SamBee

[Guest guest]

Maybe I can explain my position by using another analogy.

Imagine you live in a highly polluted urban area, say, Mexico City. (I

lived there for several years). Carcinogens enter the environment in this

city from hundreds, even thousands, of sources: cars, factories, chemical

waste spills, and so on. And carcinogens are carreied by every vector; they

are in the air, in the water, in the dust and dirt, just everywhere.

Obviously, anyone living in Mexico City faces a seriously elevated cancer

risk.

Now, imagine you live in Mexico City and go to your doctor. You tell

him, " Doctor, I want to avoid getting cancer due to exposure to

environmental contamination, but, if I do get it, I want to know what the

best treatment is. What do you advise. "

The doctor answers:

" Sir, I can't really give you any medical advice on how to avoid

getting environmental-carcinogen induced cancer. These carcinogens are

everywhere. Your exposure depends on where you live, how the wind blows,

what meals you eat and where, and many thousands of factors. Nobody can

calculate all these many variables, and doctors have no special knowledge

about this great complexity of factors. I can give you some very general

advice - for example, don't smoke, stay away from radiation sources - but

that is just common sense stuff. "

" Further, " the doctor goes on, " even if we could calculate the thousands

of different ways you are exposed to environmental carcinogens each day, how

your body will react is an unknown. There is a lot of just plain random

chance involved. Some people get small exposures but develop disease;

others get big exposures but don't. We really can't predict it. And, of

course, there are scores of DIFFERENT types of cancer. If you do get sick,

we can't predict what type of cancer you will get, either. " .

" As for treatment if you are afflicted, well, that again is highly

individual. It depends on what type of cancer, how advanced it is when we

find it, your age, your health state, your diet and general physical

condition, and many other factors. There are different treatments, for

different kinds of cancer, at different stages of development, and for

different kinds of people. I just can't give you any general rule here.

There is not one treatment which is good for every case; in fact, each case

is unique. "

" Damn, " you respond. " Doctor, you don't seem to know anything. You

haven't told me one overall truth which will help me. "

" Well, " the doctor replies. " There is one very general thing that I can

tell you, and it is important. A very high percentage of cancer is

resulting from all this environmental pollution. If we could reduce the

pollution, we could reduce cancer rates quickly and substantially. I can't

tell you much about which INDIVIDUALS might get the cancer, not give you any

general rule which would fit every case as far as treatment goes. But I CAN

give you a rule which is sure and important for our SOCIETY. If we cut this

damn pollution, many fewer people will have cancer problems. "

Now, what gets called 'addiction' is, in fact, a whole variety of ways in

which people break down under social stressors. They drink too much, get

depressed, get angry and hostile, have thought disorders, start to overeat,

become fearful, gamble excessively, and do scores of other things. When we

look at each of these things, incidence rates can be tied to a great variety

of social factors, which I will lump all together here and call 'stressors'.

Who will be stricken by a dis-ease, and exactly when, is impossible to

predict. The more stressors you are exposed to, the more the odds go up.

But stressors are, like the pollutants in my analogy, all around you. A

nasty boss, a hostile person on the bus, a bad marriage, economic troubles,

racism in the community, depressing or demeaning messages in the media, and

so on and on and on. People feel cut-off and stressed by thousands of

things. The exposure pattern for each person is unique, each person's

resistance to each form of stress is different, and there is a lot of just

plain random variation involved.

Some people may be exposed to a lot of stress, and not snap. Someone

else will be stressed less, but then slip into heavy drinking, depression,

or some other form of dis-ease.

And, as with cancer, once a problem appears, getting over the problem

turns out to be a highly individual thing. But here my analogy breaks down

a bit. For we DO have some efficacious treatments for cancers, but we don't

have any medical treatment for dis-eases that seem to work any better than

the spontaneous recovery rate, and some 'treatments' are actually harmful.

(Some 'treatments' give a result the government likes, such as drugging up

school children to keep them quiet in class. I think Breggin, M.D.,

is right when he labels psychotropic drug 'treatments' as punishments or

social controls, and I think the evidence he offers to show that ALL

prescribed psychotropics are likely to be harmful rather than beneficial to

the individual, is strong.)

Now, you could very well say to me, " , you don't know beans. You

can't tell me much about who will break down under stress; all you do is

suggest the most obvious, common sense stuff - like eat healthy, and

exercise, and so on. Anybody knows that. And, when it comes to 'treatment'

after a problem occurs, you do no better. You say nothing works better than

just reducing stress, and plain old time. Boy, you have nothing useful to

say on this subject. "

Here, I reply to you, I have one useful thing to say. Most of these

dis-eases are resulting from environmental stress conditions, just as many

cancers result from environmental pollution. And stress has been exploding

over the last 30 years, as the American Dream has evaporated. There is too

much insecurity, conflict, competition, overwork, economic pain, media

filth, and so on. Dis-ease is exploding because social stress and conflict

are exploding. We are headed for disaster if we don't get a handle on this

'pollution'.

I know this is not the answer you might have been wanting, but it is the

only one I am able to offer. There is one other comment I would like to

make, though.

When cancer rates go up, a lot of dishonest charlatans move in,

capitalize on people's worries, and try to sell them phony cures. AA is

like that when it comes to dis-eases. And so is the War On Drugs, though it

is even worse. Indeed, these phony cures actually INCREASE, rather than

decrease, stress levels. Hence, they add to the problem, even as they claim

to solve it. We have to find real, effective ways to reduce social stress

in order to prevent dis-eases, and we need to reject the phony cures offered

by the 12-Step Movement and the War On Drugs.

Re:

> In a message dated 6/7/01 2:38:11 PM Central Daylight Time,

> pauldiener@... writes:

>

> <<

> 12-Stepping is a 'new religion movement', aka 'cult movement' (using

the

> term in its technical sense). More specifically, it is a secularized

> version of pietistic-holiness personalism. It focuses upon making the

> PERSON better by removing sin/addiction/flaw. Social amelioration is

> supposed to result 'one person at a time', via personal regeneration or

> recovery.

>

> If you leave 12-stepping and adopt a more social understanding of what

> gets labeled 'addiction', then you have made a major change in your

approach

> to life. What we call 'addiction' (aka, dis-ease) grows out of the

> conflicts and pressures of social interaction. It simply can't be

> understood 'one person at a time', since, like the farmer's marketing

> dilemma, it grows right out of the social process.

>

> But what if you leave 12-stepping only to enter into some OTHER

> personalistic recovery cult? If you still focus on the individual, you

will

> still misunderstand 'addiction'. And if you encourage the individual to

> brown nose more, please the boss more, or try harder, compete harder,

> struggle harder - in a society where corporate monopoly and

small-business

> throat cutting are EXACTLY what causes most social stress, then you will

> only exacerbate the problem. You will be like the farmer, growing ever

> better crops, but faced with an ever meaner social environment. >>

>

> O.K., THIS I get, and can agree with. A lot of the other stuff you've

posted,

> , I don't get the point of...but then I was raised in the suburbs.

; )

> Perhaps you could elaborate on what each person might be expected to

> do, if acting " personally " isn't it?

>

>

>

>