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cooper_trooper 's review for:
The Madness of Crowds: Gender, Race and Identity
by Douglas Murray
I think this is exactly the book I needed to read right now.
Like so many, I'm constantly telling people to read books written from differing perspectives, discuss topics that push them out of their comfort zone, and yet, reading this made me realise how rarely I do this.
I certainly don't agree with everything Murray says here, although to be fair, I think it would be unnatural to agree with absolutely everything someone says. Yet while I had thought I knew where I stood on most of these topics, I have to be honest with myself that so often I had just absorbed the ideas of those around me, those who I already agreed with, with hardly any analysis, of them or of the opinions I held.
An aspect I will wholeheartedly praise is Murray's ability to construct an argument. Anybody who wants to work on their critical writing or debating skills should study how he writes. I for one will definitely continue to read what he publishes, even for this alone.
A wake-up call - that's how I'd summarise my experience reading this. I'm going to follow this with a conscious effort to practice what I preached and read from a greater variety of perspectives, especially those I (for various reasons) have an instinctual feeling that I would disagree with. That's how I felt going into this, and I was proved both right and wrong, multiple times. If I get that feeling again, I know it's a sign that I should read it.
Like so many, I'm constantly telling people to read books written from differing perspectives, discuss topics that push them out of their comfort zone, and yet, reading this made me realise how rarely I do this.
I certainly don't agree with everything Murray says here, although to be fair, I think it would be unnatural to agree with absolutely everything someone says. Yet while I had thought I knew where I stood on most of these topics, I have to be honest with myself that so often I had just absorbed the ideas of those around me, those who I already agreed with, with hardly any analysis, of them or of the opinions I held.
An aspect I will wholeheartedly praise is Murray's ability to construct an argument. Anybody who wants to work on their critical writing or debating skills should study how he writes. I for one will definitely continue to read what he publishes, even for this alone.
A wake-up call - that's how I'd summarise my experience reading this. I'm going to follow this with a conscious effort to practice what I preached and read from a greater variety of perspectives, especially those I (for various reasons) have an instinctual feeling that I would disagree with. That's how I felt going into this, and I was proved both right and wrong, multiple times. If I get that feeling again, I know it's a sign that I should read it.