If anyone has read this, and could provide a Marxist/materialist perspective, or a link to a known one, I would greatly appreciate it.
Edit: Wow! I am glad I asked before wasting any time at all reading any part of this. Thank you.
I am asking, because I was recommended to read Dale Carnegie's 1936 book How to Win Friends and Influence People, by my current boss, and I had read that when I was 19 at the recommendation of my Evangelical father. I mostly disliked it then, finding it trite and vague. So, I was trying to find an alternative, and tried to look up an alternative that I could read instead. I saw that this 48 Laws book was highly read by people incarcerated in US prisons, and the book had been banned by many prisons. I was hoping it had some sort of subversive anti-authoritarian messaging that could fly under my boss's radar.
It's an interesting to read to help understand how the worst people you know think the world works.
yeah in the year 2000 a proto alt right high school friend recommended it to me
his dad owned a bunch of surf bars in san diego and he had a deformed penis that gave him a lot of masculine insecurity
great book
how to be a sociopath and reduce every social dynamic and interaction into its bare essence, which only serves to further your personal aspirations.
Like, as another user said, it's an interesting read if you want to get insight into how too many fucking deranged people think and maybe use it for tactical defense in the hellscape that is the workplace but I quit after a few chapters because I I'm trying to remove myself from whatever fucking world these type of people exist in.
This book is just about ruthlessly manipulating those around you for personal gain. It’s a deeply toxic message and outlook lacking in any form of empathy, just disgusting stuff
Yeah. I read it junior year in college. I was in my peak young man hustle-grind mindset. I was lifting weights, reading 50 laws of power, and other dudebro stuff. I would say from my very limited understanding of Marx is that there is a lot of stuff in the book about understanding material and immaterial power dynamics/relationships and leveraging them for personal gain. Or to give you the mindset to see others doing the same thing
I see this guy's next book was called 'The Art of Seduction'
I guess he really was targeting a self-help grindset audience even back in the early 2000sI read that one too, really glad I broke out of the orbit of that nonsense. Yeah, it’s all slimeball literature. It’s not poorly written sadly so can’t even dunk it for that or anything like that, however it’s all gross. The whole genre is like “elevated manosphere” stuff. There is some real thought and some basic philosophy infused in these books but most of them are all about understanding philosophy for personal gain or accumulation of power. Which is why I hate it the most, in that if were written in a less slime-y way it could offer something of worth to people, but instead it’s just how to push others down so you can stand taller
I read it when I was a depressed ball of repression and anxiety in my early 20s, and in retrospect I'm half convinced that the book was an elaborate shitpost to get the sort of person who wants to read a book on manipulating people to instead read a bunch of old arabic parables and ultimately get indirectly called a dumbass in the final chapter for thinking they could learn how to manipulate people and wield power from a book, which also praises Mao and the CPC's strategic ability during the revolution.
Recommended to me by a libertarian when I was a Bernie Bro lib. Read it and remember kinda liking it at the time.
Libs of all stripes will universally love this book. Only ones who don't hate it because they're addicted to moral grandstanding. But really, it's trash that libs love because it confirms all their clichés. This is something a lib will read then feel scholarly putting everything Putin or Xi does in these terms while smugly libsplaining to other libs about "how authoritarians think"
Maybe a handful of worthwhile thoughts in the whole thing, but most of it is drivel or immediately obvious observations.
If you understand dialectical materialism and base/superstructure, there's little for you to learn, but if you don't, this is a book that will reinforce idealist brainworms with bits of historical anecdotes to provide an air of pseudo-intellectualism.
High fructose corn syrup of idealism posing as an unhealthy, lib-safe materialism substitute.
Best analogies I can draw are:
- The Art of War, repackaged in an even lib friendlier form.
- "Rules for Rulers" video by CGPGrey, but in book form.
Lovers of poorly-drawn alternate history or stick figure YouTube videos justifying western imperialism would enjoy this. Has no real use for Marxists unless you have no interpersonal skills.
Reviews (5)
"the best instruction manual since I was forced to read Machiavelli."
— Dudebro Chud: ★★★★★
"So true! This is exactly how ebil Putler and Xi think! Very useful. Favorite book I have read since I finished Harry Potter."
— Insufferable Turbolib: ★★★★★
"This is why Marxists can't be trusted with a state. Stalin did all of these when he crushed my savior Makhno with his giant spoon."
— Reddit Anarchist: ★★★★★
"not very insightful. supplementary at best when your interpersonal skills fail to guide you. actively harmful without understanding dialectical materialism."
— Marxist: ★☆☆☆☆
"Anyone who likes this is ontologically evil. Just like Drumpf. Triggered by even the suggestion that someone else would think this way. #fuckputin #SlobberUkraini"
— ImStillWithHer_1975: ☆☆☆☆☆
If you're that interested, read the bulleted list of rules.
