Smile or Die: How Positive Thinking Fooled America and the World
Explores the tyranny of positive thinking, and offers a history of how it came to be the dominant mode in the USA. This book argues passionately that the insistence on being cheerful actually leads to a lonely focus inwards, a blaming of oneself for any misfortunes, and thus to political apathy....
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Explores the tyranny of positive thinking, and offers a history of how it came to be the dominant mode in the USA. This book argues passionately that the insistence on being cheerful actually leads to a lonely focus inwards, a blaming of oneself for any misfortunes, and thus to political apathy. It reveals the dark side of the nation.
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Format: paperback
ISBN:
9781847081735 (1847081738)
Publish date: 2010
Publisher: Granta Books
Pages no: 235
Edition language: English
When I picked Barbara Ehrenreich’s Bright-Sided up from the library, I was almost embarrassed to be seen with the book, even going so far as hiding the cover under those of the other books in my stack. The promotion of positivity is so pervasive in our society that I felt self-conscious checking out...
I sought this out after reading Ehrenreich's L.A. Times essay on her experience with breast cancer. The first chapter of this book is indeed called "Smile or Die: The Bright Side of Cancer." Because I'm shallow, I didn't find the transition from the personal to the political a smooth one. It works t...
Everyone who read and preaches The Secret and everyone in the Irish Government and senior Civil Service should be forcefed this book. Barbara Ehrenreich got breast cancer and got annoyed at the constant message of not letting it get you down (I had cancer too, I had a Doctor tell me that because I ...
Ehrenreich makes a solid case that the positive thinking movement is more harmful than helpful, especially when it leads to the converse of "The Secret"--that is, if people can attract good things by thinking positively, then people who have bad things happen to them must have been thinking too nega...
I didn't realize folks put so much faith in The Secret. . .
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