In my opinion he is a good guy - tells it like it is. A no nonsense kind of person. And I like that he provides a road map if one choose to follow it on how to change or alter bac behavior.
Thanks for the link, soz. Interesting article.
This has turned out to be an interesting thread.
I agreed with the speaker who found Dr. Phil a quilty pleasure because he is a mass culture product. When I started college in 1965, during the age of David White and . . . senior moment . . . that media critic out of the University of Toronto who wrote the Media is the Massage . . . everyone was concerned about mass culture v. high culture.
Dr. Phil as commercial product bothers me.
Dr. Phil was a psychologist bored with counselling (by his own admission) who was brought back to psychology by Oprah -- a woman who made herself very powerful through television -- bothers me even more. (If you remember, Oprah met him when the beef industry tried to skewer her for an innocuous remark about hamburger and McGraw was doing jury selection advising or something like that.)
I have seen Rickie Lake and find her talk show host lite. She isn't experienced enough with life to really run a talk show. I've also seen Maury Povich -- for about 15 minutes, which is all that I can stomach.
When Phil showed up on Letterman, I was impressed with his wit. I think he would be a great person to be in a gourmet club with -- the table banter would always be bright and fun. I'm not certain, however, if I would want to see a therapist who was bored with therapy. To put such a person on television, consoling the masses makes me wonder whether we as a nation are in need of a medicine man, which is more akin to what he is than a psychologist. (I say this because some of the medicine man's efficacy was due to position within the tribe and by putting McGraw on television, he has assumed a prominent position within the American tribe.)
It concerns me that he sometimes yells at people on his show. Some of them need to be yelled at. Certainly, many of the weight loss people are a self-pitying bunch and a bitch slap rather than a diet is probably better medicine for most of them.
But what does it say when people want to watch a man yell at others? Does he do what we want to do? Are we living vicariously through him?
Now, I like some of the common sense things he says and that's why -- in addition to his quick wit -- I enjoy him. Common sense is something sorely lacking in our commercially driven culture. But it bothers me when he yells at people because I am not entirely certain what it says about the people in the audience applauding him.
Does the studio and the larger audience take him as a father figure? Again, as I said initially, there is something of the preacher in him and does the audience see him as a kind of ideal clergyman, fixing our spirits without making us too guilty? We can all go to the tent revival of television and be saved for the hour, then turn off the show and go about our daily lives, unchanged, without reprecussions.
Bottom line for me: If he was a psychologist self-admittedly bored with counselling, he does NOT belong in the profession at all, on television or anywhere else. It seems sales were more his calling. Screw him. I take no heed in anything this sham says. He is a self-centered guy who happens to know a thing or two about the American psyche, namely that a lot of them are whining babies, and through the Oprah show, and their audience selection process, you can find enough to build a career on. Pfft...bad news....
He could be discerned as a parody of Frasier which is a parody of an on-the-air psychiatrist to begin with. The people who are picked are those nearly without a clue -- he wouldn't last a second with someone who has some smarts.
cav,
I know Oprah has lots of fans and I acknowledge that she is probably one of the top ten most powerful (alright, maybe influential is a better word choice) people in the country but I have not had a very good experience as an Oprah viewer.
The first time I watched her was several years ago, but still several years after she became a phenomenon. Her guests that day were two Black sisters, one a quiet and shy woman, the other a big mouth. The loud sister was a fashion designer and, frankly, although the two women were obviously sisters, the quieter one was by far the prettier of the two. I'm not certain what the quiet sister did for a living but she seemed a professional person.
The obnoxious sister "made over" the quiet one. There wasn't a significant difference, she looked nice in both the "before" photos and the way her sister fixed her hair and clothes. The quiet sister seemed like she wanted the earth to open up and swallow her. Oprah and the obnoxious sister were doing the girlfriend routine and totally humiliating the quiet woman. I wished she would have walked off the set and with the words, "I want my life back."
The second time I watched her was about two years ago when she was heavy into S.S. Kresge spiritualism, lighting candles and talking about feeling good.
The third time was a week or two ago and she showed grizzly crimes. Ugh!
plainoldme, all that tells me is that Oprah likes people who yell a lot, as that makes good television, and brings in ratings. Just because she can, Oprah either goes lowbrow, or talks about her own troubled life, depending on her mood. How can anyone take that seriously? I truly feel sorry for that quiet sister, and I would feel worse if Dr. Phil was bullying her into "getting her act together."
cav,
You would have felt more for the quiet sister had you seen the show. Oprah turned to her and asked what she had learned from the make over. With her head down, she said, "I learned to try to keep it up." I remember during the 50s and 60s when working class women and girls had annual -- at best twice annual -- haircuts that included the dreaded home perm, people would compliment them on their new look by telling them to "keep it up this time." As though they could afford hair dos!
Personaly I prefer Dr. Who to Dr. Phill but that's just me.
It's a bird, it's a plane, it's the Tardis!!!!
After watching Phil with the young girl and her baby - I'm gaining more respect for him. I haven't been on the Phil team.
At the risk of opening a big can of worms, I truly felt that girl should have had an abortion.
If she had gotten an abortion then I'm betting - there wouldn't be a show. IMO
Well, of course there would have been no show, but an abortion does less harm to the body of a 15 y/o than a pregnancy. There probably isn't a 15 y/o anywhere capable of being a mother. This girl seems less capable than most.
I think the popularity of Dr. Phil, an obvious father figure, may be due to the high divorce rate and the absence of fathers in children's lives.
Dr. Phil. you mean the over weight guy who preaches about diets and weight loss...lol...the guy is a joke...imo
Consider what Dr. Phil largely does: yell at people. I think America wants to be yelled at, corrected and disciplined.
The people on his show are unbelievable. The Dr. Phil families are, frankly, candidates for rubber rooms. The hideous 15 year old with her baby and her upset parents is a walking ad for Roe v. Wade. It's amazing that a girl as physically unattractive of she is found boys willing to have sex with her -- and there were several. Her attitude is awful: if there was a license for parenthood, she wouldn't receive one.
There is something like the pioneering tv program Queen for a Day about Dr. Phil. People receive prizes and opportunities to compensate for their miserable lives.
Queen for a Day was a radio bit started by Howard Stern years ago. Is there now a TV program?
Queen for a Day was a daytime TV show which ran from 1956 to 1964.
http://us.imdb.com/title/tt0048895/
I learn something new every day here at A2K...
