Xandex-Shepherd Press ~ Existential Society Press
Thomas M. Shepherd, Publisher Photos of Publisher
Founder ~ Publisher ~ Distributor ~ Since 1969
~ working for economic and criminal justice reform and democracy ~
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criminal justice planning, existential psychology and nutrition, as well as fiction.
that we become fully free and balanced human beings."
by Tom Blaise Shepherd
ISBN 1-888716-06-1 $8.00 The Xandex Press, 1997
Shepherd is an existentialist, who believes that the labels "alcoholic" and "addict" are stigmatizing. He presents an existential-sociocultural approach to understanding alcohol and drug dependency and offers suggestions for living in a schizophrengenic society that simultaneously encourages alcohol/drug dependency and criminalizes alcohol/drug dependency.
The theme of the book is that alcohol and drug dependency are intentionally created by the alcoholic beverage industry and the drug industry in order to reap profits from the consumers that become dependent on alcoholic beverages and neuroleptic prescription drugs.
The moralistic approach of twelve step programs is barbaric in Shepherd's opinion. People use alcohol and recreational drugs because of deceptive advertising by the alcoholic beverage industry and the phramaceutical industry, not because they are morally defective.
Children and adults are brainwashed by beer commercials while tuned into TV sporting events (baseball, football, rodeo) sponsored by breweries that equate the healthy, athletic lifestyle with the consumption of beer. A Yale law professor aided and abetted contraband recreational drug use with his publication of The Greening of America in 1970, which became the Bible of the drug culture.
Shepherd cautions his readers to be leery of so-called scientific studies used to promote wine, beer or any other alcoholic beverage as a "health food." It is the unfermented red grape, not the fermented red grape, that is a health food.
Episcopal Church clergymen/women administer wine to communicants, including children, as a method of celebrating Holy Eucharist. It is thus dishonest and absurd, according to Shepherd, for Alcoholics Anonymous to claim that alcohol or drug dependency is the result of lack of faith in a "higher power."
The concept of the "alcoholic gene" or the "addictive gene" is highly speculative and inconclusive, according to Shepherd, a concept that may lead gullible people to believe that it is not the alcohol or the drugs, but defective genes, that results in alcohol or drug dependency. Because labels such as "alcoholic" or "addict" are both ambiguous and stigmatizing, it is the opinion of Shepherd that those who identify themselves as such are more likely to reinforce their alcohol or drug dependency.
Interestingly, Shepherd also claims that sexual orientation is not dimorphic, which is to say that people are not biologically programmed for attraction to either the same sex or the opposite sex and he advises responsible adults and young people to curtail the barbaric practice of using absurdly simplistic artificial dichotomies like straight and gay to define or characterize individuals, since sexual behavior is largely a situational or socially conditioned response to sensory stimuli, involving a multiplicity of variables. Terms such as straight and gay are arbitrary, unscientific and inappropriate.
Shepherd points out that The American Corporate Establishment (the ruling class, the lawmakers, the military-industrial complex and the media) encourages alcohol/drug dependency, sexual promiscuity, violence, ruthless competition and human exploitation. Rape, murder and other forms of violence are thus encouraged.
"The fact is that our educational establishment is teaching male and female children that aggressive, predatory and violent behavior is a manly virtue (and even a womanly virtue) and is therefore desirable, even though on the surface we may deny this fact," says Shepherd.
Shepherd is highly critical of government and the criminal justice system for criminalizing the victims of alcohol/drug dependency rather than the manufacturers, retailers, advertisers and distributors of alcohol and drugs.
Shepherd also believes that psychiatry is more of a cult than a science, and that psychiatric diagnosis is arbitrary, subjective and stigmatizing. Furthermore, the claim that a biochemical imbalance is the root cause of most psychological problems rests on a very shaky scientific foundation, and is most likely wrong. Thus, prescribing drugs to treat psychological problems is dangerous. Neuroleptic drugs not only weaken the immune system, but they create abnormal hormonal imbalances and impair cognitive functioning. In fact, according to Shepherd, research has shown that individuals who are not prescribed psychotropic drugs stand a better chance of coping with stress than individuals who are prescribed drugs. There is also less risk of suicide.
In lieu of 12-step programs and psychiatry, Shepherd suggests the following:
1. Daily transcendental meditation in the privacy of one's own home for mental and physical relaxation, and for enhancing intuition and creativity.
2. Adhering to a predominantly vegetarian diet, to include daily servings of fresh fruit (to include oranges, tomatoes and avocados) and fresh vegetables (to include spinach leaves, generous servings of green/red peppers, onions, garlic), steamed cruciferous vegetables (broccoli, cauliflower, Brussel sprouts) soybeans, soy products (tofu steaks), supplemented with steamed fin fish and poultry breast..
3. Regular physical exercise: walking or light jogging, bicycling, gardening, woodworking, etc.
4. Regular mental exercise: reading, writing, working crossword puzzles, playing solitaire, listening to soothing instrumental music (Baroque masterpieces) and being more selective about one's TV viewing habits.
This book is temporarily unavailable and is undergoing revision. Read INTRODUCTION HERE.
by Tom Blaise Shepherd a/k/a Tommy Separdi ~ Views of Author 1996
from The Good Earth News 1997 Edition
"The patient may be more sane than the psychiatrist . . ."
Read Excerpt
by Tom Blaise de Shepherd
by Tom Blaise Shepherd
The Myths and Realities of Human Sexuality
by Tom Blaise Shepherd
Examining the Evidence
by Thomas Blaise Shepherd
Crime Magazine:
An Encyclopedia of Crime
Optimize Your Mental and Physical Health
Niacin: The Essential Nutrient
by Thomas M. Shepherd
read text online
Existentialism, Schizophrenia & Psychiatry
by Thomas Blaise Shepherd
read text online
This Side of Paradise Revisited
Day Dreams - Lost Dreams
an autobiography - a movie
written and directed by
Tom Blaise Shepherd
Tales from the Arabian Nights
Retold by Lisa Commager - Illustrated by David Geva
~ beautifully written and illustrated especially for modern children ~
Published by Exeter Books - Simon & Schuster - New York - 1984
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American industrialist-playwright-novelist
Charles Strout Davis was born in Muncie, Indiana in 1917. He was a graduate of the Choate School and Princeton University with a degree in engineering. Among numerous works, he authored two plays, Practice to Deceive, starring Dorothy Malone (1981) and The Beekeeper, starring Rebecca Trotsky (1984). Allegiances: A Novel, was pubished by the Merriman Press in 2001.
Allegiances: A Novel is an epic adventure novel set in 1861 about love, daring, treason, and high stakes told by Virginian born Navy Lieutenant Jonathan Wade. Resigning his U.S. Navy Commission, he holds equal rank in the Confederate Navy and becomes captain of the famous sailing schooner yacht America. Torn between his honor and his duty, his naton and his state, his love for a gentle southern beauty and his equally strong passion for a seductive French actress, Jonathan struggles to resolve his romantic dilemma and to discover the moral criteria on which his primary allegiance should be based.
For twenty-five years novelist Davis was a director and executive of Borg-Warner Corporation, which his father, Charles S. Davis Sr. co-founded and headed as president and chairman, His mother was Grace Johnson Davis. He wass a grandson of Abbott Livingston Johnson, Muncie, Indiana industrialist, who founded the Warner Gear Company, forerunner of Borg-Warner. He was a first cousin of the late Margaret (Peggy) Johnson Goldwater, and a great grandson of Charles Merriman of Ashtabula, Ohio.
An avid sailor-yachtsman, Davis cruised the Great Lakes and the Caribbean extensively with his wife, two children and three grandchildren.
Allegiances: A Novel by Charles Davis is published by The Merriman Press and retailed by Amazon.com and Barns & Noble.com.
The Merriman Press
Grosse Pointe & Fort Lauderdale
ISBN 0-9675563-0-9