Cary Neeper's Blog: Reviewing World-changing Nonfiction - Posts Tagged "w-mccullum"

How To Give Up Plastic by William McCallum, USA, Penguin Books, 2019

It isn’t easy. It requires minute by minute awareness of how much plastic runs our lives. Photos tell the tale. The oceans are full of it, over 90% gets into birds, and the finest, toughest plastic wraps are choking small ocean dwellers. One third of plastic in the ocean is microfibers released when washing clothes!

The answer is difficult for all of us, since we rely on so many handy items.made of plastic. The hard part is to recognize the plastic item and find a substitute. Ultimately, however, its the manufacturers and waste managers who hold the ultimate keys to saving the oceans

For starters, this small book gives us a very useful list of finding plastic in our houses, room by room.
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Coming Apart: the State of White America 1960-2010 by Charles Murray, New York, Cox and Murry, 2012-13.

In his crystal clear prologue, author Charles Murray paints a detailed portrait of America before 1963, when President Kennedy was shot. The “civil religion” that held America together after World War II began to “unravel” with rumors of a class with an “independent ethnic heritage” in the country.

Today, in 2020, it is all too clear: “…an evolution of America…has taken place since November 21, 1963, leading to the formation of classes that are different in kind--a separation from anything that the nation has ever known.” The differences “…diverge on core behavior and values.”The whys …involve forces that cannot be changed.”

Examples explored in the book include marriage, “residential segregation,” job types, industriousness, crime, honesty, and religion. After 300 pages we have a long list to support Murray’s theses, with suggestions to compare differences between parents at a school in a median income zip code and from an “elite private elementary school”.

The author suggests that the solutions require the “new upper class” to focus on restoring “what makes America different,”… “ to restore our “precious” and “exceptional…different way for people to live together…”

“A life well lived requires engagement with those around us.”