Assholes: A Theory by Aaron James
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I'm glad I went into this with eyes wide opened as to the widespread prevalence and ubiquitous presence of assholes.

I mean, honestly, we all know one, or two, or sometimes a full office full of them. And even if we don't have many real life line-cutters, traffic-weavers, or conversation killers in our lives, at least we have Trump. And high-level bankers. And Rush. And practically the entire existing vocal portion of the political process in America. We have lots and lots and lots of good examples.

What didn't really have was a comprehensive attempt to define and refine all the aspects about what truly makes up an Asshole. Enter this book. The extremely nerdy logical equivalent of a loud fart. Not humorous in the way most of us like fart jokes, mind you. It's just so nerdy it still had me chuckling the entire time.

Assholes are people with entrenched senses of entitlement.

Pretty easy. They will sometimes give you long winded reasons why they do asshole things, giving lip service to the basic moral equivalency of cooperation and knowing that we're all in the same boat, but they still go ahead and pull an asshole move anyway. Assholes can be that person who always complains to the management when his McD fries aren't fresh enough. They're also the people who perpetuate the idea of the Noblese, making sure you know that you deserve so much more while taking the lion's share of everything. They are the people that we wish we could curtail with laws and restrictions and sanctions, but because the things they're doing are socially reprehensible, and not precisely unlawful, we all just look on in disgust as they get away with it.

Fun stuff.

I most appreciated the sociological ramifications and possible means to put assholes in their place. :)

Totally recommend, dude. Especially for surfers.

View all my reviews