The Hurtful Passion of Ayn Rand

[dbco...@webinbox.com]

After brushing the fallout off his keyboard, Carmichael
<acar...@mail.com> wrote:

[snip]
>>No, you got it all wrong. Rand was a fraud from the start. It's
>>not just that she was a jerk, or hooked on speed, or consumed by her
>>absolute intellectual and sexual power over her brown-nosing
>>"collective"; her core ideas (which imply a grim struggle for
>>collective ideological purity) are fundamentally at odds with
>>Objectivism's window-dressing of reason and egoism.
>>-Coop
>
>
>I use a different emphasis. In my view egoism is at the core of
>Objectivism. It is where Objectivism emerges from generic common
>sense observations and arrives at a flawed deduction: the first link
>in the chain of reasoning that is distinctively Objectivist. It was
>Ayn Rand who invented egoism. That creates the dilemma of asking who
>the real egoists are. Those who are attracted by Rand's concept of
>egoism but reject what she did with it, are still following her lead,
>and are indebted to her for the idea.

That's not true at all. Rand's philosophy is more of an insult to
egoism than an exemplar of it - and ethical egoism has been around
for a very long time, producing plenty of reasons for rejecting the
deadly collectivistic nationalism that Rand preached long before
anyone ever heard of Objectivism.

What is distinctive about Objectivism is that it takes the language
of self-interest, capitalism, etc., and combines it with the
collectivist theory that culture is centrally-planned by Great
Philosophers, so that the struggle for "capitalism" must take on the
aspect of a religious war. Using a clever deception, Objectivism
tricks people who are attracted by the notion of pursuing their
self-interest in a rational fashion into sacrificing their
self-interest for the sake of spreading Objectivism by any means
necessary.

Why else do you suppose that Objectivists are supposed to give
ideologically-incorrect people the cold shoulder? Why else would
they abandon their respect for individual rights on a massive scale
when going after "dictator governments" (the Objectivist code-word for
ideologically-incorrect governments)? It's all part of a pattern
where self-interest takes a back seat to a perverse notion of
collective salvation.

There is nothing you can say that will convince me that waging mass
murder, especially for the trivial reasons advanced by Dr. Speicher,
is an instance of egoism. The underlying doctrine that Objectivists
use to rationalize their advocacy of incinerating tens of millions
of people is, as I demonstrated several months ago, nationalistic
in character and has nothing to do with individual self-interest.

In fact, Objectivists have more in common with national socialists
than they do with libertarians (egoistic or otherwise), and given
control of the ultimate weapons of decision, Rand's insane cult of
death would kill far more people and do so even more quickly and more
shamelessly than Hitler did. Dr. Speicher's plan alone would kill
nearly as many people as the Holocaust, and if Dr. Peikoff is to be
believed, Iran is just the first target. Objectivists apparently want
to beat the ghoulish records established by Stalin and Mao too.

-Coop

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[Carmichael]

dbco...@webinbox.com wrote in message
<2000090520...@www.webinbox.com>...

>After brushing the fallout off his keyboard, Carmichael
><acar...@mail.com> wrote:
>
>[snip]
>>>No, you got it all wrong. Rand was a fraud from the start. It's
>>>not just that she was a jerk, or hooked on speed, or consumed by her
>>>absolute intellectual and sexual power over her brown-nosing
>>>"collective"; her core ideas (which imply a grim struggle for
>>>collective ideological purity) are fundamentally at odds with
>>>Objectivism's window-dressing of reason and egoism.
>>>-Coop
>>
>>
>>I use a different emphasis. In my view egoism is at the core of
>>Objectivism. It is where Objectivism emerges from generic common
>>sense observations and arrives at a flawed deduction: the first link
>>in the chain of reasoning that is distinctively Objectivist. It was
>>Ayn Rand who invented egoism. That creates the dilemma of asking who
>>the real egoists are. Those who are attracted by Rand's concept of
>>egoism but reject what she did with it, are still following her lead,
>>and are indebted to her for the idea.
>
>That's not true at all. Rand's philosophy is more of an insult to
>egoism than an exemplar of it - and ethical egoism has been around
>for a very long time, producing plenty of reasons for rejecting the
>deadly collectivistic nationalism that Rand preached long before
>anyone ever heard of Objectivism.

Of course I had reference to Rand's invention which is egoism alledgedly
mandated by the facts of reality in terms of the man-island, and serving as
an all or none standard of morality in the same terms.

>What is distinctive about Objectivism is that it takes the language
>of self-interest, capitalism, etc., and combines it with the
>collectivist theory that culture is centrally-planned by Great
>Philosophers, so that the struggle for "capitalism" must take on the
>aspect of a religious war. Using a clever deception, Objectivism
>tricks people who are attracted by the notion of pursuing their
>self-interest in a rational fashion into sacrificing their
>self-interest for the sake of spreading Objectivism by any means
>necessary.

This is a penetrating analysis and it follows from her brand of egoism. The
conclusions from the premises are tainted, because they are guided to
accomodate a mind-set, as you suggest.

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