The Cult of the 12 Steps

I have been meaning to write about Alcoholics Anonymous’ 12 step programs for awhile now. I do not personally know anyone who has been in the program, but what I have uncovered is quite disturbing. Awhile back I watched an episode of South Park (clip below) that dealt with AA. At first I thought the steps mentioned in the episode was a joke…that was until I did a quick search on the internet. There they where, all 12 steps of the AA cult. The steps in the episode were the actual steps.

What’s the harm you might ask? After all, AA has helped countless individuals kick their addiction! The problem for me is the steps. Throughout the steps is this notion that alcoholism is a disease which its victims are powerless to stop without the help of a higher power. This implies that the individual cannot be held responsible for his or her actions and only god can stop the individual from remaining a victim. Even if I was not an atheist I would find this notion both appalling and disturbing. In fact, here’s an excellent post by one of my fellow contributors at The Liberty Papers, Chris Byrne a practicing Catholic who wrote a more exhaustive post about the 12 steps both at his blog Anarchangel and The Liberty Papers.

Below is a clip from the South Park episode I mentioned. I apologize for the poor quality but this was the only clip I could find (you may need to turn up the volume). I was hoping to find the whole episode but this scene does a good job of making the point.