08/26/2019
As a self-identified liberal with a “penchant for devil’s advocacy,” essayist Daum (The Unspeakable ) explores hypocrisy and lack of nuance from the Left in this edgy polemic. She takes aim at the undeveloped, hamfisted modes of expression on social media; recalls arguing with friends who believe “the world sucks for women”; dismisses the concept of toxic masculinity because some women also engage in toxic behavior; argues that the Title IX regulation meant to protect sexual assault victims on college campuses fails to account sufficiently for false accusations; and recounts becoming fascinated with “free speech” personalities such as Christina Hoff Sommers and Jordan Peterson. She is most nuanced and perceptive when looking at the personal; for example, she draws an astute connection between this growing interest and the end of her marriage, and acknowledges that her opinions are informed by “aging and feeling obsolete.” But the book is largely more cultural in focus. In one characteristic moment, she asks, “Are we only allowed to punch up? And if so, does that mean those of us perceived to be on the highest rungs are left just waving our fists in the air, with nothing to punch? Maybe. But I still feel like punching something a lot of the time.” Fans of Daum’s searching, incisive essays and memoirs will likely be put off; fans of her opinion columns and fellow contrarians may be more receptive. (Oct.)
One of The New York Times Book Review ’s 100 Notable Books of 2019 One of The New York Post’s Best Books of 2019 - The New York Times Vogue.com “ an elegantly-composed treatise against tribalism and cancel culture that seamlessly weaves in personal anecdotes.”Elle Tablet Newsweek The New York Post — Vivian Gornick, author of Fierce Attachments and The Odd Woman and the City The Problem with Everything has the brutal honesty and rawness that will leave you examining your own thoughts and beliefs about the culture we are living in today. It forces you to ask yourself the question: whose side am I really on, and why do I have to choose one? I love how this book pushes me to think harder and be smarter."— Chelsea Handler, author of Life Will Be the Death of Me . . . and You too! — Hanna Rosin, host of NPR’s Invisibilia podcast — John McWhorter, author of Words on the Move and The Language Hoax The Problem With Everything arrives, slicing through the intellectual murk of outrage culture and edgy online wokeness. Daum is a virtuoso at rueful insights and self-interrogation, willing to risk upending things in the knowledge that ‘safe spaces’ and safe ideas advance none of us.”— Laura Kipnis, author of Unwanted Advances: Sexual Paranoia Comes to Campus The Problem with Everything probes a liberalism under assault from all fronts and in danger of falling apart from within. Nothing escapes Daum’s scrutiny—least of all herself.”— Thomas Chatterton Williams, author of Self-Portrait In Black And White: Unlearning Race The Problem with Everything will make you laugh and it will make you think. In these polarized times, her call for nuance feels brave, and sorely necessary. Daum strides into that most challenging, confusing of places – the grey area – and forces us to confront and unpack its layers.”— A.M. Homes, author of Days of Awe Kirkus The Stranger
Author/narrator Meghan Daum grapples with big questions in this brief exploration of contemporary American feminism and the increasing trend of public shaming amid social media culture. She is direct and firm in her contemplation of the competing forces that come together in the culture wars. In doing so, Daum establishes an intimate tone somewhere between university lecture and angst-ridden rant. The result is the feeling that we are having coffee with a smart friend who has interesting views. Listeners who are trying to make sense of current political and social events in the U.S. will find themselves nodding along. Delivered at a swift pace, these eight chapters speed by, leaving the listener with much to consider. M.R. © AudioFile 2020, Portland, Maine
FEBRUARY 2020 - AudioFile
Author/narrator Meghan Daum grapples with big questions in this brief exploration of contemporary American feminism and the increasing trend of public shaming amid social media culture. She is direct and firm in her contemplation of the competing forces that come together in the culture wars. In doing so, Daum establishes an intimate tone somewhere between university lecture and angst-ridden rant. The result is the feeling that we are having coffee with a smart friend who has interesting views. Listeners who are trying to make sense of current political and social events in the U.S. will find themselves nodding along. Delivered at a swift pace, these eight chapters speed by, leaving the listener with much to consider. M.R. © AudioFile 2020, Portland, Maine
FEBRUARY 2020 - AudioFile
2019-07-15
Award-winning essayist, memoirist, and novelist Daum (The Unspeakable: And Other Subjects of Discussion , 2014, etc.), recipient of Guggenheim and National Endowment for the Arts fellowships, takes on fourth-wave feminism, victimhood, identity politics, #MeToo, social media, ideological warfare on college campuses, and assorted other irritants in a culture that is "effectively mentally ill." Social media, asserts the author, creates an echo chamber where people lie to one another and eagerly wait for friends to lie back. "I am convinced," she writes, "the culture is effectively being held hostage by its own hyperbole. So enthralled with our outrage at the extremes, we've forgotten that most of the world exists in the mostly unobjectionable middle." Examining displays of outrage as public performance, she writes that "the search for grievance has become a kind of political obligation, an activist gesture." Accusations of sexism, sexual harassment, or assault, she believes, foster women's image of themselves as victims rather than individuals "capable of making mistakes"; in making such accusations, women "literally hand men their own power." Rather than see the gender wage gap as evidence of sexism, Daum suggests "that there are biological differences between male and female brains that can influence women's professional decisions." She also criticizes "the left-leaning chatterati" who praised Ta-Nehisi Coates' Between the World and Me as engaging in "self-congratulatory reverence," wondering "if my white friends and colleagues who venerated Coates actually liked his work or just liked the idea of liking it." This suspicion of other people's authenticity underlies much of the book: Daum admits that when she was an undergraduate in the midst of student uprisings, she "often felt like I was impersonating a college student…I had a hard time believing other people were actually for real." Now middle-aged, divorced, childless by choice, and feeling increasingly marginal, the author is dismayed by those whose energetic engagement with social and cultural problems fuels "the exquisite lie of our own relevance."
Sharp, brazen, and undeniably controversial.
