Friday, July 6, 2012

Skippy Vs. Susan B. Anthony in a Fight to the Death

You remember Dr. Gina Loudon, the bush league Dana Loesch who was ejected from the St. Louis Tea Party, probably for not bringing enough napkins and doll furniture?  Well, you'll be happy to know that she continues to soldier on, broadcasting an unnecessary talk show to various minor radio markets in the Midwest -- the kind of towns and cities that will likely suffer some of the earliest, sustained effects of Global Climate Change, and will spend the next twenty years being slowly burnt off the face of the earth, like a cosmic dermatologist taking after a Plantars wart with a surgical laser.

Dr. Gina's specialty, as you may recall, is policology ("the nexus of politics and psychology," even though she's neither a political scientist nor a psychologist, and her Ph.D appears to have been bought from that same arcade on the Jersey Shore where they print up those fake newspaper headlines for birthdays), a discipline which she's having considerably less success foisting on the rubes than Harold Hill had in hawking the "Think System."  But she has picked up one apostle, Dr. Dathan Paterno, with whom she's written a new book, and this week he gives us a preview of its thesis by scientifically proving that his own daughter is an idiot.

But just who "Dathan Paterno"?  Well, judging by his name alone, you might assume he was a Star Wars character who was somehow embroiled with the Penn State sex scandal, but not so.  According to his WorldNetDaily bio:
Dathan Paterno, Psy.D., is a licensed clinical psychologist and clinical director of Park Ridge Psychological Services.
This is even more impressive than it sounds, for not only has Dr. Paterno achieved the prestigious position of clinical director, he's also the owner of Park Ridge Psychological Services, a double honor rarely seen outside of Sy Sperling's dual position at Hair Club for Men.
Dr. Paterno's Philosophy
Dr. Paterno affirms that all people are biological, social, and spiritual beings.
Thanks for the daily affirmation, Doc.
He adamantly denies the currently held myth that emotional disorders/problems are the result of genetically transmitted, biochemical imbalances. While he recognizes that biological factors are relevant to psychological/social/emotional problems, he sees "symptoms" as meaningful and purposeful, within the holistic context of the person. This means that almost all problems are essentially normal responses to abnormal situations.
Dathan obtained his doctorate at the Illinois School of Professional Psychology, a part of the Argosy University diploma mill chain, which appears to share certain similarities with Fielding Graduate University, where Dr. Gina earned -- or at least acquired -- both her Masters and Ph.D in 2011 (as reader Joseph remarked, "Ha!  She got a MA and a PhD in the same year? I wonder how hard she had to work for that").  So it's small wonder that they hit it off.
Dr. Paterno denies that psychotropic medications are necessary, effective, or generally safe. Instead, he utilizes non-medical alternatives, which have been proven -- in an ever-expanding body of research and also in his professional experience -- to be largely more effective, safe, and humane.

Leeches, for instance, do a much more efficient job of keeping your black and yellow humors in balance than Xanax does.

Okay, since he's clearly not going to give us any decent drugs, let's see what kind of advice Dr. Dathan dispenses:
WHY FEMINISTS DON'T LIKE PEANUT BUTTER AND JELLY
Exclusive: Dathan Paterno uses popular sandwich to explain marriage, Natural Law
In this, Dathan emulates Plato, who famously used the gyro to explain his Theory of Forms, first by describing the pure essence of Lunch, then by exploring how that aspatial and atemporal archetype gains expression in the world of matter or substance through the addition of various toppings. 

This past weekend, I was driving with my family when my adolescent daughter noticed a car with a bumper sticker that read, “Behind every great woman is … herself.”

“What does that mean, Dad?” Now, I love my kids, but they’re especially adorable when they toss me softball questions like this.
I don't have a daughter, but if I did I don't think I'd assign her to serve as the family's male hustler/White House correspondent -- I'd probably just make her wash the dishes, or pick up the dog poop.
While I knew that the bumper sticker was meant to be clever, pithy and provocative, I also knew that the assertion revealed one of the essential fallacies of the modern feminist movement. Given that my and Dr. Gina Loudon’s new book addresses this very topic, the coincidence seemed uncanny.
 Yes.  Yes, "uncanny" would be one word for that coincidence.  "Improbable," would be another, although "bullshit" would more likely be the mot juste.
 I couldn’t resist a teaching moment.

“It means that woman believes that she is utterly self-sufficient, that all of her success is due to herself – her own skills, drive, talents, character, temperament – and that no one else should share any credit or glory for what she has become.”
"Fortunately, she's become the uncannily convenient tool I'm going to use to demolish your self-confidence before you develop free will and a personality and threaten to slip off the short, asphyxiating emotional leash I've got you on."
“You mean, not even her parents, teachers, or God?”

“Apparently so.”
Wait -- is he talking to his adolescent daughter, or that clay hound from Davy and Goliath?
“I wonder if she is married.”
No, honey.  Even though some states have made progress toward marriage equality for gays and lesbians, strawmen and bumpersticker slogans still can't legally wed.
“I sure hope not.” Almost immediately, I receive an elbow to the ribs from my wife (a former feminist who did her graduate studies in the California University system, before I took her away from all of that).
It was a lovely abduction wedding, but every once in awhile the Stockholm Syndrome goes into remission and she starts to struggle.  It's really not a problem, except on those rare occasions when she attacks me and makes a break for freedom while I'm driving.
  I added, “Why would she want to be married if she wants to be behind herself for everything?"
 Dathan's wife, on the other hand, is merely beside herself.
 "And what man would want to be married to a woman who didn’t need him for anything?”
This bumpersticker is a bitch.
I can see my precious girl mulling it over. “Mom, you need Dad, don’t you?” Oh, from the mouths of babes. During a few moments of silence that ensue, I sense the tension in my wife’s mind, calculating whether to use this moment to zing me or to play the dutiful, genuine godly spouse.
"It depends how her fugue state is doing.  If she's having a lucid moment, there's always the third possibility that she'll throw open the passenger door while the car is still in motion and attempt to tuck and roll down the embankment."
Safe money is on the former, so I jump in: “Mommy needs me like peanut butter needs jelly to make PB&J … which also means that I need her just as much.”
To begin with, she's essential to my ventriloquist act.
“So God is the bread?”
Wait.  Sorry.  Back up.  This is your adolescent daughter, right?  Not your adorable, 4-year old moppet, hugging her Raggedy Ann doll and lisping guileless, wide-eyed questions, but a kid whose age has reached the low double digits? 
“Yep. God loves PB&J, so he made it so that men need women and all of their beauty and wonderful strengths and skills, and women need men and all of their awesome strengths and skills. But He also knows that both of them need Him, so He holds them together in Himself. That is what marriage is.”
It'll be interesting to see how you explain her period.  "Well Baby, you know how when that last bit of Trix cereal sits at the bottom of the bowl for awhile, and it gets all soggy and turns the milk into kind of a purple sludge, and it's all gross and you just pour it down the sink?  Well, that's what God's doing with your uterus."
 Sadly, these two were mixed without benefit of clergy, and are now living in sin.
“So if we had a bumper sticker about that, what would it say?”

“I think it would reflect what we believe – something like, ‘Behind every great woman is the Lord, and behind many great women stand the parents, siblings, teachers, friends and husband He provided for her.’”
God is sort of like a matrimonial Public Defenders office.  If you cannot afford a husband, one will be provided for you at no cost.

But this raises the question, if a great woman's success is due, not to herself, but to her parents, siblings, teachers, friends, and husband, then what's so great about her? Well, maybe nothing, but you've got to admit that her Rolodex is pretty impressive.
A woman needs a man, as Gloria Steinem once opined, like a fish needs a bicycle. Yet women need men because men have what they do not
 Gills?  A sissy bar?
 – and are not supposed to – possess.
Ohhh, I see.  So really, if Gloria had been honest, she would have opined that a woman needs a man like a bicycle needs a penis.
 Modern, radical feminism whispers this sweet-smelling lie to women: that women can be uniquely and utterly independent and have evolved beyond the weakness of needing others, especially those irrelevant, barbaric men.
And even intelligent, successful modern women need Barbarians, because sometimes in the Spring, along with the silverfish under the sink, you'll get Aquilonians in your Hyborea.  But try to call during the week, because they get time-and-a-half on Saturdays.
Just as Satan’s whispers in the Garden of Eden promised the seductive notion of radical independence from God and His sovereignty, radical feminism promises radical independence from God and His Natural Law.
So if the produce manager at your local market mentions that they just got in a nice shipment of Granny Smiths, you're legally allowed to stab him, because what jury is going to convict you for killing Satan?
 Our new book, “Ladies and Gentlemen, Why the Survival of Our Republic Depends on the Return of Honor,” describes the follies and pitfalls of radical feminism and its adoptive parents, modern liberalism and atheism. 
It's like My Two Dads, but with more sandwich metaphors.
If we are to reclaim the soul of this great republic and redeem it for God’s glory and for the good of our children and grandchildren, we must recognize the sweet-smelling, seductive lies that have wafted through our culture, while learning to challenge them in light of the truth of Scripture and God’s Natural Law.
In the Garden of Eden, the sound of seductive lies wafted on the sibilant tones of a talking snake; nowadays they're delivered with the aerosol hiss of a can of Febreze.

15 comments:

Keith said...

OMG, you're on fire. Lord have mercy.

D. Sidhe said...

“It means that woman believes that she is utterly self-sufficient, that all of her success is due to herself – her own skills, drive, talents, character, temperament – and that no one else should share any credit or glory for what she has become.”

Or, hey, maybe it's just Ayn Rand's old car.

Yeah, I don't like peanut butter and jelly because peanut butter gives me a migraine. So I've learned to do without unless I want a headache. Call it a little parable.

Happy anniversary, belated, to Scott and Mary. My partner and I went off orca watching for ours, and then I had a migraine until, uh, actually I still have it. Anyway, sorry I missed that, the cats are adorable. Nagi does that with her paws, it's cute as hell.

Cole said...

“It means that WEALTHY LIBERTARIAN believes that HE is utterly self-sufficient, that all of HIS success is due to HIMSELF – HIS own skills, drive, talents, character, temperament – and that no one else should share any credit or glory for what HE has become.”

Fixorated for the other wingnut assholes.

ifthethunderdontgetya™³²®© said...

Dr. Gina's specialty, as you may recall, is policology

I'd have gone with psycholitics.
~

Carl said...

Dr. Paterno affirms that all people are biological, social, and spiritual beings.

In other affirmations, Dr Paterno asserted that water may be wet, air may be good for breathing, and he's not entirely sure he;s worked this whole "shoelace" thing out, but his shoes are on his feet.

Dathan: Shaka, when the walls fell

BillyWitchDoctor said...

Cole beat me to it. When it's tax time, a teabagger expects to be lauded most high for shrieking, I ain't owe nobody nuffin!!1, yet when some uppity bitch claims she doesn't need a man to be happy...well! Please refer to the matter of Dan Quayle v Murphy Brown (which wrong-wing pundits now agree Dan-Dan won most handily).

Weasel Tracks said...

No one seems to have mentioned the saying that this bumpersticker riffs on. Perhaps it's a generational thing — I haven't heard it in a while, so maybe you all aren't even aware of it.
"Behind every successful man is a woman." This hoary mot is itself rather feminist, though from dim, prefeminist times, but together with the bumpersticker it adds meaning to the latter. Many successful men have been helped by their wives, but to be a successful woman, one had better not expect such support. Not an argument but a pointer to consider. Not the same interpretation as Dr. Dathan.

Debbi said...

That was truly breathtaking.

I'd reblog it or something, but I'm dragging my gimpy ass off on mostly device-free holiday. Ha ha ha ...

Be seeing you! :)

maryclev said...

Well, D. Sidhe, while you and your partner went orca watching, we sat on the couch and watched Robert Shaw pilot his boat, "Orca" , to a final and bloody end, chasing down a shark that finally ate him.

There's a lesson there, but I'm not sure what it is...

Rheinhard said...

Goddamit, it's not the "University of Pennsylvania sex scandal"!! It's the PENN STATE sex scandal!!11!

University of Pennsylvania: Ivy-league university, founded by Benjamin Franklin, one-time home of the good Dr. Elizabeth Warren.

Penn State: Pennsylvania State U, founded in 1855, most well known for football.

Spread the two apart! I already got peeved when, the other weekend, I pulled out my U. Penn VISA card to pay for a purchase and was asked "Oh, you went to Penn? Did you know Sandusky?" And I remarked, "there was a reason the Penn bookstore sold T-shirts emblazoned with the logo 'NOT PENN STATE'!"

Scott said...

My apologies, Rheinhard -- I've made the correction. I guess I just naturally assume that any institution founded by Benjamin Franklin would tend to attract deviants (and yes, I realize this view is probably just an outmoded stereotype, except maybe when it comes to the Post Office. And the super-pervy Almanac industry).

Li'l Innocent said...

Whaddaya figure, Dathan's spouse married him for the laughs?

At any rate, we now know that God, in his modern goopy guise, digs peanut butter and jelly. A reassuring concept - and an improvement on Jehovah, who I always picture eating ram fat and Gentile babies, if he ate anything.

jackd said...

sometimes...you'll get Aquilonians in your Hyborea

Definitely wielding a savage sword there, Scott.

Unholy Moses said...

""Well Baby, you know how when that last bit of Trix cereal sits at the bottom of the bowl for awhile, and it gets all soggy and turns the milk into kind of a purple sludge, and it's all gross and you just pour it down the sink? Well, that's what God's doing with your uterus."

Thank god I have a son. Otherwise, I'd have used this bit of pure, amazing genius on my daughter.

Anonymous said...

I am really upset that his wife has not escaped. With her daughter. He ANSWERS FOR HER even in the article - it's so very creepy.

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