A Review of the New Temperance: America’s Obsession with Sin and Vice, by David Wagner
General theme: repression of pleasure in the United States and the constant mantra of danger.
Theme: A compelling historical, sociological, and philosophical analysis of the American infatuation with sin and immorality.
Thesis: the author reasons The New Temperance as a strategy serving the interests of social classes and the popular social movement.
About the author: DAVID WAGNER is an associate professor of social work and sociology at the University of Southern Maine. He had a chapter titled “Reinterpreting the ‘Undeserving Poor’, from Pathology to Resistance” in a recently published collection “International Perspectives on Homelessness” (Greenwood Press). His recent book, “The New Temperance,” was the subject of a column in the Boston Globe, and was also reviewed in The Texas Observer and Maine Times.
Book quality:
The paper used in this publication meets the requirements of the American National Standard for Paper Permanence for Printed Library Materials Z39.48-1984.
There are no special features such as images or maps, color plates, etc. in this book. The book has an attractive cover that more or less conveys the content of the book. This book is good for those who are interested in socio-cultural issues, especially American studies.
Author Purpose: David Wagner titled the “New Temperance” for the war on drugs, fighting smoking, controlling what kids watch on TV, censoring the internet, and the constant food warnings and sermons about teen sex.
Although the obsession with personal behavior in America over the past two decades has dramatically reversed the liberating trend of the 1960s and early 1970s, The New Temperance argues that this behavior is quite similar to the social movements of the 19th century and early 20th century, such as Temperance, Social Purity, and the Vice and Vigilance movements.”
“The New Temperance questions the constant mantra in the media and in political debates about the dangers of personal behavior and challenges America’s love affair with repression. Drawing on historical, sociological, and philosophical sources, the authors argue that the New Temperance Temperance is a strategy at the service of the state and the interest of the dominant social class, as well as a popular social movement that develops a consensual coalition between traditionally identified elements of the right and left”.
Several well-written books with different points of view tried to reveal to the public and politicians the utter uselessness of the Prohibition Substance.
In general, this book tries to explore the American behaviors in the last decades. In David Wagner’s book, we are given a compelling historical and sociological analysis of “The American Obsession with Sin and Vice” and ultimately understand the current Prohibition in relation to the nature of tradition, religion, and American politics. It discusses how Americans accepted abnormal behaviors and to answer this question the writer goes back in time to review social movements, which one is the New Temperance and gives us a historical perspective on it. Professor Wagner studies the reasons and deep roots of the repression of the pleasure of certain personal behaviors in America, from the temperance and “social purity” movements of the nineteenth century to the twenty-first century. With regard to these movements, he examines how the American media and political elites dealt with American behavior. In the end, we will see how social conservatism resulted in a severe crisis in the reproduction of social classes and how political parties approached the New Temperance.