04 Jul Book Review: Don’t Burn This Book: Thinking for Yourself in an Age of Unreason by Dave Rubin
Written by Lilian Law
Dave Rubin’s ‘Don’t Burn This Book: Thinking for Yourself in an Age of Unreason’, released April of this year, addresses the challenges to modern political dialogue driven by the ongoing clash between free-thought and groupthink. The online political commentator, comedian, author and ‘lefty of the past’ has become highly popularised for breaking down the hypocrisy of the modern progressive, admittedly, from the inside out.
For Dave Rubin, it began with losing a debate and sharing this defeat to the online world. In his mind, the emotionally charged arguments surfacing from his favourite progressive media platforms lacked the factual insight needed to address perceived issues like systemic racism or the wage gap. Rubin argues that issues like these are factually dishonest and create a narrative of perceived oppression that is unproductive and divisive. It is not, however, Rubin’s goal to create an unquestioned rule book on beliefs, but rather to reflect on how his journey of free-thinking is the first step to breaking from the regressive notions of identity politics and political correctness that limit productive debate. It is Dave Rubin’s highly public, but hugely monumental breakdown of beliefs that can possibly allow his new book to go beyond the hot-takes and click-bait titles of his YouTube career, and serve as an undeniably relevant testament to the political culture of the United States today.
Presenting the arguments of classic liberalism, Rubin brings to 2020 the ongoing relevance of individual liberty to modern US issues like Black Lives Matter, Me Too and the Second Amendment. The work is very casual, comedic and hugely anecdotal. Admittedly, the political positions sprinkled across ‘Don’t Burn This Book’ are unoriginal and can likely be sourced from some of the fine intellectual material reviewed in this series by the ACT Young Liberals. Cementing the relevance and necessity of his work, however, Rubin digresses from the usual hot takes of his fellow online political commentators and uses his experiences as a point of doubt or assurance for the newly developed or matured political perspective.
Evident across Rubin’s online community, political gaslighting has taken a new form of ‘cancel culture’ as contemporary discourse is shaped by social media platforms susceptible to the rules of the progressive mob. In an environment of identity politics, breaking the guidelines of speech built around political correctness warrants censorship through de-platforming, demonetisation and mass social ridicule. ‘Don’t Burn This Book’ revolts from the limitations of political discourse that are ultimately damaging to all ideas and allows readers to light-heartedly question the progressive media and the pre-set values enforced under identity politics.
On the other side of the world, many may see reason behind sitting back and laughing at the show that is the mass political culture clash Dave Rubin highlights across the US. The truth, however, has become more prevalent than ever as a world in isolation has become increasingly exposed to the bandwagon of one-sided dialogue within the bubble of online reporting. The enforcement of political correctness, with ‘cancelling’ as the chosen weapon, is something that continues to impact dialogue within Australian university campuses, news media and online platforms. In reading Rubin’s work, it becomes clear that this groupthink attitude is prevalent from the comment section of university discussion pages to the choice coverage of national news.
Rubin writes an entertaining read that remains relevant as it continues to dismantle the restricted narrative of the mainstream news and social media mob that preaches the ideas of political correctness with no question. ‘Don’t Burn This Book’ begins with the author’s political ‘coming out’, and finds the back cover with a simple message, to move on. Dave Rubin breaks from the confinements of the “regressive” progressives, by saying the unsayable and immortalising the fight of classic liberals, conservatives, and libertarians for free thought amongst the chaos of this new decade.
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