The New York Times "Style" section finally printed its thinkpiece on Buzz Bissinger's confessed Gucci addiction. As you probably read in the latest issue of GQ, the Friday Night Lights author copped to spending $638,412 on clothes — "an extreme case, but it is only in terms of amount," according to the Times' chat with Dr. April Lane Benson, "who specializes in the treatment of compulsive buying disorder," and "is the founder of Stopping Overshopping, LLC," per Psychology Today. She said that 18 million Americans are believed to have some form of Compulsive Buying Disorder. And based on info from a 2007 issue of the Official Journal of the World Psychiatric Association (WPA), 80 percent of those 18 million are women. That means the rest are male ... who were just treated to an adaptation of Confessions of a Shopaholic in a men's magazine.
Benson believes Bissinger's search for his true self contributed to his spending: "There is this thing called completion theory, where there's a discrepancy between who we are, who we would like to be and how we would like to be seen ... the next purchase is always the one that will unlock the secret." But at least he was doing wonders for the economy: "Don't forget we had a president who, after 9/11, said, 'We cannot let the terrorists stop our nation, so I want you to go shopping' ... He didn't tell us to go out drinking or taking drugs." Good thing we listened to that guy!
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buzz bissinger
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,strange addictions
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