Them

Why We Hate Each Other - and How to Heal

By: Ben Sasse

Narrated by: Ben Sasse

From the New York Times bestselling author of The Vanishing American Adult, an intimate and urgent assessment of the existential crisis facing our nation.

Something is wrong. We all know it.

American life expectancy is declining for a third straight year. Birth rates are dropping. Nearly half of us think the other political party isn’t just wrong; they’re evil. We’re the richest country in history, but we’ve never been more pessimistic.

What’s causing the despair?

In Them, bestselling author and U.S. senator Ben Sasse argues that, contrary to conventional wisdom, our crisis isn’t really about politics. It’s that we’re so lonely we can’t see straight—and it bubbles out as anger.

Local communities are collapsing. Across the nation, little leagues are disappearing, Rotary clubs are dwindling, and in all likelihood, we don’t know the neighbor two doors down. Work isn’t what we’d hoped: less certainty, few lifelong coworkers, shallow purpose. Stable families and enduring friendships—life’s fundamental pillars—are in statistical freefall.

As traditional tribes of place evaporate, we rally against common enemies so we can feel part of a team. No institutions command widespread public trust, enabling foreign intelligence agencies to use technology to pick the scabs on our toxic divisions. We’re in danger of half of us believing different facts than the other half, and the digital revolution throws gas on the fire.

There’s a path forward—but reversing our decline requires something radical: a rediscovery of real places and human-to-human relationships. Even as technology nudges us to become rootless, Sasse shows how only a recovery of rootedness can heal our lonely souls.

America wants you to be happy, but more urgently, America needs you to love your neighbor and connect with your community. Fixing what's wrong with the country depends on it.

©2018 Ben Sasse (P)2018 Macmillan Audio

Critic reviews

“Sasse is highly attuned to the cultural sources of our current discontents and dysfunctions...Them is not so much a lament for a bygone era as an attempt to diagnose and repair what has led us to this moment of spittle-flecked rage...a step toward healing a hurting nation.” (National Review)

Has some VERY valid points

Mr. Sasse has some very good points and lots of food for thought. As a committed Democrat, I appreciated his respectfulness and reinforcement of civility. My concern comes from his expression of purported understanding of Democratic (party) issues, which are understandably lacking in depth and nuance. Still, he is to be commended for giving it a valiant try. And as I said, many of his points are extremely salient.

Recommend to friends

Bernie supporter here: everybody needs to read this book no matter what their political background.

Fantastic book...

I really enjoyed this read. I am 26, born and raised in a small town in Montana. I could relate to Ben's story in so many ways. I couldn't agree more with the principles of this book...in order to bring America back together again, we need to get our faces out of our devices, join others in community, and build relationship. I highly recommend this and I hope many my age read this book and grasp this concept to grow a healthy community.

Outstanding Look Into How We Live Our Lives

I loved this great book. It is inspiring and enlightening in that Ben goes into much detail of things that we just don't normally think about. It is not really a book about what is wrong, but what is and how it came to be and then giving some common sense suggestions about how we can all come together even and maybe especially in our differences. This book is a wonderful view into ourselves, our choices, and how we live in the world, along with how the world has come to influence us and perhaps even pulling us to a place we didn't really mean to go to. It is about personal and political responsibility yet without a political mandate or even a political solution. As much as I have studied and thought I knew, I have learned so much from this enlightened view into our humanness and interactive relationships. Thank you, Ben Sasse!

Awesome book

Comes form a right view, but isn’t to about politics. It also asks really good questions, gave me something to chew on.