Cameron Diaz, Keith Ablow & the Wisdom of Fools

In a 1980’s television commercial for investment firm E.F. Hutton, the famous tagline was  “When E.F. Hutton talks, people listen.”  Today, that tagline has morphed into “when fools talk (or write), people listen.”  How else to explain the foolish “wisdom” coming from one of Hollywood’s best and brightest, Cameron Diaz.  For those who never equated intelligence with Ms. Diaz (most people), along comes Dr. Keith Ablow to set the record straight. 

Responding to comments in a recent Maxim interview in which the There’s Something About Mary actress declared marriage a “dying institution,” Dr. Ablow found himself in agreement with Diaz, a 38 year-old never-married actress.  “Romantically” linked to multiple celebrities — the latest of whom is Alex Rodriguez of the New York Yankees — one should not be surprised by Diaz and other narcissistic celebrities who spout foolish nonsense. 

In times gone by, most people would be too ashamed to admit that they listened to someone like Diaz, much less agreed with her.  Not so today.  Take Dr. Keith Ablow, noted psychiatrist and member of Fox News’ Medical A Team (if he’s on the “A” team, I don’t even want to know who’s on the “B” team). (I wonder if Glenn Beck or Sean Hannity agree with Ablow’s views?)  In an opinion piece on FoxNews.com, Ablow trips over himself in seeing just how fast he can agree with Cameron Diaz’s wisdom.  Listening to Ms. Diaz’s musings on the state of marriage in this country is like asking a vegan for advice on what steak to order at Outback — foolishness personified! 

If what Dr. Ablow has written is any indication of the kind of advice he dispenses to his clients — particularly those who are contemplating divorce — then I am glad that I am not in need of his services.  Dr. Ablow’s post is so chalk-full of pseudo-wisdom that one does not even know where to begin.  So, let’s begin at the beginning.  That’s the best that he has to offer and it only goes downhill from there.  In her Maxim interview, Ms. Diaz said this about marriage:

“I don’t think we should live our lives in relationships based off old traditions that don’t suit our world any longer.”

Since marriage was created by God — and He has not, as far as I can tell, told us that marriage no longer suits the world He created — Ablow and others might not want to be too quick to listen to Cameron Diaz’s pontificating on marriage.  But, then again, foolish people — even those who think they are wise — are often caught listening to the foolish ramblings of other “wise” people.

Keith Ablow thinks Diaz might be on to something.  He writes:

“Well, I’m not certain marriage ever did suit most people who tried it. From what I hear in my psychiatry office, and from what I hear from other psychiatrists and psychologists, and from what my friends and relatives tell me and show me through their behavior, and from the fact that most marriages end either in divorce or acrimony, marriage is (as it has been for decades now) a source of real suffering for the vast majority of married people.”

The good doctor really does need to get out of his office more!  While he’s at it, he might want to rub elbows with some more normal folk, as it appears that no one he knows thinks very much of marriage.  Oh, wait.  Dr. Ablow thinks that most normal people believe like his clients, fellow doctors, friends, relatives and he does.  How else to explain his weirdly judgmental notion that:

“Very few normal people who live together for long enough want to keep on doing it.”

That might help us understand what he means by “healing.”  If you have a troubled marriage that you are hoping to save, you might not want to visit Dr. Ablow for advice.  It seems his idea of healing is to trash the institution of marriage in such a way that no “normal” person — especially in a bad marriage — would want to stay married:

“To go further, I would venture that 90 percent of the married patients I speak with would rank their marriages in the top two stressors in their lives, while only 10 percent would rank their marriages as one of the top two sources of strength in their lives.  As a healer, I can’t help looking askance at anything that depletes energy, optimism, mood and passion to the extent that marriage does. It is, without a doubt, one of the leading causes of major depression in the nation.”

If this is his philosophy regarding marriage, one can only wonder at Dr. Ablow’s philosophy regarding those with suicidal tendencies.  Perhaps he’s a fan of the M.A.S.H. theme song, Suicide is Painless.  I don’t know, but it appears that he’s no fan of marriage:

“It’s only a matter of time now. Marriage will fade away. We should be thinking about what might replace it. We should come up with something that improves the quality of our lives and those of our children. And we should keep government out of it, if we know what’s good for us.”

Some things do indeed fade away.  E.F. Hutton, once the number two brokerage firm in the country, faded away following a series of ethical and legal scandals in the mid-80’s.  What once was a proud company that had people listening is but a distant television commercial from my childhood.

Marriage, which has been with us since the beginning of time, will most certainly not fade away.  If the debauchery of the Roman and Greek empires did not kill marriage, the modern-day debauchery of Hollywood and their sycophantic sympathizers cannot kill it either.  Although Ms. Diaz’s career is fading and Dr. Ablow’s career will be but a faded memory a few years hence, their “wisdom”  — which has been around for thousands of years — will unfortunately endure.  Apparently fools are not easily separated from their foolish wisdom, regardless of what century we are living in!