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silveraaadamsen
Reviews
28 Days (2000)
Misleading Pro AA Propaganda
28 days is an average AA propaganda film, which is to say that it is highly misleading. The acting and directing is adequate but is hampered by the lack of realism in the plot. Viggo Mortensen and Dominic West, the two headlining male leads and competing romantic interests for Sandra Bullock's Gwen, come the closest to overcoming the restrictions of the plot.
For example, the film turns on the idea that virtually everyone who has ever had a substance abuse problem would benefit from AA and 12 Step, even if attendance is court ordered. To further this propaganda goal, the plot has Gwen end up being court-ordered into a 12 Step rehab. The reality is that someone is more likely to be harmed than helped by 12 Step, particularly if they are coerced into participating in 12 Step.
In keeping with the Pro AA propaganda, initially the character of Gwen resists participation in AA and 12 Step. Then after falling out a window and breaking her leg, while trying to obtain drugs in the rehab facility, she decides that she will try AA and 12 Step's ideology of powerlessness and total abstinence from all drugs in the future. This change in attitude is depicted as healing improvement. However, for the idea of "powerlessness" to be healing, it has to be misinterpreted. For many, if they actually think that they have no power to consume or not consume their drug of choice, they will OD and die, which, unfortunately is more likely for opiate addicts to do when participating in AA and 12 Step than if they just continued to use on their own.
The film also distorts actual AA and 12 Step philosophy, but generally speaking for AA philosophy to be palatable for the public, it needs to be at least slightly distorted. For example, actual AA philosophy doesn't really encourage any kind of the healing work with animals and trust exercises that the rehab of the film depicts. AA and 12 Step focus more on eliminating "resentment," and taking a kind of responsibility for one's feelings that in some contexts is actually blaming the victim. Members are encouraged to see themselves as liars, users and abusers, and if they resist this labeling to be told that they aren't spiritual. Thus, the emotional support that those with more time in 12 Step have for newer members is very unrealistic.
The film also tries to tackle the contentious topic of sex for those early in sobriety, yet it slants it here too. The most abusive and yet common sexual relationships are between men with multiple years in 12 Step Program and attractive women who are very new to AA and 12 Step. In this sense Cornell, played by Steve Buscemi, is more a fantasy of the AA counselor than the reality. In practical application, the counselor would more than likely be trying to seduce those he was supposedly trying to help, at the same time that he was lecturing them on their "resentment" issues and telling them that he "was not responsible" for their feelings if at some point in time they felt betrayed by his seduction.
This said, the camaraderie between those struggling to control their substance abuse that the film depicts is real, but much of that evaporates in standard AA and 12 Step meetings. Typical AA and 12 Step is run by old timers with narcissist disorders who seem to enjoy being emotionally abusive to newer members and then claiming that this is a kind of "spirituality" to be abusive or that it is "progress and not perfection" in terms of their own flaws and abuses but that newcomers must be entirely obedient to the Big Book and their sponsors if they want to stay sober and avoid the "jail, institutions, or death" that awaits those that decide not to participate in AA.
Of course, in keeping with standard AA propaganda, the film never mentions that AA only has a 5% success rate, and that 12 Step has an even lower success rate with opiates, and that there are 10 major alternatives to AA and 12 Step.
So my main problem with this film is the same argument that applies to any AA propaganda film. It pretends to have a life-saving message of hope, but is instead rife with misinformation, that will cause the death and suffering that it supposedly is working to avoid.
10 Major Alternatives to AA (circa 2017) Free Self-Help online reference: HAMS network; SMART Recovery; SOS sobriety; Women for Sobriety (includes Men for Sobriety) Life ring; Moderation; Reddit (entirely online) Help involving paid professionals online reference : Rational Recovery; Sinclair Method (for alcohol, uses the medication Naltrexone); Ibogaine Alliance (for opiates); Sinclair method and Ibogaine use medication to rewire the addiction pathways in the brain *most doctors can prescribe the medication Naltrexone, but Goodman center.com is a treatment center specifically based on the Sinclair method. **aftercare is recommended, such as genesisiboganiecenter.com, holistichousevegas.com, and medicineheartrecovery.com
Shameless (2011)
Pro AA Propaganda
Yes, the acting and direction is solid. It's the theme that I have trouble with, the shows "shameless" and yet increasing promotion of AA and 12 Step.
I'm curious to see if the original UK version is also long vision Pro AA propaganda piece. My guess though is that the American version was shaped to become increasingly Pro AA in its theme.
So the reader might be asking now, "What is wrong with a Pro AA stance? And mixing a little healthy therapy in with all that dysfunction?"
The problem is that the fact that AA is one of numerous treatments available, not the only one and certainly not the most effective, with about a 5% success rate as verified by the most reliable studies and that is for alcohol and not opiates. Opiate "addicts" are more likely to die if participating in AA, NA or other 12 Step than if they commit on their own. There are treatments that can have very high success rates for opiates, but because AA functions like a religious cult (and many Anti-AA would say that is because AA is a religious cult) AA and other 12 Step when talking about treatment to newcomers to their program will say that it is "jail, institutions, death" for those that cannot work the 12 Step program. Remember that 95% of those that try AA statistically don't do well.
Is it irresponsible for Shameless to promote AA and not also feature the views of alternative treatments when it has an opening credit sequence that begins in a bathroom with the patriarch passed out by the toilet?
I'm going to say yes because AA and 12 Step ideology also tends to celebrate the "addict" period before its members found 12 Step. In some ways celebrating the earlier "addicted" period functions as the hook to get "addicts" into 12 Step.
10 Major Alternatives to AA (circa 2017)
Free Self-Help: HAMS; SMART; SOS; Women for Sobriety (includes Men for Sobriety); Life ring; Moderation Management; Reddit.
Help involving paid professionals rational.org sinclairmethod.com (for alcohol)* ibogainealliance.org (for opiates)**
Sinclair method and Ibogaine use medication to rewire the addiction pathways in the brain *most doctors can prescribe the medication Naltrexone, but Goodmancenter.com is a treatment center specifically
based on the Sinclair method. **aftercare is recommended, such as genesisiboganiecenter.com, holistichousevegas.com, and medicineheartrecovery.com
Wild (2014)
A Journey to Wholeness
The film has many useful attributes, the most obvious of which is that shows how to heal after hitting a emotional bottom on one's own. Indeed, the idea of working through the trauma on one's own is key to the film.
This core message is one that makes intuitive sense. However, the logic of this message is most often ignored in the topic that the film deals with most directly: opiate abuse and a related emotional bottoming out.
Wild gives a real-world example on how to turn a physical journey into a journey oneself, again after abuse of opiate drugs and what looks like a "bottom." However, rather than go to an AA or 12 Step meeting and chant over and over again that she is powerless over her drug of choice, and even her own life, the heroine takes on an amazing mental and physical challenge and proves that she is anything but "powerless." I'm sure the intentions of the author of the book that inspired the film, or even the makers of the film were not thinking of drug treatment or the increasing controversy surrounding AA and 12 Step, nonetheless the film provides interesting commentary on what many think is commonplace knowledge on drug treatment.
AA and 12 Step attempt to cultivate feelings of personal powerless in members and insist that this helps to foster a healthier individual and is recovery. Yet, in all other contexts concerned with healing empowerment is a positive. The only groups that consistently work to undermine an individuals sense of competence are religious cults, which should suggest that AA and 12 Step is not something that actually is going to be healing for most people.
This is not to say that everyone needs to hike 1100 miles, but it does point that the human beings tend to be happiest and healthiest when they feel empowered and able to meet challenges on their own.
The 13th Step (2016)
to those that don't like the film....
This is my second review of The 13th Step and it is more response to those attacking the film than actual review. My purpose is to give context to why some of these reviews say the film is dangerously inaccurate and others say it is one of the most truthful and relevant films of today. Thus, what I'm going to do is to ask readers of the reviews to think about the larger claims of those who are critical of AA in comparison to those that insist that criticizing AA is something close to blasphemy.
No religious group is without problems of exploitation of some of its members. AA for tax as well as legal purposes is a religious group, even though members will insist it is "spiritual and not religious. This is because a Higher Power is necessary and this Higher Power is supposed to receive prayers from AA members, even if atheists can substitute the group of AA for God (or any other seemingly bizarre object). I would argue that this substitution is, itself, a hallmark of cults since it puts the group of AA above absolutely everything else when AA itself becomes a Higher Power. However, the key point here is that because AA has a standard and recommended practice of prayer and subordination of personal will to either a deity or to the group of AA that it is functionally religious, regardless of whether members insist that it is merely "spiritual." Thus, the allegations of sexual and other exploitation that are growing in number against AA and other 12 Step groups need to be seen in the context of similar allegations against religions and religious cults.
For example, the religion of the Catholic Church has had problems with Priests sexually abusing young boys. Many argue that the reason the Catholic Church has had sexual abuse problems is because of its attitude towards adult sexuality. Catholic doctrine says that most forms of sex are immoral so there isn't that much of a difference between raping children and consensual sex between adults who aren't married. What made this even more of a problem was that Catholics wanted to believe that their religious beliefs didn't contribute to the abuse of boys and that the benefits of the religion outweighed the problem of sexually abusing children. Thus, there was the desire to keep the problem quiet. Of course, eventually the supposed benefits of keeping the abuse quiet were eventually outweighed by the need to protect young boys who were being abused by their own Priests. I think the abuse in AA, especially the sexual abuse, follows a similar pattern to the earlier reaction to Priests abusing young boys.
The appropriate reaction to abuse within a culture or a religion (and I would argue that AA is both) is to try and correct the abuse and help the victims. The response of the typical active AA member to allegations of abuse within AA (especially allegations of victimization) is to blame the victim and say that the victim provoked any abuse that might have occurred.
Thus, the reaction of active AA is more of a cause for concern than even the allegations. If a group/religion/ denies abuse and attacks those that point to problems, it would seem to ensure their status as a cult. This is where the Catholic Church is healthier than a cult and also healthier than AA. Eventually, the Catholic Church did address is problems of exploitation and took responsibility for trying to solve the problem, rather than saying it was an isolated incident that had nothing to do with the Catholic Church as a whole.
Now, turning the abuse found in religious cults, the initial reaction is the same as the initial reaction of the Catholic Church, but the difference is that the cult will continue its abusive practices after at least some allegations have been proved and continue to insist that those that claim abuse have no right to claim it. Thus, if one is looking for an example of sexual and emotional exploitation and abuse associated with religious cults, FLDS comes most to mind to here. Both FLDS and the Catholic Church have had allegations of sexual abuse and both have been proved to be well-founded. The Catholic Church, however, is working on addressing the problem of abuse, but FLDS sees their abusive beliefs (such as forced child marriage) as something that doesn't need to be changed.
While, of course, AA is not identical to either the Catholic Church or FLDS, it does share many traits, particularly that of allegations of abuse.
What we, as citizens of the world, have learned is that allegations of abuse against a religious or a quasi-religious group need to be taken seriously because there is a foundation for these claims and they are not born out of the air.
Thus, AA becomes a cult not just in the fact that it seems to foster abuse of a various types, including the more well-known sexual abuse that the title of the film references, but because active AA members will viciously make personal attacks against those that try to bring this abuse to the attention of the public.
Yes, all groups can have problems with abuse, but it is only a very dangerous group that blames the victim who has been abused by the group. This is why I argue that AA isn't just a religion or quasi- religion, but should be understood as one of the more dangerous cults of our time. This is also why I argue that the 13th Step is one of the most important films of today.