Bright-Sided, by Barbara Ehrenreich (published as Smile or Die in the UK)

[rachelmanija]

Barbara Ehrenreich rips toxic positivity a well-deserved new one in this much-needed but unfortunately poorly organized book surveying the origins, bizarre applications, and downside of the American obsession with positive thinking

Comments

[lorata]

Fun fact, I burned all my bridges with positive thinking culture the day someone told me if only I'd read The Secret in time (it came out 6 months after my mom died), maybe I wouldn't have let my mother die with all my negative thinking.

Shame the rest of the book is a mess, because I feel like I would have a very cathartic connection with the overall message.

[rachelmanija]

Check it out of the library or something and just read the first chapter. I think you'd relate a lot. Also: FUCK THAT ASSHOLE.

[resonant]

Did you break all that person's bones, or did you leave a few intact?

[naomikritzer]

I read that book a few years ago. I remember thinking that first chapter was freaking amazing and it would have made a terrific essay in the New York Times Magazine or Harper's or something, but instead she decided to try to turn it into a book when she really didn't have a book's worth of material.

I'm curious how the "think positive" messages go with non-female cancers. Like, do people with colon cancer get this message? Prostate cancer?

In the years since it's been published I feel like the critique has been absorbed a bit into popular culture even as the "put a happy face on it!" messages haven't gone away. There were some bits in Breaking Bad where Walt went to a support group with his family, and it was clear in the context of the show that the real purpose here was to make things easier on the family, not Walt (although Walt is a narcissistic asshole and ultimately a murderer and vengeful psychopath and the show's from his POV, so.... yeah.)

[rachelmanija]

I can vouch that non-female-specific illnesses get the same treatment if you're female. I'd be curious about stuff like prostate cancer.

The thing is, I think Ehrenreich did have enough material for a whole book. She just needed to dig deeper instead of broadening out.

Breaking Bad was pretty good at conveying complex messages, I thought. There was also the Six Feet Under "put your house in order" episode parodying the Landmark Forum that successfully conveyed that it was simultaneously ridiculous, scammy, and also genuinely helpful for some people.

[gaudior]

Oh man, now I really want to read the book she didn't write, because it sounds fascinating.

[rachelmanija]

Just read the first chapter.