Posted under Culture & Economics & Race
Charles Murray deserves a lot of credit for writing about white America in serious manner compared to compared to the crap usually put out by the academia or even the media on the subject. But however true his new book Coming Apart is about the current class divide in white American his solution for it is utterly unbecoming of a social scientist which Murray claims to be.
Perhaps the best critiques of the book from trolling the internet are offered by Rod Dreher, Yual Levine and yes, even David Frum. There are three key points I wish to chime in with: 1). Murray says he’s he’s a libertarian but yet he admonishes the upper-middle class whites for not being “judgemental” enough about their lower class brethren. Aren’t libertarians the most non-judgemental people on earth?; 2). For a social scientist, why doesn’t Murray understand, as we do here at CHT, that like-minded persons on average, whether in race, religion, creed, background, are going to coalesce in like-minded communities? 3). Because he works for AEI, Murray’s judgement is often clouded by his apparent dislike of not just the upper-middle class or lower well-to-do-class, but the liberal i.e NPR listener, members of said class. Is that really enough people to base a whole race’s problems at?
Even though Murray himself is member of the very classes he criticizes, as this article shows he tries to keep things real by eating out at a casino in West Virginia from time to time. According to the book, if taken literally, Murray believes enlightenment will come when the white “overclass” spends a day at a casino watching the white old ladies spending their Social Security checks with the one-armed bandit. Why does this remind me of the 1960s when young SDS activists moved into poverty stricken and working class neighborhoods or going even back further when the Russian Narodniks started their “To the People” movement in the 1870s to try and find out what peasants were thinking? Because it’s the same sort Utopian mindset. So the young professionals are going to tell the Korean War vets at the VFW Hall how to be better citizens? If I were them I think I would pass and leave well enough alone. Or better yet order them a copy of Grand Torino to watch and learn from.
Murray would been better off just presenting the data in his book instead of offering solutions a social scientist like himself would have found distasteful if some Lefty professor made the suggestion every white person in the U.S. had to take in a person of color in their homes. Imagine what he would have written about that.
Kirt Higdon on 25 Mar 2012 at 10:43 pm #
I’ve read Murray’s book and think it contains much interesting information and analysis. As to the three key points mentioned in the post. 1) Libertarian does not equal non-judgemental. In fact many, maybe most libertarian are quite judgemental. They just don’t think that government should enforce their personal judgements or those of others on society as a whole. 2) I think Murray understands very well that like people will coalesce with like on average. But it does not follow that what most do, everyone should do. When I grew up, my range of acquaintances was amazingly homogeneous in religion and ethnicity, but very extensive in economic class. Now it is the opposite. Murray wants to avoid a class system where the wealthy and poor have no personal contact and hence no real understanding of each other. As a libertarian he’d like to see this done on a voluntary basis. What’s the problem? There’s no need for all or even most of the wealthy to become gentrifiers, but it would be a good thing for some to do so. 3) It does not strike me at all that Murray dislikes the upper middle or lower wealthy classes. He seems to admire the way they live their lives. He wants them to preach what they practice.
Elizabeth on 26 Mar 2012 at 9:30 pm #
Probably the best review to date of Murray’s book is by F. Roger Devlin:
http://www.toqonline.com/blog/elite-and-underclass/
It’s long but it’s well worth reading all of it.
Here are some more reviews that Sailer discusses:
http://www.vdare.com/articles/charles-murray-gets-readmitted-to-polite-society-at-a-price
Kirt Higdon on 26 Mar 2012 at 11:11 pm #
I think there is a lot of downward mobility in the middle class, upper middle class falling to lower middle on a generational basis and lower middle to even lower. But I don’t think this is the case with the very wealthy. Family fortunes can take a lot of generational subdivision and still be fortunes providing that each generation has at least some who are industrious and talented enough to work on building the fortunes.