The newcomer, on the advice of the Elder, quit his medication, had a stroke, and is now crippled for life. The members of the groups are so restricted in their ability to think that they often engage in dishonest behavior without even being aware of it. Members' subservience to the group causes them to cut ties with family, friends, and personal pre-group goals and interests. The most outstanding public example of this is Rosanne Barr, who publicly denounces her parents. The group's leadership induces guilt feelings in members in order to control them.
Guilt is only secondary to fear as a motivating factor for group members.
Members are expected to devote inordinate amounts of time to the group. Even when not required, the results of indoctrination are usually a narrowing of a grouper's relationships to only other groupers. When I read them, I wonder what meetings they attended. I have not been all over the world, but I have attended meetings in several states and there is little similarity between what I just read and what I see. The suggestion that AA cuts people off from their family, with Roseanne Barr a prime example, is the opposite of my experience.