The American Spectator

L.A. Stich br> Brookfield, Wisconsin /p> p> Human Events should have the courage of its convictions and organize a book burning. I think the conservative movement just “jumped the shark.” br> — William L. Roughton, Jr. br> Fairfax Station, Virginia /p>

Human Events came up with a ten most harmful books list and then held a bonfire.

Okay, no bonfire, although you might think they had from some of the comments about the list.

What has raised the ire of many critics is the decision of the Human Events contributors to include books like Kinsey’s work on sexuality and Betty Friedan’s feministic manifesto on the list with more obvious choices like Mein Kampf, Quotations from Chairman Mao, and The Communist Manifesto.

I’m not sure the Human Events crowd was as devastatingly wrong as many believe. What the list really demonstrates is that after you name the worst books, there’s a steep drop-off to the next group. Thus, the raised eyebrows at names like Kinsey and Friedan, who didn’t contribute to superstates annihilating millions of people.

What interests me is Ralph Reiland at American Spectator being critical of Human Events for including work by Nietzsche and Comte.