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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsPete Hegseth Calls For Steep Cuts To Number Of Steps In AA Recovery (satire)

Published: March 31, 2025
WASHINGTON—Lambasting the current program as wasteful, bloated, and entirely unnecessary, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth called for steep cuts Monday to the number of steps in the Alcoholics Anonymous recovery model. “We must cut through the red tape bogging down what could be a far more efficient AA,” said Hegseth, who slammed the 12-step program as an undue burden on alcoholics, not only in the Defense Department, but across all levels of federal government.
“We’re going to start by slashing the parts about admitting you have a problem and making amends to everyone you’ve supposedly ‘hurt.’ Ideally, we’ll cut it down to one step—praying or whatever it is. That’s a 92% savings in steps. Eventually, we hope to get rid of the program entirely.” Hegseth added that the time saved by the reduction in steps would also allow Americans to get to happy hour far more quickly.
https://theonion.com/pete-hegseth-calls-for-steep-cuts-to-number-of-steps-in-aa-recovery/

Simeon Salus
(1,443 posts)Hate the sin but love the sinner. That's what some will say.
That's a bit different than
Don't hate the game, hate the playa.
This is true antichrist sh#t.
Silent Type
(8,837 posts)“That program is about 10-steps too long” for him. Tried not to laugh, but I suggested he should go.
progressoid
(51,185 posts)LetMyPeopleVote
(160,855 posts)Norrrm
(1,016 posts)
Ishoutandscream2
(6,753 posts)But drinking.
jmowreader
(52,054 posts)These are the Twelve Steps, taken directly from AA's website:
1. We admitted we were powerless over alcohol — that our lives had become unmanageable.
2. Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.
3. Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him.
4. Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.
5. Admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.
6. Were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character.
7. Humbly asked Him to remove our shortcomings.
8. Made a list of all persons we had harmed, and became willing to make amends to them all.
9. Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others.
10. Continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong promptly admitted it.
11. Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God as we understood Him, praying only for knowledge of His will for us and the power to carry that out.
12. Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these Steps, we tried to carry this message to alcoholics, and to practice these principles in all our affairs.
Please note that one huge one is missing:
3a. WE STOPPED DRINKING ALCOHOL.
Technically you could say the Seventh Step covers this, but what happens if God decides to have you keep drinking because you're even more of a mess when you're sober?
progree
(11,762 posts)https://www.aa.org/sites/default/files/2022-01/en_tradition3.pdf
Long Form of Tradition 3: "Our membership ought to include all who suffer from
alcoholism. Hence we may refuse none who wish to recover. Nor ought A.A.
membership ever depend upon money or conformity. Any two or three alcoholics
gathered together for sobriety may call themselves an A.A. group, provided that,
as a group, they have no other affiliation."
This Tradition is packed with meaning. For A.A. is really saying to every
serious drinker, "You are an A.A. member if you say so. You can declare
yourself in; nobody can keep you out. No matter who you are, no matter how low
you've gone, no matter how grave your emotional complications - even your
crimes - we still can't deny you A.A. We don't want to keep you out. We
aren't a bit afraid you'll harm us, never mind how twisted or violent you may
be. We just want to be sure that you get the same great chance for sobriety
that we've had. So you're an A.A. member the minute you declare yourself."
To establish this principle of membership took years of harrowing experience. . . .
Note to myself: 12by12.txt
Chemical Bill
(2,726 posts)But I have never seen anyone two-step themselves to death.
malaise
(282,426 posts)😂😂