So, I had a friend over last night, and it got quite late. So the next day, both of us are tired and resorts to watching television... And it just so happens, that nothing good is on. So we start flipping through the channels, and that's when it happens... We arrive at an episode of Dr. Phil, just as it is about to start, and we are stuck there.
The reason is, that while Dr. Phil normally just makes me smile and shake my head at the pretentious pocket-philosophy/psychology, this time, I was raging uncontrollably.
Dr. Phil was being a complete douche. The topic was something about two daughters, who felt their mother was a horrible person. The first thing they brought up was that she apparently crashed the wedding of her former husband(the girl's father) to a new husband. The mother claims she came by that church by accident. The daughters counter that she had to be chased off by the security guards.
At this point, it all seems like a regular Dr. Phil episode, some people that have behaved scandalous, and drama ensues.
However, then things start to evolve in a different direction.
The mother claims that the girls are being manipulated by their father, that he has been lying to them, after he cheated on her. This is a wide claim, of course, and the daughters deny that it is so. The mother then asks if they saw her being chased off by security, and they have to admit that they didn't. Dr. Phil doesn't seem to take interest in this fact, though. Still not so bad, although I'm starting to get the impression that the mother is not the standard Ineedmy15minutesofame dramaqueen, since she is very calm and somewhat constructed in her arguments.
Then the bad stuff begins. Dr. Phil mentions an episode, in which the mother hosted a party for her 18-year old son and his friends. The party is alcohol free - the police actually turns up at the party, and tests the guests with alco-metres, which concludes that none of the guests has had any alcohol. Dr. Phil, lead on by the woman's daughters, then starts going on about how she planned that party in order to play a prank on the police, alledgedly as "revenge" because they are keeping her under surveillance. Pretty far fetched, really. I mean, if you are under surveillance, part of the idea is that you don't know about it.
The reason she was under surveillance was, apparently, that she has been hosting other parties for her son and his friends, where she allowed them to drink. This is against american law, since they are not allowed to drink until 21(or is it just that you aren't allowed to buy or be served alcohol until then?), and Dr. Phil starts telling her off for that.
The mother explains it with:
- The kids would drink anyway, so she prefered to give the safe conditions, and keep it where she can keep an eye on them
- The alcohol-free party was her attempt to show the kids that fun could be had without alcohol
and that seems pretty solid reasons to me. In fact, in my mind, that is both pretty standard and responsible parenting. I come from a country where the young are allowed to purchase alcohol from the age of 16, but many have their first encounter with alcohol at the age of 13-14. What the mother has done is nothing but what every responsible parent does.
But Dr. Phil doesn't see it that way. His only response, presenting no "evidence" and no real reasoning, is "Let me ask you two things: Do you really believe that yourself? And do you really expect me to believe that?" The audience applauds him like a roman emperor.
The two girls, constantly on the verge of tears, and suddenly starts talking about that her irresponsible behavious might come from her own mother, who abused her. The mother is absolutely shocked, but remains her composure(again, exhibiting non-camwhorish behaviour, and I get the feeling that the only reason she is even there, is becuase she wants to be able to defend herself, when her daughters go on Dr.Phil), and denies that her mother ever abused her, and asks the daughters where they heard that. She asks them if it was her father that told them(again, bringin up that she believes all the ill will directed towards her is the girl's father's attempts at removing focus from and discrediting her claim that he was cheating on her). The girls deny that it is so, but fails to explain where they heard it, if not from their father.
Suddenly, another episode is brought up - the mother apparently has picked up her son after a party, in which he had got drunk. Dr. Phil critizises her for that. I have no idea why, since to me, what is the alternative? That he drive himself? That he falls asleep in a gutter? What's wring with picking up your child after a party? Then, Dr. Phil, in his smug, acussing voice says that she didn't even bring him home. She dropped him off by one of his friends. The mother admits this, and Dr. Phil and audience is absolutely appaled. The mother says that the friend's parents were home. This doesn't seem to redeem it one bit in the eyes of Dr. Phil, defender of morals.
And that's about that. The show brought up these things the mother had done, and slandered her on that basis. I was absolutely appaled. Here sits a woman, who has, to my eyes, done nothing wrong, and Dr. Phil is making her out to be a terrible mother, and horrible person, and making a fool out of her in front of millions of viewers, with the help of his audience. And the wors part of it was, thatit was so obvious, that they had nothing on her. She had done nothing wrong, she could explain her actions calmly and thorough, and yet, Dr. Phil continued going in circles, trying to make a bad picture of her, with the thinnest reasons, if he even bothered to, instead of just calling her a liar and offering no counter-explanation, as he actually did most of the time. Conveniently enough, her two sons, of whom one got the impression that they were on their mother's side, were not on the show. Dr. Phil wanted to protect them from this "hard process". Strangely enough, the mother's third daughter, 13 of age and still living with her mother, was there, so she could tell how unsafe she felt when there were drunken people in the house.
Going over my posts, I see it's long, and doesn't half convey the actual rage I felt. I was in utter disbelief. It was a complete farce, the like of I have never seen in talkshows before, not becuase it was scandalous and had those dramaqueen that are of a different reality, but because here sat a completely good woman, and she was publicly humiliated for doing nothing wrong at all. I'm sorry that I can't describe the episode better, so you have more facts and a better image to go on. But it was horrible, in that "I have to laugh, becuase this is so unreal" kindda way. In fact, a friend of mine called me up during the show, telling me to turn it on(I was alrady watching), and he was raging as hard as I was.
I'm not excactly sure what this thread is for. I primarily wanted to vent my rage, and hopefully, some of you out there know the episode I speak of, or have had similar experiences.
A second topic of the thread could be what you think of talk-shows.
EDIT: The show in question is here: http://www.drphil.com/shows/show/1077/
Also, there is a discussion on Dr. Phils own boards, and some of the replies there convey some of my views on this, especially the fourth reply, which seems to be a dane too.
The reason is, that while Dr. Phil normally just makes me smile and shake my head at the pretentious pocket-philosophy/psychology, this time, I was raging uncontrollably.
Dr. Phil was being a complete douche. The topic was something about two daughters, who felt their mother was a horrible person. The first thing they brought up was that she apparently crashed the wedding of her former husband(the girl's father) to a new husband. The mother claims she came by that church by accident. The daughters counter that she had to be chased off by the security guards.
At this point, it all seems like a regular Dr. Phil episode, some people that have behaved scandalous, and drama ensues.
However, then things start to evolve in a different direction.
The mother claims that the girls are being manipulated by their father, that he has been lying to them, after he cheated on her. This is a wide claim, of course, and the daughters deny that it is so. The mother then asks if they saw her being chased off by security, and they have to admit that they didn't. Dr. Phil doesn't seem to take interest in this fact, though. Still not so bad, although I'm starting to get the impression that the mother is not the standard Ineedmy15minutesofame dramaqueen, since she is very calm and somewhat constructed in her arguments.
Then the bad stuff begins. Dr. Phil mentions an episode, in which the mother hosted a party for her 18-year old son and his friends. The party is alcohol free - the police actually turns up at the party, and tests the guests with alco-metres, which concludes that none of the guests has had any alcohol. Dr. Phil, lead on by the woman's daughters, then starts going on about how she planned that party in order to play a prank on the police, alledgedly as "revenge" because they are keeping her under surveillance. Pretty far fetched, really. I mean, if you are under surveillance, part of the idea is that you don't know about it.
The reason she was under surveillance was, apparently, that she has been hosting other parties for her son and his friends, where she allowed them to drink. This is against american law, since they are not allowed to drink until 21(or is it just that you aren't allowed to buy or be served alcohol until then?), and Dr. Phil starts telling her off for that.
The mother explains it with:
- The kids would drink anyway, so she prefered to give the safe conditions, and keep it where she can keep an eye on them
- The alcohol-free party was her attempt to show the kids that fun could be had without alcohol
and that seems pretty solid reasons to me. In fact, in my mind, that is both pretty standard and responsible parenting. I come from a country where the young are allowed to purchase alcohol from the age of 16, but many have their first encounter with alcohol at the age of 13-14. What the mother has done is nothing but what every responsible parent does.
But Dr. Phil doesn't see it that way. His only response, presenting no "evidence" and no real reasoning, is "Let me ask you two things: Do you really believe that yourself? And do you really expect me to believe that?" The audience applauds him like a roman emperor.
The two girls, constantly on the verge of tears, and suddenly starts talking about that her irresponsible behavious might come from her own mother, who abused her. The mother is absolutely shocked, but remains her composure(again, exhibiting non-camwhorish behaviour, and I get the feeling that the only reason she is even there, is becuase she wants to be able to defend herself, when her daughters go on Dr.Phil), and denies that her mother ever abused her, and asks the daughters where they heard that. She asks them if it was her father that told them(again, bringin up that she believes all the ill will directed towards her is the girl's father's attempts at removing focus from and discrediting her claim that he was cheating on her). The girls deny that it is so, but fails to explain where they heard it, if not from their father.
Suddenly, another episode is brought up - the mother apparently has picked up her son after a party, in which he had got drunk. Dr. Phil critizises her for that. I have no idea why, since to me, what is the alternative? That he drive himself? That he falls asleep in a gutter? What's wring with picking up your child after a party? Then, Dr. Phil, in his smug, acussing voice says that she didn't even bring him home. She dropped him off by one of his friends. The mother admits this, and Dr. Phil and audience is absolutely appaled. The mother says that the friend's parents were home. This doesn't seem to redeem it one bit in the eyes of Dr. Phil, defender of morals.
And that's about that. The show brought up these things the mother had done, and slandered her on that basis. I was absolutely appaled. Here sits a woman, who has, to my eyes, done nothing wrong, and Dr. Phil is making her out to be a terrible mother, and horrible person, and making a fool out of her in front of millions of viewers, with the help of his audience. And the wors part of it was, thatit was so obvious, that they had nothing on her. She had done nothing wrong, she could explain her actions calmly and thorough, and yet, Dr. Phil continued going in circles, trying to make a bad picture of her, with the thinnest reasons, if he even bothered to, instead of just calling her a liar and offering no counter-explanation, as he actually did most of the time. Conveniently enough, her two sons, of whom one got the impression that they were on their mother's side, were not on the show. Dr. Phil wanted to protect them from this "hard process". Strangely enough, the mother's third daughter, 13 of age and still living with her mother, was there, so she could tell how unsafe she felt when there were drunken people in the house.
Going over my posts, I see it's long, and doesn't half convey the actual rage I felt. I was in utter disbelief. It was a complete farce, the like of I have never seen in talkshows before, not becuase it was scandalous and had those dramaqueen that are of a different reality, but because here sat a completely good woman, and she was publicly humiliated for doing nothing wrong at all. I'm sorry that I can't describe the episode better, so you have more facts and a better image to go on. But it was horrible, in that "I have to laugh, becuase this is so unreal" kindda way. In fact, a friend of mine called me up during the show, telling me to turn it on(I was alrady watching), and he was raging as hard as I was.
I'm not excactly sure what this thread is for. I primarily wanted to vent my rage, and hopefully, some of you out there know the episode I speak of, or have had similar experiences.
A second topic of the thread could be what you think of talk-shows.
EDIT: The show in question is here: http://www.drphil.com/shows/show/1077/
Also, there is a discussion on Dr. Phils own boards, and some of the replies there convey some of my views on this, especially the fourth reply, which seems to be a dane too.
