Book Review: Dangerous Ideas

Eric Berkowitz, Dangerous Ideas: a Brief History of Censorship in the West, from the Ancients to Fake News. Boston, MA: Beacon Press, 2021. ISBN: 9780807036242.

 

Genre: history

Subgenre: politics, human rights

Format: e-book galley

Source: Edelweiss Plus 

 

This book is a history of the censorship of ideas and how it has shaped civilization. One of the author's key claims is that everyone engages in some form of censorship or attempt to censor something at some point in time. The author also argues that censorship serves to prop up governments and regimes as well as to promote and uphold class and gender disparities. The history covers from the Chinese emperors to the United States in the Trump era and various instances of censorship around the world in between. The author presents the history to illuminate his argument against censorship. You may or not agree with parts of his argument, but the book is relevant to the current times. 

 

The book is arranged into seven chapters plus an introduction, an afterword, and a set of notes. 

 

While the topic is timely and relevant, this is not an engaging read. Most of this book reads like a history school textbook, and it is not in a good way. Like old history textbooks, a lot of the emphasis is on dates, people, and deeds. The author makes his argument along the way, but at time it gets lost in the events. The text is not exactly compelling making for some pretty dry reading. I wanted to like this book more, but it is just not that interesting as written. This is not a book your average nonfiction reader would pick up for pleasure reading. 

 

One point the author may miss is when certain groups weaponize censorship such as the current right wing partisan (and often theocratic) attacks on libraries. Much of the emphasis in the book is in government censorship, not much when a loud segment of citizens do the censoring, and the government does nothing, or worse goes along with it. When such groups force a library closure over an LGBT book, as it happened this month in Michigan, that is a problem. We do get some discussion on the oversized role of media and Internet companies towards the end of the book. Also the author addresses a bit on social media and its use by certain groups, but he still seems to cling to the "give the people power" and don't censor. Letting those people go run roughshod is certainly not in society's best interest. Still, the author clings to "censorship does not work" but offers little in way of options: 

"Indeed, one of the key points of this book is that censorship doesn't work. The ideas animating suppressed speech remain in circulation and, in the end, can become more effective for being forbidden" (8, emphasis in the original). 

Meanwhile, I would argue the United States fall short given its fetishizing of the First Amendment, which the author describes: 

"The right to freedom of expression in the modern US is exalted to the point where most speech is protected unless violence or lawlessness is imminent. If vicious remarks cause pain, fear, or loss of dignity, the law, with few exceptions, simply does not care" (200). 

And right wing extremists in the United States know that, and along with social media companies, have weaponized and made profits out of nurturing pain, fear, and loss of dignity to others. The "fuck your feelings" crowd is doing quite well in the United States protected by the First Amendment regardless of consequences. At this point, I think back to that quote in the book Gangsters Vs. Nazis (link to my review):

"It is important to non-Jews as well as to Jews. Any nation which permits a minority to live in fear of persecution is a nation which invites disaster" -- Professor L.B. Namier.

The U.S. is basically inviting disaster as long as nothing is done for the sake of the oh so precious First Amendment while libraries are forced to close and some members of society have to fear loud and often violent extremists. Towards the end of the book, the author sort of cops out: 

"There is little agreement at this point about what censorship is, much less whether it is a good or bad thing" (201, emphasis in the original).

 

Despite the relatively dry text, I would still recommend it for libraries, both public and academic. My library did acquire it for our collection. This is a book that does make some important points and provides some context for current events like the current censorship sprees happening in public and school libraries in the United States. I just wish the book was not such a drag to read. In the end it was OK. 

 

2 out of 5 stars. 

 

This book qualifies for the following 2022 Reading Challenge: