culture and illness

Alec Ramsdell a_ramsdell at yahoo.com
Sat Dec 19 09:49:18 PST 1998


---d-m-c at worldnet.att.net wrote:
>
The research was done nearly 20 years ago and I haven't read it in
> a long time, but I think Wendy Kaminers stuff on women and self help
> culture, especially co-dependency groups, makes a similar point:
when you
> read the def. of who a co-dependent is, it would seem that
*everyone* is.

It's that way in AA too. They say stuff like most people are alcoholics and don't know it. Argh.


> I suspect that there is some clue here that points toward some
answers.
> I'm not entirely sure exactly what that answer is right now, though.
> Still, from what I've seen of the way 12 step models work, they are
clearly
> symptomatic treatments--that is they treat the symptoms, rather than
the
> underlying problem (errr sliding toward essentialism there, ey?) in
the
> same way that cold medicine modifies the discomfort of the cold
without
> ever getting at the root cause of the cold.

I'd agree, from what I've seen. In that Sedgwick essay she mentions how "recovery," which one is always in according to this model, is a matter of the day to day "micromanagement of absolutes."

Thanks for the recommendation.

Alec _________________________________________________________ DO YOU YAHOO!? Get your free @yahoo.com address at http://mail.yahoo.com



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