The Madness of Crowds Gender, Race and Identity; THE SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER

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.

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.

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.