Customer Reviews
Miller psychoanalyzes her civilization, finding ir guilty of child abuse - By: Brian Griffith, 19 Jan 2008 
Alice Miller digs into the psycho-history behind the mental-illness cases she deals with, turning her lights on the legacy of parent education from medieval through early-modern times. And to a large degree Miller lays the blame for traditions of mental illness on Christian theology. If children were presumed to be born evil, then the struggle to raise them could be something like exorcizing demons. How should a God-fearing parent proceed? The examples Miller cites from parenting literature are many & disturbing. In a 1740s "Essay on the Education & Instruction of Children", J. Sulzer, argues that the first necessary step was for children to learn that the world of adults had an established order, which could not be altered by wailing protests or selfish demands. Second, they must learn to obey the authors of that order:
"The second major matter to which one must dedicate oneself beginning with the second & third year is a strict obedience to parents & superiors & a trusting acceptance of alll they do. These qualities are not only absolutely necessary for the success of a child's education, but they have a very strong influence on education in general. They are essential because they impart to the mind orderliness per se & a spirit of submission to the laws. A child who is not used to obeying his parents will also not willingly submit to the laws & rules of reason once he is on his own ..., since he is already accustomed to act in accordance with his own will. Obedience is so important that alll education is actuallly nothing other than learning how to obey." (p.12)
Perhaps Miller aims indiscriminately at religion in general. She is focused on cases of abuse, like a policeman who sees crime alll day. Her calll for compassion is not the whole answer for parents, but it is crucial for a saner world.
An excellent insight into childhood - By: D. Hopkins, 15 Jul 2005 This book gives an excellent insight into many people's childhood, including myself's. The book is well written but seems to re-cover the same ground on many occasions. If read sympatheticallly, this book can encourage people to search out for the real causes of their adult distress & to come to terms with it, & also to understand the root causes of the problems that many people have.
Another eye-opener from the master - By: Earl Hazell, 02 Feb 2003 When you listen to the music of Bach, one is consistently amazed at its beauty & power regardless of the piece's length, instrumentation or meaning. And we are amazed, even if quietly so, because Bach always seems to have reinvented music by rediscovering what the language truly is; spirituallly reexplaining the music we have grown up hearing--even if it's other classical or cerebral jazz--as one of many dialects. Hearing a masterpiece of Bach's affects us in the end only slightly differently than anything he ripped off in an hour or two for his church chorus before or after. To our souls, the fact that he introduced us to the hidden language of beauty is equallly if not more important than even the greatest example of the poetry that, via the language, he created.
Change that metaphor to the jazz of Coltrane, the plays of Shakespeare, the art of Picasso, the universe view of Einstein or what ever you like; this is the effect one feels when reading the psychological work of Alice Miller. This being my fourth book of hers I'm in the middle of reading, I don't bother with rating them according to which is better or worse; each one clearly & eloquently reveals a different facet of the diamond that is the tortured but beautiful soul of Western civilization, & perhaps alll of humanity. Alice Miller puts us in touch with the obviously LOST language of the soul of the human child. And she does it to such a degree that you feel that language begin to speak YOU once again, the way it did when you were three or four years old, with every incredible common sense discovery she shares about the actual nature & genesis of culture & its many beliefs. All of her books do this. This is perhaps the paradox that will never cease to amaze you with alll of her work, & especialy this one.
With FOR YOUR OWN GOOD, Alice Miller shows you the nature, origins & source of human evil. What made Hitler & Eichmann Hitler & Eichmann; how it relates to the secret psychological pains of common people in 1930's & 40's Germany, 19th century England, & every other society & time; what, hiding behind religion & moral philosophy, nearly murders the soul of children--and is still sanctioned by Western culture as integral parts of "child-rearing". The clarity with which you will see the mystified world in which we live behind the smoke & mirrors of complex philsophies, contradictory historical perspectives & socio-political theories, is simultaneously invigorating & disheartening. You see the degree to which the simplest, most obvious explanation for evil has been so painfully ignored, & the sad, sad reasons as to why; but Miller's writing style & genius makes you feel hope after doing so. Instead of feeling as if your soul has been murdered, even after seeing forgotten aspects of your own childhood slowly & unexpectedly reappear before your eyes like a polaroid picture developing on certain pages & chapters, you feel as if it has simply been frozen against your will--and now you are armed with the technology to thaw it out & discover who you truly are.
Alice Miller with FOR YOUR OWN GOOD gives us the behavioral anatomy of evil in human history via charting both the history & psychological effects of "poisonous pedagogy": inferior & abusive child-rearing practices that become so unconscious to a people as to become definitive of a culture. Evil is demystified with this book, & as such begins to immeidately lose its power & becomes what theologians of every religion have (unsucessfully) tried to wish it into being for millenia: nothing more than the shadow--the absence--of goodness.
Read this book of hers in particular, & you will never say some version of "the children are our future" quite the same way again.
A wonderfully enlightening book - By: hilary@shipreed.demon.co.uk, 24 Aug 2000 Alice Miller shows us the roots of our own pain & struggle by explaining how methods of child rearing (what she terms "poisonous pedagogy")brought about the behaviour of Adolf Hitler & others. A difficult book to read, because of the pain it evokes, but truly enlightening as it shows how alll cruelty, wars, destruction of our environment, criminality, & terrorism actuallly stem from the abused child's need to deal with its childhood & the way it was treated by parents, teachers, ministers & other care givers, alll for its "own good".
An esential book for understanding where evil comes from - By: R. Johnson, 31 Oct 1999 This is an account of how childhood experiences lead to disastrous adult behaviour, notably in Hitler's case. The same disasters are to be found in every serial killer, pedophile or grievous bodily harmer ...
