Clancy I. (Venice, CA) — The Hisotry of the Traditions; Copenhagen, Denmark; 20050414 – Clancy I.

My name is Clancy Iveslund, and I'm an alcoholic. I'm going to tell you something that's going to startle you. Je er fluendansk. That's all I know. I thought it would be a nice start. I come from a Norwegian background, so I know how to say je and er, but I had to find out fluendansk from my host here, thank you. But I'm glad to be here tonight, and I'm glad to be part of this AA meeting, and glad to be part of this weekend. And I wanted to come before you looking shaved and clean, but Scandinavian Airlines lost my bag. So as the week progresses, you're going to just see more and more. But I was thinking today, but I suggest I might want to talk for a few minutes tonight. To talk about something that, tomorrow night I'm going to tell my story, and tomorrow afternoon I'm going to tell maybe a little bit of where AA should go from here. But I want to talk about something, I know we have some new people here tonight, and some people who are quite unfamiliar with AA. And a little bit of a chapter of AA history that I found ought to be very fascinating. Most of you know that AA struggled very much in their first few years, they just couldn't get anywhere. They had a terrible time, and then a magazine, or a newspaper, a magazine, the Saturday Evening Post had a man who specialized in unveiling corruption. He had just finished writing a series of articles on the corrupt labor unions in Philadelphia. His next assignment was to wiggle your way into this thing called Alcoholics Anonymous and blow the whistle on them. And he got in there, and much to his surprise, they were what they said they were. They were honest, and decent, and outgoing, and helping each other, and he hardly could believe it. So he wrote an article in this magazine called Saturday Evening Post in 1941, came out in March, that just transformed, the first time in the history there had ever been any knowledge of anything that really worked for alcoholics of our type. And they were just flooded with letters, and flooded with people wanting help, and all over the country, AA started chapters. Chapters in every state, and just wonderful, just great, and exciting, and built. Wilson, the founder, sat in New York and just dreamed over all of this. And then in about a year or two, he started getting letters from these people in these groups, saying, you know, our group is becoming extinct. No one comes to the meetings anymore, and we're having great fights in our group, and people are getting drunk over it. And little by little, AA was diminishing. They don't talk about it much, but AA was really shrinking badly, and rapidly. And in an effort to try to hold AA together, he started this little thing called the Grapevine. Now it's a little magazine like this, but then it was a big tabloid-sized paper. He thought maybe some articles would help people. It didn't seem to help much at all. And in 1945, he was just about destroyed, because AA was on the way out. And a man sent in an article for the Grapevine from a place called North Carolina, saying, Bill, you ought to see this. Maybe this will help you. And Bill read this article, and he found out something that he had never known, had never heard of. Just a hundred years before that, there had been an organ... Six drunks got together in a bar in Baltimore, Maryland, and one of them was just out of jail. And he's telling this friend, you know, these people, the chaplain down there says, they understand how I feel. They don't understand how I feel. None of them do. You five guys are the only guys that seem to know how I feel, and I know how you feel. They said, yeah, that's true. But we're all drinking badly. Maybe it would help each other stop drinking. And so they drew up a little one-page constitution, and they all signed it. Elected officers, president, vice president. Only one guy wasn't an officer. He must have felt bad. But they were going to take this vow to help each other stay sober. And, you know, everybody was laughing at these idiots. They can't keep themselves sober. They're going to keep each other sober. Ha, ha, ha, ha. But as time went along, they somehow stayed sober. Every time one felt like drinking, the other five would help him. And again and again and again. And a couple of guys came down from a city called Philadelphia and saw this and went back to Philadelphia and started a little group. And they didn't have a name for themselves. So they thought there never has been in history a place where drunkards are keeping drunkards sober. It's very unusual. Just like the United States is unusual and our first president, unusual, one of a kind, George Washington. So they named themselves after him. They called themselves the Washingtonians. And a group came from Washington, D.C., and started a group in Washington. And a group started in Boston. And little by little, all of a sudden, here's a whole bunch of drunkards. Drunkards, slobs, staying sober here and there. And they did very well. And at the end of the year, they were in about seven different states. Not too many, but they started to grow really rapidly. And at the end of the second, what happened was in those days, you know, there's no radio, television, no nothing like that. So most entertainment, public entertainment, came from public speakers who would speak, give orations to big crowds. And they got a couple of good orators. Into the Washingtonians. And they'd go out and talk about the Washingtonians and got a lot of people signed up for it. They really started to get, because there'd never been anything like it. And by near the end of the second year, they sent out a letter to all the chapters they could find, that they knew about, and said, we're going to take Washington's birthday, February 22nd, as our anniversary. Because we started in March, it's close enough. It's like Washington's birthday. But on our anniversary, you have somebody from your community, some leader of your, or at least somebody who's a decision maker, come in and give a talk. Not that we want to hear what he has to say, but we want them to see that we're not crazy, that we're really doing something good. So all over the country, February 22nd, 1842, people came in. And in Springfield, Illinois, they got a young lawyer named Abraham Lincoln, who was the guy that came in to give a talk. He wasn't very famous yet. In fact, if you ever look through a book of Lincoln's speeches, which you may or may not ever see, there's a major talk in there to the Washingtonians. And he talks for a long time. The gist of it was this. I know many of you people here in Springfield, and you're intelligent, fine people. And I know exactly... The only thing I don't understand, I don't understand your thirst. I don't have that thirst. But you have that thirst. But I'm glad you're doing something about it. And continue to grow... And really flourish. By 1845, they had what they estimated, as best they could estimate, 100,000 sober drunkards in America. Unheard of. Now, that may not be impressive. You must stop and think, AA, after five years, didn't even have 1,000 sober people. And they had 100,000... Without a telephone, without nothing. Just all one-to-one, one-to-one, one-to-one. And then in 1845, these guys got... They started thinking about things that seemed right to them. Because it seems right to some people in AA today. If we could help drunkards, we should really help a lot of people. We should help people with narcotics problems who aren't drunkards. Not heroin and cocaine like today, but opium and things of that nature. We should really get involved in politics. Because we got a lot of guys here who are really well-mannered. We should help people. Maybe we can get into the anti-slavery business. Maybe we can get into the anti-slavery business. Maybe we can get into the anti-slavery movement. Help work towards the anti-slavery movement. Maybe we should work towards annexing Texas into the United States. Maybe we should do that. Maybe we should work on stamping out the sale of alcohol. Because then there wouldn't be any drunkards. And on and on. And they really all got involved in this. And they all took on a course and they worked off. And three years later, by 1848, the movement was extinct. And with very few changes, they all died drunk. I have a book home written in 1861 by one of the few survivors. by one of the few survivors. I don't know what happened. We were doing so well. Then people didn't want to come to meetings. They didn't want to help new drunkards anymore. They just seemed to all get caught up in their own thing. And one by one they got drunk and down they went. And they became extinct. I'll tell you how extinct they became. Just a hundred years later, Bill Wilson had never heard of them. And nobody else had ever heard of them. And Bill Wilson read this article and thought, My God! So many of the things in there they're talking about, people crying for publicity. One of the things they got from the problem of the Washingtonians, the speakers got fighting who got the most publicity and who was best known. And they were fighting about all sorts of things, power, prestige. And he thought, God, this is the same thing I'm seeing in my letters coming from all over the country. What can I do? And in desperation he sat down and thought about it for days and weeks. And in the last gasp effort to save Alcoholics Anonymous, he wrote the Twelve Traditions. Now, not the way we heard them read tonight, although read very well. I need a ride back to the hotel. That's why I said that. But he wrote them in the long form. I'm sure most of you know the long form. If you don't know about it, in the back of the book, across in the short form, is the long form. The same thing, only at length. Because it really describes things. Because it really describes what they're saying. In my home group in Los Angeles, which incidentally is the largest group in the world, a thousand people every Wednesday night, we read the long form once a month so the new people will know what the hell it's about. And he wrote the long form of these traditions in an effort to save AA. Based on the experience of the Washingtonians and his own experience. And he published them one by one in this new little paper called The Grape File. Now, would you know it? Most of AA refused to accept them. Because AA had the same problem then that they have now. It's full of alcoholics. Nasty bunch. We don't want any rules. We came here to find love. We don't want any goddamn rules. And people wouldn't accept it. And he started a campaign. He'd drive around in his motorcycle all over eastern United States going to meetings to talk about the traditions. Sometimes if you read about it in the history books, he'd have his wife in the sidecar with him. He'd go places. He'd go give talks. And interestingly, it got to a point, and this is really kind of sad, groups would say, Bill, would you come and speak at our anniversary? Only if you promise not to talk about the traditions. Don't come. We don't even want you to come in the building. I mean, that's bad news. And so there were some people accepting him. A lot of people didn't. A lot of people didn't. A lot of people were having fights. And so there were two people, some of you who are new don't know this. There were two founders of AA, co-founders, Bill Wilson and a guy out in Akron, Ohio named Dr. Bob Smith. And they got along very well. But their followers never got along. That's the way it always is in AA. Every time you have more than one group, two people don't like each other. But the people in New York thought they were too religious in Akron. Because in Akron they still were hanging out to a lot of the old Oxford movement from which AA had sprung. And in Akron they didn't think New York was spiritual enough, that there were two actionaries enough spiritual enough. So Bill and Dr. Bob thought, we've got to get these people together because we're all having a lot of problems. So they decided to have one meeting once. We'll have one meeting where we'll invite representatives from alcoholics all over the country to come and sit down and we'll explain the traditions to them and they'll understand it. So they said to their followers, get us a place to meet. The people in Akron said, well, we'll go to a meeting, we won't go to New York. And the people in New York, not to be outdone in spirituality, said we'll go to a meeting, we won't go to Akron. So Bill and Dr. Bob got together and they came up with this Solomon-like solution, Cleveland, Ohio. Okay. So July 4th weekend, 1950, the largest group of sober alcoholics that ever sat in one room together sat down there. And they, it was really interesting, Bill talked, Dr. Bob, Dr. Bob at this time was dying of cancer. He'd been the second, he was just behind Bill to survive, he was 15 years sober. And they said, you probably don't want to talk, Bob, because you're dying of cancer. Oh, no, I've got to talk. I'm 15 years sober. I'm next to the oldest sobriety in the world. And I want these young people to know that it works. So they, that day, his son on one side, an old veteran on the other side, helped a tall, gaunt, sick, dying man to the podium. And, you, you're possible to hear his talk on tapes. They have it, they have it written down in various places. But he started off just, not so much, nothing very important. He said, I want to welcome you all to Cleveland. I hope you'll go back and tell the boys and girls in your home group that we're all doing the same thing. We all get out of A, what we put into it, and we all have to work together, and we're on the same path. He said, I want to, as I look over this room, he said, I'm grateful that some small thing I did 15 years ago was of help to someone. He said, I want to apologize for my health. I've been very sick. I'd hoped to be better by now, but I'm not. And then he said, but I want to call your attention to two or three things. And then he gave words that just echoed down the halls of history in Alcoholics Anonymous forever. Because they're just as true tonight in Denmark as they were that day in Cleveland, Ohio. Because he was a great AA, and he wanted so desperately to convey what he wanted and what he had found before he died. And he kind of boiled down to three things. He said, First, let us remember to keep our program simple. Let us not louse it all up with Freudian complexes, which may be of interest to the scientific mind, but has nothing to do with our work here. Our work here, when reduced to the last, consists of love and service. And we all know what love is, and we all know what service is. And secondly, he said, let us guard that erring member, the tongue, and try to treat one another with dignity. And that sounds kind of silly, but you know, everybody in this room knows how that is. When you're feeling good, we're all just loving and kind, but let somebody hurt our feelings or do something we think hurt us, and that tongue cuts and slashes and burns. And finally, he said, none of us would be here today if someone hadn't taken the time to maybe explain things to us, to take us to a few meetings, to give us a pat on the back when we needed it. Let us never reach that stage of smug complacency when we are too busy to help our fellow alcoholic. He said, thank you, and sat down, was dead shortly thereafter. Great talk. And then the next day what they had, six young guys, very enthusiastic, they each took two traditions and they tried to explain that these aren't rules, these are suggestions, we're trying to save AA. And one of the things everybody says, we don't need any rules, how are you going to enforce them? There's no enforcement in the traditions. You can break every tradition in there, and we can. There's no punishment allowed. Some of us old timers feel there should be AA police. Not necessarily for that, but it is. In my hometown, unjustly of course, but I am known as something of an AA dictator, I tell newcomers what to do. You're going to go to this meeting? I'm not really that way at all. I just say, you're going to go to this meeting and I'll kill you. But what people don't realize is that it's impossible to be a dictator in AA without the absolute agreement of the dictatee. All he ever has to say is, screw you, and the dictatorship is over. That's where we should have AA police who come in the night and say, did you say screw you to your sponsor? Come with us back to the training camp for a few weeks. But they explained the purpose of AA, that these were things to save AA. And they accepted them. That day, 1950, and they'd been, and they've been with us ever since. Unfortunately, over the years, they've become just a part of our, a lot of people don't pay no attention, they don't think they are, they're just something to see if newcomers can read it and say anonymity, you know. What does it mean? But they are so important. But most of the things in there are not very difficult to accept, as we heard tonight. He wrote them in order that he thought they were important. He said the first one should be, unity, and that certainly is true because there's always, there's always conflicts in AA. If we all work in unity all the time, we're not going to achieve it. We have to work towards it. And secondly, there was a feeling that he was going to try to become dictator of AA. So he said there's, the only authority here is the group conscience. And then he goes to the third tradition, and the third tradition has been under some fire. It has been and continues to be. It says the only requirement for membership is a desire to stop. A desire to stop drinking. And so as a result of that, over the years we get some strange people who come to AA. They're not even alcoholics at all. But they sit here and say, I've got a desire to stop drinking. I belong here. You can't get me out. And it really puzzles a lot of people. How do you deal with those people? Some of them can come to the meeting smelling like booze week after week, and talk and say, screw you. And then you have to, the problem is this. In order to make the traditions a little more condensed, when they accepted them, they make one version of them in a condensed version. And so that's what we read. We read the short form of the traditions. The long form more fully explains it. Now the third tradition says the only requirement for membership is a desire to stop drinking. It's kind of hard to deal with that. But if you look at the long form of the third tradition says, we are here to help all those who suffer from alcoholism. Not the desire to stop drinking at all, but to help alcoholics of our type. Then the fourth tradition, I'm going to go through all the three. I'm just giving you an idea. The fourth tradition talked about, there was no question about that. Every group was autonomous. You can do whatever you want in your group as long as you're not making AA look bad or hurting another group. The fifth tradition is under the most heat and has been for years. It says, our primary purpose is to carry the message to the alcoholic who still suffers. And people say, what? That's nonsense. Why do we have, what's this deal about carrying the message to alcoholics? You know, how about drug addicts? It's all one big disease. You know where that phrase comes from? One big disease. It comes from a treatment center that only had one van. But to understand why you have to carry the message to the alcoholic who still suffers, I'm going to talk about this a little bit Saturday afternoon too so you don't have to come. But the whole concept of Alcoholics Anonymous, there's nothing in here that is remarkably wise. There's nothing in anything we do here that's remarkably new. The only thing is this. It is the only organization where one drunkard is talking to another drunkard. There have only been two times in the world's history where groups of people like us have been sober. One was in the 1840s with the Washingtonians. One is now in AA. They are also the only two times in history where drunks dealt with drunks. Now why is it so important that a drunk should put in a doctor or a psychiatrist or a minister or somebody who knows more about things than we do? Maybe they do. But the great symptom of every alcoholic in the world is I know you mean well but you don't understand. My case is different. The universal cry. And none of us need advice. Christ, we've had enough advice to last us for 10,000 years. Passersby think they should give us advice. Here's what you all ought to do. The point is this. If what happens if you are fortunate in AA, you may hear people describe emotions of their own or feelings or histories of their own that you can say, my God, I thought I was the only one who knew about that. It's called identification. My God, I identify with this guy. I never thought I would. And the reason that is so important that if I identify with them and I am fortunate that nonsense advice from that person becomes meaningful information. I can believe what he is saying because he knows. And little by little it opens up the armor so that the steps and the stuff can get in here. Because I'll tell you, I'm in a situation none of you are in. A few years ago I resigned a nice job in Beverly Hills where I was doing very well because I had reasons of my own which I hate to even think about. But when I go to work in the morning now, I live out by the ocean in Los Angeles. I drive downtown. I park in my parking lot. Then I have to step over the bodies of men, women, and children dying from alcoholism and drug addiction to get to my office. And I spend all day trying to figure out ways to help those poor sick bastards. Then I step over them and I can go home. We're not a treatment. We're just trying to keep people alive on the street. And you think, well, why would you help those people? I can't tell you how much I've helped them, tried to help them. But do you know why people die from alcoholism? Because you can give psychological reasons and economic reasons and genetic reasons. But the number one reason is this. I thank you for trying to help me, but you don't understand. My case is different. The armor stays up. And somehow to help anyone, we've got to get through that armor, at least to open it up just a little bit. Because without that, just everything you know bounces right off them. Anybody here who's ever worked with the alcoholics knows that. Some guys are able to do it and some guys, it's almost impossible. Most of them die without even finding out. And that's why it's so important that you have to be an alcoholic and an alcoholics anonymous. Not because it's better or worse or anything else. It's because that's the only place you're going to find identification. That is why a number of years ago, 1958 or so, a guy I knew, a friend of mine, went to New York and got permission to use the 12 steps for his new organization called Gamblers Anonymous. The first time they ever used the steps outside of AA. Then shortly after that, a narcotic addict who also was an alcoholic and when he brought his narcotic friends to AA, they didn't identify, he got permission to start Narcotics Anonymous. And Cocaine Anonymous. And Overeaters Anonymous. All these are from people who are alcoholic with a secondary thing where they're trying to help other cases. A couple of things. The guy that founded GA, Gamblers Anonymous, a good man, a man named Jim Willis. By the mid-60s, it was growing. That has also become the most successful of all the non-A's programs. By the mid-1960s, he was so busy in GA that he was going to be a drug addict. He was going to be a drug addict and he was going to be a drug addict and he was going to be a drug addict and he was going to be a drug addict and he really didn't have time for it anymore. So he was sad when he got drunk and died. But as I said in GA, we're very sorry but he never gambled again. Just as if we were someone here, we'd say, he didn't drink, he gambled again. We didn't care. I never really understood the theory of identification so clearly. When I was about two years sober in 1960, they had this new organization called Overeaters Anonymous. I gave a little talking to me like this, you know, just on obsessions because I've always been an authority on obsessions. Not what to do about them, but about the obsessions themselves. And some kind of plump lady came over and she says, oh that was wonderful. We have a new organization called Overeaters Anonymous. Would you come and talk to our ladies Sunday? And I had no front teeth. I weighed about 130 pounds. Give them a treat. I went over there on Sunday and these fat ladies sitting around the table I'm like, do you want to see somebody who's weighing 130 pounds? Look at them, baby. And I gave them a talk. They were talking about obsessions and when I got done talking they had a little sharing session which we probably won't have time for tonight, I'm sorry. But that little woman over here said, talked about it was her son's birthday. I made him a two-tiered birthday cake and he was down in Long Beach to a military school. Her husband went out to get the boy. She had one little piece of cake to see what it tastes like. Then another. Then another. When I came back the cake was gone. And I didn't say anything because I'm too nice a guy but I thought, Jesus Christ. Have a piece of cake and let it go at that. What's wrong with you? It's your kid's birthday. Woman over here talked about hanging out for more ice cream. I didn't say anything because I'm too nice a guy about it. But what are your fat eating that much ice cream? The kiss of death was this one over here. She said she ate until she couldn't eat anymore then put her fingers down the throat and vomited so she could eat some more. I thought, Jesus, don't bother shaking hands with me after the meeting. I mean, I can see doing that for drinking but not eating. I've done it for drinking a lot. Oh, the sun is still up. Now, what was different? What was different? I understood exactly what they were saying but there was no identification. It was just information that had meant nothing to me except this kind of silver. And that's the way we sound to people who don't understand the problem. They say they understand but they don't because unless you're like us, unless alcohol does something special for you, they can't ever identify you. Identification is so important. I have to find someone who will say, yes, and here's I bet you had these emotions. How do you know? And so the fifth tradition is rather important. And that's why in our group we have to make sure that when people talk or are involved they can be an alcoholic and an addict. They can be an alcoholic and a gambler. They can be an alcoholic and twist baby chickens. They can be an alcoholic and a sex for all we care. But you've got to be an alcoholic and then you've got to recommend to them that they talk primarily about drinking, not about drugs. Not that there's anything wrong with drugs but we're trying to help alcoholics identify. Now I've got three daughters who are turning 16 this year in AA. And I've got a grandson who's in AA. I'm not telling him on the way over here. I hope he's an alcoholic. So he can come in here and hear people talk about their emotions and feelings and what it used to be like and what it was like now. Not hear a bunch of psychological babble from some treatment center counselor but to hear the only thing that has ever worked for alcoholics in the history of mankind. And most of the other traditions that I've heard from people today say well God, I mean especially where I live these movie actors say I'm a movie actor, I'm a salmon alcoholic. That's what makes people want to come in. Now see what happens. Funny thing. I've never seen anybody who breaks their anonymity who didn't have a problem afterwards. Remember when I was new in 1958 there was a woman who was anonymous. They said you really shouldn't do that Lillian. Oh no I want to help this organization. And a couple years later when she was laying face down drunk in her own puke in Palm Springs I don't know what they thought about it then. She didn't hurt AA. It killed her. John Barrymore a very famous actor, his daughter wrote a book I'll Cry She died in a holding cell in Malibu choked on her own vomit and on and on. I've been watching this for years. Now you might think the purpose of anonymity is to conceal you so people won't know. Maybe it was in 1935 or some place or 45 but that's what it is now. The last letter Bill wrote is the last letter in the book that goes into the ultimate good. What anonymity means is because of the nature of my work I'm on television a lot and I've had articles written about me in the newspapers and readers digest other things and I tell them I'm a recovered alcoholic. I am a recovered alcoholic. But once I ever mention AA you must never see my face or know my name because I must submerge my ego into this ultimate thing and it is a very difficult thing because I think I don't know why breaking your anonymity should be so harmful except my concept is this and I've talked to a lot of people about this. In fact once upon a time I sat I may be the first to remember what he said but the gist of the conversation was when you break your anonymity you are now going to help AA. You have reversed the roles. AA is no longer helping me I'm not helping the little people in AA and that's the beginning of the end because there's nothing over your doubt just you and you and you and the brain. You know interesting Bill Wilson who had a great ego he had to continually fight in the 1950s AA won the Alaska award as the most significant health progress of the year and Time Magazine was going to put Bill Wilson on the cover and he turned it down had to just kill him because God said I'm the same way I like you. We said can we shoot you from the back? He said no I'll still be noticeable not me. But that's a perfect example of what you have to do. You have to submerge your ego here. So really the traditions are really very important. People who don't follow the traditions and groups survive and when you don't you gradually die and wither and die. So all you have to remember here is that we are here to help alcoholics and that we are help alcoholics by identification. So we have to be alcoholics and talk about drinking primarily. And we want to maintain our alcoholics habits. And that's what we have to remember. So many people have never had any idea what the hell it's all about ever ever. And so these are things we have to remember we are going to keep AA successful and complete and our lives continue to regrow. Thank you.