Why We Whisper: Restoring Our Right to Say It's Wrong |  | Authors: Jim DeMint, J. David Woodard
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc.
List Price: $26.95
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Rating:  11 reviews
Sales Rank: 304013
Media: Hardcover
Pages: 256
Number Of Items: 1
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.8
Dimensions (in): 8.9 x 6.1 x 1
ISBN: 0742552527
Dewey Decimal Number: 342.730853
EAN: 9780742552524
ASIN: 0742552527
Publication Date: December 6, 2007
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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| • | ISBN13: 9780742552524 | | • | Condition: NEW | | • | Notes: Brand New from Publisher. No Remainder Mark. |
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Product Description
Americans today live in the greatest nation the world has ever known. Never before has a country been the producer, and beneficiary, of so much wealth and freedom. But with great success comes even greater responsibility. Part of the American legacy is to pass our values to our posterity, as well as to future generations in other nations. To meet this responsibility, the next generation must understand what made America great, what is working, what is not working, and how to improve all the ideas that contributed to past success. No factor is more important in this task than our freedom of speech. This right is both a means and an end to improving and strengthening the nation.Why We Whisper is about free speech in America, but not "freedom of speech" as it is often defined today. It is not the freedom to practice destructive behavior or to produce obscene material. This book is about freedom of speech as it was intended by the visionaries who designed the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. The First Amendment empowers Americans to join the public and political debate with their ideas and values, including those traditional ideas and values that have made America great. This fundamental freedom is under attack, and unless principled Americans fight back, our grandchildren and future generations around the world will receive a greatly diminished inheritance. United States Senator Jim DeMint and Professor David Woodard compellingly demonstrate that through court rulings, bureaucratic pronouncements, and well-intentioned, but ultimately unhelpful laws, secular values have allied with government authority to dismantle the ideals of a moral and decent nation. A country once confident of its values and optimistic about its future is now pessimistic, nervous, and confused. Traditional American institutions like the Boy Scouts, churches, businesses, college campuses, and public schools are routinely targeted for attack and government regulation. As a result, morally responsible, patriotic Americans are forced to withdraw into the shadows of public opinion, where their freedom of speech is reduced to whispers. The positive influences and societal protections of tradition are routinely ignored by the new secular elites who have been ensconced with government power and are now anxious to advance their agenda. Americans have watched as moral relativism and secularism savaged education, law, religion, business, and traditional notions of proper behavior. If government allows, protects, and even subsidizes destructive behavior, social problems will lead to the decline, and ultimately the fall, of the United States. The authors warn that Americans must no longer allow this cultural decline. We must expect and demand government to promote positive behavior that is aligned with our historical and cultural principles. Those in authority must not only encourage but listen to, embrace, and institutionalize the whispers of the muzzled majority of Americans, and rediscover the values that made the nation exceptional in the first place.
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Showing reviews 1-5 of 11
 Want to know why America is bankrupt? November 3, 2009
T. Cotham
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
This is one book every American should read. It's only about 200 pages but many of the current ills of our country are explained here. Give it a try. Not the fastest read because there are tons of facts and details but the message is clear - we need to stand up for our values and bring back ethics in our classrooms and boardrooms. In trying to "be nice" to everyone, our lawmakers and judiciary have taken away our morals - making it okay to behave badly. This has corrupted our country. Read the book. Speak up. Protect our right to freedom of speech with everything you have. Without it we are America no more.
Why We Whisper April 27, 2009
Jesse D. (Roosevelt, UT)
2 out of 3 found this review helpful
A fantastic book on the freedom of speech and how a loss of morals has become detrimental to our society; not only on a personal level but as a whole. I highly recomend this book to anyone.
 Not a waste of time July 29, 2008
Albert Gustainis
3 out of 16 found this review helpful
"Why We Whisper" is meant to rally support around a generalized conservative religio-political agenda, one that seeks to gain control by limiting federal oversight and overpowering local opposition. Those fearful of this strategy are thus forewarned.
That stated, the book has content worth recommending to anyone. Despite a devotion to coded name calling, the observational narrative is compelling (those on the other side of the aisle will have to drop a bagful of preconceptions to appreciate its flow). The conclusions, skewed toward political correctness and ideological purity, are often unconvincing and generally not well thought out, tend to shift blame and confuse cause and effect; but whether viewed as righteous dogma or a shower of hubristic debris, the delineation of values, their assigned cost/benefit scale, and the utter freedom from objectivity make for an intermittently entertaining read. Obviously, the book is not geared toward persuading ideologues of whichever stripe to seriously reconsider their positions.
All the standard social conservative topics appear in random mishmashes of reportage and propaganda, alternately cogent and flawed, enervating and shallow, factual and irrational. The less familiar idea of "para-governmental" organizations is interesting, but too narrowly handled. Wavering stylistically between fluid testimonial, and clotted, graceless pamphleteering, the tone is sourly condescending, sprayed with the lack of respect commonplace in current political discourse, but over-arched by a tight, sunless layer of atmosphere. With repetitiousness kept light, the interludes of feigned objectivity feel like literary structure.
Forays into history, sociology and science add little to the text, there being no evidence that either author possesses the kind of scholarship that brings depth to these subjects. The historical plasticity of moral and natural law, with the tendency to conform to contemporary sentiment, circumstance and convenience, and change in general, is overlooked by Woodward and DeMint even as they introduce politicized considerations as newly minted moral law. Dubbing themselves traditionalists, the authors offer pages on their own victimization at the hands of secularists, prefaced by a single clause reducing traditionalist histories, such as slavery, to "blemishes." Statistics are read politically, which doesn't automatically support or negate them: the financial effects of single parenthood seem clear, while numbers can't explain the obligatory animus toward gays. Fortunately, Woodward and DeMint don't go much further into science than to give the literary stink eye to anyone who might question the orthodoxy of Intelligent Design.
Freedom of speech, ostensibly the central theme, is the most effective argument of the book (read this section first, instead of the rather indulgent introduction), but the actual main event is traditionalist vs. secularist. The issues are real, but the choice is false: most Americans look elsewhere for leadership and inspiration. Since neither camp is yet willing to remove politicking from the search for answers, the book's importance becomes its vivid, particular account of various and general social decays (apparently, we all need reminding).
Be aware: "Why We Whisper" is a partisan election year political tract, one essentially identifying Republicans with God, and Democrats with childhood obesity, among other things. A more honest title: "Why They Should Whisper Instead of Us."
Outstanding book June 4, 2008
Donald C. Cunningham
5 out of 6 found this review helpful
One of the best reads of the year. Recommended by Rush. Helps understand our declining culture and the high cost of a liberal agenda. Well researched & presented. Huge collection of information makes for a fairly slow read, but most worthy. Would have preferred a few clear Biblical links, although the principles are clear. Highly recommended.
 Avoid this book! June 2, 2008
history reader
4 out of 21 found this review helpful
Save your money.
If you are a like-minded conservative, you will find nothing new I suspect. The arguments, such as they are, tend to consist of one of two types. Quotes digested from other sources (and endnoted to a fare-thee-well). Or polemical argument, oh those evil secularists. You've seen this before.
If you are, like me, not a like-minded conservative, but interested in learning more of the conservative arguments, you will find little of use here. Conclusions are generally stated without supporting explanation.
One example. The authors (page 37) state that the Supreme Court ruled against a school board that required every class to start each day with the words "Almighty God we acknowledge our dependence upon Thee, and we beg Thy blessing upon us, our parents, our teachers and our Country." Okay. The authors opine (page 38) "It is a stretch to call this statement a prayer or a religious activity." Huh? Looks to me that the authors are not even being true to their own beliefs here. They're really arguing that this isn't a statement in support of some particular sect, but to call this statement non-religious is noncredible.
A last general observation is that the authors seem to have hailed from a different world than the one I grew up in. They extol a land in the 1950's where there was a Judeo-Christian heritage that was the basis of a well-ordered society. From that time I remember arguments about whether the Jews were condemned to a special hell for being responsible for crucifying Christ. Intermarriage in the church I grew up in did not mean whether whites could or should marry blacks -- unthinkable -- but whether it was possible for a Methodist to successfully wed a Presbyterian. Catholics also were out of the question for members of my mainstream Protestant church.
Full disclosure statement -- I've not completed the book yet -- I will finish it -- if my opinion changes by the end of the book, I'll update this, but that seems to be about as likely as the Rockies repeating this year.
Showing reviews 1-5 of 11
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