AA does not have to count the people who disappear.
That is the advantage.
The people who stay become the story. They give the speeches. They collect the coins. They say the room saved them. Some of those stories are real, and I am not interested in erasing them.
But they are not the whole record.
The whole record includes the people who walked out worse. The people who could not accept powerlessness. The people who rejected the spiritual framework. The people who were damaged by sponsor control. The people who rebuilt somewhere else but were treated like exceptions instead of evidence that recovery is bigger than AA.
That matters.
A system that claims gold-standard authority should carry gold-standard accountability.
Recovery should not be measured by loyalty to a room. It should be measured by self-command, stability, identity rebuild, proof, and the ability to live free without permanent dependency.
Full essay: https://jimlunsford.com/recovery-beyond-aa-uncounted-failure-rate/