What a glorious read! The Atlantic’s Adam Serwer provides comparison after historical comparison relating to the years since 2016. In instance after instance, White indifference has been challenged by first-hand reports then photographs then television and now cellphone videos. Each time, there’s been progress and then retrenchment. Will now finally be different?

One of the most powerful political books I’ve ever read, right up there with Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail, where Hunter S. Thompson predicted the rise of Ronald Reagan when that seemed impossible. I’ll read whatever Serwer writes. Now let me go subscribe to The Atlantic.

In the interest of full disclosure, I received this book from NetGalley, Random House and One World in exchange, for an honest review.

The Cruelty Is the Point contains smartly-written essays critiquing American policy and politics. It largely focuses on contemporary politics and the Republican party, but gives a background of U.S. history. The tone is academic, so it's not always the most accessible, but it is quite educational. I learned about a number of historical events and figures I was never taught about. Many of the essays were published previously, making them a little dated at times. I would have liked them refreshed specifically for this book's publication. Among the topics covered are: white supremacy and its roots in U.S. history, immigration policies, antisemitism, the U.S. COVID-19 response, and problems with policing and corruption. I wish I had read this closer to its publication date in 2021. As the news and world events seem to happen at warp speed now, it was already a little dated. Overall, an enlightening collection of essays.

Thank you to the publisher for providing this ebook. All thoughts are my own.

Serwer may be one of the few public intellectual thinkers who doesn't thoroughly lose his mind when writing about the Trump era. This book is not just rants and diatribes and hand wringing. It's not smarmy, or tabloidy, or cable news shallow, or based on magical thinking about how the Trump phenomenon will collapse or self-destruct. These essays engage the present, but then tease out the historical grounds that led up to where we are now. That's even more unnerving, of course, than trying to dismiss our current situation as some sort of surprise outlier. But it's what needs to be done, and Serwer is clearly up to the task.

Thanks to NetGalley for the ARC of this fine work.

This book - a collection of essays - is top-notch work by an important writer. It is a difficult and challenging read. The Trump Years feel too close still and at times you just want to forget them, But we cannot and this book helps us understand what happened. I highly recommend this. It is not a fun read. It's like reading about a terrible train wreck.

The Cruelty Is the Point: The Past, Present, and Future of Trump's America
by Adam Serwer
I want to thank the publisher and NetGalley for letting me read this book.
This book has wonderful content but I was not thrilled with how the content was presented. It is essays and the essays have intros. But the content itself has everything we all have seen over the years. I am so Trump fatigued and I almost hated to read more about this hateful person.
The essays cover just about everything that Trump and the GOP like to abuse such as anything they consider less to them. That would be the poor, minorities, women, immigrants, LGBT, Democrats, and anyone they are against at the time.
They made policies that helped themselves and them only and cruel policies to hurt others. One of the worst was taking children from the parents of immigrants knowing they wouldn't likely be able to get the children back to the parents.
Policies to reduce school lunch free meals, A wink and a nod to police to rough up black protesters, and boosting the white power racists groups. Lies became the normal and corruption a means to their goal.
If you don't have Trump fatigue, A great book!

I discovered Adam Serwer on Twitter about 5 years ago when he would be retweeted or liked by other journalists that I followed. Those 5 years were, of course, the horrifying Trump era, a period I still can’t quite wrap my brain about when the populace I thought was generally “reasonable” turned out to support a racist, xenophobic, ill-educated, misogynist, cruel authoritarian— the same group of people now eating horse paste and following the advice of like minded idiots on Parler rather than scientists. Adam stood out as someone who did see the “bigger picture” and could put current events in historical perspective.

This book is a collection of his essays, many of which Inread throughout the years, but also contains the cohesive narrative you might not have seen as Trump years occurred in real time. He includes essays he was not able to publish like “the myth of the legal immigrant, community divisions exacerbated by Trumpism, and how the local politics of police unions went national, and a concluding essay on the past and present of American authoritarianism.”

His takes are thoughtful and incisive — and not wish-washy. He saw the cruelty as it was happening during the Trump years, but reminds us that it started long ago with white nationalism and the Republican Party — reminding me personally that it’s been happening since the beginning of the Reagan Era, when classmates who had free school breakfast taken away and the era of “catsup is a vegetable” and meanness for sport became a sadistic pillar of modern fascism.

In a final essay, Serwer Warns that the “legacy of the Trump era, then, may linger with us for some time, even if the man himself does not. As much as he may have appeared to be the driver of the forces tearing the country apart, he was more a consequence of them, of our failure as a nation to live up to our founding promises. The cruelty was the point, but it was also always a part of us.”

5 stars — I’m happy to have the chance to read the works of someone who should be known as a great American essayist. Thanks to NetGalley and Random House for the opportunity to read this

A collection of Serwer’s essays throughout the Trump presidency that analyze what it has all meant and what it says about America. Each essay is accompanied by an introductory essay that explain Serwer’s thinking at the time of his writing and upon further reflection,
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Adam Serwer can write. He’s clear and precise while also reaching out and grabbing examples and arguments from American history. He contextualizes the moment we’re living through. He gives us frames of reference and clear observations which, during the Trump presidency, felt nearly impossible. THE CRUELTY IS THE POINT is a way to help Americans understand what we’ve just lived through.
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It should be said, that this book firmly reminded me that the historical record is worth fighting for. Serwer uses sources from America’s past to show that not everyone agreed in the 1860’s or 1920’s and that the dissenting voices shaped the progress that’s been made. So too must the voices that fought against Trump be recorded so future generations can say that some folks knew Trump was bad all along.
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Most of the essays are really good, some are exceptional, and a few felt redundant and/or less necessary. I appreciated the format and way that Serwer continued to reflect on his own reporting and understanding. This is the type of work I wish more journalists were willing to do and capable of.

First, thank you to the author, Random House Publishing Group - Random House, One World and NetGalley for an ARC of this book in exchange for my honest review.

The Cruelty Is the Point by Adam Serwer is a collection of columns that were published in the Atlantic Magazine that follow the Trump Presidency and how it has affected American as a whole. This is a very insightful book that explores a number of interesting aspects of Trump's presidency and how it was possible for it to come to fruition in current day America. A very informative read.

Adam Serwer is a staff writer at The Atlantic, focused on politics, race, and justice. Like many Americans, I have spent much of the last five years reeling as we saw the kind of President we had and the America we were becoming. I admit I waver between being so freaked out by the news I can’t bear it and feeling like I HAVE to watch/listen/read, because i HAVE to know! We have an obligation to try to hold on to the fragile democracy, and to avoid the authoritarian death spiral we often seem to be living through.

The Cruelty Is The Point is a collection of Serwer’s essays that reveal his view that the Trump Presidency is not “an aberration but as an outgrowth of the inequalities the United States was founded on.”

The author wants to show what was behind the ascent of such a man to the Presidency. He also pushes his readers to see that even the media was blindsided by it all. Highly readable, highly recommended. Five stars, and thanks to Random House One World and NetGalley for providing a copy in return for an honest review. Must reading, if you can bear it. (Yes, I admit it. I am most definitely NOT a fan!)

This is an amazing historical analysis of the Trump presidency. I don't think I have read any Serwer prior to this,but that is going to change. If you like history and context, you are going to enjoy this (well.... not enjoy it but find it fascinating)

I was not looking to read a book about Trump. The wounds from his presidency still feel too raw, and that is because the cruelty didn’t end because he lost the 2020 election. Our democracy is still being threatened, as evidenced by the most recent use of the filibuster by Republicans to block voting rights. Adam Serwer wrote for The Atlantic (June 2021), “The most immediate threat to American democracy was removed once Trump’s attempts to overturn the 2020 election failed. But with Trump gone, the Republican Party has focused on the long-term project of engineering the electorate to preserve its hold on power.”

I picked this up based on the high praise of writers I trust and appreciate, Ta-Nehisi Coates and Kiese Laymon. Glad I did. This is a book that is unafraid of telling the truth and filing in “the gaps in American public memory” about the connections between the present and past. It is an unflinching meditation on the Trump presidency and of our brutal history that paved the way for the Trump era, from the cruelty of separating enslaved families to the apparent expendability of the poor during our current pandemic. It also talks about related topics (and how they relate) including immigration, internal Jewish community divisions, and police unions. While many people including myself may have Trump-fatigue, we must reckon with what led to his rise; recognize the interconnectedness of politics, race, and economics; and make strides toward a more perfect union.

Thank you to Adam Serwer, One World (an imprint of Random House), and NetGalley for the opportunity to read and review this title before its release next week. May we never forget the cruelty of Trump’s America.

The Cruelty Is the Point is another entry in the long line of material written about the endlessly problematic Donald Trump presidency and the cult of personality surrounding him. It's a compilation of Adam Serwer's greatest hits essays from his time covering Trump's four years in office for the Atlantic, from his surprise election all the way up to the infamous Capitol riot of January 2021. Books such as this seemed to be a dime a dozen throughout the entire Trump presidency, basically writing themselves from the continual stream of inanity from the Oval Office, so the general reader can be forgiven for a bit of fatigue approaching this one. However, Serwer's analytical and historical takes on Trump's rise and consolidation in the modern Republican party are both informative and terrifying enough to offer enough nuance to justify the read. Serwer's chapters on race are particularly essential as he compares some of the current tactics and rhetoric being used now to eras of the past such as Jim Crow. This isn't uplifting reading, but as Serwer states in the title, that's exactly the point.

**I was given a copy of this book by the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. My thanks to
Random House Publishing Group - Random House**

I was not familiar with the author, though I expect I’ve likely seen his work without being away. I really enjoyed his collection. His analysis, contextualization against historical realities and traps of history was a helpful way to reflect on recent years. Worth reading!