Here’s an interview with Dr. Laura Schlessinger on her recent book The Proper Care and Feeding of Marriage. What strikes me as particularly good about her advice is that she doesn’t muddy gender roles, ignoring the existential fact of obvious differences between men and women.
Beginning her research on this book, she says she expected she would “rail against metrosexual stupidity.” To her surprise, she found that men and women generally have different expectations from marriage; women want a dependable manly man; men a woman with some feminine grace.
Interesting interview. A few years ago I used to listen to her on the radio, and somedays she could be absolutely brutal. But I always admired her hard-headed good sense and her humour, which is probably why so many phoned in for advice; for someone to verbally thrash and rake them over the coals, something to break the pattern of their own stupidity.
Sam wrote:
Rich for her to be telling people how to live isn’t it?
“While working at USC, she met Dr. Lewis G. Bishop, who was married with dependent children. According to divorce filings, Schlessinger and Bishop began an affair. Bishop left his wife after more than 20 years of marriage, and moved in with Schlessinger. They lived together as an unmarried couple, and Schlessinger tried to get pregnant after reversing an earlier tubal ligation and suffering an ectopic pregnancy. They married in early 1985, eight years after beginning their relationship, and Bishop became Schlessinger’s business manager. Schlessinger bore their only child, Deryk Schlessinger, in November 1985, when she was 38.”
Really very rich indeed.
Posted on 19-Aug-07 at 11:31 am | Permalink
Aaron Unruh wrote:
I know. Crazy that she’s telling people how to live their lives when they call her show and ask her how she thinks they should live their lives.
I love these substantive criticisms from the left.
Posted on 19-Aug-07 at 3:49 pm | Permalink
anon wrote:
Aaron, always the disingenuous ass. Very obviously (at least obvious to anyone not being purposely dishonest) is that the problem is that she draws generalizations from the small sample of morons that call her show, or that she assumes that she speaks for everyone when in fact she speaks for a very small number of people that WISH they spoke for everyone.
You should develop a bit of intellectual honesty.
Posted on 19-Aug-07 at 6:21 pm | Permalink
George Freeman wrote:
Anon, on the subject of disingenuous ass, do you have a serious criticism or not?
Sam suggests that someone who has made serious mistakes in their own life and openly admits to them, is in no position to speak to matters of good moral judgement. To the contrary, in realizing the error of one’s ways, repenting, struggling to change and improving their character, such a person is among the best qualified to speak to matters of moral judgement. Do you not agree?
As for your comments, Anon, are you saying she simply pillaged the archived calls to her radio show in researching her book? She does have a PhD.
Second, I don’t recall Dr. Laura ever claiming to speak for everyone. On the contrary, the idea of having a call-in radio show entails the obvious recognition that one does not speak for everyone. And who is this “small number of people” who wish they spoke for everyone”?
Posted on 19-Aug-07 at 10:24 pm | Permalink
Greg Farries wrote:
Love or hate her, her advice is often right on the money. I used to listen to her when I worked in agriculture, and her advice often centered around personal responsibility. If you make a mistake - and we all make mistakes - you have to take responsibility for the mistake and learn from the mistake (meaning, don’t make the same mistake twice).
As to her coloured past, big deal.
Posted on 20-Aug-07 at 7:58 am | Permalink
Canadian Cynic: If the irony were any thicker: "The Politic" edition. wrote:
[…] can you explain the way the Canadian Whackjob-o-sphere makes my life so freakin’ easy? Like with this previously-referenced piece over at The He-Man Woman Hater’s Club, where club member Greg Farries gets all, like, noble and […]
Posted on 20-Aug-07 at 1:42 pm | Permalink
George Freeman wrote:
Well said, Greg.
Funny how Canadian Cynic regularly links to The Politic, seemingly his favourite homophobic misogynistic (and every other pathological category of hate) backwater of cyberspace. But if we at The Politic were really so terrible, so vengefully lacking in critical thought, why is he linking to us, and all the time?
Could it be that The Politic provides a breath of fresh air to such dogmatically earnest and humourless cynics?
I suspect we threaten the despair of this bleak down drum blogophile. Without us, he wouldn’t have much to write about.
Posted on 20-Aug-07 at 2:27 pm | Permalink
smarter than balbie wrote:
It’s a meaningless exercise in futility to write thoughtful on-topic comments only to have Cyntie and his echo chamber of semi-literate screeds mock and deride you. They have no shame, no honor and no honesty. I tell you what, Whoooeee! they gots me chewin nails and fartin tacks.
Posted on 20-Aug-07 at 3:04 pm | Permalink
Aaron Unruh wrote:
Oh no, he called you “Georgie.” Dat’s some cleverassitude if you ask me.
Posted on 21-Aug-07 at 2:35 am | Permalink
Semi-literate screed wrote:
Funny how Canadian Cynic regularly links to The Politic, seemingly his favourite homophobic misogynistic (and every other pathological category of hate) backwater of cyberspace. But if we at The Politic were really so terrible, so vengefully lacking in critical thought, why is he linking to us, and all the time?
Well, as he’s explained before, similar to a bank robber, The Politic is where the stupid is.
Aaron Unruh himself is a particularly loaded vault, just begging to be cracked…
So, girls…smarten up if you want to be taken seriously.
Posted on 21-Aug-07 at 9:05 am | Permalink
Shane wrote:
I have to sound off as well on the idiocy of people who decry anyone with a past as being hypocrites. Basically, nobody can speak to anyone on moral issues because,
1) if they have a past they are a hypocrite who doesn’t practice what they preach, and hence should be ignored; OR
2) a) if they have no past that you can find, they’ve GOT to have SOMETHING in their closet, and they’re just hiding it deceptively; OR
b) if they really have no past, then they are a goody two-shoes, and have nothing to say because they’ve never “lived” or have no “experience” or are “naive”.
Posted on 21-Aug-07 at 9:13 am | Permalink
Aaron Unruh wrote:
“Well, as he’s explained before, similar to a bank robber, The Politic is where the stupid is.”
As he’s explained? That’s funny. Official commentary from an official drone.
Seriously, I’ve always had the impression that CC is trying to mimic someone. Like this guy. Except that he can’t write and doesn’t appear to be particularly bright, so instead we get him writing about “fuckery” and “dumbassitude” and calling every woman that disagrees with him a “cunt.”
Posted on 21-Aug-07 at 10:49 am | Permalink