# Does the Big Book say to avoid bars and drinkers?

**In short:**
- No. It says nearly the opposite: "our rule is not to avoid a place where there is drinking, if we have a legitimate reason for being there" (p. 101). That includes bars, nightclubs, weddings and parties (p. 101).
- It attaches two conditions: that you're spiritually fit (p. 100), and that your reason for going is a good one, not "to steal a little vicarious pleasure" (pp. 101–102).
- If you're shaky, don't go: "you had better work with another alcoholic instead!" (p. 102).
- It says shielding an alcoholic from temptation doesn't work (p. 101), and it warns against withdrawing from friends who drink (p. 102).

## What Chapter 7 says (pp. 100–103)

The passage comes at the end of "Working With Others." Read in order:

1. **The qualifier first.** "Assuming we are spiritually fit, we can do all sorts of things alcoholics are not supposed to do" (p. 100).
2. **The usual advice, listed and rejected.** People had said we must not go where liquor is served, must shun friends who drink, must avoid films with drinking scenes, must not go into bars (pp. 100–101). "Our experience shows that this is not necessarily so" (p. 101). An alcoholic who can't meet these conditions "still has an alcoholic mind" (p. 101), and the book jokes that even the Greenland Ice Cap wouldn't be safe (p. 101).
3. **Why shielding fails.** "In our belief any scheme of combating alcoholism which proposes to shield the sick man from temptation is doomed to failure" (p. 101). A man who shields himself may manage for a while, but "usually winds up with a bigger explosion than ever" (p. 101).
4. **The rule, with its condition.** Don't avoid a place where there is drinking "if we have a legitimate reason for being there" (p. 101). Ask yourself each time whether you have "any good social, business, or personal reason for going," or are hoping for vicarious pleasure (pp. 101–102).
5. **The motive.** "Be sure you are on solid spiritual ground before you start and that your motive in going is thoroughly good" (p. 102). "Do not think of what you will get out of the occasion. Think of what you can bring to it" (p. 102).
6. **If you're shaky.** "But if you are shaky, you had better work with another alcoholic instead!" (p. 102).
7. **Friends who drink.** Go along with a friend who wants to eat in a bar, and don't ask your friends to change their habits for you (p. 102). "Don't start to withdraw again just because your friends drink liquor" (p. 102).
8. **The purpose behind all of it.** "Your job now is to be at the place where you may be of maximum helpfulness to others" (p. 102).
9. **Liquor at home, and attitude.** Some members keep liquor at home, some don't; each family decides (pp. 102–103). "We are careful never to show intolerance or hatred of drinking as an institution" (p. 103).

## The same teaching elsewhere

Chapter 8, written to wives: "We never, never try to arrange a man's life so as to shield him from temptation" (p. 120). "Make him feel absolutely free to come and go as he likes" (p. 120).

Chapter 11 shows what "if you are shaky" looks like. A man sober a few months, alone in a hotel with a lively bar down the lobby, felt the old pull toward "that first drink" (p. 154). He turned away from the bar, went to a church directory and phoned a clergyman to find an alcoholic to help (pp. 154–155). That call led him to Dr. Bob (p. 155 footnote). He didn't test himself in the bar. He went to find a drunk.

## What the text doesn't say

It doesn't say a newcomer should start going to bars, or that anyone should go somewhere drinking is happening without a reason. Every permission in the passage rests on being spiritually fit and having a good reason, and the advice for anyone unsure is to work with another alcoholic instead (p. 102).

## Read it yourself
- Chapter 7, "Working With Others" (pp. 89–103), free from A.A.: https://www.aa.org/sites/default/files/2021-11/en_bigbook_chapt7.pdf
- Chapter 8, "To Wives" (pp. 104–121): https://www.aa.org/sites/default/files/2021-11/en_bigbook_chapt8.pdf
- Chapter 11, *A Vision for You* (pp. 151–164): https://www.aa.org/sites/default/files/2021-11/en_bigbook_chapt11.pdf
- Related: *What does Step 12 really say?*

## Sources
| Source | Pages | First published |
|---|---|---|
| *Alcoholics Anonymous*, Chapter 7, "Working With Others" | 100–103 | 1939 |
| *Alcoholics Anonymous*, Chapter 8, "To Wives" | 120 | 1939 |
| *Alcoholics Anonymous*, Chapter 11, "A Vision for You" | 154–155 | 1939 (the footnote naming Dr. Bob was added in later editions) |

Page numbers are from the fourth edition (2001). The Preface says the program chapters have been "left largely untouched" since 1939 (p. xi), but our sources have no first edition to compare page numbers against.

*Recovery Starts is independent and not affiliated with Alcoholics Anonymous. Quotations are brief and cited; the Big Book is © A.A. World Services, Inc.*