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Slouching Towards Gomorrah: Modern Liberalism and American Decline
In this New York Times bestselling book, Robert H. Bork, our country's most distinguished conservative scholar, offers a prophetic and unprecedented view of a culture in decline, a nation in such serious moral trouble that its very foundation is a nation that slouches not towards the Bethlehem envisioned by the poet Yeats in 1919, but towards Gomorrah.
Slouching Towards Gomorrah is a penetrating, devastatingly insightful exposé of a country in crisis at the end of the millennium, where the rise of modern liberalism, which stresses the dual forces of radical egalitarianism (the equality of outcomes rather than opportunities) and radical individualism (the drastic reduction of limits to personal gratification), has undermined our culture, our intellect, and our morality.
In a new Afterword, the author highlights recent disturbing trends in our laws and society, with special attention to matters of sex and censorship, race relations, and the relentless erosion of American moral values. The alarm he sounds is more sobering than we can accept our fate and try to insulate ourselves from the effects of a degenerating culture, or we can choose to halt the beast, to oppose modern liberalism in every arena. The will to resist, he warns, remains our only hope.
Slouching Towards Gomorrah is a penetrating, devastatingly insightful exposé of a country in crisis at the end of the millennium, where the rise of modern liberalism, which stresses the dual forces of radical egalitarianism (the equality of outcomes rather than opportunities) and radical individualism (the drastic reduction of limits to personal gratification), has undermined our culture, our intellect, and our morality.
In a new Afterword, the author highlights recent disturbing trends in our laws and society, with special attention to matters of sex and censorship, race relations, and the relentless erosion of American moral values. The alarm he sounds is more sobering than we can accept our fate and try to insulate ourselves from the effects of a degenerating culture, or we can choose to halt the beast, to oppose modern liberalism in every arena. The will to resist, he warns, remains our only hope.
1105 pages, Kindle Edition
First published January 1, 1996
145 people are currently reading
1344 people want to read
About the author
Robert H. Bork
213 books42 followersRobert Heron Bork was an American legal scholar who advocated the judicial philosophy of originalism. Bork served as a Yale Law School professor, Solicitor General, Acting Attorney General, and a judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. In 1987, he was nominated to the Supreme Court by President Ronald Reagan, but the Senate rejected his nomination. Bork had more success as an antitrust scholar, where his once-idiosyncratic view that antitrust law should focus on maximizing consumer welfare has come to dominate American legal thinking on the subject.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 111 reviews
July 20, 2014
I hate stars. I gave this book three even though I disagree vehemently with Bork, but it's kind of fun. His jeremiad, Slouching Toward Gomorrah uses Gomorrah as a metaphor for the United States. The book reminds me of the cantankerous old relative at the dinner table who can’t stop talking about how terrible things are today. One can’t even find time to pass the peas. Bork’s thesis is simple: our culture is immoral, and it’s all the liberal’s fault.
Society’s degradation has been caused by radical egalitarianism, radical feminism, popular culture, the Supreme Court, and rock n’ roll music (which he admits never having listened to). Portable radios share much blame for they permitted youth to listen to music without parental supervision. The Internet (which he admits to never having looked at) is a quagmire of dirty pictures, political correctness, and Afro centrists. He leaves virtually no one unscathed, attacking both the Roman Catholic Church and Protestant denominations that are living in a “leftist dream world,” and have become feminized.
Bork’s solution to this state of affairs is censorship, democratization of the Supreme Court, and religion - where this religion is to be found among today’s debased denominations he does not say.
The problem with this book is that it’s all assault and no finesse. Never does he engage the reader in a discussion of both sides of an issue. He creates a straw man and then knocks it over. He falls into the trap he accuses liberals of falling into; “assaulting one’s opponents as not merely wrong but morally evil.” He confuses cause with symptoms. Never does he reveal evidence as to how the Beatles cause immoral behavior. He states simply, “Rock and rap are utterly impoverished by comparison with swing or jazz or any pre-World War II music [personally, I always thought swing was the epitome of decadence] impoverished emotionally, aesthetically, and intellectually.”
Bork cannot resist name-calling. Liberals are fascist, totalitarian, and Nazi-like. Multiculturalism “is barbarism,” “feminist ideology is a fantasy of persecution.” He castigates those “cafeteria Catholics” who subscribe only to those elements of Catholicism with which they agree and then he proceeds to rebuke the Catholic Church’s call for a “just wage”, calling it “misunderstood economics.” Not an American institution escapes Bork’s wrath: the universities, colleges, government, the arts, the churches and the press have all been indoctrinated by liberals (that must be why we've elected so many Republicans in the last 25 years.)
For a self-defined conservative, Bork had some radical ideas. He would overturn the Constitution and Supreme Court decisions to be overridden by a majority vote of the Congress. He does not explain how, for example, if popular culture and society are so debased, a legislature elected by those debased people will fix Supreme Court decisions. It seems to me the whole purpose of the Supreme Court being immune to public pressure (as Franklin Roosevelt discovered to his dismay) is to provide a conservative brake on society, to constrain the short-lived stimulus of fleeting majorities. He is against an activist court. Not just liberal activism, but conservative as well, suggesting at one point that it all began with the conservative court that wrote into the constitution all sorts of free market principles that are not there. The liberals then just continued this process of activism but from a cultural perspective.
And what do you bet, he visited adult bookstores.
Society’s degradation has been caused by radical egalitarianism, radical feminism, popular culture, the Supreme Court, and rock n’ roll music (which he admits never having listened to). Portable radios share much blame for they permitted youth to listen to music without parental supervision. The Internet (which he admits to never having looked at) is a quagmire of dirty pictures, political correctness, and Afro centrists. He leaves virtually no one unscathed, attacking both the Roman Catholic Church and Protestant denominations that are living in a “leftist dream world,” and have become feminized.
Bork’s solution to this state of affairs is censorship, democratization of the Supreme Court, and religion - where this religion is to be found among today’s debased denominations he does not say.
The problem with this book is that it’s all assault and no finesse. Never does he engage the reader in a discussion of both sides of an issue. He creates a straw man and then knocks it over. He falls into the trap he accuses liberals of falling into; “assaulting one’s opponents as not merely wrong but morally evil.” He confuses cause with symptoms. Never does he reveal evidence as to how the Beatles cause immoral behavior. He states simply, “Rock and rap are utterly impoverished by comparison with swing or jazz or any pre-World War II music [personally, I always thought swing was the epitome of decadence] impoverished emotionally, aesthetically, and intellectually.”
Bork cannot resist name-calling. Liberals are fascist, totalitarian, and Nazi-like. Multiculturalism “is barbarism,” “feminist ideology is a fantasy of persecution.” He castigates those “cafeteria Catholics” who subscribe only to those elements of Catholicism with which they agree and then he proceeds to rebuke the Catholic Church’s call for a “just wage”, calling it “misunderstood economics.” Not an American institution escapes Bork’s wrath: the universities, colleges, government, the arts, the churches and the press have all been indoctrinated by liberals (that must be why we've elected so many Republicans in the last 25 years.)
For a self-defined conservative, Bork had some radical ideas. He would overturn the Constitution and Supreme Court decisions to be overridden by a majority vote of the Congress. He does not explain how, for example, if popular culture and society are so debased, a legislature elected by those debased people will fix Supreme Court decisions. It seems to me the whole purpose of the Supreme Court being immune to public pressure (as Franklin Roosevelt discovered to his dismay) is to provide a conservative brake on society, to constrain the short-lived stimulus of fleeting majorities. He is against an activist court. Not just liberal activism, but conservative as well, suggesting at one point that it all began with the conservative court that wrote into the constitution all sorts of free market principles that are not there. The liberals then just continued this process of activism but from a cultural perspective.
And what do you bet, he visited adult bookstores.
February 15, 2008
This book has had more influence on me than any other secular book. I read it at age 15. This book is the reason I'm a conservative. Robert Bork is one of the greatest legal thinkers of our age. The book isn't a critique of liberal politics, but explores how the vulgarity and hedonism of our culture damages our society. This damage is done by any trend or group which convinces people that good and evil do not exist
December 31, 2008
A former judge, Yale law professor, Solicitor General, and Reagan nominee to the Supreme Court, Robert Bork is pessimistic about America's future. In fact, though he never uses these exact words, he thinks we're all doomed. Sure, he holds out a glimmer of hope at the end (more on that later), but unless we turn things around quickly, it's over. America's toast.
If you don't believe my characterization, here it is in his own words:
"This is a book about American decline. Since American culture is a variant of the cultures of all Western industrialized democracies, it may even, inadvertently, be a book about Western decline. In the United States, at least, that decline and the mounting resistance to it have produced what we now call a culture war. It is impossible to say what the outcome will be, but for the moment our trajectory continues downward. This is not to deny that much in our culture remains healthy, that many families are intact and continue to raise children with strong moral values. American culture is complex and resilient. But it is also not to be denied that there are aspects of almost every branch of our culture that are worse than ever before and that the rot is spreading."
What is to blame for American's slouch toward Gomorrah? As the title implies, the fault lies with modern liberalism, particularly the two components that comprise it: radical individualism ("the drastic reduction of limits to personal gratification") and radical egalitarianism ("the equality of outcomes rather than of opportunities").
As Bork points out, it's difficult for radical individualism and radical egalitarianism to co-exist, because the liberty required for individualism leads to inequality. But the two operate in different spheres. Radical egalitarianism (hereafter known as RE) rears its ugly head in "areas of life and society where superior achievement is possible and would be rewarded but for coercion towards a state of equality," like quotas and affirmative action. Radical individualism (hereafter known as RI) "is demanded when there is no danger that achievement will produce inequality and people wish to be unhindered in the pursuit of pleasure."
As you might expect, Bork condemns both philosophies. RE "presses us towards collectivism because a powerful state is required to suppress the differences that freedom produces." RI
"attacks the authority of family, church, and private associations. The family is said to be oppressive, the fount of our miseries. It is denied that the church may legitimately insist upon what it regards as moral behavior in its members. Private associations are routinely denied the autonomy to define their membership for themselves. The upshot is that these institutions, which stand between the state and the individual, are progressively weakened and their functions increasingly dictated to or taken over by the state. The individual becomes less of a member of powerful private institutions and a member of an unstructured mass that is vulnerable to the collectivist coercion of the state. Thus does radical individualism prepare the way for its opposite."
But why has American and Western culture been subjected to these sinister forces, and not the rest of the world? Bork cites our use of technology that makes our lives easier. Hard labor has rapidly given way to white collar work, in which typing at a keyboard for eight hours is considered work. This absence of true labor can lead to boredom, which causes people to pursue pleasure in other areas, some constructive, some destructive. Envy also plays a role, because American is a wealthy nation, and those who are not wealthy often are jealous of those who are.
Like many conservatives, Bork lays much of the blame of the recent rise in RE and RI on the Sixties. Students and other activists rebelled against authority and sought to tear down institutions or at least bully them into adopting reforms, and our institutions proved too weak or unwilling to put up much of a fight. So they caved and the "barbarians" won, and these same barbarians now run these same institutions, thus becoming the establishment, the intellectual elite that wields so much influence in America.
However, unlike may conservatives, Bork believes the Sixties were merely the time that RE and RI rose to full prominence. The roots of revolution existed in America long before that, but their growth was stunted by World War I, the Great Depression, and World War II. In fact, RE and RI is ingrained in our culture by the Constitution and Declaration of Independence, which claimed that all men were created equal. This gave birth to the rise of RI, and is also why Bork is so pessimistic about America's chances. This is all part of our nature and character as a nation - we can cut it out no more than we can remove our hearts and still live.
Many institutions and groups have done their part in leading us towards Gomorrah. Bork writes a scathing chapter on the Supreme Court and ridicules several of its opinions, such as Roe v. Wade and cases involving flag burning, education, religion, and sex and race discrimination. The Court, in Bork's view, has gotten all this dreadfully wrong and ignored the Constitution to impose its own view on the rest of the country. It has become its own little dictatorship and robbed us of the authority and power to govern ourselves. This leads Bork to propose a constitutional amendment giving Congress the right, by a majority vote, to review and if necessary overturn any Supreme Court ruling. He believes the Court must be checked by some democratic process so the people can regain self-government.
As a brief aside, I'm not sure what I think of this proposal, but it does remind me of James Madison's idea to give Congress veto power over any state law, which his peers rejected. But something must be done, because nothing in the Constitution gives the Supreme Court the final authority over what is constitutional, and several matters they have ruled on, like abortion, euthanasia, and so on, are certainly better left for us to decide through our elected representatives.
Bork also tackles the issue of pornography, which he believes must be censored. Its influence is so pervasive and destructive that if left unchecked, it could consume our culture and destroy it. At the very least, it could strip away our ability to govern ourselves. In making his case, Bork ignores such practical matters like the government's ability to effectively control such a popular and wealthy industry, but he does offer a fine comeback to those who say if you don't like it, don't watch it. Of course, he says, but what if I am affected or harmed by someone who does watch it? What if I restrict my child from watching pornography, and yet some sicko whose perverse passions are fueled by pornography molests my child? What then?
The rest of the book, until the end, is more of a conventional conservative critique of radical feminism, abortion on demand, affirmative action, the fictional separation of church and state, and higher education.
At the end, Bork wonders if America is capable of reversing its march to Gomorrah. He's not very hopeful. He wonders if we should set up tiny enclaves of resistance, not unlike the Irish monasteries that kept the flame of Western civilization alive during the Dark Ages. He's not crazy about that idea (neither am I, it's akin to surrendering to the hordes), and concludes that the only way to stop our slide is to muster up the political will to resist modern liberalism, RE and RI in all its forms and manifestations.
I see evidence of that happening right now, with the success of conservatives on talk radio and the Internet. But is it enough?
All right, so what's my take on the book? I agree with Bork on most issues. I don't think censorship is necessary or workable. I agree American culture isn't in the best shape right now. I don't think it's as bad as he believes, or beyond repair, mainly because I disagree with his premise that our problems are inherent in our political nature. The founders did not, as Bork claims, worship at the altar of equality. When Jefferson wrote that all men were created equal, he meant that all citizens were entitled to the same rights under the law, not that everyone was the same. In fact, one way to counter the radical individualists is to summon the spirit of Jefferson and the founders, and show they would never approve of what is happening now in their name.
Bork sometimes suggests a contradiction, or at least a tension, between liberty and community, as if more liberty weakens a community. I think liberty and community work just fine together - America's success proves that. Are liberty and community under assault? Constantly. They always will be, which is why they require constant vigilance and defense.
If you don't believe my characterization, here it is in his own words:
"This is a book about American decline. Since American culture is a variant of the cultures of all Western industrialized democracies, it may even, inadvertently, be a book about Western decline. In the United States, at least, that decline and the mounting resistance to it have produced what we now call a culture war. It is impossible to say what the outcome will be, but for the moment our trajectory continues downward. This is not to deny that much in our culture remains healthy, that many families are intact and continue to raise children with strong moral values. American culture is complex and resilient. But it is also not to be denied that there are aspects of almost every branch of our culture that are worse than ever before and that the rot is spreading."
What is to blame for American's slouch toward Gomorrah? As the title implies, the fault lies with modern liberalism, particularly the two components that comprise it: radical individualism ("the drastic reduction of limits to personal gratification") and radical egalitarianism ("the equality of outcomes rather than of opportunities").
As Bork points out, it's difficult for radical individualism and radical egalitarianism to co-exist, because the liberty required for individualism leads to inequality. But the two operate in different spheres. Radical egalitarianism (hereafter known as RE) rears its ugly head in "areas of life and society where superior achievement is possible and would be rewarded but for coercion towards a state of equality," like quotas and affirmative action. Radical individualism (hereafter known as RI) "is demanded when there is no danger that achievement will produce inequality and people wish to be unhindered in the pursuit of pleasure."
As you might expect, Bork condemns both philosophies. RE "presses us towards collectivism because a powerful state is required to suppress the differences that freedom produces." RI
"attacks the authority of family, church, and private associations. The family is said to be oppressive, the fount of our miseries. It is denied that the church may legitimately insist upon what it regards as moral behavior in its members. Private associations are routinely denied the autonomy to define their membership for themselves. The upshot is that these institutions, which stand between the state and the individual, are progressively weakened and their functions increasingly dictated to or taken over by the state. The individual becomes less of a member of powerful private institutions and a member of an unstructured mass that is vulnerable to the collectivist coercion of the state. Thus does radical individualism prepare the way for its opposite."
But why has American and Western culture been subjected to these sinister forces, and not the rest of the world? Bork cites our use of technology that makes our lives easier. Hard labor has rapidly given way to white collar work, in which typing at a keyboard for eight hours is considered work. This absence of true labor can lead to boredom, which causes people to pursue pleasure in other areas, some constructive, some destructive. Envy also plays a role, because American is a wealthy nation, and those who are not wealthy often are jealous of those who are.
Like many conservatives, Bork lays much of the blame of the recent rise in RE and RI on the Sixties. Students and other activists rebelled against authority and sought to tear down institutions or at least bully them into adopting reforms, and our institutions proved too weak or unwilling to put up much of a fight. So they caved and the "barbarians" won, and these same barbarians now run these same institutions, thus becoming the establishment, the intellectual elite that wields so much influence in America.
However, unlike may conservatives, Bork believes the Sixties were merely the time that RE and RI rose to full prominence. The roots of revolution existed in America long before that, but their growth was stunted by World War I, the Great Depression, and World War II. In fact, RE and RI is ingrained in our culture by the Constitution and Declaration of Independence, which claimed that all men were created equal. This gave birth to the rise of RI, and is also why Bork is so pessimistic about America's chances. This is all part of our nature and character as a nation - we can cut it out no more than we can remove our hearts and still live.
Many institutions and groups have done their part in leading us towards Gomorrah. Bork writes a scathing chapter on the Supreme Court and ridicules several of its opinions, such as Roe v. Wade and cases involving flag burning, education, religion, and sex and race discrimination. The Court, in Bork's view, has gotten all this dreadfully wrong and ignored the Constitution to impose its own view on the rest of the country. It has become its own little dictatorship and robbed us of the authority and power to govern ourselves. This leads Bork to propose a constitutional amendment giving Congress the right, by a majority vote, to review and if necessary overturn any Supreme Court ruling. He believes the Court must be checked by some democratic process so the people can regain self-government.
As a brief aside, I'm not sure what I think of this proposal, but it does remind me of James Madison's idea to give Congress veto power over any state law, which his peers rejected. But something must be done, because nothing in the Constitution gives the Supreme Court the final authority over what is constitutional, and several matters they have ruled on, like abortion, euthanasia, and so on, are certainly better left for us to decide through our elected representatives.
Bork also tackles the issue of pornography, which he believes must be censored. Its influence is so pervasive and destructive that if left unchecked, it could consume our culture and destroy it. At the very least, it could strip away our ability to govern ourselves. In making his case, Bork ignores such practical matters like the government's ability to effectively control such a popular and wealthy industry, but he does offer a fine comeback to those who say if you don't like it, don't watch it. Of course, he says, but what if I am affected or harmed by someone who does watch it? What if I restrict my child from watching pornography, and yet some sicko whose perverse passions are fueled by pornography molests my child? What then?
The rest of the book, until the end, is more of a conventional conservative critique of radical feminism, abortion on demand, affirmative action, the fictional separation of church and state, and higher education.
At the end, Bork wonders if America is capable of reversing its march to Gomorrah. He's not very hopeful. He wonders if we should set up tiny enclaves of resistance, not unlike the Irish monasteries that kept the flame of Western civilization alive during the Dark Ages. He's not crazy about that idea (neither am I, it's akin to surrendering to the hordes), and concludes that the only way to stop our slide is to muster up the political will to resist modern liberalism, RE and RI in all its forms and manifestations.
I see evidence of that happening right now, with the success of conservatives on talk radio and the Internet. But is it enough?
All right, so what's my take on the book? I agree with Bork on most issues. I don't think censorship is necessary or workable. I agree American culture isn't in the best shape right now. I don't think it's as bad as he believes, or beyond repair, mainly because I disagree with his premise that our problems are inherent in our political nature. The founders did not, as Bork claims, worship at the altar of equality. When Jefferson wrote that all men were created equal, he meant that all citizens were entitled to the same rights under the law, not that everyone was the same. In fact, one way to counter the radical individualists is to summon the spirit of Jefferson and the founders, and show they would never approve of what is happening now in their name.
Bork sometimes suggests a contradiction, or at least a tension, between liberty and community, as if more liberty weakens a community. I think liberty and community work just fine together - America's success proves that. Are liberty and community under assault? Constantly. They always will be, which is why they require constant vigilance and defense.
August 21, 2023
It is kind of funny reading a book complaining about Baby Boomers as an up-and-coming generation ruining the world with their trash music and watered down college degrees. Why, back in my day....
Except somehow this book (which, admittedly, is full of things that made me cringe) also is full of shrewd points about politics, philosophy, and culture. Points that (even if I didn't agree with them necessarily) I was forced to reckon with because he makes a compelling case.
I've seen other reviewers argue that Bork's main thesis is that all that is evil in society can be chalked up to liberal, Democrat policies. I think it is even deeper than that. He is arguing that as a society, we have valued individualism too much, and as a result are undermining the very foundations that make it work. He would hold libertarianism as much at fault as liberalism (as Americans define them.)
I am left with quite a bit to grapple with and I wish it came in a slightly more palatable package because I think this could be a very interesting book to discuss. Unfortunately, when he veers off to complain about issues we've by and large moved on from as a culture (his rant on women in the military comes to mind) or talks about how 'in his day' no one listened to music their parents didn't approve of, it feels...harder to swallow.
I have no idea how many stars to rate this. Did I enjoy it? Not really. I certainly didn't 'really like it.' But I do think it deserves the four stars for making me ponder my own libertarian streak and if that was actually compatible with my conservative values.
Except somehow this book (which, admittedly, is full of things that made me cringe) also is full of shrewd points about politics, philosophy, and culture. Points that (even if I didn't agree with them necessarily) I was forced to reckon with because he makes a compelling case.
I've seen other reviewers argue that Bork's main thesis is that all that is evil in society can be chalked up to liberal, Democrat policies. I think it is even deeper than that. He is arguing that as a society, we have valued individualism too much, and as a result are undermining the very foundations that make it work. He would hold libertarianism as much at fault as liberalism (as Americans define them.)
I am left with quite a bit to grapple with and I wish it came in a slightly more palatable package because I think this could be a very interesting book to discuss. Unfortunately, when he veers off to complain about issues we've by and large moved on from as a culture (his rant on women in the military comes to mind) or talks about how 'in his day' no one listened to music their parents didn't approve of, it feels...harder to swallow.
I have no idea how many stars to rate this. Did I enjoy it? Not really. I certainly didn't 'really like it.' But I do think it deserves the four stars for making me ponder my own libertarian streak and if that was actually compatible with my conservative values.
December 20, 2012
I wrote a review earlier that somehow fell into the internet black hole. Here we go again...
My father had the blessing of receiving a seemingly endless arsenal of right-wing books from one of his siblings, every Christmas and birthday. This was among them. This was probably the lowest-quality one.
Robert Bork's message here is one that is as old as the hills: "people are just not as good nowadays". Ever since the advent of the industrial revolution, which replaced the cyclical time of pre-modern people with the linear time of the modern age, every generation has given us people who regret the decline of morals, customs, whatever, among the present cohort of human beings. The fact that wealth and productivity continue to increase by leaps and bounds in spite of these supposed defects, that slavery and despotism have increasingly been done away with, that wars and violence have become rarer, does not dissuade people who want a tragic story. It never will.
Being a teenager when I read this book, familiar with most of the popular culture stuff that Bork discusses, I was particularly unimpressed. Bork gets a lot of mileage out of gangsta rap, hard rock, and, surprisingly, Michael Jackson. He misrepresents popular songs wherever it suits him, neglecting to note context and details such as ironic intent that may change the meaning of words. I do not recall whether Bork is for a positive program of censorship, which would seem to be the only logical solution to the problems he sees, but in any case he lacks an inspiring rallying cry. His project is protest and denunciation. I am reminded of William F. Buckley's bon mot about his publication, National Review: "It stands athwart history, yelling Stop, at a time when no one is inclined to do so." Can you blame other people for finding this tiresome?
Addendum:
The New Yorker's obituary of Robert Bork sums up his life better than I could:
Robert Bork, who died Wednesday, was an unrepentant reactionary who was on the wrong side of every major legal controversy of the twentieth century. The fifty-eight senators who voted against Bork for confirmation to the Supreme Court in 1987 honored themselves, and the Constitution. In the subsequent quarter-century, Bork devoted himself to proving that his critics were right about him all along.
Bork was born in 1927 and came of age during the civil-rights movement, which he opposed. He was, in the nineteen-sixties, a libertarian of sorts; this worldview led him to conclude that poll taxes were constitutional and the Civil Rights Act of 1965 was not. (Specifically, he said that law was based on a “principle of unsurpassed ugliness.”) As a professor at Yale Law School, his specialty was antitrust law, which he also (by and large) opposed.
Richard Nixon appointed Bork the Solicitor General of the United States, and in that post Bork showed that he lacked moral courage as well as legal judgment. In 1973, Nixon directed Elliot Richardson, the Attorney General, to fire Archibald Cox, the Watergate special prosecutor. Richardson refused and resigned in protest, as did his deputy William Ruckelshaus. Bork, the third-ranking official in the Justice Department, had no such scruples and thus served as executioner in the Saturday Night Massacre, to his enduring shame.
In 1981, Ronald Reagan nominated Bork to the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, and then, six years later, to the Supreme Court. To his credit, Bork gave honest and forthright answers to the questions posed by the senators on the Judiciary Committee, which was led admirably by then Senator Joseph Biden. Much of the questioning focused on Bork’s long-held belief that the Constitution does not include a right to privacy. As one of the creators of the “originalist” school of constitutional interpretation, Bork asserted that since the framers did not use the word “privacy,” that value was not reflected in our founding document. Accordingly, he opposed such decisions as Griswold v. Connecticut, which said states could not ban married couples from buying birth control, and Roe v. Wade, which prohibits states from banning abortion. He promised the senators he would reflect those views as a Supreme Court Justice.
It was said, in later years, that Bork was “borked,” which came to mean treated unfairly in the confirmation process. This is not so. Bork was “borked” simply by being confronted with his own views—-which would have undone many of the great constitutional landmarks in recent American history. As Senator Edward Kennedy put it in a famous speech on the Senate floor:
"Robert Bork’s America is a land in which women would be forced into back-alley abortions, blacks would sit at segregated lunch counters, rogue police could break down citizens’ doors in midnight raids, schoolchildren could not be taught about evolution, [and] writers and artists would be censored at the whim of government."
Was Kennedy too harsh? He was not—-as Bork himself demonstrated in the series of intemperate books he wrote after losing the Supreme Court fight and quitting the bench, in 1987. The titles alone were revealing: ”The Tempting of America,” “Slouching Towards Gomorrah: Modern Liberalism and American Decline,” and “Coercing Virtue: The Worldwide Rule of Judges.” One of his last books may have summed up his views best. Thanks in part to decisions of the Supreme Court—-decisions that, for the most part, Bork abhorred—-the United States became a more tolerant and inclusive place, with greater freedom of expression and freedom from discrimination than any society in history. Bork called the book, accurately, “A Country I Do Not Recognize.
My father had the blessing of receiving a seemingly endless arsenal of right-wing books from one of his siblings, every Christmas and birthday. This was among them. This was probably the lowest-quality one.
Robert Bork's message here is one that is as old as the hills: "people are just not as good nowadays". Ever since the advent of the industrial revolution, which replaced the cyclical time of pre-modern people with the linear time of the modern age, every generation has given us people who regret the decline of morals, customs, whatever, among the present cohort of human beings. The fact that wealth and productivity continue to increase by leaps and bounds in spite of these supposed defects, that slavery and despotism have increasingly been done away with, that wars and violence have become rarer, does not dissuade people who want a tragic story. It never will.
Being a teenager when I read this book, familiar with most of the popular culture stuff that Bork discusses, I was particularly unimpressed. Bork gets a lot of mileage out of gangsta rap, hard rock, and, surprisingly, Michael Jackson. He misrepresents popular songs wherever it suits him, neglecting to note context and details such as ironic intent that may change the meaning of words. I do not recall whether Bork is for a positive program of censorship, which would seem to be the only logical solution to the problems he sees, but in any case he lacks an inspiring rallying cry. His project is protest and denunciation. I am reminded of William F. Buckley's bon mot about his publication, National Review: "It stands athwart history, yelling Stop, at a time when no one is inclined to do so." Can you blame other people for finding this tiresome?
Addendum:
The New Yorker's obituary of Robert Bork sums up his life better than I could:
Robert Bork, who died Wednesday, was an unrepentant reactionary who was on the wrong side of every major legal controversy of the twentieth century. The fifty-eight senators who voted against Bork for confirmation to the Supreme Court in 1987 honored themselves, and the Constitution. In the subsequent quarter-century, Bork devoted himself to proving that his critics were right about him all along.
Bork was born in 1927 and came of age during the civil-rights movement, which he opposed. He was, in the nineteen-sixties, a libertarian of sorts; this worldview led him to conclude that poll taxes were constitutional and the Civil Rights Act of 1965 was not. (Specifically, he said that law was based on a “principle of unsurpassed ugliness.”) As a professor at Yale Law School, his specialty was antitrust law, which he also (by and large) opposed.
Richard Nixon appointed Bork the Solicitor General of the United States, and in that post Bork showed that he lacked moral courage as well as legal judgment. In 1973, Nixon directed Elliot Richardson, the Attorney General, to fire Archibald Cox, the Watergate special prosecutor. Richardson refused and resigned in protest, as did his deputy William Ruckelshaus. Bork, the third-ranking official in the Justice Department, had no such scruples and thus served as executioner in the Saturday Night Massacre, to his enduring shame.
In 1981, Ronald Reagan nominated Bork to the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, and then, six years later, to the Supreme Court. To his credit, Bork gave honest and forthright answers to the questions posed by the senators on the Judiciary Committee, which was led admirably by then Senator Joseph Biden. Much of the questioning focused on Bork’s long-held belief that the Constitution does not include a right to privacy. As one of the creators of the “originalist” school of constitutional interpretation, Bork asserted that since the framers did not use the word “privacy,” that value was not reflected in our founding document. Accordingly, he opposed such decisions as Griswold v. Connecticut, which said states could not ban married couples from buying birth control, and Roe v. Wade, which prohibits states from banning abortion. He promised the senators he would reflect those views as a Supreme Court Justice.
It was said, in later years, that Bork was “borked,” which came to mean treated unfairly in the confirmation process. This is not so. Bork was “borked” simply by being confronted with his own views—-which would have undone many of the great constitutional landmarks in recent American history. As Senator Edward Kennedy put it in a famous speech on the Senate floor:
"Robert Bork’s America is a land in which women would be forced into back-alley abortions, blacks would sit at segregated lunch counters, rogue police could break down citizens’ doors in midnight raids, schoolchildren could not be taught about evolution, [and] writers and artists would be censored at the whim of government."
Was Kennedy too harsh? He was not—-as Bork himself demonstrated in the series of intemperate books he wrote after losing the Supreme Court fight and quitting the bench, in 1987. The titles alone were revealing: ”The Tempting of America,” “Slouching Towards Gomorrah: Modern Liberalism and American Decline,” and “Coercing Virtue: The Worldwide Rule of Judges.” One of his last books may have summed up his views best. Thanks in part to decisions of the Supreme Court—-decisions that, for the most part, Bork abhorred—-the United States became a more tolerant and inclusive place, with greater freedom of expression and freedom from discrimination than any society in history. Bork called the book, accurately, “A Country I Do Not Recognize.
March 7, 2022
A little dated, but a great read! The afterward brings it up to date.
This is truly a prophetic book. Written in the late 90s, Bork saw a lot of things that were about to take place. I highly recommend it!
This is truly a prophetic book. Written in the late 90s, Bork saw a lot of things that were about to take place. I highly recommend it!
March 6, 2018
A friend recommended this book, which he read in a collegiate political science course, as an authentic/unfiltered perspective on modern day america from a recognized figure in the conservative landscape...I sincerely hope this is not an accurate representation of a broader mindset.
His perspective on historical events/influences is shallow and blatantly selective, as he clearly prefers to omit objective information that does not support his biases. He is also constantly placing blame on subgroups with virtually no empirical evidence to support his claims...In the end, this book is equivalent to listening to a wandering and aimless rant from a grumpy man with an old fashioned perspective on the world.
You're better off just reading Trump tweets (They carry the same vibe and message).
His perspective on historical events/influences is shallow and blatantly selective, as he clearly prefers to omit objective information that does not support his biases. He is also constantly placing blame on subgroups with virtually no empirical evidence to support his claims...In the end, this book is equivalent to listening to a wandering and aimless rant from a grumpy man with an old fashioned perspective on the world.
You're better off just reading Trump tweets (They carry the same vibe and message).
April 22, 2017
Bork is famous for being nominated by Reagan to SCOTUS and then proceeded to get sandbagged. When this happens now it's called a "borking." After reading this I guess I'm glad he didn't get on the court as he had some silly views like this: Sooner or later censorship is going to have to be considered as popular culture continues plunging to ever more sickening lows. The alternative to censorship, legal and moral, will be a brutalized and chaotic culture, with all that that entails for our society, economy, politics, and physical safety. It is important to be clear about the topic. I am not suggesting that censorship should, or constitutionally could, be employed to counter the liberal political and cultural propagandizing of movies, television, network news, and music. They are protected, and properly so, by the First Amendments guarantees of freedom of speech and of the press. I am suggesting that censorship be considered for the most violent and sexually explicit material now on offer, starting with the obscene prose and pictures available on the Internet, motion pictures that are mere rhapsodies to violence, and the more degenerate lyrics of rap music.
Baby boomer conservatism is almost as bad as extreme liberalism. You can't just censor things cause you don't like them, commie. It does a really good job explaining a lot of the problems leftism causes with society and is overall a good read if you lean right but this book isn't gonna sway anyone right or left. I think a valid criticism of this would be that it sounds like a cranky grandpa yelling at his typewriter. Which isn't necessarily a bad thing it's just that you're not gonna win anyone over like that.
Other highlights:
Gitlin, once a leader in SDS, stresses many of these factors as shaping his generation, and adds another: the “rock-bottom fact that life ends.” To adolescents without religious belief, that realization can be devastating. Radical politics can then become a substitute for a religion, a way to seek meaning in life, and even, one can hope, a form of immortality. To lead or to be part of a movement that changes the world is, perhaps, to be remembered forever. For many, modern liberalism is a religion.
Black law students had a separate grievance. The law school, competing with other schools, had rushed into affirmative action and recruited black students who, having attended very inferior colleges, were in no way prepared for the Yale law school. As economist Thomas Sowell has pointed out, a minority student who is overmatched can react in one of two ways. Either he can accept his inability to meet the standards of the school or he can attack the standards as dishonest, corrupt, and probably racist. In an effort to hold on to self-respect in a bewildering and seemingly hostile environment, many will choose to reject both the standards by which they are judged and the faculty that judges them. One Saturday I was writing at home when a telegram arrived from the Black Law Students Union announcing that I, along with the rest of the faculty, was “summoned” to appear before the BLSU in the faculty lounge the following week. In a mild panic, the faculty met at the dean’s house but could not agree on a course of action. Some denied that the “summons” was an insult. One professor said that it was his custom to accept “invitations.” The president of Yale, Kingman Brewster, was present but, already daunted by the radicals, declined to give any advice. I decided not to go. In the end, a little over half the faculty appeared as summoned. The result was a fiasco. The faculty sat in folding chairs that had been set out for them; the BLSU leaders stood before them like instructors…very angry instructors…before a class. Two large students stood at the door, seeming to prevent any faculty from leaving, and no professor chose to test that proposition. In violently obscene language, the BLSU leaders berated the faculty which sat submissively in their chairs and took it. When the dean, a man who had marched at Selma and had a long and distinguished record of fighting for racial equality, tried to speak, he was told that he must remain silent so long as any black had something to say. But, for some reason, the BLSU leader did recognize the former dean, Eugene Rostow. He, however, refused to speak unless the present dean was given the floor. At that, the students swept angrily out of the room, much to the relief of a very frightened faculty. Probably the students needed a pretext to leave since there was no reason for the gathering except to shout obscenities at the faculty, and, that having been fulsomely accomplished, continuation could only have been anticlimactic. When the BLSU was gone, a prominent member of the faculty turned to Alexander Bickel, from whom I had this account, and said, “Wasn’t that wonderful! They were so sincere!” Bickel did not speak to the man for almost a year.
White radicals behaved no better. One of the few favorable developments, from the faculty’s point of view, was that the black radicals refused to cooperate with the white radicals. They believed, accurately, that the whites wanted to use them to further the whites’ aims. Blacks sat at separate tables in the dining room, sat together in the rear of the classrooms, stood apart at receptions and other functions, demanded and got their own office and television set on the ground that they could not relax with whites. Timid professors cajoled the white radicals, both cajoled the blacks. Neither set of cajolers got anywhere.
The Sixties were, as Robert Nisbet wrote, “a decade of near revolutionary upheaval and of sustained preaching of social nihilism.” Except that it was even worse than that. Unlike any previous decade in American experience, the Sixties combined domestic disruption and violence with an explosion of drug use and sexual promiscuity; it was a decade of hedonism and narcissism; it was a decade in which popular culture reached new lows of vulgarity. The Sixties generation combined moral relativism with political absolutism. And it was the decade in which the Establishment not only collapsed but began to endorse the most outrageous behavior and indictments of America by young radicals. It was the decade that saw victories for the civil rights movement, but it was also the decade in which much of America’s best educated and most pampered youth refused to serve the country in war, disguising self-indulgence and hatred of the United States as idealism. What W. H. Auden said of the 1930s was even more true of the 1960s: it was “a low, dishonest decade.”
Because of the universities’ expansion, this might have occurred in any event, but more slowly. The Sixties compounded the problem. An entire generation of students carried a more virulent form of intellectual class attitudes and cynicism about this society into a range of occupations outside the universities. The transformation of the New York Times illustrates what has happened to prestige journalism generally. A newspaper once called “the good, gray lady” is now suffused with Sixties attitudes, which are most explicit, of course, in its editorial and opinion pages, though they can be detected as well in its news pages. Similarly, Hollywood, which once celebrated traditional virtues, has become a propaganda machine for the political outlook and permissive morality of the Sixties generation. If the universities have become permanent enclaves of Sixties culture, and continue feeding converted students into such fields, this may be a permanent feature of our intellectual and artistic communities.
The idea of liberty has continuous change built into it, precisely because it is hostile to constraints. Men seek the removal of the constraint nearest them. But when that one falls, men are brought against the next constraint, which is now felt to be equally irksome. That is why the agenda of liberalism is in constant motion and liberals of different eras would hardly recognize one another as deserving the same label.
The idea of liberty has continuous change built into it, precisely because it is hostile to constraints. Men seek the removal of the constraint nearest them. But when that one falls, men are brought against the next constraint, which is now felt to be equally irksome. That is why the agenda of liberalism is in constant motion and liberals of different eras would hardly recognize one another as deserving the same label. Harry Truman would have hated the Sixties, and, because his liberalism contained more powerful constraints on individualism, he was not a liberal in the same sense that Bill Clinton is. The perpetual motion of liberalism was described by T. S. Eliot half a century ago: “That Liberalism may be a tendency towards something very different from itself, is a possibility in its nature…. It is a movement not so much defined by its end, as by its starting point; away from, rather than towards something definite.”10 What liberalism has constantly moved away from are the constraints on personal liberty imposed by religion, morality, law, family, and community. Liberalism moves, therefore, toward radical individualism and the corruption of standards that movement entails. “By destroying traditional social habits of the people, by dissolving their natural collective consciousness into individual constituents, by licensing the opinions of the most foolish, by substituting instruction for education, by encouraging cleverness rather than wisdom, the upstart rather than the qualified … Liberalism can prepare the way for that which is its own negation: the artificial, mechanised or brutalised control which is a desperate remedy for its chaos.”
Radical egalitarianism cannot be implemented by individuals, families, or any group other than government. As government taxes more and subsidizes more, a greater portion of society’s wealth passes through its hands. Individuals and families have less income to dispose of as they see fit, which is why Jouvenel said that “redistribution is in effect far less a redistribution of free income from the richer to the poorer, as we imagined, than a redistribution of power from the individual to the State.”
Power in the “new despotism” will be gentle because government will try to protect its citizens from every occasion for suffering, physical or moral. Democratic man, thinking that others are like himself, identifies with anyone who suffers.30 This compassion born of the passion for equality leads to the power of claiming victim status. We have become what Charles J. Sykes called a nation of victims.31 The list of victim groups…minorities, women, homosexuals, the disabled, the obese, the young, the old…is virtually endless, including at one time everybody but ordinary white males. Now, however, there is even a men’s movement claiming victim status. Putative victims stress their pain as a way of demanding special treatment from others, and they often get it. If there is power in claiming to feel pain as a victim, there is also power to be gained by the politician who assures us that “I feel your pain.”
Weber remarked that when certain types of German intellectualism turned against religion, there occurred “the rise of the economic, eschatological faith of socialism.”4 Not only communism but fascism and Naziism were faith systems of the Left, offering transcendental meaning to their adherents.
Television, not surprisingly, displays the same traits as the movies and music, though because it is viewed by families in the home, not to the same degree. Television viewing still resembles a bit the days when the family sat around the radio console, and that places a few restrictions on the medium. Still, things have changed here, too. Language is increasingly vulgar. A major study of changes in program content over the life of television finds, as might have been expected of a medium that has recently come under the influence of the Sixties generation, that “[B]eginning from a relatively apolitical and traditional perspective on the social order, TV has meandered and lurched uncertainly along paths forged by the politics of the populist Left.“3 That has dictated changes in the way sex, social and cultural authority, and the personifications of good and evil are presented. Recreational sex, for example, is pervasive and is presented as acceptable about six times as often as it is rejected. Homosexuals and prostitutes are shown as social victims. Television takes a neutral attitude towards adultery, prostitution, and pornography. It “warns against the dangers of imposing the majority’s restrictive sexual morality on these practices. The villains in TV’s moralist plays are not deviants and libertines but Puritans and prudes.“ The moral relativism of the Sixties is now television’s public morality.
There is no longer any doubt that communities with many single parents, whether because of divorce or out-of-wedlock births, display much higher rates of crime, drug use, school dropouts, voluntary unemployment, etc. Nor is there any doubt that the absence of a father is damaging not only to the unwed mother but to the prospects of the children. [T]he presence of a decent father helps a male child learn to control aggression; his absence impedes it…. When the mother in a mother-only family is also a teenager, or at least a teenager living in urban America, the consequences for the child are even grimmer. The most authoritative survey of what we know about the offspring of adolescent mothers concluded that the children suffer increasingly serious cognitive deficits and display a greater degree of hyperactivity, hostility, and poorly controlled aggression than is true of children born to older mothers of the same race, and this is especially true of the boys.
Gun control shifts the equation in favor of the criminal. Gun control proposals are nothing more than a modern liberal suggestion that government, which is unable to protect its citizens, make sure those citizens cannot defend themselves.
In thinking about abortion, it is necessary to address two questions. Is abortion always the killing of a human being? If it is, is that killing done simply for convenience? I think there can be no doubt that the answer to the first question is yes; and the answer to the second is almost always.
No amount of discussion, no citation of evidence, can alter the opinions of radical feminists about abortion. One evening I naively remarked in a talk that those who favor the right to abort would likely change their minds if they could be convinced that a human being was being killed. I was startled at the anger that statement provoked in several women present. One of them informed me in no uncertain terms that the issue had nothing to do with the humanity of the fetus but was entirely about the woman’s freedom. It is here that radical egalitarianism reinforces radical individualism in supporting the abortion right. Justice Harry Blackmun, who wrote Roe and who never offered the slightest constitutional defense of it, simply remarked that the decision was a landmark on women’s march to equality. Equality, in this view, means that if men do not bear children, women should not have to either. Abortion is seen as a way for women to escape the idea that biology is destiny, and from the tyranny of the family role.
As Judge John Noonan observed in a Ninth Circuit panel opinion subsequently overturned by the en banc court: “Physician neutrality and patient autonomy, independent of their physician’s advice, are largely myths. Most patients do what their doctors recommend. As an eminent commission concluded, ‘Once the physician suggests suicide or euthanasia, some patients will feel that they have few, if any, alternatives but to accept the recommendation.”’21 This reality puts assisted suicide in a somewhat more sinister light, as it does euthanasia. Euthanasia, in which the doctor does the actual killing, is only a half step beyond assisted suicide. It is sure to arrive as accepted practice if assisted suicide is accepted. The courts that have found assisted suicide to be a right have not specified the safeguards that must be followed. We can see the difficulties that will attend any effort to provide safeguards by looking at the conditions required by Oregon’s Death With Dignity Act, adopted in 1994. The patient must, for example, make three requests for assistance with suicide (the third one witnessed, transcribed, and signed), and two physicians must determine that the patient has six months or less to live. A physician may then prescribe a lethal dose of medication. This sounds simpler and safer than it will be. Determinations of life expectancy for the terminally ill can be very wrong. When my first wife was diagnosed with cancer, the doctor told me she would live only six months to two years. She lived nine and a half years, and those were good years, for her, for me, for our children, and for her friends. Mistakes of that nature, and some of that magnitude, are certain to be made under any assisted suicide regime.
Abortion has coarsened us. If it is permissible to kill the unborn human for convenience, it is surely permissible to kill those thought to be soon to die for the same reason. And it is inevitable that many who are not in danger of imminent death will be killed to relieve their families of burdens. Convenience is becoming the theme of our culture. Humans tend to be inconvenient at both ends of their lives.
Radical feminism is the most destructive and fanatical movement to come down to us from the Sixties. This is a revolutionary, not a reformist, movement, and it is meeting with considerable success. Totalitarian in spirit, it is deeply antagonistic to traditional Western culture and proposes the complete restructuring of society, morality, and human nature. Radical feminism is today’s female counterpart of Sixties radicalism. The feminist program is in its main features the same as that of the disastrous Port Huron Statement,2 modified to accommodate the belief that the oppressors, the source of all evil, are men, the “patriarchy” rather than the “Establishment.” All else remains the same. “Feminism rode into our cultural life on the coattails of the New Left but by now it certainly deserves its own place in the halls of intellectual barbarisms.“
Even if this feminist contention were correct, its totalitarian implications are obvious. Culture is a stubborn opponent. To defeat it requires the coercion of humans. The Soviet Union attempted to create the New Soviet Man with gulags, psychiatric hospitals, and firing squads for seventy years and succeeded only in producing a more corrupt culture. The feminists are having a similarly corrupting effect on our culture with only the weapon of moral intimidation. The contention that underneath their cultural conditioning men and women are identical is absurd to anyone not blinded by ideological fantasy.
So alienating are the messages of the women’s studies programs that Professor Sommers writes that she would like to see some of the more extreme institutions put warning labels on the first page of their bulletins: We will help your daughter discover the extent to which she has been in complicity with the patriarchy. We will encourage her to reconstruct herself through dialogue with us. She may become enraged and chronically offended. She will very likely reject the religious and moral codes you raised her with. She may well distance herself from family and friends. She may change her appearance, and even her sexual orientation. She may end up hating you (her father) and pitying you (her mother). After she has completed her reeducation with us, you will certainly be out tens of thousands of dollars and very possibly be out one daughter as well.
Baby boomer conservatism is almost as bad as extreme liberalism. You can't just censor things cause you don't like them, commie. It does a really good job explaining a lot of the problems leftism causes with society and is overall a good read if you lean right but this book isn't gonna sway anyone right or left. I think a valid criticism of this would be that it sounds like a cranky grandpa yelling at his typewriter. Which isn't necessarily a bad thing it's just that you're not gonna win anyone over like that.
Other highlights:
Gitlin, once a leader in SDS, stresses many of these factors as shaping his generation, and adds another: the “rock-bottom fact that life ends.” To adolescents without religious belief, that realization can be devastating. Radical politics can then become a substitute for a religion, a way to seek meaning in life, and even, one can hope, a form of immortality. To lead or to be part of a movement that changes the world is, perhaps, to be remembered forever. For many, modern liberalism is a religion.
Black law students had a separate grievance. The law school, competing with other schools, had rushed into affirmative action and recruited black students who, having attended very inferior colleges, were in no way prepared for the Yale law school. As economist Thomas Sowell has pointed out, a minority student who is overmatched can react in one of two ways. Either he can accept his inability to meet the standards of the school or he can attack the standards as dishonest, corrupt, and probably racist. In an effort to hold on to self-respect in a bewildering and seemingly hostile environment, many will choose to reject both the standards by which they are judged and the faculty that judges them. One Saturday I was writing at home when a telegram arrived from the Black Law Students Union announcing that I, along with the rest of the faculty, was “summoned” to appear before the BLSU in the faculty lounge the following week. In a mild panic, the faculty met at the dean’s house but could not agree on a course of action. Some denied that the “summons” was an insult. One professor said that it was his custom to accept “invitations.” The president of Yale, Kingman Brewster, was present but, already daunted by the radicals, declined to give any advice. I decided not to go. In the end, a little over half the faculty appeared as summoned. The result was a fiasco. The faculty sat in folding chairs that had been set out for them; the BLSU leaders stood before them like instructors…very angry instructors…before a class. Two large students stood at the door, seeming to prevent any faculty from leaving, and no professor chose to test that proposition. In violently obscene language, the BLSU leaders berated the faculty which sat submissively in their chairs and took it. When the dean, a man who had marched at Selma and had a long and distinguished record of fighting for racial equality, tried to speak, he was told that he must remain silent so long as any black had something to say. But, for some reason, the BLSU leader did recognize the former dean, Eugene Rostow. He, however, refused to speak unless the present dean was given the floor. At that, the students swept angrily out of the room, much to the relief of a very frightened faculty. Probably the students needed a pretext to leave since there was no reason for the gathering except to shout obscenities at the faculty, and, that having been fulsomely accomplished, continuation could only have been anticlimactic. When the BLSU was gone, a prominent member of the faculty turned to Alexander Bickel, from whom I had this account, and said, “Wasn’t that wonderful! They were so sincere!” Bickel did not speak to the man for almost a year.
White radicals behaved no better. One of the few favorable developments, from the faculty’s point of view, was that the black radicals refused to cooperate with the white radicals. They believed, accurately, that the whites wanted to use them to further the whites’ aims. Blacks sat at separate tables in the dining room, sat together in the rear of the classrooms, stood apart at receptions and other functions, demanded and got their own office and television set on the ground that they could not relax with whites. Timid professors cajoled the white radicals, both cajoled the blacks. Neither set of cajolers got anywhere.
The Sixties were, as Robert Nisbet wrote, “a decade of near revolutionary upheaval and of sustained preaching of social nihilism.” Except that it was even worse than that. Unlike any previous decade in American experience, the Sixties combined domestic disruption and violence with an explosion of drug use and sexual promiscuity; it was a decade of hedonism and narcissism; it was a decade in which popular culture reached new lows of vulgarity. The Sixties generation combined moral relativism with political absolutism. And it was the decade in which the Establishment not only collapsed but began to endorse the most outrageous behavior and indictments of America by young radicals. It was the decade that saw victories for the civil rights movement, but it was also the decade in which much of America’s best educated and most pampered youth refused to serve the country in war, disguising self-indulgence and hatred of the United States as idealism. What W. H. Auden said of the 1930s was even more true of the 1960s: it was “a low, dishonest decade.”
Because of the universities’ expansion, this might have occurred in any event, but more slowly. The Sixties compounded the problem. An entire generation of students carried a more virulent form of intellectual class attitudes and cynicism about this society into a range of occupations outside the universities. The transformation of the New York Times illustrates what has happened to prestige journalism generally. A newspaper once called “the good, gray lady” is now suffused with Sixties attitudes, which are most explicit, of course, in its editorial and opinion pages, though they can be detected as well in its news pages. Similarly, Hollywood, which once celebrated traditional virtues, has become a propaganda machine for the political outlook and permissive morality of the Sixties generation. If the universities have become permanent enclaves of Sixties culture, and continue feeding converted students into such fields, this may be a permanent feature of our intellectual and artistic communities.
The idea of liberty has continuous change built into it, precisely because it is hostile to constraints. Men seek the removal of the constraint nearest them. But when that one falls, men are brought against the next constraint, which is now felt to be equally irksome. That is why the agenda of liberalism is in constant motion and liberals of different eras would hardly recognize one another as deserving the same label.
The idea of liberty has continuous change built into it, precisely because it is hostile to constraints. Men seek the removal of the constraint nearest them. But when that one falls, men are brought against the next constraint, which is now felt to be equally irksome. That is why the agenda of liberalism is in constant motion and liberals of different eras would hardly recognize one another as deserving the same label. Harry Truman would have hated the Sixties, and, because his liberalism contained more powerful constraints on individualism, he was not a liberal in the same sense that Bill Clinton is. The perpetual motion of liberalism was described by T. S. Eliot half a century ago: “That Liberalism may be a tendency towards something very different from itself, is a possibility in its nature…. It is a movement not so much defined by its end, as by its starting point; away from, rather than towards something definite.”10 What liberalism has constantly moved away from are the constraints on personal liberty imposed by religion, morality, law, family, and community. Liberalism moves, therefore, toward radical individualism and the corruption of standards that movement entails. “By destroying traditional social habits of the people, by dissolving their natural collective consciousness into individual constituents, by licensing the opinions of the most foolish, by substituting instruction for education, by encouraging cleverness rather than wisdom, the upstart rather than the qualified … Liberalism can prepare the way for that which is its own negation: the artificial, mechanised or brutalised control which is a desperate remedy for its chaos.”
Radical egalitarianism cannot be implemented by individuals, families, or any group other than government. As government taxes more and subsidizes more, a greater portion of society’s wealth passes through its hands. Individuals and families have less income to dispose of as they see fit, which is why Jouvenel said that “redistribution is in effect far less a redistribution of free income from the richer to the poorer, as we imagined, than a redistribution of power from the individual to the State.”
Power in the “new despotism” will be gentle because government will try to protect its citizens from every occasion for suffering, physical or moral. Democratic man, thinking that others are like himself, identifies with anyone who suffers.30 This compassion born of the passion for equality leads to the power of claiming victim status. We have become what Charles J. Sykes called a nation of victims.31 The list of victim groups…minorities, women, homosexuals, the disabled, the obese, the young, the old…is virtually endless, including at one time everybody but ordinary white males. Now, however, there is even a men’s movement claiming victim status. Putative victims stress their pain as a way of demanding special treatment from others, and they often get it. If there is power in claiming to feel pain as a victim, there is also power to be gained by the politician who assures us that “I feel your pain.”
Weber remarked that when certain types of German intellectualism turned against religion, there occurred “the rise of the economic, eschatological faith of socialism.”4 Not only communism but fascism and Naziism were faith systems of the Left, offering transcendental meaning to their adherents.
Television, not surprisingly, displays the same traits as the movies and music, though because it is viewed by families in the home, not to the same degree. Television viewing still resembles a bit the days when the family sat around the radio console, and that places a few restrictions on the medium. Still, things have changed here, too. Language is increasingly vulgar. A major study of changes in program content over the life of television finds, as might have been expected of a medium that has recently come under the influence of the Sixties generation, that “[B]eginning from a relatively apolitical and traditional perspective on the social order, TV has meandered and lurched uncertainly along paths forged by the politics of the populist Left.“3 That has dictated changes in the way sex, social and cultural authority, and the personifications of good and evil are presented. Recreational sex, for example, is pervasive and is presented as acceptable about six times as often as it is rejected. Homosexuals and prostitutes are shown as social victims. Television takes a neutral attitude towards adultery, prostitution, and pornography. It “warns against the dangers of imposing the majority’s restrictive sexual morality on these practices. The villains in TV’s moralist plays are not deviants and libertines but Puritans and prudes.“ The moral relativism of the Sixties is now television’s public morality.
There is no longer any doubt that communities with many single parents, whether because of divorce or out-of-wedlock births, display much higher rates of crime, drug use, school dropouts, voluntary unemployment, etc. Nor is there any doubt that the absence of a father is damaging not only to the unwed mother but to the prospects of the children. [T]he presence of a decent father helps a male child learn to control aggression; his absence impedes it…. When the mother in a mother-only family is also a teenager, or at least a teenager living in urban America, the consequences for the child are even grimmer. The most authoritative survey of what we know about the offspring of adolescent mothers concluded that the children suffer increasingly serious cognitive deficits and display a greater degree of hyperactivity, hostility, and poorly controlled aggression than is true of children born to older mothers of the same race, and this is especially true of the boys.
Gun control shifts the equation in favor of the criminal. Gun control proposals are nothing more than a modern liberal suggestion that government, which is unable to protect its citizens, make sure those citizens cannot defend themselves.
In thinking about abortion, it is necessary to address two questions. Is abortion always the killing of a human being? If it is, is that killing done simply for convenience? I think there can be no doubt that the answer to the first question is yes; and the answer to the second is almost always.
No amount of discussion, no citation of evidence, can alter the opinions of radical feminists about abortion. One evening I naively remarked in a talk that those who favor the right to abort would likely change their minds if they could be convinced that a human being was being killed. I was startled at the anger that statement provoked in several women present. One of them informed me in no uncertain terms that the issue had nothing to do with the humanity of the fetus but was entirely about the woman’s freedom. It is here that radical egalitarianism reinforces radical individualism in supporting the abortion right. Justice Harry Blackmun, who wrote Roe and who never offered the slightest constitutional defense of it, simply remarked that the decision was a landmark on women’s march to equality. Equality, in this view, means that if men do not bear children, women should not have to either. Abortion is seen as a way for women to escape the idea that biology is destiny, and from the tyranny of the family role.
As Judge John Noonan observed in a Ninth Circuit panel opinion subsequently overturned by the en banc court: “Physician neutrality and patient autonomy, independent of their physician’s advice, are largely myths. Most patients do what their doctors recommend. As an eminent commission concluded, ‘Once the physician suggests suicide or euthanasia, some patients will feel that they have few, if any, alternatives but to accept the recommendation.”’21 This reality puts assisted suicide in a somewhat more sinister light, as it does euthanasia. Euthanasia, in which the doctor does the actual killing, is only a half step beyond assisted suicide. It is sure to arrive as accepted practice if assisted suicide is accepted. The courts that have found assisted suicide to be a right have not specified the safeguards that must be followed. We can see the difficulties that will attend any effort to provide safeguards by looking at the conditions required by Oregon’s Death With Dignity Act, adopted in 1994. The patient must, for example, make three requests for assistance with suicide (the third one witnessed, transcribed, and signed), and two physicians must determine that the patient has six months or less to live. A physician may then prescribe a lethal dose of medication. This sounds simpler and safer than it will be. Determinations of life expectancy for the terminally ill can be very wrong. When my first wife was diagnosed with cancer, the doctor told me she would live only six months to two years. She lived nine and a half years, and those were good years, for her, for me, for our children, and for her friends. Mistakes of that nature, and some of that magnitude, are certain to be made under any assisted suicide regime.
Abortion has coarsened us. If it is permissible to kill the unborn human for convenience, it is surely permissible to kill those thought to be soon to die for the same reason. And it is inevitable that many who are not in danger of imminent death will be killed to relieve their families of burdens. Convenience is becoming the theme of our culture. Humans tend to be inconvenient at both ends of their lives.
Radical feminism is the most destructive and fanatical movement to come down to us from the Sixties. This is a revolutionary, not a reformist, movement, and it is meeting with considerable success. Totalitarian in spirit, it is deeply antagonistic to traditional Western culture and proposes the complete restructuring of society, morality, and human nature. Radical feminism is today’s female counterpart of Sixties radicalism. The feminist program is in its main features the same as that of the disastrous Port Huron Statement,2 modified to accommodate the belief that the oppressors, the source of all evil, are men, the “patriarchy” rather than the “Establishment.” All else remains the same. “Feminism rode into our cultural life on the coattails of the New Left but by now it certainly deserves its own place in the halls of intellectual barbarisms.“
Even if this feminist contention were correct, its totalitarian implications are obvious. Culture is a stubborn opponent. To defeat it requires the coercion of humans. The Soviet Union attempted to create the New Soviet Man with gulags, psychiatric hospitals, and firing squads for seventy years and succeeded only in producing a more corrupt culture. The feminists are having a similarly corrupting effect on our culture with only the weapon of moral intimidation. The contention that underneath their cultural conditioning men and women are identical is absurd to anyone not blinded by ideological fantasy.
So alienating are the messages of the women’s studies programs that Professor Sommers writes that she would like to see some of the more extreme institutions put warning labels on the first page of their bulletins: We will help your daughter discover the extent to which she has been in complicity with the patriarchy. We will encourage her to reconstruct herself through dialogue with us. She may become enraged and chronically offended. She will very likely reject the religious and moral codes you raised her with. She may well distance herself from family and friends. She may change her appearance, and even her sexual orientation. She may end up hating you (her father) and pitying you (her mother). After she has completed her reeducation with us, you will certainly be out tens of thousands of dollars and very possibly be out one daughter as well.
November 4, 2014
Possibly among the five most important non-religious books I've read. Bork was a professor of law at Yale and Chicago. He was denied a position on the Supreme Court that he was beyond qualified to fill, over politics. So then he wrote this book. I forgot about adding this book until today, when I looked back and his chapter on abortion, assisted suicide, and euthanasia. Especially apropos right now fro this chapter:
"Oregon's Death with Dignity Act, "adopted in 1994. The patient must make three requests for assistance with suicide (the third one witnessed, transcribed, and signed), and two physicians must determine that the patient has six months or less to live. A physician then prescribes a lethal dose of medication." "Mistakes do not express the full pathos, and evil, that will certainly attend assisted suicides. The patient who is a candidate for medical termination of his life will be in a greatly weakened physical condition, probably frightened or in despair, which means that his will and his capacity for independent thought will aoso be weakened. He will be flat on his back with his relatives and the authority figure of the doctor looking down at him. There can be few better subjects and settings for subtle or not so subtle psychological coercion. The patient will know, and probably will be informed, that prolonging his existence, which the physician syas will be brief, places an enormous emotional and financial burden on his family. A great many people in this position are likely to accept premature death under coercion. That can hardly be called death with dignity."
"Determinations of life expectancy for the terminally ill can be very wrong. When my first wife was diagnosed with cancer, the doctor told me she would live only six months to two years. She lived nine and a half years, and those were good years, for her, for me, for our children, and for her friends. Mistakes of that nature, and some of that magnitude, are certain to be made under any assisted suicide regime."
"Author Micahel fumento cites the Netherlands' experiences to oppose euthenasia, to show what it, probably inevitably, becomes. Until fairly recently, the Dutch law, like Oregon's, forbade any medical killing unless a dying patient requested it. That has changed. The evolution was accomplished by Dutch courts and ratified by the legislature in 1995. In 1973, a doctor killed her terminally ill mother, was convincted, but given on only a suspended sentence of one week in jail. The next step was to dispense with convictions and absolve doctors who killed patients with eterminal illnesses. Then the Dutch High Court held that killing was permissible if the patient's disability, although not fatal, was incurable. Thus, a doctor who killed a young girl with multiple sclerosis went free."
"Oregon's Death with Dignity Act, "adopted in 1994. The patient must make three requests for assistance with suicide (the third one witnessed, transcribed, and signed), and two physicians must determine that the patient has six months or less to live. A physician then prescribes a lethal dose of medication." "Mistakes do not express the full pathos, and evil, that will certainly attend assisted suicides. The patient who is a candidate for medical termination of his life will be in a greatly weakened physical condition, probably frightened or in despair, which means that his will and his capacity for independent thought will aoso be weakened. He will be flat on his back with his relatives and the authority figure of the doctor looking down at him. There can be few better subjects and settings for subtle or not so subtle psychological coercion. The patient will know, and probably will be informed, that prolonging his existence, which the physician syas will be brief, places an enormous emotional and financial burden on his family. A great many people in this position are likely to accept premature death under coercion. That can hardly be called death with dignity."
"Determinations of life expectancy for the terminally ill can be very wrong. When my first wife was diagnosed with cancer, the doctor told me she would live only six months to two years. She lived nine and a half years, and those were good years, for her, for me, for our children, and for her friends. Mistakes of that nature, and some of that magnitude, are certain to be made under any assisted suicide regime."
"Author Micahel fumento cites the Netherlands' experiences to oppose euthenasia, to show what it, probably inevitably, becomes. Until fairly recently, the Dutch law, like Oregon's, forbade any medical killing unless a dying patient requested it. That has changed. The evolution was accomplished by Dutch courts and ratified by the legislature in 1995. In 1973, a doctor killed her terminally ill mother, was convincted, but given on only a suspended sentence of one week in jail. The next step was to dispense with convictions and absolve doctors who killed patients with eterminal illnesses. Then the Dutch High Court held that killing was permissible if the patient's disability, although not fatal, was incurable. Thus, a doctor who killed a young girl with multiple sclerosis went free."
May 13, 2008
This book is a passionate, accurate assessment of the devastating immorality present in the liberalist party, and its effects on the very safety and salvation of this nation. Every good American should have a copy of this book.
August 8, 2008
We need more people like Bork speaking up.
August 16, 2007
This was one of the first books I ever read in college. I'll take a line from my poli-sci professor and say that this book is all about why America is going to hell in a handbasket. That sums it up pretty nicely.
If you even think you've got conservative leanings, read this book and you'll feel like a bleeding heart liberal in comparison. Robert Bork basically says "this country has a lot of problems", but he leaves a lot of loopholes in trying to fix said problems. I find the book to be well written, and I agree with his ideals to a degree, but you'd think that if he's going to b*tch about how our country is just going down the toilet, he'd provide his theories on how to reverse that, and I just don't remember him doing so. But still a good book to read!
If you even think you've got conservative leanings, read this book and you'll feel like a bleeding heart liberal in comparison. Robert Bork basically says "this country has a lot of problems", but he leaves a lot of loopholes in trying to fix said problems. I find the book to be well written, and I agree with his ideals to a degree, but you'd think that if he's going to b*tch about how our country is just going down the toilet, he'd provide his theories on how to reverse that, and I just don't remember him doing so. But still a good book to read!
March 25, 2018
I bought this book back when I was much more conservative. Bork makes a few points but on the whole I breath a sigh of relief that I saw the light and that Bork was never confirmed to the Supreme Court. I cringe to think of the country going that direction and the loss of conscience that would entail. If you force people to live according to your conscience haven't you really deprived them of their own? That is a poor trade for anything that might be gained.
February 19, 2019
An abysmal attempt at critiquing the left. Not even sure where to begin with this one. This reads like an American Renaissance video. Full of white supremacy, blaming minorities, and pure doctoring of history. My favorite tidbit is his inability to understand what “the blacks” were so upset about in the 60s....
October 9, 2008
One of my all timers. If you care about where the world is pointed and want to understand its immediate implications this is a great read. This is the kind of book I would love to read as a book club to discuss.
August 28, 2019
Really great book in describing the moral decline that occurred in the 1950s and 60s, but the sections on the “now” (the mid-90s when the book was written) have not aged well. Bork is overly optimistic that we will recapture the moral center of America than the last 20 years have demonstrated.
November 11, 2008
This book does a great job explaining why our society is in such a moral decline. It also helps me understand why liberal views can sometimes be misguided.
December 30, 2017
A brilliant, devastating analysis of modern liberalism. Written in the mid 90s, it is absolutely prophetic. He should have been a justice of the Supreme Court.
April 30, 2023
"Slouching Towards Gomorrah: Modern Liberalism and American Decline" is a book written by Robert Bork, a former federal judge and legal scholar, and published in 1996. The book argues that American culture has been in a state of decline since the 1960s due to the rise of modern liberalism and its rejection of traditional values.
Bork argues that modern liberalism has promoted moral relativism, radical individualism, and a rejection of authority and tradition, which has led to a breakdown of social order and a loss of cultural coherence. He further argues that this cultural decline has been accompanied by a decline in the rule of law, particularly with regard to the Supreme Court's interpretation of the Constitution.
The book has been controversial, with some critics accusing Bork of being alarmist and overstating the extent of the decline, while others have praised the book for its insights into the cultural and political challenges facing American society. Despite the controversy, "Slouching Towards Gomorrah" has been widely read and continues to be cited in discussions of American culture and politics.
GPT
Bork argues that modern liberalism has promoted moral relativism, radical individualism, and a rejection of authority and tradition, which has led to a breakdown of social order and a loss of cultural coherence. He further argues that this cultural decline has been accompanied by a decline in the rule of law, particularly with regard to the Supreme Court's interpretation of the Constitution.
The book has been controversial, with some critics accusing Bork of being alarmist and overstating the extent of the decline, while others have praised the book for its insights into the cultural and political challenges facing American society. Despite the controversy, "Slouching Towards Gomorrah" has been widely read and continues to be cited in discussions of American culture and politics.
GPT
June 10, 2016
Bork begins his book covering his experiences in the era of the tumultuous 60s and 70s, where the chaotic and barbaric events are eerily similar to those unfolding today. Contemporary liberalism is an ideology focused on egalitarianism; not for the equality of opportunity, mind you, but for the equality of results. But such results can only enforced through totalitarianism and a breakdown of society. The violence brought on by the militant group Black Panthers mirrors the violence of the current group Black Lives Matter. The judgement on the color of a person's skin was exactly what Martin Luther King Jr. condemned, but it is by skin color, argued vehemently by today's liberals, where a person's identity is formed and rooted.
I disagree with Bork's conclusion that classical liberalism (or, in today's terms, libertarinism) necessarily leads to radical individualism and radical egalitarianism. The main axiom libertarians follow is the non-aggression principle (NAP), which states an individual cannot use or threaten the use of violence, including nuisance, against another individual or their property. The NAP does not emphasize radical individualism; it does not conclude a man is an island and only self-reliance is possible; it does not prohibit morality or the belief in religion as a source of morality.
Additionally, I do not agree with Bork's argument for the censorship of pornography and violence in media. Invoking morality uses the same argument modern liberals use to ban guns, that is, for the benefit of society. Both case misses the point; if an individual does not harm another, s/he should be free to engage in whatever activity s/he so desires. Using morality as a premise, it would lead to exactly the same path as radical egalitarianism, encompassing any and every activity that vocal minorities deem immoral. That does not mean I condone pornography, violent media, or indulging of drugs, nor would I want a society which celebrates these, as I consider, vices but, again, individuals should be free to pursue their goals and interests.
I will conclude with the things I do agree with this book. Bork does contribute to the nearly infinite literature on how Big Government is slowly encroaching into every part of our lives. From sex to education to drugs to marriage to religion to bathrooms to business, government has come to dictate nearly every action and identity. The Civil Rights Act of 1964 was a monumental piece of legislation, but, under current application, government has overstepped its bounds into discriminatory and hiring practices of the private sector. Legalization of abortion has eclipsed the rights of women over the rights of an infant. Universities are becoming more and more indoctrinated into Leftist views, some professors exalted for holding Marxist and socialist views, planting the seeds for future destruction. Anti-religious zealots view the Church as a place where brainwashing and paternal domination occur. The government is increasingly heralded as the solution to the problems it creates, a frightening prospect for our time.
I disagree with Bork's conclusion that classical liberalism (or, in today's terms, libertarinism) necessarily leads to radical individualism and radical egalitarianism. The main axiom libertarians follow is the non-aggression principle (NAP), which states an individual cannot use or threaten the use of violence, including nuisance, against another individual or their property. The NAP does not emphasize radical individualism; it does not conclude a man is an island and only self-reliance is possible; it does not prohibit morality or the belief in religion as a source of morality.
Additionally, I do not agree with Bork's argument for the censorship of pornography and violence in media. Invoking morality uses the same argument modern liberals use to ban guns, that is, for the benefit of society. Both case misses the point; if an individual does not harm another, s/he should be free to engage in whatever activity s/he so desires. Using morality as a premise, it would lead to exactly the same path as radical egalitarianism, encompassing any and every activity that vocal minorities deem immoral. That does not mean I condone pornography, violent media, or indulging of drugs, nor would I want a society which celebrates these, as I consider, vices but, again, individuals should be free to pursue their goals and interests.
I will conclude with the things I do agree with this book. Bork does contribute to the nearly infinite literature on how Big Government is slowly encroaching into every part of our lives. From sex to education to drugs to marriage to religion to bathrooms to business, government has come to dictate nearly every action and identity. The Civil Rights Act of 1964 was a monumental piece of legislation, but, under current application, government has overstepped its bounds into discriminatory and hiring practices of the private sector. Legalization of abortion has eclipsed the rights of women over the rights of an infant. Universities are becoming more and more indoctrinated into Leftist views, some professors exalted for holding Marxist and socialist views, planting the seeds for future destruction. Anti-religious zealots view the Church as a place where brainwashing and paternal domination occur. The government is increasingly heralded as the solution to the problems it creates, a frightening prospect for our time.
December 13, 2014
Justice Bork is one of those rare writers: an exceptionally clear thinker, a genius at crafting a well-reasoned argument, but also widely read and (dare I say it?) actually popular. After THE TEMPTING OF AMERICA, I couldn't stay away. This book does not disappoint. As before, the sentences are perfectly built, the architecture of each paragraph worthy of the Parthenon.
I stopped at four stars instead of five because in the end--for reasons probably entirely my own--it took me some five years to finish this book. As lush as the writing is, the subject matter is arid. Or it was for me--and I'm pretty patient about such things. But I know that had this book had been the revelation that his first was, I would have burned through it in a matter of days. I'm a huge fan; I wish everyone would read Bork. (Frankly, I wish everyone COULD read Bork, but the former Yale professor remains a scholar.) He's not for everyone. But his arguments are an education in rhetoric, and his conclusions merit close scrutiny.
The content of the book? An interesting and often personal account of life in post-modern America. He begins with campus protests during the 1960s (that brought Yale University to its knees), and shares his reactions to what amounts to widespread and often utterly pointless rebellion. Bork argues the "rebellion" or counter-culture would have come sooner had not the Depression and WWII put it off a few years. In fact, he argues it may have been an intrinsic part of the nation since its founding: that America's emphasis on equality and liberty could never have continued without the inevitable conflict. I can't explain it here--but it's an interesting read, and Bork provides so many insights. I value his point of view, and regret that his pen has been silenced. We have lost a great resource.
By the way, I would love to add a few quotes to the Goodreads quote pages--but I underlined about half this book, and put stars and brackets around the other half. I'd need to provide 100 quotes if I started copying down even one.
I stopped at four stars instead of five because in the end--for reasons probably entirely my own--it took me some five years to finish this book. As lush as the writing is, the subject matter is arid. Or it was for me--and I'm pretty patient about such things. But I know that had this book had been the revelation that his first was, I would have burned through it in a matter of days. I'm a huge fan; I wish everyone would read Bork. (Frankly, I wish everyone COULD read Bork, but the former Yale professor remains a scholar.) He's not for everyone. But his arguments are an education in rhetoric, and his conclusions merit close scrutiny.
The content of the book? An interesting and often personal account of life in post-modern America. He begins with campus protests during the 1960s (that brought Yale University to its knees), and shares his reactions to what amounts to widespread and often utterly pointless rebellion. Bork argues the "rebellion" or counter-culture would have come sooner had not the Depression and WWII put it off a few years. In fact, he argues it may have been an intrinsic part of the nation since its founding: that America's emphasis on equality and liberty could never have continued without the inevitable conflict. I can't explain it here--but it's an interesting read, and Bork provides so many insights. I value his point of view, and regret that his pen has been silenced. We have lost a great resource.
By the way, I would love to add a few quotes to the Goodreads quote pages--but I underlined about half this book, and put stars and brackets around the other half. I'd need to provide 100 quotes if I started copying down even one.
March 13, 2008
Bork focuses on two aspects of modern liberalism -- unfettered personal liberties and equality of results (i.e. not merely opportunities) and argues that they are rooted in classical liberalism, i.e. the principles upon which our nation was founded. The individualistic aspects of liberty were kept in check mostly by the moral standards imposed by society, family and the church. All this changed in the 1960s, when the constraints largely were rejected. Bork claims that the '60s didn't cause our social problems but simply sped up the process.
Bork taught at Yale Law School in the '60s and has some interesting (and disturbing!) stories to tell from that time. He has some really interesting points -- e.g., how making educational institutions more "democratic" has watered down education; how the '60s activists were similar to fascists -- and he provides a good brief general history of topics such as the rise of obscenity, affirmative action and feminism.
Bork sees the only likely hope for our country coming from faith-based cultural change. He notes that having conservative leaders won't do it -- look at how our nation continued to decline morally during the Reagan years.
This book was written in 1997, I think, but still seems quite current. As a formerly liberal/apolitical type who started thinking about political conservatism only since becoming Christian, I found this book very helpful -- it helped me catch up a bit. Bork is a good, logical and persuasive writer.
Bork taught at Yale Law School in the '60s and has some interesting (and disturbing!) stories to tell from that time. He has some really interesting points -- e.g., how making educational institutions more "democratic" has watered down education; how the '60s activists were similar to fascists -- and he provides a good brief general history of topics such as the rise of obscenity, affirmative action and feminism.
Bork sees the only likely hope for our country coming from faith-based cultural change. He notes that having conservative leaders won't do it -- look at how our nation continued to decline morally during the Reagan years.
This book was written in 1997, I think, but still seems quite current. As a formerly liberal/apolitical type who started thinking about political conservatism only since becoming Christian, I found this book very helpful -- it helped me catch up a bit. Bork is a good, logical and persuasive writer.
August 7, 2015
Very interesting read. Does a good job of showing how radical individualism and radical egalitarianism begin to break down basic social values, social institutions, intellectual rigor, and contribute to authoritarianism. Is very descriptive of these two principles and their effects. Shows how a lot of what the New Left says is not what it seems, e.g. how the current implementations of "multiculturalism" by emphasizing race contribute to fragmentation of society into racial groups and isolation. I disagree with some conclusions, but overall he does a good job of citing studies and support for problems in modern society caused by the rise of the New Left. I found the part about the decrease in intellectual rigor and the New Left's attack on rationality as particularly interesting.
July 21, 2008
Frankly, I enjoyed it more than his Tempting of America book, which had too much about case law for non-lawyers, but this book seems quite similar to Closing of the American Mind - by Bloom. These books spend 95% describing the problem, and not enough time on the solution.
June 21, 2009
Very interesting at first but became very repetitious and more of a polemic than offering any solutions for the problems he outlines in too much detail
December 10, 2014
Self-righteous clap from an elite that is used to telling others what is best; take his word for it seems to be the basic argument; not much else.
September 19, 2021
I would consider the merits of this book differently than how I would typically review a book on Goodreads, because except on rare occasion, I predominantly read fiction.
Slouching Towards Gomorrah
is not fiction.
That last statement might seem naively innocent, but it is not, neither in the literal nor the figurative sense.
I consider, then, Slouching Towards Gomorrah on three fronts: 1) whether it is well written and organized, covering the ascribed topics with sufficient breadth and scope, 2) the content of the writing and whether it exhibits what would appear to be reliable intellectual rigor, and, 3) its value as something to be read (whether that be for pure entertainment, to learn and be informed, or to either learn about “the other side” (to use today’s vernacular) or reinforce one’s own).
As for the credentials of the author, it does not take much research to find that both academically and professionally, he was well educated and held tremendous positions of responsibility and influence. He definitely holds a significant place in our political history (and judicial as well, if not only for the scrutiny he faced during congressional hearings for his Supreme Court nomination).
Bork attacks the topics of his book head on, without reservation, and with an overt realism that is jarring. So much has been said about Bork over the years that might, without much caution, be summarized as exaggerated hyperbole, if not purposefully and cynically untrue (read Ted Kennedy’s oversimplified condemnation of Bork’s views right from the Senate floor, many accusations resoundingly rebutted later as factually unsound).
What do I mean by an overt realism? Let me answer it this way. Quickly scanning the GR reviews, I came upon the comment which, in essence and by way of matter-of-fact example, indicated that Bork criticizes Rock and Roll without ever listening to Rock and Roll. Point in fact, it’s not so much that Bork did not listen to Rock and Roll so much as he studied it, analyzed its contents, and ripped it apart to peer at the guts of it. We got a small sampling of it in his book. He does this in the chapter The Collapse of Popular Culture. An example of this is as follows, as sampled from the chapter:
“The distance and direction popular culture has travelled in less than one lifetime is shown by contrast between best-selling records. A performer of the 1930s hit ‘The Way You Look Tonight’ sang these words to romantic music:
Oh, but you’re lovely,/With your smile so warm,/And your cheek so soft,/There is nothing for me but to love you,/Just the way you look tonight.
In our time [ Slouching was originally published in 1996], Snoop Doggy Dogg’s song “Horny” proclaims to “music” without melody:
I called you up for some sexual healing./I’m callin’ again so let me come get it./Bring the lotion so I can rub you./Assume the position so I can f...you.
Then there is Nine Inch Nails’ song, “Big Man with a Gun.” Even the expurgated version published by the Washington Post gives some idea of how rapidly popular culture is sinking into barbarism:
I am a big man (yes I am). And I have a big gun. Got me a big old [expletive] and I, I like to have fun. Held against your forehead, I’ll make you suck it. Maybe I’ll put a hole in your head....I can reduce it if you want. I can devour. I’m hard as [expletive] steel and I’ve got the power....Shoot, shoot, shoot, shoot, shoot. I’m going to come all over you....me and my [expletive] gun, me and my [expletive] gun..
The obscenity of thought and word is staggering, but also notable is the deliberate rejection of any attempt to achieve artistic distinction or even mediocrity. The music is generally little more than noise with a beat, the singing is an unmelodic chant, the lyrics often range from the perverse to the mercifully unintelligible.”
Recall, this was in a chapter entitled, The Collapse of Popular Culture, and what I’ve just quoted came from the first page-and-a-half of the chapter! Movies, TV, late-night cable television escort service adds, V-chips and their failure, he delves into all of it. There is not much embellishment or emotional “outcry.” Rather, the discourse is cool and analytical, letting the content and his mental gyrations speak for itself. His thoughts on pornography are even more jarring, insightful, thought-provoking, and eerily prescient.
And so, as to my first criteria for which I consider this work—whether it is well written and organized, covering the ascribed topics with sufficient breadth and scope—it most certainly is. He considers a plethora of political, social, and cultural issues, tears them apart, considering the arguments and criticisms from every angle, and responds to all of them. On certain topics—perhaps some of the most divisive in our nation (if not the world), some “justifications” for a position, which are routinely used in corresponding "debates," he addresses so succinctly and yet convincingly, comprehensively, flicking them off his shoulder as if a pesky gnat not worth much more consideration. For at least one significant issue, he readily admits that he was initially on the other side of the fence, not giving the matter much thought at all. Now, however, he delves into every aspect of it, referencing the writings of other giants in the area, wrestling with each pro and con, and referencing (thankfully very infrequently, dare I say only once, really), statistics (perhaps realizing himself how often the numbers, and even the questions and manner of asking them, can be made to yield two sets of numbers that indicate the exact opposite conclusion on the point).
That leads me to the second criteria: the content of the writing and whether it exhibits what would appear to be reliable intellectual rigor. By now, one should know my view on this. In his chapter, The Decline of Intellect, Bork writes:
“What seems conclusive evidence of the decline of rigor is that the average number of days classes were in session during the academic year dropped precipitously over the period examined. The average was 204 days in 1914, 195 in 1939, 191 in 1964, and then a dramatic drop to 156 classroom days in 1993.”
The rise in crime and the state of our criminal justice system, the trends in taxation, abortion, assisted suicide, euthanasia, judicial activism, he presents his view on so much.
And finally, that brings me to the final question, its value as something to be read (whether that be for pure entertainment, to learn and be informed, or to either learn about “the other side” (to use today’s vernacular) or reinforce one’s own).
I stumbled on this book after recently reading an op-ed piece in the Wall Street Journal. I made a mental note to consider the book in the future. Then this weekend I attended the annual used book sale at our local library. I went twice that day. The second time around, later in the evening and close to closing, there were much fewer people there, and much fewer books, many having already been picked over. I went over to another “wall” of books with sections on history, war, military, politics, presidents, conservatism, liberalism, and just browsed with my hands in my pockets, biding my time while other family members were finishing up their own browsing, and I spotted Slouching. Interestingly, the inside book cover had the $6 penciled price crossed out and reduced to a another penciled price of $4, which was crossed out and reduced to the final penciled-in-price of $3. What did I have to lose?
Now, this is no non-fiction Walter Isaacson biography. It's not narratively entertaining in Isaacson's sort of way. Robert Bork presents his case with cool, analytical prose and unabashed presentation of views and discourse--sometimes it’s like sitting through a law school or philosophy lecture—but to me it was an informative, well-thought out, honest and forthright presentation of one’s views on important issues. I also found it extremely engaging, though at times admittedly tough to keep up with the rigid rigor of some chapters. Different chapters will be more interesting and engaging than others, I suppose depending upon what seems more particularly important to each individual. There is certainly some mental toughness required to get through it all. There is also, dare I say it, some humor in the book, though it is dry and matter-of-factly presented, which sometimes has the effect of making me laugh out loud far more than humor and jokes more overtly presented. I wish I can find the section where he talked about when he was a law professor at Yale. He said liberals outnumbered conservatives in the law professor ranks by on the order of 47-2. They were interviewing another candidate to hire, and the candidate was voted down, the reason being, the candidate was a conservative, and they couldn't afford to have another one in the ranks because that would "tip the sales." Who knows, perhaps that spoke volumes on the power and strength of Bork himself within those ranks.
I suppose one problem the reader might have in trying to digest the philosophical insight proffered by Bork is the mental blockage due to one’s own predisposition on any particular topic. I wonder about this. I can say for sure I learned a lot about things I thought I already knew a lot about. Plato talked of the distinction between mere opinion versus Truth. At least by engaging in the topics as Bork has, one can begin, or continue, to look far below the surface and test all the views, trending toward informed knowledge as opposed to transient opinion (whichever side of the pendulum one may believe he or she leans). I’m certainly glad I took the journey. At next year’s used book sale, I’m going to visit that particular wall again, browse its non-fiction sections even more closely, maybe find a respected treatise from the other side of the spectrum. This would allow me to once again visit the tough issues and subject matter Bork addresses, test my own thinking on them--topics we should all spend some time considering.
Note: The edition I read was the originally published 1996 version. I bought this, after all, at a used book sale. The newer version purports to have and updated "afterward." I wonder how much later in time Bork provided this update, and what it was he further had to say. Wikipedia reports that he passed away in 2012.
That last statement might seem naively innocent, but it is not, neither in the literal nor the figurative sense.
I consider, then, Slouching Towards Gomorrah on three fronts: 1) whether it is well written and organized, covering the ascribed topics with sufficient breadth and scope, 2) the content of the writing and whether it exhibits what would appear to be reliable intellectual rigor, and, 3) its value as something to be read (whether that be for pure entertainment, to learn and be informed, or to either learn about “the other side” (to use today’s vernacular) or reinforce one’s own).
As for the credentials of the author, it does not take much research to find that both academically and professionally, he was well educated and held tremendous positions of responsibility and influence. He definitely holds a significant place in our political history (and judicial as well, if not only for the scrutiny he faced during congressional hearings for his Supreme Court nomination).
Bork attacks the topics of his book head on, without reservation, and with an overt realism that is jarring. So much has been said about Bork over the years that might, without much caution, be summarized as exaggerated hyperbole, if not purposefully and cynically untrue (read Ted Kennedy’s oversimplified condemnation of Bork’s views right from the Senate floor, many accusations resoundingly rebutted later as factually unsound).
What do I mean by an overt realism? Let me answer it this way. Quickly scanning the GR reviews, I came upon the comment which, in essence and by way of matter-of-fact example, indicated that Bork criticizes Rock and Roll without ever listening to Rock and Roll. Point in fact, it’s not so much that Bork did not listen to Rock and Roll so much as he studied it, analyzed its contents, and ripped it apart to peer at the guts of it. We got a small sampling of it in his book. He does this in the chapter The Collapse of Popular Culture. An example of this is as follows, as sampled from the chapter:
“The distance and direction popular culture has travelled in less than one lifetime is shown by contrast between best-selling records. A performer of the 1930s hit ‘The Way You Look Tonight’ sang these words to romantic music:
Oh, but you’re lovely,/With your smile so warm,/And your cheek so soft,/There is nothing for me but to love you,/Just the way you look tonight.
In our time [ Slouching was originally published in 1996], Snoop Doggy Dogg’s song “Horny” proclaims to “music” without melody:
I called you up for some sexual healing./I’m callin’ again so let me come get it./Bring the lotion so I can rub you./Assume the position so I can f...you.
Then there is Nine Inch Nails’ song, “Big Man with a Gun.” Even the expurgated version published by the Washington Post gives some idea of how rapidly popular culture is sinking into barbarism:
I am a big man (yes I am). And I have a big gun. Got me a big old [expletive] and I, I like to have fun. Held against your forehead, I’ll make you suck it. Maybe I’ll put a hole in your head....I can reduce it if you want. I can devour. I’m hard as [expletive] steel and I’ve got the power....Shoot, shoot, shoot, shoot, shoot. I’m going to come all over you....me and my [expletive] gun, me and my [expletive] gun..
The obscenity of thought and word is staggering, but also notable is the deliberate rejection of any attempt to achieve artistic distinction or even mediocrity. The music is generally little more than noise with a beat, the singing is an unmelodic chant, the lyrics often range from the perverse to the mercifully unintelligible.”
Recall, this was in a chapter entitled, The Collapse of Popular Culture, and what I’ve just quoted came from the first page-and-a-half of the chapter! Movies, TV, late-night cable television escort service adds, V-chips and their failure, he delves into all of it. There is not much embellishment or emotional “outcry.” Rather, the discourse is cool and analytical, letting the content and his mental gyrations speak for itself. His thoughts on pornography are even more jarring, insightful, thought-provoking, and eerily prescient.
And so, as to my first criteria for which I consider this work—whether it is well written and organized, covering the ascribed topics with sufficient breadth and scope—it most certainly is. He considers a plethora of political, social, and cultural issues, tears them apart, considering the arguments and criticisms from every angle, and responds to all of them. On certain topics—perhaps some of the most divisive in our nation (if not the world), some “justifications” for a position, which are routinely used in corresponding "debates," he addresses so succinctly and yet convincingly, comprehensively, flicking them off his shoulder as if a pesky gnat not worth much more consideration. For at least one significant issue, he readily admits that he was initially on the other side of the fence, not giving the matter much thought at all. Now, however, he delves into every aspect of it, referencing the writings of other giants in the area, wrestling with each pro and con, and referencing (thankfully very infrequently, dare I say only once, really), statistics (perhaps realizing himself how often the numbers, and even the questions and manner of asking them, can be made to yield two sets of numbers that indicate the exact opposite conclusion on the point).
That leads me to the second criteria: the content of the writing and whether it exhibits what would appear to be reliable intellectual rigor. By now, one should know my view on this. In his chapter, The Decline of Intellect, Bork writes:
“What seems conclusive evidence of the decline of rigor is that the average number of days classes were in session during the academic year dropped precipitously over the period examined. The average was 204 days in 1914, 195 in 1939, 191 in 1964, and then a dramatic drop to 156 classroom days in 1993.”
The rise in crime and the state of our criminal justice system, the trends in taxation, abortion, assisted suicide, euthanasia, judicial activism, he presents his view on so much.
And finally, that brings me to the final question, its value as something to be read (whether that be for pure entertainment, to learn and be informed, or to either learn about “the other side” (to use today’s vernacular) or reinforce one’s own).
I stumbled on this book after recently reading an op-ed piece in the Wall Street Journal. I made a mental note to consider the book in the future. Then this weekend I attended the annual used book sale at our local library. I went twice that day. The second time around, later in the evening and close to closing, there were much fewer people there, and much fewer books, many having already been picked over. I went over to another “wall” of books with sections on history, war, military, politics, presidents, conservatism, liberalism, and just browsed with my hands in my pockets, biding my time while other family members were finishing up their own browsing, and I spotted Slouching. Interestingly, the inside book cover had the $6 penciled price crossed out and reduced to a another penciled price of $4, which was crossed out and reduced to the final penciled-in-price of $3. What did I have to lose?
Now, this is no non-fiction Walter Isaacson biography. It's not narratively entertaining in Isaacson's sort of way. Robert Bork presents his case with cool, analytical prose and unabashed presentation of views and discourse--sometimes it’s like sitting through a law school or philosophy lecture—but to me it was an informative, well-thought out, honest and forthright presentation of one’s views on important issues. I also found it extremely engaging, though at times admittedly tough to keep up with the rigid rigor of some chapters. Different chapters will be more interesting and engaging than others, I suppose depending upon what seems more particularly important to each individual. There is certainly some mental toughness required to get through it all. There is also, dare I say it, some humor in the book, though it is dry and matter-of-factly presented, which sometimes has the effect of making me laugh out loud far more than humor and jokes more overtly presented. I wish I can find the section where he talked about when he was a law professor at Yale. He said liberals outnumbered conservatives in the law professor ranks by on the order of 47-2. They were interviewing another candidate to hire, and the candidate was voted down, the reason being, the candidate was a conservative, and they couldn't afford to have another one in the ranks because that would "tip the sales." Who knows, perhaps that spoke volumes on the power and strength of Bork himself within those ranks.
I suppose one problem the reader might have in trying to digest the philosophical insight proffered by Bork is the mental blockage due to one’s own predisposition on any particular topic. I wonder about this. I can say for sure I learned a lot about things I thought I already knew a lot about. Plato talked of the distinction between mere opinion versus Truth. At least by engaging in the topics as Bork has, one can begin, or continue, to look far below the surface and test all the views, trending toward informed knowledge as opposed to transient opinion (whichever side of the pendulum one may believe he or she leans). I’m certainly glad I took the journey. At next year’s used book sale, I’m going to visit that particular wall again, browse its non-fiction sections even more closely, maybe find a respected treatise from the other side of the spectrum. This would allow me to once again visit the tough issues and subject matter Bork addresses, test my own thinking on them--topics we should all spend some time considering.
Note: The edition I read was the originally published 1996 version. I bought this, after all, at a used book sale. The newer version purports to have and updated "afterward." I wonder how much later in time Bork provided this update, and what it was he further had to say. Wikipedia reports that he passed away in 2012.
September 13, 2023
“Slouching Towards Gomorrah: Modern Liberalism and American Decline” by Judge Robert Bork is a perceptive identification and a jarring jeremiad against the destructive force that modern liberalism has been on American culture. Although this book was written in 1996, with a few cultural updates, one would have thought it was written only a few minutes ago. Even so, the accuracy of title is, as we have seen over the last 28 years, vastly understated.
Bork correctly identified the 2 primary philosophical, albeit antithetical, commitments of the modern American left: egalitarianism (of outcome, not of opportunity), and radical individualism. Although these philosophical streams flow in different directions, they have combined as a potent and deleterious force in the undermining of Western culture. Bork saw the trend and he predicted the direction and the likely outcome.
If one is disturbed by our culture and one wishes to understand they “why” behind the question, “How did we arrive here” this book is for you. Happy reading!
Bork correctly identified the 2 primary philosophical, albeit antithetical, commitments of the modern American left: egalitarianism (of outcome, not of opportunity), and radical individualism. Although these philosophical streams flow in different directions, they have combined as a potent and deleterious force in the undermining of Western culture. Bork saw the trend and he predicted the direction and the likely outcome.
If one is disturbed by our culture and one wishes to understand they “why” behind the question, “How did we arrive here” this book is for you. Happy reading!
November 6, 2018
I remember my mother reading this book when I was a child, and revisiting it now feels like an opening into the world of adults that was shielded from me as a child. As someone barely able to tear their eyes away from the TV at the time, I wouldn't have been able to understand what the adults on the radio were arguing about. Well, now I've discovered what it is: a book that falls somewhere between the well-reasoned, calm arguments of Barry Goldwater and the vicious mudslinging of Anne Coulter.
I was surprised to find, halfway through reading this, that the author, Robert H. Bork, had once been nominated for the Supreme Court. I was not surprised to find that Congress had rejected him. This isn't an attack on Bork's staunch conservatism, so much as on his partisanship, and clearly tilted view of his political opponents. The crux of this book isn't just that leftism as a whole is based on bad philosophy, or that it too-often empowers radical elements. Rather, the book seems to lean more in the direction of saying "Leftists... are bad. Just plain bad."
Mr. Bork traces his view of leftism through his experiences as a professor in the 60s and 70s, dealing with unruly student protestors, then continuing with a critique of important law cases. He addresses affirmative action, anti-war protesting, abortion, feminism, and welfarism, often with decently argued arguments (his chapter on affirmative action is a good roundhouse tour of the common arguments against it). Bork colors his arguments with anecdotes, usually showcasing an embarrassing moment for a particular leftist cause: student activists who were caught up in the self-importance of protest, or free-speech advocates who defended the legal rights of pornographers.
But this is a breed of conservativism unique to Bork (or possibly, to the early 90s, when he writes). Bork consistently attributes the failures of leftism to "radical egalitarianism and radical individualism", which some today may take more as a compliment than a condemnation. Rather than basing his arguments strongly on core conservative principles, he fairly often seems to appeal to a vague sense of dignity and propriety (for example, after energetically warning against judicial ruling that could be seen as "activist", he then turns around and widely supports strict rulings against pornography, appealing to the general welfare and a sense of moral cleanliness.) Bork's approach, in contrast to that of, say, Goldwater, is centered on the fear that our society is literally falling into a trap of hedonism and anti-intellectualism. In other words, Bork really does argue that sex, drugs, and rock-and-roll pose legitimate threats to the country. They are, after all, *too* egalitarian and individualistic.
Still, Bork does not fall into the simple mud-slinging of the sort of polemicists that can be ignored. His arguments may be biting, but they also deserve some attention: pro choice advocates should be aware of his depictions of partial-birth abortions, and his case against affirmative action needs to be addressed, if not necessarily agreed-with.
I would describe Slouching Towards Gomorrah like so: it's "an interesting flavor of conservatism". Less philosophical, more rooted in tradition and generally-accepted morality, and with just enough bite in it to rile up its target audience.
I was surprised to find, halfway through reading this, that the author, Robert H. Bork, had once been nominated for the Supreme Court. I was not surprised to find that Congress had rejected him. This isn't an attack on Bork's staunch conservatism, so much as on his partisanship, and clearly tilted view of his political opponents. The crux of this book isn't just that leftism as a whole is based on bad philosophy, or that it too-often empowers radical elements. Rather, the book seems to lean more in the direction of saying "Leftists... are bad. Just plain bad."
Mr. Bork traces his view of leftism through his experiences as a professor in the 60s and 70s, dealing with unruly student protestors, then continuing with a critique of important law cases. He addresses affirmative action, anti-war protesting, abortion, feminism, and welfarism, often with decently argued arguments (his chapter on affirmative action is a good roundhouse tour of the common arguments against it). Bork colors his arguments with anecdotes, usually showcasing an embarrassing moment for a particular leftist cause: student activists who were caught up in the self-importance of protest, or free-speech advocates who defended the legal rights of pornographers.
But this is a breed of conservativism unique to Bork (or possibly, to the early 90s, when he writes). Bork consistently attributes the failures of leftism to "radical egalitarianism and radical individualism", which some today may take more as a compliment than a condemnation. Rather than basing his arguments strongly on core conservative principles, he fairly often seems to appeal to a vague sense of dignity and propriety (for example, after energetically warning against judicial ruling that could be seen as "activist", he then turns around and widely supports strict rulings against pornography, appealing to the general welfare and a sense of moral cleanliness.) Bork's approach, in contrast to that of, say, Goldwater, is centered on the fear that our society is literally falling into a trap of hedonism and anti-intellectualism. In other words, Bork really does argue that sex, drugs, and rock-and-roll pose legitimate threats to the country. They are, after all, *too* egalitarian and individualistic.
Still, Bork does not fall into the simple mud-slinging of the sort of polemicists that can be ignored. His arguments may be biting, but they also deserve some attention: pro choice advocates should be aware of his depictions of partial-birth abortions, and his case against affirmative action needs to be addressed, if not necessarily agreed-with.
I would describe Slouching Towards Gomorrah like so: it's "an interesting flavor of conservatism". Less philosophical, more rooted in tradition and generally-accepted morality, and with just enough bite in it to rile up its target audience.
March 12, 2025
The depth of this book was a challenge to my puny mind. At times I had the dictionary out learning definitions to new words. It wasn’t just new words to me but new ideas. My brain matter was stretched.
Bork has an incredible mind & it is still difficult to understand how he got “Borked.”
There is not an important topic that he does not try to touch & bring some clarity to the situation. He speaks to religion, philosophy, liberalism, conservatism, culture, censorship, killing, sex, race, perversion, families… If it is important, he spoke to it.
I will need to read this again.
Bork has an incredible mind & it is still difficult to understand how he got “Borked.”
There is not an important topic that he does not try to touch & bring some clarity to the situation. He speaks to religion, philosophy, liberalism, conservatism, culture, censorship, killing, sex, race, perversion, families… If it is important, he spoke to it.
I will need to read this again.
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