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A review by brenticus
The Burnout Society by Byung-Chul Han
challenging
informative
reflective
fast-paced
4.0
Han argues that our "achievement society" pushes an excess of positivity, a constant desire for more, that is driving many of the mental health epidemics society is currently struggling with.
In some cases it feels like he's making odd medical judgments from a philosophical perspective, but for the most part his arguments are consistent, intriguing, and match experiences I commonly see in the world. He is able to effectively argue that the burnout pandemic plaguing modern society is a cultural problem with solutions we have abandoned in the past.
My main problem is just the language, which may be a translation issue: Burnout Society has a lot of language which isn't entirely clear, and sometimes opts for overly complex wording that obscures the subject to an unnecessary extent. It also made me annoyed with Freud, as a whole page discussing ego and super-ego becomes word salad when "ego" pops up so many times in a row.
Regardless, once you parse through the language Han presents interesting ideas that pull together philosophy, psychology, and sociology in a comprehensive way that points towards real problems and solutions.
In some cases it feels like he's making odd medical judgments from a philosophical perspective, but for the most part his arguments are consistent, intriguing, and match experiences I commonly see in the world. He is able to effectively argue that the burnout pandemic plaguing modern society is a cultural problem with solutions we have abandoned in the past.
My main problem is just the language, which may be a translation issue: Burnout Society has a lot of language which isn't entirely clear, and sometimes opts for overly complex wording that obscures the subject to an unnecessary extent. It also made me annoyed with Freud, as a whole page discussing ego and super-ego becomes word salad when "ego" pops up so many times in a row.
Regardless, once you parse through the language Han presents interesting ideas that pull together philosophy, psychology, and sociology in a comprehensive way that points towards real problems and solutions.