Them

This was a very jarring read given the age of the book. OBL pre September 11th, young Alex Jones, and above all else, so much lizard person talk.

If you're into what makes fringe thinkers tick, you might enjoy this. The chapters on Thom Robb and his new age KKK were just incredible head scratchers.

I wasn't familiar with Ian Paisley, in fact I don't know much about The Troubles at all, but that chapter upset me more than any other in the book.

I think Jon Ronsen is incredibly talented and applaud his courage to plant himself in the middle of indisputable danger for the sake of a story.

And while I normally enjoy his skippidity-style, breaking his interviews/analyses, this book jumped around too quickly and I found myself wishing he'd dedicate more time to exploring one set of “Thems” than another.

I think the premise of this book is more important than ever and would advocate Ronsen do a second-edition write focused on the “Thems” in our current world.

3.5 stars. ‘Them' is a quirky investigation into the bizarre world of extremists and conspiracy theorists. I didn't find this as insightful as ‘The Psychopath Test', but that might have something to do with the disturbing and more direct application points of that book - versus the distance I feel, from a social point of view, from the global elite and their secret societies which Ronson explores in this account. This book isn't entirely baked in theory; there are some very real experiences Ronson reflects on which shakes up one's views of the 1%, which led to some interesting background reading escapades I embarked on.