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creationwing's review against another edition
informative
reflective
medium-paced
3.25
Interesting overall, but I wasn't a huge fan of the structure, and was a little bothered by the casual othering of autistic people.
Content Warnings
Moderate: Police brutality, Gun violence, Misogyny, Injury/Injury detail, Ableism, and Racism
Minor: Medical trauma, Child abuse, Physical abuse, Domestic abuse, and Sexism
ulyssies's review
informative
lighthearted
reflective
fast-paced
3.75
Content Warnings
Moderate: Racism
Minor: Suicide
matcha_cat's review
informative
reflective
medium-paced
3.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Gun violence, Murder, and Police brutality
Moderate: Misogyny
Minor: Death and Racism
katrinarose's review against another edition
informative
reflective
medium-paced
3.0
On a surface level, I enjoyed this book. Tons of anecdotes on just about any topic, there’s something for everyone. These stories are interesting to discuss and I can see myself bringing them up in future conversations. However, I don’t feel like there’s a very cohesive argument. Sometimes snap judgements are good, sometimes they are bad. There’s lots of studies discussed but it seems like they’re just thrown in an individual curiosities not part of the whole book. There were several times I found myself wondering “now why has he been discussing this random thing for 10 minutes” and then there’s a weak connection to the thesis (which itself is weak).
I appreciated the unconscious racism discussion but I didn’t like how it led straight into apologizing police brutality. Yes, police officers face a lot of pressure in high-stress situations that causes their ability to make sound judgements break down, but let’s not ignore the fact that the police force in America attracts people who are racist and violent, and there are plenty of studies to show this.
Overall not a bad book but I feel like it missed out on another round of edits to make it more cohesive.
I appreciated the unconscious racism discussion but I didn’t like how it led straight into apologizing police brutality. Yes, police officers face a lot of pressure in high-stress situations that causes their ability to make sound judgements break down, but let’s not ignore the fact that the police force in America attracts people who are racist and violent, and there are plenty of studies to show this.
Overall not a bad book but I feel like it missed out on another round of edits to make it more cohesive.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Blood, Death, Gun violence, Medical content, Misogyny, Murder, Police brutality, Racism, Violence, and Sexism
sharknerd's review
0.5
I was gonna give the book 1.5 stars but, near the end, I read the sentence “Most police officers - well over 90 percent - go their whole career without ever firing at anyone, and those who do describe the experience as so unimaginably stressful that it seems reasonable to ask if firing a gun could be the kind of experience that could cause temporary autism” and had to lower the score 💀
The author seems like he only has a basic understanding of the concepts he is trying to teach others and reaches conclusions with little backing.
The author seems like he only has a basic understanding of the concepts he is trying to teach others and reaches conclusions with little backing.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Ableism and Police brutality
Moderate: Murder and Racism
stevia333k's review
slow-paced
1.0
it's only good for pop culture references. this book is white supremacist & ableist as all hell. Malcolm Gladwell is a windbag. highly recommend "a mind of its own" by Cordelia Fine over this book (it covers a lot more ground than this one & is a lot more helpful). Fine's book even gives more recommendations for preventing bigotry from entering the judgement process than this book.
Malcolm Gladwell doesn't understand how racism works. he doesn't understand the consequentialism of systems. he thinks the pronouns of the overton window is everyone/everybody which alienates people of different neurotypes such as autistic people & those whose brains have impaired regions for decision making (everyone/everybody pronouns is based on the myth that everyone has an organ called "common sense" instead of "common sense" being an ideology. Gladwell claims he's talking about science.)
so this book is apologia for police brutality when the pop culture was already aware that it was police brutality. this book compares supporting prejudice with developing algorithms for diagnosing people. due to this idea of prejudice is good & his desire to normalize it, he throws different neurotypes under the bus too. (The old ableist playbook of calling evil people disabled in order to not hold evil accountable.) point being, this book is neoliberal if not outright fascist trash.
he literally says that when cops are in a heightened state that they are "mind-blind". he reduces autism to "mind-blindness" when labels like "high functioning" imply a Spectrum. ...this could've been an argument for police abolition, but it wasn't. Therefore this sympathy for the devil bullshit is especially horrendous considering that cops murder autistic people.
so here's the list of topics for a jacky of all trades skillbox
- tone reading
- face reading (2022-1106-0858 PS: this turned out to be some Evo psych bullshit & body language is cultural instead of universal. It's upheld because forensic science is based on conviction rates instead of accuracy. The whole thing is fueled by appeal to authority & vertical models of ethics: https://youtu.be/Y0VQyEY-B2I )
- heart attack algorithm
- blind auditions.
- there's some more, but frankly, i suspect there's a wikipedia article for this sort of list.
seriously, compared to cordelia fine's book, this book is not information dense at all. it's a lot of fluff.
this might be good for cultural revolution types, as well as that other book i recommend over this book. this is because workplace culture being involved in sabotage plays into this. but again, if fascism involves mind trickery than Cordelia Fine's book is the superior book.
Malcolm Gladwell doesn't understand how racism works. he doesn't understand the consequentialism of systems. he thinks the pronouns of the overton window is everyone/everybody which alienates people of different neurotypes such as autistic people & those whose brains have impaired regions for decision making (everyone/everybody pronouns is based on the myth that everyone has an organ called "common sense" instead of "common sense" being an ideology. Gladwell claims he's talking about science.)
so this book is apologia for police brutality when the pop culture was already aware that it was police brutality. this book compares supporting prejudice with developing algorithms for diagnosing people. due to this idea of prejudice is good & his desire to normalize it, he throws different neurotypes under the bus too. (The old ableist playbook of calling evil people disabled in order to not hold evil accountable.) point being, this book is neoliberal if not outright fascist trash.
he literally says that when cops are in a heightened state that they are "mind-blind". he reduces autism to "mind-blindness" when labels like "high functioning" imply a Spectrum. ...this could've been an argument for police abolition, but it wasn't. Therefore this sympathy for the devil bullshit is especially horrendous considering that cops murder autistic people.
so here's the list of topics for a jacky of all trades skillbox
- tone reading
- face reading (2022-1106-0858 PS: this turned out to be some Evo psych bullshit & body language is cultural instead of universal. It's upheld because forensic science is based on conviction rates instead of accuracy. The whole thing is fueled by appeal to authority & vertical models of ethics: https://youtu.be/Y0VQyEY-B2I )
- heart attack algorithm
- blind auditions.
- there's some more, but frankly, i suspect there's a wikipedia article for this sort of list.
seriously, compared to cordelia fine's book, this book is not information dense at all. it's a lot of fluff.
this might be good for cultural revolution types, as well as that other book i recommend over this book. this is because workplace culture being involved in sabotage plays into this. but again, if fascism involves mind trickery than Cordelia Fine's book is the superior book.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Ableism, Murder, Police brutality, Racism, Gun violence, Hate crime, Mental illness, Gaslighting, Sexism, Sexual harassment, Classism, and Misogyny
erinboberin's review
challenging
informative
medium-paced
2.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Ableism, Police brutality, and Racism
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