Laura Schlessinger

Laura Schlessinger
File:Drlaura.jpg
Born	Laura Catherine Schlessinger
Career
Show	The Dr. Laura Show
Station	Clear Channel Communications
Style	Advice
Country	United States
Website	http://www.drlaura.com

Laura Catherine Schlessinger (born January 16, 1947) is an American radio host, author, and conservative commentator. Once a professional counselor, Schlessinger offers advice to callers every day on her nationally-syndicated radio show, The Dr. Laura Program, which airs through Premiere Radio Networks.

Schlessinger is an outspoken critic of practices that she considers immoral and have become too prevalent in contemporary American culture. These include sex outside of marriage, premarital cohabitation, intentional single parenthood, day care in lieu of parents staying home to raise their children, the viewing of pornography, marrying too quickly or out of desperation, permissive parenting (also known as laissez-faire parenting), abortion, easy or no-fault divorce, and same-sex marriage. Her radio program often features short editorial monologues on these and other social and political topics, followed by her characteristically direct responses to callers' questions and moral dilemmas. Certain aspects of feminism are often discussed on her show (Dr. Laura was a self-claimed feminist in the 1970s).

She has also authored numerous self-help books, including the best-selling Ten Stupid Things Women Do to Mess Up Their Lives, and several religious books. The Proper Care and Feeding of Husbands has been her most successful book thus far. Her books are both controversial and popular.

Personal history

Laura Schlessinger was born in 1947 in Brooklyn, New York, to Monroe (Monty) Schlessinger and Yolanda Ceccovini Schlessinger. She has a younger sister, Cindy, who is eleven years her junior. Schlessinger grew up first in Brooklyn, then in Long Island, New York. She has described her childhood in a dysfunctional family as unpleasant, because of extended family rejection of her mixed-marriage parents (her father was a non-practicing Jew, while her mother was an Italian non-practicing Roman Catholic) and what she has described as an unloving environment.

Schlessinger received a Bachelor's degree from the State University of New York at Stony Brook, and a Ph.D. in Physiology from Columbia University which included a 1974 dissertation of 114 pages entitled "EFFECTS OF INSULIN ON 3-O-METHYLGLUCOSE TRANSPORT IN ISOLATED RAT ADIPOCYTES," according to DAI, 36, no. 05B, (1974): 2093. A brief marriage in her early twenties ended in divorce, and she moved to Los Angeles, where her parents had resettled.

Schlessinger received her certification in Marriage, Family, and Child Counseling from the University of Southern California (USC) and lectured at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), the University of California, Irvine, and Pepperdine University.

While working at USC, she met Dr. Lewis G. Bishop, who was married but separated with dependent children. According to divorce filings, Schlessinger and Bishop began an affair. Bishop left his wife after more than 20 years of marriage, and moved in with Schlessinger. They lived together as an unmarried couple, and Schlessinger tried to get pregnant after reversing an earlier tubal ligation and suffering an ectopic pregnancy. They married in early 1985, eight years after beginning their relationship, and Bishop became Schlessinger's business manager. Schlessinger bore their only child, Deryk Schlessinger, in November 1985, when she was 38.

Schlessinger began practicing Judaism in 1996, and she and her son Deryk became followers of Conservative Judaism. Although Schlessinger's father was Jewish, she was not a Jew under Jewish law, which dictates that the children are the ethnicity of the mother only. In 1998, Schlessinger, Bishop, and their son converted to Judaism and began learning to practice Orthodox Judaism under Rabbi Reuven P. Bulka of Ottawa, Ontario. Schlessinger sometimes used Jewish law and examples to resolve the moral dilemmas of her callers, whether or not they were Jewish. She occasionally clarified ethical and moral issues with her local Orthodox Rabbi, Moshe D. Bryski, before mentioning them on the air. She was embraced by many in the politically conservative segment of Orthodox Judaism for bringing more awareness of Orthodoxy to her radio show. Schlessinger received a National Heritage award from the National Council of Young Israel in early 2001. Some of her expressed views were explicitly religious, and found their way into her 1999 book The Ten Commandments: The Significance of God's Laws in Everyday Life. While her other books stressed the importance of morality, they were secular in nature.

She has received awards from both media and conservative organizations, including the Marconi Award for Network/Syndicated Personality of the year, American Women in Radio & Television's Genii Award and National Heritage Award, and the National Religious Broadcasters' Chairman's Award. She also lectures on the national conservative circuit, and was the commencement speaker at Hillsdale College in June, 2002. Her son matriculated there the following fall; he subsequently left college and joined the United States Army under its 18x Special Forces contract program.

In July 2003, 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. Her religious approach on the show lessened substantially after this announcement. She emphasized on the air how her Christian callers always reached out to her as a respected and valued friend, unlike her Jewish contacts, who were inclined to be indifferent.

Radio show

Schlessinger's first time on radio was not as a host, but as a caller to the Bill Ballance show in 1974, under the pseudonym of "Cathy." Impressed by her quick wit and sense of humor, Ballance began featuring Schlessinger in a weekly segment. She and Ballance also began a romantic relationship, which came to light many years later (see "Nude photos," below). Her stint on Ballance's show led to her own shows on a series of small radio stations, and by 1979, she was on the air Sunday evenings 9-midnight on KWIZ in nearby Santa Ana. An article about talk radio in LA said she had come over to KWIZ after being the "weekend psychologist" at KABC. (James Brown. "Talk of the Town," Los Angeles Times, 4 December 1979, p. H1)

Her big break came in the late 1980s, when she started filling in for Barbara De Angelis's nighttime relationship-oriented talk show in Los Angeles on KFI, considered by many to be a powerful and prestigious radio station. When De Angelis replaced noontime talk show host Toni Grant, Schlessinger got De Angelis's former nighttime time slot. A few years later, De Angelis left the station, landing Schlessinger the coveted noontime time slot. Her show became very popular, leading to its national syndication.

Maurice Tunick, former Vice-President of Talk Programming for the ABC Radio Networks, comments: "Toni Grant was not on KFI, and was not replaced by Barbara De Angelis. Toni Grant was on KABC, and was replaced by Dr. Sonja Friedman in 1995 on both KABC and the ABC Talkradio network, which distributed the show nationally. KABC was the market leader back then, with KFI way back in the pack. While Laura did fill the De Angelis time period at noon, she was also holding down [the] fort on weekends at KGIL San Fernando. When Sally Jessy Raphael moved from NBC Talknet to ABC Radio, I was in search of a regular sub, because Sally had numerous TV commitments, and would require a dependable fill-in. Dr. Laura, who was little-known outside of Southern California, became the regular sub for Sally, filling in on her personal advice show in the evening."

The Dr. Laura Show was nationally syndicated in 1994 by Synergy Broadcasting a company she and her husband created. In 1997, the syndication rights were picked up by the Premiere Radio Network. Schlessinger has characterized her show as a "moral health program" rather than an "advice program." Her responses to callers usually display a trademark frankness and bluntness; she gets to the core of a caller's issue quickly, rather than letting them talk for a long time. (Her approach has been likened to that of the highly popular Judge Judy, as she has many of the same qualities.)

Schlessinger now broadcasts from her home in Santa Barbara, California, and as of 2005, was added to the lineup of satellite broadcaster XM Radio. In that same year, Schlessinger was nominated for induction into the Radio Hall of Fame, but was not selected for induction. Podcasts and live streams of the show are available on her website. Her show is also carried on a one-day delay at 9 a.m. EST on some East-coast stations.

The Dr. Laura Show is currently (as of 2007) ranked 3rd highest-rated radio show after Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity. At its peak, it was the second-highest-rated radio show after The Rush Limbaugh Show, and was heard on 471 radio stations. In September 2002, the industry magazine Talkers named Laura Schlessinger as the seventh greatest radio talk show host of all time. However, by November 2003, the number of Dr. Laura affiliate stations had dropped to 275.

The dropoff in listenership to Schlessinger's show has been attributed to multiple factors. Over time, she became more conservative, and her stance on homosexuality and gay rights was offensive to many (see "Views on homosexuality," below). Additionally, following the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, talk radio became less relationship-oriented, and decidedly more political. Many stations replaced Dr. Laura with political hosts like Glenn Beck and Sean Hannity. Hannity's show debuted nationwide in 2001 in the same time slot as Dr. Laura (3 p.m. EST, 12 p.m. PST).

Schlessinger sold her ownership of the show to Jacor Communications, Inc., for $71 million. Jacor was then sold to Clear Channel Communications.

Television show

In 2000, Schlessinger signed a deal with Paramount Television to produce a TV talk show, with Schlessinger as the host. The deal came after years of Schlessinger stating she would not work with the company, due to its association with Howard Stern. She stated in an appearance on CNN's Larry King Live that she had wanted her show to be called "Schlessinger," in the tradition of Phil Donahue's successful talk show that was titled with his last name. But producers refused, and the show was called Dr. Laura. With the television show, producers hoped to extend the enormous success of Schlessinger's radio show to daytime television. However, the show was fraught with controversy before it ever aired, and it proved to be very short-lived.

Dr. Laura's views on homosexuality were a major factor in the show's undoing. Prior to 1997, Schlessinger was very supportive to gay callers during her radio show. In those years, she took issue with Christian religious leaders who were opposed to gay relationships, and said that it was cruel to deny love and happiness to gay couples. She renounced this view in 1997, however, and said she had been misinformed in her earlier views. Soon, her monologues approvingly mentioned ex-gay groups who claimed they could help homosexuals become heterosexual, and she attacked the American Psychological Association for condemning the position of ex-gay groups. Schlessinger cited Dr. Jeffrey Satinover, a Harvard-, MIT- and UT-educated psychiatrist, as support for her revised views on homosexuality.

In the months leading up to the premiere of her TV talk show, Schlessinger called homosexuality a "biological error." She expressed the view that it was okay to be a homosexual, but not for homosexuals to practice homosexuality, or to adopt children. On May 8, 2000, GLBT activists protested Dr. Laura’s TV show at Paramount Television in New York, and stated that her views were bigoted and offensive. Similar protests in other U.S. cities followed, and a website was launched with the purpose of getting Paramount to cancel the show prior to its premiere.

Not long before her own show was set to premiere, Dr. Laura appeared as a guest on the daytime talk show The View. The appearance was tense at best, as protests outside the studio continued, and she was confronted by audience members. She appeared visibly shaken, and her trademark no-holds-barred critique of callers suddenly vanished as she went face-to-face with her detractors. Host Joy Behar took issue with some of her comments, and host Barbara Walters raised the issue of Schlessinger's nude photos, in response to criticisms Schlessinger had made about a photo of Walters naked and past affairs with married men including a State Senator.

Amid growing concerns at Paramount, the first episode of Schlessinger’s television show aired September 11, 2000. Many critics and viewers found it dull in format, and it failed to generate the energy and interest of her radio show. The biting rhetoric that worked so well on radio for Dr. Laura seemed overly harsh for face-to-face discourse, and the radical change in Schlessinger's demeanor from her radio persona left viewers cold.

She was also still fighting an uphill battle with public opinion. In October 2000, she took out a full-page ad in Variety magazine, apologizing for some of her "poorly chosen" words about homosexuality. She stopped short of apologizing for the overall message of the comment, however, and repeated it (albeit more carefully-worded) on later radio broadcasts. On October 25, 2000, the television show The West Wing used a storyline with a character clearly meant to be Dr. Laura, who was thinly disguised as "Dr. Jacobs," a conservative radio talk show host.

The credibility of Schlessinger's TV show also suffered during its first month. The New York Post and other media reported that Schlessinger had used a member of her staff more than once to falsely pose as a guest on the show. A September 25, 2000, episode named "Readin', Writin', and Cheatin' " featured a so-called college student who specialized in professional note-taking. On the next day’s show, "Getting to the Altar," the same guest appeared in different hair and makeup, and said she was a woman living with her boyfriend. In fact, the woman was San-D Duchas, a researcher for the Dr. Laura TV show. Her name even appeared in the closing credits of the shows on which she posed as a guest.

By November 2000, Schlessinger’s TV show had lost many of the advertisers that had originally committed to it, and its ratings were in freefall. CBS directed its stations to move the show to a late-night slot, or replace it altogether. As a result, Philadelphia’s KYW-TV dropped the show entirely. Other stations outside of CBS did the same thing, while others moved it to weaker sister stations. The television show was canceled on March 30, 2001, and last aired on September 7, 2001.

Publications

On July 29, 2006, it was announced that Schlessinger would join the Santa Barbara News-Press, replacing notable former columnist Barney Brantingham. This news came weeks after an incident at the News-Press led to the resignation of many top editors and columnists (See Santa Barbara News-Press controversy). Her columns, which appear on Thursdays and Sundays, deal with Santa Barbara news, as well as general news and cultural issues discussed on her radio show.

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, while others are more religious or moral in orientation. The later advice books emphasize religion more than the earlier works, until her announced departure from Orthodox Judaism in July 2003.

Her 2004 book, The Proper Care and Feeding of Husbands, sold well despite poor reviews by critics. It was a departure from her previous books, which tended to focus on premarital relationships and children. Proper Care asserts that men need direct communication, respect, appreciation, food, and good loving, rather than tearing down the husband's sense of strength and importance. Schlessinger's thesis is that wives have the power to change their husbands' attitudes by seeing to these needs, and then their husbands will "swim across shark-infested waters to bring you lemonade." The book proposes that wives have the power to promote devotion, compassion, and love from their husbands.

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 Damsels, Dragons, & 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 2002)
• The Proper Care and Feeding of Husbands (January 2004)
• Woman Power (July 2004) (a workbook to use with Proper Care...)
• Bad Childhood Good Life: How to Blossom and Thrive in Spite of an Unhappy Childhood (January 2006)
• The Proper Care and Feeding of Marriage (January 2007)
• Stop Whining, Start Living (March 2008)

Religious books:

• How Could You Do That?! The Abdication of Character, Courage, and Conscience (January 1996)
• The Ten Commandments: The Significance of God's Laws in Everyday Life with Rabbi Stuart Vogel (August 1998)

Children's books, with Martha Lewis Lambert, illustrated by Dan McFeely:

• Why Do You Love Me? (April 1999)
• But I Waaannt It! (April 2000)
• 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 has ceased publication.

She wrote a syndicated weekly column that was carried in many newspapers, as well as Jewish World Review, where archives are still available. She currently writes a monthly column for World Net Daily.

Foundation

In 1998, Schlessinger created The Dr. Laura Foundation to help abused and neglected children. Schlessinger regularly asked her on-air audience to donate items for "My Stuff" bags, which go to children in need (often children who must leave their home with no possessions). All other donations came from other people or groups, usually in the form of donated items for the bags. Per the foundation's reports, money not used for operations was directed toward pro-life organizations, such as crisis pregnancy centers.

In September 2004, Schlessinger announced that she was closing down the foundation by the end of the year. Her reason for ending the foundation's work, as given on her website and in an announcement to listeners, was to support adoption and abstinence.

Controversies

Qualifications

Schlessinger's Ph.D. is in physiology, and not psychology as her show's title and content may lead listeners to assume. Critics have characterized the show's name as deceptive. Schlessinger's Ph.D entitles and qualifies her as a Doctor, however her California Marriage Family and Child Counseling (MFCC) license has been inactive for several years. Schlessinger has never stated that she is a Doctor in Psychology, but has often referred to herself as "a licensed therapist". Critics have also called into question Schlessinger's authority in personal development, including marriage and family counseling, because of her highly controversial social conservative views. Schlessinger never makes psychiatric diagnoses, and commonly recommends that her callers or their loved ones undergo legitimate psychological or psychiatric assessment in order to better address their concerns.

Nude photos

In 1998, allegedly upset that he was snubbed by Schlessinger at an event, former radio mentor Bill Ballance sold nude photos of Schlessinger to media outlet IEG. Schlessinger had posed for the photos while involved in a sexual relationship with Ballance in the 1970s. Internet Entertainment Group (IEG), known for distributing a sex tape of Pamela Anderson and Tommy Lee, purchased the photos and subsequently posted them on its website. The photos were originally available only to subscribers to the IEG website, but were later leaked to the general public.

Schlessinger initially denied that the photos were of her, but then claimed a copyright interest in them in court. Attempts to have the photos removed from various websites failed after a court ruling stated that IEG had legally acquired the rights to the material. Eventually, she admitted that the photos were authentic, and read a statement on her radio show addressing the issue.

In the statement Schlessinger called Ballance a "mentor and friend", and said she was "mystified as to why this 80-year-old man would do such a morally reprehensible thing." She claimed to have possessed "no moral authority" when the photos were taken, citing her young age of 28 and a painful divorce as factors contributing to her ostensibly hypocritical behaviour. She added that she had undergone "profound changes over the course of my life, from atheist to observant Jew".

Despite the statement, many radio show listeners felt betrayed. The photo scandal brought to light accusations that Schlessinger had been unfaithful in her first marriage, caused the breakdown of her second husband's marriage, cohabitated with him while unmarried, and intentionally bore a child with him out of wedlock. Schlessinger had railed against infidelity, cohabitation, and intentional single parenthood on her show, but never mentioned were part of her personal life experience. Schlessinger responded to these criticisms saying "A hypocrite says, 'Do what I say, not what I do,' rather than, 'Do what I say, not what I did'".

Family issues

On December 16, 2002, Schlessinger's mother Yolanda (from whom Schlessinger calimed to have been estranged for many years) was found dead in her Beverly Hills, California condominium by the Beverly Hills Police Department. Authorities stated that her remains had possibly been there for more than two months.

Views on homosexuality

Prior to 1997, Schlessinger was very supportive to gay callers to her show. During that time, she took issue with Christian religious leaders who were opposed to gay relationships, and said that it was cruel to deny love and happiness to gay couples. She renounced this view in 1997. Soon, her monologues approvingly mentioned ex-gays that claimed they could help homosexuals "turn" heterosexual, and she attacked the American Psychological Association for condemning their stance. Schlessinger also began citing Harvard, MIT, and psychiatrist Jeffrey Satinover in support of her new views.

Afterward, Schlessinger was frequently criticized in the gay community for her view of homosexuality as a "biological error," and for her opposition to adoption by same-sex couples. The GLBT rights group GLAAD began monitoring Schlessinger's on-air comments about homosexuality, posting weekly transcripts of relevant shows on its website.

On May 10, 2000, The Canadian Broadcast Standards Council (CBSC) ruled that Schlessinger's "consistent characterization of the sexual behavior of gays and lesbians as 'abnormal,' 'aberrant,' 'deviant,' 'disordered,' 'dysfunctional,' and 'an error' constituted abusive discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation, and as such, were in violation of the human rights provision of its Code of Ethics. The CBSC found similar fault with her generalized statements that pedophilia is more prevalent among members of the gay community.

In response to her comments about homosexuality, a rhetorical and sarcastic "letter to Dr. Laura" was circulated circa 2000 on the Internet that attempted to illustrate disagreements with her literal interpretation of the Bible, especially with regard to homosexuality. This letter was the inspiration for the character Jenna Jacobs in a Season 2 episode of The West Wing called "The Midterms." In that episode, President Bartlet criticizes Jacobs for using the Bible to call homosexuality "an abomination".

Schlessinger attempted to repair her relationship with the gay community without success. Her March 2000 public apology on her radio show was withdrawn two weeks later when it was not wholeheartedly accepted. In October 2000, Schlessinger paid for a full-page ad in the "Gay Hollywood" issue of Variety as a Yom Kippur apology for previous negative remarks.

In her book, The New Thought Police: Inside the Left's Assault on Free Speech and Free Minds (Prima, 2001), lesbian author Tammy Bruce discussed Dr. Laura's relationship with the gay community at length, and criticized some gay activists' treatment of Dr. Laura. Bruce said Dr. Laura has not only unfairly been accused of hate speech, but also has had her freedom of speech suppressed. Schlessinger wrote the foreword to Bruce's book.

Comments on Wives of Iraq-Deployed US Soldiers

In a story first reported in late May 2007 in The Salt Lake Tribune by Matthew D. LaPlante, Schlessinger appeared at Fort Douglas before an audience for a live broadcast of her daily radio show. She said she was annoyed with military wives who complain to their deployed spouses, and admonished the wives, "You're not dodging bullets, so I don't want to hear any whining," adding that "warriors need warrior wives," and that they should share their complaints with friends or family members, not the deployed: "He could come back without arms, legs, or eyeballs, and you're bitching?" Schlessinger's own son, Deryk, was deployed in Afghanistan.

The controversy sparked an interview on Bill O'Reilly's Fox News television program. O'Reilly blasted the original newspaper article as an incomplete, one-sided editorial, which Schlessinger contested. Schlessinger repeatedly mentioned that her son was serving in "the Middle East," and that she knows as well as any, what it's like being a military family and support system for her only child, a soldier serving abroad on a life-threatening situation.

Beach Access Surf Shop

Dr. Laura Schlessinger was in Costa Mesa's Beach Access surf shop with her son when she began perusing "Big Brother Skateboarding" magazine. Schlessinger deemed the magazine to be "stealth pornography" and said so on her radio show. When Tom Moore, the owner of Beach Access, publicly denied that she found pornography in his store, Schlessinger sued Mr. Moore for lying and claimed that his denial had hurt her reputation. When Schlessinger's case went to court, the judge said it was a frivolous lawsuit and dismissed it. Tom Moore's $4M countersuit against Schlessinger for hurting the reputation of his store (defamation) was allowed to stand. The suit has since been settled, but terms of the settlement have not been revealed. Behind the scenes and off the record, Moore's lawyers and friends claimed victory, indicating the settlement was "about the amount of a moderately priced Orange County home" (at the time, $650,000 to $2 million).

In popular culture

Executive Producer David Lee and others were upset with Dr. Laura's opposition to homosexuality and they saw the radio host as a good foil for Frasier. Dr. Laura had originally liked Frasier, but publicly pulled her support from the show because she disagreed with the series' tacit endorsement of unmarried sex.

In a second-season episode of the television show The West Wing entitled "The Midterms," Dr. Laura is parodied as the fictional character Dr. Jenna Jacobs, in a conversation with President Bartlet revolving around her academic qualifications, and the consequences of a literal interpretation of Leviticus regarding homosexuality — referring to Dr. Laura's characterization of homosexuality as a "biological error."

The character Dr. Lorna in the webcomic Sluggy Freelance (now revealed to be the mother of Riff, one of the main characters) is an obvious parody of Dr. Schlessinger.

According to DVD commentary for an episode of Futurama, the final choice of character for Mom was based on Dr. Laura.

Dr. Laura is also the primary nemesis in the animated series Queer Duck.

External links

• Dr. Laura's website
• Dr. Laura Forum
• Dr. Laura monthly columns at World Net Daily
• Dr. Laura columns at Jewish World Review (inactive)
• FOXNews.com - Foxlife - Dr. Laura Tells Women: Just Do It
• Salon Technology|Dr. Laura targets the new Sodom: Libraries

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