Frightening book titles

[WanderingKnight]

I was in the library today picking up some inter-library loans (Why People Believe Wierd Things by Michael Shermer - highly recommended so far). While I was waiting I saw a shelf full of books other people had requested.

One which caught my eye was A Parent's Guide toPreventing Homosexuality (1)

Now... I don't know if homosexuality is genetic or if it's a choice, and as far as I know the scientific evidence is shaky either way. But the attitude that it's something that needs to be "fixed" or "prevented" is what scares the crap out of me.

Imagine some poor teen, confused about his (or her) sexuality finding this book on his parents nightstand?

Some of the reviews on Amazon are telling, I think;

a silly, extremely close-minded and paranoid work guaranteed to preserve the status quo of messing people up while they're young so that they will then rush off to see PhD's like Nicolosi when they're older. Call it planned obsolescence for minds.

This book does nothing but further societal hate and prejudice on an already oppressed and misunderstood minority. This is not science; it's hate.
Statistics show that the number one reason for young people commit suicide is the direct result of their parent's refusing to accept their sexuality.
This book has nothing positive to offer; unless you are a closed minded, right-wing fanatic who would rather see your children commit suicide rather than live a health productive life.

Don't think I could have put it better myself.





(1) by by Joseph, Phd Nicolosi, Linda Ames Nicolosi here's the book on Amazon

 

[Chaos]

We have an old encyclopedia from the 60´s lying around which states that homosexuality "is a (usually treatable) disease".

Nice, huh? But that was the 60´s for you. I would not have thought anyone published that crap these days.

 

[Mr Manifesto]

Now, let's see... what does Mr Manifesto have from his selection of Bad Books...

Ah ha! "God is a Match-Maker" by Derek Prince. It's all about how to be properly married in the eyes of the Lord.

Here's what it says about the role of a woman in the household:

It is generally the wife who markets, brings home the food, cooks it and serves it. She does the laundry and keeps the home clean. She is responsible for decorating it appropriately. During the years the children are small, much of her activity centers in the home. The woman has the responsibility to God and to her husband to mold and shape the characters of the little lives that are entrusted to them.

Sounds like one of those 1950's homemaker factsheets that get faxed around offices for a giggle, doesn't it? Well, this book was written in 1986. Last published in 1999. Progress, eh?

 

[epepke]

We have an old encyclopedia from the 60´s lying around which states that homosexuality "is a (usually treatable) disease".

Nice, huh? But that was the 60´s for you. I would not have thought anyone published that crap these days.

The World Health Organization didn't stop considering homosexuality a disease until 1981.

 

[Wyvern]

More frightening book titles (although I can't top your example):

Mysticism and the New Physics - Michael Talbot

On firewalking: "All attempts to explain it in the framework of classical physics have so far proved unsuccessful, and only underline the phenomenon as an incongruity, a glistening unreality in the maya of our classical conception of space-time and causality."

Huh????

Men are Not Cost-Effective - June Stephenson, Ph.D.

Excerpted from back cover: "Men commit the most crime in America, outnumbering women in prisons 94 to 6. Yet women are expected to pay their unfair share for this essentially male pursuit.

June Stephenson has an idea: a tax on men".

I have to admit, as a woman I find this title amusing. But even I admit it is a p^ss poor premise. And if I were a man I would be angered by it.

Beyond Machiavelli - Fisher, Kopelman, Scheider

'nuff said

 

[iSani]

Here's a classic:

How to Good-Bye Depression: If You Constrict Anus 100 Times Everyday. Malarkey? or Effective Way?

I think constricting anus 100 times and denting navel 100 times in succession everyday is effective to good-bye depression and take back youth. You can do so at a boring meeting or in a subway.

From the same author:

Rejuvenation and Unveiled Hidden Phenix: Carlos Castaneda Shamanism Plus a After His Death

As I discuss in Rejuvenation and Unveiled Hidden Phenix, I think the following points are essential for us to attain the goal of Inca-Shamanism. They are: stopping your breath automatically, sleeping without losing consciousness, circulating your energy in your physical body, cleaning up your central energy pipe, making the beautiful, strong, energetic core of abdomen flexible and firm, good spine, the secret of physiognomy, good complexion, rejuvenation, fasting, influence of other people and of devils, cutting the pipe of floating devil above your head, good relationship with opposite sex, dependable self-importance, good repentance, imagining powerful men such as Christ and absorbing the power of various voices and of various flights. So, I have added them.

 

[ceo_esq]

The World Health Organization didn't stop considering homosexuality a disease until 1981.

Just a sidebar here. In Homosexuality and American Psychiatry: The Politics of Diagnosis (Princeton UP 1987), a scholarly study of the American Psychiatric Association's decision to change the diagnostic classification of homosexuality, Ronald Bayer (professor at the Columbia School of Public Health and National Academy of Sciences member) concluded:

The entire process, from the first confrontation organized by gay demonstrators to the referendum demanded by orthodox psychiatrists, seemed to violate the most basic expectations about how questions of science should be resolved. Instead of being engaged in sober discussion of data, psychiatrists were swept up in a political controversy. The result was not a conclusion based on an approximation of the scientific truth as dictated by reason, but was instead an action demanded by the ideological temper of the times.

Though a non-scientist myself, I have a hard time viewing homosexuality as a pathology. Still, it's a little disturbing to think that a rational scientific organization would proceed in such a manner.