So I made the mistake of listening to a radio show the other day called Dr. Laura. It is on an AM talk radio station called 630 CHED, which features almost no actual news but a full spectrum of talk radio.
The shows on this talk radio station are basically a clearinghouse of right wing moral hypocrisy and hillbilly ignorance that will usually insult anyone with a brain. I would be surprised if anyone on this station had a high school education and all of them carry around archaic ideas about immigration, education, guns, religion's role in society, homosexuality and basically any form of progress we have made to becoming a more fair, tolerant and peaceful society.
Dr. Laura is a syndicated american talk radio show that is picked up by stations all over north america. People call in with their problems and Dr. Laura gives them advice, a lot like the T.V. show Frasier.
I can't say since I don't actually know, but I suspect Dr. Laura didn't attend any Med School. So I assume her title of Doctor was earned either by winning at the tabletop game Doctor or by calling herself a Doctor kind of like Colonel Sanders called himself a Colonel.
Another possibility is that she somehow has a PhD. I suppose that could happen. Another possibility was that maybe she was inside someone's house who earned a PhD and took it off their wall, crossed out their name and wrote hers on it.
Her show is popular because she is considered to be an unwavering moral champion of tough love. She has no patience with people who lie to themselves and she tells it like it is even if it hurts. If this was true it would be somewhat commendable. It is difficult and sometimes risky to tell people things they don't want to admit to themselves. This is true providing of course you have a relationship with that person and some actual insight into their situation. It is not true if you don't. Its neither difficult nor risky to give advice to strangers. And that's the problem with Dr. Laura.
None of her callers get more than 15 seconds to describe their situation. Any detail that seems extra is instantly discarded. Within that time Dr. Laura has already identified the type of person making the call, their problem and selected the appropriate formula solution to solve it.
Unfortunately Dr. Laura seems to only use about 4 different categories of people and problems. Since there are millions of people and problems which she's presented with other than the 4 she understands, only 4 in a million will fit into one of her categories. But since there are only 4, they're going to have to fit in somehow. So all the factual details of the problem that don't fit or contradict her categorization she ignores.
That is probably why the caller gets 15 seconds. Any more time would bring out all the troublesome facts of their situation that would make her advice look shallow and incomplete. It doesn't help that she is an idiot anyway and even if she understood the problem her advice would actually be wrong. Dr. Laura is also a religious right wing lunatic who is not surprisingly a homophobic bigot and against women putting a career before their family. In fact it's one of her views that women have a duty to their children before their career. That sounds right but it is actually incredibly stupid. Imagine the worlds best cardiologist is a woman, but she refuses to do a triple bypass on the woman researcher who could cure cancer because she has to drive her kid to his clarinet lessons.
Women have just as much the talents and the obligations to contribute to the human race as men. Anyone who discourages women from pursuing a meaningful career is obstructing them . However if Dr. Laura's kids kept her home from work everybody wins.
I'm off topic. People call Dr. Laura because they are in some kind of crisis. They genuinely want guidance with how to handle their situation, they are vulnerable and highly suggestible. This is not a good time for bad advice. Too bad their lives are in the hands of someone who isn't listening. That is what is so appalling. Her carelessness with the futures of people looking to her for help is very wrong.
It seems strange that people would take advice from someone who gives them 15 seconds to explain their problem. But its because she tells them that she is smart and that it only takes 15 seconds because it is actually very simple. Problems can be diagnosed and solved in less time than it takes to microwave bacon. Which you should assume is what you are truly meant to be doing with your life. So just like everybody in the self help field she survives on public acceptance of the notion that there are easy answers.
Anyone who tells you there are easy answers is lying. The question you have to ask yourself is why are they lying. The best possible scenario is that they are well intentioned and they actually think there are easy answers. That is okay, it just means they're wrong and you shouldn't listen to them. A worse scenario is that they know there are no easy answers, but they are lying to you anyway. That means not only is their guidance wrong, but they are also manipulating you for some reason.
Life is not simple. Lots of people will suggest to you that life looks complicated on the surface, but underneath it is truly simple. That is fucking backwards. Life looks simple on the surface and gets more complex the deeper you go. A shallow understanding is easy, a deeper understanding is difficult. But as it happens it is also closer to the truth.
You may not agree with this, life may seem simple for you, everything is usually pretty clear and obvious. I propose that maybe everything is currently harmonious and therefore appears simple, but take a moment and think about how many little things are going on right now that cause that appearance of simplicity.
Now think of how much it would take to spin that easy harmony into utter fucking chaos.
So that brings me back to Dr. Laura. She is a dangerous simpleton who gives advice that could easily kick your life straight into utter chaos. The only promise she makes is that you will never have to deal with the exhausting mental effort of comprehending life's subtleties. You will never get a headache from recognizing the puzzles in the details of your catastrophe and your role in it because you pretend those details don't exist.
Conventional wisdom is that truth can be recognized by the fact that it seems obvious. This makes sense. When you think about things that are true they do appear obvious. It's true that the sky is blue, it is also obvious. It's true that I am a big mouth, it is also obvious.
But the fact that the sky is blue is not simple. Neither is the fact that I'm a big mouth. They rest on a very deep set of other truths which result in that truth. Is that simple, nope. So why does it appear to be? Because it is harmonious with our expectations and so it is obvious, which we then consider to be simple.
However it is not my friends. And I'm selling you the same scam as Dr. Laura. I'm making it sound like I know the truth, everything I've written is the same patronizing tune as all those fuckers I want you to ignore. Well I am just one view and if was you I wouldn't trust me either. I have no answers for you and all the times I said I did were lies. Even this one. Skepticism is your only defense against the liars, popes, presidents, and Darth Vaders of this world.