The Core Documents of S.L.A.A.

1. We admitted we were powerless over sex and love addiction – that our lives had become unmanageable.
2. Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.
3. Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood God.
4. Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.
5. Admitted to God, to ourselves and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.
6. Were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character.
7. Humbly asked God to remove our shortcomings.
8. Made a list of all persons we had harmed, and became willing to make amends to them all.
9. Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others.
10. Continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong promptly admitted it.
11. Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with a Power greater than ourselves, praying only for knowledge of God’s will for us and the power to carry that out.
12. Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps, we tried to carry this message to sex and love addicts and to practice these principles in all areas of our lives.

*©1985 The Augustine Fellowship, S.L.A.A., Fellowship-Wide Services, Inc. All Rights Reserved. The Twelve Steps are reprinted and adapted with permission of Alcoholics Anonymous World Services, Inc. Permission to reprint and adapt the Twelve Steps does not mean that A.A. is affiliated with this program. A.A. is a program of recovery from alcoholism only. Use of the Twelve Steps in connection with programs and activities, which are patterned after A.A., but which address other problems, does not imply otherwise.

1. Our common welfare should come first; personal recovery depends upon S.L.A.A. unity.
2. For our group purpose there is but one ultimate authority — a loving God as this Power may be expressed through our group conscience. Our leaders are but trusted servants; they do not govern.
3. The only requirement for S.L.A.A. membership is a desire to stop living out a pattern of sex and love addiction. Any two or more persons gathered together for mutual aid in recovering from sex and love addiction may call themselves an S.L.A.A. group, provided that as a group they have no other affiliation.
4. Each group should be autonomous except in matters affecting other groups or S.L.A.A. as a whole.
5. Each group has but one primary purpose — to carry its message to the sex and love addict who still suffers.
6. An S.L.A.A. group or S.L.A.A. as a whole ought never endorse, finance, or lend the S.L.A.A. name to any related facility or outside enterprise, lest problems of money, property, or prestige divert us from our primary purpose.
7. Every S.L.A.A. group ought to be fully self-supporting, declining outside contributions.
8. S.L.A.A. should remain forever nonprofessional, but our service centers may employ special workers.
9. S.L.A.A. as such ought never be organized; but we may create service boards or committees directly responsible to those they serve.
10. S.L.A.A. has no opinion on outside issues; hence the S.L.A.A. name ought never be drawn into public controversy.
11. Our public relations policy is based on attraction rather than promotion; we need always maintain personal anonymity at the level of press, radio, TV, film, and other public media. We need guard with special care the anonymity of all fellow S.L.A.A. members.
12. Anonymity is the spiritual foundation of all our traditions, ever reminding us to place principles before personalities.

*©1985 The Augustine Fellowship, S.L.A.A., Fellowship-Wide Services, Inc. All Rights Reserved. The Twelve Traditions are reprinted and adapted with permission of Alcoholics Anonymous World Services, Inc. Permission to reprint and adapt the Twelve Traditions does not mean that A.A. is affiliated with this program. A.A. is a program of recovery from alcoholism only. Use of the Twelve Traditions in connection with programs and activities, which are patterned after A.A., but which address other problems, does not imply otherwise.

1. Ultimate responsibility and authority for S.L.A.A. world services always reside in the collective conscience of our whole Fellowship.
2. The Annual Business Conference, by delegation, is the voice and conscience for our world services and of S.L.A.A. as a whole.
3. To insure effective leadership, each element of S.L.A.A. – the Conference, the Board of Trustees, staff, and committees – all possess the “Right of Decision.”
4. The “Right of Participation” is maintained by allowing members the opportunity to cast one vote up to the level at which they are trusted servants.
5. The “Right of Appeal” prevails so that minority opinion is heard and personal grievances receive careful consideration.
6. The Conference recognizes that the chief initiative and active responsibility in most world service matters should be exercised by the trustee members of the Conference acting as the Board of Trustees.
7. The Articles of Incorporation and the By-Laws of the Fellowship are legal instruments, empowering the trustees to manage and conduct world service affairs. Although the Conference Charter is a legal document; it also relies on tradition and the power of the S.L.A.A. purse for final effectiveness.
8. The trustees are the principal planners and administrators of overall policy and finance. They have custodial oversight of the separately incorporated and constantly active services, including their ability to hire staff.
9. Good service leaders, together with sound and appropriate methods of choosing them, are at all levels indispensable for our future functioning and safety. The primary world service leadership must be assumed by the Board of Trustees.
10. Every service responsibility is matched by equal service authority – the scope of this authority is always well defined whether by tradition, by resolution, by specific job description or by appropriate charters and by-laws.
11. The trustees need the best possible committees, staff, and consultants. Composition, qualifications, induction procedures, systems of rotation, and rights and duties are always matters of serious concern.
12. The Conference observes the spirit of S.L.A.A. Tradition, a. taking care that it never becomes the seat of perilous wealth or power; b. that sufficient operating funds and reserve be its prudent financial principle; c. that it place none of its members in a position of unqualified authority over others; d. that it reach all important decisions by discussion, vote, and, whenever possible, by substantial unanimity; e. that its actions never be personally punitive nor an incitement to public controversy; f. that it never perform acts of government, and that, like the Fellowship it serves, it will always remain democratic in thought and action.

*©2012 The Augustine Fellowship, S.L.A.A., Fellowship-Wide Services, Inc. All Rights Reserved. The Twelve Concepts of Alcoholics Anonymous are adapted with the permission of Alcoholics Anonymous World Services, Inc. (“AAWS”). Permission to adapt the Twelve Concepts does not mean that Alcoholics Anonymous is affiliated with this program. A.A. is a program of recovery from alcoholism only – use of A.A.’s Concepts or an adapted version in connection with programs and activities which are patterned after A.A., but which address other problems, or use in any other non-A.A. context, does not imply otherwise.

THE S.L.A.A. PREAMBLE
©1985, 2003, 2012 The Augustine Fellowship, S.LA.A., Fellowship-Wide Services, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
Sex and Love Addicts Anonymous

Sex and Love Addicts Anonymous is a Twelve Step, Twelve Tradition oriented fellowship based on the model pioneered by Alcoholics Anonymous.

The only qualification for S.L.A.A. membership is a desire to stop living out a pattern of sex and love addiction. S.L.A.A. is supported entirely through the contributions of its membership and is free to all who need it.

To counter the destructive consequences of sex and love addiction, we draw on five major resources:

1. Sobriety. Our willingness to stop acting out in our own personal bottom-line addictive behavior on a daily basis.
2. Sponsorship / Meetings. Our capacity to reach out for the supportive fellowship within S.L.A.A.
3. Steps. Our practice of the Twelve Step program of recovery to achieve sexual and emotional sobriety.
4. Service. Our giving back to the S.L.A.A. community what we continue to freely receive.
5. Spirituality. Our developing a relationship with a Power greater than ourselves which can guide and sustain us in recovery.

As a fellowship S.L.A.A. has no opinion on outside issues and seeks no controversy. S.L.A.A. is not affiliated with any other organizations, movements or causes, either religious or secular.

We are, however, united in a common focus: dealing with our addictive sexual and emotional behavior. We find a common denominator in our obsessive/compulsive patterns, which transcends any personal differences of sexual orientation or gender identity.

We need protect with special care the anonymity of every S.L.A.A. member. Additionally we try to avoid drawing undue attention to S.L.A.A. as a whole from the public media.

Conference-approved July 25, 2012

© 1990 The Augustine Fellowship, S.L.A.A., Fellowship-Wide Services, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
Sex and Love Addicts Anonymous

1. Having few healthy boundaries, we become sexually involved with and/or emotionally attached to people without knowing them.
2. Fearing abandonment and loneliness, we stay in and return to painful, destructive relationships, concealing our dependency needs from ourselves and others, growing more isolated and alienated from friends and loved ones, ourselves, and God.
3. Fearing emotional and/or sexual deprivation, we compulsively pursue and involve ourselves in one relationship after another, sometimes having more than one sexual or emotional liaison at a time.
4. We confuse love with neediness, physical and sexual attraction, pity and/or the need to rescue or be rescued.
5. We feel empty and incomplete when we are alone. Even though we fear intimacy and commitment, we continually search for relationships and sexual contacts.
6. We sexualize stress, guilt, loneliness, anger, shame, fear and envy. We use sex or emotional dependence as substitutes for nurturing care, and support.
7. We use sex and emotional involvement to manipulate and control others.
8. We become immobilized or seriously distracted by romantic or sexual obsessions or fantasies.
9. We avoid responsibility for ourselves by attaching ourselves to people who are emotionally unavailable.
10. We stay enslaved to emotional dependency, romantic intrigue, or compulsive sexual activities.
11. To avoid feeling vulnerable, we may retreat from all intimate involvement, mistaking sexual and emotional anorexia for recovery.
12. We assign magical qualities to others. We idealize and pursue them, then blame them for not fulfilling our fantasies and expectations.

40 QUESTIONS FOR SELF DIAGNOSIS
excerpted © 1985 The Augustine Fellowship, S.L.A.A., Fellowship-Wide Services, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
Sex and Love Addicts Anonymous

The following questions are designed to be used as guidelines to identifying possible signposts of sex and love addiction. They are not intended to provide a sure-fire method of diagnosis, nor can negative answers to these questions provide absolute assurance that the illness is not present. Many sex and love addicts have varying patterns which can result in very different ways of approaching and answering these questions. Despite this fact, we have found that short, to-the-point questions have often provided as effective a tool for self-diagnosis as have lengthy explanations of what sex and love addiction is. We appreciate that the diagnosis of sex and love addiction is a matter that needs to be both very serious and very private. We hope that these questions will prove helpful.

Yes [ ] No [ ] 1.) Have you ever tried to control how much sex to have or how often you would see someone?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 2.) Do you find yourself unable to stop seeing a specific person even though you know that seeing this person is destructive to you?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 3.) Do you feel that you don’t want anyone to know about your sexual or romantic activities? Do you feel you need to hide these activities from others – friends, family, co-workers, counselors, etc.?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 4.) Do you get “high” from sex and/or romance? Do you crash?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 5.) Have you had sex at inappropriate times, in inappropriate places, and/or with inappropriate people?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 6.) Do you make promises to yourself or rules for yourself concerning your sexual or romantic behavior that you find you cannot follow?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 7.) Have you had or do you have sex with someone you don’t (didn’t) want to have sex with?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 8.) Do you believe that sex and/or a relationship will make your life bearable?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 9.) Have you ever felt that you had to have sex?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 10.) Do you believe that someone can “fix” you?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 11.) Do you keep a list, written or otherwise, of the number of partners you’ve had?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 12.) Do you feel desperation or uneasiness when you are away from your lover or sexual partner?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 13.) Have you lost count of the number of sexual partners you’ve had?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 14.) Do you feel desperate about your need for a lover, sexual fix, or future mate?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 15.) Have you or do you have sex regardless of the consequences (e.g. the threat of being caught, the risk of contracting herpes, gonorrhea, AIDS, etc…)?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 16.) Do you find that you have a pattern of repeating bad relationships?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 17.) Do you feel that your only (or major) value in a relationship is your ability to perform sexually, or provide an emotional fix?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 18.) Do you feel like a lifeless puppet unless there is someone around with whom you can flirt? Do you feel that you’re not “really alive” unless you are with your sexual / romantic partner?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 19.) Do you feel entitled to sex?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 20.) Do you find yourself in a relationship that you cannot leave?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 21.) Have you ever threatened your financial stability or standing in the community by pursuing a sexual partner?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 22.) Do you believe that the problems in your “love life” result from not having enough of, or the right kind of sex? Or from continuing to remain with the “wrong” person?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 23.) Have you ever had a serious relationship threatened or destroyed because of outside sexual activity?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 24.) Do you feel that life would have no meaning without a love relationship or without sex? Do you feel that you would have no identity if you were not someone’s lover?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 25.) Do you find yourself flirting or sexualizing with someone even if you do not mean to?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 26.) Does your sexual and/or romantic behavior affect your reputation?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 27.) Do you have sex and/or “relationships” to try to deal with, or escape from life’s problems?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 28.) Do you feel uncomfortable about your masturbation because of the frequency with which you masturbate, the fantasies you engage in, the props you use, and/or the places in which you do it?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 29.) Do you engage in the practices of voyeurism, exhibitionism, etc., in ways that bring discomfort and pain?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 30.) Do you find yourself needing greater and greater variety and energy in your sexual or romantic activities just to achieve an “acceptable” level of physical and emotional relief?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 31.) Do you need to have sex, or “fall in love” in order to feel like a “real man” or a “real woman”?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 32.) Do you feel that your sexual and romantic behavior is about as rewarding as hijacking a revolving door? Are you jaded?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 33.) Are you unable to concentrate on other areas of your life because of thoughts or feelings you are having about another person or about sex?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 34.) Do you find yourself obsessing about a specific person or sexual act even though these thoughts bring pain, craving or discomfort?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 35.) Have you ever wished you could stop or control your sexual and romantic activities for a given period of time? Have you ever wished you could be less emotionally dependent?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 36.) Do you find the pain in your life increasing no matter what you do? Are you afraid that deep down you are unacceptable?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 37.) Do you feel that you lack dignity and wholeness?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 38.) Do you feel that your sexual and/or romantic life affects your spiritual life in a negative way?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 39.) Do you feel that your life is unmanageable because of your sexual and/or romantic behavior or your excessive dependency needs?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 40.) Have you ever thought that there might be more you could do with your life if you were not so driven by sexual and romantic pursuits?

S.L.A.A. SIGNS OF RECOVERY
©1990 The Augustine Fellowship, S.LA.A., Fellowship-Wide Services, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
Sex and Love Addicts Anonymous

1. We seek to develop a daily relationship with a Higher Power, knowing that we are not alone in our efforts to heal ourselves from our addiction.
2. We are willing to be vulnerable because the capacity to trust has been restored to us by our faith in a Higher Power.
3. We surrender, one day at a time, our whole life strategy of, and our obsession with the pursuit of romantic and sexual intrigue and emotional dependency.
4. We learn to avoid situations that may put us at risk physically, morally, psychologically or spiritually.
5. We learn to accept and love ourselves, to take responsibility for our own lives, and to take care of our own needs before involving ourselves with others.
6. We become willing to ask for help, allowing ourselves to be vulnerable and learning to trust and accept others.
7. We allow ourselves to work through the pain of our low self-esteem and our fears of abandonment and responsibility. We learn to feel comfortable in solitude.
8. We begin to accept our imperfections and mistakes as part of being human, healing our shame and perfectionism while working on our character defects.
9. We begin to substitute honesty for self-destructive ways of expressing emotions and feelings.
10. We become honest in expressing who we are, developing true intimacy in our relationships with ourselves and others.
11. We learn to value sex as a by-product of sharing, commitment, trust and cooperation in a partnership.
12. We are restored to sanity, on a daily basis, by participating in the process of recovery.

WHAT IS ANOREXIA IN S.L.A.A.?
excerpted © 1992 The Augustine Fellowship, S.L.A.A., Fellowship-Wide Services, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
Sex and Love Addicts Anonymous

This document is intended for sexual, social, and emotional anorectics, that they may see themselves, and know they are not alone.

Possible Signs of Social, Emotional, or Sexual Anorexia:

• we may not have had sex or been in a close personal relationship in years
• we may be in partnerships but find it difficult to be emotionally close
• we may have many acquaintances but no one we’re really close to
• we may have close relations with only certain people, our children, say, but keep distance from anyone else
• we may feel overwhelmed in social settings
• we may feel incapacitated by shyness in relationships with others
• we may be emotionally invested in a relationship but remain sexually or socially unavailable
• we may have an overwhelming dread of making phone calls
• we may function well in the workplace where intimacy is not usually valued, but find we are distant with family or friends

There are many other varieties of anorectics, but whichever kind we are, all of us in some important way have distanced ourselves from experiencing love. Faced with getting our needs met, we are baffled because we can’t even name these needs. However, beneath the surface, anorexia consists of not doing something. Not trusting, not committing, not surrendering. Here, unlike picking up a drink or shooting up a drug, anorexia’s symptoms are obscure, and uneventful. We observe that we are engaged in a policy of dread of others and a strategy to keep them at bay. Whether our anorexia is social, sexual, or emotional, we awaken to the fact that we are not experiencing the giving and receiving of love that is so precious to human life.

Hope and Recovery

You are not alone. There are many who respond as you do and who feel as you do. Or who once felt that way. We have begun to do the work of recovery and change in Sex and Love Addicts Anonymous. We endeavor to stop a pattern of sex and love anorexia and we work the Twelve Steps of S.L.A.A. We have found, no matter how different or alone we feel, that reaching out to others – to give help and to ask for it – helps us to recover from our anorexia.

Some S.L.A.A. meetings have a specific focus on anorexia. If there isn’t an anorectic meeting near you, you may want to start one. For more information about recovering from social, sexual, and emotional anorexia, including anorexia-focused meetings and literature, contact the Fellowship-Wide Services Office of S.L.A.A, www.slaafws.org.

AM I ANOREXIC? – 50 QUESTIONS FOR SELF DIAGNOSIS
excerpted © 1992 The Augustine Fellowship, S.L.A.A., Fellowship-Wide Services, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
Sex and Love Addicts Anonymous

Here are fifty questions you might want to address. There is no score for these questions. Your own instinct will tell you to what degree they apply to you. Following the questions is information, should you wish to explore further.

Yes [ ] No [ ] 1. Do you go for long periods without being involved in a sexual or romantic relationship?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 2. Do you go without social activities for extended periods of time?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 3. Although in a relationship, have you found that, for a long while, you have not experienced: romance? sexuality? intimacy? friendship?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 4. Are you alone more than you want, but feel unable to change that?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 5. At work do you have trouble developing relationships?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 6. Do you avoid relationships with a certain gender?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 7. Do you stay aloof when in groups?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 8. Are you afraid of being noticed?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 9. Does being in the presence of others exhaust you?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 10. Do you habitually panic or push people away when they start getting close?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 11. Do you usually try to withdraw from or completely control emotions?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 12. Do you feel uncomfortable when offered nurturing?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 13. Do you usually dread encountering someone to whom you are attracted?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 14. Do you feel safer when a relationship remains at the level of flirting and intrigue?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 15. Do you feel a deep pessimism about your ability to experience lasting intimate relationships?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 16. Are you continually attracted to people who don’t meet your needs?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 17. Are you afraid to relax around people because you fear it might lead to a sexual situation?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 18. Do you fantasize about having a relationship without actually pursuing a relationship?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 19. Do your sexual habits, masturbation for instance, keep you from relationships?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 20. Anhedonia means the refusal to receive or give pleasure. Do you practice it?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 21. Do you regularly disown your physical and emotional need for others?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 22. Do you have a hard time playing and having fun with others?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 23. Is it so difficult for you to set healthy boundaries with others that you withdraw completely?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 24. Does everything have to be perfect before you get involved?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 25. Do you envy more outgoing people?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 26. Do you feel your demonstrativeness is inauthentic?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 27. Does shame about your life cause you to avoid relationships?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 28. Do you use your feelings of superiority or inferiority to set yourself apart from others?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 29. Do you think that no healthy, attractive person or group of people would want someone like you?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 30. Do you have a hard time letting people know you care about them?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 31. Do you think you are not “enough” – smart enough, attractive enough, old enough, young enough, successful enough, healthy enough, enough to deserve a relationship?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 32. Do you stay in relationships because you feel you don’t deserve anything better or can’t have anything different?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 33. Do you find it overwhelmingly difficult to show emotion or to tell the truth to someone you wish to be involved with?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 34. Do you drive others away by coldness? aggression? timidity?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 35. Do you prefer being alone, rather than question the choices that keep you alone?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 36. Is your fear of rejection or of looking foolish so intense that you seem to be permanently stuck?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 37. Do you suspect that your capacity to move toward intimacy with another is damaged or dead?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 38. Do you have an overwhelming fear of being socially, sexually, or emotionally, exploited or used?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 39. Do you usually feel resentful or envious toward people who have intimate relationships or active social lives?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 40. Do you find sex repugnant?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 41. Do you feel sex is only for healthy people and will therefore never be for you?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 42. Are you more open to people you cannot be sexually close to?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 43. When you do date someone, do you set a time limit beforehand on how long you will date that person?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 44. Are you tied to your family of origin to the exclusion of others?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 45. Are you mainly attracted to unavailable people?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 46. Do you consider it not worth the trouble to engage with others because past experiences have been threatening or painful – especially if others want to get close to you?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 47. Do you feel more comfortable or more in control when you decline sex or relationship or social invitations?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 48. Are you habitually more open to strangers than those you are close to?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 49. Do you feel so different from others that you are afraid no one can care about you or understand you?

Yes [ ] No [ ] 50. Do you feel that love is missing from your life, yet don’t know what to do about it?

12 RECOMMENDED GUIDELINES FOR DEALING WITH THE MEDIA
excerpted © 1985 The Augustine Fellowship, S.L.A.A., Fellowship-Wide Services, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
Sex and Love Addicts Anonymous

1. We try to avoid drawing undue attention to S.L.A.A. as a whole from the public media.
2. S.L.A.A. has no opinion on outside issues, hence the S.L.A.A. name ought never to be drawn into public controversy.
3. Our public relations policy is based on attraction rather than promotion. (We do not court publicity.)
4. Any unilateral action, by any S.L.A.A. member acting on his/her own, to place S.L.A.A. before the public media, at any level is expressly discouraged.
5. Group conscience-based decisions need always be made regarding the appropriateness of accepting or declining any and all media or public relations opportunities, and, if an opportunity is accepted, regarding in what ways to respond, within the spirit of these guidelines.
6. All media or public relations offers which are extended to S.L.A.A. under condition of a “deadline,” which, in order to accept such an offer, would make it necessary to circumvent or shortcircuit appropriate group conscience decision-making regarding the offer, should be declined.
7. Public relations or media situations which are entered into need always be handled by at least two sober S.L.A.A. members. Participating S.L.A.A. members should make it clear that they speak only as individuals, and not for S.L.A.A. as a whole. No S.L.A.A. member should ever be in a position in which there is the appearance that he/she speaks for S.L.A.A. as a whole.
8. Any S.L.A.A. members involved in responding to media/public relations offers should utilize first name pseudonyms for this purpose. Visual anonymity is strongly recommended in all media situations involving T.V., film, or video. We need always maintain personal anonymity at the level of press, radio, T.V., film and other public media.
9. We avoid participating in public forums, workshops or other media events in which there appears to be any possibility that S.L.A.A. would be pitted against opposing or adversarial viewpoints, or spokespersons representing other interests or causes.
10. The appropriate level of “group conscience” to be consulted in matters of media or public relations is that level which represents the geographical area of S.L.A.A. to be impacted, or affected, by the prospective publicity. Media/public relations opportunities which would affect a larger level of S.L.A.A. Fellowship should be referred to the “group conscience” body operative at the larger level of S.L.A.A. Each level of “group conscience” within S.L.A.A. may, if it chooses, appoint a media/public relations conscience committee, responsible directly to the “group conscience” which appoints it, to serve as the “group conscience” decision-making body regarding media/public relations offers, at each respective S.L.A.A. service level.
11. Any media/public relations opportunities which have an aspect to them which could potentially affect S.L.A.A. as a whole, should be referred to the “group conscience” decision-making body operative at the Fellowship-Wide level, c/o the Board of Trustees.
12. It is recommended that media/public relations decision-making at any level of “group conscience” be preceded by one minute of silent meditation, so as to clear a channel through which the guiding God presence behind S.L.A.A. may make itself felt, helping to ensure that “group conscience” decisions will truly reflect this Power’s design for S.L.A.A.