# Dr. Phil's Shills



## Lester Burnham (Jun 2, 2008)

Following are excerpts from Dr. Phil’s “Relationship Rescue”, in his individual letters to men and women. I have edited them for the sake of brevity but nothing is out of context. What you see is what you get.

First the letter to women:

“Speaking personally and to blow the whistle on my brethren, we men don’t get it!…It doesn’t matter why; what matters is that we just don’t get it. The really stupid stuff we do, and , more important, don’t do, comes from ignorance and from…a bizarre set of priorities…”

“…we measure success very narrowly…from a huge financial perspective. We lose sight that you need love…This caveman mentality……we seek to control by intimidation…to hide our fear and doubt.”

“…that doesn’t mean in our own fumbling, bumbling way that we don’t care.” 

And now from the letter to men:

“…if the lady in your life went to the trouble…to buy this book, you could be in a lot of trouble, buddy. …I want to give you a wake up call here.”

“You can continue to blame her for whatever has happened in your relationship. But in the end, that dog won’t hunt--and you know it. Is it worth it to avoid a chance at happiness because you…hate to admit you’ve got a lot of improvements to make? …you can use this book to find out how you went off course in your life…to find out how to get yourself out of that ditch.”

Translation: Ladies, it is as you have always known, nothing bad in your relationship is your fault. It’s him. And men, the problem is you, stupid.

It’s time to “blow the whistle” on Dr. Phil.

Either all troubled relationships are a paring of highly enlightened women with Neanderthal idiots, or, and I think this is it, Phil McGraw knows in order to sell books he has play on women’s erroneous belief that things are just that way. That is the is guiding principal for success in the massive junk psychology market, in which McGraw is the current golden child. The strategy is to target and exploit women who are unhappy in relationships because they are generally the ones more open to seeking professional advice. If these women start out knowing they contribute to some of their own difficulties, Dr. Phil and others will help them get over that for the little more than the price of a good cappuccino. 

Now, multiply the cost of that cappuccino by say, ten million.

Blanket exoneration is an easy sell. It’s lazy and disingenuous to tell people what they already believe, especially if what they believe is the very thing hurting them. But it is often profitable. With all the moral foundation of an Enron executive, he capitalizes on, and worsens their problems instead of offering viable solutions. His method for accomplishing this is simple. He lies to the people that trust him. 

He encourages women to shun accountability and to control men with the same caveman-like intimidation he claims to abhor. He does this with all the finesse of a schoolyard bully. Try watching his show. 

Despite his supposedly wonderful and sensitive distaste for measuring success in dollars, he is doing just that. The growing spectacle of his success, despite the toxicity of his message, is an ongoing testament to that.

I don’t have a problem with him having a #1 _New York Times _bestseller, or ten of them, but I do think that fiction belongs on the fiction shelf. The consequences of peddling this stuff as reality are just too great.

You’d think we would know better by now, but people still have an unfortunate tendency to over-trust authority. Put a Ph.D. after someone’s name, bolster them with the power of mass media and we, for some god-awful reason, toss our common sense in the dumpster like an empty beer can. We actually forget that relationships involve problems from both sides. Scarier, we do that even when the “authority” is engaged in such shameless pandering.

Read over the quotes above again and ask yourself one simple question. Do you believe that the picture he paints of men and women will help anyone build a good relationship or repair a bad one? If you really think the answer is yes, then it’s possible your boat has drifted a long, long way from shore. I can only suggest you start rowing with everything you’ve got. If finding solutions to relationship problems is contingent on believing that half of the partnership is never right and the other half is never wrong then we can all hang it up. There will be no solutions.

Never.

I can tell you that most married couples that enter therapy almost always come in pointing the finger at each other. Usually the only reason they are there to begin with is because they fantasize the therapist will take their side and help them beat up on their partner. Consequently, the first challenge of many therapists is to get either of them to shut up long enough to think about why they are there.

People don’t need help finger pointing. They need help to stop it. 

In all honesty, I know many men who think this lop-sided understanding defines what is wrong with their relationship in the first place. So does our good old Texas boy Phil. But those men don’t buy the books, their wives and girlfriends do. 

Even more alarming is that so many women are taken in by it. It seems to be an accepted absolute in marketing to women that you must tell them exactly what they want to hear (no snickering, guys). Marketing tells us much more about people than psychology ever did. 

To some degree this is true with everyone. After all, you can’t sell Kobe beef to a vegan, even at ground-round prices. Still, it is more than shocking that so many millions of women are so desperate to believe that what they have been told about men is true that they will pay even the most transparent charlatan to do so. 

False beliefs need regular reinforcement or the light of day will eventually shine through. Pity women (and men) the professionals that are oh so available to block that light.

I am no expert on relationships, and never claimed to be. I am not convinced that anyone is. But I know calculated bullshit when I see it. And I know that relationships in trouble need two mature adults invested in solving problems, whoever’s lap those problems lay in. Sometimes they need help with this. No shame in it. The only real shame is when people seek help and end up counting on a huckster disguised as prophet.


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