New Boyfriend Alert

I just wrote a ranty comment on Col’s Blog, regarding alarmist bird flu reporting, which led me to Amazon, so I could look up the name of the guy who wrote The Culture of Fear (Barry Glassner–awesome book), which led me to my new boyfriend, Frank Furedi.

I haven’t read a word of the man’s prose, other than his titles, but the titles are enough. A sampling:

-Culture of Fear: Risk-Taking and the Morality of Low Expectations
-Politics of Fear
-The Imaginary Timebomb: Why An Ageing Population is Not a Social Problem
-Paranoid Parenting: Why Ignoring the Experts May Be Best for Your Child
-Therapy Culture: Cultivating Vulnerability in an Uncertain Age
-and finally, my very favorite, Where Have All the Intellectuals Gone?

I want one in every color.

I love the subtitle of Therapy Culture–that about sums it up, to my mind. Not regarding therapy itself, necessarily (I’m a big fan, have benefited hugely from it–in fact, have become far less vulnerable and anxious–and will probably be signing on with a new shrink in the near future), but all of it. The fear-mongering news, the doubt-seeding advertisers, this idea that we can be happy 24/7 and ultimately cheat death, and if we’re not knocking ourselves out to achieve those goals, there’s something wrong. (I also want to read this guy.) Cultivating vulnerability in an uncertain age. Yep.

And as for therapy itself, a good friend of mine has an ex-therapist she’s still in touch with–the lines got blurred a long time ago, and they became friends without much of a break between that and the patient/therapist relationship. That was problem one. Problem two is that, even though this friend has tried to distance herself from this highly unethical therapist/friend–who speaks to her like neither of those things, but more like a controlling mother–when they do have contact, the message coming from the “professional” always seems to be the same: you are too weak to survive your own damn life. This friend has endured a lot of hard shit without breaking, and I think of her as an extremely strong person. The ex-therapist, apparently, doesn’t. She actually sent an e-mail to my friend recently in which she warned that a large life decision my friend made might result in grief and anxiety that would “consume [her] soul.” Like, Jesus, don’t mince words, lady. This is a practicing therapist speaking to an ex-client, using her authority to foster fear and self-doubt. Where to begin?

So, yeah, I’m a huge fan of therapy when you’re lucky enough to find a good therapist–which I have been, twice–but I do worry a lot about those who aren’t so lucky. The friend I’m talking about is incredibly intelligent and insightful, but she’s also a trusting person carrying a lot of baggage. When you’re already vulnerable, it’s not always easy to see through people who don’t have your best interests at heart–especially when those people sincerely think they do, and are just too fucked-up themselves to create appropriate boundaries. When I was studying social work, I discovered that many of my classmates were former addicts, abuse victims, homeless people, welfare recipients, etc.–they were drawn to the work because they wanted to help people like themselves. I imagine the same is true of psychology, and thus I imagine a whole lot of therapists started out just as batshit and/or issue-laden as the rest of us, if not more. You hope they’ve fully recovered before they start practicing. But what if they haven’t?

I don’t have an answer to that. Maybe Furedi does. Off to the bookstore.