Author Is Not Fluent In The 5 Languages Of Love

 Monday, Heavy Monday
Apr 082013
 

Real Relationship Advice

Gary1 263x300 Author Is Not Fluent In The 5 Languages Of Love

CoupleDumb tries to live with integrity and works hard not to offend unnecessarily. It is with this idea that we tend to avoid giving our opinion on other relationship ‘experts’. When some ‘experts’ garner success and notoriety because their message has struck a chord with the general population, we try to support and be happy for them. However, some of these people’s idea of providing expert advice on the topic of relationships is a simplistic belief system that would do more to hurt a relationship than help. One of these offerings is the book, “The 5 Languages of Love” by Dr. Gary Chapman. This week I am going to dissect his ideas and why these concepts are actually a superficial understanding of the relationship dynamic. Today let me focus on the writer.

Dr. Gary Chapman has been providing counseling for marriages and families for over 30 years according to his biography on his site. That is very impressive. However, when you present yourself as a “Dr.” many assume that you are either a medical doctor or have your Ph.D. in a subject matter that would qualify you to offer such a service. A quick search of the good doctor will show you that his M.R. E. and Ph.D. is from Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary (the former is a Master’s in Religious Education and it is not noted what the Ph.D. is in but you can assume it was Religious Education). Not to be a snob but does that change your mind about the ‘expert’ part of his title? I would listen to him regarding the life implications of the New Testament but I have some reservations listening to a pastor, educated in Christian doctrine, to explain relationship systems to me.

I find that his choice of presenting himself as a Dr. instead of as a Pastor or Ph.D. in Religious Education to be intentionally deceptive. We automatically have a certain respect for the letters. Of course, most of us are intelligent enough not to follow something blindly but the initials do have a gravitas that Joe Shmo just does not convey.

I have spoken about this here before. An expert needs to have more under their hat brim than just some common sense and novel ideas. Dr. Gary Chapman has 30 years of experience and that in and of itself is very impressive. However, when reading some of the questions he answers on his site, I can clearly see that his religious education is the foundation of all of his advice.

For example, when a woman asks him about his 5 Love Languages and her verbally and emotionally abusive husband, he responds by sending her to counseling to learn to “influence” her husband. No mention is made of her mental state, safety or even if she wants to leave this abusive man. No mention is made of her getting out, seeking a safe place or if she has any support system that she can count on. He puts the onus of fixing the relationship on her and tells her to seek an outside source of support to learn how to “influence” him because she won’t be able to change him. This simple exchange is enough for me to become very clear of what I think of Dr. Gary Chapman and it is altogether not very Christian.

Come back tomorrow as we dissect his 5 Love Languages.

Food Addiction

 Monday, Heavy Monday
Mar 252013
 

Real Relationship Advice

fries 300x228 Food Addiction
We have said a million times, between the two of us, we know everything. Seriously! One of us was all science and math guy and the other was all touchy-feely, Sylvia Plath and Jung. With the added interests in religion and entertainment, we pretty much cover every area of life perhaps with the exception of some pygmy tribe in the Congo. We can speak intelligently about a lot of things but one of our favorite subjects is FOOD! We can talk about food all day long with breaks only for snacks.

We are the rare combination of the two extremes of food addiction. One of us is over-weight and has struggled with obesity all of her life whereas the other at one point in his life went on a 10,000 calorie a day diet to gain weight. Skinny or fat, the addiction to food is there. And like crack heads, some things mess us up more than others. Our triggers differ but the result is the same, an unhealthy relationship with food.

Let’s face it, if you watch TV now, you know this country has a really unhealthy relationship with food. Food is no longer utilitarian; it is an event not unlike an orgasm. Not that we have anything against a good orgasm, on the contrary, we say, ‘Orgasms for everybody!’ But food should not feed the need for such intense pleasure. Food has taken its place among the pantheon of love and safety substitutes with the likes of sex, money and violence. Before, food was something fun and now we have made it an obsession.

Case in point, why did the Food Network really need to spin off another channel called ‘Cooking’. If you watch the channel at all, you see more of their shows are really about food than the actual art of cooking. They feature food trucks and neat ways people are taking comfort food and making it even more decadent (because putting a pound of butter into your mac and cheese wasn’t decadent enough, let’s use duck fat and cheese curd!). We aren’t complaining. Food television has taken the place of porn. People sit there and salivate (and we would be surprised if the occasional Bon Appetit magazine wasn’t used for something other than recipes, wink, wink.)

We are obsessed with looks and weight and yet we feature the chef taking a bite of his cuisine like a money shot. This double bind is what is making this country unhealthy. These mixed messages are saying don’t eat but take a bite of this! In the old days, this is what scientists thought caused schizophrenia. Mommy loves you now go to your room, you are punished. No wonder we all feel a little whacky these days. The double bind is all around us. We are told to eat healthier but we are also shown the science that denying yourself leads to feelings of resentment which makes us eat. This is why we can eat the duck fat French fries with the Diet Coke. They cancel each other out!

Food has become the top topic of cognitive dissonance. I can eat whatever I want if I work out. We recently observed that a woman was posting on Facebook how many calories she burned every day. The amounts usually ranged around 3000. Here is someone who is convinced that she can give up her food addiction whereas she has supplanted it with a working out addiction. The addiction is always there just waiting for you to satisfy it. Today she will be happy with 1000 jumping jacks, tomorrow it will be a hostess cherry pie. Yum!

Steubenville’s Culture Of Rape

 Monday, Heavy Monday
Mar 212013
 

Real Relationship Advice

yarn 300x300 Steubenvilles Culture Of Rape

Steubenville Ohio up until recently was a little city on the Ohio River with less than 20,000 residents. For most of us in this country unless we really followed High School football, it was a little inconsequential town. For the high school football world, Steubenville had the 20th most winningest high school football teams in the country. Now, again, for most people, that is as impressive as the biggest ball of twine. But for some, especially Steubenville Ohio, the Big Red Football team was everything.

Today, Steubenville Ohio is known for producing rapists who believed that raping an unconscious girl and recording it for posterity and mass dissemination on the internet is all fun and games. Last weekend, two young football players from the famed high school team were convicted of rape and understood that this was no longer ‘fun and games’. When the verdict came down, the boys were visibly shaken and began to cry. The reaction of the media was to grieve the loss of freedom for these two boys who had promising futures and now are condemned to be sex offenders forever more. Yes, what CNN and other news outlets said was insensitive to the victim. Yes, they could have done a better job reporting this. Rape is a violent act and there is no excuse for it. However, lest we forget the realities here, we are talking about two under aged boys who were lauded as gods in a town where everyone knew everyone. These boys are not just rapists as everyone wants to brand them. They are also the very product of a microcosm of male entitlement, violence and the definition of a rape culture.

Many are prone to blame the coaches and how they covered up this act. The football coaches knew that the rape occurred and did not stand up for the victim which is against the mandate of law which requires teachers to report abuse. For this they should be prosecuted. These men fostered the atmosphere of entitlement. They were the gate-keepers of the gods who brought fame and fortune to this little Podunk town.  These men taught these boys and encouraged them to feed on the glory they were bestowed and revel in being above the fray. They hijacked the talent of these young men and enjoyed their own fame as being the wranglers of these titans.

However, this is not a rally cry to lynch the coaches. This is a call to put much of the blame on the parents. Yes, it isn’t a popular thing to do. Yes, these poor parents have lost their sons. Yes, these boys, 17 and 16 should have known that rape was wrong but they didn’t. These boys were raised in homes that somehow communicated to them that sexually assaulting a girl was all right. They were raised in a home that somehow communicated that a woman has to protect herself and if she is caught unaware she gets what she deserves. They were raised in a home that somehow communicated that their actions had no consequences. The parents failed them. The parents did not tell them that a woman must be respected and that you cannot have sex with someone if they do not give you permission. They were not taught that women were valuable and not a play thing to be humiliated and abused and used. The parents failed to tell them that their power was a responsibility as role models to the rest of the people in Steubenville. We want to blame these boys of this heinous act but there is plenty of blame to share. These boys were raised to rape.

If we want to understand why it is that women still get raped and our politician’s talk of rape and subsequent pregnancies with the ignorance that they do, this is why. Steubenville is a case study on what small towns really think of women. Women are there to be humiliated, abused and used. The women’s movement only moved the misogyny out of the limelight and into these inconsequential little towns with football teams and balls of twine. Unfortunately, we cannot bleach Steubenville out of the American Collective Unconscious. It is part of who we are as Americans. In a sense, we are all responsible for the rape of a 16 year old girl by not weeding out these places. Perhaps with the microscope trained on this little river town, we can begin to change the conversation from one of don’t get caught to respect.

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