Susan Jacoby -- The age of American unreason: Warnings to the educated and rational; likely ignored by others.
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In the words of Dave Berry (and others) "I am not making this up".
Reality, and those in it, is wackier that anything we can make up.

Reading Jacoby's "Age of American unreason" is about as good an
inoculation against a failure to educate and a failure to reason
and think as you are likely to get.  However, I have doubts that
those who need this most will every read it.

We are witnessing, according to Jacoby, a decline of print culture
and a decline of reading.  In addition to a chapter that
concentrates on the loss of a culture inclined to reading
thoughtful materials, one chapter of this book, in particular, is a
lament over middle-brow culture that existed in the 1940's and
1950's.  For Jacoby, that culture included thoughtful magazines
such as "The New Yorker" and also fiction that was above the level
of "pulp" and self-help and cooking and so on.  By "print", she
means more than just written words (as opposed to oral).  She means
writings that are long and thoughtful, articles that take time and
concentration to digest.  She means, for example, fiction that does
more than follow a formula.  I suspect that Jacoby has read a few
mysteries, but she also wants us to read fiction that is of some
consequence in our lives and that can possibly change our views of
our lives and those around us.

One particularly interesting chapter is that on the religious
right.  It's interesting because it contains an attempt to connect
a cluster of values and to show how that family of values are all
held by a the same people in a single demographic.  These values
include support for values such as anti-abortion, anti-gay, and
women's subservient position in the home.  That this a single,
identifiable demographic is significant because it means that those
in this group can likely be targeted and exploited and manipulated
for political purposes.  For members of this group, these issues
trump and override all others.  For example, for someone who is
anti-abortion, that is a determining factor in their voting.  So,
there is no point in attempting to argue with a committed
anti-abortion voter that a given vote is not in his/her economic
self-interest.  For that person to vote in his/her self-interest
and contrary to that value (anti-abortion, anti-gay, etc.) would be
viewed as selfish and immoral, in some cases because these values
are based on a belief in a god or his teachings.  There is no real
possibility of compromise on these issues, nor of rational
discussion, unless you view arguing from the basis of religious
texts, for example, as rational.  But, this is the kind of voting
behavior that progressives and liberals and Jacoby, too, I suspect,
would view as irrational and unreasoned.  By the way, Europeans
are, according to Jacoby, frighten and appalled by this strain of
irrationality in the U.S.

One thing that is missing from this book is an attempt to analyze
and explain *why* this decline in print culture and dumbing-down of
our thinking is taking place in the U.S.  There are many reasons,
but I'll give one suspect: There is a rise in populism in the U.S.,
and there are, at least, two things interesting about this
populism: (1) It is especially virulent among those in the
political far right and the religious right.  (2) There are some
indications that the target of the anger exhibited by those in this
populist movement is directed at the educated elite rather than the
wealthy elite.  One piece of evidence in favor of this second point
is the fact that keeping in place the tax cuts to the wealthy is
especially important to the political right, and does not seem to
cause any significant conceptual conflict.  That seems incongruous
if you believe that the populist right is angry at the rich.  But,
it makes sense if you believe that the populist right is angry at
liberals, progressives, and the educated, that is at those
considered intellectuals.  If that explanation is correct, then the
dumbing-down of our thinking and the reduction in thoughtful
reading and the loss of the ability to think carefully and
critically would not be viewed as a failure by those who exhibit
it; rather it would be taken as something to be proud of.

12/22/2010

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