From: George Koob, Ph.D., Director, NIAAA, a Division of NIH
Subject: Cease and Desist
Date: May 7, 2014
Dear Mr “Addiction Myth”,
NIAAA (a division of NIH) demands the immediate retraction of the false, misleading, libelous, slanderous, and dangerous article entitled “A Conversation with Addiction Guru Aaron White, PhD”. The ‘interview’ is a sham and both your original questions and the answers kindly provided by Dr White were modified to make him appear ridiculous and disparage the Science of Addiction. I can assure you he is an accredited scientist and it is a legitimate field of medicine and Nora Volkow is brilliant and may win the Nobel Prize one day for curing Addiction. So what if she sometimes practices her acceptance speech at work? That is none of your business.
You make the following outrageous claims:
- AA is a mischievous cult that brainwashes vulnerable people into powerlessness and then challenges them to prove it
- These people are then abused and exploited by the cult and sometimes kill themselves
- AA reports the deaths back to NIAAA and NIDA
- These divisions publicize the deaths as a health crisis
- These divisions create junk science propaganda about drug use and impose it on impressionable young people in the guise of ‘educational material’
- These young people then do drugs and believe they are addicted
- They are sent to AA/NA and repeat the cycle as either mischief-maker or victim
This is so absurd on so many levels. You are basically saying that there is a huge conspiracy involving all levels of society with government collusion that kills thousands of people every year just to justify a drinking club’s mischief. Do you realize how psychotically insane that sounds? In my field we have a term for it: CRAY-CRAY!
I have dedicated my life to helping people with the dreaded affliction known as Alcoholism, in which people crave alcohol uncontrollably and then drink compulsively until drunk and then engage in naughty behavior until falling asleep. The drinking may be so severe that they may not even remember the aforementioned behavior until they are reminded of it or until they have another drink or two. Don’t believe me? Just watch Nora’s interview on 60 Minutes or read the Wikipedia article on Alcoholism, complete with footnotes. Then tell me you still don’t believe it!
My staff is equally committed to the cause. You are trying to make a mockery of our life’s work. I will have none of it! If not for the First Amendment and the fact that NIH has no enforcement division, I would shut you down!
Among the numerous falsities in your ‘research’ I would like to rebut:
- You claim that detox is easy. Nothing could be further from the truth! I have many friends who went through withdrawals, and they say it was brutal! They can tell you stories! Go to your local AA meeting and see for yourself! Many of them NEARLY DIED, and AA was the only thing that worked for them and they tried EVERYTHING! And now they are happy, joyous, and free™!!
- You deny the Big Book’s claim that alcoholics drink too much and then go home and play solitaire through their tears, cursing their affliction. I can assure you, sir, that this is completely true. My best friend Harry from college did exactly this through his mid-30’s. I know because I sat with him on countless evenings wiping his eyes just so he could see the cards!
- You claim that Old Timers at AA drink normally. This is medically impossible! Alcoholism is a serious chronic relapsing disease and there is no cure. Or do you believe in miracle cures and faith healing?? If any of them had so much as a sip of alcohol, they would be back in the hospital in no time. Once they accidentally switched the punch bowls at our holiday party, and we had to rent out a whole wing at Betty Ford for 2 months!
- Dr White’s friend didn’t say he was speaking French. He said he was “using the French tongue”. Of course you are tone deaf to nuance. (But seriously Aaron, I have to say, if the girl looked anything like her brother, you should be grateful you don’t remember!)
- You claim that complex human behavior cannot be extrapolated from simplistic animal models. Let me assure you that our models are quite sophisticated and have explained nearly every aspect of addictive behavior with remarkable accuracy including the ‘blackout’ phenomenon and the ‘crack whore’ dynamic, both of which you obstinately insist to be ‘mythical’. The only thing left is the human-to-mouse tear duct transplant, which ran into technical problems last year, but once completed is expected to fully vindicate the theory! (I smell Nobel!!)
- You claim that Thomas McLellan, Addictions Psychiatrist and past Deputy Director of the Office of National Drug Control Policy, is the Devil Incarnate. That’s ridiculous! Just because he is a prized Higher Power in AA doesn’t make him evil. Otherwise, Oprah and Richard Simmons would be evil too! Plus he’s Nora’s bff!!
Your arguments are mendacious, twisted and illogical, and your “articles” sound like drunken, angry rants. I have instructed the employees of this organization not to look at your web site or to respond to your questions or any similar questions under the “Leaks” provision of their Contract of Employment (Section 15.3).
You are a public menace, and I fear for the still-suffering alcoholic who visits your web site. Did you even stop to consider the havoc that would ensue if they mistakenly believed they were responsible for their own drunken behavior?? It would be worse than World War Z!! (OK not the best movie but you know what I mean.)
You are obviously sad, lonely, and bitter and you blame the world for your problems. I really feel sorry for you. And for good reason: based on our analysis of your internet activity, you have one of the lowest social indices we’ve ever seen. Your score is lower than my grandmother’s! And she’s been dead 12 years! If I didn’t know better, I’d think you were alcoholic!!
I pray to the god of my understanding to remove your character defects. Seriously, get help.
Warm regards,
George Koob, Ph.D.
george.koob@nih.gov
Director, NIAAA, a Division of NIH – “Pathologizing bottled fun since 1968”
GFK/ndv
First off he who started this post is out to piss people off and he is doing just that do not give him his 20 minutes of fame encourage him to seek the truth. Some people can quit on their own but if they die from it then they could not do it on their own, AA is there for those who need the help. I have never tryed nor talked someone in take their life nor to believe tbat they have a disease I have actually talked someone out of taking their life. Stop posting lies and look into the truth by educating one self.
@ Sean
Your running sobriety tally down to the day, tells me you’re still in some question that your decision is going to hold. If it was truly a quality and definite decision why would it be needful to focus and obsess on it. Either it’s in the past or it’s not. I think that’s one of the biggest cons about AA, that you must be in bondage to the past. In your lingo, I was as ” addicted” to cigarettes as can be, yet I made a quality decision, and quit by myself without aid, and now I can stop and really think back in order to tell you the month and year, but I can’t tell you the day, and don’t care, because it’s in the past, and because it was a quality decision, it’s going to stay in the past. I am not tempted, I can be around smokers, and I am not in bondage to the past. I don’t have to think about it, it’s never part of my thoughts, it simply isn’t part of my life at all. The power of decision is a powerful one. To obsess over it and focus on it, just brings it to your awareness of fear. It’s the ” pink elephant in the room” that you’re not supposed to touch, but meanwhile everybody in the room keeps talking and talking about it, building up the fear quotient and CREATING a needless ” temptation” that never has to exist. They constantly STIMULATE MENTAL HABIT OF OBSESSION, SO HOW CAN YOU JUST WALK AWAY AND LIVE A NEW LIFE IF YOU’RE GOING TO KEEP FOCUSING ON IT ALL THE TIME???? Not going to happen. You get what you focus on. If you obsess in fear, then your fear WILL be fulfilled. You guys need to learn how to make definite quality decisions,, and leave stuff in the past. Then you can walk away and live free. Don’t you want that?? Don’t you understand the power of TAUGHT FEAR?? It’s the little cord around the leg of the powerful animal that could break it just by walking away. You really don’t have to be in bondage- to fear, to anything. Your biggest enemy is the spirit of fear that is wielded against you all the time. If you are going to be victorious, you can’t surround yourself with a bunch of naysayers and still be free!! Who does that?? Nobody that’s serious about their decision.
I’ve started to see young people say things like, “I’m not going to drink until my birthday next month.” Wow, it’s like they’ve already started practicing being an alcoholic!
I agree it’s weird that Sean knows the number of days. But I would say first of all, Sean have a drink. It won’t kill you. If you believe it will then you have drunk the mental coolaid and you are a danger to yourself. Secondly, it’s not a matter of willpower. All the willpower in the world can’t help in some situations. But on the other hand it’s easy to figure out the problem. Say Sean drinks because he’s feeling lonely or depressed or sexually frustrated. Well the mere recognition of WHY he wants to drink will immediately reduce the cravings. It’s when you LIE and say “I don’t know why I want to drink I just do” then you have a battle against your willpower that may not end well. That is called the “Craving Lie” and that is AA’s great innovation and key to its success. But there is ALWAYS a simple psychological reason for one’s inability to resist the cravings to drink that is clear if you are honest with yourself.
Unfortunately people like Sean then go to AA and discover they can exploit the newcomers there. And of course they defend AA with a religious zeal. While this reduces the cravings for alcohol, it’s not a good solution. Of course he claims to be helping people but given his self-delusion about his drinking (which he probably admits to) I wouldn’t trust what he says.
AA is masonic. The levels of membership are based on the number of years you have sober. It is after psychically draining and brainwashing as many “newcomers” as possible. That is what keeps ” old-timers” sober. If you have a strong enough intuitive side, you will see AA for what it truly is. A cult of vampire entities that will drain you for their own benefit.
Bull shit. I’m 8 months sober with AA help. Drunk for over 50 years.
Thank God I do not think like this guy or I would be dead. Alcoholics anonymous has saved my life and totally changed me as a person who in the past was thought of by others to be some mentally ill nut case who drank too much. I also have something now that I have never had in my life, that is true friends that care about me.
OK so AA is a social club in which you convince each other you have a disease that makes you drink and get drunk and sometimes kill yourself ‘accidentally’ out of loneliness, or at least convince other people to kill themselves or let you exploit them in the mistaken belief that they have a deadly disease for which only you have the cure. And it helped you find god, which could very well be satan, but it doesn’t matter because it makes you sound sincere. Well sorry, but that doesn’t make it a real disease. It just shows how AA (religion) and NIAAA (gov’t) work together to plunder and massacre. Not to mention, allowed you to waste years drinking and fighting under cover of a ‘disease’.
You have No idea what you’re talking about . Kindly keep your opinions to yourself. You’re causing serious damage.
Sober for 12 years
Kindly post your drunkalog, which will demonstrate my points one after another. Of course, you won’t. So allow me to improvise based on everything I’ve ever heard at every meeting I’ve ever been to: “I drank, I got drunk, I got high, I had sex, I came home and beat my wife. And yet I wasn’t satisfied.” Rinse/repeat until middle age (dropping into AA periodically to reaffirm that you’re ‘not ready’) and then one day when even the cows won’t sleep with you, you ‘rediscover’ AA and ‘realize’ that it’s not just a bunch of losers and all you wanted all along was ‘peace and serenity’ anyway, as if you had so many other options. And now you try to brainwash vulnerable young newcomers into powerlessness so you can have your way with them, or if not then at least get them to kill themselves to prove they really belong to your psycho club. And of course now you drink normally, and if anyone sees you, just call it a ‘relapse’ of your ‘disease’ (thanks NIAAA).
Well I have news for you. The only girls at the meetings who will even talk to you are recovery house shills and they are just leading you on. Sorry to break it to you.
‘Causing serious damage’ is my goal. Thanks for the encouragement. 🙂
You know nothing about aa
I know it’s gonna crumble under the weight of its own lies.
you are a dangerously sick sob.
Correct. Trusted friends.
Alcoholic anonymous has saved my life,and the GOD of my understanding is doing things in my life that I thought was impossible,and aa is not a cult,get a life whoever says it is.
Wait… what?? Who exactly is this GOD??
AA *is* a cult. Just another form of substitution. I tried AA, and all it made me want to do was go get a drink. The madness didn’t stop until I made up my own mind that I had to take control. Guess where that *didn’t* happen? If it’s bad enough and there’s reason enough, people can and do quit completely on their own. But what would I know, I only did it. Not everyone reaches the realization in time, I’ve had quite a few friends quit drinking, right after they quit breathing, too.
I can have sex by myself too but I enjoy it much more when I share it with another person.
Thank you for demonstrating a common brainwashing technique, but better to save it for the meetings.
Too bad they didn’t go to AA. Maybe they’d be alive today.
I’m a sober member of A.A. it has saved my life in so many ways, I count my blessing. I was a drunk and a stonner in to trouble brought on by drinking and drugging and of self! A.A. is not a cult and I urge anyone who has a drinking problem to read the 164 pages of the “Big Book” of Alcoholics Anonymous, and decide for yourself.
Michael W. Sobriety date 12/29/2011
OMG, I don’t agree!! That means I must be part of the vast conspiracy against DickMyth…
“Please save us, oh Great DickMyth from the Vast Zionist Media Conspiracy on Addiction.”
DickMyth: “Here I come, to save the day!” (Sung to Mighty Mouse theme)
Men with butterfly nets: “Once we get him down, get the Rhino dart in his left buttcheek fast!!”
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You really should leave your Savior Complex at home…or stay on your meds…or both…
We’ll pray for your swift recovery from whatever the heck your actual problem is…
Yes, aDickMyth, you are nuttier than a Christmas fruitcake!!
Look up lunatic in the dictionary whenever you want to see a nice picture of yourself.
Definitely a couple beers short of a six-pack.