07/18/2008
An Oprahtic lifestyle
(Some of the) reasons I find Oprah Winfrey repulsive:
1. She's elitist, building a school in South Africa that won't necessarily help to educate young girls but will absolutely create an instant upper class of the "chosen," and presenting a model of "big give" charity that simply involves giving people things, often with an underlying-but-still-pretty-obvious advertising-related motivation.
2. She and her team of doctors support pseudoscientific beliefs in reiki, vitamins-as-medicine, and past-life regression.
3. She regularly promotes The Secret, which is at best bullshit and at worst fascist philosophy. (And somewhere in the middle of that spectrum is "selfishness" or "self-absorption.")
4. She seems to have a bit of a God complex, no?
A 35-year-old writer in Chicago has started the Living Oprah blog, in which she will chronicle her attempts to follow all of Oprah's "lifestyle suggestions" for a year. This will be amazing.
15:45 Permalink | Comments (3) | Email this | Tags: oprah, the secret, alternative medicine
Comments
I would love to agree with you PR especially regarding the God complex but I don't want to forever ruin my chances of oneday getting a book featured on Oprah's Book Club
:-)
Posted by: squib | 07/18/2008
RE: the first concern, I'd also want to know how sustainable one very good school is for the society. Assuming most of the graduates move away, either to the big city or the west, you've helped the big city and the west, but not the community they come from. (At least, not as much as a solid trade school.)
Posted by: Dan tdaxp | 07/19/2008
squib,
You can always just pull a Franzen and become famous for turning the Great and Holy Oprah down. Though that might not work a second time ...
Dan,
Exactly ... Oprah & friends really don't seem to get what's wrong with the "one very good school" concept.
Posted by: PrimroseRoad | 07/20/2008
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