Kerby Anderson

Abigail Shrier has written an essay “In Defense of Political Escalation.” You may remember that she is the author of the book, Irreversible Damage, which documents the sudden rise in young people, especially teenage girls wanting to transition. Even if you don’t accept her conclusion, her essay is worth reading because she documents so many cases of censorship that are rarely even covered by the media.

Ryan Anderson and his co-author lost their ability to offer pre-orders of their pro-life audio book when the book’s distributor dropped them for ideological reasons. In previous commentaries, I talked about how his book, When Harry Became Sally on the transgender movement was erased by Amazon. Even third-party sales of his book were banned from Amazon and all the sites they control. This is significant because half of all US book sales flow through its channels.

She discussed the decision by Target two years ago to delete her book. At the time, there was a public outcry, and they reversed the ban. But they once again deleted the book when no one was watching. She concludes that we have become so used to censorship that we are like the characters in Fahrenheit 451 who simply accept a censorship as part of daily life.

Why aren’t people on the left speaking out? She says that most liberals will be content to allow institutions to punish conservatives if they remain unscathed. And they can see what happens when brave souls like J.K. Rowling, Elon Musk, or Joe Rogan speak out.

She concludes, “Those waiting on the mythical pendulum to swing back, should stop holding their breath.” She makes a good case for political escalation that we need to thoughtfully consider.