I have not read the book Eat Pray Love, nor have I seen the movie Eat Pray Love.
In fact I rarely eat, rarely love and haven’t prayed since the third quarter of the AFL Grand Final.
I am therefore in a uniquely untainted and unbiased position to be able to say that this deformed abomination of fertiliser-grade horsesh-t should be blasted back into the hellish furnace of retardation from whence it came.
It is about time that the people of planet Earth stood up and said that no more will they tolerate moronically banal observations by ten cent philosophers who think that if they say the sky is blue and then pause long enough with an expression that means they are either deep in thought or taking a dump that everyone will gasp at this sudden clarity of insight.
Fortunately I have not had direct exposure to every ode to spasticity uttered in this self-indulgent atrocity, but even having had them repeated to me by now-former friends makes me feel dirty and invaded, as though a parasitic worm is sucking out my intelligence.
Take for example this seemingly popular line:
“Having a baby is like getting a tattoo on your face. You really need to be certain it’s what you want before you commit.”
Well thank Christ someone told me that. I thought you could just bang one out on a whim and leave it at the casino. But now that Elizabeth Gilbert has shared her epiphany with me I realise that it’s preferable to have a baby if you really want one. Boy it’ll take me a few days to get my head around that concept.
It is also worth considering that, by my calculations, Gilbert was 36 years old when she wrote that. It took her no less than 36 years to figure out that it was important to be sure you wanted a baby before you had one and even then she was dumb enough to think that it hadn’t occurred to anyone else.
This is toxic stupidity – although of course we are talking about a woman who also thought she needed to remind other people to eat.
Even leaving aside Gilbert’s formidable intellectual rigour, the morality of her quest for self-adulation at all costs is also worthy of note.
Despite covering my ears and screaming every time someone mentions this steaming pile, my understanding is that she left her husband after he said that he wanted to go back to study and she didn’t want to support him financially.
Normally the following old chestnut is a cheap trick, but in this case it is irresistible: Just imagine if the roles were reversed.
Just imagine if a woman told her husband she wanted to return to study and he refused to support her, divorced her, and went jetsetting around the world until he shacked up with a hot Brazilian babe. Then imagine he wrote a book about it and thought that people would feel sympathy for him.
This is beyond rampant narcissicism. This is verging on psychopathy.
Of course I realise some people will say “But Joe, how can you know you don’t like Eat Pray Love if you haven’t read it or seen it?” And I would say this: I haven’t had my legs sawn off by chainsaws but I know that I would not like it—although it would still be preferable to reading one page of that rancid trash.
Indeed the only mind-numbingly obvious thought that hasn’t infected Eat Pray Love is that there are seven billion people on the planet with bigger problems than her and none of those problems will be solved by her self-obsessed banalities.
Gilbert is to empathy what Al Qaeda is to western decadence: Not only does she not practise it but she wants to wipe it out across the world.
Indeed, the truly terrifying thing is she is urging other people to be like her. How many millions of hours, days and lives will be wasted on bourgeois self-reflection while the world burns? How many adult brats are being created by glib one-liners that disguise rampant self-indulgence as some tin-pot philosophy?
Eat Pray Love is an assault on serious thought. It is a virus that feeds off selfishness, laziness and vanity and one which must be wiped out at all costs.
Don’t miss: Get The Punch in your inbox every day
Get The Punch on Facebook
Facebook Recommendations
Read all about it
Punch live
Up to the minute Twitter chatter
It's a Sydney thing, but 95.3FM... Why? It used to be all Bohemian Rhapsody and Walk this Way; now it's Father to Son and Country Road. Wah.
Recent posts
The latest and greatest
We don’t deserve this huge, exciting scientific project
I’d like to be able to say that sharing the world’s largest radio telescope with South Africa…
Mining money talks the loudest in Australian politics
When North Queensland Liberal MP George Christensen got the idea of launching a new political organisation…
Please enter your password
Help! I’ve succumbed to a crippling modern illness that can strike at any moment. Symptoms include:…
Nosebleed Section
choice ringside rantings
From: They must pay for one’s bitter disappointments
Michael S says:
"A teacher at Geelong Grammar had criticised her for using words that were too long, which had left her confused and had made her doubt her ability to write essays. She became ''quite distressed'' when her English marks began to fall." I can sympathise. My scholastic mentors conveyed to me a causal relationship… [read more]From: Welfare for breeders is a bonus for everyone
Change Up! says:
I have no problem paying my taxes. As a single, childless person on a very decent income, I can afford it and not have my life severely altered. Plus I understand that my taxes paying for things like schools, childcare and infrastructure is ultimately a good thing. A better community is better for me… [read more]Gentle jabs to the ribs
They must pay for one’s bitter disappointments
A private school girl’s family is sueing her elite, extremely expensive private school for not… Read more
Most commented