Dear Dr. Laura,
I went to the Barnes & Noble website to buy "The Proper Care & Feeding of Husbands". I was annoyed at the negative reviews. While you may not be bothered by such anymore, I could not let one attack go and reported it as contrary to the review guidelines. I then posted my own. I just had had enough of inaccurate info being passed on and on.
My review was:
"It is interesting that many of the negative reviews this book has generated are based on personal bias against the author, inaccurate gossip or misunderstandings of the concepts. Any review that contains personal attacks on any author should be viewed with skepticism. To clarify some misrepresentations, Dr. Laura has never been a gym teacher. Her doctorate is in physiology, which is defined as the scientific study of function in living systems; a sub-discipline of biology. Its focus is in how organisms, organ systems, organs, cells, and bio-molecules carry out the chemical or physical functions that exist in a living system. Her post-doctoral certification is in Marriage, Family, and Child Counseling from the University of Southern California. She was also on the faculty of the Graduate Psychology Department at Pepperdine University.
The book does not advocate that women take abuse. In fact, the first page of the book clearly states that if a man is addicted, an adulterer or abusive the advice in the book is not applicable.
This book is intended to remind women of the power they hold in the marital relationship. Too many women believe the wedding is the goal and they stop doing all the girlfriend behaviors that won her the man. They look at their relationship as a sibling rivalry and not a partnership. If a man wants something, he's being controlling. If a woman wants something then a man has to be attentive to her needs, which men should never have for their own. Husbands become sidelined as peripheral appendages and something to be tolerated. A woman should not view giving a man his preference about something as her having lost something or that he has won something, and thus depriving her. Too often women want to prove to a man that they will not be controlled by him, which they do by proving how they don't need him. A woman needs a man like a fish needs a bicycle! If you keep showing and telling a man that you don't need him, don't be surprised when he finds someone who does need him. The intent of this book is to get women to treat their men as they did when they looked at him with respect, admiration and love. The overall concept is to encourage women to treat men kindly, which is now seen by some as derogatory. The book does not support a woman being subservient to a man or being his doormat, but seeks to remind a woman how to use her feminine charms, which she employed in her girlfriend days with desired results. The point of the book is the proviso, choose wisely and treat kindly. For further reading, try O. Henry's the Gift of the Magi."
Linda
