The Wave of Lecturing

 Probably around 2012....I reached some point while viewing the news media and social commentary.....where I felt lectured on a daily basis.  

Politicians, sports people, social justice warriors, news people, doctors, etc.....were all jumping on the lecture wagon.

At some point in the mid-1990s....while still in the Air Force, I sat in an exam room and got a three-minute lecture by some military doctor.  About six months would pass and I'd be back in the exam room with another doctor, who also wanted to lecture me....which I stopped about 30 seconds into this and just told the guy my time was valuable and I didn't need BS....urging him to get to the exam business.  

Am I anti-lecture today?  Yes, to a significant degree.

If I'm in a airport situation and forced to view CNN....I slip into the anti-lecture mood, and try to find a corner where I can't view the monitor.  

If I'm flipping channels and get to a point where something interesting is on....I'm ready to hit 'mute' the minute that the lecture starts up.

I don't want the Channel twelve weather guy to lecture me on climate change.  I don't want the deacon of such-and-such local church to lecture me on 'fake good will'.  I don't want fake lectures from some Congressman or Doctor-Doom-type on Covid-19.  I don't want some Captain Star-Tripper lecturing me over life or death.

Looking back....in the 1970s/1980s....I probably didn't ever get the five-star lecture treatment, and when I did....it was just a once-a-week type of experience.  Today?  I'll suggest at least forty lectures a day, and some are pretty intense.  

A phobia about lectures?  Maybe....but the question, how would you treat a patient like that?  Send them  off to Montana for a month of isolation?