Originally Posted by
soberlicious 
Hi all,
I have been thinking about this exchange I had with another member about "newcomers". There seems to be a concern about what people who decide they want to quit drinking and go online looking for information might read/see/be exposed to.
This misses the bigger picture for me which is what are newcomers going to think when they come to this site looking for help and instead of a sharing of personal experience they see personal attacks and disparagements of other methods.
This notion that one must absolutely "share" very personal information about oneself in order to help another with an addiction is simply a holdover from the idea of "sharing" for witnessing, which comes from the Oxford Group.
I don't need my surgeon to witness in order to help me heal from an injury, and I don't need to witness in order to help another with an addiction. I may indeed often share parts of my experience, but it is not strictly necessary.
Originally Posted by
soberlicious With an eye on permanent abstinence based recovery, do you think that how we view the addicted population matters?
Yes, absolutely, because society largely believes that independent recovery from addiction via planned, permanent abstinence is simply impossible. Some very nice points here, soberlicious.
While AVRT is one such avenue to independent recovery, and the main subject of this newly created forum, I don't believe that Rational Recovery would object to information on independent recovery, regardless of, and independent of, RR and AVRT.
Part of the mission of Rational Recovery is to make self-recovery a viable option to all addicted people everywhere. My own personal thoughts on RR or AVRT notwithstanding, this sub-forum was obviously many years in the making, as were RR and AVRT.
Kudos to those who had the requisite foresight and fortitude to make it possible.