The Right Side of History: How Reason and Moral Purpose Made the West GreatA #1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER! Human beings have never had it better than we have it now in the West. So why are we on the verge of throwing it all away? In 2016, New York Times bestselling author Ben Shapiro spoke at the University of California Berkeley. Hundreds of police officers were required to protect his speech. What was so frightening about Shapiro? He came to argue that Western civilization is in the midst of a crisis of purpose and ideas;