Respect for choices

[Katya]

[Neon Trees] doesn't preach their Mormon teachings in their songs, but none of them drink or party. "It's funny how backstage, if you say you're doing it for God or doing it for morals or for health, people say, 'That's stupid' or 'lame.' But if you say you've been sober for 10 years, they respect you because you've been through AA," Glenn says.

"Artist of the Week: Neon Trees." Rolling Stone. July 29, 2010

So, why is it that you don't get respect for staying sober for some reasons, but you do for others? (I have some ideas, but I thought it would be interesting to hear from others, too.)

[Dead Cat]

I think the respect is for the fact that they fell in a hole and were able to climb out of it. There's a reason the try/fail cycle in fiction works. Most readers don't want to read about a guy who succeeds all the time--he has to fail a lot before he finds success--and it makes that success all the happier.

[melbabi]

I definitely have my opinions on this! Just as a background, I work in a detox facility for women and I have my internship doing counseling for adults with substance abuse (s.a.). In my experience, there are certain people who have more of a predisposition towards addictions. Not just substance addictions, but others as well but for the sake of this thread, I'll focus on substances. When people with s.a. vulnerabilities start using, they have an extremely difficult time stopping. This is different than just refraining from substances. They know how much they enjoy using and typically they do not quit the first time they try to. About 90% of my clients at my internship relapse either throughout treatment or after treatment. Therefore, we celebrate when people stay sober from their substances.

[Katya]

Therefore, we celebrate when people stay sober from their substances.

But you'd also really want people to stay clean, generally, having seen the damage it can do, right? Like, you wouldn't mock someone who'd never even tried that stuff, because you've seen the damage it can do.

I guess what intrigues me more is not the respect for overcoming something, but the lack of respect (in some circles) for not even going there in the first place.

[melbabi]

I took your question to a few of the ladies at my work (who obviously have s.a. issues) and asked their thoughts. They were saying that they thought that it was because it is such a difficult thing to go through that if you haven't, then you can't relate as well. Booksmarts can only get you so far.

So say that you do have s.a. issues, depending on your motivation for treatment, external (court) or internal (self), you will view treatment differently. I have found that those with an external motivation for treatment find themselves saying that those who haven't used don't know what it's like and as a result, their advice/thoughts are considered invalid. So I think that the judgment you're referring to comes most often from those who are externally motivated to seek treatment. It is from those who think that they don't have a problem and that it's something they do for fun. They see it as experiencing life and tend to judge those who haven't, in their eyes, 'experienced life.'

I think it can go the opposite way as well. Say someone has not tried any substances for external reasons, such as medical or family reasons. Then they can be judgmental of those who have gone through s.a. Many of my clients discuss that in group, the difficulty of being judged by someone who has never tried anything because oftentimes, those people will think that they're better than those who have s.a. issues or who have even tried any substances. So regardless, I have found that there is negative judgment on both sides.

[Katya]

I think the respect is for the fact that they fell in a hole and were able to climb out of it. There's a reason the try/fail cycle in fiction works. Most readers don't want to read about a guy who succeeds all the time--he has to fail a lot before he finds success--and it makes that success all the happier.

Interesting take. So, are Mormons just destined to live boring lives because they try to avoid a lot of life's temptations?

[Whistler]

some Mormons lived exciting lives before they converted, or avoided temptations unsuccessfully

[Katya]

some Mormons lived exciting lives before they converted, or avoided temptations unsuccessfully

*sigh* No one seems to understand what I'm trying to get at.

[bobtheenchantedone]

Because when you are staying sober because you went through AA, at least you tried the alcohol, liked it, and only gave it up because you didn't use it responsibly. Those of us who never try it can be seen as having a holier-than-thou attitude, because we completely abstain from and even think sinful something that is perfectly normal to others.

[Katya]

Those of us who never try it can be seen as having a holier-than-thou attitude, because we completely abstain from and even think sinful something that is perfectly normal to others.

Bingo. Although, do you think it's always "holier-than-thou"? I would have also thought naive or scared.

[Dragon Lady]

Those of us who never try it can be seen as having a holier-than-thou attitude, because we completely abstain from and even think sinful something that is perfectly normal to others.

Bingo. Although, do you think it's always "holier-than-thou"? I would have also thought naive or scared.

Couldn't repulsed be one of them? Cigarettes, for example, make me physically sick. I don't want to try it, even if I weren't Mormon, because the smell of them, the list of ingredients in them, and the after-effects simply repulse me.

[Katya]

Those of us who never try it can be seen as having a holier-than-thou attitude, because we completely abstain from and even think sinful something that is perfectly normal to others.

Bingo. Although, do you think it's always "holier-than-thou"? I would have also thought naive or scared.

Couldn't repulsed be one of them? Cigarettes, for example, make me physically sick. I don't want to try it, even if I weren't Mormon, because the smell of them, the list of ingredients in them, and the after-effects simply repulse me.

Well, I'm thinking about perception, not about actual motivations. So I'm wondering about Mormons (and others) being perceived as holier-than-thou or naive or scared for not trying things.

But yes, being repulsed is certainly a strong motivation for avoiding some things.

[Dead Cat]

I think this scene from Finding Nemo more or less covers it.

[Katya]

I think this scene from Finding Nemo more or less covers it.

[Tao]

I'm wondering about Mormons (and others) being perceived as holier-than-thou or naive or scared for not trying things.

But yes, being repulsed is certainly a strong motivation for avoiding some things.

I think the diversity in the thread actually makes a good point for this. True motivations are complex, deep, and often not understood even by the one directly affected thereby. (My intellect is firm on no alcohol, yet somehow amidst a bad day involving a goat, rubber knife and the high school gym, my only desire was to go drink myself into oblivion. (Analyze that, Herr Freud.) So when dealing with other people's motivations, we often default to assuming stereotypes. "You're a virgin at 40? You must have been completely ignorant and/or asexual." "Never even tried alchohol? Goody-two-shoes."

Rather than understand, we'd prefer to assume and get back to thinking about ourselves.

[krebscout]

I guess what intrigues me more is not the respect for overcoming something, but the lack of respect (in some circles) for not even going there in the first place.

I don't know if this is what you're trying to get at, but it seems that God and organized religion in general have been made to look ridiculous in the eyes of many. My evidence is all anecdotal and mostly in the form of blog posts where the blogger admits only with some embarrassment that they are religious, or comments in which people chastise the author for giving thanks to God instead of crediting their own hard work and intelligence. The news, the way those who make it to the news are always extreme and ignorant (Westboro Baptist), the way that famous people of faith (Glenn Beck, Bill O'Reilly) behave and talk about God...

I think the world/Satan has so effectively made religion look ridiculous that even I have been effected by it. I've found myself putting up walls of incredulity when I hear someone say they're "super Christian" or something like that. Which is horrible. But true - citing Christian morals and God as a motivation - especially for something as generally acceptable as drinking alcohol - just doesn't have the respectable ring to it that it had a few generations ago.

Goody-goodyism has always had its critics, anyway.

[Portia]

This is a very interesting question. Alcohol consumption, especially, is seen as an "adult activity" . . . and while we are certainly far from <i>Mad Men</i>-style imbibing, it seems to be part of our culture that drinking is just "something you do," especially in your working years. We are in a cultural moment which seems to be especially harsh towards any of the virtues of temperance or moderation, so anyone who is a jerk about teetotaling to others in general or you, Katya, in particular, is probably no more evolved than a teenage Neanderthal saying "what, too chicken?"

Plenty of areligious people want to not drink, for a variety of reasons. An entirely medically valid one would be being or possibly being pregnant. Dry Soda, a very good brand out of Seattle, was created by a woman who had four kids right in a row and spent a lot of time pregnant, yet she didn't want to drink, say, Kool-Aid.

Drinking is still seen as something attractive and fun people do at parties, and there's everything from the wine snob to the cocktail partyhound pushing others to partake (or at least not declare abstinence. It's like the mania bike riders, or organic food eaters, or kinky-sex-lovers display... always trying to get others to join the bandwagon, that you're a square if you happen to like your fruit cheap or drive to work or do not, in fact, want to have a threesome much less talk about it at work).

When I was teetotal and trying to explain so to my French coworker, I asked what the term would be in French. He replied a "con," and your French is good enough to get the gist of his view of such prudes, eh?

It's very similar for sexual abstinence. The absence of not doing something (sex) becomes this really big freakin' deal where everyone feels justified poking their nose in. "The American Virgin" blog runs first-person entries from people who just happen not to have had sex, not people who are repulsive or dying or dislike sex or are afraid, it just hasn't happened. I think healthy abstinence in all its forms needs to be normalized: for crying out loud, I somehow doubt you go around calling others lushes and whores, so why should people find it so absurd and not-worthy-of-respect if someone decides to not drink or not boink, whatever the reasons? We've normalized smoking abstinence: it could happen.