Douglas Rushkoff has an interesting essay on Alcoholic Anonymous in his book, 'You are being lied to'.

He basically is saying that AA becomes kind of a self fulfilling prophecy. They pound into your brain that all it takes is just one drink and you are fucked again just as you came into the program. I have been a member for a couple years about a decade ago, and I saw that a few people would probably have been dead without it, but the majority had enough self control that they could have pulled themselves out of alcoholism by some other means.

Their is IMO a danger of there constant one liners reinforcing the idea that there is no other hope but AA such as:

Don't drink, don't think and go to meetings

A. A. is the last stop on the train

Surrender to become Victorious

The bottle, big house, or the box

Death, insanity, or recovery.

We don't get run over by the train, we get hit by the engine (1st. drink).

Don't work my program, or your program, work "the program"

If you can't remember your last drink, maybe you haven't had it.

Underneath every skirt is a slip.

The farther I get from my last drink, the closer I get to my next drunk

Once an alcoholic always an alcoholic.

As I said before, there are definitely cases that have no choice but the extreme. I cannot knock it wholeheartedly. But I do believe there is a definite self fulfilling prophecy element to it. It was constantly drilled into my brain that if I didn't do the steps, didn't go to meetings, I would be dead or in jail.

What turned me around was myself, I just got tired of living the way I used to. I stayed sober for about a year after I left the program, and very cautiously I went out to a bar with my buddies.

I'm a hard drinker, I definitely have a compulsion to get hammered. But I actually had to relearn that just because I take one drink, doesn't mean I have to keep drinking as the program implies will happen.

Now don't get me wrong, I get hammered maybe 4 or 5 times out of a year now, but I used to drink daily. Like I said, it was a self realization that I couldn't drink my problems away and it was making my situation worse that fixed it for me.

IMO AA is not entirely a cult, but there are definitely some cult like attitudes going on in the program. If you absolutely need it, it should be a last resort. But do not join unless you are completely out of options.