I'm Dysfunctional, You're Dysfunctional: The Recovery Movement and Other Self-Help Fashions - Softcover

Kaminer, Wendy

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0679745858 ISBN 13: 9780679745853

Publisher: Vintage Books, 1993

Synopsis

A critical look at the recovery movement diagnoses various groups' tendency toward authoritarianism and the cult of victimhood and evaluates the claims of gurus such as Shirley MacLaine and M. Scott Peck. Reprint. 40,000 first printing.

About this title

From the Inside Flap

obel Prize were awarded for clarity and sanity in a world gone mad, Wendy Kaminer would be on her way to Stockholm." -- Newsday

Anyone who's ever wondered why talking about addiction has become so fashionable, shuddered on hearing an "adult child" compare his upbringing with the Holocaust, or felt that admitting one's powerlessness is a frightening prospect for a participatory democracy will be delighted by this bracingly outspoken and intelligent work of social criticism.

Whether she is infiltrating twelve-step meetings and codependency workshops or evaluating the claims of gurus from Shirley MacLaine to M. Scott Peck, Wendy Kaminer deftly diagnoses a national movement (and multi-million-dollar industry) with a strong tendency toward authoritarianism, a cult of victimhood, and a nasty streak of covert religiosity.

Controversial, original, and brilliantly reasoned, I'm Dysfunctional, You're Dysfunctional changes the way we think about self-help --

Edition details

• Publisher: Vintage Books
• Publication date: 1993
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0679745858
• ISBN 13: 9780679745853
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 180