I was studying the 12x12 this morning (The Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions) the two warnings below regarding the future of the fellowship. The traditions, if followed, would safeguard the integrity and stability of the program. But they are not, so the fellowship and the program is at threat. One of the major threats seems to be the need to seek approval from the world. To conform to it. All the things that drove us to drink in attempting to conform, twist and fit to the illogical, are now infecting the fellowship directly. In the Introduction to the 12 x12 (which is hard to find on the internet now as it seems the Introduction doesn't suit the narrative), but the hard copy remains they simple states:
*Alcoholics Anonymous first published Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions in 1953. Bill W., who along with Dr. Bob S. founded Alcoholics Anonymous in 1935, wrote the book to share 18 years of collective experience within the Fellowship on how A.A. members recover, and how our society functions.In recent years some members and friends of A.A. have asked if it would be wise to update the language, idioms, and historical references in the book to present a more contemporary image for the Fellowship. however, because the book has helped so many alcoholics find recovery, there exists strong sentiment within the Fellowship against any change to it. In fact, the 2002 general Service conference discussed this issue and it was unanimously recommended that: The text in the book Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions, written by Bill W., remain as is, recognizing the Fellowship’s feelings that Bill’s writing be retained as originally published. We hope that the collective spiritual experience of the A.A. pioneers captured in these pages continues to help alcoholics and friends of A.A. understand the principles of our program.
And about the dangers of taking sides, how conforming to outside issues and their agendas, altering the integrity of the text, is by definition "taking sides" and was just the beginning of the deflecting the primary purpose from getting recovered to virtue signaling to fit an outside issue that was never a issue seeing that we have always been all inclusive and never exclusive......and do not need to promote that in any form:
“Our Public Relations policy is based on attraction rather than promotion; we need always maintain personal anonymity at the level of press, radio, films
“An AA Group ought never endorse, finance, or lend the AA name to any related facility, or outside enterprise, lest problems of money, property and prestige divert us from our primary purpose.”
“Alcoholics Anonymous has no opinion on
outside issues; hence the A.A. name ought
never be drawn into public controversy.”
*NEVER since it began has Alcoholics Anonymous been
divided by a major controversial issue. Nor has our Fellowship ever publicly taken sides on any question in an
embattled world. This, however, has been no earned virtue.
It could almost be said that we were born with it, for, as one
oldtimer recently declared, “Practically never have I heard
a heated religious, political, or reform argument among
A.A. members. So long as we don't argue these matters privately, it's a cinch we never shall publicly.”
As by some deep instinct, we A.A.'s have known from
the very beginning that we must never, no matter what the
provocation, publicly take sides in any fight, even a worthy
one. All history affords us the spectacle of striving nations
and groups finally torn asunder because they were designed
for, or tempted into, controversy. Others fell apart because
of sheer self-righteousness while trying to enforce upon the
rest of mankind some millennium of their own specification.
Where I personally failed was to sit idol while those who unconsciously sought outside approval took over the fellowship. Myself, not being well versed in the 12x12 because of my own complacency lead to such infiltrations in groups I belong to because of my lack of courage and not wanting to get involved.
That people feel the need to change the integrity of AA in order to fit an outside issue so that they feel good about themselves in the public is as old as mankind itself. The fault is upon the old timers who didn't at least try to educate the newcomer as to how changing words pokes holes into a whole intact program will invariable start the watering down process, not because we have any opinion on the outside issues, but because once you start changing original and sacred text it's compromised and will have less of a result. It's a recipe that now is open to be tampered with and changed to fit whatever is going on in the world.
If A.A. is to wash away, it will return stronger someday. God will make sure of that. I think that this cycle has come to an end but the original text that helped so many to recover is still in hard copy text and written on the hearts of those who will pick it up once this cycle has come to pass. I am grateful I made it in before the full blown watering down of the program. That God led me to spiritually fit Big Book AA and to those who were doing their to diligence to carry the message-not doing their due diligence to change the message.
I urge those who seek and seek to keep the message in tact, to start up fellowships in their home and get back to basics. To get old copies of the original texts before they are completely changed and scrubbed from the internet. Where 2 0r more are gathered, you have an A.A. meeting. I would like to see A.A. made real life again- in my heart, in my home and my community. I am grateful for online AA and I do see it an asset for my personal program, but I also see the disconnect in humanity and only having an online presence, detrimental to not only A.A. but our spirit. If there is no physical representation of AA in real life, then it can easily be white washed, watered down and eventually dissolved into the metaverse....same with people.