An engaging read . . . O'Neil lays out the ways in which shame drives problems such as obesity, drug addiction, poverty and political divides. She discusses how social media thrives on and is designed to encourage humiliation, and unpicks the many fallacies in how we think about shame

Striking ... O'Neil examines how the 'shame industrial complex' divides us and how we can develop a healthier, more forgiving version

A unique and riveting look at a crucial yet little understood aspect of modern life

A simple rejoinder to our digital phantasmagoria. . . O'Neil encourages readers to try to think more deeply not just about what shame is but what it might be for

What is the relationship between shame and power - and is shame being weaponised? Smart thinker Cathy O'Neil tackles the question in this book, exploring whether public shaming is becoming dangerous

In this trenchant, and at times heartbreaking, critique of the shame industrial complex, Cathy O'Neil lays bare how shame underpins the deep divides of modern society. But not all shame is bad, O'Neil contends -- used correctly it can be a powerful tool to fight injustice

An intimate and unflinching account of the many ways that shame is produced, weaponized, and turned into profit by industries that can only grow big when we feel small. With moral clarity and powerful storytelling, Cathy O'Neil reverse engineers the 'shame machine,' revealing its inner workings and inciting nothing short of a cultural reckoning that has the potential to blow this machine to bits

Cathy O'Neil's fascinating, important, and insightful book is a hard look in the mirror, but one that also gives us hope that we can marshal shame into a force for social reform and not just social punishment

Cathy O'Neil's Weapons of Math Destruction was a thunderclap -- using wonderfully vivid stories, it exposed the dehumanizing effects of a data-driven world. The Shame Machine is even more personal, but no less devastating. Whether it's through body-shaming mobs or a deeply flawed judicial system, humans use shame as a weapon to bully, demean, and devalue other humans. And with the unstoppable growth of digital tools, this power has become far too great. O'Neil reminds us that we must resist the urge to judge, belittle and oversimplify, and instead allow always for complexity and lead always with empathy

Whether it's smoking in public, masking against Covid-19, or promulgating political lies, O'Neil allows room for shame while also urging readers always to 'punch up' at the social and economic machine and its masters rather than down at the vulnerable. A thoughtful blend of social and biological science, history, economics, and sometimes contrarian politics

Andrew Scull weighs American psychiatry in the balance and finds it seriously wanting. So this may not be the best introductory text for an aspiring medical student. But it is required reading for anyone who appreciates great writing, insight and outstanding scholarship - just the kind of people we want doing psychiatry

A riveting chronicle of faulty science, false promises, arrogance, greed, and shocking disregard for the wellbeing of patients suffering from mental disorders. An eloquent, meticulously documented, clear-eyed call for change

An immensely engaging - if often dismaying - account of American psychiatry. Scull impressively balances the social reality that constitutes 'mental illness' with the ever-shifting rationales used to explain such unsettling behaviors and emotions and justify the social function of those who manage these elusive ills. Desperate Remedies is an important contribution to our understanding of a fundamental and still-contested aspect of human experience

An important plea for psychiatrists not to be seduced into offering a cure that is worse than the disease...Scull's engaging account of the development of psychiatry and psychiatric treatments since the 19th century shows history repeating itself many times over...The grisly part of Scull's story is not gratuitous. It is the context from which modern drugs such as antidepressants and antipsychotics emerged...Desperate Remedies is a reminder of the tragic and barbarous measures that have often been inflicted on people in the name of curing mental disturbance

A provocative and often persuasive analysis of psychiatry...A must-read for those who have been - or fear they will be - touched by mental illness. If psychiatry is to survive, Scull concludes, psychiatrists must be more candid about the limits of their knowledge

Scull is well aware that psychiatry has vacillated between treating 'the mind' with therapeutic dialogue and treating 'the body' with surgery and psychotropic drugs...The medical discipline has never known and still does not know what it is treating. Scull directs the reader's attention to the fact that after decades of research and billions of dollars spent, not a single biomarker for psychiatric sickness has been discovered

An intensely skeptical history and analysis of psychiatry. The gist of his argument is: although there have been undeniable advancements, mental illness remains baffling, and no discipline has done a great job of treating symptoms and understanding causes. Scull has written the best kind of 'feel-bad' book, lashing offenders left and right with his whip of evidence

For me the greatest value of Desperate Remedies is the brilliant spotlight that Scull shines on historical and current truths about psychiatry. There is an implicit plea that is interwoven throughout the book for a measure of relief from the 'devastating tragedy' that envelops people with mental illness. Medical students intending to train in psychiatry would be well served by the masterful perspective Scull provides and the penetrating questions he raises for the profession

Scull delivers a remarkable history of psychiatry. The final section is a devastatingly effective chronicle of the rise of psychopharmacology and its tendency to regard all mental illnesses as potentially treatable with the right medication. This sweeping and comprehensive survey is an impressive feat

A carefully researched history of psychiatry, it provides a critical assessment of the psychiatric enterprise. In the rush to find cures for psychiatric illnesses, Scull believes that there has been a disappointing lack of focus on patients