church, which seems to track a proposal I made at my previous church 20 years ago. So there is progress, not perfection.