FlyLady: The Cult of Clean

Yesterday, I added a post about a negative experience that I had with a FlyLady acolyte *ahem* moderator, and it got me thinking...as do most things. On a whim, I Google-searched "Is FlyLady a cult?" The results were both amusing and disturbing.

FlyLady uses a very particular brand of slang, full of acronyms for ideas taken from the FlyLady system. See the list below for examples:

• SHE = Sidetracked Home Executive
  
• CHAOS = Can't Have Anyone Over Syndrome
  
• FLYing = Finally Loving Yourself

In addition, participants are referred to as "FlyBabies," hence, the Beginner's Baby Steps that serve as the introduction to the system. The VERY few male participants are known as "FlyGuys." Husbands and children are reduced to DH = Dear Husband, DD = Dear Daughter, and DS = Dear Son. Negative commentary or self-deprecation is known as "stinkin' thinkin'." A success story, a new scrubber, or anything else that has a positive note is often called a "God-breeze." Emotional outbursts induced by the numerous testimonials often come with the attached line: "crying purple puddles." By themselves, these things are just--annoying, IMHO--soundbites meant to create a sense of community and to simplify parts of the system, making them more marketable. I won't even go too far into the 1950's hausfrau/Stepford Wives feeling that seems to be pervasive on FlyLady; after all, the word "lady" is right there in the title. Cleaning is for ladies. Right.
The number of people/acolytes/FlyTrolls who used these terms to argue the value of the system when it came under criticism on blogs, YahooAnswers!, etc. was...well..a little terrifying. In fact, there were so many comments and complaints about the YahooAnswers! question--which was obviously meant as tongue-in-cheek satire--that it was eventually pulled from Yahoo! for being "offensive." This thread--on FlyLady's BlogTalk forum--was posted after the question was pulled. The responses on the forum are all from FlyBabies. There is much laughter, some irony, and then it all devolves into a discussion about penguins.

Again, by themselves, these things mean very little regarding an assessment of FlyLady, as a system. But, let's be serious, folks.... These people are up in arms over HOUSEKEEPING. They are riled up enough to get a question pulled from YahooAnswers! and create a forum topic that kept going for over three weeks. Any sane person would have written off the criticism and moved on without a second thought. More red flags, for me.

So, it comes down to this: the resources on the FlyLady site are free, and now, so am I. I unsubscribed from the mailing list without blinking, this afternoon. No more marketing ploys eating up space in my inbox, no more whiny "testimonials" about how much better life is thanks to FlyLady, no more awful music assaulting my ears via radio and video podcasts, and no more second-guessing about why I never wanted to complete many of the Beginner's Baby Steps in the first place. If I want scheduling help, I'll go directly to the dashboard at FlyLady.net and ignore the rest.

I'll be happy to clean, but I won't convert.