Achieving Grace through Self Help

I only ever had a vague memory of how beautifully Paul Simon and Art Garfunkel's voices blended from back when my parents still listened to them in our house. I remember the original S & G's Greatest hits; Peter, Paul and Mary; Johnny Cash, Live from Folsom Prison; Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass, and a few others that I'd probably have to see again to remember. These were the last sounds to fill our house before I developed my own taste in music and before my dad switched permanently to talk radio.

A few years later, I remember seeing Simon and Garfunkel on Saturday Night Live together. They'd broken up, but got back together for the show for some reason. That caused me to be aware that Garfunkel had released some solo albums, but they never quite turned into much and so from that point on, and especially after a number of Paul Simon solo hits as I was growing up, I always wondered why Simon ever kept this guy around. Once my parents quit listening to them, I'd only ever hear their songs on the radio at work or while other things were going on so I never really paid attention and it was only rarely that the sound quality could do the vocals justice anyway. I always assumed I only liked their songs together because they reminded me of that wonderful time when my parents were still cool enough to play real music.

Last year I got a digitally remastered copy of a two disc "greatest hits" and actually listened to it on a decent system with no distractions. Here's the point: Art Garfunkel's voice is one of the purest, clearest, most brilliantly beautiful sounds I've ever heard. It is Grace (with a capital G) unleashed upon us earthly creatures. Like Ben Franklin said of beer: "it's proof God loves us and wants us to have fun."

Don't really know where all that came from, but if you haven't listened to Bridge Over Troubled Water in a while, do yourself a favor. It'll remind you why Simon kept him around as long as he did. Oh yeah, I told you that story to tell you this one...

Those were some of the last sounds to emanate from my dad's stereo speakers before talk radio took over. Much like its effect on the rest of the world, commercial talk radio represented the demise of rational thought in our household. From that point on, good music was no longer acceptable. I tried hard. I bought dad the cassette deck to go along with the Willie Nelson album I got him for Christmas one year. We played it a couple of times, but after that, no more music. Just that talk radio crap. Even worse, it was AM talk radio.

By now you must know where I'm going with this, but here's where the idea came from: I'm reading SHAM by Steve Salerno. It's about how the self-help industry is leaving us helpless. He titled it based on his self-coined acronym - Self-Help And Motivation (industry.)

Anyway, Salerno's real point is that while most of us just pass self-help off as, at worst, an annoying but amusing fad, its effect on all of us is worse than we imagine. It costs even those of us who would never buy it more than we think.

Salerno splits his description of the industry into two camps: the victimization camp and the empowerment camp. The victimization folks believe that nothing is their fault, rapidly destroying all sense of personal responsibility... like say joining the national guard to avoid the draft, but then never fulfilling your obligations, and then, when questioned about it during a presidential campaign, never producing the DD214 that would clear up all the questions, thus not living up to one's personal obligations and being perfectly fine with it. Republicans usually call these people Democrats.

The empowerment folk believe that simply setting one's mind to something and trying it is good enough, regardless of whether you accomplish anything or are even remotely qualified to even try it... like, say, being the president of a horse club, but really wanting to run a federal agency. So empowerment means you can do whatever you want regardless of your ability, desire, means, or qualifications... kind of like being above the rules. Democrats call these people Republicans.

How, you ask, does this apply at all to talk radio? Well, it seems to me that both Rush Limbaugh and Bill O'reilly are graduates of both camps. Rush was a victim when he accepted public assistance during leaner times, but an expert on fairness when he suggests cutting such "entitlement" programs now that he's rich. He was a victim of his housecleaner's unrelenting supply of Vicodin, but now he's empowered to talk about the illegality of abortion clinic funding. O'reilly is blameless when caught masturbating with tele-porn, but empowered to write a teen advice book.

Those instances, by themselves, are no more than humorous anecdotes. Pure entertainment, but Rush and Bill, like their predecessor, Paul Harvey, often blur the lines between entertaining political commentary and paid advertising. Unlike John Stewart, who cries foul whenever he hears people say they "get their news" from The Daily Show, Rush and Bill never make those pleas. They never distinguish among entertainment (what they do,) political expertise (what they and their fans claim,) and paid endorsements for products they talk about. Again, for those of us who are familiar with valid, logical arguments, the relevance of facts, and the common fallacies invoked by those with little truth on their side, this is innocent entertainment. I admire the fortune Bill and Rush have amassed with their mastery of oversimplification and false logic. And since it's only entertainment, what harm could it do?

But in the last 10 years, their oversimplification and false logic seems to sum up the way we choose political leaders. Fit it into a sound bite, take it as gospel, ignore all the contrary, obvious evidence, and go about your business. It's the empowerment argument. Then when something goes wrong, blame everyone and everything else (like partisan politics) and become a victim.

This trend really has made its way into public policy. Personal religious beliefs are being turned into laws for the greater good and protection of all mankind even though not all of mankind shares those personal religious beliefs and they offer no real protection from anything. The empowerment camp struck a victory when faith-based programs like Alcoholics Anonymous received government funding even though little or no documented evidence exists supporting those programs' success. In fact, according to Salerno, a 1995 study by Harvard Med says those NOT in AA stood a better chance of quitting drinking.

What really amazes me about this now $8.5 billion is how it defies the very trends that it replaces. Granted, business consultants preach a different brand of help, but the Continuous Improvement, Baldridge Total Quality, TQM, Value Added, whatever the hell you want to call it movement is all about measuring and tracking results and yet there is NO documented evidence that we've received anything in return for the $8.5 billion this industry has sucked out of us all. And don't think just cuz you haven't bought anything to contribute to Tony Robbins's $80 million a year income you haven't paid for some of it. Corporations shell out big bucks to hire these guys to "train" employees. Guess who ends up paying for that? Not only is there no evidence that it helps, but the growth of sales suggests we're worse off for all the crap we've already bought... we must need even MORE help as a result of it. This market is supposed to increase even more dramatically. Actually, that's about the only logical thing I see in these trends. The SHAM folks have us all convinced we're empowered enough to move up to the next level of training, or that we're victims who need their help to deal with what we deserve. Man are we idiots.

So anyway, listen to Art Garfunkel again. I hope that guy's still getting some royalty checks, cuz that's therapy that works! And like George Carlin says, "if you're readin' it in a book, it ain't SELF help, it's HELP."

Chow,
Luth