Stupid White Men by

3 January 2003


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A good read, if a little scary at time. In a way it is unreal, like watching a parania TV show, and maybe that is why this sort of thing is ignored. We don’t really believe things are as bad as this books makes the out. Or if we do believe, we don’t want to. Ignore it and it will go away.

But there are a couple of problems with the book. I found the tone to be all wrong. It is too jokey to be taken seriously, and I don’t mean humourous but too stupid. He tries to point out problems and offers jokey solutions but the issues aren’t really that funny, so the jokes often fall a little flat. eg notion of converting protestants to catholics in NI.

The book is also a little too black and white. The Republicans (or is it the Democrats, I can’t tell them apart. Bush’s party) are evil and proud of it, while the others are also evil, they simply pretend they aren’t. Everyone who is evil is evil through and through, and everyone who is good must agree with everything that Moore believes is right. One of the issues tat he uses to tell the good people apart from the bad is that of abortion. And wherever you stand on that issue I think that you have to consider people who oppose you as having certain valid points to raise. After all if one believes that a life begins at the second of fertilisation then obviously one could never sanction destroying it. If however one believes that life is only life after a certain point in time, then the morning after pill, for example is certainly not murder of any sort.

Real life is too complex for easy answers, but I think that is what Moore is looking for in this book. A nice way to solve the problems of the world. It ain’t that simple, and never will be.

Despite those quibbles I would recommend this book as a wake-up call, as some of the points raised are very very valid. It is a little too “your’re either with us or against us”

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