A very well written book that clearly describes the cultural and political challenges that the west is undergoing and exposes the nature of the Marxist approach to deconstruct and the destruct all western institutions, beliefs, etc. the brief concluding chapter offers 2 ways forward to reverse the negative trend, of which only one preferred by the author, my view is unfortunately, the option that is to be avoided looks far more likely to be realised.
The 4 star rating was die to the brief and less than convincing conclusion, again a well written book describing the ills facing the west but very little on how to truly combat the threats faced. ( )

Much as with The Strange Death of Europe this book is primarily descriptive, not instructive. A lot of it takes the form of "look at X event from the recent years, isn't this crazy". If you're even slightly tuned into this topic you will have already heard of the majority of things Murray brings up, making the book work great as an overview for uninformed people who would never read the book in the first place.
But the principal problem of the book is that after all the descriptions of cancerous ideas infesting the west, it has no solutions but "grin and bear it". The majority of his own pushback comes in the tepid form of the conservative gravestone; "what if the roles were reversed".
You can trace the infection back in time much better than Murray bothers to here (only scant remarks about the intellectual heritage from Focault and others), and see a stronger reaction from people like Harold Bloom (and his "culture of resentment") or Victor Davis Hanson tracing out one of the first casualties in academia, the classics departments, in Who Killed Homer in the tail end of the 90s. This is not a new problem, it's just a malignant cancer that's finally spread to most areas of society. We're decades beyond the need to point to the cancer and well into the need for a treatment.
Unfortunately this book has no such answers. You get a nice back pat for the west being the only place that would tolerate the cancer having a platform and that's it. ( )

3.5 actually.

Nothing really wrong with the book, but, at least for me, I didn't learn too much more about the subject, that I didn't know already. ( )

The arguments in The War on the West are meticulous and convincing. I agree with pretty much all of them. What feels off is how these problems might seem like a "war" only if you primarily live and work inside Academia. Experts and intellectuals would contend that Academia isn't simply one industry among many, but a leading frontier for of ALL of society. Any internal threats to the industry would feel like a threat to everyone, but is really? Maybe. It's difficult to tell in the context of all the other problems the modern world faces.

I absolutely believe in the free exchange of ideas and will always welcome a spirited debate, even at the expense of someone's comfort level, and when I hear countless examples of this not happening, on campuses or in the public square, I am, of course, concerned. But at the same time many of those examples feel so insular, like they're an unintended consequence of the changing nature of the institutions themselves. I am concerned, but I'm not yet outraged at the level Douglas Murray is trying to convince me to be. Time will tell if I should be. ( )

Murray is wrong to suggest that there is a War on the West if that war means actual armed conflict against Western institutions. The rich are every richer than the middle class as they continue to evade paying their fair share of tax due to their brilliant accountants and laywers. Capitalism, modern finance and stock markets, not to mentioned entrenched privilege and informal networks of patronage among chums or mates (England or Australia) from private schools, still romp home in the West. However he is right to say that the Left in control of symbolic power in cultural institutions such as the arts and the humanities in universities and galleries and museums and a significant part of the 'serious' media, have been keen in recent years to accentuate the ills of Western history and culture while showing a consistent lack of gratitude for its boons and benisons. I personally have always thought I was a left leaning person, but I have become increasingly shocked at how there is always someone more left wing than you are who will persecute the Heretic with the bile and ferocity of a eighteenth century Spanish inquisitor. Luckily Twitter is not an accurate representation of the overall population's political views - extreme views are over-represented on social media. Murray's book would have benefited from being honest about all of the institutions that have not been altered by the rising tide of 'wokeness', but his book is of value in standing up above the parapet and speaking in measured tones about the incoherence of many of the attacks on Western European culture made in recent times.

The War Against the West, Douglas Murray, author and narrator
If one can ignore the bias and the hypocrisy that is so prevalent today, as the time honored history of the Western world is daily redefined and questioned, and if one can keep an absolutely open mind, this book will be an enlightening experience that will clarify, explain and deconstruct many of the issues and conflicts being raised, as the different demographic groups compete for space in the world order. This book will expose the approach by certain entities to smear and dishonor all things we have achieved in the past that do not agree with their current ideas about race, in order to rewrite history to satisfy their possibly distorted beliefs. These groups operate on the premise that in the successful, free, Western world, whiteness is inherently evil and is an embedded character trait, as well as a lack of color, in some human beings. These groups believe that the lack of achievement in demographic groups of color, is not due to a lack of skill, education or training, but rather to the idea that white supremacy controlled their ability to advance and achieve. These groups believe that whiteness can never be altered or erased, and is a flaw that can never be repaired or forgiven. It is at the root of all the evils in the Western world, and they also believe that those who are white must still seek to be less white, even though that attempt is futile.
If the achievements of the Caucasians are, at their core, contemptible, because they are simply the unfair and corrupt result of white privilege and white power, in a world of many colors, then that influence must be unwritten and removed from memory. Some actually believe that the Western world is one in which white people are responsible for the failures of all non-whites that have been unable to compete. To correct this travesty of justice, the rules have to be changed and redesigned to advantage those others, in order to make the playing field level, even when and if the rules make little sense, even if the history and records are changed to suit those demands, ultimately altering reality. The aim of the book is to illuminate and expose the effort of these groups and individuals that have attained prominence and power, who have managed to gain control of the message, as they try to alter the history of the Western world, to make it look guilty of unforgiveable racist behavior which is evidenced by the obvious exclusion of persons of other colors from the Western melting pot of glory and achievement. The supposedly anti-racist groups believe that systemic racism and white supremacy are at the core of the creation and success of the Western world, and that this same world, because of white privilege, has ignored the achievements of those who actually built the Western world, those people who were not white. The fact that more white people have been successful is deemed not to be the result of qualifications, but to be due to the color of their skin and the disregard of the talent of others, by those white people, and to the effort of those same white people to prevent others from climbing their ladder of success. It is, therefore, not the result of their ability or hard work, but the result of their white rage. Murray very ably exposes the flaws in the reasoning of these groups as he exposes their lack of knowledge and dismantles their convoluted pattern of thought as they seek to blame their failures, elsewhere, basically on the whiteness of the Western world.
As Murray provides examples of every area these groups have infiltrated from music and art to science and actual history, with their anger and complaints, he analyses the fraudulent and uninformed reasoning that is behind each of their issues. The very idea that math, gardening, literature, language, statues and every other area of human life is inherently racist, is overturned with brilliant examples of the hypocrisy being promoted as their war is waged on Western success. No effort is made, by these groups to dismantle the areas in which people of color dominate, however, even though they are, in some areas, in far greater proportions than their total numbers. That is not their concern. While they rightly believe that economic and academic success must be an equal opportunity, they do not want that opportunity to be based on ability, because in the past, they believe that only one skin color has been able to dominate, supposedly preventing the success of all others who are not white. Taking it further, if two plus two cannot be mastered as equaling four in a particular demographic, it must be shown that two plus two can also equal five! If some people are unable to add, and cannot master mathematics, then mathematics must be racist according to the groups that wage war on the Western way of life. If the world can be rebuilt on the basis of false facts created to fit a particular narrative for people who feel they have been left out of the process, nothing can be counted on as truth.
Alternatively, Murray uses whiteness as a concept, not an identifier. He illustrates that law and order, rules and regulations are not racist, but constructs that are necessary in societies if they are not to descend into chaos. In order for functioning, free societies to thrive, the most skilled, the most highly qualified and responsible, and the hardest working, generally rise to the top and improve conditions for all, not just a particular race. While diversity is admirable, in order for the society to work well, the best and the brightest need to be chosen to do any job. If there is not a representation of people of color, is their absence racist, or is it because there are not yet enough who are well qualified or well educated? In a blind search, when candidates of color did not get chosen, was it racist or their inability to compete? Should rules be changed, as now they are changing, to lower the standards to be more inclusive, or should they be kept high to encourage those that compete to try harder so they will next be chosen for the positions they seek. If great achievement is deemed to be racist, these groups basically insist that we must dumb down society to correct it. However, that will just lower the standards of great achievement, instead, preventing the gains a successful society needs to maintain to thrive. As Murray continues to exposes the often ridiculous examples of bias and hate being fostered by the likes of Robin DiAngelo, Ibram Kendi, Nicole Hannah Jones, Ta-Nehisi Coates and others, he shows the ignorance of their attacks on our system as they insist that those who have no power cannot be racist. Those demanding and making the changes in our society, encouraging Critical Race Theory, cancel culture and a woke society, indeed have already achieved great power, and so surely, they can be racist too, according to their definition. The idea of Elie Wiesel and Ibram Kendi sharing the same award, when one is promoting anger toward the white race and the other actually experienced the anger and violence aimed at annihilating his people (people of the Jewish faith), often incorrectly described as a race, is exposed as contradictory. In a chaotic environment in which false premises are supported, like up is down, down is up, men are women and women are men, math is racist and Churchill is besmirched, Shakespeare’s achievements are denigrated and statues are torn down, composers and artists supposedly have ulterior racist motives, what is the real truth and what is the real falsehood? Where is the justice for the accused?
Douglas Murray marries details with broad concepts and exposes the contradictions that are obvious and or subtle, in so many of the racist accusations against white Westerners who are actually responsible for the many discoveries and advances made to improve all of our lives and the lives of others, everywhere, not just in the Western world. The actual history of slavery, of which America is accused of, as a major player, is being ignored by the accusers. In the Arab world, slavery was promoted and carried on for centuries, but there are no descendants to prove it because the slaves were castrated. This prevented the production of descendants so there are none to demand reparations, none to point fingers at innocent people for something that occurred years before their birth. Can this simply be erased from world history because it does not fit the narrative being promoted?
Enormous in-depth research has gone into this book, and the author’s extensive knowledge and gifted language skills coupled with his excellent oral reading skill, as he offers the multitude of examples he gives to provide the reader with a more accurate picture of the history of the West, exposes the falsehoods these anti-racist groups are promoting, and points out that this country will suffer if it continues in this fashion. No country can survive as a free country if lies are truth, good is bad, and definitions no longer matter. Words have meaning, rules need consistency, and some universal truths must endure. If the least qualified are chosen to run everything and educate everyone, and are allowed to deny what is in fact reality, we will all be living in a failing alternate universe. If rules are changed to satisfy the whim of a group, or a particular moment in time, rather than because of a need based on reality, if the achievements of the Western world that are gifts to the entire world are ignored, if there is no gratitude for them, can we continue to prosper and grow? Murray believes we should all be grateful for the past achievements of great men and women, regardless of their skin color, that we should appreciate their effort as we show gratitude for their success and our ability to enjoy the fruits of their labor. That will enable us to flourish once again as we stop looking for issues to complain about, and instead, search for and appreciate the things for which we can be grateful, the things that improve all of our lives. ( )

A great, informative read and one that ends with an uplifting prescription on how to stand up against the left’s racist war on Western Civilization, regardless of the color of an individual's skin. Dr. King would approve.
Four and a half stars for a job well done. ( )

The author has presented a solid defense of classical liberal Western culture. One weakness is in the final chapter, where the author flirts a bit with the same race wars he decries earlier in the book rather than presenting his case for Western ideals shared by all peoples who value them, regardless of race. Other than that, it is an excellent book. ( )

Building on his previous work The Madness of Crowds, and in a similar format, this book by Murray again attacks the pieties and ideals held by the Left. Chapters on race, history, religion, and culture; with interludes on China, reparations, gratitude; with an introduction and conclusion. The chapter on race continues the attack on C.R.T. and its minions, remarking that the West isn't the only racist culture, but the only one that gets the blame. The chapter on history, near and dear to my heart, shows how the Left attacks Western history, persons, and ideals, all to tear it down. Deconstruction gets its comeuppance here. Foucault (pp. 181-183) gets outed as a pedophile (none of which is mentioned on that increasingly leftist arbiter of knowledge, Wikipedia). The last chapters and all the interludes are good. The gist is, and i'm paraphrasing a Thomas Sowell quote I can't find, the whole purpose of the Left is to tear down the Western culture that allows them to exist and thrive bashing the West. Douglas Murray's books are well-written, well-reasoned, middle- to high-brow, and, coming from an atheist gay man, unexpectedly good. ( )

This was a much anticipated book. Douglas Murray is one of the leading public intellectuals of our time and thinks and writes with great clarity. His latest work did not disappoint. ( )