Dr. Lau… (sniff, sniff) Ewwwww.
So I had a friend tell me about this book that his mother and sister gave to his wife, asking her to read “this amazing book”. So she tried. She made it about half way through the first chapter before she threw the book in the trash, telling her husband “What a (expletive deleted) piece of (expletive deleted) (expletive deleted).”
I’m pretty sure that constitutes a bad book review. I did ask why she didn’t burn the thing if she was so opposed to it to make sure no one else could read it. She said she would have felt bad about burning a book when her survival didn’t depend on it. Good for her for knowing her book burning limits.
With my curiosity now peaked, I thought it might be fun to review something that one considered to be on the same level as junk mail, dirty diapers and raw chicken juice from the last night’s dinner. Who could be responsible for such an abrasive reaction? None other than Dr. Laura. Maybe some of you have heard of her, then again maybe not. Up to this point in my life, I had never heard of the lady.
Apparently there are two different schools of thought in regards to people who have never heard of Dr. Laura. Either I have been living under a rock and have hillbilly friends (no offense meant to me and all my hillbilly friends, remember that is their opinion, not mine), or I am one bloody lucky individual to have made it through life without having to hear the diatribe of a lady who’s relationship advice is remnant of the tonal horror that is ally cat coitus (there are a fair amount of people out there that seem to have a severe abrasion to this lady).
So, I googled the old doc to see what the big deal was, and this is what I found. This is the screen shot I took after clicking on the link to take me to Dr. Laura’s web site…
Did I laugh? Yes. Did I push the button? No. Did I kind of want to? Perhaps… ok yes. Did I read anything else about Dr. Laura? I sure didn’t. Is the doc a helpful relationship therapist, or is she a crazy person? I have no idea, but when I did go to her sight she did have an ad for a FARTButton at the top of their web page displayed in a font that was larger than the name of the actual website.
Do first impressions mean something? In this case they sure did. To me, she will forever be the Fart Doctor. I just can’t get past it, and because of this mental, albeit amusing, block I had to get a hold of my friend’s wife for her synopsis of Fart Doctor’s book she threw away.
She explained that the ideas and suggestions in the book are very remnant of a 1950’s mentality where a woman’s place is in the shadow of her husband as a subservient wife. Apparently there’s a section about how men should be allowed to take 3 week hunting trips by themselves and the wife’s responsibility is to agree to it unquestionably. Apparently a solo vacation for the wife is not allowed because she has children to raise. There was also a section explaining that if a man is feeling neglected because his wife is working late or working extra hours she should quit her job so she is home when her husband wants her to be, to serve her man. And to top it off, she should never complain if her husband works late or extra hours.
Based on the review I received, the book sounds biased and unbalanced, and the advice breaks down to this: women are responsible for all the compromising and changing in a relationship and men can do what ever they want. On a personal note, if you are a man, or woman for that matter, that agrees with the subservient woman philosophy, you’re a jack ass (just my opinion).
In order to be fair, I decided to hit Amazon and look up some of the reviews by people who actually read the book. Here are a few things that the readers said about the book “The Proper Care and Feeding of Husbands”
- The 1950’s Called – They Want Their Schtick Back
- A must read!
- A little too hard core for me
- Out of Control Women and Neglected Men
- An interesting display of wisdom and ignorance
- Have an open mind & it makes sense
- How to live miserably ever after
- Makes us look at how selfish we’ve become!
- Dr. Laura at her most Dr. Laura-ish: no surprises here!
- This will help your marriage!
- Complete waste of time
- You are a disgruntled wife? Huh? Then read this book, it will HELP you.
- Even my husband thinks this book is stupid
- Every woman should read this book!
Yeah, some reviews were good and some were not. As for me, you know what I gained from this experience? First off, I now know who who Dr. Laura is, and apparently she’s a fart doctor too. Secondly and more importantly, I learned that I don’t give a flying… care about Dr. Laura and rejoice in the knowledge that I will never read any of her books.