How Getting Sober Firmly Solidified My Atheism (Part 2)
A continuation of my unapologetic criticism of Alcoholics Anonymous, and the blind stupidity that comes with it; all fueled by a broken health care system, in which the most accessible program for drug and alcohol recovery is (and always has been) contaminated by organized religion
Rehab Facilities Don’t Give A Fuck About You
Rehab is expensive. And I would have to imagine that the state of rehabilitation centers, and options for recovery in the country has improved at least to some degree, compared to 2014, which was the one and only time that I endured it.
As someone who spent years, and years as a heavy alcohol abuser; and as someone who has actually lived 30 days inside a private, in-patient rehab facility where you couldn’t comfortably express your personal views unless they were nearly aligned with the views, and or agenda (The 12 Steps) of the staff at the rehab facility — it’s just something that, to this very day, annoys the piss out of me.
Because no single person is the exact same, and we are all led down a different path, when we ultimately wind up sharing our dumb, little sob stories together at the same rehab facility.
It doesn’t take very long to pick up on what the point of rehab actually is.
The point of a private rehab facility is not to keep you sober for a longer period of time than it takes for you to relapse, but — so that you can pay the full price of admission all over again, and at the same fucking rehab facility.
And you can only blame someone so much who’s probably been duped into paying for a 30-day in-patient rehab more than once because — it’s all they’ve got. They don’t believe that other options exist.
For-profit rehab facilities are a business, just like any other business, and their top priority is to make money off of anyone that they can. In this case: the weak, the desperate, and their families.
…And YOU getting sober??? That’s your prerogative. If you can’t afford the $12k per month — or much, much more — that it costs to remain a resident at one, you can go fuck yourself. What, you think the very best of these facilities are funded, and covered by the state, or by the federal government?
Grow the fuck up.
Many of these “rehabs” are privately-owned businesses. These “facilities” that are presented as safe havens for you to get help at (if you have the money), while at the same time, operated as a way to exploit what is arguably your greatest weakness (also, if you have the money), and all during a time in life when you, or someone that you care about, is at their most vulnerable.
And besides, U.S. taxpayers generally have no compassion when it comes to addiction, and substance abuse. They don’t want to fund your rehabilitation, and they sure as fuck don’t want to fund your housing while you’re recovering — unless you’re promptly incarcerated for your addiction, or substance abuse problem. That, they might be open to.
It’s easy for rehab facilities to achieve their goal, especially when they’re bringing in the religious nonsense to the forefront of the recovery.
And I get why it was a socially acceptable form of brainwashing during the 20th century, but we live in the year 2024 now; so — why in the actual fuck is this still a thing?
You’ll Never Hear Me Credit Santa Claus For My Sobriety… So Why The Fuck Would I Give God Any Credit?
Crediting God for something that you obviously earned on your own will always be a mystery to me. The older I get, the more insane that it sounds.
It’s counterproductive; and it fools decent people into giving someone, or something else credit for a hard-earned achievement that had ultimately been accomplished by that one person.
Of course, other real life individuals that are close to you, are allowed to receive credit as well, if they played a direct role in your recovery… but, seriously. To instead, thank god—over a doctor, or physician that saved your life… or to thank god — over that one friend of yours that was willing to suffer through all of your boring, drunken stories; your countless fallings up, and fallings down the staircase of some miscellaneous acquaintance’s party—to where they then have to pick your ass up, and help walk you to the passenger seat of the car before the miscellaneous acquaintance/host of the party tells you that you need to leave; that one compassionate, emotional support friend of yours — doesn’t even get an honorable mention during your monotonous ramblings of how it was “because of god” that you found the strength to recover…?
Oh, please. Then you deserve to relapse.
It’s like, “Oh, you had to aggressively trick yourself into believing that an unproven deity is to credit just so that you could stop getting so fucked up everyday???”
Congratulations. Hey, to each their own. Whatever works, as long as it’s not hurting anyone else…
…Oh, but now, you want to spread that message of how you’re so weak and powerless to other people who don’t know any better, whether they have a substance abuse problem, or not.
The way you see it is: Hey, it helped me (or at least so you think it has), so that means it can help others.
Isn’t that great?
What a sad, sad waste of good intentions.
But you can do a whole lot worse…
Thank You, Atheism?
I know atheists get a bunch of shit for… no sensible reason, obviously. I guess it’s because we’re not being held captive psychologically by an old-timey, sophisticated version of the Easter Bunny.
That’s something to envy, I suppose. Especially, if someone else in your household is always dragging your ass to worship every Sunday.
I could see that. So in that case, I offer my sympathies.
I mean, just imagine being an adult, and forcing yourself to wake up every Sunday morning; going to worship just because that’s how you were raised — only to find out that when you die, there’s nothing. And then here’s the twist… there was no god all along; just your conscience.
I’d be mad as hell at atheists, and gay people, and anybody that knows how to have real fun too if I were at the end of my life, only to find out that it’s the only life I had, and I never really lived it the way I wanted to because I was convinced by my hypocrite elders that I was supposed to live by some old, outdated fantasy book that reads like B-Level Shakespeare. What a bummer.
I don’t directly thank atheism everyday as if it were some dominant father figure watching my every move, every single day — because I’m not a complete fucking weirdo.
But since it’s relevant to the topic, I thank atheism for showing me the light, I guess? Because why not.
I thank atheism for allowing me to be my own person, that makes their own choices, and is guided by their own conscience, to make the right decisions in life, and to be kind to others without the fear of having to answer to some bitter creator that’s going to punish me simply because I didn’t give in to their divine planning that can all be found on planet earth through their relentless dispensary of cryptic bullshit — that I was apparently supposed to cower to — and all so that I can be properly validated, and salvaged for some vague afterlife that doesn’t even exist.
I thank atheism for allowing me to coexist with everyone in my life who loves to drink — whether they have an obvious problem, or no problem at all — and for allowing me to respect those who don’t even plan on quitting anytime soon, if at all, in their lifetime.
I thank atheism for allowing me to quit drinking on my own, as my own decision; instead of suggesting I use magical thinking as a way of guilting me into believing that drinking is morally, and ethically, wrong.
I thank atheism for not belittling me into believing that only with the power of some asshole watching over me until the day I drop the fuck dead — because I’m too scared to accept that I am not immortal, and that I will no longer be here one day, and that I can’t achieve anything of prominence on my own, nor can I achieve such prominence from the direct assistance of another caring human being in my life, and that I’m such a dumb shit, that I must be guided by some unknowing force that is most certainly looking out for my own best interests…? Okay, sure.
…I also thank atheism for allowing me the common sense to refrain from praying in public, and in general, as if praying were less — a random act of superstition… and more of a weird tick, or nuisance, that’s much more aligned with the inconvenient symptoms of OCD.
And so in an unpredictable turn of events, I thank Alcoholics Anonymous… for indirectly throwing me into the correct direction toward sobriety; helping me to draw the conclusion faster than I probably ever would have otherwise; that I am at heart, an atheist. I’m serious. That is genuinely something that I thank them for.
So now that I’m through tenderizing the bloody spirit of one of my all-time favorite American punching bags, AA, I would like to clarify something that warrants sincerity, and with nearly all jokes aside…
Getting sober is so hard. Believe me. I know.
And some people simply cannot do it on their own. And that’s okay.
But you have to remain an optimist. You have to believe in yourself. Don’t start saying that you believe in god just to try and get sober — that’s magical thinking for people who don’t want to handle the situation like adults. They want a make-believe unicorn to guide them, and a lazy boogeyman that yawns whenever it tries to scare them.
Again, there is no one way to fix a single problem about ourselves, when we are all wired so very differently from everyone else with the same problem.
I’m sure that there are plenty of people who would take it to their second hand dog houses, conveniently provided by the imagined compassion of their make believe higher power (not to mention their literal graves), and I can’t argue with them. If they say it works, let ‘em think it works. Sure. That’s fine. All that matters, is that they found a way.
If being in a cult keeps them from temporarily getting drunk, climbing into their F-150, and running down some sad bastard riding their Dynacraft in the bike lane at 3am — more power to them.
And I think that there is absolutely a silver lining to having a long-term, ongoing program like Alcoholics Anonymous in the mix, when it comes to rehabilitation programs that are there to help you figure out how to reprogram yourself away from addiction and substance abuse… and that silver lining is — to help give a struggling substance abuser a much clearer perspective on exactly what DOES NOT work, and how shockingly outdated, counterproductive, and downright fucking useless that type of program truly is.
For the average person — who does not need god, who does not need a spiritual answer, and who doesn’t even need those awesomely shitty little AA medallions — that wind up at the bottom of some pond after a poor duck just got finished choking to death on it — to achieve a healthy sobriety for the remainder of their lives.
Now, to try something that works…
