Click-Bait Nonsense for the Addicted

A self-important person wrote an essay on Medium claiming that AA banned certain substances, including weed, sugar, and nicotine. This was my response:

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This is just click-bait nonsense for the addicted. There are, of course, no AA-approved addictive substances. No forbidden substances, either, not even alcohol. If you want to drink, go ahead, it's none of our business.

But if you want to stop drinking, then AA's Third Tradition is "The only requirement for A.A. membership is a desire to stop drinking." Come join us.

There is no prohibition against, say, weed or micro-dosing or heroin or or or. That's none of AA's businesss, either. Or nicotine or sweets.

If you've come to AA to stop drinking and change your life for the better, you've found the right place. If you've come because you're an alcoholic and addicted to, say, meth, it may still be the right place. Or you might prefer NA. They both focus on stopping the addictions that are killing you. Your choice.

You wrote, "If you use marijuana while in AA, you have to start back on day one — at least if you admit to it."

No, you don't. In fact, AA doesn't have ANY "have tos" at all. Live your life the way you want. No one in AA wants to change you. But if YOU want to change, then, as Bill Wilson wrote, "There Is A Solution." AA members are eager to help you change yourself. It helps us change ourselves, too.

As to the ridiculous notion that AA is a religion, I defy anyone to prove up on that topic. AA members are encouraged to find a higher power OF THEIR OWN CHOOSING. It can even be the AA group itself, just someone or something that is greater than the AA member herself, as proven by the fact that they have stopped drinking and she hasn't. Thus, it/they are more powerful than the person alone. If we hadn't needed that, we could have stopped on our own.

I have these suggestions for anyone on the brink of coming to their first AA meeting:

1. Go to lots of meetings, don't drink between meetings, and talk to other drunks.

2. Buy a Big Book, get a sponsor, work the steps.

If you want what we have, do what we did.

See you tonight.