A review by aallyoop_reads
Conversations with People Who Hate Me: 12 Things I Learned from Talking to Internet Strangers by Dylan Marron

4.0

3.5 stars

Thank you to Atria Books for an early copy of Conversations with People Who Hate Me in exchange for an honest review.

I had not heard of Dylan Marron before reading this book, and found the premise fascinating. He conducts a social experiment to hold conversations (not debates, nor attacks) with internet trolls. The book features these conversations, but also dissects the notion of internet hate and whether his approach was actually making a difference in making the internet a less hateful place. There was a lot of interesting analysis of why people choose to send hurtful messages to others, and he ponders such ideas as to whether showing empathy to his haters is equivalent to endorsing bad behavior. Overall, I enjoyed the concept, but parts of it were slow. I enjoyed Marron's humorous tidbits about his personal life scattered throughout each chapter.