Gathered for Sobriety

An A.A. group is alcoholics who gathered themselves, and a room of clients gathered by a counsellor is something else, whatever the sign says. The Long Form (Big Book, p. 563): "Any two or three alcoholics gathered together for sobriety may call themselves an A.A. group". Look at who does the gathering, and why: alcoholics, for sobriety, calling themselves a group. Now the captured version. A counsellor books the room, takes attendance, opens with the program's announcements and closes by reminding everyone the hour counts toward their plan. The people in the chairs are alcoholics, but they did not gather themselves, and attendance is the point. Bill W. wrote about that kind of pressure long before anyone built a business on it (A.A. pamphlet P-17, p. 37): "Time out of mind, families, friends, employers, doctors, clergymen, and judges have tried their hand at disciplining alcoholics. Almost without exception the failure to accomplish anything by coercion has been complete." Coercion means forcing someone. A.A. worked where all of that failed because nobody in it held the power to force anyone. Put a counsellor with that power at the front of the room and you have rebuilt what failed, under A.A.'s name. Test it tonight: ask who called your meeting into being, who keeps the attendance, and who could cancel it.