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3.71 AVERAGE
3.71 AVERAGE
This book may cure many boys from their disastrous Nice Guy Syndrome. Making them men who are happy with how they are and their own needs as a priority in career, relationships and sex.
A book by a self-declared “recovering nice guy” for nice guys seems like a hot mess. And yet. The very first chapter lays out how Nice Guys only think they’re nice (hence the name) and are in fact manipulative and passive aggressive. The book then lays out chapter by chapter how reform your life to have healthier relationships (both romantic and platonic). The titles of each chapter were red flags, “Get the Sex You Want”, “Reclaim Your Personal Power”, etc but it quickly became clear that a lot of this book was couched in sexist language to appeal to the kind of person who thought they were a Nice Guy.
A lot of the advice in this book is really useful and positive, such as having friends and/or a support group to talk through your issues, to not infantilize your partner or make her your emotional center (Robert A. Glover goes out of his way multiple times to tell you he helps straight and gay men, but this book is clearly written almost exclusively for straight men).
Nice guys are known for being anti-women, essentially blaming women for all of their problems. And for the most part “No More Mr Nice Guys” avoids falling into this trap, pressing men to take accountability for their actions and relationships. Some parts… get weird though. Glover goes through the history of America (presumably? He doesn’t specifically say its American but he also doesn’t talk about anything else). He decries elementary schools for being taught mostly by women. Does he get into the nitty gritty of why women are pushed into caregiving roles? No. But he does blame this for a stunting of young men’s emotional growth. He blames especially the fathers for the creation of Nice Guys but he also gets into some weird Freudian kill your father, sleep with your mother stuff. There is a whole section about monogamy to your mother that is a lot.
For a book written in 2003 for and by nice guys, this has a lot more positive than negative. There are definitely parts of this book that are red flags, but they’re smaller red flags than nice guys usually have so I’ll take that as a win.
A 2.5 rounded up to 3 stars because Goodreads won't give us half stars!
A lot of the advice in this book is really useful and positive, such as having friends and/or a support group to talk through your issues, to not infantilize your partner or make her your emotional center (Robert A. Glover goes out of his way multiple times to tell you he helps straight and gay men, but this book is clearly written almost exclusively for straight men).
Nice guys are known for being anti-women, essentially blaming women for all of their problems. And for the most part “No More Mr Nice Guys” avoids falling into this trap, pressing men to take accountability for their actions and relationships. Some parts… get weird though. Glover goes through the history of America (presumably? He doesn’t specifically say its American but he also doesn’t talk about anything else). He decries elementary schools for being taught mostly by women. Does he get into the nitty gritty of why women are pushed into caregiving roles? No. But he does blame this for a stunting of young men’s emotional growth. He blames especially the fathers for the creation of Nice Guys but he also gets into some weird Freudian kill your father, sleep with your mother stuff. There is a whole section about monogamy to your mother that is a lot.
For a book written in 2003 for and by nice guys, this has a lot more positive than negative. There are definitely parts of this book that are red flags, but they’re smaller red flags than nice guys usually have so I’ll take that as a win.
A 2.5 rounded up to 3 stars because Goodreads won't give us half stars!
I deliberately stopped reading this and left the reading group for it. The points in here can be summarized as “respect and prioritize your own needs and boundaries” and “stand up for yourself.” This book does have the decent point that sometimes that means prioritizing your needs over those of others, which is a valid and useful thing for “nice guys” to hear, but much like so much of Jordan Peterson’s advice, the sensible basic concepts are couched in so much awful, poorly contextualized, needlessly gendered boomer bullshit that it’s actively harmful.
This book isn’t about men vs women, it’s about general emotional intelligence and self-preservation in the face of those that may take advantage of kindness, as well as breaking out of the “transactional relationship” mindset. That’s it. Instead, we get endless anecdotal conjecture with absolutely no logic to back it up outside of wildly problematic perspectives on things like anti-war protests and feminism.
For example, the author posits that the American youth of the Vietnam War era simply “didn’t understand” why the conflict couldn’t be resolved without guns and violence because they were too detached from their masculinity after being raised by women. There were SO MANY REASONS to be against the Vietnam war, from the new level of journalistic coverage to the civilian casualties to the questionable reasons for the Americans being there in the first place (for starters), but the author reduces it to “after all of the men died in WW2 and FEMINISM became a thing, too many men of the time were just super pussified, bro. We’ve gotta get back to our ROOTS.”
Even if you’re able to set aside the questionable logic and flagrant misogyny and closed-mindedness that the book pushes, what little value that the book has is still questionable because while some more timid and emotionally mixed up man may benefit, someone who’s already an asshole could read it and use the logic within to justify being a selfish prick with no regard for rules or the needs of others.
I stopped after chapter 6 because chapter 7 is “success strategies for intimate relationships.” No way in hell am I going to subject myself to intimacy advice from this blowhard. This book is toxic garbage and has its head completely up its own ass. There are better ways to do this.
This book isn’t about men vs women, it’s about general emotional intelligence and self-preservation in the face of those that may take advantage of kindness, as well as breaking out of the “transactional relationship” mindset. That’s it. Instead, we get endless anecdotal conjecture with absolutely no logic to back it up outside of wildly problematic perspectives on things like anti-war protests and feminism.
For example, the author posits that the American youth of the Vietnam War era simply “didn’t understand” why the conflict couldn’t be resolved without guns and violence because they were too detached from their masculinity after being raised by women. There were SO MANY REASONS to be against the Vietnam war, from the new level of journalistic coverage to the civilian casualties to the questionable reasons for the Americans being there in the first place (for starters), but the author reduces it to “after all of the men died in WW2 and FEMINISM became a thing, too many men of the time were just super pussified, bro. We’ve gotta get back to our ROOTS.”
Even if you’re able to set aside the questionable logic and flagrant misogyny and closed-mindedness that the book pushes, what little value that the book has is still questionable because while some more timid and emotionally mixed up man may benefit, someone who’s already an asshole could read it and use the logic within to justify being a selfish prick with no regard for rules or the needs of others.
I stopped after chapter 6 because chapter 7 is “success strategies for intimate relationships.” No way in hell am I going to subject myself to intimacy advice from this blowhard. This book is toxic garbage and has its head completely up its own ass. There are better ways to do this.
Quite interesting in the beginning, a bit repetitive and therefore, boring in the end. I can see myself in some of the types explained in this volume, though.
informative
slow-paced
It was mostly a nice summary of what I'd known in the past, but I guess the average reader will find a lot of value here on what is essentially a guide on how to stand up for yourself.
Well, it had some good ideas, most of which are covered better elsewhere. I would have liked to have finished the book in a more timely manner. However, it would have been more judicious to never have read it at all.