BOOK REVIEW<\/p>\n
\u201cCOMING APART\u201d (The State of White America, 1960-2010)\u00a0 \u00a0by Charles Murray, Ph.D<\/p>\n
If the reader is a lover of the American way of life as envisioned by the Founding Fathers, and you\u2019re wondering where in the hell things are going wrong, this book will answer most of your questions. In this reviewer\u2019s opinion, it is one of the most important books in recent years.<\/p>\n
Every reflective American now knows that our way of life has drastically changed since World War II\u2014and not for the better in important ways. The institutions that formerly held our nation together are collapsing, and making most Americans feel as if they are adrift in a lifeboat without oars. It\u2019s getting harder to make long term plans, and many must live their lives \u201cone-day-at-a-time.\u201d<\/p>\n
Dr. Murray, with degrees in history and political science, is well qualified to address the current American condition, both as to what is going wrong and what must be done to fix things. He reports how things have slowly\u2014and often without our understanding\u2014morphed into a nation that is losing the institutions and values that have served us so well in the past. He recognizes that we are not a perfect society, and have had major problems, but we still became the best nation on earth, and are still striving to keep that crown. However, the loss of individual industriousness, marital failures, collapse of the public school system, less honesty, decline in religiosity, and other factors are eroding our country.<\/p>\n
Perhaps he can best be summed up from a quote in this book: \u201cTo be a man means that you are brave, loyal, and true. When you are in the wrong, you own up and take your punishment. You don\u2019t take advantage of women. As a husband, you support and protect your wife and children. You are gracious in victory and a good sport in defeat. Your word is your bond. Your handshake is as good as your word. It\u2019s not whether you win or lose, but how you play the game. When the ship goes down, you put the women and children into the lifeboats and wave goodbye with a smile.\u201d<\/p>\n
Though this paragraph is loaded with clich\u00e9s, as he admits, \u201c\u2026 they were clich\u00e9s precisely because boys understood that this was the way they were supposed to behave.\u201d Ladies had similar codes, and together they kept America moving in a good direction.<\/p>\n
If the book has a central theme it is that the creative and industrious white population in America has been adopting and internalizing many of the values of the lower classes, values which are dragging all of us down to lower standards. The implication is that these lower values need to be elevated to higher levels, so that America can still become the beacon for the world that the Founding Fathers had hoped for.<\/p>\n
Though the style of the book is somewhat academic, with the usual appendices, notes, bibliography, and index, he has made a complex subject as readable as possible for the general public. There are also many charts and graphs, which are helpful, but can be skipped most of the time.<\/p>\n
If you want to know what\u2019s going on in America, you need this book. See your local booksellers, Amazon.com., etc.<\/p>\n
Joe Wilkins, reviewer<\/p>\n
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BOOK REVIEW \u201cCOMING APART\u201d (The State of White America, 1960-2010)\u00a0 \u00a0by Charles Murray, Ph.D If the reader is a lover of the American way of life as envisioned by the Founding Fathers, and you\u2019re wondering where in the hell things … Continue reading