Christopher Lasch

Conservatives sense a link between television and drugs, but they do not grasp the nature of this connection. ”

The left has come to regard common sense - the traditional wisdom and folkways of the community - as an obstacle to progress and enlightenment. ”

Conservatives unwittingly side with the social forces that contribute to the destruction of traditional values. ”

Conservatives have no understanding of modern capitalism. They have a distorted understanding of the traditional values they claim to defend. ”

Progressive rhetoric has the effect of concealing social crisis and moral breakdown by presenting them as the birth pangs of a new order. ”

Today Americans are overcome not by the sense of endless possibility but by the banality of the social order they have erected against it. ”

A growing awareness of the depth of popular attachment to the family has led some liberals to concede that family is not just a buzzword for reaction. ”

The left dismisses talk about the collapse of family life and talks instead about the emergence of the growing new diversity of family types. ”

The question of the family now divides our society so deeply that the opposing sides cannot even agree on a definition of the institution they are arguing about. ”

The left sees nothing but bigotry and superstition in the popular defense of the family or in popular attitudes regarding abortion, crime, busing, and the school curriculum. ”