The culture wars are, to quote Pat Buchanan, a struggle "for the soul of America," and they've been consuming our political discourse for centuries. As Andrew Hartman writes, "the history of America, for better or worse, is largely a history of debates about the idea of America." Are we a racist country? Should gay people be allowed to marry? What about gun control, abortion, transgender medicine, affirmative action, equal pay for women, book banning, deplatforming, cancel culture, safe spaces and so-called wokeness?
Fought on many fronts, the outcome of this war can have — to state the obvious — profound real-world consequences. Last year, there were 693 mass shootings that left 703 people dead and 2,842 injured, and a recent study found that overturning Roe v. Wade could cause a "21% increase in the number of pregnancy-related deaths," with this disproportionately affecting Black women. Children go through active shooter drills in school, and transgender people are sometimes denied the treatments prescribed by their doctors. Pay inequality makes being a single mother difficult, and the question which books our children are allowed to read could shape a whole generation's understanding of the American project. The list goes on.
