The Perils of Worldview Warnings

I groaned a bit when I saw a recent reviewer’s attempt to tag me politically. The review was even-handed overall, but closed with an advisory note that I am a Christian who “appears to exhibit a friendlier attitude toward those of the Christian right than those in opposition, either politically or religiously." To anyone who knows me well, and likely even to many who do not, those words are as risible as they are cringe-worthy. For the record, my presidential campaign donation history begins with Howard Dean and ends with Barack Obama. In sum, I am a liberal Democrat of the new class variety, even though I fancy myself as having a pragmatic streak (in the sense that, by the summer of 2004, I sported a Kerry-Edwards bumper sticker). I am a Christian, though.

But I should not pick on the reviewer too much. My guess is that he mistook writerly empathy for political sympathy. Thus, this anecdote is perhaps best cited as a cautionary tale about labeling an author. It is a lesson that hits close to home, because I, too, have made assumptions about authors whose books I have reviewed. To this day, I am not sure how accurate many of those assumptions were, because I lack the evidence to prove or disprove them. At some level, commenting on an author’s background and predispositions is necessary and even healthy. Still, I think we should all be wary of worldview warnings. For they might actually be red herrings.