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3.82 AVERAGE
3.82 AVERAGE
audiobook: a really fascinating read on the importance of community. I love how it combines personal stories, interviews, and scientific research to display how modern society has lost community and has become so individualized.
I started this book anticipating that I would agree all along. And the overall premise: that connection and community are intrinsically human and essential to our well-being and happiness, is definitely one that I buy into fully. This book’s strengths lies in its stories, some of which are very moving. And the final chapter discussing how war forces a sense of community and how American society needs to find better ways to help veterans re-enter civilian society has some really great thoughts.
But.
The weaknesses of this book were too distracting for me to really enjoy listening to it. The scientific studies felt cherry picked to prove his points and several didn’t even seem to do that. What does it actually mean that in the list of the Righteous Among the Nations after removing married couples women slightly outnumber men (and given that at the time it is unlikely any of those marriages was not heterosexual wouldn’t women still slightly outnumber men in that context?) I’m not sure you can draw any meaningful conclusions from a slight outnumbering.
And it is amusing that directly afterward he says that 20% of PTSD cases become chronic, calling that rare. I’d call that fairly common in the scheme of things. More meaningful than a slight outnumbering anyway.
The generalizations about so-called primitive or stone age societies were painful as well. I don’t know a whole lot about Native American tribes but I do know enough to become immediately distrustful of anyone who ascribes any sort of cultural fact across the board to them. And more broadly, crediting the community of these tribes with their members better mental health (compared to us moderns) ignores so many other present factors that have been correlated with strong mental health. That they spend more time in nature, have more day to day physical movement and exertion, and eat little to no processed foods all have to be taken into account as well.
And are there really no ‘modern’ societies who at least do better at community than the average? That could be an applicable useful example.
Last but not least, aside from the weird slightly outnumbering statistic cited above, women are largely ignored in this book. More than once he describes a society so devoted to egalitarianism that when a man threatens to become an alpha male several other men will band together to stop him. No mention of the women in this scenario (the egalitarianism premise wouldn’t hold up if he included it I suppose.) The examples of community built in combat are interesting for sure. Those are largely male though. Why no discussion of the ways women often build a sense of community for themselves?
It’s time that it be made clear: you cannot claim to draw conclusions about the whole of humanity if you don’t include half of it.
In closing: I’m not sure if this book needed to be longer (to cover the topic more comprehensively) or shorter (to remove questionably applicable data.) It certainly needed to be better.
But.
The weaknesses of this book were too distracting for me to really enjoy listening to it. The scientific studies felt cherry picked to prove his points and several didn’t even seem to do that. What does it actually mean that in the list of the Righteous Among the Nations after removing married couples women slightly outnumber men (and given that at the time it is unlikely any of those marriages was not heterosexual wouldn’t women still slightly outnumber men in that context?) I’m not sure you can draw any meaningful conclusions from a slight outnumbering.
And it is amusing that directly afterward he says that 20% of PTSD cases become chronic, calling that rare. I’d call that fairly common in the scheme of things. More meaningful than a slight outnumbering anyway.
The generalizations about so-called primitive or stone age societies were painful as well. I don’t know a whole lot about Native American tribes but I do know enough to become immediately distrustful of anyone who ascribes any sort of cultural fact across the board to them. And more broadly, crediting the community of these tribes with their members better mental health (compared to us moderns) ignores so many other present factors that have been correlated with strong mental health. That they spend more time in nature, have more day to day physical movement and exertion, and eat little to no processed foods all have to be taken into account as well.
And are there really no ‘modern’ societies who at least do better at community than the average? That could be an applicable useful example.
Last but not least, aside from the weird slightly outnumbering statistic cited above, women are largely ignored in this book. More than once he describes a society so devoted to egalitarianism that when a man threatens to become an alpha male several other men will band together to stop him. No mention of the women in this scenario (the egalitarianism premise wouldn’t hold up if he included it I suppose.) The examples of community built in combat are interesting for sure. Those are largely male though. Why no discussion of the ways women often build a sense of community for themselves?
It’s time that it be made clear: you cannot claim to draw conclusions about the whole of humanity if you don’t include half of it.
In closing: I’m not sure if this book needed to be longer (to cover the topic more comprehensively) or shorter (to remove questionably applicable data.) It certainly needed to be better.
This book has an important message we already know but have not verbalized or done anything about: modern society isolates individuals so much that it destroys our mental well being.
The anecdotes are excellent. They hit me in the feels over and over.
The missing star is due to a missing section: what can we do about our isolation?
The anecdotes are excellent. They hit me in the feels over and over.
The missing star is due to a missing section: what can we do about our isolation?
Fascinating insight and perspective. A quick read that is definitely worth it.
Listened to this quick 3 hour audiobook in a day. There are some pretty good thoughts in here about what it means to be in community with the people around you. I found it especially interesting to learn about the way that people frequently look back on difficult times like wartime or natural disasters with fondness because of the sense of community they felt.
A short, snappy read about the importance of community and shared sacrifice, of challenges, of the damage that allowing people to be victims does to a society. The west needs to figure this stuff out if we want to solve our mental health crisis.
Only 135 pages and yet I struggled to finish it. Had some thought provoking ideas but idk the writing was not enjoyable to read. It felt like reading something a college freshman would write idk it just didn’t say anything worth saying I guess
Intriguing thoughts about community, belonging, purpose. Interesting discussion of PTSD and reentry into “normal” times/society.
informative
reflective
fast-paced
challenging
dark
hopeful
informative
sad
fast-paced