nonunique and unalone: the institutional purpose
Johnette Foltz said she wanted Erdedy and Gompert to see how completely nonunique and unalone they were in terms of the Substance that had brought them both down.
Context
The Identify-not-Compare doctrine as an institutional errand. Johnette drives the House's two marijuana casualties to the one NA meeting devoted to grass specifically so they can witness their own non-specialness — the deflation of the addict's conviction of being a unique case, met with a whole room of people ruined the identical way. The theme's mechanism is exactly the White Flag one (you are not unique; this hopelessness unites everyone here), applied as therapy: the cure for the isolating specialness at the heart of the Disease is the sight of two dozen strangers with the same story. Recovery begins when "nonunique and unalone" stops being an insult and becomes a relief.