The Bookstore - Staffed by Pippa (Disclaimer: Pippa Not Included)

[Security]

Finished reading Thomas Sowell's latest book Social Justice Fallacies, and I'm a bit underwhelmed. I'm unsure just who this book is written for. If it is written for proponents of social justice, it's quite the assumption that they'd even read it. If for his regular readers, it's a very short summary of various topics he's gone into greater length in various other books.

The proponents of social justice are the same people with the unconstrained vision he's written about, and he knows this. The negative aspects he addresses in this book are positives in their eyes. However, with he himself having once been on the other side of the fence, maybe he thinks the information presented here would be convincing enough to open their minds. I have significant doubts about that, but I suppose he would know better than me, from his experience and wisdom. My disagreement would come from me being more in touch with the current wave of these people simply by age.

If not written for those people, best I can say is that this feels like a good starting point for your average person who is not a devotee of the social justice mindset, but who has heard bits and pieces of the good sounding aspects and like what they heard. This would be something for them to see some of how it actually operates and what actually comes from it, and set them on the path to learn more. However, again, I am unsure if this is actually written for that person in mind. Best I can figure is it's some sort of amalgam of being for social justice advocates, at the general population, and himself as an outlet of his frustrations.

For those familiar with his books, it feels more like a primer. This makes sense, given the title, as his Economic Facts and Fallacies also felt like a primer, and was also underwhelming to me when I had already read his Basic Economics and Applied Economics.

I had been hoping, after Charter Schools and their Enemies, that Sowell would be able to get out at least one more book, and that it'd be on social justice. That it's not a giant, more focused take down on social justice, not only how it is in modern day but all throughout history, is quite disappointing - however, given that most his books in the past thirty years are about the particular mindset these people have, it's kind of difficult for me to complain, and Intellectuals and Society is largely already that.

So for normies, I'd recommend it. For people who are already familiar with Sowell's work, it's... fine. Not one of his best, and plenty of others I'd recommend over it, but it works as almost a quick reference guide to his other books, given how much he directly sources from them.

 

[Euthyphro]

In light of all the developments in the VTubing world so far in 2024, there has been a lot of discussion and interest in the differing attitudes of EN and JP fan communities, as well as the dynamics between English-speaking VTubers and the mainly Japanese companies that employ them. If you, asylum-dweller, want a solid foundation in any Japan-centric cultural discussion, then here's the book for you:

The Chrysanthemum and the Sword is the seminal work of modern Japanese cultural studies, written in 1946 as a guide for American officials to understand the character of the defeated Japanese. Originating as a compilation of anthropologist Ruth Benedict's reports to the U.S. Office of War Information, it is perhaps best known for popularizing the idea of Japan as a "shame"-based culture, as opposed to "guilt"-driven Western culture. More than that though, it is about the contradictory character of Japanese culture, where rules are highly context-dependent, where Western concepts of unified moral and ethical systems simply do not apply.

It is all the more interesting then that this book came from war-time studies. This fact makes it a far more goal-oriented book compared to most anthropological works, which seek to document and observe, rather than conquer and subdue. The roots of this book as a practical text mean that it is highly readable and accessible to laymen compared to more academic works.

Now, it's worth noting that Japan has changed significantly in the decades since the war, and over the decades, much ink has been spilled questioning the accuracy of Benedict's description of Japanese culture. Still, the effect of this book on Western views of Japan and Japanese views of themselves can't be understated. In the same way that some have described Western philosophy as all footnotes to Plato, an entire genre of works on "Japanese-ness" owes its existence to The Chrysanthemum and the Sword.

Upon reading this book, you will hopefully be able to navigate through a discussion on why your JP oshi and Japanese companies act the way they do, and look smart to strangers on the internet while doing it. After all, everyone knows that the best shitposting is accurate shitposting.

 

[Fucking YTs]

While this don't quite fit the mold for this section I'd like to mention my favorite podcast: 372 Pages We'll Never Get Back, it was originally created by two of the Rifftrax/One of MST3K writer/performers to eviscerate one of the worst modern novels: Ready Player One way back in 2017 when the movie was announced.

Since then, they've delved into bizarre manifestos, TekWar, My Immortal, 'Cozy Mysteries', and my current favorite: Kalieb's Dream, a self-published Amazon book that is just fucking insane. Here is a list of books they have covered.

It's usually very funny.

 

[Security]

Recently finished The Origins of Woke by Richard Hanania. Despite the title, it's not about the philosophical origins of what one would call "woke" (he provides his own definition early on), as he notes in the opening chapter, but instead he focuses on the governmental and institutional origins - the laws and policies that brought about the conditions we see today.

He makes a case that much of the government and corporate actions over the past sixty years originate with the Civil Rights Act of 1964, and have only been enhanced since then by subsequent bills, judicial rulings, and federal agencies' selective interpretations of the law. The law's vague language resulted in companies having to institute minority quotas in hiring and job roles, while at the same time not admitting to having quotas, or else they'll face penalty under law. Additionally, the rise of HR is due to the harassment aspects of the law, resulting in companies taking the safe side and policing speech and interactions heavily.

As the CRA 1964 has been enhanced and expanded, it added more and more into the protected categories, including "gender" and "identity." So in order to not run afoul of the judicial system enforced Disparate Impact Theory, corporations have to take an active step, else the threat of very real and very expensive lawsuits will come knocking - and the last sixty years have shown they will not win. Creating so many "protected" classes, along with the laws being so vague, means accelerating in this area is the best option to not lose money.

He also points out how the CRA 1964 has led to the destruction of merit, the loss of freedom of association, and the sterility of the workplace (and other places). As should be obvious, forcing people to be with each other and forcing them to get along results in the opposite, fostering social strife and increased polarization. He posits it is this law, and the subsequent laws, rulings, and agency decisions, as the functional reason for the rise in animosity.

Hanania offers ways to course correct, such as using the Executive Branch to enact executive orders and change the function of agencies, and have the increasing amount of conservative judges make rulings against disparate impact and the like. He focuses on these as he sees them as more realistic in the immediate, with legislative methods to be pursued down the line.

Obviously, this is Ameri-centric, but I think he presents a strong case. Whether it'd actually work out is another thing altogether, given how crafty and inventive the proponents of the woke ideology are; they will work to find new ways to pressure government and businesses to follow their dogma (as Blackrock already does). He's far more optimistic than me, but I'm curious to see if his suggestions get enacted and how they'll play out.

 

[2DUM4U]

So, funny book story. I started reading The Persians by Lloyd Llewellyn-Jones, but didn't get past the introduction. The thing is that the book begins with a lot of complaining about how histories, especially British ones, tend to cast the Persians merely as oppressive villains in the story of the idealized Greeks, and further how the British used this to justify their own imperialism. Now this criticism is not without merit, but it went perhaps a bit too far in the opposite direction and just came off as whiny. I even started calling the author "the Whiny Welshman" in my mind.

That wouldn't have been enough to stop me reading on, however. I stopped when I read this:

The classicist H. D. F. Kitto, himself a product of the British public-education system and the author of a (still bestselling) 1951 introduction to Greek history, invited his readers 'to accept... as a reasonable statment of fact' that the Greeks 'had a totally new conception of what human life was for, and showed for the first time what the human mind was for'.

Which the author then criticized as "imperialised philhellenism".

My response, naturally, was to immediately put down Persians and purchase The Greeks by H. D. F. Kitto, and a damn good decision if I do say so myself. The Greeks is a wonderful brief survey of classical Greek history that touches on every aspect of their culture, art, religion, philosophy, and of course politics. It's definitely a quality over quantity type of book, that packs a great deal of both intellectual interest and witty entertainment into a short space. It also sheds light on some unexpected facets of ancient Greek culture that in my experience don't get much attention.

I may return to Persians at some point, I'm still very much interested in that history as well, but as an author and educator Kitto stands head and shoulders above most others, so The Greeks is highly recommended to anyone with an interest in classical history.

 

[2DUM4U]

I just remembered a relatively obscure book that I greatly enjoyed years ago. Have you guys ever heard of Hilaire Belloc, famous Catholic historian and author of the early 20th century? He's not as well known now, this possibly owing in part to a 1922 book of his entitled The Jews (accusations of antisemitism have arisen against him since ever since his lifetime, despite his protestations to the contrary, including in the aforementioned book.)

But I'm not here to talk about that. I became interested in Belloc many years ago when I found out that in life he was a close friend and colleague of GK Chesterton, and since I enjoyed some GKC I decided to give Belloc a try. I don't recall which of his books I read first, but the one that gave me the fondest lasting memories is The Mercy of Allah, which you can read for free online.

What do you expect from a book entitled The Mercy of Allah? Naturally, I thought it would be about Islam and I was very curious to see what a learned Franco-English gentleman of the 1920's had to say about it. But that's not really what it's about. Oh, it's set in the Arabia of the indeterminate past, but it's really about the capitalist West.

But I'm getting ahead of myself, let's start at the beginning. The Mercy of Allah is not a nonfiction discourse on the religion or history of the Middle East, but a novel. A very funny novel, because like Gilbert and Sullivan in The Mikado, Belloc uses a foreign setting to parody the culture of his own homeland. Specifically, he uses a story set in Arabia to criticize contemporary capitalism.

(Far be it from me to weigh in on any economic debates, I will simply observe that both the benefits and the flaws of the capitalist system in practice are manifest and are fair game for the social critic, and that no criticism of capitalism as such should be taken as endorsement of some other system.)

Now, as to the book itself. The story follows the exploits of an enterprising Arab adventurer, who through hard work, good luck, and a total absence of morality rises to the apex of wealth and power. He begins as a destitute young man, desperate but hopeful, who runs petty scams for pennies. Each chapter narrates another of his adventures, with the amount of money acquired - and the damage to his unfortunate victims - growing ever greater. I particularly enjoyed Chapter 3: "The Pipkins" IS THAT A MOTHERFUCKIN PHASE CONNECT REFERENCE?!?!?!?!??!?! ARGLBLARGLEHBLARGLEBLARGH!!! By the end, our sociopathic hero is manipulating entire economies and maneuvering whole nations into war for his own profit. In this way, you can see how Belloc is able to criticize a capitalist system (or perhaps a mixed "corporatist" system such as we have in real life) on every level, in hilarious fashion.

While most of the content is fairly clearly directed at the England of the author's own time, I think you will see that the device of setting it in a fictionalized version of a foreign land serves to give the parodies and criticisms included a timeless and universal quality. Moreover, Belloc was a talented author, and the story is quite good and engaging even if you ignore the satirical elements. The hero - absolute scoundrel that he is - is actually quite likeable, and you find yourself rooting for him in his many unscrupulous schemes. What makes it even funnier is that the entire novel is framed as the merchant himself in old age telling the stories to his grandchildren as life advice and instruction - instruction which amounts to "be the most dishonest, back-stabbing POS you can be."

It's been years since I read The Mercy of Allah, but it definitely made an impression as you can tell. I was reminded of it when reading my current fare, The Count of Monte Cristo, and the similarity in language brought my old favorite back to mind. So if you're in the mood for a very humorous and accessible story by a most erudite and accomplished author, then be sure to pick up The Mercy of Allah by Hilaire Belloc.