Laura Schlessinger

Overview

Laura Schlessinger is a popular American radio talk-show host of the Dr. Laura call-in show. The full show runs three hours a day, five days a week.

The basic premise of her show is that listeners with problems can call in and receive advice from Schlessinger. She characterizes her show as a "moral health program" rather than an "advice program." Schlessinger's responses to callers usually displays a trademark frankness that can be seen as harsh and crude (she characterizes living arrangements other than marriage as "shack-ups", women who have unmarried sex as "sluts" and male unmarried sex as "putting it in a warm place"). However, her advice was widely sought, and the show was one of the most popular in the United States. Recently, however, callers have been remarking how quickly they have been put on the air, and Schlessinger asks many of them to call back for an update of how her advice worked. A few years ago, Schlessinger would tell callers that no one got more than one call to the show. Many have suggested that certain calls are scripted, as they fit too closely with a theme Schlessinger has raised at the time.

Her Ph.D. is in physiology, not psychology as some people may conclude. Her use of "Dr." as part of her show's name has been characterized as deceptive: in her defense she points out that she is a licensed marriage therapist, but does not do "therapy" on her show. However, she is licensed in past tense (used to have a license to practice) but not as a descriptor (currently holding a license to practice). Her California Marriage Family and Child Counseling (MFCC) license has been [http://www2.dca.ca.gov/pls/wllpub/WLLQRYNA%24LCEV2.QueryView?P_LICENSE_NUMBER=14914&P_LTE_ID=720 inactive] for several years. Some of the calls sound suspiciously like therapy. Her website lists her MFCC degree, which is Masters level work, as "post-doctoral." This is true in the sense that she got the MFCC after the Ph.D. but the term typically means related doctoral-level work begun after the doctorate was granted.

Schlessinger converted to Judaism in 1996 and was deeply religious until 2003. She is a outspoken critic of abortion, divorce (though she herself is a divorcee), and gay rights. Her radio program often features short editorials on these and other social and political topics. These usually occur at the top of the hour of each one-hour segment. She has also weighed in against public schools and public libraries, claiming both wish to provide sexual access to children.

She has authored numerous religous and self-help themed books, including the best-selling Ten Stupid Things Women Do to Mess Up Their Lives.

History and Accolades

Born in 1947 to Monroe (Monty) Schlessinger and Yolanda Ceccovini Schessinger, Laura Catherine Schlessinger grew up first in Brooklyn, then in Long Island, NY. She described her childhood as unpleasant, due to extended family rejection of her mixed-marriage parents (Monty was Jewish but an unbeliever, while Yolanda was an Italian Catholic war-bride) and what she has described as an unloving environment. She was an only child for eleven years until the birth of her sister, Cindy. Schlessinger received a bachelor's degree from SUNY Stonybrook and a Ph.D. in Physiology from Columbia. A brief marriage to a NY dentist ended in divorce, and she moved to Los Angeles where her parents had already settled.

She received her MFCC from USC and taught at UCLA, UC Extension Irvine, USC, and Pepperdine. She met Dr. Lew Bishop while at USC. Her contract was not renewed, and he chose to leave his tenured job. They married in early 1985. Their only child Deryk was born in November, 1985, after Schlessinger had to deal with reversing a tubal ligation, and then a tubal pregnancy.

Schlessinger's first radio gig was as a guest on the Bill Ballance show in 1974. She did her own shows on a series of small radio stations before landing her current show at KFI. The Dr. Laura Show was nationally syndicated in 1994. She sold ownership of the show for $71 million, and at its peak, The Doctor Laura Show was heard on 471 radio stations. KFI remains her flagship station.

She converted to Judaism in 1986. She and her son Deryk joined the Conservative branch, then in 1998 the entire family converted to Orthodox Judaism under Rabbi Reuven P. Bulka of Ottawa. Schlessinger often discusses religion on the show, giving examples from Orthodox Judaism. She often would discuss matters with her local Orthodox Rabbi, Moshe D. Bryski, leader of a Lubavitcher congregation. She was embraced by the politically conservative segment of Orthodox Judaism, this article covers some of the issues her Orthodox supporters raised. She received a National Heritage award from the National Council of Young Israel in early 2001.

At present, Schlessinger is a major voice in conservative media. She has won awards from some media and many conservative organizations, including the National Religious Broadcasters' Chairman's Award. She also lectures on the national conservative circuit, and was the Commencement Speaker at Hillsdale College in 2002.

Controversies and Scandals

What started as a straightfoward, tough-talking advice show began to move into conservative political radio within two years of national syndication. The Dr. Laura Show went national in 1994. By 1996, Schlessinger began her list to the right, first by denouncing abortion and then taking a stronger position against working mothers. What was advice became a lecture, and then condemnation. Former supporters noticed her show became a forum for bashing feminists, day care, and eventually all women. Atheists and others of liberal religions, such as Unitarians and Wiccans were also insulted.

This "new attitude" (her show opens with the Patti LaBelle disco tune) came with Schlessinger's embrace of Judaism, first Conservative, then Orthodox. Her religious journey got off to a rocky start when she began speaking to Jewish groups. A speech to the Dallas Jewish Women's Federation led to a contretemps when Schlessinger rejected taxis, hotel rooms, and meals provided by her hosts, spoke unpleasantly to the dinner guests, then walked out ignoring her hosts and their gifts. After Maryln Schwartz, a Dallas Morning News columnist, reported on the bad behavior, Schlessinger became extremely upset on her show when reacting to the column, and began attacking all journalists. Schwartz replied with another column, which in turn inflamed Schlessinger. Angry references to the events in Dallas and the columns continued for many months and Schlessinger referred to Schwartz as "that terrible woman" in a subsequent interview (scroll down for it) in the LA Times Magazine. This "Dallas incident" was not the first time Schlessinger reacted badly to being critiqued, as she took offense at radio host Pat Thurston in 1995. Nor would it be the last, as Schlessinger next attacked Minnesota columnist Kristine Holmgren for her view of working-mom-bashing.

In September, 1997, Jacor paid $71 million for the Dr. Laura show, bought from a partnership between Schlessinger and John Shanahan, who distributed Hooked on Phonics. Schlessinger never informed her viewers of her financial relationship with Shanahan when praising the product. Her son, Deryk, recorded an on-air ad for Hooked on Phonics. Many on the conservative right embrace the phonics movement. Hooked on Phonics is also marketed on the Rush Limbaugh radio show. Jacor merged with Clear Channel in May, 1999.

In 1998, major embarassment struck Schlessinger. Well-positioned as a nationally-known moral arbiter who "preaches, teaches, and nags," naked pictures of her were posted on the Internet. At first she denied that she was the woman in the photographs, but two weeks later she sued for copyright infringement. Schlessinger's suit was ultimately dropped (search for Schlessinger to find article) when she failed to get an injunction against IEG to stop displaying the photos. The pictures were released by ex-lover Bill Ballance, who gave Schlessinger her start in the radio business in 1974.

Also in late 1998, Schlessinger ceased taking calls from gays. She began making controversial remarks, calling them "biological errors" and saying they should not adopt children. These comments continued until late 2001, when Schlessinger stopped mentioning the subject of homosexuality at all.

In July 1999, Schlessinger attacked an Orange County, California retail store, Beach Access, because they sold Big Brother, a skateboarding magazine published by Larry Flynt. Flynt earlier that year had purchased the infamous pictures of a young, disrobed Schlessinger for publication in Hustler, a porn magazine. Schlessinger claimed that Big Brother was Hustler magazine with a skateboarding cover stapled on, and encouraged her callers to voice their displeasure directly to the store. Schlessinger provided the telephone number and the name of the assistant manager who would not remove the skateboarding magazine. When the store owner disputed Schlessinger's version of events on the Howard Stern show, Schlessinger sued. Her lawsuit was dismissed as a SLAPP suit, use of the legal system to restrain public speech. Beach Access's owner received a settlement estimated in the low six figures.

In November, Schlessinger attacked an award-winning essay written by an eighth-grade girl, that favored free speech on the Internet. Still reacting to her pictures on the Internet, Schlessinger stated on national radio: "If she was my daughter, I’d probably put her up for adoption...Poor Sara doesn’t get it. When she makes her marriage vows and her husband has sex with everybody else, let’s see if she thinks that this philosophy works." Schlessinger suggested sacrificing the child, Inca-style and refused to apologize when reached by the Connecticut Attorney General.

In Spring 2000, Schlessinger signed a deal with Paramount to do a television program. Thousands complained to announced sponsors, who dropped support of the show, and a website, Stop Dr. Laura, came online to protest. It is not clear if the show failed because of or in spite of the website, but critical reviews were uniformly negative. The show was cancelled in March 2001 due to poor audience ratings. The complaints and the website stemmed from Schlessingers negative comments about gays, yet the television show avoided controversy while the radio show embraced it. This may be the real reason the latter is still in production.

Meanwhile, the Canadian Broadcast Standards Council (CBSC) ruled that the Dr. Laura (radio) show violated that nation's broadcasting ethics code because her anti-homosexual remarks could lead to violence. Over the next year, all Canadian stations dropped the show.

In October 2000, Schlessinger paid for a full-page ad in the Gay Hollywood issue of Variety, that presented itself as a Yom Kippur apology for previous negative remarks. Few in the gay community felt it was sincere, mindful of a March 2000 apology she made to them that she retracted five days later.

In May, 2001, Schlessinger advised a caller not to let a boy with Tourette's Syndrome attend a wedding, angering many with the syndrome or who cared for TS children. Schlessinger compounded her mistake by defending her advice and referring to a 20-year-old textbook which recommended medication. This enraged the National Tourette Syndrome Association (TSA), whose members deluged her show's parent company, Premiere Radio Networks, with angry calls and faxes. Within a week Schlessinger read an on-air apology that again did not satisfy those who criticized her.

After September 11th, 2001, Schlessinger attempted to steer the show more toward politics than advice. Ratings dropped. At the height of the show's success, The Dr. Laura Show was heard on more than 450 stations. Today there are fewer than 250, and many stations either carry fewer than 3 hours or no longer carry the show live. By contrast, the Rush Limbaugh show continues to be heard on more than 600 radio stations.

In December, 2002, Schlessinger's mother Yolanda was found dead in her condominium, apparantly dead for months. The lurid story stayed in the headlines because of a suspicion of murder. Controversy arose because of Schlessinger's previous advice to callers telling them to "honor thy father and mother" contrasted with her not knowing her own mother had died months ago. Some felt Schlessinger handled the situation poorly, making statements that disrespected her mother, who could no longer defend herself. Others noted that after Yolanda's death, Schlessinger became harsher with advice on handling callers' mothers. Several months later, the death was ruled from natural causes.

In June, 2003, Laura Schlessinger announced on her show that she was no longer an Orthodox Jew. In a series of monologues over the next month, she explained that she did not feel a connection with God and felt frustrated by the effort she had put into following the religion. She also mentioned envying the relationship with God described by her Christian fans. However, in early spring of 2003, she took up sailing and sailboat racing at the Santa Barbara Yacht Club. Several posters at the Usenet newsgroup alt.radio.talk.dr-laura noted that some races she had entered took place on Saturday, which is the Jewish Sabbath, a clear violation of Jewish law. With more and more posters soliciting opinions from Orthodox rabbis, it was only a matter of time before Schlessinger would have to choose between sailing or remaining an Orthodox Jew.

She chose sailing, becoming a member of SBYC in July, 2003. According to their newsletter, Schlessinger owns four sailboats.

Publications

Schlessinger has published a number of books. Several follow the mold of her successful Ten Stupid Things Women Do to Mess Up Their Lives, with similarly named books giving advice for men, couples, and parents, others are more religious or moral in orientation. The later advice books emphasize religion more than the earlier works.

Advice Books

• Ten Stupid Things Women Do to Mess Up Their Lives, February 1994
• Ten Stupid Things Men Do to Mess Up Their Lives, September 1997
  • portions repackaged as Damsals, Dragons, and Regular Guys, March 2000
• Parenthood by Proxy: Don't Have Them if You Can't Raise Them, April 2000
  • repackaged as Stupid Things Parents Do to Mess Up Their Kids, January 2001
• Ten Stupid Things Couples Do to Mess Up Their Relationships, January 2001
• The Proper Care and Feeding of Husbands, January 2004

Religious Books

• How Could You Do That?! The Abdication of Character, Courage, and Conscience, January 1996
• The Ten Commandments: The Significance of God's Law in Our Everydays Lives with Rabbi Stuart Vogel, September 1999

Childrens' Books, with Martha Lewis Lambert, illustrated by Dan McFeely

• But I Waaaaaaaant It!, April 2000
• Why Do You Love Me?, April 1999
• Growing Up is Hard, April 2001
• Where's God?, April 2003

For several years, Schlessinger published a full-color 16 page monthly magazine, The Dr. Laura Perspective, but it is now defunct.

She wrote a syndicated weekly column, carried in many newspapers as well as Jewish World Review, where archives are still available. She stopped the column to do the television show, but this may reflect several newspapers dropping the column due to reader complaints. She currently writes a monthly column which can be read at World Net Daily.

Foundation

Schlessinger created a foundation called, what else, The Dr. Laura Foundation which "helps abused and neglected kids." Schlessinger asks her on-air audience to donate items for "My Stuff" bags which go to "children in need." A review of the foundations 1099's (in alt.radio.talk.dr-laura) shows Schlessinger's own donations to the foundation are her name and the proceeds from the necklaces she makes and then auctions. Cash donations from the foundation go toward conservative organizations such as pregnancy crisis centers rather than women's shelters.