The oldtimers have fled NA because of the courtslips. I have 26 years and none of my friends that I got clean with go citing the lack of anonimity. But I didn't leave. I drive an hour each way to a meeting where no one knows me just to keep my anonimity. The courtslips really have made it harder for me to stay clean but NA really is not impressed with oldtimers any more so they don't care if I'm there or not. I usually don't mention my clean time. It just makes things easier ( no attitude toward me).
I've watched the passing parade for years and still watch it. True, I see courtslippers get clean but the problem is they have killed the host. How would you like to have 5 or 10 years and realize all the oldtimers had been run out by the chaos of courtslippers. I would be pissed. I had to have lots of people with lots of cleantime to teach me how to go double digit. Now you have to figure it on your own. A real blow for those who really value their recovery and worked hard for it. But the codependents rule. NA's days are numbered. The latest thing is shutting the meetings down early. You drive an hour to a meeting full of courtslippers and it only lasts half an hour.
By pushing drug court affiliation, NAWS has lost it's most valuable asset, oldtimers. It would be like a university losing all it's professors or a football team losing all of it's experienced players. This is a disaster of biblical proportions.
It's true that the newcommer is the most important person, but the last part of that sentence is "because we can only keep what we have by giving it away".
It's kind of like the US sending all it's jobs overseas and now we wake up and realize we are screwed with ten percent employment.
NAWS will someday wake up and realize that the charge "There is no clean time in NA " could have easily been prevented just by being civil to it's oldtimers.
The last time I was asked to speak was in 1999. My friend with 25 who still attends meetings never gets asked to speak. We are an embarrassment to NAWS because we will not be railroaded.
We oldtimers are their worst nightmare. We can't be bought off by a junket overseas and we say " The Emperor has no clothes on".
It's going to be interesting watching NAWS deal with lack of funds. They killed the money tree and now have pissed off courtslippers who will not give money to the basket.