To name just one of Graeber's essential lies: he makes the claim that Federal Reserve issuing American debt is privately controlled and weaves an extensive chapter based in fundamental ways on this misapprehension. This is a lie that's not "minor" nor "a matter of interpretation" nor unrelated to the "character of the book or arguments within": it's a fundamental misapprehension of the most important debt instrument in modern history (perhaps all history). In a book about debt in history.
I don't really care too much for Graeber's self-important response. If the answer is, yes, Graeber's entitled to say what he wants because people celebrate and have conferences about him, and those who disagree are implied to be beneath him... well, the brazen self-importance is so astonishing that I can't rightly understand how one can agree with that degree of self-importance so directly presented, especially when it comes paired with no actual defense of his statements -- not even a link.
Statements of the form "I'm right because I'm important, and that's all I need to say" are not usually tolerated from almost anyone as a substitute for basic, bare truths. That they are accepted here is not only a comment on the character of Graeber but on the character of his followers.
I don't really care too much for Graeber's self-important response. If the answer is, yes, Graeber's entitled to say what he wants because people celebrate and have conferences about him, and those who disagree are implied to be beneath him... well, the brazen self-importance is so astonishing that I can't rightly understand how one can agree with that degree of self-importance so directly presented, especially when it comes paired with no actual defense of his statements -- not even a link.
Statements of the form "I'm right because I'm important, and that's all I need to say" are not usually tolerated from almost anyone as a substitute for basic, bare truths. That they are accepted here is not only a comment on the character of Graeber but on the character of his followers.