Re: Kayleigh: Pete: Ya, what he said!

[Guest guest]

At 16:35 20/03/00 -0800, you wrote:

>One thing I do confess is when I have doubted my attitudes re XA, I

>have taken comfort in the support of and Joe. These are both

>reasonable guys who have won my respect, and I have felt asssured I was

>on the right course because I felt they agreed with me. Joe has been

>pretty silent about this and has made his opposition known. I do

>think being compare to McCarthy and the mafia is a bit much though - as

>I replied I think it is more accurate to suggest I am like an actual

>member of the American Commuist Party desperately trying to protect it

>from McCarthy's henchmen.

>

>however, I accept i probably saw red with and didnt respond

>fairly. Youve now gone quiet too , and I hope you read this. As

>there does appear to be a consensus that I am too confrontational here

>then it might be an idea to start another list with a stated position

>on this question. I fI goahead with this I will remain here but will

>tone down my responses to " XA apologists " .

>

>P.

Sometimes in the past I felt you were just a bit too confrontational, or

maybe got confrontational too early on, but not to an extent that I thought

it was worth commenting on- where it was more a matter of judgement rather

than " getting it wrong " . But recently the comments you have made have

seemed pretty okay to me. Comparing you to either McCarthy or the wise guys

seems to be a little excessive- I don't agree. It is a difficult area and

This is an issue that isn't going to go away because many steppers can't

stand the idea that there are forums like this and have a compulsion to

" carry the message " even here every so often. You can see this phenomenon

in various places- people say they have been abused in step meetings or by

step people and guess what- more step people abuse them. There may be no

one perfect answer for this and a number of step free forums that take

slightly differing approaches to how to deal with the invasions of the body

snatchers is probably an inevitable evolutionary development. I don't like

step apologists here either. I don't think this list is here for AA members

to discuss how to improve AA- that would be " 12-step-improvement " , not

" 12-step-free " . Maybe we could all try to bear in mind that a troll has the

aim of getting us arguing among ourselves. This is what makes me a little

suspicious of the very idea of the " reasonable stepper " on this list. I

realise people can be at different stages of realisation or breaking away

from AA, but sometimes these things still just don't ring true to me.

Ultimately we have to follow our own consciences in what we say and to who.

Joe B.