Review of a book we have not read

Germany's favorite political bad boy, Mr. Sarrazin, is back with a new book on the state of the nation.

"Der neue Tugendterror", something like "the new terror by the virtuous" or 'when idealists cause terror' is as far as we try to translate the title.

The K-Landnews is not on the list of publications that receive ample preview copies of books for review. And we don't see any reason to go and buy a copy of this opus.

Which leaves us with a "meta review", a blurp about reviews and public reception of his book. According to reviewers, the main line of argument this time is that German mainstream media won't give a voice to views that diverge from the middle ground consensus and won't give a voice to what ole Richard Nixon called the silent majority. He is upset with what he perceives to be a relentless egalitarianism of German public discourse and brings up all sorts of facts to show we are not all equal. One of his previous arguments about genes and Jews backfired so fiercely that he apologized. His call for immigrants to "integrate" has found somewhat broader support in some circles, yet, we find it utterly hilarious that this descendant of immigrants is so set in his ways.

Those mainstream media, of course, have a field day with that argument, pointing out with some glee that they are giving him a voice by reviewing the book.

To us, Mr. S. is the embodiment of modern day Germany in ways that he might not appreciate. As a member of the social democratic party, you cannot really call him a hard line "f*** the poor" politician, yet he shows contempt for those on basic social benefits. He proclaims that you can enjoy a good, healthy diet on just above one Euro a day while he has enjoyed above average salaries all his working life. "Facts" without context and much sense, such as the number of patents filed by Switzerland versus that filed by Turkey...you know what he makes out of it. Or that one about men being more intelligent than women, tempered by a note that there are more men under IQ 70 than women...a factoid sans context, useless at best and open to the most egregious abuse, just ask history.

The privileged prescribing the correct way of life to the non-privileged has a long and checkered tradition, and his books fit like a hand in a glove.

It is fascinating that some of his arguments are not even wrong but seem to add up to something that feels wrong.

As to the "silent majority" and the "blandness" of German mainstream media? Again, he does have a point there but the attributed cause, the grand collusion of these media, is off.

And we dare to stipulate that some of "the German mainstream media" have never been more open and diverse than today. The reader comments sections of the web sites of major print media do give a much broader spectrum of opinions today than the old letters to the editor system ever did.

So, despite deeply disagreeing with Mr. S. on facts and "facts", we think this one person struggle of Germany in the 21st century adds color to the debate.

For the record, we can be called "Gutmenschen", which would make us part of the problem described in his book.

So what?