Book of the Week: “Why We Hate Us” by Dick Meyer
Before you make any New Year’s resolutions, here’s a book you might want to take a look at: Dick Meyer’s Why We Hate Us: American Discontent in the New Millennium. Meyer, a longtime CBS News producer who joined NPR as their VP of Digital Media in 2008, has written a “man-on-the-street-ifesto” (forgive me) about what it is in modern life that is not simply crass and superficial, but that makes us stressed out and unhappy.
According to Meyer, the growth of what he terms “omnimedia” and “omnimarketing” have broken down the ties between people, making it easier for us to be discourteous and disrespectful at our various technological removes and making it harder for us to come out of our individual shells and “only connect,” as R. Buckminster Fuller would remind us to do.
That thesis may not be new, but Meyer’s treatment of it from a media professional’s perspective combined with his personal gentlemanly temperament, is. It’s a treatise that manages to be analytical and personal at the same time. Example: One of the most elegant sections of the book is a chapter about Meyer’s father-in-law and how that man created community and meaning throughout his life.
If you read Why We Hate Us, your New Year’s resolutions might, just might, look a little less about you and a little more about the people around you. Some friends of mine have a printed list of ways to create community displayed in their home. I’ve searched online for that list but can’t find it; if anyone out there has a link, I’d love to see it! The point is (and I’m not stating this as well as Meyer does, so read his book), having a community around us is important, and even vital. Doing something for somebody else is one of the fastest and easiest ways to get rid of discontent (NB: I’m not recommending philanthropy as a cure for depression; I’m talking about a less pernicious form of discontent).
We’ve got ten copies of Meyer’s book to give away to the first ten readers who share their favorite way of creating community — even online ways apply!
