Word: phobias
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...people have a phobia about taking drugs because they think drugs will alter their natural condition and carry them into the unnatural sphere. But there is no condition for human beings which could be identified as the natural one. If you happen to drink a lot of coffee and eat bagels all the time, your natural condition will be tremendously different from what the man who eats beef and drinks wine feels like...
There are many types of phobia. According to Dr. Baker, these particular three were chosen because they have been eliminated by clinical treatment in the past. So far, 70 people have signed up for therapy in public speaking. The respondents for claustrophobia and acrophobia have been fewer, and these programs may be temporarily deferred. Treatment for the phobia consists of twice-weekly sessions which last for two months...
Cohen said that a phobia is not simply a fear. "Someone who is nervous about addressing 10,000 people in the Boston Garden is not necessarily a phobic. But the guy who cuts his seminar because he is afraid that he will be called upon to speak has a crippling disability...
...Gaulle has sold a dozen Mirage 3s to Lebanon and is dickering to sell 54 more to Iraq. Every major non-Communist paper in France denounced the ban on arms to Israel. In reply, De Gaulle harshly raised, through Information Minister Joël Le Theule, an old European phobia over Jewish influence in the press: "It is remarkable how Israeli influence could make itself felt in circles close to the information media." Le Monde rightly rejected the charge as "insulting...
...Manhattan Model Peggy Moffitt first flew at the age of seven, and used to commute to California by plane; now she travels only by train. Why the changeover? "Nothing dramatic," she says, "I just got married, and that made me feel mortal." Most groundlings trace the beginning of their phobia to an especially hairy flight. Jackie Gleason swore off flying in the 1940s when the plane on which he was a California-to-New York passenger lost two engines and landed in a Midwest wheatfield. Old Trouper Jimmy Durante also dates his dislike of flying to "the worst flight ever...