Posted on 01/30/2005 3:14:41 PM PST by beavus
Has Ayn Rand gone mainstream? The radical champion of individualism and capitalism, who died in 1982, is no longer an exotic taste. Her image has adorned a U.S. postage stamp. Her ideas have been detected in a new mass-market animated comedy film, "The Incredibles." And Wednesday, on the 100th anniversary of her birth, there will be a Rand commemoration at the Library of Congress--an odd site for a ceremony honoring a fierce anti-statist. In her day, Rand was at odds with almost every prevailing attitude in American society. She infuriated liberals by preaching economic laissez-faire and lionizing titans of business. She appalled conservatives by rejecting religion in any form while celebrating, in her words, "sexual enjoyment as an end in itself."
(Excerpt) Read more at chicagotribune.com ...
It was about extraordinary people and society's resentment of their great qualities.
"One question: What did "The Incredibles" have to do with Ayn Rand?"
That people who have superior ability should not be punished for their ability, but should be free.
"..I don't know", Atlas Shrugged.
One of the overriding themes in "The Incredibles" was that the exceptional should be encouraged and revered. Another was that the impulse to cut down the exceptional, and make everyone the same, is one of evil.
If I have to pick between Ayn Rand and God I certainly won't pick Ayn...
Of course. Thank you. I guess the author is right. Rand has hidden in my subconscious!
Two themes, interesting. Do you agree with them?
I'm sure Ayn would have been grateful to see government money spend on ceremonies, monopoly post stamps memorializing her ideas & influence - by big-spending, ideological poseurs.
Ron Paul is the only person fit to participate
The "bad guys" in The Incredibles are like typical socialists.
Rand was THE anti-Marx. Writers like F.A. Hayek provided the economic arguments for capitalism, essentially proving that socialism can't work, and will spread misery wherever it is tried. These were fine and dandy, but it took Ayn Rand and a novel called 'Atlas Shrugged' to lay out the MORAL justifications for a society based on capitalism and freedom, rather than state control in the name of "equality".
Together, Rand (morality) and Hayek (economics) offer very powerful intellectual ammo against the left.
Supposedly one of the most widely read books in the country, but you wouldn't know it by talking with people. My guess is that most people who read it are teenage girls and think it is a romance novel.
Why would you say that? I've heard conversations about Ayn Rand come up lots of times in literate circles. Usually the consensus is that the Fountainhead is a great book, and Atlas Shrugged is a lot weaker as a novel, but has a lot of provocative ideas.
I find intellectuals and people on the left give her a lot of props and respect these days. They have a mature relationship with her, admiring some things, diasagreeing with many, without feeling the need to either join her cult following, or paint her as the anti-christ.
Because my personal experience when arguing with people is that they don't realize that intelligent responses were made to their assertions decades ago by one of the most widely read American authors. If they had read Rand, the debate would start at higher level.
I read most of Ayn Rand's works 20 plus years ago. Like most theorists, her strength was her extremism in her views. I take from her like I take from most thinkers, that which makes sense to me, and reject that which contradicts my own sense or faith. In the case of Rand, I celebrate, along with her, the talents and abilities of the gifted. To a lesser extent I agree with her rejection of altruism, but only to the extent that it leads to a sense of entitlement among those who are its beneficiaries. Altruism makes ME feel good, and so has value to me, and so by helping others I am, in a sense, being selfish, as Rand champions. I also favor giving enough assistance to others so as to encourage them to become productive, or more productive, which benefits them directly, and the rest of us indirectly. She would disagree with my religious faith, but the use of my ability to reason, coupled with a level of human intuition, provides me with no honest alternative.
Sorry for the rant, just my initial reaction to this post. And I HAVE to go see The Incredibles.
I don't think Rand was against altruism at all.
What she hated was FORCED altruism via the government.
Here’s an except that I posted on it.
Please tell me you're drunk.
You're just not talking to the right crowd. I've read it twice and am now listening to the audio version of it while working out.
My mother has read it twice.
My father has read it.
My son-in-law has read it and has begun reading it a second time.
My son-in-law to be is reading it.
None of these people are teenage girls. The book is ranked at #434 on Amazon 48 years after it was first published. That's pretty good.
I've read much of Rand's work. Her novels, in retrospect, seem designed to appeal to impressionable minds. In my case, at least, that was a very good thing. The protagonists of her novels Atlas and Fountainhead, though passionate in their work and sexually aware, were too self-confident to be sexually amoral or permissive. Are my memories incorrect?
You are correct, what I took from Ayn's writings is you must take care of yourself in order to have the means to be altruistic.
If one were to read "The Fountain Head" that would be considered more of a romance but even a teen would quickly find it much deeper than they would want to continue with.
Alan Greenspan was once one of her disciples.
I'm not sure what you are referring to here. Are you referring to one of the common errors by people who claim to have read Rand?
I've read both Atlas Shrugged and The Fountain Head and was even at one time a teen aged girl. Believe me when I say that neither of those books are something that would keep the attention of your average girl let alone have them think they tended toward romance.
She and Sir Karl Popper,Jewish, are amoung the greatest minds of the 20th century.
" I've heard conversations about Ayn Rand come up lots of times in literate circles. Usually the consensus is that the Fountainhead is a great book, and Atlas Shrugged is a lot weaker as a novel"
I find it interesting that the literary circles would find the Fountainhead a better book than Atlas Shrugged. My take on the Fountainhead is the premise is flawed. We have an architect demanding to do things his way with other peoples money. It's fine to do things your way when your footing the bill, when you expect to get things your way on someone elses dime I think you've gone too far.
Ayn rhymes with rain.
I am quite sure she would not have liked the briliant Jewish femal classification, since she was anti-religion and anti-feminism, as both things, in her mind were subjective ways of keeping the people unequal and from realizing their true potential.
Some would call it "idealism".
I take from her like I take from most thinkers, that which makes sense to me
You might recall that she recommended no more than that. She was a self-proclaimed philosopher, after all. Understanding was vital to her.
Altruism makes ME feel good, and so has value to me, and so by helping others I am, in a sense, being selfish
Reminds me of a funny rant by Kant regarding regarding the apparent impossibility of altruism.
Sorry for the rant, just my initial reaction to this post.
Not at all. A very interesting post. You sound like an introspecting individual.
I saw the "Incredibles" when it first came out. Now I vaguely do remember some thought of Rand popping into my head when I watched it. But that was quickly washed away by thoughts of Hillary Clinton who resembles the female lead.
The movement was always very idealistic. You might get some idea of how they would behave in practical situations by reading the Objectivist news letters pertaining to current events. But even those are highly simplified and idealistic, IMO.
Your are right on!!!
personally i think her book of essays "the new left: the anti-industrial revolution" is her best book.
she had these people figured out a long time before anyone else.
dear old Alis Rosenbaum (re)named herself after a writing machine, an Remington-RAND typewriter.
She hated both. She considered herself a philosopher and was deeply concerned with the ideas underlying peoples actions. The notion of altruism, being self-sacrifice, she considered to be an irrational idea for an individual to act upon.
Don't confuse her with a libertarian. Libertarians are not concerned so much with how an individual lives or thinks, so long as he doesn't interfere with others. Reminds me of someone who once referred to Objectivism as the "anti-libertarian wing of the Libertarian party". It's a common confusion.
Good thing no one asked you. sheesh.
Apparently you see more of her influence than I do. I even talked with people who've read it. I'm left wondering what motivated them to read it, since it apparently wasn't her philosophy. I'm guessing it must've been the sweaty sex scenes.
No I'm not drunk. Not a bad idea though.
The Fountainhead is probably the best novel ever written.
I did not say anything about my personal view, I was merely pointing out that Ayn Rand herself would have been highly irritated by being termed " a Jewish intellectual" as she viewed herself and any others she agreed with as " Intellectuals, not female intellectuals, jewish intellectuals, etc. I personally disagree with her views on religion, and have no problem if someone wished to call me a female intellectual, or a southern intellectual, and so forth. Just pointing that out to you, very sorry if I offended you in any way.
booked for later
Did you read it or Atlas Shrugged?
Here’s to the crazy ones.
The eccentrics.
The misfits.
The rebels.
The troublemakers.
The round pegs in the square holes.
The ones who see things differently.
They’re not fond of rules.
And they have no respect for the status quo.
You can praise them, disagree with them, quote them,
disbelieve them, glorify or vilify them.
About the only thing you can’t do is ignore them.
Because they change things.
They invent. They imagine. They heal.
They explore. They create. They inspire.
They push the human race forward.
Maybe they have to be crazy.
How else can you stare at an empty canvas and see a work of art?
Or sit in silence and hear a song that’s never been written?
Or gaze at a red planet and see a laboratory on wheels?
We make tools for these kinds of people.
While some see them as the crazy ones,
We see genius.
Because the people who are crazy enough to think
they can change the world, are the ones who do.
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