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librarygxrl's review
2.0
DNF at 25%. Has some good ideas but the entire book is framed as a blatant rant. In the audiobook he literally pinches his nostrils to emulate the voices of people who engage with third wave anti-racism. There are better books on race than this
gemurray's review against another edition
I would absolutely not recommend this book, and I’m unsure how it made it onto my reading list. The author uses rhetoric and insults to dismiss what he deems as third wave anti racism, but provides no real evidence to describe how “woke racism” has “betrayed Black America”, as the title suggests. He even states that Black Americans had an easier time rising through socioeconomic ranks than other migrant groups because segregation was outlawed and therefore those racist ideals were no longer a problem for Black people. Quote below:
“Segregation had been outlawed from on high with Black Americans not having had to endure the long, slow, clawing-our-way-into-self-sufficiency, regardless of prevailing attitudes, that other groups had dealt with. In the grand scheme of things, it was a moral advance for the country that a subordinate group did not simply have to make the best of the worst with no questions asked.”
“Segregation had been outlawed from on high with Black Americans not having had to endure the long, slow, clawing-our-way-into-self-sufficiency, regardless of prevailing attitudes, that other groups had dealt with. In the grand scheme of things, it was a moral advance for the country that a subordinate group did not simply have to make the best of the worst with no questions asked.”
gazzahaz's review
2.0
While I agree generally with McWhorter that online performative allyship and aggressive social character assassinations are reductive and mostly unhelpful, I found this book to be guilty of the same reductive reasoning it claims to be so thoroughly against. He overblows, in my opinion, both the cultural power and the consequences of “wokeism” while simultaneously mischaracterizing modern antiracist movements and ideologies as little more than a meme. Rather than engaging with the tenets of Critical Race Theory, Marxism, or other academic frameworks of thought that inform leftist movements, he tosses them into his arguments as something his readers should unquestionably dismiss as nothing more than fodder for religious zealotry that has no meaningful consequence in the “real world”— a term which he smugly overuses as if it’s something antiracist protesters have absolutely no interest in. He’s right that black folks aren’t a monolith. Neither are these protesters.
I see no reason why ending the war on drugs, pedagogical reform, and promoting vocations that do not require college degrees cannot comfortably coexist with the grander cultural community finding new ways to hold people accountable for racism or white supremacist viewpoints. And while they figure that out and fail at times to do it in helpful or productive ways, our children are not facing existential danger from these ideologies in an even remotely comparable way to when the ideologies taught in schools were (and in many places still are) institutionally white supremacist. McWhorter asserts multiple times that antiracist education for our children is exclusively nefarious bullshit that will harm them and we (more reasonable and rational and therefore morally superior folk) should rally against these mentally unstable mobs to protect them from it. This sort of fear-mongering serves white, middle-aged Tucker Carlson re-tweeters and pretty much nobody else.
Some of the most thoughtful, engaging, and deeply empathetic people I’ve ever met are participating actors in the antiracist movements going on in our country, and I join them in the struggle for a better world and a better country. Ideological disagreements aside, I can’t think of a single person among them who would disagree with McWhorter that the reforms he proposes would be empowering to the black community in America, and in addition to calling out people for perpetuating racism, they are also donating their time and money to these and other reforms that are making a measurable difference in the “real world.”
I see no reason why ending the war on drugs, pedagogical reform, and promoting vocations that do not require college degrees cannot comfortably coexist with the grander cultural community finding new ways to hold people accountable for racism or white supremacist viewpoints. And while they figure that out and fail at times to do it in helpful or productive ways, our children are not facing existential danger from these ideologies in an even remotely comparable way to when the ideologies taught in schools were (and in many places still are) institutionally white supremacist. McWhorter asserts multiple times that antiracist education for our children is exclusively nefarious bullshit that will harm them and we (more reasonable and rational and therefore morally superior folk) should rally against these mentally unstable mobs to protect them from it. This sort of fear-mongering serves white, middle-aged Tucker Carlson re-tweeters and pretty much nobody else.
Some of the most thoughtful, engaging, and deeply empathetic people I’ve ever met are participating actors in the antiracist movements going on in our country, and I join them in the struggle for a better world and a better country. Ideological disagreements aside, I can’t think of a single person among them who would disagree with McWhorter that the reforms he proposes would be empowering to the black community in America, and in addition to calling out people for perpetuating racism, they are also donating their time and money to these and other reforms that are making a measurable difference in the “real world.”
xtina4evahhh's review
challenging
informative
reflective
medium-paced
4.5
Really potent take down of the “religion” that is wokeism. The chart in the beginning of the book laying out all the idiotic paradoxes of this ideology was particularly persuasive.
Unlike other works on this topic that I feel tend to downplay the racism and discrimination many marginalized groups still face in America today, McWhorter acknowledges those issues, which gives him more credibility than some of his peers. He just doesn’t think DEI/woke ideology is doing a thing to address them and on that point I thought he was very convincing. He has a very simple three step plan for improving the welfare of black Americans: end the war on drugs, teach reading via phonics, and make vocational training an accessible and legit alternative to traditional four year college education. If the woke mobs would direct their resources to these concrete actions rather than screeching “RACIST!” and trying to ruin the lives of anyone who deviates even an inch from woke orthodoxy, progress in enhancing the lives of black Americans might actually be made.
I wish he’d delved deeper into how to actually enact such a plan (especially the war on drugs part which seems to me about as entrenched in our culture as the racism he says will never be fully abolished), but I understand that’s outside the scope of this book.
What’s stayed with me a week post reading: the simple point that if we actually care about improving the lives of real people experiencing hardship, then we need to devote our time and energy not to staging moody selfies holding a copy of White Fragility but to taking concrete actions per the three step plan mentioned above.
marysasala's review
3.0
I liked most of the arguments he made but found the structure and style of the book hard to make it through. A great look at an intellectual look at the new race “conversation” had by certain segments of our population and how it is dangerous. This book was specifically meant for liberals/left of center audiences (he says so at the beginning of his book). So it wasn’t meant for one of my political leanings, I still found his points and arguments important.
jennifergallo's review against another edition
2.0
This book was not for me. 180+ page rant. Fans of not citing sources might like this book.
stephenmeansme's review against another edition
2.0
This is a difficult one to rate. I more or less agree with McWhorter's sentiments but he's better in audio than in text on these subjects; and his insistence on calling the "woke" turn a literal religion strikes me (an atheist!) as weird if he's trying to reach Normie America. The other annoyance is that in some of the anecdotes he leans too hard on a "victim of the woke mob" narrative, when (1) focus on the bizarre, self-flagellating, and/or overwrought statements by said mob would do fine; and (2) when the situation is actually a bit more complicated and would count as a normal "group decides member isn't adhering to group standards and parts ways" if there wasn't additional loud wailing about isms and deeply-rooted whatevers and the-work-doings.
The question is, who would I recommend this book to, when I think I could articulate McWhorter's position in my own words in a fraction of the time? Or recommend his Times articles, or his his review in The Atlantic of WHITE FRAGILITY? It's hard to say, so I can't rate this highly.
2.5 stars rounded down.
The question is, who would I recommend this book to, when I think I could articulate McWhorter's position in my own words in a fraction of the time? Or recommend his Times articles, or his his review in The Atlantic of WHITE FRAGILITY? It's hard to say, so I can't rate this highly.
2.5 stars rounded down.
thujaplicata's review against another edition
challenging
informative
reflective
fast-paced
3.75
I didn't agree with all of it but it is necessary and important. I look forward to more in this vein
eznark's review
5.0
"Frankly it is better said by someone black"
Towards the end of the book McWhorter writes the above. It applies to this entire, excellent book. I recommend the audiobook, which the author reads himself. It is tremendous.
Towards the end of the book McWhorter writes the above. It applies to this entire, excellent book. I recommend the audiobook, which the author reads himself. It is tremendous.