Commentary editor Noah Rothman takes aim at the “woke left,” comparing them to stern, joyless Puritans who seek to make every daily choice a matter of life or death and break society down into the saintly or sinful.

THE RISE OF THE NEW PURITANS:
Fighting Back Against Progressives’ War on Fun
by Noah Rothman
Broadside Books/HarperCollins, July 2022

In Noah Rothman’s view, the Left used to be the party of the hippies and the free spirits. Now it’s home to woke scolds and humorless idealogues. The New Puritans can judge a person’s moral character by their clothes, Netflix queue, fast food favorites, the sports they watch, and the company they keep. No choice is neutral, no sphere is private.
Not since the Puritans has a political movement wanted so much power over your thoughts, hobbies, and preferences every minute of your day. In the process, they are sucking the joy out of life.
In THE RISE OF THE NEW PURITANS, Noah Rothman explains how, in pursuit of a better world, progressives are ruining the very things which make life worth living. They’ve created a society full of verbal trip wires and digital witch hunts. Football? Too violent. Fusion food? Appropriation. The nuclear family? Oppressive.
Witty, deeply researched, and thorough, THE RISE OF THE NEW PURITANS encourages us to spurn a movement whose primary goal has become limiting happiness. It uncovers the historical roots of the left’s war on fun and reminds us of the freedom and personal fulfillment at the heart of the American experiment.

Noah Rothman is the associate editor of Commentary Magazine, author of Unjust, and an MSNBC/NBC News contributor.