December 6, 2005 at 9:37 am ·
Filed under 4 - Alcoholic Myth of the Month
"The young runaway's memories of her cruel upbringing drove her to drugs,"wrote columnist Patricia Towle in the November 21, 2005 National Enquirer, about Oprah Winfrey's surrogate daughter, 21-year-old Alexandra Molina. Oprah reportedly told Molina, "You've been through hell…All you need is somebody who believes in you….â€
Regardless of whether or not true depending on your view of the Enquirer, the article promulgates far-reaching myths about alcoholism. If behaviors weren't an issue, no one would bemoan the fact that someone had been driven to drugs. The implication in "drove her to drugs"is, therefore, "drove her to use drugs addictively."Upbringing does not drive anyone to use drugs addictively. The fact that Molina was raised in a cruel manner indicates that those who raised ...
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December 6, 2005 at 9:36 am ·
Filed under 3 - Dear Doug...
Dear Doug:
My husband of 16 years and I have five well-behaved children. Everything was fine between our families until his brother married "Lenore"and they had a son, now 5 years old.
At family events, this little boy continuously bites, pulls hair and otherwise abuses his cousins. When we try to intervene, he goes after us. When we ask Lenore to use some discipline, she puts down her cigarette and tells him to stop. He laughs and continues abusing others.
The whole family has tried, but she makes excuses and insists that being stricter will bring on greater violence. When my husband finally told her that he will discipline the boy if she doesn't, she became irate, threatened us with legal action and ...
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December 6, 2005 at 9:35 am ·
Filed under 2 - Movie & Book Reviews
This well-acted 2004 film, originally on FX TV, is available on DVD. Jamie Fox plays Tookie Williams, with Lynn Whitfield playing a charming and appealing Barbara Becnel, who asks Tookie to provide her with information for her upcoming book on gang history. While admitting she holds gangs in contempt, she gets Tookie's cooperation when she explains she intends to be objective and tell the truth about them, whatever the truth may be.
Tookie helped start the Crips to "protect the neighborhood."Responding to Becnel's comment that it was a criminal enterprise from the start, Tookie replies that the cops weren't protecting anyone. "Either I was going to be a victim or a victimizer."However, he failed to note that he'd been doing ...
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December 6, 2005 at 9:34 am ·
Filed under 1 - Top Stories
Stanley Tookie Williams: A Model of Alcoholism, Horrific Behaviors, Sobriety and Possible Redemption
Many recovering addicts do everything they can to redeem themselves. Does this mean they shouldn't pay the price for committing the ultimate crime?
In 1981 Stanley Tookie Williams was convicted and sentenced to death for the 1979 murders of four people in two separate incidents. After the usual decades of appeals, he is scheduled for execution December 13, 2005. His unique case was chronicled in a 2004 movie and has provided fodder for weeks of talk-radio debate and bombast.
Tookie, who grew up fatherless but with an apparent caring mother, began sniffing glue at age 13. He later became addicted to PCP, which causes extreme violence in some addicts, ...
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December 6, 2005 at 9:31 am ·
Filed under 1 - Top Stories
Runners-up for top story of the month:
Venezuelan de facto dictator Hugo Chavez, calling Mexican President Vicente Fox "a lapdog"of the U.S. at the Summit of the Americas in Mar del Plata, Argentina, after Fox argued in favor of global free trade. The Mexican government, which considered the attack "over the top,"recalled its ambassador from Venezuela and booted out the Venezuelan ambassador to Mexico.
Actor Robert Blake, found liable by a civil jury for "intentionally [causing] the death"of wife Bonny Lee Bakley and ordered to pay her children $30 million in damages. You'll find the story of the criminal trial in the January 2005 edition of the Thorburn Addiction Report (http://www.addictionreport.com).
Prime Minister Tony Blair's father-in-law Tony Booth, criticizing the British ...
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November 11, 2005 at 12:45 pm ·
Filed under 5 - Amazing Alcoholic Antics
Society's icons are often alcoholics
Stories from "This is True"by Randy Cassingham, with his "tagline:â€
"THE DRUG-DRIVEN LIFE: After Brian Nichols grabbed a deputy's gun and shot his way out of the courthouse in Fulton County, Ga., killing four people, Ashley Smith was hailed as a hero. Smith, who Nichols took hostage in her own apartment after his rampage, told police how she convinced him to surrender by talking about God and reading aloud from the book, The Purpose-Driven Life. Now, Smith is putting out her own book which details how she really got Nichols to cooperate: she gave him her supply of crystal methamphetamine. Smith admits she was a meth addict and had used the drug hours before she was taken ...
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November 11, 2005 at 12:26 pm ·
Filed under 4 - Alcoholic Myth of the Month
"The human impulse to blame grows out of the evolutionary need to avert harm.â€
So explained Ohio University professor Mark Alicke, who researches the psychology of blame, according to an article in the Wall Street Journal. However, the author of the piece, Jeffrey Zaslow, doesn't differentiate between appropriate and inappropriate blame in describing Alicke's views. A group of prehistoric men blaming a member of the group for a threat to their survival for not carrying his load may appropriately point fingers. Someone stubbing a toe on a chair kicking and cursing the chair is reacting inappropriately and childlike. Such behavior is an excellent indicator of alcoholism, suggesting that the human impulse to inappropriately blame grows out of this disease and not ...
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November 11, 2005 at 12:25 pm ·
Filed under 4 - Alcoholic Myth of the Month
After husband Robert Altman's reputation was ruined when he was accused of taking bribes in a bank scandal, Wonder Woman Lynda Carter, "unable to keep up with her TV character's clean-cut image, hit the bottle.â€
So said a report in the National Enquirer on the now sober Carter. As usual, cause and effect is reversed. If she was sober, she relapsed"stress will do that to alcoholics. If she wasn't, she merely spun into more obvious alcoholism. Either way, she hit the bottle addictively because her inborn biochemistry allowed her to.
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November 11, 2005 at 12:24 pm ·
Filed under 4 - Alcoholic Myth of the Month
"Royal watchers…predict (Prince Harry's 21st birthday) may mark the maturing of the royal family's most wayward son.â€
So claimed a news report in the Los Angeles Daily News on the wild child, Prince Harry, who frequently appears in British tabloids with a cigarette and beer in hand. Sorry to disappoint, but he will not begin to mature emotionally until he is in a program of sobriety.
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November 11, 2005 at 12:22 pm ·
Filed under 3 - Dear Doug...
Dear Doug,
Since I moved away from my ex-boyfriend several months ago, our relationship has taken a turn for the worse. He verbally abuses me over the phone, threatens to beat me and has promised to ruin my life. He tells me he wants me back and loves me and, in the same breath, tells me he hates me. Could his verbal abuse turn into something worse?
Signed,
Afraid
. . . . .
Dear Afraid,
While other columnists might say that "people who love each other do not treat each other"this way and that your ex- has become obsessed, the truth of the matter is that sober people do not treat others this way and that alcoholics, in the active stages of their disease, are ...
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November 11, 2005 at 12:21 pm ·
Filed under 3 - Dear Doug...
Dear Doug:
My son and daughter-in-law, after neglecting their twin toddlers for the first three years of their lives, are now divorcing. While the mother went out drinking and cheated on him, our son did what he could to feed and bathe the children. Because there was often no food in what was usually a filthy house, my husband and I helped with the groceries and cleaning.
My son is experiencing bouts of depression while the mother, who is supposed to bring them to us for babysitting in a shared custody arrangement, takes them to the YMCA. Contrary to court order, she frequently brings her male friends to her home when the kids are there. This can't be good for my grandchildren: ...
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November 11, 2005 at 12:20 pm ·
Filed under 2 - Movie & Book Reviews
Bush on the Couch: Inside the Mind of the President, by Justin A. Frank, MD
Dr. Frank's well written if overly complex book suffers from two fatal flaws and numerous lesser ones. First, he views everything President Bush says or does through his admitted (pseudo)liberal bias. Despotism aside, mixing psychological and political analysis is fatal to an accurate diagnosis of psychological state and alcoholism. One of Frank's unstated but recurring underlying themes is that those with views differing from his must be psychologically disturbed. This is particularly true of those who would cut government programs aiding the poor and hungry, as if government creates food and other wealth. Frank leaves no room for agreeing to disagree.
Second, in arguing that Bush ...
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November 11, 2005 at 12:03 pm ·
Filed under 1 - Top Stories
The U.S. has survived a number of Presidents who were alcoholics. Could this time be different?
The United States has had several obvious alcoholic Presidents. In The Secret History of Alcoholism, James Graham identifies Andrew Johnson and Franklin Pierce as having been active alcoholics while in office. Ulysses S. Grant was in recovery by the time he was elected President. As Graham points out, all held office in the nineteenth century and none had much of an opportunity to abuse others while in office. Although their ego-fueled need to wield power capriciously may drive them to abuse that power, alcoholic Presidents are stymied from taking full advantage of such privilege in an open society that has a system of checks and ...
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November 9, 2005 at 1:23 pm ·
Filed under General
I barely had the exchange between me and Harry Van Twistern on the blog when an "old-timer" (i.e., a long-time senior recovering alcoholic) wrote:
"I am somewhat amused by Scotts supporter. When I drank my daily fifth of vodka with my daily case of beer, while working, nobody knew that I was drinking or drunk. The gentleman doesn't know us functioning alcoholics! I've watched Gene Scott while I was an active drinker and in retrospect there is no doubt in my mind, he was an alcoholic. The old adage, "it takes one to know one". You may quote me on this."
Harold
I know Harold and his own incredible story well. When he speaks about alcoholism and alcoholics, I pay heed.
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November 8, 2005 at 10:06 am ·
Filed under General
I recently had a fascinating exchange of ideas with a friend of Pastor Gene Scott. I mentioned his February 2005 passing in the "Under Watch" section of the www.addictionreport.com in March 2005, for reasons mentioned in the exchange. Dr. Scott's friend, Harry A. Van Twistern, gave me permission to publish our exchange without the usual altering of names and minor details.
Dear Mr. Doug Thorburn:
I found the following item in the Thorburn Addiction Report of March 2005:
"Televangelist Gene Scott who, as a young man, rebelled against the strict teachings of abstinence from alcohol that he grew up with as the son of a fundamentalist preacher and subsequently married three times, dead at age 75 from prostate cancer."
I think you should know ...
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