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Why We Hate Us: American Discontent in the New Millennium | 
 enlarge | Author: Dick Meyer
Publisher: Crown
Category: Book
List Price: $24.95
Buy New: $13.90
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Avg. Customer Rating:  13 reviews
Sales Rank: 12438
Media: Hardcover
Edition: 1
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 288
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1.1
Dimensions (in): 9.3 x 6 x 1.2
ISBN: 0307406628
Dewey Decimal Number: 973.93
EAN: 9780307406620
ASIN: 0307406628
Publication Date: August 5, 2008
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Shipping: International shipping available
Condition: Brand new item. Over 3.5 million customers served. Order now. Selling online since 1995. Order with confidence. Code: B20081119222050T
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Product Description
Americans are as safe, well fed, securely sheltered, long-lived, free, and healthy as any human beings who have ever lived on the planet. But we are down on America. So why do we hate us? According to Dick Meyer, the following items on this (much abbreviated) list are some of the contributors to our deep disenchantment with our own culture:
Cell-phone talkers broadcasting the intimate details of their lives in public spaces
Worship of self-awareness, self-realization, and self-fulfillment
T-shirts that read, “Eat Me”
Facebook, MySpace, and kids being taught to market themselves
High-level cheating in business and sports
Reality television and the cosmetic surgery boom
Multinational corporations that claim, “We care about you.”
The decline of organic communities
A line of cosmetics called “S.L.U.T.”
The phony red state–blue state divide
The penetration of OmniMarketing into OmniMedia and the insinuation of both into every facet of our lives
You undoubtedly could add to the list with hardly a moment’s thought. In Why We Hate Us, Meyer absolutely nails America’s early-twenty-first-century mood disorder. He points out the most widespread carriers of the why-we-hate-us germs, including the belligerence of partisan politics that perverts our democracy, the decline of once common manners, the vulgarity of Hollywood entertainment, the superficiality and untrustworthiness of the news media, the cult of celebrity, and the disappearance of authentic neighborhoods and voluntary organizations (the kind that have actual meetings where one can hobnob instead of just clicking in an online contribution).
Meyer argues—with biting wit and observations that make you want to shout, “Yes! I hate that too!”—that when the social, spiritual, and political turmoil that followed the sixties collided with the technological and media revolution at the turn of the century, something inside us hit overload. American culture no longer reflects our own values. As a result, we are now morally and existentially tired, disoriented, anchorless, and defensive. We hate us and we wonder why.
Why We Hate Us reveals why we do and also offers a thoughtful and uplifting prescription for breaking out of our current morass and learning how to hate us less. It is a penetrating but always accessible Culture of Narcissism for a new generation, and it carries forward ideas that resounded with readers in bestsellers such as On Bullshit and Bowling Alone.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 8 more reviews...
Shallow as a kiddie pool, then deep as an ocean October 29, 2008
3 out of 3 found this review helpful
Inconsistent little book here.
Dick Meyer starts out with what is basically a hundred or more pages of whining about American culture. He whines about peoples' attitudes and the press and politicians and what's on TV. It gets old quickly and it's ironic, because you're reading all of this whining in a book called "Why We Hate Us" and the temptation to say, "whining is why I hate us" and walk away from the book.
That would be too bad, because the book takes a turn somewhere about halfway through and Meyer starts making some really insightful points about American culture and how to lead your life in a way that will help you get beyond a lot of the nonsense of America's culture and to contribute to a better culture. I found myself dog-earring pages because of points that Meyer was making and finished the book thinking differently about my actions: That's a big deal from a book that also quotes Talking Heads lyrics as source material.
If you'd like some original and off-beat insights into modern American life, and you're willing to wade through a healthy dose of nonsense in order to get there, then you'll probably be happy with the decision to read this book.
Reinventing the Wheel October 25, 2008
1 out of 2 found this review helpful
Americans have another habit not mentioned in the book. We must constantly reinvent the wheel. Marshall McLuhan essentially said all this, in a far wittier manner, in his 1951 classic "The Mechanical Bride", which fortunately is still available. It comes to this: by giving up our respect for the intellect, and pandering to mobocracy, we have created a diverse paradise that breeds only discontent. The schools, which stress corporate communication education, are as much to blame as anyone. There is really nothing new in this, but it does prove that the old virtues had some merit. That is also the point of the satirical allegory "Planet of the Apes." Meanwhile, the American Dream has been denigrated into "winning the lottery." People refuse to accept one essential truth: self-esteem comes from what you think of yourself,and your own efforts; not from what others think of you. Yet modern psychological tests reward you for answers that "go with the group." Well, we shall survive.
 Why I hate people like Meyer October 15, 2008
2 out of 9 found this review helpful
The book does not really tell you anything that most people do not already know. In one chapter Meyer also made it a point in the book to say that anyone who does not believe in man made global warming has somehow invented his own truth or "truthiness". Personally I do not believe Dick Meyer is qualified to make that judgement. Why is he even bringing this up in a social science book I would like to know. He should put that in his follow up book a reason I hate people is because they point out that others are lying to themselves even if they are qualified scientists and the author is not.
 Lots of questions. Few Answers October 15, 2008
3 out of 4 found this review helpful
Half-way through this book, I realized it wasn't going anywhere. It was a good journalist's approach, but lacking depth and precision. Meyers was very good in reviewing all the works of others about America's ennui, but made few critical remarks about them.
In reviewing America's bad manners and belligerence, the works he cites never go back very far in history. Americans have always been a contentious and litigious lot. We used to have a lot more riots, demonstrations, public fights and brawls than we do now. We have always had bitter rivalries between various classes. We used to have slavery, remember?
During WWII cold war, we seemed to have hunkered down and behaved better. That sense of conformity broke down with the Vietnam war, which we entered without much unity or enthusiasm, always a mistake.
Meyers seems to be uncomfortable with the fact that we are all postmoderns now. Truth is relative. We all have to create our own values (which we always do by selecting those communities we identify with). Meyer misses entirely the point made by modern philosophy and science that the ego itself is an illusion, a construct of ideas we get from those around us. Whatever "identities" there are available to us are available in society.
Enormous numbers of people are not happy with their lives. People are working harder and longer in the U.S. with less to show for it. A little more attention to the inequality in our lives would have given this book more grounding and substance.
 Dysfunctional culture likely to remain so, despite vague discontent (3.25 *s) August 30, 2008
10 out of 13 found this review helpful
The author makes clear that the modern social world is characterized by isolationism of its members and "meism." The fact that such a society does not function harmoniously or that many are upset by those developments is hardly surprising. The author, in a work that draws upon Putnam's "Bowling Alone," but more personally and anecdotally, recounts an entire litany of socially dysfunctional behaviors: boorishness, indifference, phoniness, etc. Face-to-face communities that once perpetuated shared values and some degree of tolerance have largely disappeared. The vast majority of us are ensconced in manicured suburbia surrounded by a plethora of personal electronic devices: computers, cell phones, iPods, PDAs, DVDs, etc. With the prevalence of these devices, few are inclined to interact with a neighbor, let alone a community. Even if there is the desire, town centers and the corner bar are constructions of the past. These developments have had profound consequences for our society.
According to the author, "OmniMedia" and "OmniMarketing" are all pervasive in our culture with relentless impact on our traditions. There are so many media options that viewers and users, using cable and online sources, can tailor their selection of information and concepts that they wish to be true. Truth has been transformed into self-selected "truthiness." In addition, the entertainment industry and media have completely undermined conventional mores with salacious and provocative content.
Advertising and marketing have been driving our consumption oriented economy for almost a century. Now, that shaping of minds has seeped its way down as a tool for individuals. Creating a marketable "you," replete with images and the right credentials, is part of what the author calls "selfism." The well-rounded citizen is a person of the past. The author notes that marketing and self-promotion often slip into phoniness and deliberate misinformation.
With the pervasiveness of truthiness and selfism, it's hardly surprising that American is depicted as being polarized. The news media is a large proponent of that notion, though the author insists that view is more superficial than real.
Much of the author's description of our culture is inarguable. Loutishness, indifference, phoniness, and political screamers are everywhere for the seeing. However, the author's claim that we hate our culture is quite vague. Does a political ideologue hate the fact that he or she is an ideologue or that others do not agree. Does a marketer hate his own slippery advertising as much as he does the next guy's? Does outrage at the depiction of women as fast and loose stop the purchasing of goods or buying tickets to entertainment? Should we be concerned with the hate of convenience?
The author's ideas for reclaiming our culture from its current state of affairs seem most inadequate. The notion that a few random individuals that choose to operate with integrity and the highest moral purpose will put in a dent in modern trends seems disingenuous. It is a fact that corporate values dominate our society. People are no longer primarily citizens; we've all become consumers and commodities. We operate according to self interest. We seek to buy cheap to the disadvantage of our fellow men if need be, but to sell ourselves high to the exclusion of others. Where is the concern for downsizing and off shoring and the devastation to families and communities, beyond those directly affected? Do we hate that?
Yes, much about our culture is dysfunctional. There may be vague dissatisfaction in some circles, but hate of our culture is doubtful. The ability of corporations to drive our culture and to subtly persuade us to like it is increasing every day. The citizens of the US are largely unequipped with either the tools or the knowledge to fully understand our culture, let alone repair it.
The book is a nice overview of our culture for those unable to understand what they see. Absolutely nothing new about our culture is presented; the observant person has seen all that the author has, and more. And the book is somewhat repetitious and tedious to read. One suspects that we are a lot further away from righting our culture than the author suggests. The forces of hate or discontent are hardly significant enough or rational enough to drive changes in a direction that would be beneficial to the society as a whole.
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