A review by piratequeen
The Age of American Unreason by Susan Jacoby

3.0

I read this right after I finished "Anti-Intellectualism in American Life", which in retrospect was a poor decision. I did it because I've been trying to read more intelligently, and sticking to a theme in order to get a clearer picture seemed like a good idea at the time. All it did in this case, however, was overwhelm me with the depressing reality of how bad America is educationally, culturally, and politically. They say confirmation bias is an ever-growing problem, especially with the internet and our ability to find information that agrees with our view with the push of a button, because it feels good to read things that we agree with. Not so for me, not this time. I agreed with Jacoby's scathing indictment of America's irrational and uninformed government, schools, and people, but her confirmation of my views left me feeling depressed and hopeless, especially since her conclusions about our current situation was virtually identical to those of Richard Hofstadter 50 years earlier. When our country's climate of unreason hasn't changed, and has in many cases worsened, over the past half-century (the massive and vicious debate about creationism in science classes that we see today was virtually unheard of 50 years ago), what hope is there that we can correct our course, and become the educated, critical population that our country needs?