Tonight, I had to attend an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting. As I sat there for the interminable hour, I realized that its success is based on its duplication of the formula for religion. AA has a holy book. AA has speakers and testimonials. AA congregations have preset phrases akin to “Amen” and “Hallelujah” and join in unison to utter such phrases at appropriate times during a session. Just like Friday night fellowships and mid-week Bible studies, AA sessions are designed to divert you from other social activities — in this case, drinking. AA, like religion, indoctrinates you into group motivated behaviors, eventually brainwashing away your proclivities to drink, just as religion brainwashes away your rational mind. There is even an offering basket in which you may donate money to the cause. By the way, I gave a magnanimous $2 to the cause. At least this offering will go to something more important than the payments on a pastor’s new Mercedes Benz.

Clearly, what we see is a successful model for behavioral conditioning. As I sat there, I thought it might be interesting to take AA to the next level, to convert it into a religious following, proselytizing abstinence at the entrance to markets and building ornate edifices to house their meetings. Sponsors would become elders and… I’ll stop there with my reverie. I felt a twang of pity as I stared out across the sea of self-professed alcoholics. These are people who will probably have to abstain from the sweet nectar that we call scotch for the rest of their lives. And, as such thoughts passed through my wicked head, I could think of nothing more urgent than rushing home to relish a glass of the 18 year old Glenlivet sitting on my kitchen counter. Tonight I shed a tear for all the people who can’t have alcohol out there — the alcoholics, the enzyme deficient, the allergic. I pour out some of my liquor for you, homies. Just a little. It would be a shame to waste such good scotch.