Are you guys trolling me?
Sounds like you feel as though you're smart enough to "see through" the propaganda, but those with lesser intellect may succumb?
By that standard, nobody should read about Marx... ever... because you'll instantly and irreversibly transform into a Marxist.
Pro-Marxist literature shouldn't be part of the CNO's reading list. I literally just said if any 1000 people read extremist propaganda then only a small minority will be influenced by it. I have a Masters in Regional Security Studies from NPS. I have studied these things in a controlled environment. That's different then the CNO putting it on his reading list, with no explanation that these are bad and anti-American ideas, and with no counter-points or literature provided, and telling sailors to read it without anyone there to even guide a discussion on it.
I managed to read up on Somali culture and history without joining al Shabaab. I read the monthly newsletters put out by ISIS without strapping a bomb under my SDBs.
On the flip side, I have family members that believe Alex Jones.
It also contains the following idea:
“There’s a stronger and clearer correlation between levels of violent crime and unemployment levels than between violent crime and race, but that’s not the story policymakers have chosen to tell.“
Thank you for proving my point. Some people are not as susceptible to certain types of extremist ideas as others. Some people can listen to Alex Jones and think, "Yeah, this guy's right!", and others won't. Should the CNO put monthly ISIS newsletters on his reading list, for Seaman Timmy to read without any context? I guarantee if we made every sailor read ISIS propaganda, we would do more harm than good and some small minority of sailors would be radicalized. If such material is taught in classes, however, or given to people who we know already have strong critical thinking skills (probably everyone on this forum, for example, but not every random sailor who might come across a book in the ship's library on deployment), then it wouldn't be a problem.
As for your additional quote from the book: Who is out there saying there is a higher correlation between violent crime and race than unemployment? I've literally never heard that argument made. Even if this wasn't a straw man argument... great, he had a useful insight in the book to go along with his calls for overthrowing the government and constitution that we are sworn to protect (both of which guarantee capitalism).