Does the pervasive influence of popular psychology and emotional rhetoric undermine the integrity of the American criminal justice system? Wendy Kaminer, a lawyer and social critic, investigates how the cultural obsession with victimhood and therapeutic language has distorted public policy and legal accountability. By analyzing high-profile criminal cases and legislative trends, she argues that both liberal and conservative approaches to crime control have abandoned objective analysis in favor of demagoguery and moral panic.

Critics and readers often note the provocative nature of Kaminer's arguments, which challenge conventional wisdom across the political spectrum. Experts frequently cite this work as a sharp, polemical contribution to the discourse on how cultural trends influence the administration of law.