Our Worst Strength

We are all settlers on our own personal frontiers.It's our national way of life. Individualism. America has now taken individualism to its logical extreme like no other society on Earth. And the results are mixed. Radical autonomy without wisdom and lots of social support is a dangerous gift. It can even become a curse of self-destruction.This book explores how individualism affects the five major domains of American life that comprise 80% of our waking time - work, fun, food, friends, and family.Using fresh national research on older Americans' life experiences, his training as a cultural anthropologist, and his own awkward life experiences, Dr. Richardson has crafted a first-of-its-kind social history of the late 20th century and what it yielded to us as a nation.Part One - How to Make a Hyper-Individualistic Society in Seven Easy StepsPart Two - How It Became Awkward at WorkPart Three - How We Got Lost in the American Fun-housePart Four - How We Came To Eat Whatever, WheneverPart Five - How We Turned Friends into Entertainment DevicesPart Six - How We Shriveled the American FamilyPart Seven - The Future of Individualism in AmericaDr. Richardson argues that individualism is not an inevitable way of life. We can take our gifts of autonomy and calibrate them to a more community-oriented future. We have to truly understand what we have before we make changes we would regret as a country.