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Date: Mon, April 8, 2013 3:30 pm (Answered 25 April 2013) Dear Mr. Orange, You say that you have about 30 million hits per year on your site. Cool. Why do you only get about $150-$200 dollars a year sent to you ? Are your readers cheapskates or what ? Heck, they have to have enough money to be on a computer, so what's going on ? Tom
Hello again, Tom,
Well, I would guess that they have their own problems to deal with, like paying the rent
and taking care of the kids, and things like that. And donations are increasing. We may hit $300 or $400
this year. Which is good, because I have to get a better (more expensive) host than Hostmonster.com, which
has turned out to be a nightmare. (They are an overseller who promises everything to get you to sign up,
and then takes it all back in the fine print in the user agreement, and rules imposed later. Then they
overload each server with so many users that it slows to a crawl. Then their incompetent technicians
break things. Yes, I have to find a new host.)
Oh well, have a good day anyway.
== Orange
Date: Tue, April 9, 2013 12:14 pm (Answered 25 April 2013) I would like to thank you for taking the time for helping to expose AA for what it really is, a cult. I am sure you probably receive a great deal of mail, so I have been debating sending a lengthy detail of my terrible experience with this group. I agree that this group is a very dangerous and is responsible for many deaths. There is simply no substitute for proper medical treatment for those suffering from mental illness. When I was approached regarding the various inventories, I immediately thought of the auditing process that scientology employs. It is unfortunate that this group has not been exposed on a larger scale. It would be nice to expose this group to the mass media. I am not certain as to how this could be accomplished. I am hopeful that you continue in your efforts to expose this evil group, as it has devastated the lives of so many. If you are interested, I will send you a detailed account of my personal experience. Thank you, R
Hello R.,
Thanks for the offer. Yes, I would very much like to get your story. I am collecting
A.A. Horror Stories so that other people will get some understanding of what might happen
to them in Alcoholics Anonymous. There is a list of previous stories here:
A.A. Horror Stories.
So yes, I'd be happy to add your story to the list. And length is no problem. One of the
nice things about the World Wide Web is that we don't have to pay for blank paper.
Oh, and yes, there is a great deal of similarity between Scientology "auditing" and the A.A.
fourth and fifth Steps. Both make the victim obsess with the past and fixate on what he
did wrong years ago, and constantly harp on what's wrong with him, which really messes with peoples' minds
after a while. And that is also one of the standard cult characteristics:
Have a good day now.
== Orange
Date: Mon, April 8, 2013 7:03 am (Answered 25 April 2013) Dear Orange, I'm a college student at a large university on the east coast. I am 22 years old and I have suffered from anxiety/depression issues since the age of 14/15. I started to realize I drank to deal with these emotions I was feeling and I was no longer drinking to meet people or have fun. So, I decided to join AA a little under two months ago. Let me tell you that this has been one of the worst experiences of my life. I actually just called my sponsor last night to tell her I was calling it quits. Ever since I joined the program, my problems got worst, I fell behind on my school work (I have a 3.5 at a well respected university), I had a poor attitude at work, I began to have severe migraines, and I suffered serious depression than I ever have before in my life. I have been going to job interviews and I traveled this past weekend to go to an interview and my sponsor just didn't get that I couldn't attend meetings, work on my readings, work on the 4th step while I was gone. I was there TO GET A JOB... that was my priority, not AA. It's like they expect you to drop everything (which I sort of have) and hand your life over to this program... and then they have all these answers as to why you're feeling so miserable because of it. It's a scam and I am relieved that I got out before it really ruined my last 5 weeks of a school that I have loved dearly. Thank you for making this website. It reinforced everything I was already feeling about the program before. I am usually one to question everything and wondered why I hadn't researched the AA program before entering the room. But, when you're vulnerable/broken/depressed/etc. people (such as myself) will listen to anything anyone tells them. I am glad I got out of it sooner rather than later, completely brainwashed. Have a great week, Orange!
Hello Alix,
Thanks for the letter. I'm glad to hear that you have escaped from the madhouse.
Don't feel bad about not carefully researching A.A. before going there. Neither did I. All that I had
ever heard was that it was a wonderful self-help organization that helped people to get sober and stay
sober. Little did I know what the truth was. But I found out. And so did you.
So have a good day now, and a good life.
== Orange
Date: Wed, April 10, 2013 6:04 am (Answered 25 April 2013) Hi All This book has just been released: Ferentzy, P., Turner, N. A 2013. History of Problem Gambling: Temperance, Substance Abuse, Medicine, and Metaphors. New York, Springer.
Best Wishes
Peter Ferentzy, PhD
Okay, Peter, I'll check it out.
Have a good day now.
== Orange
Date: Thu, April 11, 2013 5:25 pm (Answered 25 April 2013) Agent Orange, Thank you for your service, exposing the "cult of A.A." As defined and expressed by NPR's Paul Harvey, one of the most brilliant minds in broadcasting history. My questions: Why hasn't there been a class action law suit of those adversely affected by A.A. attendance? And, why hasn't there been an investigation into the prospects of RICO Act violations predicated on alleged fraud of treatment, amateurish, at that, constantly perpetrated across state lines under the guise of a Twelve Step Program of recovery? A.A, doesn't maintain statistics of recidivism, because that would further expose their current and ongoing ineptitude. "Principles before personalities" as far as their "servants" are concerned is a ruse. I was in the program, that began 42 years ago. And, at that time, you would not believe with whom I attended my first A.A. Meeting. In retrospect, I can't believe it. So, if you'd be so kind, please let me know if you know of any class action law suits pending or ongoing. Thank you.
By the way: _Click here: treatment the 1 cause of death in america — Google Search_ Sincerely Billy G.
Hello Billy,
Thanks for the letter and the question. I don't know of any such lawsuits in progress now.
I am also mystified about why more people are not suing. I know that part of the reason is that
most down-and-out alcoholics cannot afford to pay a lawyer. Also, A.A. has cleverly structured its
organization in a pyramid of irresponsibility. They will always argue that it was your despicable
sponsor who did the bad things, not the A.A. corporation in New York City. They will argue that
every group is independent, and the headquarters doesn't control the groups way down the pyramid.
Now that isn't entirely true, but it makes for a good legal argument in court.
And then the treatment centers avoid lawsuits by writing contracts that new patients must sign that
basically promise nothing except that the patient must pay in full, even if he quits the program after
one day.
But I sure would like to see the A.A. leaders held accountable for their actions.
== Orange
Date: Thu, April 11, 2013 9:28 pm (Answered 25 April 2013) See below. As the result of a single blood test for alcohol (phosphatidylethanol) , this physician was asked to be evaluated at one of three 12-step oriented rehab facilities (Talbott, Marworth, Hazelden). He requested an independent facility but the board of medicine denied it. He was evaluated at Hazelden in September 2011 and they found no evidence of alcohol abuse but, because of the positive test results that prompted the evaluation, they could not "rule it out" and recommended going to AA. Based on these recommendations the medical board mandated three 12-step meetings per week and that he obtain a sponsor and meet with him weekly. Once he found the sponsor he was to provide a telephone number to them so they could call and make sure he was working the program. They also mandated that he obtain names and phone numbers from other attendees at AA and provide them to the regulatory agency so they could call them to verify attendance. The positive test that started the process was changed from "positive" to "invalid" by the lab in October 2012. The board did not consider that relevant when they suspended him 2 months later for "noncompliance." -WM
Hello WM,
Thanks for the story. That is appalling. I did not know that the Talbott-Marsh Center was even still in
business. I thought that they got sued out of existence for false diagnosis and false imprisonment
of a doctor. And they have a terrible track record for driving doctors and nurses (their patients) to
suicide.
(That story is
here
and
here
and
here
and
here.)
The Hazelden Center is of course grand central station for the 12-Step cult religion. Having them pass judgement
on anyone is like sending mental patients to Scientology for evalutation.
I wonder how many members of that Massachusetts board are actually hidden Steppers.
Can we get the names of the board members and investigate them?
Oh well, have a good day now.
== Orange
[ Link here = https://www.orange-papers.info/orange-letters350.html#WM ]
Date: Thu, April 25, 2013 5:11 pm (Answered 27 April 2013) The Board members are listed in the attached letter in the address heading- I've also cc'd the physician who remains suspended from practicing medicine. He has been on staff at Harvard and MGH for 15 years, has never had a malpractice suit or complaint, and is well liked by colleagues, nurses, and patients. He also has been working on a patent to help kids dying from fatal food allergies that these bastards have put in jeopardy. life clearly out of control. Everyone is dumbfounded. -WM List of board members in heading
Hello again, WM,
Thank you for the information. Now we have some investigating to do. What's the story with those board members?
Are they secret Steppers, trying to force people to join their religion? Isn't it a violation of several
laws to use an official position to coerce membership in someone's chosen religion? Besides the obvious
and glaring Constitutional violation.
What I see is:
Readers can help by sleuthing and investigating. People who live in those towns in Massachusetts can especially help by seeing who goes to A.A. meetings. And checking to see if any of those board members ever got a DWI and were themselves sentenced to A.A. meetings. Have a good day now. == Orange
Date: Sun, April 21, 2013 3:30 pm (Answered 25 April 2013) My friend, I have said some really negative things about the 12 Steps. I'm not active in any recovery program right now, but if, for some reason that I cannot imagine now but could possibly come to happen, I had to attend a 12-step meeting, I would go in shoving you in ahead of me. That's the only way I could avoid one massive mugging. You rock! Lin
Hello Lin,
Thanks for the letter and the laugh. And the compliments.
You have a good day now.
== Orange
Date: Tue, April 23, 2013 5:46 am (Answered 25 April 2013) Hi Orange. Please find my letter for your website below. Please do not use my real name or contact information as I do not want any steppers coming after me. They can be a toxic and vindictive bunch. Please refer to me only as "Salty". Thanks.
Hello Salty,
Thank you very much for the letter and the story. I'm adding that to
my list of A.A. horror stories.
That letter says so much. I don't want to just repeat all of your points, so I won't.
Have a good day now.
== Orange
[ Link here =
https://www.orange-papers.info/orange-letters351.html#Meatbag ]
Date: Mon, April 22, 2013 3:01 am (Answered 25 April 2013) I found this image floating around on Tumblr: http://25.media.tumblr.com/242b9eda461f93027ee4ac46c6409fa0/tumblr_mlfo9o7K3O1rleemro1_1280.jpg
I'm sure you'll have a field day with it. I'm personally more willing to trust your opinions on such matters than some random infographic. Incidentally, if you're not familiar with Tumblr, think of it as Portlandia the website. Also, I hope you're in good health. I'm kind of worried, since you haven't updated the letters in a few weeks.
Hello again, Meatbag,
Thanks for the picture, and the concern. Not to worry. I'm just fine. I've just been busy with several
other things, including computer disk problems and getting the tablet working. And then Hostmonster.com —
the company that hosts my web site — screwed
up their email system, again, for the dozenth time, and for a week, I couldn't get into the email.
Hostmonster is terrible and getting worse.
What is even more maddening is that they feign innocence and pretend that there is no problem. "Can you
describe the problem in detail? Things look fine here." I learned from another web site that the
people working the so-called "help line" are required to read scripts. They just give the standard
response, giving me the run-around, always asking for more details, and more description of the
problem, and insisting that there is no problem.
Yes, I need a new hosting service.
About that image: That is a good example of several logical fallacies and propaganda tricks.
The carp are actually so aggressive in going after bread that they will even
climb up on the shore to get bread. No joke.
The first time that I saw it, I almost couldn't believe what I was seeing.
A carp crawled up onto the shore and grabbed
a piece of bread, and then turned around and crawled back into the water.
I felt like I was watching Darwin's evolution in action. "Here they come, up out of the water."
It sounds to me like what the author of that poster is describing is a dead pond — a stagnant body of water
where the muck on the bottom is anerobic, and there are no fish, so if a piece of bread sinks to the bottom,
it just sits there uneaten, and rots. That is not a natural situation. Who killed the pond?
Well, ducks just love to dabble in the mud and dig around for worms or algae or whatever. They do it all
day long, just for entertainment. If there are botulin bacteria
growing in the bottom of the pond, it seems like the ducks would be constantly getting poisoned by whatever they
find down there. But they aren't.
I mostly feed the geese and ducks rolled oats. Then they get whole wheat bread or 14-grain bread as a treat.
A couple of loaves of bread divided between 40 or 50 ducks and geese means that nobody is getting a lot of it,
just a slice or two each.
A usual feeding for them is 10 or 15 pounds of oats and 2 loaves of bread. No way are they living on bread.
If the author is trying to imply that the ducklings and goslings will not bother to eat greens if somebody
gives them white bread, well that doesn't jive with reality. Again, the goslings are very insistent about
getting their greens. They eat greens first, and then they might take some whole wheat bread or rice or
oatmeal to top things off. When I was raising the family of five little ones, they stopped taking anything
like that from me after a couple of weeks. When their mouths got strong enough to shear off the grass,
they lived solely on grass. I took them to the park first thing in the morning for breakfast, and we
often spent all day there. They just ate grass, morning, noon and night. They didn't want anything else.
Ask a goose, and they will tell you, "Grass. It's what's for dinner."
Here is a picture that I just posted earlier today, that shows their environment:
As you can see, there is greenery all over the place. They munch grass and other greens all day long.
Then they come to me to get some staples to supplement their diet.
What they are getting from me is essentially just grass seed. Oats, wheat, any grain, it's just big fat
grass seeds. They love grass seeds because the seeds are much more nourishing than just blades of grass.
Huh? The author was raving about the evils of white bread, and then suddenly he is saying that "something"
— like feeding the ducklings — attracts predators and domestic ducks.
Attracts domestic ducks?
As if domestic ducks are just wandering around out there in the wilderness, looking for a loaf of bread?
That is so unrealistic that it is nuts. The only way that domestic ducks show up in the wilderness is if
a human dumps them out there.
And predators reduce the population. They do not cause overpopulation. And the ermine (or whatever he is)
is gradually eliminating the domestic ducks at the Fernhill Wetlands. Last year there were a dozen, and now
they are down to four, all males.
I won't argue with feeding ducks some nice treats like lettuce, carrots, tomato, or watermelon.
But I don't see why it has to be in the water. Now it really will sink and ferment, unless the carp eat it.
I would put it on the land.
The proof of all of that is the fact that I've been feeding the geese and ducks for 12 years now, and they
haven't gotten sick from it yet. Quite the opposite, they thrive. And when the ducklings and goslings grow up, they
bring their own babies to me to get fed.
I've had mother geese bring their babies to me the first day that they are out of the eggshell.
The mothers actually bring me their unbearably cute little fluff-balls to get fed. The mothers
trust me because I was feeding them when they were young. And their mothers in turn brought them to me because
they knew me from years of feeding. A generation of geese is three years. So I've fed the great-grandparents,
and then the grandparents, and then the parents, and then the babies. Four generations. And I've never seen
a gosling or duckling get deformed by what they got to eat.
 Two newborn goslings and their mother, begging for some more oatmeal. Now if the author of that sign wants to change it to read, "Please don't feed the ducklings white bread", then we can have some agreement. Any of these things are better for them: whole wheat bread, oatmeal, brown rice (preferably cooked, so that it is soft for the babies' mouths), any whole grain other than rye. (The only problem with rye is that it can grow ergot fungus, which makes it "black smutty rye". Well, ergot is poisonous to geese. Most rye does not have any ergot fungus on it, and it's perfectly okay for ducks and geese, but it's better to avoid rye on the offhand chance that a little smutty rye may have gotten mixed into the batch.) Thanks again for the image. There is just so much misinformation out there. It's unreal. Have a good day now. == Orange
[The next letter from Meatbag is here.] [The story of the goslings continues here.]
Date: Fri, April 5, 2013 9:47 am (Answered 26 April 2013) I just finished reading a segment of The Cult Test Questions 21-30. I'm convinced that a cousin's 22 year old daughter has gotten herself mixed up in a cult. For the last almost-month she has ended a 3 year relationship with someone we believe she still loves deeply, she has distanced herself from her family by moving in with two woman one of which was her recruiter into this cult, she cut her hair similar to the recruiter and she began dressing like and imitating her. After three weeks of this behaviour, she went to the town where the head "church" is located and was re"saved" and baptised. The day after she came home she walked away from her job which one month earlier she told me she loved and wanted to make her permanent career and she also walked away from her educational endeavor. She was 3 weeks from graduation with her bachelors degree with honors on the dean's list. Also that day she decided to permanently move to the location of the head "church" with her new "family" and live with them. When they told her that was not a good idea at this time, she went off the deep end and was picked up by the police walking door to door in the middle of the night claiming to be the woman who recruited her and said she was leaving for a mission trip to Africa and wanted to give the person answering the door something — usually an article of dirty clothing that she had packed in the suitcase she was toting with her. The police took her to a mental facility. That was very late Monday, April 1st early Tuesday morning. Since that time she has had a handful of psychotic breaks that the medical staff call highly religious is nature. The psychiatrist believes she was given a synthetic drug of some sort and was put in a trance-like and something was done to her. We need help. Can you please recommend where we can go for help and tell us if you have ever heard of David Viljoen (the "apostle" of this group), AWC International, and/or IAMS?
Please advise,
Hello Holly,
Thank you for the letter. Sorry to take so long to answer. I've been investigating and searching,
to see what I could find about David Viljoen and his AWC International organization. I had never heard of
him before.
Unfortunately, I don't see anything other than the usual publicity fluff web pages that say that it's a good
group. But I am very suspicious of them:
It sounds like your niece (is the daughter of a cousin a niece?) is in the right place, in the hands of doctors.
She obviously needs medical treatment, and she is getting it. I don't know what drug they might have
given her. I thought I knew all about drugs, because I used to live on a hippie commune and have taken
everything under the sun for years. (And I do mean everything.)
But I don't know what designer drug a brainwasher would give someone
to convert them to belief in a cult religion. That's a new one.
Her story just reeks of "cult". Abandoning her college degree and career
and moving in with the church are a couple of classic signs of cult assimilation.
And so is cutting herself off from her family and severing her relationship with
her significant other.
So is "cloning" — cutting her hair and making herself look just like the recruiter.
First off, I would leave her in the hands of the doctors. They sound like they know what they are
doing and have a good take on the situation.
After that, you can prepare yourself to help her by
learning how to deal with a cult member in ways that actually work, rather than widen the rift between you.
A book by Steve Hassan comes to mind:
Releasing the Bonds: Empowering People to Think for Themselves.
That is the kind of book you want to have if you discover that
a friend or relative has gotten sucked into a cult, and you want to know how
to get them back out alive. It is described in the bibliography, which has some links to quotes.
So click on the name of the book and go there.
You can also check out Hassan's other book:
Combatting Cult Mind Control.
Here are some links to letters where we discussed the anti-cult techniques in Hassan's books.
Many of these letters talk about getting someone out of A.A., but the process is the same for any cult.
The similarity between cults is large. They all use the same mind-bending techniques, and the same
logical fallacies, and recruit the same way, and become brainwashed true believers the same way.
I have read about cults that existed hundreds of years ago,
and they sound just like the ones that plague us today.
And then, if you wanted more information on cults in general, see
the "Top 10" reading list
on cults, here.
Good luck, and have a good day now. And please don't hesitate to write back if you have more questions.
== Orange
Last updated 31 October 2013. |
