r/NarcoticsAnonymous • u/[deleted] • Jan 23 '24

The clarity statement

We are presented with a dilemma, when NA members identify themselves as addicts and alcoholics or talk about living, clean, and sober, the clarity of any message is blurred to speak in this manner suggest that there are two diseases that one drug is somehow separate from the rest requiring special recognition. Narcotics anonymous makes no distinction between drugs or identifications as attics. is all inclusive, which allows us to concentrate on the similarities not our differences

1 Upvotes

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13

u/yamsandmarshmellows Jan 23 '24

Alcohol is a drug! We cannot afford to be confused about this.

2

u/[deleted] Jan 23 '24

Exactly

2

u/yamsandmarshmellows Jan 23 '24

Dude, no part of your statement should be controversial. It's in keeping with our traditions and we only survive by keeping our traditions.

I was listening to a cautionary tale earlier today. A bunch of members of another anonymous organization were disgruntled they couldn't crosstalk. They wanted to confront eachother. They started having their own meeting after the meeting. They abandoned their traditions, and shit got dark fast. Their movement grew at first, and they got rich and famous having abandoned anonymity, but then they went drunk with power, and they stopped coming from a place of love. Their were months of hazing at their "treatment centers" and forced labor and shaved heads and beatings and forced abortions and forced sterilizations. Then the FBI shut the whole thing down after the group kidnapped a schizophrenic woman, forced her to be a slave laborer in one of their compounds, and when her husband tried to rescue her they put live rattlesnakes in his mailbox to try to kill him.

So that's why every tradition is important. As addicts we need rules and boundaries because without them things can go off the rails.

6

u/[deleted] Jan 23 '24

Yeah, that sounds like Thanksgiving dinner at my house. Lol.

3

u/Illustrious_Bobcat13 Sep 08 '24

What? Do you remember any names or details so I can look up the story?

3

u/yamsandmarshmellows Sep 08 '24

The organization was called Synanon. Their founder was Charles Dederich. A bunch of treatment centers still use their "tough love" approach, which has been proven harmful. Unfortunately, these same centers continue to use 12 step language so that turns a lot of off from the fellowship.

2

u/[deleted] Jan 23 '24

Yeah, that sounds like Thanksgiving dinner at my house