26 September 2014

Dinesh D'Souza ordered to undertake therapeutic counselling

D'Souza is a conservative and this might have some bearing on why the inimitable Theodore Dalrymple is going in to bat for him, in spite of the fact that the thesis that got D'Souza into trouble in the first place is an even sillier piece of psychobabble. I call it karma being a bitch. Nevertheless it's always good to check in with Dalrymple:
...therapeutic counseling is not hideously cruel, though it is likely to be agonizingly idiotic for any intelligent person. Moreover, it is also likely to invite dishonesty on the part of the “treated,” who will be expected to accept the counselor’s point of view without demur, however ludicrous or demeaning it may be. Contestation will be taken as a sign that the patient-criminal is not cured and therefore in need of yet more therapeutic counseling. To enforce therapeutic counseling as “treatment” for a criminal act is a violation of the integrity of the human personality. There are worse violations no doubt, but it is the beginning of a descent down a slippery slope.