Talk:Roger Scruton

Trolling and superficiality.
Has anyone else felt that Scruton is a very superficial intellectual? When he criticizes someone - and in general his most famous works are criticism of others intellectual currents - he is terribly superficial in his argument. For example, in his criticism of Kenneth Dover's work on Greek homosexuality, it was that Dover's work was "trivialising" and some other epithets, but he never gave a compelling argument on why the book was bad. The same happens in his book on the New Left, whose his major criticism is that the New Left deviates too much from classical Marxism, never taking into account that this is the very reason and sense of the birth of the New Left.

I think he is more of an pop intellectual than a serious one.
 * 05:32, 10 June 2018 (UTC)


 * It's actually amazing how detailed and lucid his arguments can be when he philosophize a topic not properly done before (his epic work on the Philosophical themes of Wagner and his opera Tristan und Isolde). But when he starts hammering on other philosophers, indeed, there is little meat. Broad criticisms that often miss the point, superficial examples to back up big criticism and of course...there is the cranky old witty slightly humerous philosopher man writing style, that gives him a slight pop-philosophy vibe (though not remotely as much as the baffling cult following that Derrida had or the even stranger following Slavoj Žižek has now.) Shabi  DOO  18:36, 11 June 2018 (UTC)

I don't think that statement is very accurate. In Latin America, especially in Brazil, this man has a number of followers that can be equated with Derrida, Deleuze, Dawkins or any other famous intellectual.

There is a definite resemblance in my opinion. Could this be alluded to as a joke in the caption for his image? 2001:8003:A51D:CB00:301E:3924:EEF1:A5EE (talk) 14:46, 7 September 2020 (UTC)

I don't want to detract his academic position, but he is not an outsider in academic matters. There are other conservative intellectuals much less famous and with a much more original work. Alain de Benoist or Guillaume Faye are the first examples that come to mind of conservative intellectuals with a more interesting and less famous work than Scruton. --190.174.91.112 (talk) 14:38, 6 July 2018 (UTC)


 * In my experience in four different universities in four different countries, he is quite the outsider. His values based approach isn't particularly topical and he isn't frequently quoted in books or journals, his books in the libraries look like they are still new (except his work on Tristan und Isolde) and I've never seen him in a course syllabus nor heard his name mentioned during any lecture at any level. The few times I heard his name mentioned, no one had much to say or respond to it. If he still has a following in English speaking countries, I'm not sure where that following is based. I'm not saying he is irrelevant or a bad philosopher or hated, but he certainly seems like an outsider to me. Shabi  DOO  22:51, 7 July 2018 (UTC)

Jon Pertwee?
There is a definite resemblance in my opinion. Could this be alluded to as a joke in the caption for his image? 2001:8003:A51D:CB00:301E:3924:EEF1:A5EE (talk) 14:46, 7 September 2020 (UTC)