Barbara
Ehrenreich uses common sense, critical thinking and a sharp sense of humor to
analyze the positive thinking philosophy that influences so much of American
society. Tracing positive thinking back
to a nineteenth century backlash against the dourness of Calvin-based religion,
she examines the philosophy of Ralph Waldo Emerson’s Transcendentalism and the
Christian Science of Mary Baker Eddy.
Moving into the twentieth century, she scrutinizes the self-help books
of authors like Norman Vincent Peale and Dale Carnegie, also the belief that
attitude can deter the progress of serious disease and the prosperity theology
of preachers like Joel Osteen. Finally, she traces our country’s current
problems to the wide-spread reliance of politicians, CEOs and managers on
feelings and intuition instead of the analysis of hard facts their counterparts
used in the past. She concludes that positive thinking is not a benign
philosophy which improves our attitude, but rather the purposeful turning of a
destructive blind eye to signs of trouble we should be heeding.
