"Alcoholics Anonymous should
remain forever nonprofessional, but our service centers may employ special
workers."
ALCOHOLICS ANONYMOUS will
never have a professional class. We have gained some understanding of the
ancient words "Freely ye have received, freely give." We have discovered
that at the point of professionalism, money and spirituality do not mis. Almost
no recovery from alcoholism has ever been brought about by the world's best
professionals, whether medical or religious. We do not decry professionalism in
other fields, but we accept the sober fact that it does not work for us. Every
time we have tried to professionalize our Twelfth Step, the result has been
exactly the same: Our single purpose has been defeated.
Alcoholics simply will
not listen to a pain twelfth-stepper. Almost from the beginning, we have been
positive that face-to-face work with the alcoholic who suffers could be based
only on the desire to help and be helped. When an A.A. talks for money, whether
at a meeting or to a single newcomer, it can have a very bad effect on him,
too. The money motive compromises him and everything he says and does for his
prospect. This has always been so obvious that only a very few A.A.'s have ever
worked the Twelfth Step for a fee.
Despite this certainty,
it is nevertheless true that few subjects have been the cause of more
contention within our Fellowship than professionalism. Caretakers who swept
floors, cooks who fried hamburgers, secretaries in offices, authors writing
books--all these we have seen hotly assailed because they were, as their
critics angrily remarked, "making money out of A.A." Ignoring the
fact that these labors were not Twelfth Step jobs at all, the critics attacked
as A.A. professionals these workers of ours who were often doing thankless
tasks that no one else could or would do. Even greater furors were provoked
when A.A. members began to run rest homes and farms for alcoholics, when some
hired out to corporations as personnel men in charge of the alcoholic wards,
when others entered the field of alcohol education. In all these instances, and
more, it was claimed that A.A. knowledge and experience were being sold for
money, hence these people, too, were professionals.
At last, however, a plain
line of cleavage could be seen between professionalism and non-professionalism.
When we had agreed that the Twelfth Step couldn't be sold for money, we had
been wise. But when we had declared that our Fellowship couldn't hire service
workers nor could any A.A. member carry our knowledge into other fields, we were
taking the counsel of fear, fear which today has been largely dispelled in the
light of experience.
Take the case of the club
janitor and cook. If a club is going to function, it has to be habitable and
hospitable. We tried volunteers, who were quickly disenchanted with sweeping
floors and brewing coffee seven days a week. They just didn't show up. Even
more important, an empty club couldn't answer its telephone, but it was an open
invitation to a drunk on a binge who possessed a spare key. So somebody had to
look after the place full time. If we hired an alcoholic, he'd receive only
what we'd have to pay a nonalcoholic for the same job. The job was not to do
Twelfth Step work; it was to make Twelfth Step work possible. It was a service
proposition, pure and simple.
Neither could A.A. itself
function without full-time workers. At the Foundation* and Intergroup offices,
we couldn't employ nonalcoholic's as secretaries; we had to have people who
knew the A.A. pitch. But the minute we hired them, the ultraconservative and
fearful ones shrilled, "Professionalism!" At one period, the status
of these faithful servants was almost unbearable. They weren't asked to speak
at A.A. meetings because they were `making money out of A.A." At times,
they were actually shunned by fellow members. Even the charitably disposed
described them as "a necessary evil." Committees took full advantage
of this attitude to depress their salaries. They could regain some measure of
virtue, it was thought, if they worked for A.A. real cheap. These notions
persisted for years. Then we saw that if a hard working secretary answered the
phone dozens of times a day, listened to twenty wailing wives, arranged
hospitalization and got sponsorship for ten newcomers, and was gently
diplomatic with the irate drunk who complained about the job she was doing and
how she was overpaid, then such a person could surely not be called a
professional A.A. She was not professionalizing the Twelfth Step; she was just
making it possible. She was helping to give the man coming in the door the
break he ought to have. Volunteer committeemen and assistants could be of great
help, but they could not be expected to carry this load day in and day out.
At the Foundation, the
same story repeats itself. Eight tons of books and literature per month do not
package and channel themselves all over the world. Sacks of letters on every
conceivable A.A. problem ranging from a lonely-heart Eskimo to the growing
pains of thousands of groups must be answered by people who know. Right contacts
with the world outside have to be maintained. A.A.'s lifelines have to be
tended. So we hire A.A. staff members. We pay them well, and they earn what
they get. They are professional secretaries, * but they certainly are not
professional A.A.'s.
Perhaps the fear will
always lurk in every A.A. heart that one day our name will be exploited by
somebody for real cash. Even the suggestion of such a thing never fails to whip
up a hurricane, and we have discovered that hurricanes have a way of mauling with
equal severity both the just and the unjust. They are always unreasonable.
No individuals have been
more buffeted by such emotional gusts than those A.A.'s bold enough to accept
employment with outside agencies dealing with the alcohol problem. A university
wanted an A.A. member to educate the public on alcoholism. A corporation wanted
a personnel man familiar with the subject. A state drunk farm wanted a manager
who could really handle inebriates. A city wanted an experienced social worker
who understood what alcohol could do to a family. A state alcohol commission
wanted a paid researcher. These are only a few of the jobs which A.A. members
as individuals have been asked to fill. Now and then, A.A. members have bought
farms or rest homes where badly beat-up topers could find needed care. The
question was--and sometimes still is--are such activities to be branded as
professionalism under A.A. tradition?
We think the answer is
"No. Members who select such full-time careers do not professionalize
A.A.'s Twelfth Step." The road to this conclusion was long and rocky. At
first, we couldn't see the real issue involved. In former days, the moment an
A.A. hired out to such enterprises, he was immediately tempted to use the name
Alcoholics Anonymous for publicity or money-raising purposes. Drunk farms,
educational ventures, state legislatures, and commissions advertised the fact
that A.A. members served them. Unthinkingly, A.A.'s so employed recklessly
broke anonymity to thump the tub for their pet enterprise. For this reason,
some very good causes and all connected with them suffered unjust criticism
from A.A. groups. More often than not, these onslaughts were spearheaded by the
cry "Professionalism! That guy is making money out of A.A.'s Twelfth Step
work. The violation in these instances was not professionalism at all; it was
breaking anonymity. A.A.'s sole purpose was being compromised, and the name of
Alcoholics Anonymous was being misused.
It is significant, now
that almost no A.A. in our Fellowship breaks anonymity at the public level,
that nearly all these fears have subsided. We see that we have no right or need
to discourage A.A.'s who wish to work as individuals in these wider fields. It
would be actually antisocial were we to forbid them. We cannot declare A.A.
such a closed corporation that we keep our knowledge and experience top secret.
If an A.A. member acting as a citizen can become a better researcher, educator,
personnel officer, then why not? Everybody gains, and we have lost nothing.
True, some of the projects to which A.A.'s have attached themselves have been
ill-conceived, but that makes not the slightest difference with the principle
involved.
This is the exciting
welter of events which has finally cast up A.A.'s Tradition of non-professionalism.
Our Twelfth Step is never to be paid for, but those who labor in service for us
are worthy of their hire.
*The work of the
present-day staff members has no counterpart among the job categories of
commercial organizations. These A.A.'s bring a wide range of business and
professional experience to their service at G.S.O.