Prescribing Patriarchy: Dr. Oz

                     found here

With the recent upsurge of television doctors and shrinks (targeting mainly women) it should come as no surprise that patriarchal propaganda is alive and well in the West. Television aficionado's spend hours every day in trances, listening to these so-called “professional” doctors spew advice on everything from what a healthy turd look like to how to maintain a boner. As someone who knows many people who tune into gawk at these star-struck docs, I feel obligated to discuss the trend. Since this post will likely be lengthy, the others may be discussed separately. Nevertheless, these “experts” include:

Dr. Drew Pinsky (addictions specialist)

Dr. Mehmet Oz (heart/lung surgeon)

Dr. Phil McGraw (psychologist)

Dr. Laura Berman (sexual health educator, relationship therapist)

Dr. Laura  Schlessinger (right wing commentator, private marriage/relationship counseller, radio host)

I want to focus on Dr. Oz as he has a strong hold over the "medical-entertainment" market and spouts the most "advice" regarding women's bodies, sexual activity, and food consumption. 

Oz's cuddly promo!!

The infamous Dr. Oz is actually a cardiothoracic surgeon with a net-worth of 7 million dollars. Before nabbing his own day time show, he was a habitual "expert guest" on the Oprah Winfrey show. With her help, The Dr. Oz Show was on the air and continues to be a popular choice for televised health enthusiasts. On the show,  Oz conducts interactive demonstrations that seem to have been inspired by kindergarten classes in order to explain bodily processes. He often has guests from the audience take part in these demonstrations. His range of expertise, apparently, extends from heart surgery to mental health, sexuality, weight-loss and something he refers to as "Anti-Aging." 


Preventing  aging  is a hot topic on the Dr Oz Show,  he has a "superfood" to make you stop "looking old",  because old people are not beautiful nor are they valuable (he openly uses the term "anti-aging" and has created an entire section for it on his website!) In this section, Oz asks, "Are your bones making you fat?"  Clearly, our very bodily structure - our skeleton, is really to blame for our wrinkled woes! Dr. Oz's  anti-aging agenda is closely linked to his obsession with the size of women's bodies.The surgeon in scrubs measures guests' waist sizes and weighs them on novelty scales. He has all kinds of diets and suggestions that are aimed at making everyone's body's the same - slim/fit
He manages to cram his weight-loss advice into other markets such as magazines and books. But his obsession with women's body size also ties in with his obsession with women's sexual activity. In his 100 weight loss tips, he suggests "Healthy sex may help control the amount of food you eat and it's great exercise." 


Healthy sex? As opposed to unhealthy sex? Does the type and healthiness of the sex act change the number of calories burned? 

This "you" expert has also stirred up controversy in the last few years. He featured a debatable topic referred to by his show as the "Arsenic Apple Juice Crisis!" This Crazy-McCrazerson episode has been referred to by some as nothing more than a  "ratings ploy"  but hey, Fox News thinks its all legit because a consumer report told them so!


With so much expertise and loyal viewership, the Dr Oz show has a lot of "buzz-creating" advice on sex and sexuality. 

"Shocking Ways Your Hormones Are Affecting your Marriage!" 

Oz makes his millions by giving his  millions of viewers “doctor-approved” 
sex advice, or should I say, intercourse advice. This advice is easily marketable and likely ups Oz's ratings. 


He even offers sex advice on his website. Here, users can take the quiz, "How healthy is your libido?" Such a quiz does nothing more than perpetuate (hetero)normative ideas about sex-drives and sexual activity, the notion that high-libido is the standard and "normal." This is considered "normal" for men have high-libidos, it is "normal" for men, but a woman with a high-libido would likely be perceived much differently. However, low-libido in women is much more medicalized than a high-libido, this is because men are perceived to be hyper-sexual at all times and women are expected to be sexually available at all times. In fact, one of Oz's  key-to-a-healthy-life tips is to have as much heterosexual intercourse as possible. Indeed, he claims up to 3+ times a week is adequate to maintain health. This degree of intercourse, he claims, will actually make you live longer!

Such advice fails to really discuss how "normal" sexuality has been socially constructed within a society that has a history of male dominance, colonialism, racism, and heteronormativity. Dr. Oz spouts out the same old, same old - he offers the same regurgitated, limited view of sexuality. His view is clear in this statement:

“It means, number one, that the penis works and for the male, the penis is a dipstick for your health. If it's working, everything else is probably working, too. When it's not, it could be a bunch of things, but something's not right. So it's a good litmus test if things are shaping up the way they're supposed to. For women, it's not about amount of sex. It's about quality of sex. They need loving, nurturing, sexual relationships in their lives.” 

His incredibly phallocentric and sexist perspective is obvious from this quote. He proposes that men and women are so incredibly different, that is why they need different sex. For men, it is all about getting laid as much as possible, but for women, being as passive and sensitive as we are, require “quality” sex, which essentially means that our assumingly male partners must be able to “nurture” us while they penetrate us four times a week. This will gratify our apparently universal sexual needs as women! Our silly woman-brains are to blame! But, his advice is patronizing and downright silly. It is ridiculous to suggest that women require “different” sex simply because we are women, as if all women are heterosexual and that ALL heterosexual women desire to have intercourse. Of course, Oz points to a study that dates back to the 1960s to prove that men require intercourse. I have an inkling that Oz is alluding to Kinsey's sex research. To understand why such studies are not the best sources, one only needs to read Andrea Dworkin, who took to deconstructing Kinsey's work and his biases. Also, couldn't Oz pull up some recent studies? Possibly studies not conducted by a man...

Self-Explanatory 

Like many doctors, though, Oz claims that this need is complicated and is due to the extensive “biological differences”  in men and women’s brains (he even insists women's brains shrink during pregnancy!) Also, like many other doctors operating from a male-centric perspective, Oz believes in the seemingly new problem of “sex addiction." This "diagnosis" informs men that they actually cannot control using and buying women's bodies or consuming pornography. But men have different brains!
With this sexual equivalent of a “get out of jail free” card, it is easier for men to see themselves as victims and “powerless” over their decisions and actions that affect women, women's status in the world and society as a whole. Why don't we ask ourselves: what does such a diagnoses say about our society and what does it say about how we construct our social realities?

Patriarchy has a way of normalizing itself and the media assists in that normalization by providing men with reassurance that they indeed are not in control of themselves. Not only do men need to maintain sufficient erections, but they need to place that erection into a woman’s body or "deal with" their erection through using pornography. Women are then held responsible. Women are told to facilitate this apparently "inevitable" need that men have, this apparent healthy-life requirement. Women are to do this by providing constant access to their bodies -- through physical access, the male gaze and consuming self-criticism. How dare any woman (assuming, as Oz does, that she is heterosexual) try and shorten her husband’s life and negatively impact HIS health by not having intercourse with him?

Such televised medicalizing and public devaluing of women’s bodies, health, and sexuality, which is masked as“liberation” furthers sexual inequality and oppression. When rich people with lots of power spout out restrictive advice as "scientific truth" they truly allow propaganda to flow freely; propaganda that is intended to maintain the patriarchal status quo and keep women in a subordinate social position.