Comment by anon1385

Of course pg hates the "middle brow" dismissal. Part of his schtick is Malcolm Gladwell style 'intellectual porn' essays that ignore facts and complexity to paint an aesthetically pleasing (but false) narrative to people who are not subject experts. At this stage I'm not sure if PG does it deliberately like Gladwell admitted doing. I'm willing to give him the benefit of the doubt and say he does it inadvertently by writing about topics where he has no knowledge of previous study, coupled with a large ego born of being rich and constantly surrounded by sycophants trying to get funding.

The middle brow dismissal is apt/damaging in these situations because it saves everybody a lot of time by quickly demonstrating that the author ignored those pesky real world facts and complexities that spoilt the ideological narrative.