Disclaimer: Recovery Farmhouse is not any sect of Alcoholics Anonymous. RFH is providing information to anyone interested in recovery addiction step work and 12 step programs. This article is for informational purposes only and means to incite no accusations against AA or its non addict paid servant board of directors and officers.
How did Bill Wilson preserve the power of the top of the Triangle of AA meaning the group’s members authority?
click here to read BILL WILSON’S ANSWER (OR click “continue reading” below if you’re on the homepage.)
Clearly the largest part of AA’s income comes from literature sales therefore my next article will be on how group members have or have not any power whatsoever related to those millions of dollars or any say at all in what that money is used for. Clearly the Big Book proceeds go to the family of Lois Wilson as she instructed in her will. She did leave much of her estate to the Stepping Stones foundation. The Foundation, created by Lois Wilson in 1979, maintains the home, its contents … “If the fellowship is an extension of my family then Stepping Stones is home.”
Alcoholics Anonymous Financials 2016 at the link:
Can AA groups fire General Service office? Can AA groups fire the General Service Board’s committees and highest (or lowest) level of Treasurer?
Yes, to the best of my knowledge, if all, several, or many AA homegroups at members level wanted to defund the hierarchy of AA we could both legally and effectively fire New York’s GSO if they became ineffective or somehow irresponsible in our definition.
But can members vote out that line of hierarchy service at group level from profiteering massive funds from AA approved literature? This is another matter for the next article. But at group level as far as our contributions “yes” we can defund GSO, and GSB. As per Bill W in Language of the heart where he compiled his Grapevine and other articles.
Clearly AA itself is the members not the non alcoholic hired lawyers and bureaucrats who actually run the show in New York.
How are AA grassroots groups “at the top of the pyramid” when General Service Board of directors consisting of 8-16 rotating non alcoholic lawyers and professionals seem to be running the show in New York? Non addict beurocrats who often enjoy anonymity using last initials instead of a full legal name on various AA documents, Grapevine articles and official GSB reports. Why? Including our hired Treasurer Terrance B., Chair of the General Service Board, a lawyer, x military officer, and previously medical administrator, risk manager in the medical profession, who later became AA’s General Service Board (GSB) Treasurer presently and since 2008 https://aa-nia.org/wp-content/pdf/del_page/GSBReport-en.pdf.
For accountability sake these non alcoholic lawyers and board members should in my watch dog opinion be using their last names so we can follow their public image and behaviors.
If it be true we at the top of the pyramid pay these lawyers salary as they guard AA’s financial health. Should we not keep an eye on our own servant employees?
One thing clear GSO does not need our group funds whatsoever.
https://www.recoveryfarmhouse.net/alcoholics-financials-2016/
These service boards and offices like GSB, GSO, World Service, services who we members hire to run the business end of AA are supposed to be the bottom of the pyramid according to AA business principles.
So hypothetically, keeping human nature in mind, how would we, the grassroots members of AA at group level stop such powerful and law savvy bureaucrats from ruling in a way we may not agree with? How do we as members and as a homegroup by our election decision making process, employ or fire these GSB bureaucrats?
Bill Wilson was very clear on the topic of who the hand and the boss of AA is. And he and the founding AA members went to great lengths to protect AA from corruption by elite organizational entrenchment. But what about all that literature money? That will be addressed in my next article.
Bill W. wrote this in Language of the Heart page 25-26 Chapter
“Safe Use of Money” (Parenthesis are my comments)
“To begin with, it seems most certain that we need never be overwhelmed by our clubs, local offices, or the general headquarters at New York City. These are places of SERVICE; they cannot really control or govern AA.
If any of them were to become inefficient or overbearing the remedy is simple enough. The average AA would stop his financial support until conditions were changed. As our AA membership does not depend on fees or dues, we can always take our special facilities or leave them alone. (in other words take or leave any service offices we of AA employ) THESE SERVICES MUST ALWAYS SERVE US WELL OR GO OUT OF BUSINESS.
(Bill continued) Because no one is compelled (required) to support them they can NEVER dictate. Nor can they stray from the main body Tradition for very long.” Bill W. Language of the Heart page 25-26 Chapter
If you have been in the business end of AA at group level you will know we make all our own decisions on how much money we give to which service organizations who require our support. However the Grapevine and Literature incomes a greater portion of the monies that AA brings in. This finance will be addressed in the next article, “AA’s Servant Elite”.