Jon RonsonBesprekingen

Had a lot of valid and interesting points but the way it was written just reminded me of a lost teenager with too many resources to play with.
I am well aware that it was written by a journalist and if you're a fan of that style of writing then it is a good book for you for someone that prefers a more factual, textbook layout in my non-fiction this just came across as bunch of thoughts and arguments half thought out and only semi researched. The topics of the thoughts were entertaining enough but just lacking any substance which is an excellent way to make people further research them on their own - which I sense to be the intention - but if you have already got anything past the bare minimum of the topics it's redundant.

An interesting exploration of shame and various iterations of it, with the impetus being online shaming. I was engaged throughout the book and assumed the author would reach a more impactful - or even half-formed - conclusion. He did not. Left it hanging out there for someone else to pick up.

This was a very interesting book, that was well written and thought provoking. I would recommend to anyone looking for a good non fiction book to read,

A masterful writer on an important issue, the uncontrolled (verbal?) violence of online crowds. Twitter shaming and how it ruins lives without control...

The author/book was disappointing in that the problem described very well and personably was not taken apart into its components: why twitter more than others, what alternate positive examples are there, what is the longer term story of this medium, how is it paralleled to other media.

I feel a missed opportunity here from a very talented and entertaining journalist.

Ron Johnson is a talented and entertaining journalist, and a great reader for the audio versions of his book. The story is intriguing following the bizarre path of nonlethal weapons in warfare and use of “weird science” to affect the minds of fighters and prisoners alike. Science and pseudoscience intermingle, and find ways to survive in the massive machinwa of defense spending. Pseudoscience and science are presumed applied to real world situations with unisual ethical dilemmas.

The problem is that Ron makes this all a bit too fun and entertaining while neither thinking through what a reasonable alternative route might have been for the army nor whether the suggested actions that occurred were outside the ethical framework we accept. He could take his story a bit more seriously and leave us with a bit more insight.

Funny weird world described through fairly dark lenses in a period around 2000. The almost endearing description of very strange people, including Alex Jones, which I don’t think would stand today seems to suggest there would be a second order Them to the Them...

I learned something, but not sure I wanted to...

3.5 stars

As one of the blurbs on the endpapers (from Salon, I think) rightly observes, Jon Ronson's clever prose moves this book along at a nice clip but also manifestly engages some of the big epistemological issues related to psychiatric diagnoses. This is a fascinating--and even profound--piece of journalism.

Originally posted at www.csdaley.com

I think I am funny. I am fairly certain that a handful of people think I am funny. I know that I have occasionally thrown something out onto Twitter that has garnered a few laughs. I also know that I have had jokes fall like weighted anvils to the bottom of the social media stream to never be laughed at or seen again. At least that's what I hope. The truth is far different from that. It doesn't go anywhere. It just sits there and waits. If you're lucky. If you're unlucky and you said something particularly offensive to somebody or you become famous, those jokes and comments will rise up like a leviathan and swallow your life whole.

We live in a world that seems to enjoy the piling on of public shame. We revel in it. Some people seem to be waiting around just hoping for that good shame feast to pounce on. This happens again and again with little to no thought of the consequences. There are times when the public shaming seems to be well deserved. Someone's caught plagiarizing or being misogynistic. Often times it is just a joke gone wrong. A few words misunderstood. Then the shame is piled on like we are in a coliseum and we are going to feed those people to the public lion. There are no breaks and lives are often destroyed in the process.

This is the subject Jon Ronson tackles in his new book So You've Been Publicly Shamed. He starts off with a personal story of shaming someone who stole his identity as a joke or thought experiment. He writes about the glee he felt when he brings them down with the power of the internet. It leads him to a deeper thought. Did I go too far? Did the punishment actually fit the crime?

He sets off to interview and tell people's stories of their public shaming. Some of them are heart breaking. Lives completely destroyed and torn apart because a joke sunk like a bomb. What's worse is their inability to ever escape it because it sits out there like an anchor around their neck. Waiting to be discovered by the next person who Googles their name.

This was my favorite Jon Ronson book since Them and that is saying something because I love Ronson. I felt he told the stories fairly and evenly. I loved that he kept his own personal feelings about the people and public shaming right up front. This book became about self discovery as much as telling these people's story. His understanding of the glee he took in several public pile ons keeps him moving forward.

As a person who puts a lot of things out into the social media world this hits close to home. It is not that hard to imagine myself at the other end of a particularly nasty lashing. It has made me examine my own behavior out on the web. To really think about the people I have blasted over the years. To examine if I want to actually be part of the shame culture that seems to exist in social media. There is no easy answer to this question but it is one well worth examining. This book will help start that journey.

I really enjoyed this book. Had some interesting things to say about mental health. I am not going to lie though. The chapter about the over prescribing of drugs to children was my favorite. I have long believed this to be true in my part of the world.

I loved this book. A series of essays and articles. Full of laughter, sadness, horror and strange things people believe.

It's a bit difficult to get into at the beginning. But it is very informative and makes you think.

This was fascinating— Ronson combines personally interviews with people notoriously shamed on the internet, work with psychology experts and a ton of first person journalism to explore shaming and our responses. There’s no easy answers here — in the afterword he says basically “some people prioritize ideology over humans; I prefer humans” and that captures a lot of this book: there’s a lot of humanity here. Which means a lot of care for human beings and thoughtful approaches to not what “feels right” but actually helps people do right. There’s not shaming of shamers, either — Ronson is also honest about his own temptations to scoff at people over the internet. For such a firebrand of a topic it’s calm and personalized. And very readable.

Liked it. Liked it quite a lot! Not an incredibly in-depth/sciencey look at psychopathy, but very interesting and kept the subject very accessible. It also gave me a little list of other books/journal articles/people in the field to look up, which is wonderful.

Oh, added bonus? If you're a person who takes transit, just having this book in your lap, or held up in front of you when reading on the bus, definitely helps ensure that no one sits beside you. :) Pro tip!

Does a good job of humanizing the (mostly American) fringe, including revealing facts about 'Ruby Ridge' that I never knew, while not loosing sight of that fact that these people are weird, very weird, and that's just for starters. Ronson succeeds in revealing how e.g. Alex Jones' world view might make sense to him and his followers --in other words, they are not 'just crazy'-- while not loosing sight of the fact that they are, well, a bit crazy (in the colloquial sense.)

Jon Ronson's style is so breezy it's almost apologetic. If you take him at face value, he bumbles here and bumbles there and then somehow meets so many interesting people that he has no choice but to come to his conclusion. He doesn't purport to be telling any particular story, just relating his own meanderings and the start of the book doesn't even really indicate what he plans to do or why he wrote it. However, I don't believe for a second that's how Ronson actually wrote the book. I imagine he agonised over it, followed endless dead ends and carefully crafted the prose.

Nevertheless, the consequence for me, as a reader, is that this is a very light read. It doesn't make any very grand claims, but then it doesn't take too much of your time and energy, either. If you're eager to learn about the subject matter you will probably find this book disappointing, but if you like the soudn of going on a quirky adventure with a self-conscious, somewhat anxious guide, I'd highly recommend The Psychopath Test.

The author attempts to track down the truth of a weird story of a man who remotely killed a goat. He covers some pretty strange stuff but never seems to get to the point. I have not seen the movie and probably never will.

library book read 7/27/2023½

This book starts really well and is enjoyable but about half way it becomes very disjointed. When the conclusion arrives it feels forced. One to read if you have nothing else to read.

Interesting book. I found the author endearing and relatable in some ways, with his awkwardness and anxiety, but sometimes it could be too much, and his personal life could get in the way of the story he was trying to tell.

The topic of the book is very interesting, essentially being about psychopaths. How to spot one, what it means to be one, etc. Learning that a good percentage of politicians and CEO's are psychopaths is not surprising in the slightest.

This book could be a bit rambly at times, with talking about misdiagnosis of other mental conditions, as well as some digressions into commentary about insanity in general. I would have preferred it stay a little more on topic, and perhaps go more into the science/data, rather than focus on the anecdotes.

I do think I like Jon Ronson's journalistic style, and I may try other books of his.

Not exactly what I expected, and I'm glad I didn't buy it. I never knew there was a "psychopath test" , and I learned more about the DSM-IV than I ever needed to know...but this "journey" was an unsatisfying one.

Oh no, no no. I need to take a breather to decide whether and how to articulate the anger and disappointment I'm feeling about this.

This was waiting for me in NY. I've a feeling anything else he's written will follow shortly.

Funny and random and plenty interesting. Easy read and a good staring point for some entertaining conversations.

I truly don’t intend to be judgmental in my review of this short story. It was not for me. I don’t mind the language or sexual content and I respect peoples’ lifestyle choices. I found the plot boring and immature. I received this as a free Audible original ages ago. It has a full cast of narrators that was mediocre. I was expecting it to be more of a dark mystery. I bailed pretty quickly. This just isn’t a story I want to spend my time with.

I know anybody who is reading these entries linearly will be extremely bored of my writing: "Standard Ronson pleasures", but that's pretty much where we are. It's lightly funny and interesting, and Ronson has a lively way with stories and insanely precise character moments that can only occur with excellent nonfiction.

Still, I've always been less interested in his white sumpremacy narratives because they presuppose a certain level of competance and rationality at their core that I think doesn't generally exist in that domain, and this story suffers from that.

It does put ATF incompetance on full display, though, and that's always something of a public service.