Post abt XA I made to the Personality Disorders list

[Guest guest]

12-step groups encourage ppl to believe they

are " Powerless " over lifetime diseases like alcohlic

drinking, drugs, or co-dependency, and that they need

lifetime involvement in the group ands a God to keep the

dieseases 'arrested'. I dont think ithis is helpful and

may actually be a self-fulfilling prophesy that makes ppl

relapse. Fwiw, the 12-step-free list at is

also accumulating horror stories abt the abuse ppl have

suffered thru 12-step involvement; there's no quality

control, no membership list ppl can be removed from or

authority you can appeal to, and abusers can use meetings

as hunting grounds for financial, sexual or other

expolitation and you need to keep your eyes open.

- In 12 Step, step 10 is " Continued to take personal inventory, and

when wrong, promptly admit it. "

The " inventory " referred to is a moral one, as the

reference to being " wrong " implies. I find it hilarious

were it not for it being tragic that the 12-step disease

model of addiction is actually portrayed as a medical,

guilt-free liberator from the Temperance " Moral Model " ,

when it actaully is its undead corpse, risen from the grave

and preying on the lifeblood of those ppl who can be

persuaded that they are lifelong

alcholics/addicts/codependents.

Many ppl who suffer addictive, and especially depressive,

disorders are only too aware of their perceived wrongness

without further encouragement to ruminate on it still

further. Borderlines have a core image of the self as evil.

Many 12-step counsellors and sophisticates twist the notion

of inventory to include things like " Admitting the defect

of not accepting that I am a precious child of God " , " The

Defectof not being assetive when I'm not wrong and

admitting that I am actually in the Right " or " needing to

make amends to myself for having turned to self-harming as

an attempt to stop myself dissociating as a result of being

sexually abused as a child " and so forth.

Apart from the fact that this is undoubtedly nothing like

what Bill and his colleagues had in mind when these

steps were written (certainly the AA literature has nothing

like that in it), this kind of twisting could pretty well

deliver Zen enlightment from a Japanese Manual on

Motorcycle Maintenance.

Rather than engage in imnsho these ludicrous semantic

contortionns, I suggest that unless you have Antisocial or

possibly Severe Narcissistic Personality Disorder (in which

case you would almost certainly want nothing to do with

12-step or this list that you couldnt selfishly exploit )

then I would suggest for those who have or seek insight

into who they are and how to heal this simplistic 'Simple

Program' is generally avoided to advantage.

Many individual 12 step ppl are kind and the

great majority mean well; that doesnt mean the *program* is

necessarily good tho. Social support on 12-step groups will

probably help; the ideas are much more questionable.

Fwiw, many alcoholics and addicts do indeed suffer from

Antisocial Personality Disorder - and that is a reason why

the guy next to you at a 12-step meeting is worth a wary

eye.

Pete.

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