In praise of intransigence
Subtitle: the perils of flexibility
By: Richard H. Weisberg
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Published: 2014
Language: eng
Number of pages: 182
ISBN-13: 9780199334988
Subjects: Rigidity (Psychology); Modern Ethics; Adaptability (Psychology)
Description: "In this short and provocative book, Richard H. Weisberg asks us to reexamine our collective cultural bias toward flexibility, open-mindedness, and compromise. He argues that flexibility has not fared well over the course of history. Indeed, emergencies both real and imagined have let people to betray their soundest traditions. Weisberg explores the rise of flexibility in Western thought, which he traces not only to the Enlightenment but further back to early Christian reinterpretation of Jewish sacred texts. He illustrates his argument with historical examples from Vichy France and the occupation of the British Channel Islands during World War II as well as post-9/11 betrayals of sound American traditions against torture and other compromising practices. Despite frequent damage wrought by the incautious embrace of flexibility over the past two millennia, Weisberg does not make the case for unthinking rigidity. Rather, he argues that a willingness to embrace intransigence allows us to recognize that we have beliefs worth holding on to--without compromise"--Jacket.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references (pages 173-175) and index.
Table of contents: title: Thinking about the way we think: how flexibility can be fatal; title: The politics of compromise: "red-baiting" takes a new form; title: The use and abuse of flexible distortion in the New Testament and early Christian thought; title: Wartime France and the occupied British islands: two "flexiphobes" unyieldingly fight the genocidal trend and are joined by a sitting judge in Nazi Germany itself; title: Secular story tellers present the limits of compromise: Shakespeare, Glaspell, and Faulkner; title: Flexible distortions of American law and tradition, or how saints Paul and John influence fundamental social policy.