Jon Ronson


Jon Ronson is a British-American journalist and documentary filmmaker whose works include The Men Who Stare at Goats, , and The Psychopath Test. He has been described as a gonzo journalist, becoming a faux-naïf character in his stories.
He produces informal but sceptical investigations of controversial fringe politics and science. He has published nine books and his work has appeared in publications such as The Guardian, City Life and Time Out. He has made several BBC Television documentary films and two documentary series for Channel 4.

Biography

Personal life

Ronson was born in Cardiff in Wales and attended Cardiff High School. He worked for CBC Radio in Cardiff before moving to London for a degree in Media Studies at the Polytechnic of Central London. Ronson, who is culturally Jewish, is a "distinguished supporter" of Humanists UK. He is married to Elaine Patterson, with whom he has a son. Ronson is a supporter of the football team Arsenal and has spoken of his "adoration" of the club. Ronson resides in upstate New York and became an American citizen in 2020.

Writing career

Ronson's first book, Clubbed Class, is a travelogue in which he bluffs his way into a jet set lifestyle, in search of the world's finest holiday.
His second book, ' chronicles his experiences with people labelled as extremists. Subjects in the book include David Icke, Randy Weaver, Omar Bakri Muhammad, Ian Paisley, Alex Jones, and Thom Robb. Ronson also follows independent investigators of secretive groups such as the Bilderberg Group. The narrative tells of Ronson's attempts to infiltrate the "shadowy cabal" fabled, by these conspiracy theorists, to rule the world. The book was described by Louis Theroux as a "funny and compulsively readable picaresque adventure through a paranoid shadow world." Variety magazine announced in September 2005 that Them was purchased by Universal Pictures for a feature film.
Ronson contributed the memoir A Fantastic Life to the Picador anthology Truth or Dare, in 2004.
Ronson's third book, The Men Who Stare at Goats, deals with the secret New Age unit within the United States Army called the First Earth Battalion. Ronson investigates people such as Major General Albert Stubblebine III, former head of intelligence, who believe that people can walk through walls with the right mental preparation, and that goats can be killed simply by staring at them. Much was based on the ideas of Lt. Col. Jim Channon, ret., who wrote the First Earth Battalion Operations Manual in 1979, inspired by the emerging Human Potential Movement of California. The book suggests that these New Age military ideas mutated over the decades to influence interrogation techniques at Guantanamo Bay. An eponymous film of the book was released in 2009, in which Ronson's investigations were fictionalised and structured around a journey to Iraq. Ronson is played by the actor Ewan McGregor in the film.
Ronson's fourth book, Out of the Ordinary: True Tales of Everyday Craziness is a collection of his Guardian articles, mostly those concerning his domestic life. A companion volume was What I Do: More True Tales of Everyday Craziness.
The Psychopath Test: A Journey Through the Madness Industry is Ronson's fifth book. In it, he explores the nature of psychopathic behaviour, learning how to apply the Hare Psychopathy Checklist, and investigating its reliability. He interviews people in facilities for the criminally insane as well as potential psychopaths in corporate boardrooms. The book's findings have been rejected by The Society for the Scientific Study of Psychopathy and by Robert D. Hare, creator of the Hare Psychopathy Checklist. Hare described the book as "frivolous, shallow, and professionally disconcerting".
' is Ronson's sixth book.
Ronson's book, So You've Been Publicly Shamed, concerns the effects of public humiliation in the internet age.

Radio

Ronson's main radio work is the production and presentation of a BBC Radio 4 programme, Jon Ronson on... The program has been nominated for a Sony award four times. In August 2008, Radio 4 aired "Robbie Williams and Jon Ronson Journey to the Other Side", a documentary by Jon Ronson about pop star Williams' fascination with UFOs and the paranormal.
In the early 1990s, Ronson was offered the position of sidekick on Terry Christian's Show on Manchester radio station KFM. Ronson also co-presented a KFM show with Craig Cash, who went on to write and perform in The Royle Family and Early Doors.
Ronson contributes to Public Radio International in the United States, particularly the program This American Life. He has contributed segments to the episodes "Them", "Family Physics", "Naming Names", "It's Never Over", "Habeas Schmaebeas", "The Spokesman", "Pro Se", and "The Psychopath Test".
Ronson hosted and wrote the podcast The Butterfly Effect, which was released in November 2017 by Audible. The show focuses on internet pornography, and Fabian Thylmann and PornHub's effect on the industry. Ronson subsequently also hosted and wrote the podcast The Last Days of August, released in January 2019. It focuses on the 2017 death of pornographic actress August Ames.

Music

In the late 1980s, Ronson replaced Mark Radcliffe as the keyboard player for the Frank Sidebottom band for a number of performances.
Ronson was the manager of the Manchester indie band Man From Delmonte.

Television

Ronson presented the late nineties talk show For The Love of..., in which each week he would interview a gathering of guests and experts on different phenomena and conspiracy theories. Ronson has also appeared as a guest on various shows, including .

Films

Ronson sold the film rights to The Men Who Stare at Goats, and subsequently a film of the same name was released in 2009 as a comedy war film directed by Grant Heslov and written by Peter Straughan. According to Ronson's DVD-commentary, the journalist-character Bob Wilton did experience some elements of Ronson's self-recounted story from the book. However, unlike Ronson, Wilton was an American from Ann Arbor. Also, unlike Ronson, Wilton went to Iraq.
In the process of visiting the set during the shoot, Ronson began a collaborative writing project with Straughan. This was the screenplay for Frank, a fictitious feature film inspired by Ronson's time in Frank Sidebottom's band.
Ronson co-wrote with Bong Joon-ho the screenplay for the 2017 Netflix film Okja.

Works

Books

Filmography