Off Griddin'

So last weekend when I was at my parents house, I mysteriously finished the Hunger Games a lot faster than I expected and was left with nothing to read. I thought the best thing would be to grab another book out of my dad's creepy survivalist stack called Off the Grid: Inside the Movement for More Space, Less Government, and True Independence in Modern America by Nick Rosen.

Now, I think I've made it pretty clear from my choice of books beyond fantasy and classics that I'm definitely interested in living close to nature. There are more to come (hopefully) later this year with books like Walden and Into the Wild in my "Important seriously read these books quit buying more books" stack. So this book definitely appealed to me in that respect. It presented a lot of options for alternative lifestyles and information about challenges faced by people living "off the grid".
The thing that totally turned me off about this book though, was the author. I definitely don't read a lot of non-fiction, but when I do, I expect a certain amount of objectivity if I'm going to be taking it seriously. I like when the author has voice and an interesting perspective (like Dolly Freed, see previous post), but this guy was plain rude.

He would write people's full names, and whether he liked them or not would determine his description of them. "She was short with pleasant looking laugh lines" might turn into "She was stunted and old, age had not served her well, her face was wrinkled like an old paper bag". He might not outright say that he didn't like them, but his opinions were clear by what he chose to focus on, including the state of their home, ridiculous beliefs, or reluctance to participate in his interviews. And he judges them too quickly, giving them no sympathetic human qualities. It's like he doesn't realize that they're real people, not just characters. It was too personal to be read as "truth", which made me question the entire legitimacy of the book.
He really forces his judgement on the reader, which is really annoying, and leaves no room for you to think freely and create your own opinion.

He's also disrespectful of some people's privacy. I mean, most of the time they've invited him into their home and shared personal information about themselves, and he has the audacity to pass judgement on them alongside their full name in print. It's like come on! They're trusting you! There's literally no reason to write that mean for a book with this sort of content. And sometimes he goes to their property without their permission, or interviews people close to them behind their backs. It's frustrating.

I also question whether he chose people representative of "off gridders", or just went for the most fascinating stories. At one point, he is at a homeless camp that is mostly men, and he makes a beeline for the only young female there, admittedly to get a story. I get that, I get that you want people to find your book interesting, but the fact that people live off grid at all is already super interesting, and I'm sure they have no shortage of fascinating stories.

There's just a lot of things that bother me about this book that I couldn't get past. I'm sure if a more pleasant person with a more open mind were to go interview those same people, they would get very different stories out of them, and a lot more interesting personal information. Whatever. I'm not recommending this book to anyone and it isn't my loss.