Stripping away someone’s autonomy dehumanizes them. Any individual or group who says they know your ego, the seat of our hopes, dreams and aspirations, better than you do should be steered clear of. To smash the EGO, is a method of control. The group or individual who attacks the ego of another is not trying to help them, but to control them. This is basic indoctrination protocol.
AA, NA, CA, AFTA use this process to indoctrinate people. It is no wonder the ego smashing is third after, shameless, unethical, and baseless self-promotion to get the indoctrinee to visit the group often; and second love-bombing.
Now comes EGO smashing once an individual is relatively firmly ensconced, the “elders” begin to methodically smash the ego using the group’s “tools.” According to their indoctrination manual, the big book, the indoctrinee anxiously desiring love and accetance, should be approcahed when they are most vulnerable, its best if his wife and family don't forewarn him so, whenever possible they are not consulted. They say they have found it best this way. To approach a potential indoctrinee without the family's knowledge.
Having gotten mom or dad to spend all of their spare time at meetings and doing service work, the rest of the family, potentil indocrinees, will be approached whne they are most vulnerable, using indoctrination techniques specifically desgined for each member of the family -- alanon, alateen.
Elders will notify members of these 12 step cults and give them the phone numbers, so that family members may be indoctrinated into the web of 12 step cult religions will be approaced when they are most vulnerable.
Or if the inodccrinee is in a "treatment" program family members will be assigned to 12 step cults designed to specifically indoctrainate them.
The indioctrinee allows this only after they have accepted the false front that the group is effective, the “elders” have special knowledge, and that they have finally found the love they have so desperately been seeking.
Once the “elders” start to dismantle individual egoes, the indoctrinee is caught in a familiar cycle, being told they are loved and then being told they need to do the group’s bidding in order to hold onto that love.
The above is of course cult indoctrination not “treatment.”
No other “disease” is treated this way.
It is also the glue that holds the cult together, such that living in common quarters is not necessary, save for the beginning stage at a treatment center.
Having been indoctrinated, then stripped of their humanity the AA indocrinee will do anything in this fruitless chase of their own ego that can never be regained as long as they remain bound to the cult.
They will attribute everything good that happens to them as coming from the cult, having had thier ego, their internal and autonomous self guidance system, smashed they will look to AA elders for direction; they will attribute their successful treatment to the cult. Thus, being fully indoctrinated they serve the cult themselves as elders and continue this cycle of illusion and deceit, zeroing in on the vulnerable at their hour of greatest need.
And thus the cult perpetuates itself without proof of effectivness at combating the disease.
In fact, in spite of proof of its ineffectiveness in treating a demoralizing and socially unacceptable behavior.
Tacit approval from those who should know better is all that is needed to allow this insidious cult to flourish.
But it is a destructive failure and a sham, and we will not rid ourselves of it by simply trying to co-exist.
It must be attacked at every level by those who have walked away and not only survived but are thriving in a way they could not do as cult members.
What kind of people would dehumanize others as a matter of course.
AA is BS, it is a dangerous movement that itself must be smashed.
I agree with all of this, mostly because I was raised in a high control religion that also used shunning as a tool to get their members to stay. The similarities between the 12 step crap and that religion were so apparent to me that I left mostly because of it.
ReplyDeleteAs an #ExposeAA activist, I've read a fair amount of analysis on how and why 12 Step is a manipulative and dangerous cult. I've even written on this myself. However, this article still points out aspects of how 12 Step functions as a cult that I hadn't really considered before, and these are quite valid.
ReplyDeleteYes, how could psychologists support a group that blames the victim and similtanously works to "smash the ego." I also like the emphasis on getting the individual to acknowledge their 12 Step group as the foundation of all good in their lives and that the individual is incapable of finding or having a good life on his or her own.
I'm blending some of my own ideas with those here, adding to both. This would be a worthwhile read at 20 minutes, but it is close to 2.
If only more of the public could get how valid these points are.
Think you.
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