Addiction in America

[Alex]

Originally Posted by Not Afraid

There are numerous former drunks that post on this board. ALL of them got sober initially through AA. Is that quantifiable enough?

No, honestly it isn't. I'm not at all saying that people who go to AA don't get sober, I'm saying there is little evidence that people who go to AA get sober at a significantly different success rate than people who don't go to AA.

I can provide millions of people who believe that horoscopes accurately predict their life, that doesn't make it so.

Yes, your argument can be successful on paper, but in reality, whatever it takes to get a drunk sober is probably a good thing.

If it actually does anything. And if it does actually do anything it will be a quantifiable difference. If no matter what 5% each year will go sober, then the 5% who do it cold will think they are giants of willpower. The 5% who do AA will give AA credit. The 5% who try hypnosis will think it was the greatest thing ever. The 5% who find god will credit god.

The 95% who went to AA will just move on. The 95% who tried willpower will just move on. Then 5% of those 95% will find success in the next year with whatever they are doing and they will say "wow, this works so much better than that thing I was trying before."

Now go one step farther and create a society where everybody is pressured to believe that the only effective treatment is Treatment X so almost everybody who tries to kick the habit tries it with Treatment X and then 5% of the people get better. It will certainly look like Treatment X should get the credit for every sober person.

Show me a solid differential then I will grant that it is even worth considering forcing people to AA. There is no clear evidence of this so if you want to claim it, that's fine, but it has all the power of someone saying that sunspots are causing global warming because it seems to make sense to them.

But I still won't accept it because it is religion (even if loosely defined) and a fundamental bedrock of our nation is that nothing is more important than not forcing religion on someone. And if given a choice between pretending to religion and going to jail I'd like to think I'd stand by my principals and go to jail but I wouldn't. That doesn't make it ok, though.