Phil Brennan, NewsMax.com
Wednesday, Jan. 25, 2006

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The theme of Dr. Laura Schlessinger's new book "Bad Childhood – Good Life: How to Blossom and Thrive in Spite of an Unhappy Childhood" could be described as 'what parents do to their kids, and how it affects them when they grow up' (Check out our FREE offer for this book! - Click Here.)

In an exclusive interview with NewsMax.com, Dr. Laura expanded on the problems affecting so many people today and the reasons behind them.

NM: Isn't the root of the problem the behavior of parents?

Dr. Laura: My concern after 30 years on radio, taking calls from adults, kids, grandparents, young people, is that especially since the 60s there has not been very much thinking about the impact of daily [parental] behavior on children - it's basically not bothering to think about it.

On my program I shock and horrify, upset and offend a lot of people because I put up a mirror to their attitudes and behaviors – and what they don't do – and the impact it's having on their kids.

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Early-married, divorced, dealing with somebody else's step-kids, making more kids, their kids are just visiting, their kids don't have a house to live in and are visiting back and forth, back and forth ... there is one thought to [those actions]: "I want my love life. The kids will accommodate. I shouldn't let the kids rule my life." I have actually had people tell me shrinks told them that.

There has been a growing dismissal of a sense of responsibility or an acknowledgement that what we do affects our kids. When we are yelling at each other, when we have two careers and don't pay attention to them, all sorts of stuff.

NM: Do you think this has gotten worse in present times?

Dr. Laura: Absolutely. The feminist movement put almost the final knife in the heart of it.

The feminist movement started out largely as "we're individuals worthy of respect – if we have the brains and competence we should get a job and be paid." That's civil rights, that's good sense – it makes good business. So I have no issue with that, obviously. I'm a woman! I like that concept a lot.

But the feminist movement was quickly co-opted by women who hate women, who are not interested in things about women – marriage, men, child-bearing – and who have negatively brainwashed women to believe that they are completely unimportant to their own children.

Why a woman would want to buy the lie that her breasts for milk and her arms for love and her bonding and teaching and nurturing and protecting were not vitally important to the development of her kid, and that dumping kids on some low-paid institutionalized day-care, nanny or babysitter is not only equivalent but even better, is bizarre.

To me that's stripping a woman of a large part of her innate identity.

NM: It's her nature?

Dr. Laura: Of course it is. It's built into the programming. Which is why you have so many women in their 40s saying, "Oops, made a mistake." They can't find guys. So then they make babies without guys and that's part of the feminist mantra – men are not necessary.

Not only that, they are the oppressors. They'll rape and molest your kids and beat you and leave you. The whole mentality is bizarre. And so we have a large percentage of children who will never have a father.

So yes, I think it's gotten worse except for the people who have allowed me to browbeat them into sense.

An M.D. came up to me when I was at a book signing in Houston, kissed me, hugged me in front of hundreds of people and said, "I quit my practice to be home with my kids because I finally admitted to myself you were right."

NM: Aren't there positive results from childhood?

Dr. Laura: What really moved and impressed me was one letter from this fellow who said, "My mother never did this for me so I had to do it for myself."

He had a list of 10 things he had to do himself, so now he says "I'm a competent adult who can do things myself." That kind of sense of humor and that kind of mental emotional spin is to me indicative of a healthy mind.

NM: Is it worthwhile for those who had positive experiences in childhood to look back?

Dr. Laura: Of course it is because positive doesn't mean perfect. One could have very kind parents who are just not very open or kissy/huggy. One could have very kissy/huggy parents who are also sort of flighty and uninvolved. As a result, in the book I never really defined "bad," because it isn't all horrendous stuff that would make you gasp. It's the small stuff too. It's the spending time with your kids, it's everybody sitting at dinner and actually talking.

There are families in which everybody is sort of nicey-nice but where deeper things are not dealt with.

The irony is, it doesn't have to look like a bad childhood. And that's why I was really impressed when the guy from Book List, which is part of the American Library Association, gave [my book] a positive review and said in the last sentence that there was something in this book for everybody. He didn't say this is just for people with a bad childhood.

I think he got it – that there are things you experience which determine to a reasonable extent how you perceive the world, how you perceive relationships, safety, trust, bonding, sex - everything.

It's not only the horrendous experiences that can be issues.

Editor's Note:: Get your copy of "Bad Childhood – Good Life" FREE Offer! - Click Here.