Back to the Orange Papers themselves

Reading files like this on the 'Orange Papers' is what made me remove myself from all association with those who practice or in any way condone any aspect of Steppism. For me, there is nothing to argue about here. I thought the Forum might be a place where I could discuss some of my chagrin at having been duped by Buchmanism and cultism. Virulent trolls seem to be ready to derail discussion, and instead degrade and denigrate my statements of support to the posters on the Forum, like JR Harris, who I feel are doing us all a great service by continuing to tell the truth.
Lately, I have returned to reading many of the files on the OP's that I skipped over or only skimmed, especially 'The Religious Roots of AA and the Twelve Steps.' The constant small-minded sniping and utterly irrelevant bickering on the Forum fades into the background.
I realize I don't need to add my two cents into the mix. For what? Stirring up hornets is boring. I really think Orange has already said it, and said it incontrovertibly well.
Thank you, Orange. You have my eternal gratitude for all the work you've done over the years. 'Nuff said.

#42 from "What's Not Good About AA"
A.A. members can easily hide their A.A. membership, because it's all confidential and anonymous, by definition. Hidden members have worked themselves into positions of power where they control the future of our nation's drug and alcohol treatment programs. A.A. uses its entrenched position to prevent any other treatment modalities from encroaching on what it considers to be its territory, and its money. A cult religion with an ineffective treatment program has no business running our nation's drug and alcohol treatment programs and lying about what it is doing.

Personally, I could hardly care less what a bunch of crazy cultists want to believe. It's their lives, and they can do pretty much anything they want to with them. I get leafletted and hit on by the Hari Krishnas and the Scientologists often, and it doesn't matter. I don't care if a bunch of feeble-minded alcoholic burn-outs want to cluster together in church basements and convince each other that they are God's special children, and The Chosen People. It doesn't matter.

But it does matter when a cult uses City, State and Federal tax money, as well as State, Federal, and private health insurance money, to promote its own religion while pretending to provide medical treatment for a deadly disease. That is unacceptable and unjustifiable (and felony fraud, too).

It does matter when a cult uses parole officers, judges, and therapists to force more people to join the cult. That is unacceptable.

It matters when people who are sick, desperate, confused, and going through a real crisis, are deceived and lied to and fed a crackpot cult religion as the universal cure for all drug and alcohol problems, by people who are supposed to be therapists, but who are really just proselytizing religious nut-cases. That is not acceptable.

To force the insane, bizarre, and superstitious practices of a cult religion on people who are supposed to be receiving medical treatment for a deadly disease is a crime so monstrous, so evil, and so sick, that it is basically unbelievable. That is how groups like Alcoholics Anonymous and Narcotics Anonymous are getting away with it. People can't believe that it is really happening. The other people, that is — the people to whom it is not being done.