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There was a lot of hype in the conservative community over Shapiro’s latest book. You can find this New York Times Best Seller for relatively cheap at any bookstore or Costco near you. While I finished reading it a little while ago, I felt like a great time to review the book was right after the first set of captivating Democratic primary debates. I plan to review a Democratic primary debate as well (once the field of candidates gets to a reasonable size).
I want to start off by saying that this book was not a relatively easy read. Shapiro takes on a very different tone from the one he uses when he debates students at various colleges (Shapiro DESTROYS liberals) and even the one he uses on his daily podcasts (Shapiro RAVAGES politicians with LOGIC BOMBS). While I definitely feel like the Shapiro is a lot more thoughtful in presenting his ideas in this book, he throws in an assumption here and there which people might not take for granted. The premise of Shapiro’s book is that modern Western society was built on the two pillars of Judeo-Christian morality and an Ancient Athens mixture of reason and purpose. These two pillars, he claims, allow our society to provide individual morality, individual capacity, communal morality, and communal capacity. If you think that was a mouthful and hard to understand, don’t worry I had similar troubles. Here are my definitions of what he means
- Individual Morality: Concerns with what is right or wrong on an individual level. For example, we ought not kill, steal or envy. This allows humans to grow beyond baser materialistic instincts, and, is supported in Judeo-Christianity by humans being created in God’s image.
- Individual Capacity: The power for humanity to live up to the ethics set by individual morality. We have the freedom to choose our actions and thus have responsibility if we fail. Our power lies in our belief in our capacity for reason and ethics provided by Athens.
- Communal Morality: Similar to individual morality, this is when we build upon our relationships within our community and think of our goals as a collective. We use our social ties to foster virtue.
- Communal Capacity: The belief in the power of community to shape ourselves. We believe that the community is greater than the sum of its parts and had to power to do great things.
It is very difficult to attain a combination of these four values in a society: too much power given to the community could restrict individual capacity, or too much individual freedom could lead to anarchist mentality restrict the progress of society. Shapiro spent the majority of this book going over how the cultures of Athens and Jerusalem allowed Western civilization to find a precarious way of balancing on these 4 stilts. He concludes with a grim message concerned that we are chipping away at the balance with an attack on religion and a promotion of tribalism.
Sorry for all the spoilers, but my quick summary barely gives this book justice. Shapiro definitely put a lot of time and effort into this bad boy—around 300 citations and overviews of at least 20 prominent Western philosophers. But what the book has in its audacity, it loses in depth. There were points in this book where Shapiro would take two sentences to summarize a point from Voltaire or Solomon and then give a quick blurb about why they were right/wrong. Often, I would have to take a minute scratching my head convincing myself of if his analysis was sound. It definitely doesn’t do Kant justice to say his entire book of Reason was flawed from the beginning since it tries to avoid a base in religion.
One other minor gripe I had was that Shapiro believes that philosophy itself drives and explains the passage of various societies. He attributes a society’s progress or flaws entirely due to their moral landscape. While I agree that this definitely is a factor, I feel like politics and resources play a huge role. It is easy for America to stay united as countries in Europe dissolved into capitalism because we didn’t have to deal with political problems such as serfdom or national divisions.
Overall, I thought Shapiro did a good job trying to weave the thread of his ideas through the tapestry of history in an easy to follow manner. He neatly ended on an optimistic message of how he tries to further Western values through his children. His passion for his country, his fellow peers, and his commitment to a higher ideal were everywhere in this book. Whether you agree with what he says or completely disagree with everything, reading this book will help give some insight into his flavor of conservative thinking and teach you something interesting along the way.