Talk:Jon Ronson

Family

Is Jon Ronson related to the DJ & producer Mark Ronson? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 94.196.95.246 (talk) 04:39, 24 August 2009 (UTC)

Other things that can be added

Why isn't "The Men Who Stare At Goats" listed as one of his documentaries? It was a TV documentary on Channel 4, if I remember correctly. I'd put it in, but I don't know the year (though it was only a few years ago at most), is there any reason it isn't included or has it just been forgotten?

Oh and also, Jon Ronson was one of those interviewed it the Sky One Programme "Secrets of the CIA" presented by Danny Wallace, he was mainly talking about the CIA's experimental drug Project MKULTRA, that should be mentioned in the article to.

--Hibernian 04:54, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

The "men who stare at goats" was the book, the doc was called "Crazy Rulers of the World" --Zleitzen 05:27, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

Oh really? Well I could have sworn it was called "men who stare at goats", but if you are sure, then ok. And what about the Sky One programme he was in? --Hibernian 06:10, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

Go ahead!--Zleitzen 06:50, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

Notes on The Men Who Stare At Goats

Because I've just read this, and because it had been cited as a source in Psychokinesis (before a non-logged in user performed a major, major revision), I want to put some notes here for possible future reference.

First, to be perfectly clear: I think this book is a completely valid citation to cite in support of

a) the existence of the "Goat Lab,"

b) the premise that the possibility of psychokinesis has been taken seriously by the U. S. government both at times in the past, and by the current administration.

That doesn't mean of course that what Ronson says is true, but it's unquestionably a print book, not self-published, by a respectable publisher (Simon and Schuster), with a respectable Amazon sale rank (about #18,000 as I write this) that has been reviewed by The New York Times[1] and other serious reviewers. And the review by the New York Times characterizes Ronson as a "journalist". (Wait, it actually received two reviews... one by Ron Rosenbaum which does not appear to be freely available online. )

What I want to discuss is the tone and content of the book.

I find no place where Ronson says plainly whether or not he personally believes that any of the people he interviewed actually can perform psychokinesis or remote influencing.

Here his how his tone of voice strikes others:

Amazon's reviewer says that the book "strikes a perfect balance between curiosity, incredulity, and humor."

The New York Times review opens "The journalist Jon Ronson appears to be looking for furtive, paranoid quacks who play mind games. He seems to have hit the mother lode."

The cover of the book says it describes what happens when highly placed men "began believing in very strange things."

In the book, Ronson uses language such as "information that would soon lead me into what must be among the most whacked-out corners of George W. Bush's War on Terror."

Many of the incidents he describe read to me as ludicrous failures. The book opens (pp. 1-3) describes, in an account Ronson says is based on a circa-2003 interview, how during the 1980s, a General Stubblevine, convinced of the psychic possibility of walking through walls, seriously attempted to do so personally. "General Stubblevine bangs his nose hard on the wall of his office. ... [he] is confounded by his continual failure to walk through his wall."

Later on page 71-2 he offers to disperse a cloud for Ronson, which according to the General is one of the easiest powers to demonstrate. "Anyone can see it and anyone can do it." He begins, and while Ronson is "trying to work out which cloud the general was trying to burst," his wife Rima shouts "It's gone!" and the General confirms "The cloud appears to have gone." Then the general says he isn't sure, it wasn't possible to prove 100% that he was the cause. Apparently he does not attempt another demonstration. So, Ronson did not see the cloud vanish, but he heard the General and his wife say it had vanished and heard the General say he was not sure whether it was because of his mental powers. (It's not clear why he does not attempt a second demonstration).

The chapter in which Guy Savelli claims to have killed his own pet hamster is equally ambiguous. He shows Ronson a home video of two hamsters in a cage, one of whom is the target. The target hamster shows behavior which Savelli says is unusual. Ronson says it "did indeed seem suddenly mistrustful of its wheel." "Usually the hamster loves its wheel" says Savelli. Ronson opines that "emotions such as circumspection and wariness are not that easy to discern in hamsters." Suddenly the target hamster falls. "Its legs were in the air." "I'm accomplishing my task," says Savelli. Then the other hamster falls, too. "You're dropped both hamsters," says Ronson. "No, the other one has just fallen over," says Guy. The target hamster remains motionless for fifteen minutes, then "it shook itself down and began eating." Ronson comments that the hamster "did appear to be behaving unusually in comparison with the control hamster, but on the other hand, it definitely didn't die. I thought you said I was going to watch it die." Savelli and his wife says this is edited tape of the first two days, and the hamster dies on the third day, but that because they don't know enough about Ronson—"he might be a bleeding-heart liberal"—they won't show him that.

Describing Jim Channon and the concepts of the First Earth Battalion, Ronson says (p. 49)

The army leaders... offered him the opportunity to create and command a real First Earth Battalion. But he turned them down. Jim had higher ambitions than that. He was rational enough to realize that walking thorugh walls, sensing plant auras, and melting the hearts of the enemy with baby lambs were good ideeas on paper, but weren't, necessarily, achievable skills in real life.

The closest thing to Ronson actually directly reporting a psychokinetic or remote influencing experience involves his own encounter with Pete Brusso (pp. 138-140) whom he depicts as "maestro of violence." Brusso challenges Ronson to try to choke him, and asserts that he'll "interrupt your thought process... I'm going to touch you and that's it. I'm not ogoing to move even my feet. But I'm going to project myself into you, and you will fly." Ronson says "I didn't see Pete's hands move. All I know is that both my armpits, my neck, and my chest began to hurt enormously, all at once, and then I was flying." Russo says "You felt fear, didn't you? Beforehand?" "Yes, I was debiliated with fear." "Would you say the amount of fear you felt was abnormal for you?" "The amount of fear I felt in the runup to the choking seemed unusual," Ronson acknowledges. "It was my thought projection. I was inside your head," says Pete.

My point here is just to convey the flavor of the book... because I think it's relevant. Does the book support the idea that people in the U. S. Government believe in psychokinesis? Yes. Does it support the actual existence of psychokinesis? I think not. Dpbsmith (talk) 14:45, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

Good points and research. I recommend you begin work on the page The Men Who Stare At Goats --Zleitzen 21:13, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

How much of the book is fact and how much is fiction? --User: The Goats Who Stare At Men 16:13, 24 October 2006 (UTC)

Though citations are hard to work out, there are numerous errors and leaps of logic in the book. Another history, written from a very similar orientation is Jim Schnabel's book Remote Viewers, which at least brings into question many of Ronson's claim and interpretations. I'd love to do the legwork, but the day job and all... Doctorambient (talk) 20:39, 31 May 2011 (UTC)

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Bakri

Wasn't there a Jon Ronson film all about Bakri called 'Tottenham Ayatollah'? Jooler 07:39, 10 July 2007 (UTC)

Yes, it's on YT 87.74.9.103 (talk) 08:23, 8 April 2024 (UTC)

Importance of Jewish identity

I've changed Jewish back to British. There's no evidence that the guy's ethnicity is relevant to his work or fame. On the other hand we do generally state the nationality of authors. Andrewa 17:17, 5 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Given that the for his book 'Them' he hung around with Islamic extremists (including collecting money, which lead him to write "What the hell was I doing, guarding money that would be used to kill the Jews."), the Klu Klux Klan, Neo-Nazis, people who believe in a 'Zionist Occupied Government', the Jewish Defense League, and people who believe that Jews are giant lizards that run the world, — I think it's relevant that he's Jewish. Indeed, many profiles of him mention he's Jewish within the couple of paragraphs - [2], [3], [4]--Xed 18:13, 5 Sep 2004 (UTC)

To be fair, David Icke doesn't believe all Jews are lizards. just that some people who claim to be Jews are in fact lizards.

Though entertaining, I wouldn't call his work "light." He deals with very serious subjects . . .

I don't see why he shouldn't be described as Jewish. Other people are described by their religion, e.g. Cyril Jackson (educationist) is described as an Anglican even though it isn't very significant, at least not obviously, to his career. One presumes that somebody's religious and ethnic background have an influence on many aspects of life. I don't see that to be mentioned it has to be relevant to the person's work or fame. It is just interesting.--Oxonian2006 (talk) 10:28, 20 April 2008 (UTC)

You seem to be making two points here, first that it is relevant ("One presumes that somebody's religious and ethnic background have an influence...") and second that it is not relevant ("I don't see that to be mentioned it has to be relevant to the person's work or fame...."). Given the context of the article it seems that the mention is not just for interest's sake. If it is relevant, it seems that relevance must be shown, and further, sticking with Wikipedia's verificationist policy (WP:V), it would have to be shown from secondary sources. Following your other line of reasoning, I am not sure interest is a specific policy. (Is it? Let me know if it is!) Either way, what is the source for his religious background? I don't recall reading it in his books, or hearing it in any interviews I have seen. Doctorambient (talk) 20:47, 31 May 2011 (UTC)

The subjects Jewish background is hardly of such fundamental importance that it needs to be mentioned in the first sentence of the article. I have moved it further down, to the sentence about the British Humanist Association, where it seems more relevant. That of course leaves us with the question of whether he should be described as British or Welsh...Wilus (talk) 17:13, 8 October 2012 (UTC)

Biography.

Anyone got any biographical notes about his life up to and including his Uni days?. He definitely went to the Polytechnic of Central London (I'm sure it was changed to the University of Westminster later). I am fairly sure he studied Media Studies at the Riding House Street site. Working from correlating data, I reckon he would have been there from Autumn 1986 to Summer 1991 - four years for a three year course - because he took a year out to be Social Secretary for the Students Union for one of the years.
Anyone else got any info?
Mariya Oktyabrskaya (talk) 10:33, 25 August 2008 (UTC) So some of this is supported by jon's interview listed in the links. But I dont't think PCL did a "journalism" course as such - I beleive it was Media Studies. He also confirms the bit about orgainisng student gigs, but doesn't use his formal title of Social Secretary.
anyone else got any info/sources?
Mariya Oktyabrskaya (talk) 10:44, 25 August 2008 (UTC)

Broken Citation Links

"The book has been rejected by The Society for the Scientific Study of Psychopathy and by Robert D. Hare, creator of the Hare Psychopathy Checklist.[21][22]" Both of these links are broken. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2001:984:9396:1:54EF:9643:7CD9:2F8B (talk) 15:01, 18 December 2015 (UTC)

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