In his book Nail ‘Em: Confronting High-Profile Attacks on Celebrities and Businesses, Eric Dezenhall assesses attacks made on his clients, who are journalists, presidents and celebrities. Dezenhall focuses on the bad attacks, those that do more harm than good. He defines bad attacks as malice, falsehoods, distortions and hidden agendas that impede the search for justice and crusades for the public good. He has the vantage point of being on the inside, the person who defuses attacks made on high-profile people. Dezenhall writes about the phenomenon of attacks on his high-profile clients, who depend on public support but feel indignant that their audience could turn against them at any time.
Dezenhall writes that culture of attack stems from a discontentment of not achieving the same success as the attacked. He uses a six-step method to define attacks. The victim claims to have suffered injustice; the villain becomes the target of the attack; the vindicator tries to redeem the attacked; the void is an unfilled need that the public demands be met; the vehicle is the medium in which the attack is delivered; and the value is the social principle under which the attack is justified. In each case he writes about, he defines the six “v’s.”
Some of the cases that Dezenhall uses are from his experience and all of them are based on true cases. His mixture of cases keeps the book interesting while his storytelling capabilities far exceeded my expectations. Dezenhall spends a large portion of his book on schadenfreude, which is the enjoyment of someone else’s misfortune. He believes this to be a large incentive for attackers. In other words, Dezenhall believes that the attackers not only want to succeed, but they also want to make sure no one else does. He makes the point that this may not be the sole reason for an attack, but it is a result of other, perhaps legitimate, reasons to attack a person or business.
Although I would recommend this book to anyone who wants to learn more about crisis communication, I would not recommend it for a class because the examples are outdated. He uses cases involving Kathie Lee Gifford, cellular telephone manufacturers, Eli Lilly pharmaceutical company and Prozac. The book was written in 1999, so the examples predate social media technologies such as Twitter and Facebook. These media introduce ways that crises can be spread faster and wider, changing the way we look at crisis communications. Overall, Dezenhall’s book provides some good examples of classis cases, but it is not an indication of how crises are handled today with the new media technologies.
Haley Sklut
University of North Carolina-Chapel HIll
Dezenhall writes that culture of attack stems from a discontentment of not achieving the same success as the attacked. He uses a six-step method to define attacks. The victim claims to have suffered injustice; the villain becomes the target of the attack; the vindicator tries to redeem the attacked; the void is an unfilled need that the public demands be met; the vehicle is the medium in which the attack is delivered; and the value is the social principle under which the attack is justified. In each case he writes about, he defines the six “v’s.”
Some of the cases that Dezenhall uses are from his experience and all of them are based on true cases. His mixture of cases keeps the book interesting while his storytelling capabilities far exceeded my expectations. Dezenhall spends a large portion of his book on schadenfreude, which is the enjoyment of someone else’s misfortune. He believes this to be a large incentive for attackers. In other words, Dezenhall believes that the attackers not only want to succeed, but they also want to make sure no one else does. He makes the point that this may not be the sole reason for an attack, but it is a result of other, perhaps legitimate, reasons to attack a person or business.
Although I would recommend this book to anyone who wants to learn more about crisis communication, I would not recommend it for a class because the examples are outdated. He uses cases involving Kathie Lee Gifford, cellular telephone manufacturers, Eli Lilly pharmaceutical company and Prozac. The book was written in 1999, so the examples predate social media technologies such as Twitter and Facebook. These media introduce ways that crises can be spread faster and wider, changing the way we look at crisis communications. Overall, Dezenhall’s book provides some good examples of classis cases, but it is not an indication of how crises are handled today with the new media technologies.
Haley Sklut
University of North Carolina-Chapel HIll