So You Ve Been Publicly Shamed

Now a New York Times bestseller and from the author of The Psychopath Test, a captivating and brilliant exploration of one of our world's most underappreciated forces: shame. 'It's about the terror, isn't it?' 'The terror of what?' I said. 'The terror of being found out.' For the past three years, Jon Ronson has travelled the world meeting recipients of high-profile public shamings. The shamed are people like us - people who, say, made a joke on social media that came out badly, or made a mistake at work. Once their transgression is revealed, collective outrage circles with the force of a hurricane and the next thing they know they're being torn apart by an angry mob, jeered at, demonized, sometimes even fired from their job. A great renaissance of public shaming is sweeping our land. Justice has been democratized. The silent majority are getting a voice. But what are we doing with our voice? We are mercilessly finding people's faults. We are defining the boundaries of normality by ruining the lives of those outside it. We are using shame as a form of social control. Simultaneously powerful and hilarious in the way only Jon Ronson can be, So You've Been Publicly Shamed is a deeply honest book about modern life, full of eye-opening truths about the escalating war on human flaws - and the very scary part we all play in it.

An urgent, illuminating exploration of the social nature of shame and of how it might be used to promote large-scale political change and social reform. “[Jacquet] exposes the ways shame plays into collective ideas of punishment and reward, and the social mechanisms that dictate the ways we dictate our behavior.” —The Boston Globe Examining how we can retrofit the art of shaming for the age of social media, Jennifer Jacquet shows that we can challenge corporations and even governments to change policies and behaviors that are detrimental to the environment. Urgent and illuminating, Is Shame Necessary? offers an entirely new understanding of how shame, when applied in the right way and at the right time, has the capacity to keep us from failing our planet and, ultimately, from failing ourselves.

Frequently hilarious, sometimes disturbing, always entertaining, these fascinating stories of the chaos that lies on the fringe of our daily lives will have you wondering just what we're capable of. This updated edition of Lost at Sea includes the complete text of Frank: The True Story that Inspired the Movie. Jon Ronson has been on patrol with America's real-life superheroes and to a UFO convention in the Nevada desert with Robbie Williams. He's met a man who tried to split the atom in his kitchen and asked a conscious robot if she's got a soul. Fascinated by madness, strange behaviour and the human mind, Jon has spent his life exploring mysterious events and meeting extraordinary people. Collected from various sources (including the Guardian and GQ) Lost at Sea features the very best of his adventures. Portions of this book have appeared previously, in slightly different form, in Out of the Ordinary, What I Do, the Guardian and GQ.

A New York Times–bestselling author hangs out with conspiracy theorists and hunts for the Bilderberg Group in this “hilarious, disturbing” memoir (The New York Times). A wide variety of extremist groups, from Islamic fundamentalists to neo-Nazis, share the oddly similar belief that a tiny shadowy elite rule the world from a secret room. In Them, journalist Jon Ronson has joined the extremists to track down the fabled secret room. As a journalist and a Jew, Ronson was often considered one of “Them,” but he had no idea if their meetings actually took place. Was he just not invited? Them takes us across three continents and into the secret room. Along the way he meets Omar Bakri Mohammed, considered one of the most dangerous men in Great Britain, PR-savvy Ku Klux Klan Grand Wizard Thom Robb, and the survivors of Ruby Ridge. He is chased by men in dark glasses and unmasked as a Jew in the middle of a Jihad training camp. In the forests of northern California he even witnesses CEOs and leading politicians—like Dick Cheney—undertake a bizarre owl ritual. Ronson’s investigations, by turns creepy and comical, reveal some alarming things about the looking-glass world of “us” and “them.” Them is a deep and fascinating look at the lives and minds of extremists. Are the extremists onto something? Or is Jon Ronson becoming one of them? “Jon Ronson has managed to write a hugely amusing book about the lunatic fringe.” —The Washington Post “Them is at times funny, other times unsettling, but always astonishing.” —Booklist “It takes a funny man to see the humor in all the conspiracy theories that float hatefully across the land, and Jon Ronson is a funny man. It takes a brave man to chase that humor right into the belly of the beast, and Jon Ronson is a brave man too.” —The San Diego Union-Tribune

Now a major film, starring George Clooney, Ewan McGregor, and Jeff Bridges, this New York Times bestseller is a disturbing and often hilarious look at the U.S. military's long flirtation with the paranormal—and the psy-op soldiers that are still fighting the battle. Bizarre military history: In 1979, a crack commando unit was established by the most gifted minds within the U.S. Army. Defying all known laws of physics and accepted military practice, they believed that a soldier could adopt the cloak of invisibility, pass cleanly through walls, and—perhaps most chillingly—kill goats just by staring at them. They were the First Earth Battalion, entrusted with defending America from all known adversaries. And they really weren’t joking. What’s more, they’re back—and they’re fighting the War on Terror. An uproarious exploration of American military paranoia: With investigations ranging from the mysterious “Goat Lab,” to Uri Geller’s covert psychic work with the CIA, to the increasingly bizarre role played by a succession of U.S. presidents, this might just be the funniest, most unsettling book you will ever read—if only because it is all true and is still happening today.

A startling and at times unsettlingly prescient collection of J.G. Ballard’s greatest interviews.

From the bestselling author of The Psychopath Test comes a characteristically humorous story of a musician on the margins. In Frank: The True Story that Inspired the Movie, Jon Ronson reflects on his days playing keyboard for the Frank Sidebottom Oh Blimey Big Band. Frank Sidebottom, best known for performing with a big fake head with a cartoon face painted on it, was a cult favorite in the United Kingdom and is the subject of the new movie Frank, co-written by Ronson and starring Michael Fassbender, Maggie Gyllenhaal, and Domhnall Gleeson.

Bestselling author Jon Ronson walks the mean streets of America where he finds real life, modern day superheroes. Fighting crime, saving old ladies, and chasing away drug dealers – all while wearing a mask and a cape. Phoenix Jones patrols Seattle, masked, muscles rippling, while corner boys scatter and teenage runaways are helped, whether they want it or not. He might still see his pediatrician when superhero-ing gets a little too intense, but he’ll be back out there with his ass-kicking comrades as soon as he’s bandaged up. These do-gooding citizens talk the talk, and walk the walk of mythical superheroes – the only thing they're missing is actual supernatural powers. The Amazing Adventures of Phoenix Jones is an inside, intimate look at the world of amateur superheroes and a front row seat to their adventures.