Rational Polemics: Tackling the Ethical Dilemmas of Life

by Richard Todd Devens

Overview

Rational Polemics: Tackling the Ethical Dilemmas of Life There's a whole host of beliefs that most people simply repeat without question. They are chanted so often as to have nearly lost all meaning, and are rarely challenged. Rational Polemics dares to expose the contradictions that are rife in many of these blindly accepted beliefs. The book endeavors to question all things - to expose the folly and hypocrisy of universally held beliefs, including accepted religious dogma. It is geared toward open-minded readers with the courage to challenge convention and political correctness to consider alternative viewpoints. Rational Polemics by Richard Devens presents a provocative, controversial, outrageous challenge to the ideas and values that most of the world merely accepts "on faith - ideas that, upon closer examination, make little sense. "I wrote this book to encourage people not to blindly accept what others believe just because it is 'politically correct' to do so, or just because the majority does," Devens says. "I encourage people to think for themselves, and to live by the courage of their convictions. I encourage people to have the integrity of living by their own moral code if, by rational thought and reflection, they are convinced they are right." Told through personal anecdotes, with tongue-in-cheek humor and refreshing candor, Rational Polemics is a breath of fresh air to anyone ready to consider the true nature of evil, the hypocrisies inherent in religion and other prickly debates. Rational Polemics opens readers' minds to new ideas about deep and often difficult topics, sans the sugarcoating.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781432798802
Publisher:	Outskirts Press, Inc.
Publication date:	05/29/2013
Pages:	228
Sales rank:	1,014,969
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 0.52(d)

About the Author

Richard Devens is a classically trained pianist, piano instructor, and writer. His article What Is Talent? appeared in the September-October 1992 issue of Piano Guild Notes. Earl Wild-The Romantic Master, a full-length interview of the late great piano virtuoso, was the cover feature of the November-December 1996 issue. Richard is co-author of the book Martial Arts for Kids (Weatherhill, 1997). He has also contributed articles to WUSHU KUNG FU, Official Karate, Karate/Kung-fu Illustrated, and BLACK BELT. He lives in New York.

Editorial Reviews

Devens, in his debut, holds forth on a broad selection of societal ills, inconveniences, inequities and inanities. This wide-ranging, ambitious book covers a lot of ground, tackling everything from self-righteous religion to syrupy movie sound tracks. The author confidently wades into such thorny issues as criminality, the death penalty, marriage, obscenity and the solicitation of prostitutes. The book treats each polemic pit stop with an air of utmost sobriety and sophisticated reason, even when the arguments come off as rather strident. For example, the author recalls an incident in which he witnessed a disturbed teen masturbate in front of a gorgeous woman on a Brooklyn sidewalk, and he laments that he was not a "dictator" at the time, capable of having the pitiful offender "executed." There's little hint of Jonathan Swift when the author advocates cannibalizing convicted murderers: "By devouring the remains of a monster, [victims' loved ones] can more easily achieve closure...especially when they later go to the toilet to purge the aftermath of the meal from their bodies." The subjects of racism, torture, performance-enhancing drugs and vigilantism are afforded similar consideration, while the ongoing Israeli-Palestinian dispute is quickly discarded as an example of an unsolvable issue. Devens also enthusiastically defends American troops' urinating on corpses, and the husbands of ugly women having sex outside of marriage. When batters nail headhunting pitchers in the noggin with line drives, he calls it "poetic justice." However, Devens sometimes directs arguments at easy targets, such as traffic enforcement agents (or, as the author calls them, "meter maids"); after all, no one enjoys getting a ticket. Intellectual fodder for like-minded conservatives.

Kirkus Reviews