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bad history bad science further reading very bad advice

The “Airport Books” that destroyed the world. Tell me some big popular books that you actually hate

Stock photo models enjoy Airport Books in the airport

So I’m working on a bigger piece on a recent report about incels, but in the meantime I found myself a little distracted by a thread on Twitter about harmful “Airport Books” — that is, those non-fiction books usually with one big and possibly very bad idea that are waiting to snare unwary passengers at the airport bookstore.

Some suggestions from the thread that followed include Malcolm Gladwell’s Outliers, Neil Strauss’s The Game, JD Vance’s Hillbilly Elegy, Rachel Hollis’ Girl, Wash Your Face, “all those New Atheist books,” and of course The Art of the Deal by that guy whose name we’re all very tired of hearing.

So are there any “Airport Books” (or just popular books in general) that you think have made the world a little (or a lot) worse? (Fiction is fine, too, especially if he has a didactic side to it.) Let us know in the comments!

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Virgin Mary
Virgin Mary
2 years ago

I haven’t read Girl Wash Your Face, but I would have thought it was just Incels upset about that one, for women being told that you are in charge of your own destiny and do not have to dress and wear makeup to please men is liberating. Can anyone explain what exactly is wrong with this book please?

opposablethumbs
opposablethumbs
2 years ago

@Elaine all the (long-distance intercontinental virtual) hugs, if you want ’em. I’m so sorry and I hope you will be ok – that in time all the good memories get into the foreground and stay there, over the sad ones. {{{hug}}}

Vic
Vic
2 years ago

I think Daniel Harper of the “I Don’t Speak German” podcast gave the best answer for this on twitter – Thomas Friedman’s “The World is Flat”.

Bakunin
Bakunin
2 years ago

Bestseller lists are surprisingly easy to game with money, organization, and questionable ethics. All of which fund I es have in spades

Jazzlet
Jazzlet
2 years ago

Elaine I am so sorry, virtual *hugs/hot chocolate/icecream/pillow fort* or whatever else works for you.

LouCPurr
LouCPurr
2 years ago

@Virgin Mary

The Maintenance Phase podcast does a deep dive into Rachel Hollis and her problematic books. She’s like your impression of her. She’s White Capitalist Feminism Lite™.

Jenora Feuer
Jenora Feuer
2 years ago

@Virgin Mary:
To follow up on what Bakunin said above… how do these books get on bestseller lists? The various political organizations like Focus on the Family use their money to buy up these books in bulk and give them to churches as ‘witnessing tools’. Or the churches themselves do. There’s a large ready market for ‘approved’ books, and the number of them that are actually read rather than thrown into the trash after being given to someone who didn’t want them is much lower than the number sold to organizations and then given out to individuals.

Elaine the witch
Elaine the witch
2 years ago

She was the best dog anyone could ask for. She went peacefully and she didn’t seem to be frightened. Thank you all for the words

Sheila
2 years ago

@Elaine. I’m so sorry.

Books: surely The Secret? OK, I haven’t read it, but it seems to be the seminal work that spawned all the It’s-entirely-your-own-fault-that-you’re-poor books.
Could your attitude on its own be enough to keep you poor? Possibly.
Is it the only possible thing keeping you poor? Highly unlikely.
And so on for sick, sad, fat, and all the other things you’re supposed to be able to fix by looking in the mirror and talking to yourself.

Crip Dyke
Crip Dyke
2 years ago

I’m glad for you both, Elaine.

Take care of yourself, now that you have taken care of your friend.

Jazzlet
Jazzlet
2 years ago

Elaine she obviously knew you gave her the best care so she trusted you to look after her at the end. In an awful situation that is all we can ask.

personalpest
personalpest
2 years ago

So sorry for your loss, Elaine.

RJ Dragon
RJ Dragon
2 years ago

@ Elaine, My condolences on your loss. She was a very good girl.

My two are 15 now and getting a bit slower, I worry about them constantly and I’m dreading the day I have to make that decision.

OP – worst books

Any diet book and most self-help books. They’re almost always the same with a minor tweak, have little understanding of dietetics or nutrition, and/or are basic capitalism driven ‘you are responsible for your own situation’ texts.

Surplus to Requirements
Surplus to Requirements
2 years ago

It’s noteworthy how many of the books “recommended” by this thread are propaganda of some stripe — much of it neoliberal, some of it white supremacist, all of it aimed at legitimating current social hierarchies.

Full Metal Ox
2 years ago

I was fortunate that Ender’s Game had yet to be written when I was in junior high; for a particular sort of disaffected and put-upon geekish kid, the book is a Protagonist-Centered Morality Gospel (as well as rooted in the myth of American and Christian perpetual innocence): https://redsails.org/creating-the-innocent-killer/

GSS ex-noob
GSS ex-noob
2 years ago

@FMOx: I’ve loved that essay ever since it came out.

There’s another one often listed beside that one which deals with the not-really-subtext gayness of the book, even though OSC hates teh gheyz. He has a lot of gay male barely-even-subtext in a lot of his books, which make people wonder, y’know…

Full Metal Ox
2 years ago

@GSS ex-noob:

There’s another one often listed beside that one which deals with the not-really-subtext gayness of the book, even though OSC hates teh gheyz. He has a lot of gay male barely-even-subtext in a lot of his books, which make people wonder, y’know…

This one?

https://web.archive.org/web/20181202182603/http://www4.ncsu.edu/~tenshi/articles/Boninessay.htm

Alyson
Alyson
2 years ago

@Elaine sorry for your loss
I hated Harry Potter before it was cool. Before it was transphobic, it was racist (house elves, anyone?) and just generally shitty. The amount of deus ex machinae the books use are just…
It’s low quality drivel that just happened to hit the right spot with the general audience.

mal
mal
2 years ago

I don’t think you can say Harry Potter itself ruined the world, but if it did it’s because it represented a lowering of standards for liberals. It’s all well and good to laugh at people who take the Bible as gospel, but not if you’re standing there with Harry Potter as your replacement moral text.

Weirdest anecdote about “The Secret”: that “dirtbag leftist” American guy who went off to join the YPG and fight ISIS in Northern Syria claimed that when he first arrived in Turkey & met members of the YPG, they told him that to prepare for his revolutionary training he needed to make a vision board, which is the “Secret” in the Secret. I have no idea how or why far-left Kurdish nationalists came into contact with the Secret, but I’d love to know.