Every added story takes us closer to objective reality!
A
year after we had moved to Canada, so some time in 2002, we went for a
walk. Next to the city hall, there was a guy standing and waving a big
American flag. When we got closer to him (and as usual, there were no
other pedestrians in sight) he told us enthusiastically that he is
"celebrating capitalism!" He had a little table that held Objectivist
pamphlets and other material, which he tried to offer us, but my wife
wanted to move on.
I was familiar with the comical religion of Objectivism on the Internet a long before I actually read "Atlas Shrugged". The first time I read about this ideology, I thought that it was cool, since objective reality is good. Of course, it gradually turned out that this "Objectivism" is simply a form of subjectivism, and the absurd claims such as that there can be no conflicts of interest between rational men or that quantum mechanics must be false because it somehow violates the Law of Identity didn't exactly make me a true believer.
For some reason, the proponents of this religion tend to fall somewhat short of their fictional idols whom they, if I have understood their rhetoric correctly, literally imagine to be real historical people who actually lived. The real-world Objectivists rarely seem to be any kind of important inventors, bankers or other movers of the world. I doubt that the rest of the world would even notice if all Objectivists one day "disappeared" into their secret Galt's Gulch somewhere, let alone grind to a halt and collapse without them. I have to wonder if these jesters still have to smoke cigarettes during their meetings to symbolize the flame of their minds or be evicted as heretics. Scott Ryan's essay "On Criticizing Ayn Rand: A Short Fable" and Michael Shermer's essay "The Unlikeliest Cult in History" say the whole thing much better than I ever could. Mike Huben has a specific page on Objectivism.
As is usual with all seminal books, when you actually get around to reading them after all the hoopla, they turn out to be much worse than the stuff that was later built on them, and the same applies to Atlas. This is a natural consequence of ideas being improved and distilled, which is good, but it makes bad reading. And I can't deny that there were certain highlights in the book that were good. Especially the scene where the train full of people, each of whom somehow exemplified some incorrect way of thinking, explodes in the tunnel due to incompetence, was funny, and not just because it was obviously written using only one hand. Also the description of the collective that John Galt left was a perfect explanation why socialism doesn't work: when you get the same no matter what you do, nobody has any motivation to do anything. And what do you know, when one character in the collective turned out to require expensive medical care, he just "happened" to suffocate one night. (Speaking of which, see the news article "N.Korean defector says disabled newborns are killed". Predicted leftist outrage over this: zero, since their rules of what is acceptable are very different for different nations.)
Especially the character of Ivy Starnes was almost eeriely prescient: when this committed Marxist learns to her disappointment that socialism didn't work, this fabulous and strong woman handles the cognitive dissonance by becoming a New Age mystic who believes that nothing is really "real". The Green and leftist parties of the world today are full of little Ivy Starnes clones: scratch any middle-aged Green or leftist woman, and you will quickly reveal belief in homeopathy, New Age, alternative medicine, horoscopes etc.
These days, Objectivists don't seem to be very visible or have much influence in politics. They don't even get much voice in the right-wing publications. In the occasional cases when I have seen their writings, they advocate nuking other nations for pre-emptive self-defense and publish "moral defenses" of Israel which, as a nation, is just like John Galt. I have to wonder what old Ayn would have thought of this idea of nations as individuals, especially when it comes to nations that were explicitly founded on religion and mystical revelation. It's also hilarious how the Objectivists absolutely reject libertarians as heretics since libertarians believe in liberty without bothering to give a consistent reasoned basis for this, but then go and enthusiastically ally with the nation of Israel, which not only is built on religion and mysticism, but as far as the economic and individual liberties go, consistently ranks in these respects behind even Sweden. Apparently consistency is not a big virtue for Objectivists.
(Of all the wingnut hallucinations out there, the surprisingly common idea that Israel as a nation is an exemplary of economic freedom definitely takes the cake, considering that Israel is one of the few remaining nations in the world that still has kolkhozes, that is, collectivized agricultural farms. As usual, I guess that God told them that and that settles it.)
I was familiar with the comical religion of Objectivism on the Internet a long before I actually read "Atlas Shrugged". The first time I read about this ideology, I thought that it was cool, since objective reality is good. Of course, it gradually turned out that this "Objectivism" is simply a form of subjectivism, and the absurd claims such as that there can be no conflicts of interest between rational men or that quantum mechanics must be false because it somehow violates the Law of Identity didn't exactly make me a true believer.
For some reason, the proponents of this religion tend to fall somewhat short of their fictional idols whom they, if I have understood their rhetoric correctly, literally imagine to be real historical people who actually lived. The real-world Objectivists rarely seem to be any kind of important inventors, bankers or other movers of the world. I doubt that the rest of the world would even notice if all Objectivists one day "disappeared" into their secret Galt's Gulch somewhere, let alone grind to a halt and collapse without them. I have to wonder if these jesters still have to smoke cigarettes during their meetings to symbolize the flame of their minds or be evicted as heretics. Scott Ryan's essay "On Criticizing Ayn Rand: A Short Fable" and Michael Shermer's essay "The Unlikeliest Cult in History" say the whole thing much better than I ever could. Mike Huben has a specific page on Objectivism.
As is usual with all seminal books, when you actually get around to reading them after all the hoopla, they turn out to be much worse than the stuff that was later built on them, and the same applies to Atlas. This is a natural consequence of ideas being improved and distilled, which is good, but it makes bad reading. And I can't deny that there were certain highlights in the book that were good. Especially the scene where the train full of people, each of whom somehow exemplified some incorrect way of thinking, explodes in the tunnel due to incompetence, was funny, and not just because it was obviously written using only one hand. Also the description of the collective that John Galt left was a perfect explanation why socialism doesn't work: when you get the same no matter what you do, nobody has any motivation to do anything. And what do you know, when one character in the collective turned out to require expensive medical care, he just "happened" to suffocate one night. (Speaking of which, see the news article "N.Korean defector says disabled newborns are killed". Predicted leftist outrage over this: zero, since their rules of what is acceptable are very different for different nations.)
Especially the character of Ivy Starnes was almost eeriely prescient: when this committed Marxist learns to her disappointment that socialism didn't work, this fabulous and strong woman handles the cognitive dissonance by becoming a New Age mystic who believes that nothing is really "real". The Green and leftist parties of the world today are full of little Ivy Starnes clones: scratch any middle-aged Green or leftist woman, and you will quickly reveal belief in homeopathy, New Age, alternative medicine, horoscopes etc.
These days, Objectivists don't seem to be very visible or have much influence in politics. They don't even get much voice in the right-wing publications. In the occasional cases when I have seen their writings, they advocate nuking other nations for pre-emptive self-defense and publish "moral defenses" of Israel which, as a nation, is just like John Galt. I have to wonder what old Ayn would have thought of this idea of nations as individuals, especially when it comes to nations that were explicitly founded on religion and mystical revelation. It's also hilarious how the Objectivists absolutely reject libertarians as heretics since libertarians believe in liberty without bothering to give a consistent reasoned basis for this, but then go and enthusiastically ally with the nation of Israel, which not only is built on religion and mysticism, but as far as the economic and individual liberties go, consistently ranks in these respects behind even Sweden. Apparently consistency is not a big virtue for Objectivists.
(Of all the wingnut hallucinations out there, the surprisingly common idea that Israel as a nation is an exemplary of economic freedom definitely takes the cake, considering that Israel is one of the few remaining nations in the world that still has kolkhozes, that is, collectivized agricultural farms. As usual, I guess that God told them that and that settles it.)
The Israeli kibbutzes and moshavs (ultra socialists) are on the other hand truly voluntary and one can leave whenever one so chooses. I think that makes a difference to their Soviet counterparts. Those who stay are dedicated.
Posted by Catilina | 12:43 PM
And the falling of Soviet agriculture was not so much due to shared ownership of kolhozes or state ownership of sovhozes as it was to the completely centralized and regulated management. Moscow tod the farms what to sow, how much to sow and even when to sow regardless of local circumstances. The workers couldn't achieve anything by conscientious and proper working. Their only reward could be totally imaginary Donald Duck money with which they couldn't buy anything in any case so why bother?
Posted by Catilina | 12:58 PM