Vexed

Dante said that the hottest places in hell are reserved for those who remain neutral in the face of moral crisis. This author agrees and the point of this brilliant short book is to get intelligent humans to think and to refuse to be bludgeoned by what Christopher Booker, and others, have called 'Groupthink' . This is a serious book but it is presented in the most intelligible and mind grabbing way. Each chapter takes a major ethical issue today, the kind of issues that we ought to be concerned with even if we are not. The chapters include 'Clowns to the Left-Jokers to the Right', 'Family Values', 'Why don’t social conservatives do more for the working poor?', 'Carnal Desires' and 'Why does the left rail against greed but excuse lust?'.

Underlying all this is a central point: we live in an age both paralysed and inflamed by political polarisation. The election in the USA of a populist president has calcified the bitter partisanship so devastating to both Congress and country. Across the democratic West, the intensity of this polarisation has been heightened by the extremely personal ways in which we identify with our political positions. Challenge a person’s politics and increasingly you challenge his or her very being. Is it any wonder that our political commitments have widened the chasm between those on the left and those on the right? The great curse of our generation is how this polarisation is warping the way we think through our deepest moral dilemmas.

What are the items so problematically bundled together in the Left wing and Right wing package deals? By the careful analysis of key issues, James Mumford wishes to bring us to our senses. His writing is at all times sensible, sound and wise.