“Its
three decades of fame and infamy should have made Synanon into little
more than a historical curiosity, an object lesson in rehab gone
awry, larded with all the now-clichéd excesses of the 1960s and
‘70s. Instead, the organization has gone on to function as a
perverse sort of model for the ways in which Alcoholics Anonymous’s
original approach can be corrupted and misused.
The
problem derives from AA’s own bottom-up structure, or “benign
anarchy” as founder Bill W. put it, in which individual branches
are largely self-governing and don't have to report back to the home
office on their exact methods of treatment. Synanon was decidedly not
a branch of AA, but its example can be seen in the evolution of
deviant AA chapters, in which the presence of a strongman or guru,
institutionalized paranoia and member abuse are hallmarks, resulting
in the rise of entities which call themselves AA meetings, but
function more like cults. The irony is that the stated reason for
AA’s adoption of its famously decentralized, leaderless approach
was specifically to prevent cults of personality.
In 2007,
in a brief burst of media attention, the Midtown Group of AA, just
outside Washington, DC, was exposed as a haven for illicit behavior
under the guiding hand of one Michael Quinones, or “Mike Q.”
[sponsored by Clancy I] Under his system, teenage female addicts were
paired off with predatory middle-aged male sponsors. Women who spoke
out against or wanted to leave the chapter were humiliated at the
hands of older male members, many of whom had long since beaten their
drug addictions and were staying in the group simply to score with
girls young enough to be their daughters. Along with being assigned
sponsors who functioned more as sexual partners (a particularly
reprehensible form of what’s known as “13th-Stepping”), members
might be encouraged to break off contact with friends and family
outside of the group and to quit using all drugs—even
prescription meds needed to fight, say, depression or schizophrenia.
The allegations were all quite sensational, but were largely treated
as a one-off aberration by the mainstream media—and were more or
less forgotten when Mike Q. died a few months after the story broke.
Although the Midtown Group no longer operates in DC, it still
holds itinerant meetings in Northern Virginia, and its members have
learned to avoid the glare of outside inquiry. Perhaps the
most salient point of the whole affair, however, was the inability of
AA HQ to do anything about the rogue group.
Indeed, AA
has a policy of not addressing allegations involving individual
chapters—much less monitoring their actions—following Bill W.’s
anarchic credo. One of the few comments the home office did make (via
an anonymous staff member in the Washington Post) about Midtown was
that “groups that did not follow the [AA] traditions and concepts
would fall away” and, citing the Second Tradition, that the
organization’s national leaders “are but trusted servants ...
They do not govern.” Indeed, the home office typically refuses to
comment on, or at best makes vague generalizations about, the actions
of its chapters, however much they depart from the organization’s
mission and practices.
With AA
having little such oversight, it’s difficult to get a read on how
widespread these perverted groups may be. Given AA's generally solid
reputation, and since the police and press have little interest in
uncovering therapy cults that likely operate within the fringe of the
law, most testimonials about cult-like AA groups come from, as you
might expect, comments on blogs and websites.
Though not
quite up to the standards accepted by mainstream journalism, the
stories amassed by sites such as orange-papers.org,
aacultwatch.co.uk, xsteppers.multiply.com and stinkin-thinkin.com are
often as compelling as they are depressing. Here we learn that Clancy
Imislund, a famed addiction expert [?] who managed to get
celebrities such as Anthony Hopkins clean while operating an LA rehab
program for the homeless, is the driving force behind the Pacific
Group, also based in Los Angeles and one of the country’s largest
AA chapters. Some allege that the Pacific Group has adopted many of
Synanon’s former methods, including claims of guru status for
“Clancy I.,” sexual exploitation and various forms of behavioral
control. Imislund himself seems to be a somewhat of a globetrotter,
advising other AA chapters around the country and the world,
expanding the presence of the Pacific Group with spin-off meetings
and giving countless speeches about personal empowerment and beating
the demon of addiction. (Interestingly, when asked about the
Midtown Group scandal, Imislund responded in the Washington Post that
“there probably have been some excesses, but they have helped more
sober alcoholics in Washington than any other group by far.”)
........
And he’s
[Clancy I] not the only one: From Dallas to Anaheim, from Phoenix to
Bainbridge Island, Wash., you can read online about larger-than-life
men—and they are almost always men—who have transformed their
own little chapters of AA into personality cults based on their own
interpretation of the 12-Step gospel. Here, age-inappropriate sex
might masquerade as sponsorship; rejection of friends and family
might go hand-in-hand with rejection of pushers and enablers; and
using medications to control your blood pressure might be viewed as
negatively as popping pills to get high.
It’s a
fairly grim alternate universe—but how much of it can be proven or
even substantiated is mostly unknown. Aside from press reports of the
now infamous Midtown Group, few above-board analyses of AA cults even
exist, leading skeptics to wonder if they aren’t just figments of
disillusioned former members’ imaginations.
.........
In the
face of such shadowy claims, it remains up to the reader to determine
his or her own truth about how widespread or exceptional deviant AA
chapters really are, and whether the organization’s intentionally
anarchic policies may too easily allow self-proclaimed gurus and
sexual predators a foothold within them. Between a lack of
accountability to the home office on the one hand, and potentially
repressive policing by a centralized authority on the other, a
third way for AA to deal with this threat is certainly called for—if
not an approach that gives it policing power over its members, then
at least a method by which the gurus and strongmen can be exposed and
kept from preying on the vulnerable. In the end, despite being
defunct for more than 20 years, the specter of Synanon continues to
haunt AA”
(Our
emphases)
Comment:
For a third way see Minority Report link above
Cheerio
The Fellas (Friends of Alcoholics Anonymous)
