To be honest I do have my own negative bias towards many religions so thats why the God thing really poked at me for a bit, and the people that I talked to about AA really dug the whole God thing into it as God was the answer even though they couldn't really give me any explanation as to why God has been of any help. ALthough if it helps, if there is a God I do believe that we are all part of a piece of him..kinda like cells in a body.
I still don't believe the powerless thing. I"m looking at this from a USA viewpoint, and alcohol is EVERYWHERE. I mean have you ever taken the time in a day to see how many times you see alcohol? I really feel horrible for people trying to just rid themselves of drinking it cause it's like no escape.. You see it in sports, ads, movies, cartoons, videos, magazines, celebrations, facebook,instagram, celebrations,events, social gatherings.. in another way too I also view getting over an addiction not needing to be 100% sober, but just having the substance no longer having control over you which from what I read AA makes it seem like thats impossible. I've known a couple of alcoholics that totally stopped for a while but now they can have a beer or two and just have a normal night and really just drink when they want to if its an event or whatever.
I know once I stopped drinking I basically lost all my social life and friends. And then theres the people using it to forget about their problems,stress from work and its just legal and accepted everywhere so something that you end up liking can turn bad depending on your lifestyle.
However I really do agree with alot of what your saying even though it may not seem like it..cause some peoples brains just have that instant addiction to alcohol just like any other drugs and then theres the people that shouldn't even be touching a drip of alcohol.. I had 3 close friends that were like that, 2 of them dead now and 1 went to AA and didn't help him a single bit.
I may also have my own narrowminded viewpoint on this cause whenever I hear someone wanting to get help it seems that 100% of the time AA seems to be the only answer to alcoholism when there is so much more.
Though one religion I truly believe can help with addiction is actually something like Buddhism. More so the philosophy on life and how to treat yourself,others and how to look at life itself.
I like your point about all cells in the same body. I just wrote a post yesterday about how we need to stop hating and realize we are leaves of the same tree one conciousness
I use a method called "natural rest" developed by Scott Kiloby, it's based on Advita Vedanta or contemporary non-duality self-inquiry methods.
I've never heard of that..now I'll have to check it out, sounds interesting!