UBT: Leaving and Cleaving
I got a request to UBT David Brooks‘ New York Times piece “Leaving and Cleaving.” It’s not the usual Universal Bullshit Translator fare. Instead of the drunken ex text, or breezy, blame-shifting clickbait like “25 Ways Your Outdated Haircut Made Your Marriage Fail”, Brooks has presented the UBT with a philosophical meditation on parting ways.
UBT translation of “Leaving and Cleaving”: “I Am Dumping You for My Much Younger Research Assistant.” We snarked about Brooks last week, but I felt it warranted circling back, just to dissect this enormous load of self-congratulatory wank. He wrote this about the time he was divorcing his wife of 28 years.
So much of life is about leave-taking: moving from home to college, from love to love, from city to city and from life stage to life stage.
The world is but a stage and we are merely actors. Your starring role in my life has been usurped by a much younger understudy. Exit stage left before I call security.
In earlier times, leaving was defined by distance, but now it is defined by silence. Everybody everywhere is just a text away, a phone call away. Relationships are often defined by the frequency and intensity of communication between two people.
In earlier times, leaving a wife was defined by riding the rails out of town, a Mexican divorce, or having them beheaded. But now it is defined by silence. Everybody everywhere is just a text or phone call away. Demanding answers, explanations, finding hotel receipts. I wish you would be silent.
The person moving on and changing a relationship no longer makes a one-time choice to physically go to another town. He makes a series of minute-by-minute decisions to not text, to not email or call, to turn intense communication into sporadic conversation or no communication. His name was once constant on his friend’s phone screen, but now it is rare and the void is a wound.
I love you, but I’m not in love with you. After 28 years, it’s more like a friendly roommate love. I’m moving on (with my much younger research assistant). I will think of you sporadically or not at all. Unless I need something. Like my pastel, tassel-loafer golf shoes, which I thought I packed, but apparently I didn’t. My name, once a constant, will fleetingly appear on your screen, and your heart will swell with love for me, as you rise from the wounded void of my absence to answer… I only want my golf shoes. Do you have them?
If you are like me you know a lot of relationships in which people haven’t managed this sort of transition well. Communication that was once honest and life-enhancing has become perverted — after a transition — by resentment, neediness or narcissism.
Some people have not managed this sort of transition well — leaving one’s wife of 28 years for one’s 32-year-old research assistant. Lesser mortals have mid-life crises. I, however, have managed it splendidly by writing a thinly veiled screed about your “neediness” in the New York Times. Really darling, you have failed to grasp your obsolescence.
Resentment = I resent your continued presence in my life. You have served your purpose as a birthing vessel to our three children.
Neediness = I’m a desperately needy man who needs the sensitivity and lyricism validating pussy of a much younger woman.
Narcissism = I am a narcissist.
We all know men and women who stalk ex-lovers online; people who bombard a friend with emails even though that friendship has evidently cooled; mentors who resent their former protégés when their emails are no longer instantly returned; people who post faux glam pictures on Instagram so they can “win the breakup” against their ex.
Instant communication creates a new sort of challenge. How do you gracefully change your communication patterns when one person legitimately wants to step back or is entering another life phase?
I’ve posed this as a question of modern manners, when really I’m asking: how does one dump his wife for his much younger research assistant gracefully? Without anyone thinking ill of him, or casting aspersions on his character? It’s a new sort of challenge. Can one legitimately step back from the same old tired snatch when one is now entering another vagina?
The paradox is that the person doing the leaving controls the situation, but greater heroism is demanded of the one being left behind. The person left in the vapor trail is hurt and probably craves contact. It’s amazing how much pain there is when what was once intimate conversation turns into unnaturally casual banter, emotional distance or just a void.
Be a hero and sign this nice divorce settlement I’ve prepared for you. I know you’re hurt, left in the vapor trail of my awesomeness. You probably crave contact — more awesomeness, David! MORE! But ask yourself — what would a hero do?
A hero would fuck off, Sarah.
The person left behind also probably thinks that the leaver is making a big mistake. She probably thinks that it’s stupid to leave or change the bond; that the other person is driven by selfishness, shortsightedness or popularity.
I am driven by selfishness. I am shortsighted. I am popular vapid.
Yet if the whole transition is going to be managed with any dignity, the person being left has to swallow the pain and accept the decision.
Eat the shit sandwich with dignity, Sarah. It’s a hero sandwich. Swallow!
The person being left has to grant the leaver the dignity of her own mind, has to respect her ability to make her own choices about how to live and whom to be close to (except in the most highly unusual circumstances). The person being left has to suppress vindictive flashes of resentment and be motivated by a steady wish for the other person’s ultimate good. Without accepting the idea that she deserved to be left, the person being left has to act in a way worthy of her best nature, to continue the sacrificial love that the leaver may not deserve and may never learn about.
It’s not enough that I’m leaving you for my much younger research assistant, I will now dictate to you from the pages of the New York Fucking Times exactly how you should feel about it, the deference to which you must treat my decision, and demand a “steady wish” for my continued good.
I will shame you with an appeal to continue “sacrificial love” for me. Because I have no shame.
That means not calling when you are not wanted. Not pleading for more intimacy or doing the other embarrassing things that wine, late nights and instant communications make possible.
I, the Great and Noble David Brooks, foremost expert on Character will now publicly humiliate my wife of 28 years by dissing her pick-me dance. You LOST, Sarah. Do not drunk text me with booty calls. You are NOT WANTED.
Who will rid me of this meddlesome wife? #imissbeheadings #makedivorcegreatagain
Maybe that will mean the permanent end to what once was, in which case at least the one left behind has lost with grace. But maybe it will mean rebirth.
Leaving you for my much younger research assistant is good for you too! Really it’s for the best and all part of God’s my bigger plan!
For example, to be around college students these days is to observe how many parents have failed to successfully start their child’s transition into adulthood.
The mistakes usually begin early in adolescence. The parents don’t create a space where the child can establish independence. They don’t create a context in which the child can be honest about what’s actually happening in his life. The child is forced to deceive in order to both lead a semi-independent life and also maintain parental love.
By college, both sides are to be pitied. By hanging on too tight, the parents have created exactly the separation they sought to avoid. The student, meanwhile, does not know if he is worthy of being treated as a dignified adult because his parents haven’t treated him that way. They are heading for a life of miscommunication.
I see you as mommy. It’s not sexy to fuck mommy. I want the liberation of younger pussy.
You forced me to deceive you with your constant helicopter parenting of me. I must have my independence. I am a dignified adult.
But if the parents lay down sacrificially, accept the relationship their child defines, then it can reboot on an adult-to-adult basis. The hiddenness and deception is no longer necessary. Texts and emails can flow, not as before, but fluidly and sweetly.
If you accept this sacrificial hero shit sandwich, my double life will no longer be necessary. I can marry my much younger research assistant, and hey, we can still be friends!
Communications technology encourages us to express whatever is on our minds in that instant. It makes self-restraint harder. But sometimes healthy relationships require self-restraint and self-quieting, deference and respect (at the exact moments when those things are hardest to muster). So today a new kind of heroism is required. Feelings are hurt and angry words are at the ready. But they are held back. You can’t know the future, but at least you can walk into it as your best and highest self.
Sometimes healthy relationships require not fucking the much younger research assistant. They require self-restraint, self-quieting, deference, and respect to one’s family. I am not that hero. I will fuck the much younger research assistant and I will justify my decision on the pages of the New York Times. I blame my wife for not being her best, highest, sacrificial self, when in fact, I was not my best self. I am a hypocritical douchebag. #character
Perfect, Chump Lady!
Gawd the entitlement, the conceit… telling his wife of 28 years to have sacrificial love, be a hero, lost (him) with grace!!!! Don’t beg for intimacy. Omg what a disgusting piece of narc scum brooks is!
And SHAME on the New York Times for allowing him to print that low blow bold sucker punch trash to his ex wife! Just cringe worthy and revolting. I’ve lost all respect for both the NYT and brooks and both won’t receive my eyes on their ads $ or subscription. Time to burn his books!
Yes, perfect. Thank you.
PERFECT is right! I would love to see CL version in the NYT instead. Brooks is such a fucking douche rabbit.
Here is the part that jumped out to me: “He makes a series of minute-by-minute decisions to not text, to not email or call, to turn intense communication into sporadic conversation or no communication.” Perfect description of a narcissistic discard.
Right, he makes those decisions cause he’s a passive aggressive little prick.
I agree, rockette. CL, I wish you would send your response to the NYT. Shame on them for publishing this load of self-serving crap. Wasn’t there anyone on the staff who looked at this and thought, “Uh, no. This isn’t a celebrity gossip rag.”?
Brooks, you are an asshole. It’s not bad enough that you destroyed your marriage and ditched your faithful partner of 28 years and the mother of your children for some strange, but you have to call her out publicly, using your platform as a political commentator as a way to shame her? And for what? Because she wants to know what’s going on? Because she’s trying to figure out where her husband went and who is this pod person that took his place? Because she has the RIGHT to know what went on in her relationship? Because she’s a normal person who still loves you (hopefully not for long) and is struggling with the pick-me dance?
I am beyond disgusted. I feel like this is a new low in cheater behavior. At least most pathetic cheaters use pseudonyms when they write these exercises in narcissism. Shame on the NYT, and shame on Brooks, but of course, that man has no idea how to feel shame.
Amen, MovingOn.
Cheaters really are All The Same. Brooks’ intellectualism is just gold flakes on the giant turd. I can’t believe he had the gall to leave his pile of cheater feces on the NYT OpEd page- but even in taking it too far, he’s just like all the rest of them.
I hope every now and then his ex-wife and her friends pull that column out, and make a drinking game out of it, and have a rip-roaring good time celebrating her freedom.
I haven’t felt this much anger in a very long time. My mind and heart are now bubbling cauldrons. Brook’s words brought back all the rage, humiliation and feelings of wanting to wring someone’s neck…how dare he (and my ex)!
He very neatly writes off any feelings his ex-wife and children (if he has any) may have after being discarded.
Knowing that the cheater can really feel this way is infuriating.
A arrogant monster of a cheater like this truly deserve a karma bus running right over his brain, multiple times!!!!
I wish I could hug his ex-wife…no one deserves a NY Times humiliation.
I am with all of you who felt the ol’ anger rise up to Herculean proportions.
Using the NY Times as a bully pulpit is the height of cowardice.
This one has really got me angry too. Restraint, honestly? Maybe this hit a particular nerve with me because ex-coward actually had the nerve to tell me that I didn`t know how much restraint he had used over the last few years. This entire article by this man makes me want to throw up.
+2. — That was my exact reaction, as well, that I haven’t been this angry at the bullshit mindfuck of these guys in a really long time. After three years, I’m happily at Meh, have just sort of accepted that XH was a bad accident I had to get past and have moved along. However, Brooks’ comments have been like someone coming along and poking a sharp needle right into the most painful part of that old wound: the self-justification and lying to preserve one’s own sense of righteousness.
Perhaps it’s so offensive to me because it’s lipstick on a pig, all gussied up in neophilosophical doublespeak, and it does a disservice to the legitimate help available to those of us who are waylaid by such devastation. It PURPORTS to be “helpful,” to “explain,” but it misses the mark, and widely.
For one thing, if the age-old means of separation used to be distance, then why don’t more of these fuckers just GET THE HELL OUT OF MY TOWN! No? You don’t WANT to leave? You want to stick around and, oh, what, *I* should leave?
Secondly, as usual, he misses the enormous consequence of unilateral decision-making. HE is in control because HE is the only one who knows about it! He’s going to communicate his waning attachment to his partner by sending only seventeen texts today instead of twenty-three? THAT is how his wife is supposed to understand their marriage is coming to an end? How about grabbing ahold of those massive balls you seem to think you have and sitting down and having an actual CONVERSATION with her about how unhappy you are, or (god forbid) actually trying to reconnect to that person and rededicate yourself to nurturing a relationship you once held dear? No? Not interested?
Then how about sitting down and saying, “Look, I’m a huge fucking coward. I’m weak and lazy and I just want out. I don’t want to work on fixing anything. I just … I’m done. I’m out. But because I’m such a greedy selfish shallow asshole, I won’t be taking anything with me and I certainly won’t be expecting to retain any of the affection or respect of our friends. I’m sorry I hurt you. This was never you, this was always about me and my horrible mental illness(es). I’m a terrible person. I’m leaving town now, goodbye.” — Nope. They want to do all this shit and STILL be the good guy even to the point (a la Brooks) of offering “helpful hints” to the abandoned partners. Asshole.
Well-said, NWBiblio. Every single word! What Brooks wrote made me crazy-angry and it’s been awhile since I’ve felt that way. He’d need a tanker truck of lipstick to cover his piggishness.
“Lipstick on a pig” is right. No matter how he dresses “it” up, we all see WHO he is.
What always amazes me is that I can feel like things are going fine, that I’m over the betrayal, and then I read something like this and flames start shooting out of my ears. I admit my fuse in regards to cheaterspeak is a lot shorter than it used to be, though.
+ 1, Rebecca, this post also made me so damn angry. I want to throw up in this jackass’s face!
My cheater actually had the gall to write to the judge that “engaging in sporadic extraconjugal relations” was to be expected from a man who works in a different city than his wife (we are both 65) and that they are no basis to be sued for moral damages because I was not “publicly humiliated”. I live in a no fault country and, even though he was defrauding me, we have to split 50/50. The only way to get a bit even is to sue him for damages. A lot of chumps win. No matter that his latest “sporadic” affair was at least 4 years long, jewelry, trips, shoes, etc.
The asshole in my marriage called it ‘caveats’ to which he was entitled.
I agree. The self-serving arrogance of this pretentious faux-philosophizing is breath-taking. I hope his EX is not reading it. If he’s this obnoxious in public, I can only imagine how much drivel she’s been subjected to in private. For a person who sees modern leaving as a form of silence, he does a piss-poor job of practicing silence.
What a great point. How about YOU shut up, Brooks?
I hope Sarah is here to witness our outrage.
Sarah: what that monster did to you and your children is unconscionable.
Pox on him.
Ah the delusion of cheaters, wanting to control their chump during the discard… I hope Sarah Brooks turns into the next Nora Ephron…
Or helps David Brook’s live through their divorce the same way as Robin Williams defined: “Ah, yes, divorce … from the Latin word meaning ‘to rip out a man’s genitals through his wallet.”
I really hope Sarah can get a really good settlement out of this narcissistic a-hole. I sooo hate the passive tone “Feelings were hurt” nonsense. Yes, yes they were. Now pay up.
That’s what intellectual assholes do: theorise and depersonalise a terribly emotional situation through logic:”you’re just not being REASONABLE”.
Because I’m sure they used tons of reason to get themselves into the situation they did. Ugh.
So true, Chumptitude! We need a sequel to “Heartburn,” taking down another Big League Newspaperman.
And since Robin Williams cheated with the nanny (how cliche), ripping his genitals out through his wallet seems apropos.
I didn’t know that about Robin Williams. That is disappointing. I wonder if his suicide was part of his Karma when he realized just how far he had fallen. Suicide seemed easier than fixing his character.
His suicide was in part because of his declining health due to his recent diagnosis of Lewi body dementia and depression his wife said he struggled with. Having said that, I think he did the discard by cheating v more than once, IIRC.
They are not able to cope. When things go wrong, most people will try to incorporate the change and attempt to envision how to make adjustments to get to a better, even if different, future. People in this camp don’t. They get depressed and turn to addictions and infidelities to help them feel better right now. They are consumed with how they feel. Whoever else might be affected by the change or hurt by their actions are inconsequential to their own feelings.
GetMeFree! Bingo! ^ + 1000 Today when I read Brad Pitt’s narrative on his alcoholism I thought about all this…. It is SO interesting that he fails to address his CHOICE to be a cheater but yah know the world will applaud him for discussing his alcoholism, right????
This describes my STBX. Using his dick like a baby would suckle a pacifier. Except babies suckling pacifiers cause no harm. Such a short-sighted mindset. I’ll never fucking get it…
Robin Williams was not married to the nanny at the time of his suicide. He was marrird to another woman, divorced from the nanny.
And it was a shitty thing to do to the mother of his children, fucking the nanny. But to say his suicide was bc he was too lazy to fix his character? That is a horrible thing to write. Really awful.
Ok, perhaps that came out harsher than I really intended and the use of the word Karma was wrong. Not even cheaters deserve suicide as part of their Karma. It seemed plausible on first thought as some cheaters (especially middle aged ones) do eventually recognize the damage they have caused (which often goes beyond just infidelity) and that can lead to depression which I have heard described as “anger turned inward”. I was not suggesting that he was too lazy to fix his character, but rather that he may have been overwhelmed in the moment and thought it wasn’t possible.
Further research, however, shows that he had a medical condition that he did not want to face and that is what led to his suicide, so nothing to do with his love life. It does show a need to be in control, however, which is trait often shared by cheaters.
My sincere apologies. I had not intended to be mean spirited. I have heard of instances of people committing suicide out of remorse before and hearing that he had been a cheater caused me to immediately make that connection which in this case is most likely false. I had not intended to imply that he deserved to be suicidal or to die by his own hand. I can see how my poor choice of words could have been viewed that way and I apologize.
As a therapist, I will only say that taking one’s life by suicide is a complex decision. Perhaps his past played a part, perhaps not. It’s an occurrence that I would not wish on my worst enemy, particularly if I don’t know them. I’m sorry, this particular thread just seems a little mean spirited.
I realized that infidelity is awful, and I have my active revenge fantasies that have included the ‘death’ of my x. And they are just that, fantasies which are a healthy part of grieving.
That’s what I thought, too, Tempest, about Robin Williams. Aka, just another cheater.
And I know RW is/was popular, but he always made my skin crawl.
“Communication that was once honest and life-enhancing has become perverted — after a transition — by resentment, neediness or narcissism.”
Here I thought he was talking about himself as it fits his lack of character. Never a mention of lying or cheating; hey it was a transition.
#ithinkwithmydick #iwritewithmydick
#icommunicatewithmydick
Yes, he was insinuating that these qualities belonged in her camp. What a tool.
This was an example of him trying to project his most vile character flaws onto his wife. It won’t work. You can’t cleanse yourself of you faults by just passing them onto someone else. She is the better person and always will be.
#Iamadick
I thought this said llama dick. ?
Lol. Hey, no bashing llamas!
Iamacolossaldick. +100 Who, in their right mind, would want this man for a partner?
Only dim and available, with legs that open like the mouth of a hungry crocodile at the whiff of money would want something like this guy. I think “It” calls itself : “Anne”.
My XH filed a restraining order against me because I contacted him one night in a series of wine-driven texts (I’m not a hero). Contact was set off when his brother’s wife snapped a pic of whore hanging on him at newly ex’d in-law’s Thanksgiving and sent the pic to me. It was just 5 months after ILYBINILWY, 2 weeks post divorce. We were married almost 17 years. Guess I lacked the dignity Brook’s mentions. Oh well!
Oh, why would she do that? I would have replied: keep that trash for yourself. It’s not my monkey, not my circus!
+1
Yes, Chunpitude.
That’s EXACTLY what this is all about: control. “I left, and now I describe how you must act so society doesn’t judge you as ‘bitter.'”
This is a bummer. I didn’t often agree with Brooks, but I at least respected him. Now I see that he uses the same passive-aggressive pseudo-intellectual, wannabe-professorial pontificating about society to describe his own marriage and divorce.
What a tool.
“I left, and now I describe how you must act so society doesn’t judge me as an asshole.”
^^^Nailed it!^^^
Perfect! Mic drop!
Yes, this!!
I mean who uses vapour trail in divorce rhetoric?
Mr. Brooks is a vapor trail… the kind of vapor trail that exits through a butt hole. And the void he mentions must be between his ears and in the place where his heart should be. What a cruel, self-serving hypocrite.
Nicely said!
What a freaking scumbag!!! I really feel for his wife, this has really pissed me off. And he wrote a book about character!? Twitter campaign >> #FuckDavidBrooks @nytdavidbrooks
I like this idea. I repost this blog in.his facebook page. #ProductiveAnger
Loool apparently #fuckdavidbrooks has already been a hashtag since 2012!!! A prize turd of a guy
I saw those same search results. Did you read the articles? He hasn’t said if he’s converted or not. It’s just speculation. Though, it does say the woman he’s married had a difficult time serving Christ while working in journalism, so I am guessing that she would not convert out of Christianity herself. She clearly has no problem serving someone else’s husband’s dick.
Also, interestingly, she was his assistant in writing his most recent book, which is the one that has lead to speculations that he has converted, since it has a lot of Christian themes, and the Christian theme thing has been going on since he and his first wife divorced.
HE is a condescending shit, and a shitty person. SHE is a fucking hypocrite. Serving JESUS,? Really? On her knees, no doubt,
He hasn’t converted to Christianity. He’s gone to church. It sounds like he might be contemplating a conversion, but where did you get that he’s converted?
Anyway, if his first wife converted solely for him then all of this has got to hurt. But, maybe she actually wanted to convert.
Whatever. I don’t know if he actually cheated on his first wife, and maybe this much younger woman IS a better match for him. But that is one of the most dickish things I have ever written. He is a jerk and his first wife is lucky.
I have read. HA. I mean, he left the mother of his children and then has the gall to be angry at her for texting him. I mean….WOW>
I googled him (because I’ve never heard of him) and his conversion popped in the first few links. I dunno….
Yes Serial, I just spent the last 20 mins looking for Sarah brooks’ twitter account for you but could not find. 🙁
The man is a joke though, plus I don’t think the newspaper should print this shit, they deserve a mention too.
Looking at his self-congratulatory turd of a wiki, his ex-wife’s maiden name was Jane Hughes. She changed it to Sarah when they may and she converted to Judaism. I noticed a few chumps have had to deal with publically known cheaters, so I hope she is already here.
*married
And now he’s converted to Christianity! It’s been an education for me today. Yes hopefully she’s here… Hi ??
I wish there’s a way that this blog would reach Brooks’ ex-wife.
#imissbeheadings <– exactly. Prior to our d-day, prior to me knowing what he was actually doing, I remember hysterically hyperventilating and snot-crying to a girlfriend on the grass, at a playground, in broad daylight, with our kids toddling around, saying out loud, "why… why…. why do I feel like he wants to KILL me????" That was the last day of our friendship as I went forward in my pick-me dance for two more years.
And yes to everything else too.
Wow what an asshole!!!! It’s unreal.
I’m stunned after reading that. What a spiteful piece of narc shit he is. Research assistant will leave eventually and he will rot in some rich folks retirement home, good riddance to bad rubbish.
I’m pretty sure it was Sarah’s family that had the money. I think this asshole married into it. I just don’t give enough of a shit about him or his fuckbuddy to look it up.
or maybe she won’t.
Look at all of us here, if you add up the years chump nation members spent pick me dancing it would equal centuries. Sometimes the AP’s stick and even marry.
I think my ex could of written that piece, I think his AP will marry him, I think she will be there for years, and I think every day it will get a little worse and she will just attribute it to the relationship getting comfortable, or her not trying hard enough, or the 5lbs she gained, or that she’s a failure for working on her kids science fair project with him instead of having sex with him. She will never understand exactly why things feel just…..off. Until she eventually catches him cheating. If she wanted to be his true love the last thing she should of done was become the main squeeze. That’s the kiss of death in a relationship with a narcissist…..the chase is over and now you are just a ……ugh, spouse.
They are just awful people.
I hate everything about this article, it’s like an open window into the mind of my ex.
Agreed, Paint Widow. My ex will do everything that he can to stay married to his AP because he doesn’t want to go through the financial agony of another divorce, and he wants to prove that he was justified in getting a divorce from me because he and the AP have “twu wuv.” If his marriage to the AP collapses, then it goes to show that he is a screw up who can’t keep a marriage together.
I love it. They are stuck with each other. Happily Never After. 🙂
Paint widow,
Yep, my ex could have written that. He has a degree in Philosophy and moved into business. Thinks he’s special. He’ll probably marry the fuckatery who works for him. It will crash his tenuous relationship with his children. Oh, well. As long as he pays me what he owes, I’m all good over here. Meh.
This exactly. The AP will go through the same shit we did. Difference is that she knows more about them than we did. She knows he lies and cheats. Have fun with that and God help the kids who have to continue to deal with the fuckedupness that is their parent.
What a self-important wanker! His long suffering wife is lucky to be rid of him.
It is a bitter kind of luck, but I do hope she can see how little she’s missing sooner rather than later.
I thought he was supposed to be a serious, political columnist. How on earth did this piece get published in The NY Times? A complete asshole. Pathetic!
I agree. Aren’t there editors, for god’s sake, who could and should have screened out this thinly veiled personal screed?
Editors may also be cheaters.
Just was I was thinking NWBiblio ! Cut from the same cloth.
My thoughts exactly…someone got paid to seriously consider his words but they rubber stamped it. They should be held accountable.
I’m going to stick with the Washington Post. 😉
Me, too.
I bet the whore helped him write or edit it. Hopefully the next time he is in the news it is because the karma bus ripped his limbs off.
The Karma bus takes many forms:
http://www.thepoke.co.uk/2016/01/27/daily-mail-early-entry-headline-year-corker/
HA HA !
Well, research assistant can book mark it for later use when this loser finds a new young(er) research assistant. At 32, she’s a little over the hill for these types. She has better have a couple of babies, stat. It won’t keep him home but he probably won’t leave, just have a side piece.
He is clearly the more popular and profitable writer of the two. She made a career move when she set that honey trap for old man Brooks. It’s the Broadwell/Patraeus , Thurston Moore/whatever his mistresses name was, syndrome. (All I know is that if you’re the woman who breaks up Sonic Youth you should be on trial at the musical Hague)
Slavering sycophants love to stroke the egos of those with the upper hand, and apparently that technique works every single time as evidenced by the smoking tire marks left in my driveway when old husband came alive under the constant compliments of his mistress.
Blowing rainbows up the ass of a narcissist gets you their temporary full attention.
UBT perfection. I love you CL! You are helping the world flip the script.
Oh my god! What a patronizing, self-entitled, revolting piece of drivel this disgusting narcissist has managed to churn out. His total lack of empathy and entitlement is mind-boggling. Banging on about compassion when he is patently so pitiless – an enormous hypocrite indeed.
He thinks he justifies himself but really he just betrays himself. I hope for the sake of his wife that the majority of readers are as repulsed by this nauseating man as they should be. That would be a bit of revenge anyway for . It may be awful for her right now but she has in bold print now why she truly is better off without this dreadful dreadful man.
This struck a raw note for me, particularly. My smug, cruel covert narcissist always blamed things on my “lack of forgiveness” – for using prostitutes, spending $300k behind my back etc etc etc. It was never his actions – although he was occasionally “sorry my feelings were hurt” (although not sorry he hurt them), but my reaction that the was the problem. After marrying OW 5 months after he walked out the door (together 20 years, never married, 2 DDs) I have no doubt he is peddling the story (to his small harem of sycophants) that I am just bitter and need to get over it too. The irony was that I was too compassionate, too forgiving for far too long. He betrayed himself though too recently, although not so dramatically – making friends with people at work on FB (we work in the same organization) and posting pictures of the wedding (a colleague told me) – thinking he looks fabulous when, of course, he just looks like a heartless tosser.
I am not in the US but if I was I would think twice before buying the NYT after allowing this piece of shit yet another forum to humiliate and abuse his ex-wife.
At a time when good Journalism has become a rare commodity, little valued by the public when it comes to reaching for their wallets, but still so desperately needed by the world, I would not let a single drivel-spouting fool put me off subscribing to an entire organization.
But yeah, I hope scum sucking David gets his comeuppance.
In fairness to the NYT, it was not clear at the time he wrote this what the state of his marriage was.
It was gossiped about, but it wasn’t common knowledge. This was written in 2015. He only just married the research assistant. I sure the NYT and his readers thought he was waxing on in his word salad way about life changes, goodbyes, and technology.
Even if it had had nothing to do with his ex wife, it is a horrible thing to put out there to anyone who has been left behind in any relationship. I think that is why our reactions are so visceral. He could as easily be talking to any of us as to his ex-wife. We find it insulting to imply that the onus is on us to suck it up and take one for the team (or no longer team) while the cheater gets off scot free. Its not our job to help our cheaters overcome the negative consequences of their own bad actions.
“He could as easily be talking to any of us”.
Agreed, this is my takeaway from his letter; I wonder if he wants to believe his own words so badly as if he can talk himself into having character.
Exhole did the same; he inferred a greater good had been achieved through the fallout of his actions. He is insane.
Hummm, I don´t know … Where there is smoke there is fire….
I bet the NYT did know about this pompous-assed hypocrite. After all didn’t he have this apprentice helping him? Don’t the people at the NYT have any imagination? Have they not read it all?
Papers publish what their readers want to read. Like, it’s OK to cheat, but not OK to be angry about it. After all, no readers, no money. No adds.
I think this leaving and cleaving shit should be nominated for the IgNobel Prize in Tacky, Gooey Literature. Seriously. For work that makes people laugh. Then think.
Check out these 2016 IgNobel Prizes, all very appropriate for today’s topic and sponsored by Annals of Improbable Research – AIR …
http://www.improbable.com/ig/
Some winners don’t even comment, for example, the 2016 CHEMISTRY PRIZE [GERMANY] — Volkswagen, for solving the problem of excessive automobile pollution emissions by automatically, electromechanically producing fewer emissions whenever the cars are being tested.
REFERENCE: “EPA, California Notify Volkswagen of Clean Air Act Violations”, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency news release, September 18, 2015.).
Others proudly accept their prize from the hands of real Nobel winners.
2016 PSYCHOLOGY PRIZE [BELGIUM, THE NETHERLANDS, GERMANY, CANADA, USA] — Evelyne Debey, Maarten De Schryver, Gordon Logan, Kristina Suchotzki, and Bruno Verschuere, for asking a thousand liars how often they lie, and for deciding whether to believe those answers.
REFERENCE: “From Junior to Senior Pinocchio: A Cross-Sectional Lifespan Investigation of Deception,” Evelyne Debey, Maarten De Schryver, Gordon D. Logan, Kristina Suchotzki, and Bruno Verschuere, Acta Psychologica, vol. 160, 2015, pp. 58-68.
WHO ATTENDED THE CEREMONY: Bruno Verschuere
2016 PEACE PRIZE [CANADA, USA] — Gordon Pennycook, James Allan Cheyne, Nathaniel Barr, Derek Koehler, and Jonathan Fugelsang for their scholarly study called “On the Reception and Detection of Pseudo-Profound Bullshit”.
REFERENCE: “On the Reception and Detection of Pseudo-Profound Bullshit,” Gordon Pennycook, James Allan Cheyne, Nathaniel Barr, Derek J. Koehler, and Jonathan A. Fugelsang, Judgment and Decision Making, Vol. 10, No. 6, November 2015, pp. 549–563.
WHO ATTENDED THE CEREMONY: Gordon Pennycook, Nathaniel Barr, Derek Koehler, and Jonathan Fugelsang
2016 LITERATURE PRIZE [SWEDEN] — Fredrik Sjöberg, for his three-volume autobiographical work about the pleasures of collecting flies that are dead, and flies that are not yet dead.
REFERENCE: The Fly Trap is the first volume of Fredrik Sjöberg’s autobiographical trilogy, En Flugsamlares Vag (“The Path of a Fly Collector”), and the first to be published in English. Pantheon Books, 2015, ISBN 978-1101870150.
WHO ATTENDED THE CEREMONY: Fredrik Sjöberg
2016 (Now this one is really up Ann Snyder’s lane…..) PERCEPTION PRIZE [JAPAN] — Atsuki Higashiyama and Kohei Adachi, for investigating whether things look different when you bend over and view them between your legs.
REFERENCE: “Perceived size and Perceived Distance of Targets Viewed From Between the Legs: Evidence for Proprioceptive Theory,” Atsuki Higashiyama and Kohei Adachi, Vision Research, vol. 46, no. 23, November 2006, pp. 3961–76.
WHO ATTENDED THE CEREMONY: Atsuki Higashiyama
And by the way, Chump Nation should nominate the UBT for the IgNobel Prize in Psychology, Peace or Logic
actually it isn’t clear when they divorced. Though they live in DC, where all these records are public, nothing can/could be found. They sold a big house in 2012/2013 when there was rumored that they were divorced — but actually purchased one about the same time together. if you google david brooks and divorce you can see the whole house thing. Sarah Brooks still apparently has the house.
Perhaps he was only justifying it to himself then! I didn’t realize it was an old article and, in retrospect, perhaps it does look very different – I suppose the NYT can’t be held responsible for that. Still fairly pompous but UBT managed to cut through it beautifully though! 🙂
I really don’t know how the UBT got through this one. I have a mental picture of an entire tree being shoved through a wood chipper. At some point you think that thing is going to jam and not work….
Anagram for “David Brooks” = “Dark Void Sob.”
Very descriptive of your soul, I’d say, David.
What an overflowing bed pan of a human being.
I don’t want to talk face to face like an adult. I also don’t want to communicate via the written word. I just want you to evaporate so I can be carefree and not think about the consequences of my actions.
UGH!
After that column, his ex is a hero for not just straight out murdering him. I hope she takes some consolation in our admiration and the image of him having dinner with other narcissists with the ugliest dinner plates I have ever seen.
I wouldn’t puke on those plates. Vomit would make them look classier.
Totally! And she can take that piece of trash to any therapist or MC that tells her otherwise!!!
“But sometimes healthy relationships require self-restraint and self-quieting, deference and respect (at the exact moments when those things are hardest to muster). So today a new kind of heroism is required. Feelings are hurt and angry words are at the ready. But they are held back. You can’t know the future, but at least you can walk into it as your best and highest self.”
What a buttwipe.
Also, what a demanding thin-skinned little baby–“Don’t say mean words to me, if you do it will hurt you worse than it will hurt me. Really.”
A guy who can talk about deception being “necessary” in any interpersonal relationships has just written a book about character.
Oh. My. God. I just threw up. This self-important, narcissistic mother fucker deserves everything karma has coming to him. I won’t get into specifics bc I would prefer that CN not know exactly how evil my thoughts can be. Suffice it it to say that I hope the cells in this assholes testicles begin to mutate. Now.
Yes and we as a considerate CN should welcome him to a new marriage by purchasing that nut chopper which was on his gift registry.
Assholes all of them
Modern day mantra for journalism- leave people wondering WTF are you saying? If it doesn’t make sense after reading it 3 times, it must be good. Oh how I wish NYT would publish chump lady’s translation- now there is truth in journalism!!!
Brooks says he needs space from his wife because he is “entering another life phase.”
I’ve heard a lot of euphemisms for vagina, but never “life phase.” ?
Hope the Other Research Assistant contracts a virulent and lifelong fungal infection of her “life phase.”
Yeah, right…another “life phase.” Would that be located in the Twilight Zone of narcissistic self-delusion and denial. So little self-reflection. So much self-promotion. Typical.
That can be my euphemism from now on: “I have an appointment with my doctor this afternoon. I hope she has a warming tray for her speculum, because last time it gave my Life Phase quite a start, it was so cold!”
I do hope every American on this forum posts this on their Facebook!!!
I always wanted to blame the OW, or the affair fog, or myself, but reading this makes me realize even more it’s just a giant character flaw, an empty selfish heart.
And a big pair of blinders.
I love how he alternates the pronouns, as if speaking abstractly on this subject, even though EVERYONE knows exactly who he’s talking about.
This reminds me of something a literate adolescent boy would write. It is so patently offensive and narcissistic it could stand in as a satire of an essay about breaking up.
Rather than feeling humiliated, Brooks’ wife should be glad to be rid of this POS. I just hope she had a very good lawyer. I’m so glad she’s free of him.
I’m offended on behalf of my literate adolescent son, and my literate adolescent self. 😉
Narcissistic bullshit!!
This guy just opened his dark soul to the world. Very insightful. What a prick.
I’m looking up dates to his UC reading. Frankly, if it is a ‘pay to play’ scenario, I will not be attending.
If anyone wishes to contact Mr. Brooks and share their thoughts with him directly, go to jackson.yale.edu/person/david-brooks. The asshole even posted his cell number.
GD I am pissed off.
Thank you for the info. I read his book when it was fairly new and I took it at face value. Apparently, reading it was an enormous waste of time, knowing what we know now. I don’t think he has any concept of character or what it takes to simply be a decent, caring human being. It must be easier for people like him to recognize character in others than to actually have his own character. Too much work and not enough self-gratification. I’ll definitely go to the website, but I wouldn’t spend a cent to call long distance. (Borrowed the book from the library which will save me from shredding a book I actually paid for).
Would love to read Sarah’s take on things. His take may be more elegantly expressed than most narcissists can manage, but it boils down to the usual round of entitlement, blame-shifting, and ham-fisted image management. Odious glimpse into the mind of a literate cheater.
What I would really love would be that this pompous blowhard’s “thoughts” become obsolete. I mean, I have to admit, this “article” (UBT “wank piece”) is probably accepted by many (at least those not too concerned about integrity and good character). I am noticing the world differently now. My tribe, as chump lady calls it, is pretty small. The responsible types who show up, contribute, care about their circle more than just, “hmmm, what will I get out of this?”…
Seeing his words from 2015 just make me feel puzzled…how the heck is this attitude going to be regarded as wrong when “popular” people like this wanker are out there dictating how we should feel?!
God, I hope CL’s book gets picked up as a series because we need the word out more!
Yes to everything everyone has said…but additionally, as the CN Unicorn Emeritus, I read this feeling anger at myself that when I was hearing things this stupid coming from the mouth of my long-term husband (father of my 3 children), my reaction was as he described:
“you are making a mistake (and my job as loving spouse is to protect you from your momentary lapse, so I will put myself between you and this bad decision thus sacrificing my well being for your selfish stupidity)”
what I should have said is “which suitcases should we pack your stuff in (this very minute)?”
Heft bags, as me how I know!
Oh how I too wish I would have said the same thing and known not to do the pick me dance!
OH My GOD!!! This effin Asshole! And his poor EX wife had to read this garbage in the New York Times? What a shit sandwich! I haven’t felt this angry in a long time!!
The odiousness of his “recommendations” to his discarded wife to man-up, let him go, and stop sending sad, pleading texts is bad enough. Seeing his head on a pike would satisfy my darker urges after reading that drivel.
But, aside from perhaps lusting after college students, what the fuck does he know about them? or their parents? And what exactly is he advocating, by way of parental advice?
E.g., “The mistakes usually begin early in adolescence. The parents don’t create a space where the child can establish independence. They don’t create a context in which the child can be honest about what’s actually happening in his life. The child is forced to deceive in order to both lead a semi-independent life and also maintain parental love.”
I guess parents should be all chill with anything their adolescents want to do, so that the child can establish independence. “Hey, Mom & Dad, this high-status columnist from the NYT contacted me on Facebook and wants to meet up. Since I’m only 14, I can’t drive, so can I have extra allowance for busfare. Oh, and I’m kind of nervous about the meeting. Could I borrow a few of your Ativan to quell my nerves? Might need money for condoms, too.”
Brooks is so similar to my cheater in the way he writes, and his pompous-ass protestations, that I admit this has triggered all my latent desires to put these jackasses through a wood chipper.
Tempest, my eloquent cheater speaks a-la David Brook as well! But picking up on the parental role, I wonder if he means his own upbringing. Looks like his parents did not create a conducive environment for this baby-man to face up to his own “life phases” in an adult-like responsible approach. Instead of concentrating on his family he decided to stick his nose and other sticking parts of his body into various life phases for instant gratification.
“The child is forced to deceive in order to both lead a semi-independent life and also maintain parental love.” That’s exacly what you did, David Brook, until your AP upped her pick me dance.
I’m not even sure WHICH parents he’s blaming, exactly! His wife’s, for not having prepared her for a life in which she would be deceived, chumped and left? His own, for having set him up to justify his own deceiving of his wife? Or is he blaming his wife for how she’s currently raising their own kids [do they have kids? I didn’t check]?
That’s one of the most unctuous aspects of this whole piece: Most of the time, it’s impossible to know exactly whose behavior he’s rationalizing. The cheater? The abandoned spouse? The in-laws? He shifts perspective so often it’s like he’s really just trying to melt everyone into one big melting pot, like, Hey, we’re all the same, so why can’t we all just get along and not speak of this again? — It’s so infantile.
Also, I was PLENTY encouraged toward independence from a very young age, and abandonment still hurt like a motherfucker, so, umm, no, David. You got that part entirely wrong.
This passage was his rationalization for grooming and fucking college girls, “Parents, when your daughter tells you she wants you to meet her new fuckbud… uh… “boyfriend” please remember to maintain your dignity and not to pass judgement on her (and especially ME) for fucking a sophisticated established gentleman like myself. Its proof that you have properly sent her off into adulthood.”
It was also a shot across his new wife’s bow, “Honey, when you see pictures of me out with a random sophomore from Columbia, you should be happy that she is expressing herself as part of a well-balanced transition into adulthood.”
[* * BAAAAAARF!! * *]
Tempest your last line made me laugh out loud- I hope my sick sense of humor doesn’t make me disordered but visions of guiding cheater’s limbs through that chipper gives me great satisfaction. Chainsaws and chippers are some of his favorite toys.
I am sure Brooks is merely projecting his own adolescence here where he was forced to learn to deceive- parallels my stbx too. Much easier for mommy and daddy to buy the lies of golden boy than to confront his deception and have to correct him.
I think those “how to raise kids right” paragraphs by David cluster b brooks is all a dig on his wife. He is probably jealous of the closeness his wife had/has with his kids (as most of us probably have) and has rewritten his own history in his head. He is critical of her, as those personality disordered types are, because at the end of the day, it makes him feel less of a shit if she is flawed. He has to fill that never ending inauthentic self esteem pit that can’t be filled…oh but he’ll try to fill it with woman after book after article, after public appearance…and the list goes on and on. I wish for him that he is a laughing stock-that really would hurt this type.
somewhere I saw a quote where he says he was a decent father and after the divorce is still a decent father. He says he worked alot, blah blah blah.
I don’t think he ever claimed to be a great dad.
An recurring theme the last few years was how much he envied how happy his kids were — and he wanted that.
He is a self serving SOB
Blech. Glad I never heard of him until CL.
What a smug self-righteous vindictive pretentious narcissistic prick. Thank God for the UBT. I wish the NYT would publish an article about the Amazing Chumplady and her UBT, using Brooks’ piece as an example.
What an asshat this man is. Of course he writes a book about character. These narcissistic tools are all the same. He thinks he’s so clever and wonderful and inspired when really he’s just predictable and boring.
What a self-righteous asshat. This strikes a chord for me too, as my now-in-counseling STBX is all up on himself for taking the high path while I wallow in my anger (probably being construed as “verbal abuse” or some such shit to anyone who will listen and take pity on him). Let us not forget that this is a man who lied to me for five years, through new jobs, moves, and a baby, thus robbing me of my ability to make informed decisions about my life while he manipulated me to suit his…oh, and didn’t like what he got since it was pretty fucking evident to me that he was not actively participating in our life together, yet at the time not apparent why. His time line of my anger and what I’ve said and how I’ve said it is conveniently altered to suit his story-weaving needs also. Piece of shit cock sucker assholes, ALL OF THEM.
My cheater said that he must have aspergers… “I know that I SHOULD care about what you and the kids are doing but I don’t care that much about anyone, not even myself.”
Sad little sausage. And I bought it. “Poor guy doesn’t even care about *himself* and self-sabotages and feels worthless. Must make it my mission to show him that he IS worthwhile and do successful-y things in his stead and attribute the glory to him; fake it ’til he makes it!”
He really enjoyed that, I’m sure. Ugh
They really know how to put on a show, don’t they?
The me back then would have reacted the same and constantly make it a mission to fluff up STBX ‘frail’ ego. After getting solid evidence of his cheating — truth I cannot run away from — flashbacks of sad sausage moments replayed in my mind. Only this time, instead of empathy I felt chills running down my spine as I realized who he truly was — a duplicitous slimy manipulator who can say whatever is needed to get what he wants, everybody else be damned.
Me too, IOH! I mean, I am a little anti-social/introverted at times, and I attributed his self-analysis as something similar. Knowing his childhood a little (and of course things are still coming out that he didn’t remember until more recently) I should have been hit over the head with the red flags. The self-destruction, lashing out against some authority (as his wife, I was basically his father totem — and his father is a serious narc, so, um, really insulting), when he always had the opportunity to be himself, do what he wants (you know, within the realm of being a decent human being), etc. I never held him back from that. He did. Should have seen what he has said (self-destructive actions, questioning his ability to connect) as truth/insight. Looking at him now, I honestly don’t know if he has the capability to love anyone.
Even though I divorced his sorry ass, and never looked back, my X became convinced that I was still ‘obsessed’ with him and his new replacement family. His AP/GF took down her LinkedIn account the day after she realized I had accessed it. He deleted two conferences from his public vita, because these were the conferences he took AP/now GF to while married.
My motivation was actually to collect information for my PI to use to find out what happened in my marriage (as I knew it was HUGE and not the “eensy, weensy affair from 8 years ago,” that he could “hardly remember”). Let him think I was pining for him; I now have enough physical evidence of his multiple affairs with students, a case where he sexually harassed someone who wouldn’t sleep with him out of her graduate program, and embezzlement of university funds to pay for his affair partner costs, that I could bring down his career in 5 short minutes. #dontfuckwithmeHannibal
Tempest,
I wish I had your research skills! I too left without looking back. I know the narrative he has painted of me and don’t give a flying fuck. Thanks for keeping it lively!
Tempest – mine tried the same thing… funny thing about things done on the Internet… they never go away. That trash folder in his email that he never emptied had over six months of correspondence to personal ads, hookers, “chat buddies”, you name it. He “confessed” to the OW that he only did those things because he knew I had spyware on the computer – he was trying to hurt me. Thing is… I have a RECEIPT that indicates I didn’t purchase/install software until six months later. HMMMM.
Hiring a lawyer was the best thing I ever did.
#cancelnytimessubscriptiontoday
ICanSeetheMehComing–sheesh, didn’t you get the memo that it’s never their fault?
I hope your computer searches result in a very ‘equitable’ distribution.
Tempest, you minx. Your astute investigative skills have located his “Achilles” and he knows it.
Bravo!
Ah yes, Tempest. Keep your friends close and your enemies closer. Best to let a narc think that you’re obsessed with them while you gather info…it’s the only way they can think anyhow, so they kind of help you out, in their own myopic way. God, I wish I had something more concrete than vague ATM transactions. So we’re only filing as “irreconcilable differences” and I’m seriously hoping that he doesn’t fuck up his role as father also. I could look back now and pinpoint every time he took cash out to pay for prostitutes though. Fucking scumbag.
There’s almost always a trail. Do you have access to STBX’s computer? He undoubtedly looked up places of passion, and a good forensic computer person can find even the searches he deleted.
I do not have access to his computer anymore. Ironically, he does network security for a living, so I’m not sure what I would be able to uncover. Got paper statements mailed to the house with items indicative of his continued deception though (didn’t change it over to e-statements fast enough)! Ugh, FML…
Yes There is a fine line between stalking and getting the info needed for a fair divorce settlement! I will be relieved when I no longer have to document his life for legal reasons!
I am right there with you. I am just about burned out on following the shit he is doing to devalue his business and hide income. And the divorce is dragging out because he hasn’t turned over everything we requested. But I refuse to take less than the kids and I deserve. And with the games he is playing, I need all the proof I can get. But I look forward to the day I can just stop.
Sounds like our cheaters are cut from the sam cloth- comfort in knowing I am not the only one here!
I can not even believe this shit is in print! WTF??? To behave as if he is conscious of his descend from a superior position (he calls it humble, I call it condescending) when what he is actually doing is dictating what others should feel! Remember chumps “respect his ability to make his own choices” but you are not allowed the same respect, unless of course, it falls in line with what he wants… which is to be untouched by any emotion that might provoke a human response.
Sure dude, you have every right to behave as a douchbag, and sadly the natural emotion provoked in your ex wife does not deny you that right! As much as you would like the world to think the natural consequence of such is an impediment to your douchbaggery rights … err I mean “their ability to lose with grace” (barf). Newsflash (put this in print), you are NO PRIZE to be won, so really did your ex wife lose??? I think not!
Judge not, unless thee be judged! Hey let’s not make any judgments about your behavior, but please, please let’s spew a load of negative judgments about others emotions and tell them how “They” should think and behave, because of course that is the epitome of “deference and respect (at the exact moment when those are the hardest things to muster)”
#douchebag
# hypocrisyatitsfinest
#someonethinkstheyaregod
#areyoufuckingkiddingme
#dopeopleactuallyfallforthisshit
#hashtagtomindlessidiots
#justificationmanifesto
Thanks for another lightbulb moment “got a brain”. It is all about control. I need to tell myself that constantly along with trust that he sucks when I don’t get him.
http://Www.cjr.org/the_profile/the_transformation_of_david_brooks.php
Yack.
“Part of the reason Brooks comes off as moralizing is because people don’t know who he is, just that he has a lot to say about other people.
“I stand by that piece. But some of the effects I put in there to provoke attention were maybe wrongheaded.”
Like his head in the wrong place
It’s never a good thing when you discover your head is firmly shoved up your butt. Unfortunately, he’ll never take a good, hard look. He’s much too pleased with himself. “Wrongheaded”? He certainly provoked more than attention.
From the article, “BY THE SPRING OF 2012, Brooks found a forum for his emerging ideas in a course he began teaching at Yale. It was titled, “Humility.”
I am rolling on the floor laughing right now.
From the same article, Taibbi’s takedown of Brooks is telling, ““Part of the reason Brooks comes off as moralizing,” Taibbi told me, “is because people don’t know who he is, just that he has a lot to say about other people.” Those people, Taibbi maintains, tend to be poor. Brooks “has basically one idea,” he explains, “which is that the poor are badly behaved and need to behave better, and all of these lectures that he gives on moral vocabulary are really a way to express this idea that all of the problems the underprivileged face are their own fault.”
Now, for “poor” substitute “my X-wife:” “my X-wife is badly behaved [after our breakup] and need[s] to behave better…..all of the problems [she] faces ..her own fault.”
Loquacious pomposity does not equal sound moral code and character. Ex. #prickdavidbrooks
Taibbi states a clear false equivalency.
Taibbi is the Chump Lady of the political & journalistic world.
…about how #prickdavidbrooks thinks about moral code and conduct. As if $$$$ make you morally superior. Ex. #orangemenaceandadministration
Brooks teaching a course on humility is like Jeffrey Dahmer teaching a course on veganism.
Tempest, Love the comment about Brooks and veganism. Too bad he doesn’t become a Breatharian. He’d have to survive on the stink he leaves in the wake of his vapor trail.
He assigned his own essays as required reading in that course.
https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2013/01/heres-syllabus-david-brookss-humility-course-yale/319461/
LMAO! Am I surprised? No.
Next semester Professor Brooks will teach a writing-intensive seminar in Empathy in Public and Private Life.
Only one microlecture needed: “To develop true humility, be the opposite of me in every respect. Class dismissed.” Snort. But he could never do that. Next up, he and the new wife appliance should teach a course on love and marriage.
Hahahahaha!
“The paradox is that the person doing the leaving controls the situation, but greater heroism is demanded of the one being left behind. The person left in the vapor trail is hurt and probably craves contact. It’s amazing how much pain there is when what was once intimate conversation turns into unnaturally casual banter, emotional distance or just a void.”
Here’s your Bitch Cookie. Feed it into the vapor trail I’ve made of your soul. I assume you need Bitch Cookies. I’m a mighty, word-ful man who obviously devastates anyone I leave behind.
::GAG::
“The person being left has to suppress vindictive flashes of resentment and be motivated by a steady wish for the other person’s ultimate good. Without accepting the idea that she deserved to be left, the person being left has to act in a way worthy of her best nature, to continue the sacrificial love that the leaver may not deserve and may never learn about.”
Is this guy fucking serious?? Reading this made me want to throw my phone across the room and smash it into 1000 pieces.
I hope this turd of misery gets the blowback he deserves in the comments section of the NYT.
What a piece of self-important drivel. An article about what the one who has been betrayed should do? Well, isn’t that special? His wife is the one who is supposed to exhibit self-restraint? Why, because this gas bag says so? This is one instance where I hope his then wife dumped all his clothes on the front lawn, set them on fire, spray painted his car with “I’m a cheater” and sent his girlfriend a dozen dead roses. At a bare minimum, she should tell him in graphic terms that she doesn’t give one flying fuck about how he thinks she should act…about anything. He has forfeited the right to have an opinion about her actions when he made the conscious and premeditated decision to betray his marital vows with a woman young enough to be his daughter. (Best of luck changing his diapers, bitch!) I truly hope the karma bus hits both of these low life hypocrites, backs up, and runs them over again for good measure. Then, perhaps he will show “grace” and “restraint” by not whining about how unfair life is, all the while begging his ex-wife for a second chance.
Basically: be nice so I don’t feel guilty because that brings up bad feelings which I don’t want to deal with. I’d much rather get off Scott free.
Violet….holy moly, I am so thankful I’m on your team!! clap, clap!
?????
This sums it up for me:
“… the person being left has to act in a way worthy of her best nature, to continue the sacrificial love that the leaver may not deserve and may never learn about.”
He’s flat out saying that the abandoned ex should continue to love and support the cheater behind the scenes. Is this not the most blatant possible request for “More cake, without drama! Keep silently pick-me dancing for me.”
I’d argue that the person being left has to act in a way worthy of her (or his) best nature, excising the cheater from their life like a cancer, being completely honest about what happened, and not giving any pretense of still feeling love for the cheater. At least we agree that the cheater does not deserve the love of the person being left.
All of us male chumps (and female too) should take offense at the notion that the chump is referred to as ‘she’ throughout the article – ignoring the fact that women cheat and abandon or destroy their families too.
In a sense, we’re all unlucky that Brooks had the bully pulpit of the NYT to spew this nonsense out to a wider audience. And hopefully, we’re all lucky that the backlash from this might move the needle a little bit towards societal condemnation of this kind of behavior. After all, Brooks isn’t the first man to leave his first wife for someone who was barely out of diapers when he married that wife, and sadly he won’t be the last.
Hugs. Strength. Peace.
aeronaut
Who THE HELL is this guy??? I’ve never, in all my life, read such a shitty heap of dreck! He is the most monumental douche nozzle the world has ever produced– followed closely by my ex, who spouted a similar load narcissistic double speak aimed and deflecting all blame & making himself appear to be some noble character, rather than the typical lying, cheating, pathetic, cowardly a-hole he is.
I literally laughed out loud and much of his delusional rantings, and the UBT was spot on as always. What a monumental tool this David Brooks is! Ultimately his wife is the winner because she’s free of this rancid, useless heap of inhumanity! His much younger RA? Good luck with that and have fun when this fetid bag of useless flesh moves on to his next “life phase”! Ugh!
In DB case that next life phase is probably death….
Grr – I do believe that grace and restraint are virtues but hearing about them from this guy is gross.
What a sanctimonious windbag. Fuck him and the young(er) whore he rode in on. These idiots will get what they deserve, I’m just not sure the exact form that will take.
Wow, that was great.
I need a cigarette.
“I am a hypocritical douchebag. #character”
That pretty much sums up the whole article right there.
Blah blah. Blah blah. Word salad.
I wish I got paid as much as he did for self proselyting.
Eat pray love drivel.
As long as you talk in the third person you can pretend that it want YOU and no one actually got hurt.
Skid mark.
Speaking in 3rd person when everyone clearly knows who/what he is talking about — like a highschool kid asking out somebody’s number ‘for a friend’.
*it wasn’t you
THIS.
I know I have come far when I read the bullshit in this type of stuff, come up with my own translation, and see how closely it matches Chumplady’s! YES!
So much win on a Monday! ?
“How do you gracefully change your communication patterns when one person legitimately wants to step back or is entering another life phase?”
No – one person did not legitimately step back. Legitimately stepping back would have meant having at least a conversation with your present life partner before moving on to another. That’s what a decent human does. This monkey just made sure he had a firm grip on the next branch before letting go of the old branch.
The hubris of this guy is just …. what an arrogant piece of work he is.
So true. My STBX was afraid of he tried with me for a while she would be gone if he decided it didn’t work. Cake. Stupid stupid assholes.
In a weird way, this horrible excuse for a human being publically humiliating his wife in punishment for his own immoral and despicable behavior makes me less angry at my STBX. My STBX may have devalued, betrayed, and discarded me but at least he isn’t trying to shame me either publically or privately for being angry about it. He at least understands that he has caused a lot of pain and I have a right to be upset, he just doesn’t care enough to do anything about it because Schmoopie (who can suck a golf ball through a garden hose) is a higher priority. In other words, STBX is still a jerk, but he is a lesser jerk than David Brooks and I have always been good at counting my blessings.
That made me laugh, Chumpinrecovery. Always looking at the bright side!