How I Accidentally Joined the Vast Right-Wing Conspiracy: And Found Inner Peace

As a journalist in an industry populated by liberals, Harry Stein carried the left-wing banner in his life and work. Then he became a father, and suddenly the Right sounded right. Even worse, the Left was starting to sound — and look — wrong.

Stein cuts through the distortions on both sides and fearlessly tackles such provocative topics as feminism, affirmative action, PC education, gay rights, and sexual McCarthyism, and shows how liberating it is to no longer have to pass as a correct thinker. Daring, brilliantly argued, and savagely funny, How I Accidentally Joined the Vast Right-Wing Conspiracy will resonate with many who have witnessed the social revolution of the past thirty years and questioned its outcome — even if only secretly.

As a journalist in an industry populated by liberals, Harry Stein carried the left-wing banner in his life and work. Then he became a father, and suddenly the Right sounded right. Even worse, the Left was starting to sound — and look — wrong.

Stein cuts through the distortions on both sides and fearlessly tackles such provocative topics as feminism, affirmative action, PC education, gay rights, and sexual McCarthyism, and shows how liberating it is to no longer have to pass as a correct thinker. Daring, brilliantly argued, and savagely funny, How I Accidentally Joined the Vast Right-Wing Conspiracy will resonate with many who have witnessed the social revolution of the past thirty years and questioned its outcome — even if only secretly.

Publishers Weekly

The journey from liberal to conservative chronicled here by Stein is a journey already described by others such as Norman Podhoretz and David Horiwitz. Though thus predictable, Stein's account is nevertheless amusing. He relates personal anecdotes about growing up, raising children and relating to friends and colleagues, but also touches on current events, culminating in the sexual transgressions of Bill Clinton. The light tone and humorous prose eventually wear thin, however, and Stein sets up a straw man in his attacks on the Left. Essentially, Stein paints himself in his liberal days as a man with ideological blinders firmly in place, and he skewers liberals in general as if they all wore the same blinders. For example, in claiming that liberal psychology undermines personal responsibility by abjuring everyone from fault for everything, he presents an extremist position. Stein himself states at one point that extremists on both ends of the ideological spectrum deny "a fair hearing to alternative views on complex social issues"-yet he is guilty of the same error. (June) Copyright 2000 Cahners Business Information.|

Harry Stein is the author of eight previous books. The New York Times Book Review called his recent memoir, How I Joined the Vast Right Wing Conspiracy and Found Inner Peace, "a wickedly funny and moral book." He has also written for numerous publications, including the Wall Street Journal, the New York Times Sunday Magazine, Playboy, GQ, and Esquire, for which he created the"Ethics" column. He lives in Hastings-on-Hudson, New York.