James Dobson

==Criticism==

U.S. Surgeon General [[C. Everett Koop]], a fellow evangelical Christian who wanted Dobson as an ally in his battle against the [[AIDS crisis]], was deeply disappointed when Dobson embraced pseudoscientific and homophobic claims about AIDS. "The Christian activity in reference to AIDS of both [[D. James Kennedy]] and Jim Dobson is reprehensible," Koop said in 1989. He viewed the AIDS crisis as "an opportunity for Christian service" that Dobson was squandering.<ref>{{cite news |title=Koop Criticizes Evangelical Leaders on AIDS Stands |date=June 10, 1989 |newspaper=Los Angeles Times |url=https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1989-06-10-me-1321-story.html }}</ref>

In her 2020 book ''[[Jesus and John Wayne]]'', [[Calvin University]] professor [[Kristin Kobes Du Mez]] criticizes the ideal of Christian masculinity created by Dobson, [[Mark Driscoll]] and others: "It was a vision that promised protection for women but left women without defense, one that worshiped power and turned a blind eye to justice, and one that transformed the Jesus of the Gospels into an image of their own making."{{sfn|Du Mez|2020|p=294}}

Don Jacobson, who published books by Dobson and other conservative Christian authors at his Multnomah Press, later rejected the [[Christian nationalism]] his press had helped cultivate. After reading historical Christian justifications for murder and conquest of [[Native Americans in the United States|American Indians]], he came to view [[American exceptionalism]] as incompatible with [[Christian love]].{{sfn|Du Mez|2020|p=303, 343}}

Gil Alexander-Moegerle, a former Focus on the Family executive and radio show co-host, wrote the highly critical book ''James Dobson's War on America'' in 1997. In it, he says that Dobson's loving, caring public persona is a sham; the real Dobson is racist, sexist, homophobic, materialistic, power-hungry, and shameless. He says that the [[Church of the Nazarene|Nazarene]] religious concept of [[entire sanctification]] is key to understanding Dobson's views: "James Dobson believes that he has been entirely sanctified, morally perfected, that he does not and cannot sin. Now you know why he and moralists like him make a life of condemning what he believes to be the sins of others. He is perfect."<ref>{{cite magazine |magazine=[[5280]] |title=And on the Eighth Day, Dr. Dobson Created Himself |first=Eileen |last=Welsome |date=August 28, 2010 |url=https://www.5280.com/and-on-the-eighth-day-dr-dobson-created-himself/ }}</ref>

Some fundamentalist Christians consider Dobson a [[heretic]] for presenting secular concepts from psychology and self-help literature as though they are justified by the Bible.<ref name=Johnson1998 />

Theologian [[Donald Eric Capps]] contends that Dobson's corporal punishment techniques exploit children by turning their natural need to be loved against them. Dobson's advice to "break the will" of the child is a recipe for child abuse, according to Capps, and is antithetical to loving one's child. He also argues that corporal punishment may sexualize children. For evidence of this, he points to Dobson's vivid childhood recollection of being beaten with his mother's girdle. Capps believed that using physical pain to heighten a child's relationship to God is "perverted."<ref name=Johnson1998 />