Mr, Brooks, sarcasm doesn't become you.
36
We have a sign on our front lawn that says, in 4 languages, "No matter where you are from, we're glad you're our neighbor." Did we put it up to make ourselves feel morally superior? No, we and others put up these signs to let our many Muslim, Vietnamese, and Latino neighbors know that they had no reason to fear us after Trump issued his very first Muslim ban; in fact, that we would defend them if Trump's Brownshirts came stomping their way. Get out of your bubble Mr. Brooks, walk the real streets, and quit tossing off these hectoring, lecturing columns.
35
Brooks really oughtn’t attempt snark. He has no gift for it.
24
David Brooks, what is this sarcastic rant? Why do you sound like Tucker Carlson? Your point was made much more effectively by John McWhorter just two weeks ago in Atlantic Magazine. https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2018/12/why-third-wave-anti-racism-dead-end/578764/
What happened the columns you used to write, in which you did some original research? Also, don't tell us that Mother Theresa exemplified some kind of moral life that we should follow. Christopher Hitchens has shown years ago that she was a ghoul who opposed contraception and who actually denied palliative care to the people in her hospice, forcing them to die in agony and abjection. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NJG-lgmPvYA
12
Based on reading Mr. Brooks a few years now, I think this column is meant to be "tongue in cheek" with a stab to all sides to get over themselves a bit... maybe I am just thick and wrong.
16
This latest solitary, poor satire is nasty, brutish, and not short enough.
13
David, you are precious and priceless.
15
Does this mean we will soon see you all in black wearing a beret. Bring it on down Brooksy. Time for you to dump the collared shirts and go for the tees with the message, I heart David. Poke the ant hill a little harder and you will get more ants. A few more exclamation points should do the trick!!!!!
4
Satire from David Brooks gives me a tingly feeling. More, please, in the new year.
11
Brooks needs to stay far, far away from attempts at humor.
10
Who took over David Brooks column today? This sounds like a “Daily Shouts” satirical piece in The New Yorker. C’mon, cut it out! My mother is a classic narcissist, believe me, she has no time to truly think about anyone else, unless that person has done something she views as a personal attack, slight, provocation, or outright anger provoking. This must be a joke David; you wrote this for the Narcissist-In-Chief, yes?
6
Monty Python had something to say about this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sxhaunU2AxY&t=0s&list=LLHvPy9qYQwBwjiY7UpXBU_Q&index=7
5
So beneath this sophomoric attempt at satire, what you're doing here is nothing more than declaring the moral inferiority of people whose contribution to society consists entirely of claiming moral superiority. If you're serious about this you should continue the absurdity by posting an outraged comment here condemning yourself and then start a furious thread attacking the attack ad infinitum.
13
David you are really getting to be quite a curmudgeon.
Also, the meaning of woke is not indignant. Woke is becoming aware of the life experiences and challenges of people unlike yourself, and thereby appreciating that you may need to change your own attitudes and behaviors.
14
Ooooo Mr. Brooks I am feeling indignant and I’m taking the bait! You have impressively ~*~mansplained~*~ a not-so-subtle critique of identity politics. But hey, this is what the comments section is for - to call out the possibility that the author is critiquing something that their writing suggests they don’t truly understand. I’m surprised you didn’t use the word “uppity” to better support your thesis!
8
Nice try with your Gail Collins impression.
6
And get off my lawn!
6
Ha, ha...got it!
2
Mr. Brooks, you don’t do sarcasm well. Perhaps it’s because you’re so far past the age of the generation you’re attempting to denigrate. Please know your limits!!!
9
Hey everybody! Is reality beating you over the head every day? Is the world changing too fast for you? Is your world-view out of step with everything you see around you? Are the institutions you have placed your faith in crumbling from innate corruption? Is hypocrisy eating you alive? Is your religion turning out to be nothing but a confidence game? Are you feeling guilty because it turns out that building a democracy on a foundation of individual privilege and self-reliance (call it freedom) over the needs of the collective turns out to be nothing but a “culture of selfism” – a Darwinistic disaster?
Is that what’s bothering you Bunky?
Well, step right up and join the official David Brooks “Back-in-the Old-Days” Club! It’s real simple. Just follow these two easy steps:
1) Create an imaginary past. Just use your imagination! Something like: “Back in the old days people thought morality was about living up to some external standard of moral excellence.” Or, “back in the old days every American was a Christian!” Go crazy!
2) Believe your fantasy! Repeat it over and over - don’t let anyone tell you you’re wrong! Faith will destroy all evidence to the contrary!
It's easy! With club membership “everybody gets to define meaning in his or her own way. You don’t have to read a lot of thick books or have hard experiences to feel meaning. Just do things that give you good feelings!”
*with membership you get a free “Back-in-the Old-Days” bubble – some assembly required.
23
Hey everybody! Is reality beating you over the head every day? Is the world changing too fast for you? Is your world-view out of step with everything you see around you? Are the institutions you have placed your faith in crumbling from innate corruption? Is hypocrisy eating you alive? Is your religion turning out to be nothing but a confidence game? Are you feeling guilty because it turns out that building a democracy on a foundation of individual privilege and self-reliance (call it freedom) over the needs of the collective turns out to be nothing but a “culture of selfism” – a Darwinistic disaster?
Is that what’s bothering you Bunky?
Well, step right up and join the official David Brooks “Back-in-the Old-Days” Club! It’s real simple. Just follow these two easy steps:
1) Create an imaginary past. Just use your imagination! Something like: “Back in the old days people thought morality was about living up to some external standard of moral excellence.” Or, “back in the old days every American was a Christian!” Go crazy!
2) Believe your fantasy! Repeat it over and over - don’t let anyone tell you you’re wrong! Faith will destroy all evidence to the contrary!
It’s easy! With club membership “everybody gets to define meaning in his or her own way. You don’t have to read a lot of thick books or have hard experiences to feel meaning. Just do things that give you good feelings!”
*with membership you get a free “Back-in-the Old-Days” bubble – some assembly required.
5
Did I just sleep through three months? Somehow, Mr. Brooks' column for April 1 ran today.
4
WoW! I had to recheck that it was Brooks writing.
I must feel liberating to talk about yourself and your feelings!
3
I admittedly just don't get this essay. Whether or not intended as satire, it is poorly written and far below Mr. Brooks's usual standards of thought and insight.
7
“When you are indignant, or woke, you are showing that you have a superior moral awareness.”
Oh for heaven’s sake, David. My eyes are rolling out of my head over here. I know this is your attempt at satire, but please stop. Go back to pontificating about BoBos, will ya?
Being “woke” is about recognizing that the status quo in our culture minimizes, harms, and robs certain groups of their potential to achieve and their ability to live freely. Awareness is a good first step in developing a path to a more just and equitable society.
We SHOULD find ways to talk with the “less-woke” among us, but this piece feels less of an invitation to that discussion and more like you yelling at us to get off your lawn.
11
What a horrible excuse for terrible behavior. Standards of excellence should be set, and humans should strive to meet them. Making excuses, as this piece does, for self-chosen mental disorders is disgusting.
1
A better title for this column would be "The Immorality of Selfism."
2
Irony and sarcasm do not suit you.
4
Don’t go near the water! Head for the hills! Snark attack! Snark attack!
3
I usually appreciate Mr. Brooks’ columns as a window on sensible conservative views but this one is a clunker. You don’t really “do” sarcasm all that well, David. Once again Democrats will rally to clean up the Republican mess. Stick to your positive pontificating, please...
4
Should have ended with, “And you kids get off my lawn!”
5
I'm looking for the parts of my phone that indicate laughter .....ah ha...HAHAHAHAHAHAH!!!!!!
1
This column is really the lowest form of rhetorical jiggery-pokery, knocking down straw-men with reckless abandon.
5
This reads as paranoid, agist drivel. Pinning selfishness to "self-care" is the kind of moralistic calumny that resulted in a generation of repressed baby boomers. Also! Exclamation points! Do not subtle sarcasm! Make!
6
Satire and sarcasm really are not your lanes, but thanks for playing.
4
Come on David. You are better than this.
3
Tough day Dave?
3
“Meaning” is so subjective. Trump interprets meaning as “what’s good for ME”; Michael Bloomberg sees it as what is good for society (take for example his $1BILLION gift to Hopkins Medical School); Warren Buffett sees what is in the best financial and ETHICAL interests of his stockholders and business in general and good Physicians firmly believe that helping their patients lead healthier, happier lives is “meaning”. Such differences.
Nazis advocates the extermination of all Jews, Imperial Japanese the extermination of Chinese and Americans. They both were led by evil people who perverted the moral concepts of “meaning”.
Of late, many Americans have abrogated responsibility for their actions and adopted the aberrant philosophies of sick, perverted humans to justify their actions. This must stop NOW if we are to survive. Concentrate on helping others for the good of all, and stop belly-button introspection and narcissism. Trump does enough of that for all of us.
1
Perhaps you or your editor need an updated dictionary Mr. Brooks.
“Woke is a political term of African American origin that refers to a perceived awareness of issues concerning social justice and racial justice. It is derived from the African American Vernacular English expression "stay woke", whose grammatical aspect refers to a continuing awareness of these issues. Wikipedia”
4
this a joke, right?
1
Based on the comments, Brooks seems to have hit a nerve.
6
Materialism subsumed selfnesses the first time some hairy dude put on a stone brooch.
It only took ten milleniums of the hedonic effect churning away to achieve where we are at now - "Porno Wealth" as the desired representative of success -power.The ultimate desire that defines the apex of western culture.
Folks on minimum income lined up to buy lottery tickets led by a man/child -in-chief who is KingMidas without an operating moral core..
3
Look no further than this op-ed by David Brooks to see a bright shining self-portrait of "selfism". A person via this weak attempt at sarcasm who is displaying the chronic indignation and superior moral awareness he is condemning and forever telling "your" story via a dedicated NYTimes column. No need to assign "selfism" as the sole agency of the left Mr. Brooks, you've got plenty for all of us and the known universe.
4
Pot, meet kettle.
3
Wow...that was a superbly annoying opinion piece but I guess that’s the point. As my dearly departed mother would say “get over yourself.” Selfish whining is a sign one has not moved beyond adolescence.
3
Oh, this was supposed to be funny........
3
Sigh. Just a Wierd version of Brooks moralizing. What's funny is that he throws his shade at liberals when it's nationalists and racists who are the masters of a self- absorbed culture of grievance. Stay Woke!
8
If you turned this lame attempt at satire into your Freshman 101 Lit prof. it would come back with a red letter.
4
Say what? Either David wrote this while on drugs, had an intern write it while he is still on holiday it or is joking.
Quite different.
1
Mr. Brooks should leave the satire to Gail Collins and Maureen Dowd. I was all prepared for a moral lesson about pulling one's self up by the bootstraps and that the private sector is the only way to a good life and then he comes up with this sad attempt.
C'mon, David. You're better than this. Aren't you ?
2
This may just be me, but I find it impossible to read anything with this many exclamation points. You may have a point but I was not able to finish your column.
2
Excuse me, Mr. BROOKS, isn't that your tongue in your cheek?
1
Satire is not ur strong suit because it is too obviously satire. This column could have been printed in a high school newspaper.
3
I get what Brooks was trying to do, but what a failure of tone. Not funny, tiresome to read, chock full of hasty generalizations. Sarcasm doesn't work for you, Mr. Brooks.
5
Somebody's bitter his kind is dying out.
5
This is an attempt to make liberals feel foolish. It doesn’t work - and why should I NYT column do that?
2
And the final thing you do is build a big wall around the metaphoric self of country.
3
Down with this sort of thing
2
Hmm, looks like sarcasm sometimes goes over people's heads.
I thought the article was brilliant.
4
Yikes! Calm down people, this is satire! Not a social justice how to manual! I’d say the indignation meted out here proves the point this tidy little piece of social criticism was making. I suspect a lot of these commenters, after reading “A Modest Proposal” by Jonathan Swift, would condemn Swift for his disgusting callousness, deviance, hatred of the Irish and support for the Imperialist British capitalist hegemony. This is the classic liberal circular firing squad in action. Get a grip and lighten up folks, we’re on your side. Personally, as a “classic liberal” and “social justice warrior” myself, this is the first time in a while I’ve liked a David Brooks op-ed.
8
Oh my goodness, you wrote an entire column about Trump without even mentioning his name. Well done.
2
My, my, my. You seem to have wandered off "The road to Character."
Andrew Dobelstein
2
Mr Brooks should send the recorded tape of the article to Donald Trump with the hope that he will learn something.
"We live in a culture of selfism — a culture that puts tremendous emphasis on self, on self-care and self-display."
And the people who falsely claim their dog is a "service animal" so they can parade their dogs in and out of airplanes, buses libraries, movie theaters, restaurants and grocery stores are the Absolute Masters of Selfism!
4
Just another example of conservatives who don't like it when they are called out about supporting policies that are immoral and a man who is immoral. It's not that they have no external standards that bother Brooks it's that they point out how he and other conservatives are hypocrites and violate those standards.
1
David! What hilarious irony: your indignation is noted!
4
Quite a display of offense, Mr Brooks. I hope you didn't accidently catch a "tingly meaningful feeling inside" yourself from overexertion. It's unnecessary.
The problem is: the Republican Party is entirely propped-up upon Trump's weak legs. And Trump is essentially cutting-out his own legs. Two viable parties are necessary for a democracy. So, the Republican Party must stand on its own. It's inevitable.
1
This is a smoking column, far off my map of David Brooks, with many layers of consideration.
I think, perhaps optimistically, that he is asking us to consider what is 'right action' for our personal situation. Given that there is a crazy man in the White House, (I think many of us agree on that), what does a personal response to that crazy man look like? By response, I mean an action that is the most powerful expression that we are capable of, to make our position known.
Otherwise, it will be said, 'you were there, you knew, you had opinions, but you did nothing.' What is the 'did'?
So waxing about a non existent past were people were more virtuous... got it, conservative trope #1.
2
In his effort to decry the woke social justice warriors, Mr. Brookes has made himself as obnoxious as the most straw man of any SJW. Well done Mr. Brookes, well done.
Also, technical point, Mother Theresa took money from dictators and believed the poor should suffer to grow closer to god. She was a religious fanatic beatified as part of a PR campaign by the international criminal organization known as the Roman Catholic Church.
3
Had given up on you, David. Welcome back.
3
Another Brooks column that is a textbook definition of Poe’s law.
Very funny, rich and wise, D.B.
3
David, it looks like you struck a nerve here. Your column reminded me of a quote from the '60s: "there are no identity crises in the ghetto".
4
David
What was that all about? Who are you beating up here? All you did is profess your superiority. I would remind you,”He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her.” And you speak of morality?
A reminder: morality is preached from the pulpit. Ethics is taught in universities. And morality varies between religions obsessing over sex, dress and behavior and strict adherence to scripture.
I, personally, stay as far away from morality as possible. When I need guidance I turn to ethics. You might give it a try. And lastly, avoid pomposity, it’s unbecoming.
3
It doesn't necessarily make you a bad person, David Brooks, but sarcasm, in my opinion, doesn't work for you at all. Perhaps you may have heard the term "passive-agressive"? Often sarcasm is just a childish way of expressing rage. Is that you?
3
The era of extreme selfism has given us the president of extreme selfism.
2
The most grotesque example of selfism in our culture right now is the current occupant of the White House. And two of the clearest examples of public figures engaging in mock indignation are Mitch McConnell and Lindsey Graham.
3
Oh Mr. Brooks, you sly dog. What a perfect send up of Donald Trump, the epitome of moral emptiness — without even mentioning his name. Clever you, slamming the thin-skinned president under the guise of insulting progressives — lol, he’ll never realize you’re making fun of his low inrelligence and spiritual vacuousness, so, hopefully, he won’t try to tweet-destroy you. I did get that right, didn’t I?
David Brooks mocks liberals for displaying their righteous woke millennialness, by displaying his righteous pragmatic boomerness. He makes some valid points but it's kind of rich coming from a writer who always wears his righteousness on his sleeve. I guess doing something for a "tingly feeling of meaning" makes you shallow, but doing it for a paycheck is common sense pragmatism. That's the difference between a narcissist and a serious thinker, getting paid.
4
Wow. Talk about reductionist thinking. I don’t think I’ve ever read a Brooks column that is so disingenuous and dismissive in its oversimplification of complex issues. Clearly designed to provoke, but still.
4
"First, you want to feel indignant all the time."
Okay --
Let's start with ridiculous article - so full of double-jointed "aren't-we-all-just-so-clever" liberal narcissistic sarcasm that it makes one feel as if they need to bone up on their sense of indignation...
You want to be a good person -?
Do an act of kindness for a stranger today - preferably when it's particularly inconvenient for you to do so -- and then don't tell anyone about it...
1
My sympathy to Mr. Brooks. Every once in a while you are going to write a column that is not too good. The satire was a bit foggy at times.
2
This is pure satire – all the exclamation marks should be a clue!! One cannot ignore the utter vapidity and insignificance of what passes for intelligent discourse on much of social media today; not exclusively of course, but to a great extent. It seems to be all about documenting every waking moment of someone’s day – what a waste of time for all concerned. If this were all kept in the confines of one’s circle of family and friends, great, but it is disseminated to all and sundry. This also goes for the visual, such as Instagram. Half of what is posted are ‘selfies’ – why? I just don’t get it and neither does David Brooks.
Terrific choice of illustration, by the way.
5
Where does this guy (Brooks) come from? If he wants to get a since of real and meaning, he should go live among the migrants in Tijuana rather on his high ground in the upper echelon of NYC or DC. I'll pay for his airfare!
1
sat·ire
/ˈsaˌtī(ə)r/
noun
the use of humor, irony, exaggeration, or ridicule to expose and criticize people's stupidity or vices, particularly in the context of contemporary politics and other topical issues.
synonyms:mockery, ridicule, derision, scorn, caricature
1
Geez, lighten up, people! A little sarcasm is good for the soul.
4
All the time while reading this I was wondering:" Wow, how & when did Trump learn to put more than 2 sentences together to even compose a lengthy article about how he operates?" Only when I checked again and saw the author wasn´t Trump I realized : "Oh, it must be satire."
Is Mr. Brooks trying to be the Andy Borowitz of the NYT?
If yes, he really should go back to being the protector of the faith again.
1
I cannot find any value in this opinion piece. Ironically, it reads like the rantings of a self-centered old man. I find more value in the yard signs that he would mock.
1
I think we lost David.
2
Whew! For one frightening moment I thought this was serious!
Another excellent, thought-provoking piece by Mr. Brooks- bravo! But “more good”? Not that makes me a little indignant. Remember the old ditty, “Good, better, best. Never let it rest, till your good is better and your better best.”
2
Are we there yet? With an opportunity to get the last word in;
“David, how did you manage to get so many people riled up ? You’ve always seemed like a mild mannered nice kind of guy.”
3
And be sure to share your indignation and say you expect all your on line friends to share it to all their friends. Pass the anger around. It is righteous indignation and deserves at least fifteen minutes for the world.
1
Wow. What a sophomoric perspective.
Self-acceptance, self-respect, self-trust, and self-worth - in essence, self-love - is what energizes, emboldens, and empowers us to share the "love" that we are...with others freely, fully, and without judgment.
Think Jesus. Think, turn the other cheek. Think the value of taking good care of you as being the best you can be for others, too.
It's not about self-obsession or narcissism, it's about being a healthy, happy, well-balanced, wise human being who possesses the energy and desire to connect, create, and collaborate well with others.
How can you share what you do not possess? You cannot.
There is a critical collapse in understanding within our society about what it is to genuinely pursue a “spiritual way of life,” no matter what religious practice - or not - that may include.
On the one hand, there is the picture of the joyless, disciplined, mind-fixated, intellect–based, sacrificial spirituality. On the other hand, there is the pop culture, pseudo-spirituality characterized by obsession with the latest or greatest gadget, gimmick, or Guru.
When Jesus said “love thy neighbor as thy self,” he didn’t mean love your neighbor so very, very much…to the neglect or sacrifice of you and your well-being. He meant, love you well…and then you will possess what you need to love others well and without judgment.
Check the Gospels again Mr. Brooks.
2
Not clear. So we've elected a republican sociopath into the oval office because the electorate's a pack of narcissists? The causes were too many too vociferous feuding liberal factions, off shore in concert with on shore election tampering and interference (e.g. voter supression by same), politized courts making big money available, big money from dark sources (also court sanctioned), the list goes on you name it...a perfect storm. Narcissism sounds puny in comparison to the forces arrayed against the collective will of all the people, every voter.
It strikes me that never in my 68 years of walking this planet have we had more abundance, more cheap toys, more access, more technology, more . . . well, just more. And never have we been witness to louder chorus of whining, angry, bitter people who are angry about the fact that they are angry because they are angry because angry. Angry. Get over yourselves already.
3
Ayn Rand is the prophet of selfishness. It’s a conservative belief not liberal. Unregulated Capitalism worships selfishness. Now even American Christianity has perverted the gospel to be about me saved you not.
Well, when you indoctrinate generation after generation of children with the mantra, "The most important person in the world is you!" what do you expect?
2
I like this piece a lot. It reminds me of "Liberals, You're Not as Smart as you Think," by political scientist Gerard Alexander published in the Times earlier this year: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/05/12/opinion/sunday/liberals-youre-not-as-smart-as-you-think-you-are.html
2
Dear David Brooks,
I like this article. I read everything you write. I don’t understand why so many comments are argumentative about this one. I think the article conveys just what you intended.
Thanks,
Robert O
4
This is funny, great satire. Unfortunately many of the commenters on the article either don’t understand satire, because their response only served to make Brooks’ point, or they’re devoid of humor! Learn to laugh at yourselves, it’s good for you, go on, try it!
4
Heavens, all you Progressive, Liberal, social justice warriors! Don’t you recognize satire when it smacks you in the face? Frankly, I don’t care for Brooks’ writing most of the time, and his ham-handed irony is mildly amusing, but the fact is, we are looking at a generation of the spoiled children of spoiled children leading us, politically,, and it doesn’t bode well for the future. Enough with the fragile flowers - take a deep breath, stand up straight, think about your fellow humans, and do the right thing without expectation of gratitude or acknowledgement. Grow up, America.
3
"Tell all truth, but tell it slant..." said Emily Dickinson. Thanks for poking at our self obsession using the ridiculous wisdom of a narcissist. I actually smiled.
3
Why didn’t Brooks mention MAGA hats and 2nd Amendment tee shirts? I think he just wanted to make fun of “liberal” feelings.
When a government official is spewing hate, we need to speak up. When a government official is lying, we need to speak truth.
Lately, the more I read from David, the less I like what he has to say.
What a hoot. Thanks, David.
4
David Brooks is doubling down on his trademark position: mamby-pamby, wishy-washy blindness to the faults of his own trademark "conservativism." Has anybody here ever seen him actually criticize what is going on with the Party he still identifies with? We have Bret Stephens and, in the Washington Post, Jennifer Rubin, Michael Gerson and others, taking up the cudgels on behalf of enlightened conservatism. Where is Brooks in this existential fight of our lives? Especially now, that the Republican Party itself has descended into near-fascist tendencies with its increasingly open embrace of authoritarianism and rejection of small-d-democratic norms and the rule of law?
And this whole notion Brooks attacks (snidely) of the dominance of "Self" over everything else: what distinguishes that from Ayn Rand, and her gospel of selfishness and rejection of empathy and altruism as positive "evils"?? Ayn Randianism is functionally the operating principle of the Republican Party at this point, and has been since at least Ronald Reagan and the "rugged individual" trope that he pushed.
David Brooks, you need to wake up and do some actual self-reflection.
Now Brooks should take on the white evangelical Christians who believe themselves to be morally superior while they disregard every moral directive Christ supposedly gave them. If he were more honest and objective, he would see plenty to mock and ridicule in these hypocrites.
But he won't do that. In his view, religious people are only a force for good. They are never the problem.
Whose external standard of moral excellence should we live up to, Mr. Brooks? Jerry Falwell Jr.'s? Or maybe the hierarchy of the Catholic Church? How about the Imams of Saudi Arabia?
O man this is one is a gem for Mr. Brooks. It perfectly encapsulates the philosophical and social context of the woke white liberal millennial.
Virtue signaling is essential to survive, lest you be grouped with the sub-human "them" (i.e. people who are white, rural, uneducated).
The one with the most legitimacy in any conversation is the one who can prove the deepest victimization. I may be a white transgender woman, but if you are a black transgender woman whatever you say is more legit, it has more weight.
Being woke is to be angry at everything all the time. I went to to hippy hot springs in the rocky mountains at 9,000 for New Years that uses tilapia to clean the water before it enters the river again. It was awesome, there was like 3,000 fish in a pond that ate all the human skin flakes before the water went back to the stream. It was brilliant and sustainable.
Get this, some hyper-woke PETA member complained about the density and method of keeping the tilapia alive, and the government forced them to slaughter their fish! So now they have to install a water treatment plant which may bankrupt them and also has a huge carbon footprint.
That PETA member virtue signaled on FB and complained to the government, thousands of people validated her wokeness, and a hot springs run by old hippies may go out of business as a result of a great sustainable idea they had. That's how today's wokeness works.
2
Such hog wash; “But now we know this is actually harmful! In the first place, when people hold up external standards of moral excellence, they often make you feel judged. These people make you feel sad because you may not live up to this standard. It’s very cruel of them to make you feel troubled in this way!”
Do you not realize that what other people think of you is none of your business?
I'm with David on this one. I know too many people eager to be indignant - left or right - it is insufferable. Ok, I get it, you think what so and so did or said was outrageous! Oh please, let's do keep talking about it until my ears bleed.
3
This is a very funny article and an excellent argument that "Curb Your Enthusiasm" should never be cancelled.
2
Well, that's my dose of heavy-handed sarcasm for the year.
1
This is a gem and thank you.
2
April Fool's Day is supposed to be on 4/1. I suppose it's OK to have it on 1/4 instead.
Funny things, Mr. Books. As I began reading your column I had the distinct impression you were talking about yourself. But then, I have yet to achieve the level of woke.
Selfism is usually considered to be oafish and graceless. Brooks presents it as honest and pure like a form of saintliness. People being true to themselves. It reminds me of Jean Genet being viewed as an existential hero because he had no remorse for any of his crimes.
David Brooks is having a bad day. Every columnist deserves the opportunity to try new approaches to their topics and audiences. Perhaps, on deadlines, it can be hard to know what works (or, what fails). Classic, analytical, dignified, compassionate Brooks is better than this. He'll be back. No worries.
The dominant ideology in the US - this very much includes feminism - maintains it's capacity to marginalize the point of view of people that it needs to smear as supposedly less moral through reductive demagoguery. It uses over-simplification of issues such as sex, history, and discrimination, bleaching the complicated human nuance out of them, and thus the actual accurate facts as well, to build a falsified narrative about society. Politically correct outrage can be a calculated lever to bias the popular perspective in favor of those people who use a bodyguard of lies to protect abusers. Thus it can empower abuse rather than standing up against it. Look at the sexual abuse in back rooms in retail establishments of some male workers - I'm not talking about immigrants, but on people without power in terms of how they were regarded by more connected people. I knew boys my age when I was young who were human-trafficked into sex slavery by their gleefully malicious mothers, who were indulging their depravity by enforcing feminist sadism. These kids mostly died really young. Something similar happened to me. I survived. This horror is pervasive, against some high-iq boys who are also highly moral, articulate, and poorly-connected - and particularly against "hot" girls (i.e. independent-minded children) - kids who organized feminist sadism loathes. I've lost many friends, people I once knew. I suspect many people have. The 'conspiracy theory' schoolyard chant protects crime.
External standards, I can see them, Internal Standards, what are they? Are they anything like the external variety? Are they standards at all? Are they immutable, or are you free to move the goal posts, if any?
This piece is a clever bit of revionism in its attempt to stick liberals with the bill for decades of a conservative philosophy touting the magical ability of markets to justify base greed and self interest. No, the cult of the individual has always been a distinctly conservative one in this country. If you really want to hit liberals in the hypocrisy why not take us to task for being often unwilling to raise taxes to pay for the various expensive initiatives we tout. It’s a far richer topic with immediate practical implications that won’t make you seem like such a culture war hack.
Who is this satire directed to? Of course meaning and identity and living well are subjective, within the limits of physical laws.
How are the Socialist-leaning kids of today nearly as selfish as the Boomers who seem to have ended up the biggest block of whining Oncelers in the history of the planet.
Make no mistake, Mr. Brooks is correct in his critique, I'm just not sure his generation is spending enough time in the mirror...
Yes! I've been looking for that tingly meaningful feeling all my life, and now, in your column about me, I've found it!!!!
2
I was a bit tired when I read this. I didn't realize right away that Mr. Brooks was being sarcastic! I thought he was describing how to be a good republican.
2
David, this is some of your best work. Keep it up.
3
So I learned that conservatives feel judged by what they perceive to be indignant, self righteous liberals. I have also noticed a rise in hate crimes and white suprematism as it has become popular to disparage political correctness. Don’t these inconvenient social controls serve to protect individual rights and freedoms? Why do you think we teach our children to respect the rights and privileges of others? So they can be dispensed with when we reach adulthood.
re: Tucker Lieberman post
I was going to write something similar, but yours is so much better in its tolerance, calmness, and ability to rise above callow individualism.
Thank you for adding to the discussion.
Thanks for zeroing in on the important issue of the day. I would hate for us to waste our time on trivial things like the Government shutdown or the corruption and mendacity in the White House and GOP or children separated from their parents at the border. I hadn't realized how selfish and amoral we had all become. Here I thought that tingly feeling was fear and outrage at what is happening to our country at the hands of the GOP...I should have known all along it was me being selfish.
It's funnier if you read these as sincere words of advice:
Back in the old days people thought morality was about living up to some external standard of moral excellence. Abraham Lincoln tried to live a life of honesty and courage. [It's true! And it's also true that much of what's messed up about politics in the USA can be directly traced back to petulant reactions by former slave owners to the idea that black people should have equal rights. Nice try, Brooks. I'll give you points for having the audacity of hope, at least.]
Mother Teresa tried to live up to a standard of selfless love. [This is also true! Sadly, she may have failed. The NYT published an article about it a while back: "A Critic’s Lonely Quest: Revealing the Whole Truth About Mother Teresa" https://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/27/world/asia/mother-teresa-critic.html ]
You need to make the link, David, between the greed of capitalism, which has overwhelmed every other social structure in our society, and the self-absorbed modern American. This is a tandem.
I remember a time not that long ago when companies were proud to claim that they never laid off anyone. I remember when there were almost no advertisements inside Fenway Park. Remember that? People were less self absorbed back then too.
9
Sometimes there are people in our lives, and our country’s history, who have done such emotional damage we want nothing ever to do with them again. A person, for example, in a position of trust who has misused that trust and their position. Who instead of acknowledging their harm experience subsequent criticism and rejection as a loss of control they have a right to restore — any way they can. with no real desire to apologize or acknowledge their offenses and mistakes. Instead of honest reconciliation, what they desire, as David described in a recent article, is a kind of cheap grace. That many are willing to give. With a goal of simply resuming their regular program of pretending — to be a good person — that you can trust. And society accepts this most especially of men. Providing a regular supply of negative reinforcement. Until they happen upon that one odd woman who just won’t play along. For example, the new Speaker the House. And, well, all the women who marched on the Capitol wearing funny hats. And men who cheered them on, and marched with them to acknowledge the value, and their voice. And...the wrong.
2
Wow, this is great. I have been that person. I'm a registered Democrat; lived in NYC for over a decade; was a vegetarian several years after college etc. The truth often hurts, and we need to hear it now more than ever. Thank you, Mr. Brooks.
6
I am not sure where you live, David, or what news you are watching or reading, but I just want you to know that this column does not characterize the people I know: my family, friends, and neighbors are all very lovely people.
Perhaps you should get involved in a project to help others? I am sure this will restore your faith in humanity. Wonderful, friendly, dedicated, hard-working people live throughout my city (and throughout this country and throughout the world, I am sure!) It is especially easy to find wonderful people, when you get to know them through some good cause. It will put a dance back in your step!
3
Mr. Brooks,
I've been reading your column for many years now and, invariably, you turn to some arcane discussion about morality, a discussion that implores, even begs us, to adopt an external, selfless 'moral code' that will, somehow, miraculously deliver us from our misguided, tortured, degraded, selfish lives. Yikes. Where do you get this stuff? Is it your religious background and/or training? Ultimately, it seems to me, your arguments, at base, suggest we are all quite flawed and fallible, and, left to our own devices, will likely lead miserable lives, because, by our very nature are incapable of living a meaningful life without some kind of roadmap generously provided by those that preceded us. I don't buy it. We are selfish agents, yes, but our selfishness is at one and the same time, a statement of our individual worth and an expression of our need for social connectivity. What motivates behavior? In my view, two things: a need to be valued for our individuality and a need to be connected with others.
3
"Wokeness" is very much an "external standard of moral excellence." It places how you treat disadvantaged groups at the center of morality. You may not agree with that, but it clearly isn't self-absorbed or non-judgmental. Arguably, it is less selfish than conventional morality, which puts a high emphasis on helping one's own kin and kind, even if they are not the ones in the most need of help.
2
@Aoy - No, David Brooks hits the nail on the head, at least here in NYC. Wokeness is all about virtue signaling.
2
thanks David, I've been worried about this for about 60 years. You're the only one who has found me perfect, appreciated
2
I believe one of my hero's, Muhammad Ali, said it best, "I am the greatest."
The gist of it was, he truly was . . . The Greatest.
Thanks for a great article!
2
I don't think Brooks is knocking the Left only; he probably could have done better bringing in behaviors from the Right that fit the satire. I honestly believe that our society and culture is very focused on the meaning and good feeling of self, and not on the working toward the greater good. Who will start this? Someone needs to. Maybe those who think so, including me, can start in small ways to promote the greater good.
1
I enjoyed the sarcasm. This plight aflicts all ages. I work in a FL based retail store and most customers are ages 55- 90 ish.
The ones in their 60's and 70's are as demanding as a 14 year old teenage girl but they have a lot more money and a lot less time. Thanks for making me laugh.
8
Is Brooks writing about a different country? In this universe's America, passionate organizing and political debate just propelled the most diverse Congress ever into office and changed state and local governments profoundly. We are on the verge of major new policy accomplishments, and at last have a check on our disastrous president. Neither the country nor the millenial generation are solipsistic; they are active. Brooks, on the other hand, seems impossibly focused on his own blinkered self.
11
Is this column only about the left? I kept reading it because it expressed so much what people like Trump do. And sometimes they are on the left side of the spectrum as well. This child side of our being has this selfish way of looking to the world. If being an adult is to take the responsibility - or the blame - for something, many people that are on both sides of the spectrum are still children all the time. Like the ones that think we have nothing to do with the Anthropocene age that we are living in. And it is hard - it is! - but you can try to live with this knowledge and not be outraged all the time. After all, outrage does not solve any problem and does not help clear thinking on how to find solutions. Outrage all the time is like children having tantrums.
1
A wonderful piece which I thoroughly enjoyed though sadly limited by Mr. Brooks inability to apply his points across the entire spectrum of society.
5
This article seems like an exaggerated account of a house-wife watching those Reality Shows and Oprah. Promoting self-care, self-expression, indignation to others, sure doesn't solve the problem at hand. If everybody kept expressing, would anyone be listening?
1
I love this article and I love reading this comment section, what a ride!
7
Firstly, beware of false dichotomies. It seems that more so than ever, discussion, commentary and analysis falls into that trap. Secondly, can you please explain the difference between "selfism" and "selfishness"? Thanks
1
The fatal flaw of liberals is the mistaken certitude that they are smarter than everyone else. Thus, the need for lawn signs proclaiming their antipathy for hatred, just in case the rest of us don’t know that hatred is a bad thing.
8
We’re just counterbalancing trump’s hate speech, which is difficult because I don’t have as many Twitter followers as he.
@Larry Um, millions of Americans apparently do not know that hatred is a bad thing.
This is a very accurate description of our society, and why we shouldn't have nice things like social media.
But of course the examples are all very one sided.
Indignation is the reaction de jour across the political spectrum. If its not lawn signs, its MAGA hats. Everyone has their special story and all the newspapers have to start their articles with some personal little story, before actually getting to the issue. And condemning bad people - ooh we have so many words for that - communist, fascist, socialist, free-loader, libertard, deplorable, racist, snowflake...i can keep going but no need. Time to go find a way to signal my virtue.
3
Canvassing this last election with my husband we learned to step away from houses with “Hate Not Welcome Here” and similar signs offering inclusivity (often near “No Soliciting” signs) in the windows. Your column helps me appreciate they were just much better people than we were trying to talk about the issues and candidates. Thanks!
1
Thanks David. I am still laughing (not kidding), as I can't remember another column dominated by mocking, which in this case is richly deserved. Far less amusing is that this formula actually works well for so many celebrities, business tycoons, athletes, religious leaders, school shooters, and even Presidents. Would it be fair to call DJT the most narcissistic public figure in the US? Woops, I almost forgot about Kanye. No doubt both would try to claim the crown.
9
Sometimes cultures come to moral crossroads when it is time to choose a side. America was at such a crossroads in run up to the Civil War and in the 1960s. I believe now is another such time with so much on the line -- including the life of the planet itself. Yes, service, love, forgiveness are part of any vital moral life -- individual or collective. Those essential stances are counterbalanced by equally important moral impulses for justice, fairness, and standing against what is wrong. Ideally, both sets of ideals work together to make up a coherent, vibrant moral life which is lived to the benefit of us all.
2
Mr Brooks,
Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness are paramount within our national philosophy, but how do we achieve those real and existential goals if not with the help of others? We are all narcissists to degrees, but isn't it the balance of self and others that guides us? Is who we are and our success not largely dependent on what others think? Our success depends on cooperation. Narcissism, pure selfism ultimately isolates, rendering existential morality pointless.There is no objective way of judging one’s moral preference over another’s, but our existential moral compass guides us through life, which is influenced by others. It’s circular that the individual’s success depends on the groups judgment which in turn guides our existential behavior within the group. And harmful behavior doesn’t last long. Pockmarked with lapses in moral thinking, history has shown that humans have made progress balancing selfish motives with group success. Sometimes, putting others first is a necessary part of putting yourself first, but self absorbed narcissists gain little traction making the world a better place. That is as true in past centuries as it is glaringly obvious in this one. A single formula for happiness? No. Selfism and finding meaning in life are a part of it, I suppose, but ignoring our reflection on others can leave us alone. And in isolation, does it matter at all what we think? We can evade reality, but we cannot evade the consequences of evading reality. - Ann Rand
1
Thank you, David. Truly enjoyed your column.
I have to live my life surrounded by many Saint You(s) in my profession, as academia is full of righteous people.
At times it feels like academia has fully reverted to its old, pre-Newton role of a religious institution - a place of enforced consensus and theological purity. Percy Shelley was famously expelled from Oxford for atheism for daring to question the orthodoxy of the university. I have no evidence that he would fare any better in today’s world of enforced righteousness.
8
I had to check the calendar to make sure this wasn't an April 1st column instead of the beginning of January. David seems to be in a particularly bad mood about...well, it's not obvious.
Self-absorption is not new or unusual. Social media has demonstrated the levels it can reach. This, however, does not mean one can't also be aware of others and their needs or that there are things that need fixing, changing, stopping.
I know this to be true because a lot of inward-oriented people voted to stop the madness in our national government. We're not done, but we'll get there...inward and outward.
Eclectic Pragmatism — http://eclectic-pragmatist.tumblr.com/
Eclectic Pragmatist — https://medium.com/eclectic-pragmatism
5
I can't help but think that this is some Swiftian "Modest Proposal" for the era of Trump. After having read David Brooks all these years, I can't believe that this is anything but satire.
Mr. Brooks, perhaps your age is showing? Maybe you're longing for the old days before technology graced us with the ability to take a selfie of every meal we eat? Before people walking on the beach weren't filiming their experience with a phone? When the phone fit just right between your ear and your mouth, instead of being flat?
This seems to be a good rant, just as long as it's not aimed at anyone's particular politics, which it doesn't seem to be.
I'm going to read it again - and I don't usually read your columns twice.
3
The problem with the self today is that it has become super easy to express ourselves. Sadly much of it has very little value to others. My 2 cents. Hee hee.
4
"When you are indignant, or woke, you are showing that you have a superior moral awareness," he said indignantly.
113
@SL
In a report tonight that Jill Abramson disclosed that in the late 2000 the Saltzberger family sent an apology letter to China's leadership apologizing for a critical story the Times published about China that offended their leaders. Judith Shulevitz has an Op Ed today on book writers now having to sign morality clauses. Shouldn't such a trend then apply to owners of prestigious newspapers? If true, such an apology would be a major embarrassment to the owners of this paper?
You know what feels even better? Watching Fox, and reading your column on certain lazy days in a time when we need sarcasm that speaks truth to corrupt power, David.
2
If somebody starts talking about some grand hero who is dead or lives far away, you should just respond, “Sorry, that’s not relatable.”
Sounds like someone is denouncing the teachings of the greatest do gooder of all. NOT a very good article as far as living a true Christian life.
1
The culture of narcissism begins and ends with the most narcissistic of all, our president.
Where was he in this conversation?
9
Everybody chill!
Mr. Brooks has been driven to despair. When all else is lost, there is still irony.
Give the poor dude a break!
6
I kind of followed your (rather feeble) attempt at sarcasm, until I got to the part where you use "Hate is not welcome here" and "Stop the violence" as examples of self preoccupation. Are you serious? You could have at least counterbalanced one of those with "MAGA".
It seems to me that the sentiment behind the "Hate has no home here" sign is the perception that there is resurgence of hatred in the world, and that hate needs to be countered. That is not self-indulgence. That is trying to make the world as safe and tolerable for our children and grandchildren as it has been for us.
16
People who are upset by this column should take a moment and reflect upon it as simply being something offered in the literary style of no less an author than Jonathan Swift: Satire. Mr. Brooks is no more proposing the exaltation of the imperial self as the measure of all goodness than was Swift actually promoting the harvesting of Irish children to make gloves and purses.
Context people... Please never forget to put any written offering, even opinion columns, into the literary genre it reflects. You'll save yourself a lot of distress and upset if you do.
3
What a cynical piece!? Unfortunately, this reads like a desperate eulogy for conservative individualism or liberal communitarianism. It is clear that Brooks is belittling who we really are--glamour animals or the divas of nature. What he doesn't realize, I believe, is that we actually seek higher levels and intensities of meaning, but Brooks' cynicism prevents him from seeing and appreciating this aspect of human, cultural development. We are not tragically condemned to be the self-absorbed animals that Brooks fixates about. We still do and can strive to live well and better! Brooks is speaking in this piece as exuding the virtues of a passive-aggressive flaneur, who wants to make a caricature of our dominant rituals in the techno-and infospheres!
5
Selfies are giving self portraits a bad name.
1
Brilliant piece of satire.
4
Thank you Mr. Brooks on your smug review of how the left sees morality. Thank you also for stuffing all us simpletons into a neat-o gift-wrapped box. I thought we were rightly upset about keeping brown kids in jail with aluminum-foil blankets, or taking away their food stamps. You're telling us that we're just plain silly. The next time I see a homeless person holding up a sign, instead of throwing them a couple of dollars (which I wouldn't miss anyway). I'll just read your column one more time. Much Obliged.
9
One side tends to spread outraging news stories, based in truth and from reputable news sources, about corporate rapaciousness, environmental destruction, police brutality, sexual assault, racism, modern-day genocides, and poverty.
The other side tends to spread memes and conspiracy theories, based in lies and from dubious or demonstrably fake news sources, about immigrants, Muslims, LGBTQ people, Jews, and "globalists."
Surely, we're the ones worthy of mockery and satire though, right, David?
This column comes across about as poorly as an ill-timed rape joke by an ignorant comedian or the comments by my old racist uncle about how "those people shouldn't protest that way." Stupid, selfish, narcissistic us for trying to support small businesses, take on the challenges of the future and putting social good above personal profit. I'm a teacher and just what I needed to start this new year off was a reminder that I'm what's really wrong with this nation.
David, here's something for you to reflect upon: if we're the ones worthy of your mockery, then who is worthy of your praise? There's a quote out there about good people doing nothing, and if you're mocking those of us who deign to try and do something, then perhaps you're not as anti-MAGA as you presume yourself to be.
9
Thank you David,
I feel better already. I hope you do too.
2
Nice poke at the term "woke" that people on the left use for becoming aware or having a better understanding of issues or circumstances that they did not notice or care about before. Kind of a bitter blunt barb given the tone of the piece. But more disturbing is this "Mother Teresa tried to live up to a standard of selfless love." Wrong. Mother Teresa advanced the oppressive agenda of a corrupt institution -- outdated dogma regarding abortion, contraception and divorce. Big miss by Brooks.
3
Thanks Ayn
2
Have you noticed that people who use me.com really mean it?
me me me!
When I first started reading this piece I thought Brooks was trying to cement his credibility as a Never-Trumper by lampooning the Selfie in Chief. But then I got to the part about yard signs and T-shirts and figured he was engaging in a more classic Republican ploy—projecting the spineless selfishness his party has exhibited these last two years onto the other side. It was only on my third pass, hovering over the “locally grown” produce, that finally I got it: this was a dig at conservatives’ favorite liberal characterization—the holier-than-thou “elite”—delivered with all the subtlety and nuance of a self-righteous conservative elitist with nary a hint of self-awareness.
Rumor has it, Mr. Brooks, that you do not read the comments on your opinion pieces. On the offchance you do, I would humbly suggest that if your idea of comedic timing is a ham punch at a liberal stereotype on the same day an historically diverse new class of Democratic representatives was sworn in, the same day the first female Speaker of the House in history retook the gavel, coincidentally on the 100th anniversary of women’s suffrage, you might want to hold on to your day job.
10
Wonderful, and a good corrective - I did find myself reflected (though hopefully dimly) in some of your humorous depictions, Mr. Brooks.
I might have added a bit about the pompous smugness of neoconservativism, as this large blind spot doesn't apply only to those on the left, though your send-up of those on the left was very enjoyable.
Please keep on writing about the spirit of our nation - we need that mirror, perhaps now more than at any time in decades.
3
The queen of “selfism”, Ayn Rand, deserves a mention. Especially since she has had so much influence over contemporary conservative ecomonics and thought. I find it ironic, that, Mr. Brooks’ sarcasm would seem to be directed at liberals; when it would be more appropriately directed at his own party.
9
Can anyone challenge this post without whataboutism? We get it, the Republicans are worse, far worse. Or, would criticizing leftist positions be damaging to one's own ego?
4
Satire is defined as "the use of humor, irony, exaggeration, or ridicule to expose and criticize people's stupidity or vices, particularly in the context of contemporary politics and other topical issues."
That is all. Nothing more, nothing less.
Unless that is, you feel indignant to other people's views.
2
Jugding by many of the comments, Mr. Brooks has performed a feat here: turning ironists into puritans!
2
A fine set of principles and guidelines for living the complete reality tv life. And, how timely, we stars-in-our-own-minds have a presidential exemplar to follow even if we hate him.
Morality certainly lies in a duality of how you perceive yourself as well as others, and I don’t mean your friends or people who generally hold to your opinion and world view but to the, “other,” those not in your community or family. People whom have faced discrimination and oppression usually easily empathize with others, regardless of tribe, whom are also facing similar treatments. Those whom have not faced these kinds of vicissitudes either rationalize them away, blame the aggrieved party or even worse, claim that they are now being discriminated against.
We see what narcissism leads to when coupled with power, why would it not be so on any other level?
To be meaningful, the self must, to some degree, exhibit authenticity. To the degree that our actions match our words, we are authentic or whole persons. The problem I find with this essay addressing meaning and authenticity is that it's author is clearly inauthentic. For decades Brooks has appealed to the life and ethic of Jesus of Nazareth as the template for an authentic and wholesome humanity and society. At the same time he has supported the Republican Party which, in its current iteration, is doing everything possible to deny the poor, the sick, the disadvantaged and outcast. Why should I listen to him?
7
We all have a sense of tingly in what we believe. And tingly should not make us feel good. Tingly is the warning sign that we are in the wrong place. Sort of like Colbert's "truthiness" or South Park's 2006 "Smug Alert" episode. Rather, it should immediately make us ask ourselves about our real motivations for what we believe and how we act on those beliefs.
We all have beliefs. But self-righteousness is just that - self. It's tricky business to keep affirmation of one's beliefs in action, and not just words. I try and often fail at the simplest rule "Love (respect/listen to) your neighbor as yourself." We then have to become listeners instead of shooting off our own mouths. I don't like tingly because it shows I'm not listening and not respecting myself or others.
1
I'm not sure why everyone is taking this column like it's a personal attack on the left. I happen to see more of the 'selfism' on the right side of the aisle - regardless, it's a social ill that doesn't have a political boundary.
@Nick
Well, I would too, except that the specific references are to "woke", "locally grown", "Hate is not welcome here" and "Stop the Violence" all of which refer to the left. There are no similar example on the right, though the right has as much or larger a hold on self-righteousness and judgement of others.
3
@Nick Mr. Brooks did not shower his satire on the other side, it was a one sided assault! That’s the issue!
This is escapism from social responsibility.
Unfortunately for Mr. Brooks it is the only exit he has from his years of defending socially and morally destructive "conservative [read sociopathic]" positions leading to today's Rush Limbaugh-Sean Hannity-Donald Trump party.
Humans are perfect themselves in isolation. However, they are also part of society, and just feeling tingly inside gets you Donald Trump, not Nelson Mandela. Same difference as in children and adults.
2
I grew up in a very legalistic small town Christian environment. Now I'm a big city educated liberal. But I wonder lately if my liberalism is the new legalism. I escaped an environment that judged everyone on their sexual purity, only to wind up judging everyone for their carbon footprints.
1
@Andy
The difference is that sexual purity is none of your business. Carbon footprints are everyone’s business.
Isn't "woke" just cool way of saying "informed" or "politically engaged?" It means the same thing. Why David Brooks should be so offended that young people are "woke" is a mystery.
I get the argument that we should all be aiming to cultivate our characters. I agree with it. But the "woke" people aren't the problem. By definition, "wokeness" demands that you keep up with the issues, that you stay informed.
If Brooks wants to lecture someone, he should start with the know-nothings, the xenophobes and science-deniers and Christian demagogues who don't care about kids being killed at school or along the border.
Or does he not bother because he knows the people most in need of a lecture don't read his column?
6
It is ironic that so many comments on this piece only confirm this tongue in cheek but deadly accurate characterization of today's US culture.
8
Loved it! Just what I needed!
4
Thanks David. Finally an article that makes it okay for all the indignant people to post indignant messages criticizing you for minimizing their struggles and belittling their existence.
5
When I started reading this, I thought Brooks would be citing Adam Smith and the “invisible hand”. But I was wrong. I thought individuals pursuing their own self interest, as opposed to government telling you what to do, was a key tenet of conservative thought. Thus being selfish and feeling morally superior should be ok. Regarding “me-ism” have you spoken to Donald or Mitch lately?
3
As a long time reader and admirer of David Brooks, once I finished this commentary, I sat back and said..."I wonder". I wonder how many people will take this piece literally as written? I wonder how many people will think David has gone over to to the dark side? I wonder how many people will think David has finally seen the light? I wonder how many people will totally miss is point...right down to the exaggerated use of exclamation marks.
It turns out that many people have totally missed the point of this very skillfully written commentary. I see this as a masterful parody of what our country has become...we have become Trumpified to the point where people believe that 'selfism' is an acceptable norm to be emulated widely. This is very scary indeed.
Brilliant writing!
4
I think we can all agree that the world would be a better place if we all tried to be better people. Part of being a better person is self-care and self-assessment. You have to take care of yourself in order to take care of others.
I think Mr. Brooks means to lampoon what he sees as narcissistic tendencies in our culture. And that’s fine. Narcissism is harmful to the narcissist and to society at large. But self-care and farmers markets and the various other examples of liberal pastimes Mr. Brooks uses are not inherently narcissistic, and are poor examples of the ills of narcissism.
3
I get the sarcasm, on the second paragraph I had to stop and read through the comments, to confirm others were thinking as I was.
But man I do hope Mr. Brooks was satirizing the satire because the whole thing was just another selfish call back to the "grand old times" when things were great because I agree with them...
3
One of the paragons Mr. Brooks lists - Mother Teresa - hardly met the standard of "selfless Love", as Christopher Hitchens detailed in an essay that was almost completely ignored. Among the many inconsistencies in the good Saint's character (sarcasm) was her insistence on never upgrading the facilities of her original Calcutta hospice, despite receiving countless millions in donations.
Here's a link to Hitchens' essay:
https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2003/10/the-fanatic-fraudulent-mother-teresa.html
3
Maybe I'm weird, but I found this column amusing, although I disagree with its focus on liberals as the only self-absorbed people out there. Nonetheless, mindless self-absorption deserves to be mocked, wherever it appears, including farmers' markets. For your next column, Mr Brooks, why not skewer the mindless self-absorption among conservatives? There are plenty of examples, God knows.
2
Bravo! Another extravaganza of overclass projection and tilting at strawmen. I do not know how I made it through the book leave.
7
I'm confused about what Brooks is saying. I know some people base morality on old books and teachings but my impression has always been that those people end up saying I am good because I say I believe the book. I think each of us is nothing but self since all we understand comes thorough self, "I think therefore I am". I also believe each of us sees self as good. I don't believe we can see our own self as evil. Trump thinks he's good, McConnell thinks he's good. I have in my mind what I think makes me good, what I perceive as good, and when I act I act to be who I perceive myself to be.
1
I don't agree with a lot of what is in this column, least of all the snarky tone. But, I am amazed at how many of the commentators prove the point Mr. Brooks is making by taking offense at what they perceive to be directed at them and condemning the bad "other people".
4
I do proclaim my values at my door stop and sometimes on my clothing to let those who are being vilified know that I'm on their side. I do tell my painful stories about being sexually assaulted to let the young girls and women (and and boys and men) in my life know that they too can speak up, that what has happened is not their fault. I do condemn people I know who make bigoted comments because silence is complicity. And while I'm often indignant, I spend much more time loving and serving others by volunteering my time and money.
David Brooks has long been one of the conservative writers I felt was worth reading. He often gave me a new way of seeing things. Well, no more. He's become as much of a hack as any Fox News celebrity.
4
I would take a "hate is not welcome here" lawn sign over the "Hillary for Prison" sign that is STILL up at an Ulster County NY house that i pass regularly any day of the week. seriously, it's still up. how can i make myself heard?
6
David, though an intelligent and thoughtful man, has the weakness of affecting an Olympian worldview. He sounded like someone building a resume for the position of philosopher-king.
4
You’ve isolated a group of people who are in the process of attaining knowledge and like to say things about how that knowledge makes them feel and/or they like to do things that make them feel good. How dare they. Everyone ought to know everything and act in a way that is most beneficial to society immediately and not feel good about it. Bravo, Mr. Brooks. Brilliant article.
For the entire history of this country there have been selfish people who deemed their personal feelings and needs to be more important than everyone else’s. In previous generations, these people became the owners of the fields and factories. They consolidated wealth and power. This continues to be true. The rest of us are told we should all just shut up and do what the boss tells us.
Sarah sits quietly at her desk, but only for 38 hours, so that the company doesn’t have to pay for benefits. The idea of saving money is a joke. Not to mention, she’s not had a meaningful raise in the 7 years she’s been working despite growing earnings for executives and shareholders. How dare she be indignant.
Knowledge exists on a spectrum. The ability to publish your thoughts is binary. Understanding how people feel and how those feelings comport with facts is an invaluable step towards creating a politically sustainable future. Our society’s task is to create a governing structure that curtails manipulation and actually represents us. Political and emotional expression is necessary to that end.
2
The benefit afforded a viable retirement permits one to explore the world (and culture) not possible during one’s working lifetime. The morality that Brooks speaks of must be viewed in the socioeconomic environment in which to make moral and behavioral decisions. Regrettably we find ourselves in a world that has evolved into one characterized by greed and evil. I call this “greevil” - perhaps this mnemonic will catch on. Greed seems inherent in our nature; evil is a consequence of existing law and governance. As a friend often tells me, “the young’uns will save us”. I am skeptical.
1
The play here is to confuse necessary and sufficient. To be good, it is necessary to care, and to influence others to care. But when Brooks points out that those are not sufficient the take-away should not be the implied one: that those things are not necessary.
2
It is not often that read something in the NYT that makes me laugh out loud. Thanks!
10
you nailed it bro. someone gave me advice not long ago, "sometimes i just say to myself, i am enough, i have enough, i've done enough". and, i am happy to read this man's column on top of that. and, i love the exclamation points!!
3
Well, Mr. Brooks - i used to think of you as a rather intelligent guy. But no more. If everyone were as selfish, narcissistic, and short-sighted as our president, the earth (and its population) could not exist.
If everyone loaded up their glock and headed out on 5th Ave to shoot people as our president has said (and now you as well), w/o any recourse and expecting a round of applause or a chant (Shoot-Them-All, would probably suffice), how many peeps would be left?
By ignoring scientific evidence about global warming and repealing relevant restrictions and laws, forgetting about future generations, where are YOU going to live.
Whoever invented the republican party, such as it is today, probably ought to be given a severe time-out in solitary confinement to see if they can figure out what's wrong with their thinking, as a requirement for release. I'm betting that everyone else in the world would get along just fine w/o them for however long that takes.
2
This article seems to hit a topic that's been relevant since Hillary's campaign - being moderate and not outspoken secures masculinity and your image. It's cooler and simply easier to avoid speaking out against injustices because you avoid uncomfortable backlash online and in person, whether that be from a family member or a peer that is high on the social ladder.
Indignation is a step forward, and ignoring injustices is simply giving a helping hand to those enforcing these unfair practices. But why bother speaking up when it doesn't affect you, right? Being a white male is hard sometimes, especially when others are being selfish!
4
I am a BoBo living in Paradise (see David's 2000 book) and long ago reached the conclusion that self respect is worthless unless it is based on bourgoise standards of the day, so the notion that other peoples opinions could possibly affect my bonhomie seems irrelevant.
David Brooks lives for the moral high ground and if he can’t seem virtuous then no-one can. Since Trump has made it very difficult for Brooks to maintain his identity as a sanctimonious and morally upright conservative he’s doing back flips trying to maintain a morally superior position. He has no ground to stand on and so is getting spiteful and vague.
8
If you, meaning those of you who still have some semblance of conscience and awareness, feel “judged” by others who have a defined “meaning” in support of a common good, perhaps it is time for some serious self-assessment. NO ONE has all the right answers. Adamantine stubbornness is intellectually and morally corrupt. Look at Trump, as an obvious example.
Trump is only aware of himself and what is in HIS best interest. He is incapable of self-assessment; he does not possess the intelligence or demeanor for it. As such, he will continue to self- destruct and take everyone and every thing associated with him down to its lowest common denominator and destruction.
I would hope that most Americans are smarter than that, but Republican polls seem to indicate otherwise. They keep doing the same things, lying and scheming, yet expect diffe4ent outcomes. The handwriting is on the wall, and it’s in glaring neon. Try to be ethical and garner the best moral advice from your personal religions; don’t be swayed by people who tell you WHAT to think; learn HOW to think. You will be surprised by the favorable outcome for all.
2
The truly galling thing about Mr. Brooks’ recent columns is their dishonesty: The basis for his sermonizing is always Ronald Reagan’s myth of the shining city upon a hill — and how we’ve now lost it. In Mr. Brooks’ updated mythology, America once comprised ethical, shiny happy people until …. well, until Donald Trump became POTUS. And suddenly we became a despondent, rag-tag assortment of socially and morally untethered lost souls being overtaken by existential doom.
Well, America did lose something in 2016: It lost Mr. Brooks’ beloved Republican Party, which took over government and then gladly followed the Pied Trumpster right off the Cliff of Decency. But that’s your loss, Mr. Brooks — it’s not mine; I’m happy to watch those Republicans self-destruct. Sure, losing an organization as important as the Party of Lincoln is troubling, but it’s not troubling like The People losing their souls would be troubling. Truth is, times changed and not all for the better, but for the vast majority, America remains the same as it ever was: a complicated mix of the very good and the very bad, at times difficult and at times rewarding. For all the same old reasons.
Please, Mr. Brooks, stop transferring YOUR personal angst onto OUR personal lives. Stop with the gimcrack sermonizing about what’s wrong with us — if you can’t be honest enough to admit that these things were ALWAYS wrong with us. You aren’t making things better and you’re potentially making them worse.
8
When we’re absorbed with self, we’re usually in some kind of pain - physical, emotional, psychological, spiritual.
I get the sarcasm, David, but I think the diagnosis of “narcissism” is incorrect. A lot of people find the context in which we live to be frightening, frustrating, disappointing and painful. It’s challenging to express those feelings these days.
Perhaps you need to channel your irritation into writing a self-help book.
4
Ignoring the sarcasm (please!) the core argument here is, as always with the right-wing, "the old days."
Those "old" days when the "morality" of a society was established by wealthy white men and served solely the interests of - wait for it - wealthy white men.
That is what Brooks is advocating for here. A return to "the old days" when someone like him could speak and not be disputed because wait for it - the words of wealthy white me are the only things that matter.
This is what is wrong with right-wing "intellectualism." It is devoid of ideas and seeks only to undo, tear down and go back - to the days when wealthy white men set all the rules.
Actually, you didn't have to be all that wealthy. It mostly helped if you were white and a man.
6
A man who's made his career carrying water for the greedheads of conservatism is now railing against the so-called self-absorption of the left.
Seriously, folks, you can't make this stuff up.
9
One can only hope Mr. Brooks is aware that this piece is a textbook example of the very thing it purports to critique: performative moralism.
4
Whoa, so moderate conservatives are going to start really adhering to external morals, now? Great!
3
I was most of the way through penning an irate response to this, but then I had to upgrade my Instachat feed...
4
It seems to me Brook's target was not liberals, as many of the comments seem to say, but the satisfied masses who think their arm chair activism is the equivalent of the real thing. No wonder so many commentators were offended. A little too close to home, ey?
5
@SC
If this is the case, why are his examples so politically one-sided?
1
@Brad Blumenstock It's true he's mocking liberals, but it's for their armchair wokeness and virtue signaling, not for the fact that they are liberal.
If you really look at it politically then this column is pro-liberal, as he's chiding liberals for being self-satisfied and not doing more, so it's intention then is to guilt liberals into actually doing something.
Me, navigating through a miasma of musings, meandering among the mementos of my mission as muse to mankind, as the maker of meaning, as the meter of morality. Me, the mendacious movement of must, for a moment meekly mindful of mortality.
1
It is now, always was and will forever be about intersectionality.
Actually Mother Theresa refused any care oe compassion for the sick who came to her unless they first agreed to convert to Catholicism on the spot.
4
At the time she was alive, I remember Catholic conservatives condemning Mother Theresa for administering to the physical needs of Muslims and Hindus without attempting to convert them.
Damned then for one thing and damned now for the opposite.
Poor lady.
1
You mean Ayn Rand's core philosophy? The one Paul Ryan preaches?
6
Huh? Wha? This is satire, right? Right???
If not, I just thought of a new t-shirt slogan: "David Brooks made me hate myself." If this is really how old-school moralists like David Brooks view my generation, we are all doomed. My contemporaries and I have failed humanity most epically.
First of all, the rejection of external guilt is a uniquely protestant phenomenon. Not just any protestants either. We're mostly talking about specific US protestants. Shedding moral aspirations for personal enjoyment is neither common nor healthy for a moral compass.
"Catholic guilt" is the most notable cliche. However, most people should feel guilt, or at least disappointment, over failing to achieve the same acts of ethical celebrity as Mother Teresa, Abraham Lincoln, Martin Luther King, or Mahatma Gandhi. Your selfie ice bucket challenge falls far short of a greater vision.
We should feel proud about small accomplishments. However, don't over emphasize the mundane either. Drinking local beer and shopping at the farmers market isn't exactly paradigm shattering.
Telling yourself "great job" over little stuff is a good morale booster. However, telling yourself "great job" over little stuff is also a sure path to change nothing. By contrast, feeling indignant over everything is a sure path to an early grave. You need to look at the bigger picture sometimes.
Water bottles yesterday, straws today. Yet most people still don't know our plastic recycle is mostly exported to China.
4
I see what you did there, David, with the sly "woke" reference. But the people I know who seem perpetually indignant are the ones who have the Outrage Channel going all the time on their teevees.
10
What a peculiar piece of satire! It took me more than half-way to twig... I just hope nobody takes this seriously. And I know, we are all NYT readers... still, some profound, well-written ignorance comes through... Bravo Mr Brooks!
2
Thank goodness! I started my new year by resolving to question the value of my value system -- one honed over many decades of life -- but this opinion piece has quickly set me onto the correct path of perfect me-ness. Thanks so much, Mr. Brooks; I owe you.
(Oops, does my appreciation violate my me-ness? There goes that dang value thing-ie again!)
As a matter of fact, I do NOT welcome hatred. I DO condemn violence. I DO buy organic. I DO relate stories of injustice, including ones I’ve experienced first hand. I AM indignant, and righteously so. How you’ve managed to construe these things as “selfish”, and why anyone construes this article as funny, is beyond me.
This is just more of the same Republican sentiment we’ve been hearing for years: “how dare you have the gall to judge me for my greed and bigotry?!?!” Talk about selfishness and indignation.
5
Clearly, irony is dead. Mr. Brooks has built a career on taking the side of and telling the story of those who worry first about their own pocketbooks, and second ... Oops! There is no 'second.'
10
I think you nailed it, Mr. Brooks. Much needed, and hilarious, too!
2
It's ironic to be chided by a conservative for being selfish.
10
I think David left out one of the most important tenets of selfism which is entitlement. Surely he can recognize entitlement as selfism among his own people.
2
Touche.
I'm old enough to remember our heroes being Jimmy Stewart characters playing out middle class struggles honorably. So sad how our culture has changed into "selfism."
1
Brooks is actually pretty good at being snarky. No other great import needs to be assigned to this piece. So many commenters took it as being aimed directly at themselves, which makes perfect ironic sense.
2
Ah yes, Mr. Brooks, I get it.
Wouldn't it be nice if people weren't so judgmental?
Wouldn't it be nice if people didn't project so much?
Wouldn't it be nice if people weren't so self righteous?
Wouldn't it be nice if people were just, you know, better people?
The world would be a better place. Ah, if only.
I like David Brooks' columns, but here he sounds like that cranky, old neighbor, who screams at the kids across the street for playing too loud... The irony is, he has the kernel of a good idea about the self-absorbed moralism of the political-correctness crowd, but he undercuts his own case, seeing how his criticism is too scattershot, and his tone is off-putting.
2
Wonderful and funny piece. The misfire, however, is in the use of "meaning" and "meaningful" to describe private feelings of self-satisfaction. That is not what these words usually mean. "Meaning" is more often connected with purpose, something for which one might sacrifice pleasures, and social standing, and even good feelings. Meaning most often comes to us from something beyond ourselves, something that gives our lives meaning that we did not have simply in ourselves.
1
I realize Brooks very likely did not write this column to warn people of color, or people from "undesirable" ethnic groups, but it may serve as a reminder, just in case one is needed, that the people with the lawn signs are not always your friends.
Window dressing is sometimes there to hide something ugly. Most people know, yet will let their guard down. As James Baldwin said, always be cordial but circumspect: when there is anything truly important at stake, first see whether those people paid their dues.
1
Of course I agree that a culture of narcissism unmoored from larger/transcendent values is a bad idea. Once again, though, Brooks is making an argument that he either intentionally intends as a criticism of the Left, or that is unwittingly tailor-made to be employed as a cudgel by the Right.
In fact, many of the values the oft-illusive Left espouses -- equitable opportunities and justice for all; an economic system that doesn't enslave or exploit the poor while largely serving the wealthiest; protection of our environment and our mental and physical health -- are actually transcendent ideals, rather than selfish ones. While this may also be true of some of the ideas of traditional Conservatives, too, it is certainly not true of the current GOP.
What Brooks overlooks here is that many of the "woke" people he maligns are in fact taking unpopular stances; are standing up to/against real injustices, not just inconveniences; are taking not just social but also economic and physical risks by propounding the ideas and issues and views they're putting forth, in opposition to the mainstream. Speaking up against systemic racism, sadly, is actually not nearly as popular as it should be, especially if you're white and wealthy. Just look at our president, who rarely if ever speaks about it, yet constantly rails against black athletes, politicians, and so forth, should they dare to question the status quo or him.
6
Bad week, Mr. Brooks? Couldn't come up with anything to write about, so we got THIS? You can do better. Not much, but still, "better."
5
Wow! Looks like Brooks is chafing at the judgement of his liberal peers. Get used to it Dave. It’s called instant karma. We ARE indignant, and righteously so. And “hate IS not welcome here”. And you HAVE spent a career defending the cruelty, selfishness, and bigotry inherent in the GOP. This is the time of your reckoning. You don’t seem to be handling it that well.
7
This column is classic David Brooks - sounding smart and filling space with gibberish. The good now is meaning as defined by self; morality is liberals imposing their standards to others. The killer of news media is the obsession on equivalent but opposing views regardless of its meaninglessness editors go asleep while falsehoods are spilled to little minds to consume. NYT could and should do better than this.
3
So expressing outrage at the separation of families and deaths of children at the border is self righteousness? Demanding justice for the poor or marginalized in our society is hypocritical? Concern about access to healthcare, decent housing and nutrition for the poor is selfishness? By your standards Jesus Christ was a self absorbed narcissist. What kind of bizarro world do you live in, Mr Brooks? I am astounded that the Times would actually print this nonsensical "satire."
3
So many uncharateristic exclamation points in this piece Mr. Brooks! Did you overdose on latte or are you pulling our leg(s)? Hard to say!
2
Oh dear. I imagine that you relished your own verbal cleverness and irony. But, it is so tiring and annoying to read. Try harder to be the thoughtful, self-questioning writer I think you can be. Lately, this skill has fallen by the wayside.
2
David,
Sarcasm is not your strong suit. Your point, a good one, in today’s column would have been better made directly.
Greg
1
I write to inform you that you have exceeded your quota of exclamation points for the month of January. As an adult, you are strictly limited to using a maximum of ten exclamation points per month. Do try to be more careful in your future writing.
2
Let's simplify David Brooks' job, and put all his 2019 column headlines in the form of those refrigerator magnets with miscellaneous words on them. That way his contributions here will practically write themselves.
The Morality of Selfism
The Selfism of Morality
Self: Morally
My Selfish Morals
Morally, Moi
Selfishly Me
The The of The
Of: Word or Pet?
Me, Myself, and Platitudes
How to Make a Living Doing Nothing: My Story
7
Even the morally superior altruist is self absorbed.
5
Another hectoring pot/kettle column, written a minimum of 10 years late, directed to the wrong team.
8
Usually like your columns. This one somehow doesn't come off. I understand this is supposed to be sarcastic or a parody or ?? Just misses the mark. Seems confusing to me and not biting. Too bad.
1
David, Why did I keep thinking about Ayn Rand and her right-wing acolytes (e.g., Paul Ryan, Rand Paul, the Koch Bros, etc) when reading your snarky piece? Why didn't you when writing it?
5
So many exclamation points, David! Why?
2
Oh good lord be quiet.
6
Look in the mirror Mr. Brooks.
2
Will David Brooks ever learn that moral scolding goes down a whole lot better if it comes from someone who shows humility?
Has he ever, in all his years at the Times, spoken about his own moral failings, or laughed about his own very human inability to do “the good that I would do,” to quote Paul?
Mr. Brooks, it’s not that you don’t - occasionally, anyway - have something interesting to say. It’s that your supercilious tone - your inability to enter into and participate in the human comedy - makes you an insufferable teacher.
I guess he just thinks he’s perfect the way he is!
2
@Wesley Clark, MD, MPH I think it's primarily because he's never gotten over his failure, almost two decades ago, to install the term "BoBo" solidly into our national lexicon.
Oh David. Give me a break.
1
This is snark, right?
Not so easily fooled, David. This piece comes across about as self-righteous as anything you have written.
A typical "family values" and "traditionalist" diatribe.
Give it a rest. Research the meta-ethical concepts of ethical consequentialism and ethical deontology from an honest perspective, then get back to me with which you think is morally superior and provides for the least human suffering overall.
1
Fifth: you should use a year’s worth of exclamation marks in a single column.
Is there anyone more selfish than a racist?
1
I really don't care, do u?
4
This may be the worst Brooks column I've ever read. Small and petulant. Could it all be some sort of put-on I'm too dense to recognize? Serious question.
3
Dear Mr. Brooks, Straw Man much? Jeez.
3
I love the humor columns David and Ross just keep cranking out.
2
Sarcasm is indeed the lowest form of wit. Thanks for the reminder, Brooks.
And hey - it’s rich bemoaning the culture of “selfism” in an op-ed column where you are paid richly to, er, rabbit on about whatever you want to. Selfism pays the Brooks bills!
3
Is this how you see all those correspondents to your columns who fault your shortcomings, David? Just a cabal of angry, narcissistic men and women who don't appreciate all that you are trying to do for humanity?
3
Wow, David Brooks channels Alexandra Petri. What's next? Paul Krugman cribbing Dave Barry?
1
With all due respect, David, I beg to differ profoundly. I was called last Sunday to come to care for an ailing relative. When I asked my wife, she said go without hesitation. Her life is complicated and will be worse without me. I flew across the country the next morning, and I have slept perhaps ten hours since. Compassion is everywhere around me, everywhere; in the hospital, in the street, those I know and those I meet for the first time. It is prevalent. I'd be willing to bet if you were to poll the public you'd find this is so. My informal poll says so. It is the odd person who doesn't get this, and they simply are missing a fundamental ingredient in their being. The shadows they cast are puny.
As Eleanor Roosevelt remarked, I'd rather light a candle than complain about the dark.
Let me reassure you, people everywhere are doing this because it is the right thing, what distinguishes us as human beings. We take nothing else with us when we leave this earth.
I read Kate Bowles' op-ed before leaving, and sent her book, Everything Happens for a Reason, as consolation for my relative. It arrived when I did, and I am reading it myself.
The vast majority of people are not as you describe, and I feel sorry for you if your circle is that way inclined, and recommend you get out and walk the streets of your city. You will find what I have: compassion in abundance everywhere.
9
David, your first sentence is excellent: "You probably want to be a good person. But you may also be completely self-absorbed."
Human beings, regardless of political leanings, want to be good. We help out our next door neighbor or co-worker when they need a hand.
I work with a staunch MAGA right-winger and a Me Too leftie in the same office. We all get along. We all help each other. We are all kind to each other in the office and joke around.
But you will find these same people on the opposite side of the street demonstration yelling at each other.
Our emotions decide what side we take, not our common sense. Politics and values are emotional positions, not logical ones. Facts don't matter. I believe data-driven decisions are better than pure emotional ones, but people must feel emotionally safe before they look at sane politics.
This is a fair satirical critique of some aspects of the culture of narcissism and how it might manifest among those left of center. However, the notion that this is a problem exclusive to those on the left – which this article implies – or that having an “external standard” will somehow save one from being blind to their motives or the potential consequences of their behavior is folly (and Mr. Brooks should know better). Allegiance to an “external standard of moral excellence” can be intellectually and morally lazy and can lead to great harm. Just look at the war in Viet Nam if you want evidence.
4
David Brooks:
sure, those Jews whose families were killed in the Holocaust should just keep quiet; African americans whose ancestors were slaves should pipe down; women who have been sexually assaulted should just take it and zip it ---- it's so selfish to speak up about what's happened to you and others! Be quiet rather than be indignant about mistreatment that occurs! Make sure to benefit oppressors and perpetrators by staying silent! Let them continue and continue and continue!
Just like Larry Nassar. Just like Les Moonves. Just like anti-semites, just like racists, just like sexists. Sure David.
210
@Kathy There is something to be said for forgiveness. Every one of our ancestors were at some point in time either victims at the hands of others, or abusers.
12
@Kathy I think you're missing his point.
30
@Richard
Maybe she's missing his point, but that doesn't make her point any less valid. We're all reading this paper to get those "stories." Ultimately, it's through these stories that we understand the world. Whose stories? Well, that's Kathy's point.
16
I love this. The only complaints I hear are from people for whom it may hit too close to home. I can agree with a lawn sign's statement and still agree with David Brooks' assessment that the sentiment loses impact when we are in a state of constant self involved outrage. I am glad to say that this article doesn't offend my progressive sensibilities at all. God help me if I take myself so seriously that I fall apart over an opinion piece.
9
Mr. Brooks’s skepticism toward the modern notion of individuality is shrewd, fresh, and honest. Self is a relatively new idea and perhaps a mistaken one. I often have trouble understanding who I am and maybe it’s time to stop trying to. Perhaps we only make sense as collectives.
Regardless of author’s own intentions, this inspires profound skepticism to modernity in general. I can feel but pity for everyone in the comments who are unable to rise above partisan politics and think deeper.
3
Humans are wired to be both selfish and generous. Morality is an artifice of long lasting communities to assure that everyone gets along while they satisfy their needs. Many times individuals must forego their personal needs and desires to enable the community to serve everyone’s important needs. Those unwilling to do so are considered selfish and usually immoral. Those who do so are considered generous or moral.
In our society where we depend upon people tolerating differences in order to have a working democracy, the fundamental values that should set the rules for all to follow can be challenged but it leads to conflicts. The greatest source of social conflict in our times can be attributed to the reactionary right which has come to see the very basis of our social life to be contrary to their interests. Altruism, treating all others as equals, sacrificing personal advantages for social stability and peace, and even following the golden rule they have asserted are degenerate and weaken the people and make them dependent upon social largesse instead of their own resources. The lessons of history have taught all people that selfishness hurts the community which assured all benefit from cooperation, and do selfishness is never considered a virtue. The exceptions have always occurred where those with more wealth and power come to dominate all others and behalf selfishly with impunity, but even then it creates disunity.
2
Sarcasm is a time honored argumentation strategy. It is not necessarily the highest road, but it is a road. Mr. Brooks’ point, however, is the state of morality, and thus the state of society.
Despite the fact that morality has, for the last two millennia anyway, been reinforced by organized religion (and that enforcement has often involved a great deal of hypocrisy), religion is not the source of morality. Rather religion uses moral codes to buttress its own power.
Morality is, in fact, a construct of social organization. It is, simply, the rules that allow people to live together in groups, or societies. It is the glue that has allowed humans to succeed as a species. Without banding together into communities, we are not big enough, fast enough, strong enough, or fierce enough to survive and thrive. Our need of each other, and our willingness to subjugate our self interest, made us the dominant species on earth.
We forget this at our peril, which is Mr. Brooks’ main point. A civilization that is overly focused on the self will not long survive. This isn’t a scold, it is simply reality. (See Ozymandias.) In order to thrive, we must consider others, so that we may create a safer place for ourselves. Our success has been so great, in fact, it turns out we must also consider not just other humans, but the entire planet.
Morality, and the abnegation of self, is the epitome of selfishness, which is quite the paradox.
2
Where were you when the Gospel of self-actualization and making as much money as possible reigned supreme among Evangelicals? It hasn't diminished one iota, it simply no longer needs to be emphasized because its tenets are thoroughly internalized and accepted without debate. Where are you now when the Gospel of Greed continues to dominate our economic and political systems, dictating everything from employer-employee relationships to who gets tax breaks to profit-driven imprisonment? Rather than take on philosophical underpinnings that are in direct contrast with good works, you attack ideologies that are completely compatible with them. Of course every last "woke" individual with an anti-hate sign isn't also working at the local church with the homeless or campaigning for a higher minimum wage or immigration reform or an improved criminal justice system. But at least those outward signs encourage such actions. And to be sure, plenty of Evangelicals and others on the right also work for the betterment of others. But as ideologies and outward symbols go, which is better - anti-hate or greed is good? What exactly is your objection to the former?
1
Thank you Mr. Brooks. What a great way to expose how English departments in high schools and colleges throughout the nation have so miserably failed us. Half of the commenters appear to be unable to detect the humor and the satire directed at all of us. I laughed out loud reading the piece and now I'm crying reading the comments.
Well done Mr. Brooks. Thanks! - I'm laughing again.
4
I enjoyed the satire, David. Honestly though, I think that "selfism" - though not the version you describe - can lead to good things.
If everyone would just do a good and thorough job caring for themselves and their family, America would be a greater place.
For example: (1) Maintain a healthy weight, don't smoke, and stay active; this keeps you in the workforce and out of the hospital, and decreases your and everyone else's health insurance costs. (2) Keep yourself well-read and up to date on current affairs via good media sources; this helps you make well-informed decisions at the ballot box which benefits all Americans. (3) Don't choose to have more children than you can feed, clothe, house, and care for; this means tax dollars can go to other things, like public schools and infrastructure and maintaining our public lands.
If we all just took good care of ourselves and our immediate family, most of the rest would simply fall in to place!
2
With a quick grasp, I see the column is about the changing morality in concepts over time - and - self-ness turning into the meaning of life via modern contexts. I have my own view (very modest). The die-hard moral people tend to judge everything - literally everything - by their moral standards. That’s my impression via the empirical. God may be in and out. Political heroes may be residing there to pave the standards. Today, social connotations are indispensable. All and everyone would be entangled with or into in such views. To me, a clear line (very modern - maybe) has been drawn today by its tendency, such a way that the power of love is acknowledged only as maternal, paternal, children’s craving for families, community’s cares and so on. On these days, love between man and woman is destined to be judged as biological, chemical, or procreation driven. Speaking of it timely for the season, The Holy Family became The Family with no usual intimacy of the corporal. But, I am someone who still finds the power of love apart from didactic morality or altruism, *or* the divinely miraculous. I know, that may sound the fashion of the by-gone era. Though, “the out of date” can be forcefully eternal. What would you think, David Brooks?
@Juliette Masch (former Igorantia A.)
Your language isn't always easy to follow, but if I read you correctly, I agree that love is never out of style, that expressions of caring and concern -- love -- will always belong to the "high ground" of morality. That expressions of love ALWAYS involve more than the good feeling of the one who is expressing love. Those expressions ARE expressions of care and concern and love and character because they concern more than just one's own self. Brooks is as difficult to comprehend in his twisted version of how altruism is selfish as your well-intentioned message was a little hard also to completely get. Am I wrong in my analysis?
Granted, there are a lot of people in this world who are too self-absorbed. But then again, there always have been. This is just another lame straw man column by Mr. Brooks.
3
When Sarah Palin whined with a grin, Brooks thought that Republicans were "genuine". When Democrats get whiny (and they do), it annoys him. I can relate! Please do not evaluate if I am being sarcastic or not! I do am!
I always whine about whiny people! They are most whinnable about! Gosh why do they whine all the time!
1
Well, this falls flat. Who is this snarky sarcastic article directed at? It sounds like something one would say to a self absorbed teenager. Is this who you think your readers are?
1
It must really chap Mr Brooks to hear during the safety presentation on flights to secure you're own oxygen mask first before helping others.
The only thing worse than a hypocrite is a condescending wingnut posing as an intellectual. Take your pick.
3
David: You are too smart to pull off this junior high snark. I love it when you are brainy and smug. Dumb and smug just doesn’t work. I hope you never use another exclamation point!!!!!!!!!
2
This reads a lot like Bobos in Paradise, though.
David Brooks should know the self righteous are the most selfish of all.
2
David, please quit harshing my mellow with heavy mega-negative bummer columns. Keep it real and focus on current events: grandma in a pants suit is going to kick orange boy's butt. I'm filled with the warm tingling of Schadenfreude, which by definition means I'm not just thinking of myself. Gotta run and put up my newest lawn signs: "Mother Teresa doesn't want children in cages" and "Abraham Lincoln believes in government of the people, by the people, for the people." Seriously, David, I am indignant that a corrupt, racist white nationalist colluded with a foreign power to get "elected" President and the Republican party remains in thrall. I would hope you are too.
7
I can hardly read Brooks anymore, because of this sort of writing.
9
People love it when others talk about themselves, it helps all the people who can't make small talk or who can barely hold a simple conversation. However, real conversation exists between both parties.
I want to like David Brooks, but when he writes drivel like this, it makes it hard. The "Age of Selfism"? Really?
We have a Republican administration hell-bent on dissolving the geopolitical alliances that kept the world from dissolving into all out war since 1945 led by a blatantly racist former reality TV star and David Brooks commits his mental resources and outsized journalistic voice to doing his best "old man on a porch" routine bemoaning Western society's de-evolution into selfie obsessed, safe space needing millennials?
Paul Krugman is writing op-ed pieces showing how the tax cuts have led to less stability for the middle class, but David Books is over here trying to pathetically Jonathan Swift the Instagram generation.
How about writing a piece on something that actually IS a threat to America, Mr Brooks?
How about writing about the self-induced obliviousness of Trumpism that half this country has embraced with the same cultish fervor as the followers of David Koresh or Charles Manson.
How about writing about how people seem to actually worship capitalism and money more than at any other time in history?
How about writing about dead zones and trash islands in the ocean?
In other words, how about writing about things that MATTER.
11
It appears that you take the culture of selfism, as you put it, for granted, i.e. the bedrock of social existence. You then go on to posit that this selfism can be a good thing - IF you do it "correctly." That, in itself, is an external standard.
The problem isn't that people feel judged when an external standard of moral excellence is applied to behavior. Feeling judged is an outcome of not having the same standard of moral excellence as the other person. One feels judged when your personal standard of morality does not match the other's standard of morality. In a culture of selfism, it is the standard reaction.
"Good feelings" is not a very rigorous standard of morality. People who do bad things can feel very good about doing them. Instead of attempting to identify an exemplary external standard of good feeling, we should be looking for a standard that exemplifies what is best for all, not for just one of us.
I am a psychologist who has been exposed to all kinds of theories about the self - its unique source, its unique composition and ways of being in the world. These types of theories are appealing because they suggest we are connected to some sort of perfection that lies deep within, out of reach of social toxins and pressures to be someone we are, essentially, not.
After 30 years of study, practice, and research I am sad to say that, I think, we are born empty, totally empty. Our perceptions and ideas about the self and everything else come from the outside. Yes, they are elaborated internally. Sometimes, those elaborations are novel and interesting. But, the basic equipment to elaborate a concept or organize a perception comes from the outside in the form of shared ideas about the world.
What we really need to do, I muse out loud with many of my clients, is understand the world around us before we attempt to understand the world within us. Perhaps what we take to be ourselves is something much more collective in nature than we previously recognized. So, today, try to understand someone else. It may lead to understanding yourself.
2
Re: Karim: John Locke and Rousseau would agree! Best single book on the point is EMILE, 1762, Rousseau’s account of how an ideal education should proceed. John Dewey followed his ideas into our times.
Gee, this opinion piece seems to have tweaked a lot of people's worlds, perhaps because a lack of awareness of subtle yet pernicious self-aggrandizement can easily be found in the full spectrum of our society, not just the rightmost.
3
Because it's 'self-absorbed' Democrats constantly denying equal rights for all citizens (never mind that pesky Constitution)?
Sure, Mr. Brooks, whatever you say...
3
My son has one of those signs on his front door. He also takes in shelter animals and became a public defender rather than go into a firm where he would make a ton more money. His partner is working a PhD in sociology studying the impact of opioid abuse on families. A friend of his became an immigration lawyer. She went to Harvard Law (from a very small town in Kentucky) and could have commanded six figures, but she decided on a life of service. I love you sometimes, David, but are getting really bad at over-generalizing. Your implication is that this stops at the signs, but it doesn't with my friend who is retired and works in a soup kitchen once a week or with another friend, an artist, who has a special needs child she adopted. They are ALL liberals. This is getting kind of tiresome.
6
@wanda "His partner is working a PhD in sociology studying the impact of opioid abuse on families."
Wonderful! Perhaps his research will help him understand that a key driver of the opioid epidemic is the profound loss of hope and self-worth that comes from losing one's livelihood, and that these losses oftentimes stem from the very globalist economic and environmental policies he espouses. Talk about a great lesson in empathy!
3
“. . . that just shows how much more good you are.” Is not only a vile sentence expressing a wonderful idea. But it is gramanticly incorrect. Gooder is the word you were looking for - and obviously you didn’t even no the word existed. Badder for a wrighter of your statue. Sorry 4 u, is what I’m feeling. And that’s so important to me.
1
I assume David wrote this in jest. I wonder how Republicans sleep at night with all the misery and deaths they are responsible for. As far as religion goes it means being a kind and good person, having empathy for those less fortunate, and behaving in an ethical and moral manner. Religion is within the person themselves, their veyr soul and has nothing to do with going to church.
2
Thank you, Mr. Brooks. I really needed this. And, after all, it's all about me.
3
“Sarcasm is the lowest form of wit.” — Oscar Wilde
7
The problem with the selfists is that they cannot recognize satire, especially when directed at them.
3
I did not look up the reference, but I remember a story from my younger days of a town whose Christian citizens, when white supremacists tried to intimidate their Jewish neighbors, put menorahs in their windows. Mr. Brooks is a writer and as such should know that symbols and stories and words are powerful and important. I agree that we all need to examine our souls and listen to those who do not agree with us, but this hardly sets the example, does it? Please explain to me again how, when liberals dismiss conservatives as shallow, selfish idiots, this makes them unlikely to listen or hear?
1
Humans in general seem to think about themselves first.
This is why we need good government.
This is why we need real leaders.
Greed and corruption control our country right now. And they know that no one is there to stop them.
But, where are the real leaders?
Right now, nowhere to be found.
1
When Obamacare was being debated,
many critics said: I got mine and don't
care if you don't. Not eager to subsidize
your health care coverage. This is being
self obssessed. May be theyare good
people and have meaning in their
lives, more probably they are empty
vessel.
3
Great piece of satire.
2
David,
I thought you named your annual year-end Sidney Awards after the American philosopher Sidney Hook, as someone you considered exemplary for “...living up to some external standard of moral excellence,” as many consider (your examples...) Abraham Lincoln or Mother Teresa to have done. Now you consider looking up to such exemplars of moral excellence as being “harmful”?
Based on readers’ reactions, I think you’ve failed here as an aspiring Oscar Wilde-like ironist, or you’re hypocritical, or ???
Your many years of excellent columns, however, entitle you to a clunker every now and then. I’m sure Sidney Hook, Abraham Lincoln, Mother Teresa, and Oscar Wilde would agree with me.
1
Fifth Thing: Write a snarky column sarcastically insulting a caricature that exists only in the mind of a conservative moralist.
11
I don’t know if David is too depressed about politics and where his Republican party and President are taking us or if he is too lazy to write a meaningful article
The quality of the last few of his pieces have been from mediocre to sophomoric.
World’s most important op-ed space in the world’s most important newspaper at an important time in history. And this is the best David can do? Shame on him.
3
Very Funny
“When you are indignant, or woke, you are showing that you have a superior moral awareness. You don’t have to actually do anything. Your indignation is itself a sign of your own goodness, and if you can be indignant quicker than the people around you, that just shows how much more good you are!”
3
I would like Mr Brooks to write a column without the word "moral". I would REALLY like to never see that word or idea in his columns ever again; it brings out the worst thinking in him. Weak.
6
Gosh, how I wish David Brooks was being jolly but he explained perfectly the Republican Party and the appeal of such a narcissistic group to a whole lot of resentful white folks, apparently including himself (although real white supremacists would not consider a Jewish person to be white - sorry).
2
I'm sorry, David, what's wrong with being against hate or for locally grown produce? Why aren't you concerned about racists, anti-Semites, xenophobes and climate change deniers? Or people who parrot revisionist interpretations of Russia's invasion of Afghanistan?
1
I'm not a David Brooks fan. But there's a worthwhile column here that gets lost in his choice to write it as snark.
1
This is a joke, right?
1
Huh? I don't understand ?
1
Read the room dave.
While Gail Collins can poke fun at the absurdity of trump's America you, an ardent neo-con water carrier, cannot.
At least not until this filthy genital grabbing chapter of US history is done.
We didn't much joke about WWII while it was waging mr. brooks.
We waited for all the dead to be buried first.
2
Sarcasm becomes you, David.
Yep! I get the point dear comment writers, a columnist known for his self-regard writes about the self-regard of others. How ironic! But here's the truth, the indignation some have felt about this column is that Brooks has hit a raw nerve. His smugness is our smugness; except he gets to expose his while we can hide and throw stones at his glass house. O our liberal sanctimony...
3
Sounds like Right Wing Christians.
1
In the middle of this column,on my phone: an ad for Facetune 2 Selfie Editor. AI’s do indeed have a sense of humor.
1
This was quite funny, but for those who mistakenly feel this is a skewering only of those on the left side of our national equation, please do the following:
Substitute "picture yourself shopping at a farmers market where everything's locally grown" with "picture yourself at the shooting range where everyone knows the government is evil and out to get you."
Oh, that tingly, meaningful feeling inside.
Now let's go through items one through four:
1.) Indignant? Talk to your Evangelical Pastor. He'll assure you ten times over that God is on your side. Nothing makes you more good than if God says everything you believe is one hundred percent correct.
2.) Make yourself heard? Put up that lawn sign showing Hillary Clinton behind bars! If you have a big spread in Texas, well, by golly, then put up a giant billboard encouraging liberals to get their behinds out of your state!
3.) Tell your story? Absolutely--you've kept those feelings buried far too long. It was so much better when black people sat at the back of the bus. They weren't in your face all the time, so you never had to acknowledge their existence. And women? What's up with them? Can't they stay home and have babies like they're supposed to? Your life's a misery now. Tell it!
4.) Bad people? They're everywhere, even running for president--get on Facebook immediately and tell all your friends that Hillary Clinton is running a sex operation out of a pizza parlor. This cannot stand!
Feel better now?
5
OMG! Best David Brooks column ever!!! Feeling so tingly right now.
2
Curious thing about this column: the very ethical theory David promotes in other contexts -- virtue theory -- traditionally held that acting in accordance with the right balance of virtues was the key to a good, i.e. happy, life. Now one can disagree with that approach to morality, as I do, but for a conservative who adopts the Brooks' moral point of view, being happy is indeed a sign that one is acting in accordance with standards of excellence--excellence of character.
Thank you Mr. Brooks for a wonderful column.
For those who feel they or their friends have been criticized, at no point does Mr. Brooks refer to the left or right, any political party, or any generation. If you recognize a particular group or archetype (or yourself) from his description, that's on you.
6
You made us think as usual. That's the main reason we read your columns. Today you made us think in Enrique Low Murtra, the most unselfish person we knew many years ago. Although he had a successful lawyer's office, he accepted the job of "Ministro de Justicia" during Pablo Escobar's fight against every person trying to stop drug trafficking in Colombia.
He was dismissed as Colombian ambassador in Switzerland where he was sent to protect him from Escobar's threats. Just a few persons protested. He was killed when he was leaving a university in Bogotá absolutely unprotected by the state.
That was about three decades ago and we still mourn him a lot. And under no circumstance we will stop our critics to bad guys that kill persons to maintain their grip in everything they want. Pablo Escobar ordered to bomb an airplane were more than 100 innocents died, including 3 co-workers and many other friends of us.
Just for starters.
I don’t read this as a condemnation of liberalism, but rather as a vivid criticism of selfie culture, which crosses all political boundaries. Young people of all stripes are getting that tingly feeling, whether at the local farmers market or a Trump rally. This piece describes the abysmally unevolved level of maturity of those who believe the selfies they take are an accurate reflection of who they are. As a liberal I thoroughly enjoyed this piece, sad as this state of affairs may be.
8
I read David's piece twice now and don't get, as some do, that it is anti-left (or anti-right). It certainly is very sarcastic! I agree with his main point that we live in a society where the self is celebrated over selflessness. Too much of the time both the left and right in politics are concerned with their own personal interests (and re-election) rather than the greater good.
4
Brooks misses the key point that meaning DOES actually start with the self. But it has nothing to do with "feeling" good about one's self. Instead it has to do with one's ACTIONS in the real world. By being self reliant, reliable, capable and competent, people create the foundation for doing for others, whether it be family, community or the world at large.
2
Voltaire would be proud. I'm not sure why the readership views it on such politically binary terms. Maybe it's our pre-conception of who Mr. Brooks is and the (formerly) 'minority' position he represented amongst the opinion writers at a 'liberal' news source. Then again, I agree with Max Boot on some of his assessments too. In our comments, there are instances of some or all of the stages of selfism he calls out: indignation, representation, communication and condemnation. The illustrative examples he used could have been swapped to turn this into a MAGA satire to make the same point. He had to choose one; and, maybe that's the rub - take a position on anything and face the calumny of ones peers.
3
Although Brooks' tongue in cheek column was his attempt to poke fun at those of us who are awake, aware and informed, I could add a few ideas of my own. First, in the state of affairs that we are all living under, with an unfit, embattled man soiling on all that we hold dear, on a daily basis, many of us feel called upon to resist, speak out and condemn the outrageous behavior of this president. Second, we have successfully won back the Congress through our efforts. Third, we may not be perfect, but we care about our country and are not swayed by fake news, lies and propaganda. We stand proud and we will never stop-fighting until we restore our country to the greatness that once defined it.
3
Wow. Straw man, or solution in search of a problem?
You decide.
3
What's so funny, or bad about peace, love and understanding.
3
So here we have a person, Mr. Brooks, who has enjoyed the incredible, rare opportunity to have a column in one of the world's leading news papers since 2003-- someone who has a valuable and real platform to espouse his views and who has an audience for those views AND who *actually makes his living* sharing his opinions--- mocking and deriding us plebs who use the considerably less powerful tools available to us to make our voices heard.
Holy god. How mind-numbingly tone deaf.
He didn't even do a good job writing his little satire piece-- it's difficult to tell whether he's criticizing people for speaking up at all, not speaking up enough, what they're speaking up about, or why they're speaking up. Some how I expect he doesn't know, either, and is simply motivated by the desire to criticize The Left (tm).
7
sarcasm doesn't help. you are usually much more insightful. by setting the bar high in the past you now disappoint when you resort to sarcasm. let's get back to the insightful commentary.
This is promoted by the shameless narcissism of Trump?
It doesn’t capture his full throated glee.
All he ever talks about, is he!
Now what thinks you of he?
You see?
Not you, but he!
He, himself, and him only!
2
I guess we could note here, again, the usual Brooksian passive-aggressive blaming of the left (or in his mind, "liberalism") for all things selfish *yawn*.
But of more specific interest to me is his implication, again, that conservatism (ye olde, contemporary, or libertarian flavors) could be remotely qualified to be the blessed keepers of community and other-regarding behaviors.
Just stop and think about that for a second.
Brooks' people are the original fetishizers of American exceptionalism and all manner of "sovereignty" - whether national, personal, religious, or consumer.
And yet, it's the Godless Left that Brooks simply must brand as the all-about-me tribe.
Hoo-whee. That is one strange cultural assessment.
5
Brooks conveniently neglects mentioning the the Founding Mother of Selfism, the pseudophilosopher Ayn Rand, who cleverly branded her poisonous mashup of romanticism and fabricated social science as "Objectivism," one of whose four main pillars is "self-interest." According to her, "The pursuit of [a man's] own rational self-interest and of his own happiness is the highest moral purpose of his life." You can't put it any clearer than that, folks. And yes, she, alone, is more responsible than any other single person for the "me first before anything else" attitudes now poisoning our politics, social polices and public life. Brooks knows this perfectly well but as an ideological conservative, he feels it his duty to try to confuse people. Shame on him!
3
Sadly, the people who this may be aimed at are too busy justifying their emotions/indignations to read this.
2
I have to say I always enjoy David's religious / philosophical columns, and I've gotten great leads from them for other sources (books, journals) of intellectual discussion. I sometimes think he is a wannabe rabbi or moral philosopher who got into journalism because he couldn't get tenure at Yale Divinity School. In this day and age, A Republican with any kind of ethical interests is a rare creature indeed. Thanks, David! And remember, those "MAGA" nonsense t-shirts of your former GOP comrades are equally self-centered and meaningless, as is their progenitor.
Ha! Brooks is finally Woke. No more of those thick books, the ponderous, difficult to process ideas. Hooray!
Best Brooks column ever, bar none.
1
Isn't it wonderful! Conservatives know absolutely everything. They know and you don't, so they have to tell you. And they have to label everything like Mr. Brooks does, stuff you into a file folder and put you in your place.
Mr. Brooks will tell you, as if you were a small, backward child incapable of comprehending tiny phrases or multisyllabic words, sort of like his current leader.
Conservatives will tell you how you should conduct your life right down to sex and babies. But don't dare look at how they conduct theirs.
They tell you what to believe and mock any belief other than theirs. They mock science and facts and reality itself. Their current figurehead tells his adoring mob, "Don't believe what you see or hear." And don't you dare speak out.
If you speak out, you'll be further mocked, insulted, mislabeled and hectored.
That's the way of the GOP. What they can't grab through outright theft, lying, gerrymandering, voter suppression, they reduce to nothing.
Truth is nothing. Reality is nothing. The poor, women, immigrants and off-white people are nothing. You are nothing. Democrats are nothing; after all, they are the only ones suffering in the Trump shutdown.
4
Maybe Pogo would say April 1st came on 1/1?
1
As I read through these comments I was struck by how many presume that Brooks' skewering of our narcissistic culture was directed exclusively at liberals. More to the point, the fact that many avoided the merits of his argument and instead, responded defensively, putting it through a political filter, actually supports his point.
6
We have always been a nation of slogans, so I'm not sure why you think this is something new. We have always been an indignant species, we now just have the internet to express it on instantaneously, and perpetually flood the market. I don't like Trump, but I owe him big-time. As a privileged white boy, I didn't realize that this country was still so deeply rooted in the Civil War until he brought out the half of this country that still shows it's vehement hate. Thanks to Trump I see that now. I think the shock and awe of this to everyone has triggered this type of hyper impulse to quickly display a disdain that, most of the non-hateful half still can't believe we need to show. Let the slogans of non-hate permeate the lawns and the internet like the good virus it needs to be.
1
Who knew Mr. Brooks had mastered snark over the holiday downtime. He must have been hanging around with the tweens in the family. I guess after years of getting send ups from the commenters on his holier than thou columns, he has to start the new year off with his own send up.
Nicely done.
I'm just not sure if I've been judged or not.
It's not new. I go back to Mark Twain reminding us that "Nothing needs reforming so much as other people's habits!"
4
What about the culture of greed and selfishness on the Right, Mr. Brooks? The "all for me, none for the poor" low taxes religion that has destroyed our social fabric? How about the narcissism of blowing people up in Far Corners of the world all in the name of abstractions? Isn't that also "greedy and selfish?" We get it: you came of age in opposition to what you considered to be the hippie ethos, but for G-d's sake, you're in your 60s. Isn't it time to find something new and original to say? Which argues: why does the Times hire 3 Never Trumpers who all say some variant of the same thing on the Editorial Page. Yes, you hate Trump but you hate the Hippies more. Why not a real Pro Trump voice in the tradition of William Safire who actually explained Nixonism and Reaganism to the cosseted masses who didn't get it? Aren't there any plausible pro-Trump "intellectuals' who can substitute in as a headliner for this exhausted soft rock band?
2
David
I really don't know what you were trying in this column---the more
I read the more confused I became and when you got to Mother Teresa I nearly gave up. Sorry David.
1
No one wears this degree of sarcasm well, Mr. Brooks.
Oh, my! What's gottten into sunny old you, Davy me b'y?
Solipsism is not merely the province of the comic exaggerations portrayed in this column. But not to worry, David, no need for a rewrite or edit, your column is great just the way it is!
I love when Mr. Brooks writes as a political analyst. He's incisinve and cogent. When he writes as a philosopher or moralist, he sounds like a grumpy oldhead, or like a bunch of bumper stickers strung together. In this column, he first creates an unrepresentative straw-person (the self-absorbed, woke slacktivist), and then knocks them down. Lazy and unhelpful.
David Brooks sold us a criminal, useless, illogical war and thinks that makes him a flawed hero.
1
I'll work on curing my narcissism by spending 2019 obsessing on you and your opinions, David Brooks, how's that? It will be a hilarious year full of Old Man With Big Megaphone Yells At Cloud....lol
2
This piece did not work for me, David. Way, way overblown generalizations and the sarcasm didn't work. I'm afraid I'm going to have to stop wearing my David Brooks Matters t-shirt.
3
Sarcasm is the protest of the weak. Were you 14 when you wrote this?
I mean, yeah, I get what you’re saying. But you’ve been a standard bearer for the Republicans for decades. As long as I can remember, Republicans have been all about rewarding the rich with riches while making the poor more miserable. About making sure that corporations can rape the earth and their workers. About pretending to be about small government and liberty while shoving their provincial “Christian values” down everone’s throat, demanding that teenagers bring unwanted babies into the world and condemning gay love.
Ye without sin cast the first stone...
2
Cute column-but the comments bear no rational relationship to it.
2
David, why are you a Republican?
Please write a column to those of us who continue to tune into your writing to tell us what Republican orthodoxy resonates for you.
4
Ten out of ten people will tell you David Brooks is a certified genius. On average, nine of them will do it by telling you how funny and spot-on this article is about the state of our current culture. The tenth person will do it by leaving an angry New York Times Comment, accompanied by a dozen strategically placed New York Times Comment Recommendations on similar angry New York Times Comments, inadvertently proving him right.
Someone get this man an award!
1
This is a mean article and a clumsy attempt at humor. It fails to bring understanding. It mocks.
Feel better, David? No one else does.
Hate and mockery should have no home at the New York Times. Having grown up with a Republican school teacher mother who preached and lived service and sacrifice, liberal lawn signs have nothing on the short sermons and brief aphorisms my mother employed to make us better people. Don’t assume the thoughts expressed on the sign or T-shirt aren’t lived by their speakers. Show some respect.
2
The irony is how self-indulgent this piece is. The self-righteousness is just dripping off Brooks. HE never does self-care! HE never gets indignant! HE never gives himself too much credit. That’s all those OTHER shiftless, whiny people out there! And he has to suffer them, day in and day out! It’s enough to drive a humble, others-oriented, non-TMI person mad!
3
Too funny David! Your subtle virtue-signaling to pals in the Federalist Society, Heritage, and the like. Recently, you've been a little "squishy." Just sayin'. Glad you are back.
1
Mr. Brooks, I sometimes disagree with you, but see you as a thoughtful person and good writer. I thought that penning an entire column of whiney sarcasm was beneath you.
I hope you are well and that this terrible piece is not a sign of some awful calamity in your life.
David, if only you'd written "me" instead of "you"... Wisdom starts with self-awareness.
3
Hmm, but isn’t an NYT opinion column kind of a longform lawn sign?
4
Someone is lashing out, but it isn't the straw man portrayed in this drippingly sarcastic article. It's the author, who seems to be having a cultural crisis. Nice brady bunch episode. glad I'm not living in your world.
2
Brilliant satire David! Please don't ever wake up. Or get woke. Or whatever!!!
2
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
The earnest tree-hugging intersectionalists and their twee T-shirts and signs are always fun to satirize.
The cross-burning, MAGA-hat wearing "real "Muricans" who would just as soon poison your river or shoot you because they'd had twelve beers and "yeah, it looks like a deer", not so much. Because if you make fun of them, they're likely to come find you and shoot you--not for sport.
The self-involved are, well, too self-involved to shoot you.
1
This article is a comedy at its best.
1
Timely. Wandering through the maze of virtue-signaling these days is a true test of good manners. That daily urge to be offended—if only I can find something new to be offended by, to stay ahead!—makes it difficult at times to be a productive member of society.
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When in Rome, do as the Romans do.
It's high time for narcissism and online rage.
The good thing is that nothing lasts forever. With all serious talks of A.I and Robots, we're do for a reset or an end, so there's very little point in stressing over it.
If you can't beat them, David, might as well join them. :)
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The exclamation points are a giveaway. But isn't this opinion, as most opinions, a bit narcissistic, as in feeling morally and judgmentally superior? Humans are innately narcissistic; part of our biological makeup and survival instincts. It's just that western cultures have raised narcissism to an art form, and now, thanks to the cancerous spread of "social" media, it's become a religion and elevated to parody with the election of a malignant narcissist as the "leader" of the free world who spreads his gospel in Tweets. Lest we forget, Facebook started as a way to fulfill someone's self-centered need to find a date when all else failed... my how we've evolved.
(Though tempting, no exclamation points have been abused in this response.)
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You all are making a lot of assumptions concerning who DB is characterizing. He makes no mention of dems or GOP. So can I conclude the traits he speaks of are recognized by certain readers in themselves and this has caused them to become indignant just as he described?
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Agreed! No mention is made of political alignment if any kind.
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David, your sarcasm Is one-sided and displays biases I was not aware you have. Selfism is not limited to liberals. In my experience liberals, moderate Christians and particularly millennials are living more examined and moral lives, and are generally concerned for the quality of life lived by their fellow humans, and the health of our planet. In contrast, a typical Fox News devotee, typically favors his/her own self centered, and self righteous preconceptions over facts and science, and has little regard for the affect of his/her actions on the well being of others or our planet. This is the antipathy of an examined life, and is selfism in its rawest form.
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Wow, Mr. Brooks' readers are certainly putting his first principle on full display. Do be indignant that someone may think that simply putting up an indignant sign on your front lawn may not be sufficient as a benchmark for the fully engaged and responsible citizen. I do agree however that a broader range of examples of his premise would be helpful. To wit: Drowning Prius drivers in clouds of diesel exhaust fumes from your specially modified Ram pickup because it feels good to demonstrate your distain for the discredited theory of global warming makes one feel good; Packing your AR-15 to the farmers market and demanding plastic bags for your purchases can elicit a similar tingle. Having provided a few additional examples to drive home your excellent analysis it is easier to understand that putting up lawn signs to express indignation may be necessary for eliciting that feel good tingle but it is not sufficient to nurture and sustain a vibrant and responsible democratic society.
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If you think developing your own morality is easy, just consider how much easier it is to simply adopt one written in primitive, heinous books or dictated to you by lecherous and power-hungry priests, ministers and imams.
In fact, Mr. Brooks, developing one's own ethical standards and their applications is quite hard, and it is the most moral approach. Good and evil ARE relative, subjective concepts. For the most part, the religious bail on this responsibility, but we do not. We don't always get it right, we sometimes backslide or act poorly, but it is the "faithful" who deserve your sarcastic barbs in the context of who act most morally and well.
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Why not just come out and say that "on both sides" (a la Charlottesville)? For we know what you really mean, disappointingly enough.
We've got two kinds of narcissism in the world. The first type is embodied by the current occupant of the White House. This type is separating parents from children, race-baiting, dividing, and inflicting environmental damage as far as the eye can see, only so that he can be adored by a vocal provincial minority.
The second kind is (typically but not only) the young student, "woke," (itself an interesting choice of words) with good intentions, but adolescent methods, who is infuriated at all of that and nevertheless seeks to fit in... on the right side of history.
Whom do you devote 800 words to? The 2nd sort.
It's infuriating.
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The author Brooks engaged in meaningless drivel. I could not tell if he was being serious or sarcastic. We should know something as being moral and ethical as behavior or beliefs that are selfless, i.e. it applies to all beings not just oneself. If I am not behaving morally, and someone tells me so, why should I ignore them, as Brooks recommends? I should be grateful for the advice. Why should I consider myself perfect as I am?
We have too many people in the world who think they are perfect as they are... that is the problem, not the solution!
Lost me half way, David. You contradicted your sarcastic premise when you started railing against people caring about others. If they're entirely selfish people, why should they care about struggles they themselves do no experience?
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This is very simple. On the scale of funny: 1.5/10.
The writer needs social media rehab.
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David Brooks could benefit by consulting with Alexandra Petri. She's much more adept at satire than he.
OK, I am laughing, but David, please don't get cynical. this too shall pass
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The word self has add-ons that has different implications. Mr. Brooks has produced a blend that becomes a mish mash.
self interest, self indulgent, self centered, self-less, self aware, self ignorant, self imposed, self destructive, selfish.
Determined to become a lumper with a multi-nuanced concept, Mr. Brooks has not heeded the Wordsworth's words:
"Sweet is the lore which Nature brings;
Our meddling intellect
Mis-shapes the beauteous forms of things:—
We murder to dissect."
I didn't get the feeling this applied only to the left. Many if not most of the "Trumpistas" I know fit this narration rather well. Great op ed David!
What’s with all the sarcasm? It does not become you(!)
What happens when poorly wrought sarcasm is read literally? You get sanctimonious nods of agreement and the affirmation there are other believers "out there" ... somewhere. What you do not get is an opportunity to easily reflect on one's choices.
This piece started with a pretty good idea but demanded too much work from this reader. I'd welcome Version 2.0.1 from a steady and practiced hand in the art and craft of sarcasm and satire.
Kudos to David Brooks for his satirical essay, a la Jonathan Swift.
(One caveat : lay off so many exclamation marks!!!) Otherwise, I affirm its perfection, as is the case with all of his essays.
It’s very cruel of you to make me responsible for my own well being!
I like this attempt at humor a la Stuart Smalley. Maybe David is having an Al Franken moment?
Thank you
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YUK! There is nothing more circular and boring than being endlessly bound in one's own thoughts and opinions.
Listen! Listen to your family and friends and neighbors and the voices of the world. Present and past.
Think, speak, and listen always.
I never thought I'd see a satirical column by David Brooks. Good going, David.
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I feel judged.
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My goodness! Who knew that April 1 had already arrived? I guess David is preparing for Donald's beatification.
Methinks Mr. Brooks got up on the wrong side of the bed this morning. To be fair, we all have days like that, don’t we?
I like Brooks and he is must reading for me, so don’t take this as a criticism. There is certainly some truth in what he says here.
Of course, some self-examination is what he’s calling for, but that just reinforces his central point, doesn’t it? “Meism.”
Mr. Brooks: Much truth here--but oh so condescendingly delivered. The intention, I presume, is to show us, your readers, how much greater your understanding of human nature (and moral excellence) is than ours?
Yeah, like I'm going to listen to someone admonish me sarcastically about selfishness when it's coming from an Ayn Rand loving, National Review reading, and now hand wringing regretful member of the republican party "intelligentsia".
Brooks, give it a rest. You have no business wagging a finger at us about selfishness.
O.K. David. Lefties are self involved in examining their souls. I do get that. But why am I thinking about Republicans wanting to give tax breaks to the rich while requiring the disabled to work? It seems as though he non self involved are those people who don't mind when families go hungry or the sick are without healthcare. Imagine being so thoughtless as to get cancer and then lose your job and with it your health insurance! Republicans plan ahead or they don't get cancer. I'm not sure which it is.
I am thinking about the "Christians" who wonder (aloud) how others are with Jesus while they are disgusted by the poor, the sick and the disliked who Jesus spent his life tending to.
It is all very confusing.
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@Sarah
Brooks never mentions the left.
That association was made by you.
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Jesus was a TRUE Progressive.
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@Tom Everyone knows at whom he is directing this critique.
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The list of T-shirts, lawn signs and other public affirmations that David is using as his evidence of selfism actually has its roots in making clear to women, people of color, and the LGBT community that not all of their neighbors see them as the enemy.
The affirmation would not be needed but for the fact that 60MM of those neighbors were completely comfortable with voting for a leader who is sexist, racially and religiously prejudiced, homophobic and xenophobic. He is making these the core elements of his presidency reflect this. And too many of those same neighbors (the persistent 40% approvers) are just fine with this, along with the complete Republican power structure.
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Empathy? I just watched a story about a young man who died because he could not afford the $1.300. a month that a drug company was charging for his needed insulin. Yet the executive and legislative branches sit on their hands doing nothing.
Perhaps it's time that politicians take the Hippocratic oath before taking office.
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David, you say "We live in a culture of selfism."
False fact.
YOU live in a culture of selfism. It is called the Republican party, and you are extremely well paid to obscure its immorality by pretending there's an intellectual higher ground that 'good Republicans' can take.
There are no good Republicans any more. Not since either Eisenhower (if we are limited to Presidents) or Ed Brooks (if we are limited to Senators).
As to this silly column, there is a serious subject of ethics taught in most philosophy departments. It does not read anything written by Ayn Rand, or Milton Friedman, Henry Kissinger, or other Republican 'thinkers'...amoralists all.
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@priceofcivilization Brooks has been scathing in his criticism of Trump and the feckless Republicans. Nowhere does he state this applies particularly to liberals. I think a lot of these points have merit. It's not clear to me that you have even undertaken that analysis.
So, Mr Brooks...what insights do you have to share with us about the far right? I guess those conservative types don't go to farmer's markets, they don't share their love of self, like progressives do...conservatives, with their love for all of humanity and all God's children and respect for all faiths, have much to teach us progressive types. Is that right Mr Brooks? I guess I missed that speech from your Supreme Leaders , Mr McConnell and Trump.
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@pam I don't know why you presume that this is solely directed at liberals. Brooks skewers conservatives all the time.
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@pam why do you assume this is solely directed at liberals? BTW, Brooks has been scathing in his critiques of Trump and the feckless Republicans.
“Too clever by half,” a perfect illustration of the core flaw within Republican ideology now fully exposed. Thank you David!
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1. Feel indignant
2. Make yourself heard.
3. Tell your story
4. Condemn bad people.
David,
Seems to me to be the profile of a MAGA hat wearer, too. But I know someday you will rise above accusing people on the left of the things the right does. For you David, number 5: Accusations are confessions.
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"One great thing about meaning is it’s all about the emotions you yourself already have."
This is not true. Nelson Mandela found meaning in the fight for justice. Underpaid teachers find meaning in sacrifices they make for children and our shared future. Good works undoubtedly make one feel good about oneself -- and why not?
It's a mistake to think that feelings underlie judgments of value. Of course I feel good when I live up to my values, but it doesn't follow that my values are based solely on those good feelings.
Sloppy, sloppy reasoning, but par for the course in Mr. Brooks's columns.
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In the age of Trump Mr. Brooks and Evangelicals have bankrupted what ever moral authority they ever had.
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In the immortal words of Pogo:
"We have met the enemy...and he is us."
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The sad fact it that irony is dead. One can not tell how to take the written word unless one first checks out the by-line. Mr. Brooks could use the space allotted to him better to help us sort out current events. [Our government is shut down].
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If only everyone would read this and own the selflessness inherent in selfishness.
The world would be a better place.
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I knew something was up when I saw all of the exclamation points...
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Perhaps that children's song sung frequently back in the '70's 80's has some negative fallout in hindsight.
I (gasp) may not be the "most important person in the whole wide world, and "I" should know it". Defanging competitive school Sports Days, so no-one experiences failure was a mistake. Neutralizing school report cards so that everybody gets a warm feeling from it, but not a lot of truth. There may be a consequence when grammar isn't taught, (boring subject, all those lessons on predicate, object, verb pronoun etc.,). In grammar's absence --which teaches diverse sentence structures, there may be a ho hum, why not just start sentences with I, not, you, he, or they. The I's have it.
Sheltering youth from wide ranging, real experiences, to pump up self has consequences. Self absorption is one of them
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Of course it is easy to epater les self involved, but given your forum I think speaking truth to power would be better. Are you sure that senator McConnell doesn’t get a tingly feeling when he makes it harder to vote?
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It appears that Mr. Brooks is more than a little annoyed that Democrats took over the House of Representatives.
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@Charles Focht Good point. And HALLELUJAH that they did. Trump is like a two-year flu, even for Canadians.
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I feel, you know, *judged* by this column.
Maybe Mr. Brooks might want to read up on passive aggression. He seems not to be looking into himself too astutely.
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Ah, yes, to which valediction a reader can only gently respond: "thank you very much!"
Our country is not in dire-to-catastrophic shape because of
selfism, whatever in the name of heaven this begging-the-question neologism means, but because of a bunch of crooks led by an evil man, who is more likely a consequence of good old fashioned 200 proof capitalist greed.
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It's interesting to see what Times columnists will do to pass the time until...whatever is next than where we are now.
It took me about six paragraphs to recognize this as sarcasm. At least I think it was. Your parting shot was similar to something Fred Rogers used to say, about whom you wrote admiringly a couple of months ago: "People like you just the way you are".
Dear Mr. Brooks,
Your anger shines throughout your sarcastic piece today. Could it be that you still cannot reconcile your guilt over how you voted in the 2016 Presidential election?
Again and again, you remind us, your faithful readers, of your contempt for Trump, and for people who abuse their voting privilege by not voting, or casting meaningless ballots for 3rd party or write-in candidates...or voting for the candidate for the party to which you adhere, even though you believe that candidate is in some way unfit.
I don't expect to ever read your admission that it was a mistake for you to put party ahead of country...or any other admission. Why should you? We readers can't fire you.
But we can comment.
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Having read and listened to Mr Brooks for many years, I have generally respected but not agreed with his positions. I have come to the conclusion that he is not a well presented moderate but a selfish well spoken hack. More and more of his columns seem to be a tome to David Brooks.
I never realized that all self-absorbed people were Democrats before. Thanks so much for that illuminating insight, Mr. Brooks.
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It's ironic that Mr. Brooks, who has a world-wide, well-respected platform (NYT) to share his opinions on a weekly (or more) basis, (in addition to TV appearances) can't understand that other people, who don't have access to a soapbox like his, are just trying to make their voices heard. (They even do it without being paid.)
Also, it's funny that "The Gospel of Saint You" sits right above his mugshot.
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A voice without action is just wind.
Where is your tongue, David Brooks? Is it firmly attached to your cheek? Sarcasm can be so freeing, don’t you agree? Besides, I need more moral freedom right now, because everyone else’s freedom is just bugging me to death. Keep up the good work.
"When you are indignant, or woke, you are showing that you have a superior moral awareness. You don’t have to actually do anything. Your indignation is itself a sign of your own goodness, and if you can be indignant quicker than the people around you, that just shows how much more good you are!"
Wait...
Isn't that what this article is?
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I've always wondered what a columnist does when they're facing a deadline and have absolutely nothing to say.
Now I know. What a relief. I hope the Pulitzer committee is aware of this prize-worthy commentary.
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I can't believe David Brooks wrote this. Sarcasm, like satire, is what closes on Saturday night.
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Wouldn't that have been something if lots of German citizens in the 1930's would have put up lawn signs that said, “Hate is not welcome here” or wore T-shirt that said, “Stop the Violence.” Sure, they would have caught lots ridicule from many of their fellow citizens and maybe been subjected to violence and vandalism from all the citizens that went along with the Nazi program and the propaganda. Are people who speak out against hatred and violence morally equivalent to people who play along and hide behind the cloak of cynicism? Maybe everyone is "selfish" to a certain degree but, more importantly, the content of speech matters.
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Hilarious column! But it’s meaning might be lost on many people!
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Oh David ... Clearly your satire is aimed squarely at Dems and is so witty. It is the “snowflakes” with lawn signs who are the problem. If only they weren’t so self centered! No mention of the malignant Narcissist in Chief. No mention of the “greed is good” Republican agenda based on the goddess of “selfism” Ayn Rand.
Only a fool puts out a lawn sign taking a stand against hate, “like all your neighbors”. Why do that when you can be a Republican responsible for a hideous new regime that normalizes hatred.
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@TAO very powerful retort; best I've read so far.
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Why? The straw man caricature doesn’t actually address anything which makes this derisive. The column assumes Brooks’ path to moral grounding is the only path: reading big books that he doesn’t name. People are reading books, just not the ones Brooks wants them to or which support his world view. Finally, without context, a reason why this column was written and published now, Brooks is just complaining rather than offering productive criticisms and suggestions for change.
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I can't add much to the hilarious responses of other long time Brooks readers. Just this: methinks he is picking on shallow, callow youth. How typical of old people who've stopped growing themselves.
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What is shocking to me is not just how upset people are about this column but how willfully oblivious they seem to their own side’s shortcomings. This may be news, but the Left isn’t perfect and it is ok to poke fun at someone besides Trump
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@Zack MD who besides trump claims perfection?
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@Ann
Maybe not perfection, but self-righteousness seems to be in abundance these days.
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@Zack MD: Oh, isn't this about Trump? I might have to re-read it. Sometime.
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Isn't this critique, dripping with sarcasm, precisely the thing it claims to be critical of? Whiny outrage over other people's outrage? Offense taken out of proportion to offense taken out of proportion? Smug, self-satisfied division of the world into good and bad halves, and surprise, you're on the good side! The problem is all about those other people who don't share your views. Ok. Thanks for sharing. If that's not what you meant, you should have written something clearer.
As others have noted, you don't seem bothered by MAGA. You also don't have the guts to repeat the slogans you are critical of. I have an "Oakland stands UNITED against hate" sign in my front window. I haven't seen another one in my neighborhood. But its not the mealy mouthed fake you give as an example. I don't believe you've ever seen the slogan you cite on a sign or tee shirt of a stranger. Mis-representing and muddling things you don't agree with is a classic, dishonest, debating trick. Baiting your opponent for an emotional response. My spouse thinks you're smart. I'm not so sure.
Bill Abbott
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@Bill Abbott
You need to watch Brooks weekly on PBS - he is not a MAGA fan by any means... and yeah - your spouse is right - he is pretty smart.
And I think your intemperate reply perfectly proves his point.
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@Bill Abbott well said
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@Bill Abbott Re "My spouse thinks you're smart. I'm not so sure."
I'm in a similar situation, with a friend. In our conversations I give Mr. Brooks the nickname "Puddle." Because he comes off so shallow. Same old, same old.
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As a life long Democrat I usually agree with your perspectives but strongly disagree with your endorsement of selfism. For many years people of our our country have turned away from regard for the common good. Corporations have adopted the precepts of the Agency Theory which promotes only the value to the stockholder over its other shareholders, the employees, the customers and the community, resulting in what I consider a less equitable distribution of wealth. Politics has degraded into what is good for the politician and his party rather than what is good for the country. The MeToo generation’s endorsement of only themselves disregards the role of others whom they believe threaten their way of life.
I’d prefer a return to the values of Abraham Lincoln and Mother Teressa.
3
You keep on knocking down that straw man, David.
Virtue signaling may be its own kind of vice (it has a certain allure of convenience), but it hardly stems from selfishness. Sometimes "solidarity," whatever its flaws, is expressly about showing empathy in the face of complex problems that people aren't sure how to otherwise address.
Reading Candide may make columnists feel morally superior, but meeting people where there at is often more productive, even if -- *gasp* -- keeping it real requires acknowledging others' reality.
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"....and stay off my lawn!!" After a run of excellent columns touting a balance of conservative moral values and liberal compassion as both consistent and achievable, David gets up grumpy one morning and arrives in the 1960s. Let's avoid a redo of the cultural wars that have lasted decades, damaged our social institutions, and currently paralyze our political system. Please leave these generalizations of behaviors to counselors, clergy, spouses, best friends, insightful aunties and others from whom a sincerely questioning individual seeks counsel on their application to a specific case.
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The comments provide the most insight on the essay Mr. Brooks has written. My first take is that this article is aimed at millennials with the references to trigger words.
However there does appear to be shots at liberals who are incensed by racism, sexism and general unfairness. The problem is that Mr. Brooks has painted with such a broad brush that it is difficult to identify anything beyond crankiness.
So, Mr. Brooks, how should millennials, boomers, and liberals respond when they are sick and can't afford to go to the doctor? How do indebted millenials afford to move out of their parents' home when they have a low paying job? How does anyone save for retirement when left on their own to navigate a volatile stock market? How do racial and ethnic minorities manage to navigate their lives when police see their presence as a threat? What is a person to do if she is constantly being harassed at work?
If you have never faced these problems, how can you judge? Speaking up is the first step.
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What a pithy way to deal with an important issue. As always, no one else gets to be serious unless they agree with David.
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You had me worried there for a while, David, but I think I caught on pretty quickly. Well said!
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The snark is strong in this one.
Pity it's directed at people protecting the powerless instead of those promoting the powerful.
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Truly great and courageous column. You probably have upset everyone.
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@William Tarangelo
Gosh, somehow I missed the "courageous" part.
I'm honestly embarrassed for David on this one.
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There is no longer any sense that the well being of society transcends the individual. We care more about ourselves than the good of mankind.
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@David
Certainly not in these times.
It seems to take catastrophic events to return humans to more reasonable and constructive behavior.
There will certainly be a price to pay for our current “I’ve got mine, and who cares about anyone else” mindset as our society deteriorates.
We are living in an era where the rich control all of the decisions, and are willing to sacrifice the country for personal gain.
This doesn’t usually lead to anything good.
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@David
I don't see that selfishness coming from Parkland protesters, Black Live Matter, Greenpeace, Red Cross, public schools...
I do see that selfishness coming from financiers, Wall Street, politicians, our president ...
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@PE well said
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"People are always talking about how Nelson Mandela came out of prison and tried to usher in an era of forgiveness and reconciliation. That’s all very well and good for Nelson Mandela, but what does this have to do with your life?'.....An example of extraordinary wisdom?
I guess it says a lot about where we are right now that the majority of these comments seem to be about Trump, Republicans, and Democrats, in an article that mentions none of them.
I took this piece to be about sincerity, and how it takes real effort and interpersonal interactions to invoke change. Using lawn signs or snapbacks with slogans printed on them are a personal declaration of your own morality, but they don't really do anything to change the problems you're taking issue with. Real change requires more than just self-expression.
4
Ironically, 'the virtue of selfishness' (Ayn Rand) is the bible of the current Republican Party, with its ALEC and Federalist Society, its right wing centers at universities throughout the US, its hostility to all regulatory limits, and its endorsing the deep desire to keep as much money that has landed in ones lap as possible....as for others, let them eat cake. (PS every baby boomer i know has a deep concern for the well being of others, including the poor, the downtrodden, the outcasts, the refugees, the world of nature.)
4
Those taking issue that he doesn't include MAGA folks in here are missing the point. I think David is trying to show the left that they need to step up and serve if they want to be truly progressive; that they need to stop talking about how terrible others are, and focus on helping the truly less fortunate (or the environment, etc.) Today, it is incredibly easy to "badge" morality, and it does "feel good" (at least for a little while, until that dopa wears off,) but it's a lot harder to act on it. It's also very easy to impugn others, while taking smug satisfaction in one's own pseudo superiority.
6
After surviving another Christmas with a family split right down the middle either loving or hating Trump (dinners are fun!), I realized my relatives who are always willing to help out and take time out of their day is not dependent on their political allegiance.
Some of them despise Trump, think he's a immoral and corrupt child, yet some (not all) of these very same people will not lift a finger to contribute to the community and are rather unhelpful. And some are quite the opposite.
Conversely, some of them support Trump, think he has the steel nerve to follow through on some of his promises (standing up to China, enforcing immigration, etc.), and some (not all) of these people are actively involved in their communities and volunteer a great deal, while others just watch Fox News in anger and don't contribute to much of anything.
I think we all know this, yet Trump is such a horrid person it's easy to get swept away with outrage. Mr. Brooks does a good job satirizing this unique aspect of our current political climate. And it's rather nice to see someone have fun with their column now and again.
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One thing comes to mind when reading these comments, both left and right, "If you spot it you got it".
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"We" the people, right? No us and them. No bad or good either. Just messy grey aged folks lost in a world that ran past them, while all they were doing was trying to survive.
To top those trials off, the young now insist everybody but them is to blame.
Irony is lost on people who can't see "we" are all jokers in a game of mystery.
David, this is already my all time favorite column of yours. Thank you.
4
I realize, of course, that Mr. Brooks is being tongue in cheek here. I'm certain he is aware of the fundamental difference between feelings and meaning. How am I so sure? Because I'm certain he has read Victor Frankel's Man's Search for Meaning and Erich Fromm's Escape from Freedom. The more we travelled head long down the road of hedonism; the less meaning we experienced.
1
I'm an infrequent reader of David Brooks (or any other opinion writer). When I read this, I thought it was surely targeted at Donald Trump. Then I read a few reader comments and realized I got it wrong. I still think it is a good description of Trump's behavior.
1
I hope David that this article written painting the bizarre that individual behavior can be about good and evil, is not an intimate feeling of guilt and / or caresses to an excessively demanding Ego. The fiction in a writing, whether or not sarcastic in many ovations betray us ...
I'm sorry but this just wasn't very funny though ironic, perhaps. America needs healing more than snark.
3
I've got Crony Capitalism and the Strategic Air Command on my side. The rest of the world can pound salt.
1
My morality, the morality of reason, is contained in a single axiom: existence exists—and in a single choice: to live. The rest proceeds from these. To live, man must hold three things as the supreme and ruling values of his life: Reason—Purpose—Self-esteem. Reason, as his only tool of knowledge—Purpose, as his choice of the happiness which that tool must proceed to achieve—Self-esteem, as his inviolate certainty that his mind is competent to think and his person is worthy of happiness, which means: is worthy of living. These three values imply and require all of man’s virtues, and all his virtues pertain to the relation of existence and consciousness: rationality, independence, integrity, honesty, justice, productiveness, pride.
-Ayn Rand
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For years the Republican Party has cultivated Ayn Rand acolytes and other theorists of self. Rejecting authoritarianism and racism. It is surprising to me that more people have not noticed that Brooks, as a devote capitalism, recognizes that the economic system is destructive of tradition and that he favors a cultural authoritarianism.
1
I suspect that what we have here is a binary column...part "people are so mean to me when they respond to my pretzel-twisting, tone deaf Op Eds where I try to criticize trump and the trumpers, but really can't because I am one to the core" and "whenever I try to lay out a cause and effect it ends up being both sides do it, but my side - the MAGA side - is always right". Buried in the sarcasm and rather poor attempt at humor is biting cynicism and bitterness. It is the ranting of someone who just can't quit the side that is responsible for so much of the mess we are in.
2
I'm surprised at all the exclamation marks in this article. Is that how NYT opinion columnists are supposed to write?
A major problem with U.S. society is being far too self-engaged and Brooks is celebrating this in this article. He probably should be encouraged to go on a sabbatical.
I'm a self-taught kind of "expert" when it comes to Climate Change. Many thousands of articles read (who knows how many), many hundreds of presentations watched (virtually of course since that doesn't result in any CO2 emissions on my part), and probably a hundred or so scientific studies read.
While all of this hard work has resulted in true understanding of the most important issue of all time, it hasn't resulted in any fame or fortune for myself, and I never expected that it would.
I can't even get members of my own family to care about Climate Change which greatly depresses me. I may be one in a hundred thousand when it comes to this pretty good, pretty comprehensive knowledge, but noone seems to care. They must all be going down the same path that Brooks seems to be celebrating in this article.
You could say that the efforts I've put in over a number of years are a form of self-absorbtion, it's not the same as the form being celebrated in this article.
This is why the culture of the "advanced countries" will, in the end, be destined for ruin along with all the other cultures.
Funny and true, but aimed wrong.
1
At last a true exposition on ethics by David Brooks. Bravo! It is right up there with a Modest Proposal, or sort of.
Self absorbing behavior is as old as childhood but the attack on simple consideration for how we affect others helpfully or not was begun by conservatives during Reagan’s administration who argued that base selfishness led to positive social outcomes while altruism led to poverty and loss of self respect.
4
Yes. Thank you, David, for raising these issues so sensitively and in a way that will further public discourse.
If only we could get back to true ‘conservative’ values like those David and the Republican Party have worked so hard to uphold and maintain over the past 40 years! Examples of leaders in this effort include Mitch McConnell, Dennis Hastert, and Newt Gingrich. Perhaps Ken Starr’s tenure as President of Baylor University is the best shining example.
I always read David’s column because I know I can count on him to address the most important questions of the day!
5
Let me run the world for a few minutes and even YOU will like it!
1
This column reminds me of the adage, "The enemy of my enemy is my friend." Left wing authoritarians and right wing authoritarians appear to be enemies, but both are adamantly opposed to center-left, center-right and bipartisan coalitions. What better way to defeat these powerful agents of - gasp! - effective government than convincing voters they don't exist? When authoritarians can convince people only authoritarianism exists they are halfway home to victory.
1
For the past couple years David's pieces have felt like a desperate search for where it all went wrong. Instead of self reflection on his own generation, which has held power for decades, he once again tries to pin our woes on the youngsters who just aren't as tough and self-reliant as they were "back in the day." Trust me, millennials would love to get off your lawn, but we can't afford it.
14
David, It seems like you are describing the average New Yorker who is living at the spear of consumerism bombardment with few outlets to interact with other members of our species, which has enabled us to evolve to this point. It's difficult to establish a sense of community when you avoid eye contact with your neighbor.
I love it David, you capture the Zeitgeist of American “ exceptionalism “ as innately known by every woke individual, intent on walking his or her streets of gold, reality surrounding them be damned.
3
I think Brooks is confusing the self-righteousness of youth with an actual movement.
Each generation has its conceits, mine was 'End This War.'
This generation looks out a world that has outsourced everything and as a consequence, turns inward. It may be easily mocked but it is understandable.
They too will grow up.
3
Do people really not understand that David is not criticizing liberals but people who think they are “doing something” to bring about “change” by wearing t-shirts and trolling twitter feeds?
The point of David’s piece is not that liberalism is bad but that “doing something” and feeling “morally superior” to others by simply expressing outrage on social media, etc is actually not doing anything at all! It is simply being done so you feel better about you and so you can falsely think to yourself that’ve you made a difference when in reality you’ve done very little. Real change requires rolling up your sleeves and doing meaningful and selfless work that often will not make you rich, a YouTube star, or win you countless followers on Twitter.
6
@Nickole
Does David really not understand how his critique come off as just as one-sided as those he criticizes? Furthermore, why can't people put signs in their yard while simultaneously enacting the behaviors those signs promote? The problem with this piece is that it really just engages in the same kind of empty criticism the author derides in others. Nothing in this piece is an example of the positive, selfless, work for change that David is supposedly calling for. Rather, it's just the mirror image of the "wokescolds" that those on the right are so critical of.
David, you neglect to mention the first rule of the self righteous: coat all you say with a thick layer of irony.
5
Lighten up, Bobbie, Just think about it.
"Picture yourself shopping at a farmers market where everything’s locally grown. Do you feel the tingly meaningful feeling welling up inside? Of course you do!"
Lack of porta-potties.
3
Thank you, Ayn Rand. But there's nothing moral about selfism lest the vessel's not otherwise the temple whence service's higher purpose trumps mere meaning. Look no further than FOUNTAINHEAD's starchitect Howard Roark on whose Cathedral of Inspiration's high altar is a commissioned sculpture of the woman he raped in the stone quarry. This, the same Howard Roark who blows up his low-income housing project because it didn't get into ARCHITECTURAL DIGEST.
Finally, for someone who thinks he's woke enough to pretend to know what woke even means, David Brooks might be better off fixing what's instead broke if it ain't woke.
This was supposed to be a spoof wasn’t it? I’d be sorry for the writer if it wasn’t.
Hold the sarcasm, David! It's not evidence of good character.
2
So now you've got a radical new philosophy: selfishness. Give up already.
Mr. Brooks, your column is the perfect example of what the physicist Pauli once said: "It's not even wrong."
1
David Brooks has hit it out of the park. Well done.
4
Life in VULGARIA is so pleasant.
Brooks sets out to write a column about everything selfie and people who think it's all about them are offended. Thanks for raising your hands, commenters! You have just proved his point.
4
There is more than a touch of Howard Beale in you today. You are obviously a born again something. I only wish that I could see things as clearly as you do. It must be wonderful.
So many comments. So many failures to recognize biting satire! Well done, David, and welcome back from your tired Fox News Lite endless twisted support of the heartless Right. Reading good Brooks — such a good way to start the new year! Cheers!
3
@JJR
And yet, with this "biting satire," the author is engaging in the same kind of outwardly directed criticism that he decries. Instead of modeling what's desirable, David chooses to self-indulgently vent behind the screen of sarcasm. It doesn't work because it's so clearly disingenuous.
loved it - thanks, David Brooks!
2
Hey man, it takes a lot of effort to press "like" at the end of a Facebook screed denouncing something or other (Trump, Trump,!Trump)....
1
Thankfully with the Democrats taking the house, they can do waaay more than yard signs and t-shirts!
1
What are your columns, Mr. Brooks, if not supreme examples of the virtue-signaling you condemn? This one’s unsophisticated snark is great fun to read, as is most satirical screed. But please, aim in the future to include in your lampooning a more representative sample of those who indulge this particular form of human folly. Where, for example, are those who signal their goodness by calling for an end to supposed infanticide or by demanding a ridiculous Wall in order to save America from rapists, murderers, and drug dealers? Where in this is there evidence of regard for some external moral standard? “You shall know them by their fruit” is good for both goose and gander. Virtuous talk over moral action afflicts conservatives as much as the imaginary liberals you attack. In other words, pause to revisit Swift before attempting this sort of thing in the future. You might then include among your targets columnists such as yourself, letter-writing respondents, and the whole sad lot of opinion-spouting meat puppets we call human beings.
6
@Robert
Amen. It's all too convenient that David's "satire" is deployed for such nakedly partisan ends, which, of course, renders it completely ineffective when read with any objectivity.
You nailed it!
1
Hmm. I'm in my 50's but I talk frequently with young people of the ilk that Mr. Brooks is trying to insult and I have to say, even when there is disagreement, I've never had any of them come off anywhere near as petulant and, well, snotty, as this column. Interestingly, I think Mr. Brooks should spend more time in self-reflection to ascertain why.
Also, a little more time researching the reality of Mother Teresa wouldn't go amiss.
Thanks for your opinions but I have my own moral compass and do not need yours.
1
Well, good morning, Mr. Cynical!
I’m afraid that Mr. Brooks has reached his peak and now finds himself in free fall. I fail to see any redeeming value in his comments, only narcissism in itself.
1
Brooks had me at first until I realized the sarcasm.
Some newspaper columnists write as though they are indignant, want to tell their story and condemn bad people. They want to be heard because that's the essence of their craft. Sound like anyone you know, David?
If Brooks would stop mythologizing the wonderfulness of the past maybe I would take him a tad more seriously.
2
I feel sad for Mr. Brooks who is clearly grasping at straws to make himself relevant in a world bent on increasing it’s collective level of critical consciousness. What confuses me is that “selfism” isn’t a condition for folks who, for 500 or more years, have been shut out from the structures and systems built on the foundations of white supremacy, patriarchy, and corrupted capitalism. When women, people of color, queer folks, immigrant communities, and poor folks assert their identities using social media, T-shirt’s, lawn signs, and community organizing, it is an assertion, a vision, of another world that is possible. Perhaps his editors may want to suggest a sabbatical full of trainings to unlearn his internalized racial, gender, and cultural superiority? Continuing down this path makes him appear to be yet another disgruntled white man, grumpy that he is no longer meaningful to the rest of us.
3
This column finds David just being super lazy. Listing faults in the abstract doesn’t hold ourselves to a mirror, but just provokes a shrug — we aren’t THAT bad, thank goodness.
Try harder David, please.
2
This column is David being super funny. It’s an indictment without a special prosecutor.
1
Started out pretty good and turned into a pointless old guy rant half way through.
I know it was meant to be sarcastic, but do you realize just how many people don’t ever even GET sarcasm? As far as putting yourself first, that’s called the survival extinct and it’s probably why we’re all still here on the planet. But, to ONLY think of oneself all the time, that’s where you’ll find the Narcissistic Personality Disorder types in the MAGA hats.
I thank the partisans who brought to light how much I identify as American. Two years ago I began to volunteer for a candidate based on the fact that 1. he was not Ted Cruz Administration 2. He had a college degree( not the be all end all, I know) Thanks to the people who about once a week asked if I would tuck knee scoff(rhymes with), are you as cute as you sound?, you numb ditch(rhymes with), and my favorite, the guy who wants to replace the government with 140,000 biblical supervisors and some pseudo biblical gibberish( a dominionist sharia), and then there are the folks with the right wing radio head talking points, first among them " we are not a democracy, we are a republic." It is sad how true that is. I recall the car with the antenna in front of my house on Easter weekend , some years ago, checking me out for a DOD clearance. I am always reminded of that with the current crop in the White House , many of whom couldn't get a DOD clearance if they wanted to work on a helicopter due to debt, outlandish behavior, having much to hide, and contacts with unsavory characters. do give a second thought to whether your indignation has become self-indulgent . That is absolutely the least of our worries.
David Brooks always provides me with an example to remind me why I am neither a Conservative nor a Christian. He is, as they say, a one trick pony.
2
Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.
Selfish or selfless?