Murray, Douglas

Some Modern Taboos

Madness of Crowds

Douglas Murray

THE SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER A Times and Sunday Times Book of the Year Updated with a new afterword by the author 'Douglas Murray fights the good fight for freedom of speech ... A truthful look at today's most divisive issues' – Jordan B. Peterson '[Murray's] latest book is beyond brilliant and should be read, must be read, by everyone' – Richard Dawkins Are we living through the great derangement of our times? In The Madness of Crowds Douglas Murray investigates the dangers of 'woke' culture and the rise of identity politics. In lively, razor-sharp prose he examines the most controversial issues of our moment: sexuality, gender, technology and race, with interludes on the Marxist foundations of 'wokeness', the impact of tech and how, in an increasingly online culture, we must relearn the ability to forgive. One of the few writers who dares to counter the prevailing view and question the dramatic changes in our society – from gender reassignment for children to the impact of transgender rights on women – Murray's penetrating book, now published with a new afterword taking account of the book's reception and responding to the worldwide Black Lives Matter protests, clears a path of sanity through the fog of our modern predicament.

Gender, Race and Identity; THE SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER

The Madness of Crowds

Simon Sylvest

THE SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER "An excellent take on the lunacy affecting much of the world today. Douglas is one of the bright lights that could lead us out of the darkness." – Joe Rogan "Douglas Murray fights the good fight for freedom of speech ... A truthful look at today's most divisive issues" – Jordan B. Peterson Are we living through the great derangement of our times? In The Madness of Crowds Douglas Murray investigates the dangers of 'woke' culture and the rise of identity politics. In lively, razor-sharp prose he examines the most controversial issues of our moment: sexuality, gender, technology and race, with interludes on the Marxist foundations of 'wokeness', the impact of tech and how, in an increasingly online culture, we must relearn the ability to forgive. One of the few writers who dares to counter the prevailing view and question the dramatic changes in our society – from gender reassignment for children to the impact of transgender rights on women – Murray's penetrating book clears a path of sanity through the fog of our modern predicament.

Gender, Race and Identity

Sean Wilson

This is a helpful review of the current lunacies. One feature of the Madness that I didn’t previously appreciate is that pointing out the contradictions in the whole project does not deter them, because a sort of Hegelian dialectical approach is governing the whole thing.

Murray does diagnose the problem well, but is regrettably not in any position to provide a real antidote to anything, except to call on us to return to the classical liberalism of yesteryear where everything was quite a bit nicer.

Emma Mullen

The author lacks a basic understanding of machine learning algorithms and has gone down the conspiracy big tech company agenda route. This was a very frustrating load of nonsense.

Bad Girl Bex

I think the only reason I didn't give this book 5 stars is because for the most part, Murray is really just covering a lot of ground that I personally am very familiar with; so it didn't exactly teach me anything new. Not that I should be holding back stars based on my own prior understanding of the topic, but I think perhaps I may have not only been a/ not exactly the intended audience for the subject matter at hand, but b/ I probably 'gorged' myself silly, watching each and every promotional video Murray did for the book tour, before reading the book itself, so I ended up feeling like I was rereading an older book, rather than a newer one. I know that it's essential - especially when it comes to authors who are confronting the establishment, status quo & culture wars at large - to do all one can, in order to get the book out there with as much promotional coverage as can be mustered. But it felt ever so slightly like the keenness of Murray's rapier sharp observations, appeared to have dulled slightly after my having heard them on multiple prior occasions.

I cannot fault Murray's writing style, nor his equanimous and measured approach to some of the thorniest topics currently emerging from the activism of the last 50+ years. He is thoughtful and considerate of the personal opinions of others, presenting everything in a beautifully phrased piece of work that is just as essential as 'The Strange Death Of Europe'. I move in circles where these discussions have been taking place for a while now. We are waiting for the rest of western civilisation to wake up to the problems our collective attempts at civic altruism have wrought; Murray here is doing his best, as always, to provide a balanced approach to those who may be lesser informed or involved with the topics at hand.

I recommend this book to everyone who wants to be able to live in a world where we can speak freely, without fear of recrimination, whilst also doing what is best for the mental and physical well-being of anyone who may suffer from any of the issues raised in each chapter. If you have an interest in social justice, if you are a proponent of free speech, if you care about humanity or if you just want to see what all the fuss is about, try it. This book is not particularly long and as always with Murray it is deeply engaging from the get-go. Buy it, read it, give it to someone else to read. Discuss it. But above all be very grateful that we still live in a time and place with allows for these sentinels of well-meaning opprobrium to speak out against the mainstream status quo. Long may it continue.

Madness of Crowds Some Modern Taboos

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