We
quote:
“Fellas,
In regard
to your Sunday, December 8, 2013 Posting “Handbook for AA Probation Liaison Officers (England and Wales)”
I see the
Service Structure in your land practices the same “double speak”
as they do in the States. The verbiage is similar to that in the NY
GSO document “Guideline on Cooperating with the Courts, DWI and Similar Programs”. The
technique of finding a gray (actually in many cases at best slightly
off-white) area in the Traditions, the Responsibility Declaration,
the definition of a closed meeting and the list could go on and on,
to justify the goal of introducing new members to the fellowship
knows no bounds. It all starts with the terribly misguided belief
that we or anyone can diagnose who is an alcoholic. Our whole
fellowship is based on self-diagnosis. Certainly the courts can’t
accomplish this task (no matter how much ‘training’ AA gives
them) and have it be a part of successful start of a recovery! The
fact that your Service Structure is supporting that members engage in
training probation officers has taken “Cooperation” way beyond
what is healthy or even sane! At times like this it seems that the
court system has played to our egos (please AA come to our rescue)
and the Service Structure has taken the bait hook, line and sinker.
The
probation departments in both countries should be told to do their
jobs. We should do this as tax payers not as AA members. They can
educate the probationers as to the current medical experts opinion of
what constitutes alcoholism and what will be the consequences should
they continue to engage in alcoholic behavior that slips into
criminal behavior. They can present AA as one of the many methods by
which others who thought they were alcoholic solved their problem.
They can meet with the probationer and determine if he is at risk to
re-offend. Just to bring everyone back to reality, determining if a
probationer is going to reoffend is their ONLY job. It is not their
job to get or keep anyone sober. In the States, public intoxication
isn’t even a crime.
How do I
know they can do this? Because that is exactly how it worked for me
and many of my friends. Eventually, I got tired of going to jail and
I knew that I met every criteria of an alcoholic. Then I went to an
AA meeting. There a I found a fellowship that met my needs for
sobriety and equally importantly I met the only requirement for
membership.
My gut
tells me these actions are all in a misguided attempt to build the
“numbers” up in AA. The Interesting thing is that in the 25-30
years this “Affiliation” (I refuse to say cooperation) has gone
on, AA’s membership has had minimal, if any, growth in the states.
For all the talk of “All the members we have gotten as direct
result of our “Affiliation”” where is the population increase?
Rare is the meeting in my locality that doesn’t have one or two new
attendees (sometimes more) sent to the meeting as a result of this
“Affiliation”. This occurs each and every week. Why aren’t we
holding our meetings in sports arena’s by now? Hundreds of
Thousands of probationers are sentenced to AA every year in America
and this has gone on for decades. Why is the overall membership
number in the U.S. stagnant? The same 1.3 million members in U.S.
figure it trotted out every 3 years.
My advice
to the members of AA in Great Britain is that you object to the
mining of “Gray areas” in our literature. I have learned that
once it becomes practice within AA............. it becomes AA. At
that point you will have a devil of time getting parties to recognize
the patterns and process that has lead you to a point that can not
reverse. Allow the double speak to become position at your own and
AA’s peril. …...”
We
would be interested to hear from other AA members with regard to
their own experience and/or observations of the CMA ('chit') system
(good or bad). We can be contacted at our email address here.
Confidentiality assured
Cheers
The
Fellas (Friends of Alcoholics Anonymous)
PS
Our thanks to this member (US) for their contribution to the debate
PPS
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