Something to smile about

True positive thinking comes at a very high price, and God paid it | Janie B. Cheaney

Associated Press/Photo by Andrew Shurtleff

Barbara Ehrenreich is mad, and won't be jollied out of it. The author of Nickeled and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America and Bait and Switch: the (Futile) Pursuit of the American Dream is obviously no Mary Sunshine, but it took a bout with breast cancer to truly tick her off. After the diagnosis, she found herself battling on two fronts: the disease itself and the jarringly upbeat cancer culture that bombarded her with pink ribbons and teddy bears and perky messages about finding meaning in the struggle. Enough! she cries in her latest book, Bright-Sided: How the Relentless Promotion of Positive Thinking Has Undermined America.

Judging by her previous titles, Ehrenreich already finds America well undermined. But now she's found the cause—our preoccupation with the upbeat keeps us from grappling with real-world problems. In seeking how we got this way, she turns her gimlet eye on colonial Calvinism, described as "dour," "harsh," and "self-loathing."

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November 21, 2009, Vol. 24, No. 23

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