Brad J. Murray (![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small} halfjack) wrote,@ 2008-05-20 13:23:00 |
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Dangerous Books
I recently read an article about dangerous books. Well, it's not really about dangerous books, per se, but rather a list of books that the author considers dangerous. It's immediately suspect at the most facile level as it lacks any religious texts whatsoever and at the same time includes Darwin's, Descent of Man, which is a neon sign pointing to an ugly agenda. What's interesting about the idea of the list, however, is that it assumes that there is such a thing as a dangerous book without question. Now, some of the books on there are flat out wrong and represent some evil thinking, but are the books themselves dangerous? I'll look at what might seem to be uncontroversial choices from the list.
Mein Kampf represents some odious thought that leads directly to a call for patently evil action. But does it actually generate any? It seems to me that the German fascist movement of the early twentieth century was not intellectual (that is, not really borne from the book and its analysis) but rather charismatic. The evils of that period stemmed from the man, Adolph Hitler, and not really from widespread adoption of ideas from his book absent the author's speeches and political savvy. While the book is not a highlight in our global cultural history, it's hard to see it as evil. Having read it, the arguments are not particularly compelling and it's hard to image anyone swayed by it without vigorous external forces. I can't see the book as dangerous, frankly, because it's ineffective. If Hitler had not gained power, the book would be well below our radar.
The Communist Manifesto is a more interesting case. Here's a book that has intellectual traction -- without charismatic support it contains ideas that are compelling. The essential ethical argument that, if persons have equal rights then they ought to share equally, does not need a great orator to sell. In fact the ideas spread like wildfire through Europe and the Americas without a central figure selling it. It spread so effectively, in fact, that laissez faire capitalist countries were forced to revise policies in order to survive and sidestep revolution. In this sense the central thesis of the book -- that capitalism must fail because of the inequity it requires -- was refuted by governments filing the pointy parts off their capitalism, damping the inequities and providing sufficient fairness (not total fairness) to quiet the working classes (assuming classes exist, of course). In other places the book was taken to heart and largely misread resulting in some very serious humanitarian disasters though, frankly, in countries that were not exactly models of freedom of thought to begin with. It's not clear that Russia, for example, would be a better place today without the book.
In any case, here we have a book that contains compelling ideas that can cause serious harm, but have also demonstrably caused greater good. In fact, it seems to me that the well publicised fall of communism (despite 20% of the population of the planet still living under it, albeit modified) has allowed us to dismiss the book as irrelevant, the direct result of which is a steady return to the disparity we experienced prior to it. The assumption now seems to be that because communism didn't work (despite having never really been implemented) there are no good ideas in the book. When the new disparity reaches a breaking point and the workers again intellectualise their roles, it remains to be seen how they will resolve their dissatisfaction. It seems likely that it could be a lot worse than it was the last time around. Maybe we need another dangerous idea here.
Others have spoken at length about the lack of religious texts, so I won't bother. The Koran, the Bible, and The Protocols of the Elders of Zion are all absent. All have done great disservice to the stability, peace, and prosperity of human beings but I think a cogent argument could be put forth for their benefits as well. Perhaps not the last -- I'm hard pressed to think of a believable redeeming quality -- but even there it was swiftly debunked and in the end becomes a kind of icon -- a flag to wave -- rather than a genuine intellectual source of danger.
So I'm not sure there are dangerous books and, by extension, dangerous ideas. When examined seriously they all either fall apart or provide more value than they cost. The very fact that the ideas are so completely and finally (you can't really retract or revise a physical book; you can only issue another) expressed actually exposes the idea to valuable criticism and disempowers it if it's defective.
I recently read an article about dangerous books. Well, it's not really about dangerous books, per se, but rather a list of books that the author considers dangerous. It's immediately suspect at the most facile level as it lacks any religious texts whatsoever and at the same time includes Darwin's, Descent of Man, which is a neon sign pointing to an ugly agenda. What's interesting about the idea of the list, however, is that it assumes that there is such a thing as a dangerous book without question. Now, some of the books on there are flat out wrong and represent some evil thinking, but are the books themselves dangerous? I'll look at what might seem to be uncontroversial choices from the list.
Mein Kampf represents some odious thought that leads directly to a call for patently evil action. But does it actually generate any? It seems to me that the German fascist movement of the early twentieth century was not intellectual (that is, not really borne from the book and its analysis) but rather charismatic. The evils of that period stemmed from the man, Adolph Hitler, and not really from widespread adoption of ideas from his book absent the author's speeches and political savvy. While the book is not a highlight in our global cultural history, it's hard to see it as evil. Having read it, the arguments are not particularly compelling and it's hard to image anyone swayed by it without vigorous external forces. I can't see the book as dangerous, frankly, because it's ineffective. If Hitler had not gained power, the book would be well below our radar.
The Communist Manifesto is a more interesting case. Here's a book that has intellectual traction -- without charismatic support it contains ideas that are compelling. The essential ethical argument that, if persons have equal rights then they ought to share equally, does not need a great orator to sell. In fact the ideas spread like wildfire through Europe and the Americas without a central figure selling it. It spread so effectively, in fact, that laissez faire capitalist countries were forced to revise policies in order to survive and sidestep revolution. In this sense the central thesis of the book -- that capitalism must fail because of the inequity it requires -- was refuted by governments filing the pointy parts off their capitalism, damping the inequities and providing sufficient fairness (not total fairness) to quiet the working classes (assuming classes exist, of course). In other places the book was taken to heart and largely misread resulting in some very serious humanitarian disasters though, frankly, in countries that were not exactly models of freedom of thought to begin with. It's not clear that Russia, for example, would be a better place today without the book.
In any case, here we have a book that contains compelling ideas that can cause serious harm, but have also demonstrably caused greater good. In fact, it seems to me that the well publicised fall of communism (despite 20% of the population of the planet still living under it, albeit modified) has allowed us to dismiss the book as irrelevant, the direct result of which is a steady return to the disparity we experienced prior to it. The assumption now seems to be that because communism didn't work (despite having never really been implemented) there are no good ideas in the book. When the new disparity reaches a breaking point and the workers again intellectualise their roles, it remains to be seen how they will resolve their dissatisfaction. It seems likely that it could be a lot worse than it was the last time around. Maybe we need another dangerous idea here.
Others have spoken at length about the lack of religious texts, so I won't bother. The Koran, the Bible, and The Protocols of the Elders of Zion are all absent. All have done great disservice to the stability, peace, and prosperity of human beings but I think a cogent argument could be put forth for their benefits as well. Perhaps not the last -- I'm hard pressed to think of a believable redeeming quality -- but even there it was swiftly debunked and in the end becomes a kind of icon -- a flag to wave -- rather than a genuine intellectual source of danger.
So I'm not sure there are dangerous books and, by extension, dangerous ideas. When examined seriously they all either fall apart or provide more value than they cost. The very fact that the ideas are so completely and finally (you can't really retract or revise a physical book; you can only issue another) expressed actually exposes the idea to valuable criticism and disempowers it if it's defective.
