Ronald Reagan: Fan of Ayn Rand


Dennis Hardin

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How about my grandmother?

Don't worry, everybody. if our mothers had not had us, there would be no us, which is logically impossible and quite unthinkable but here we are. Somebody else would have had us and we would still be us.

I think I have told this story here before. My mother was talking about the mixup that led to her not receiving the letter that would have summoned her to Ottawa in 1947, to work in the Civil Service. All her friends got their letters and went, but hers sat in her Aunt Ruby's farmhouse kitchen under an almanac until it was discovered when she died ten years later. Greataunt Rube was not much of a reader and thought it was from the Income Tax so she did not do anything about it.

"Just think, Carol Jane," Ma said. "If I had got that letter I would have gone to Ottawa and never met your father. I would have married somebody else and your father might have been a rich banker or a politician like Jeanette married."

"But Ma, if my father wasn't Dad, I wouldn't be me. Your daughter would be a different person."

"Oh no, Carol Jane, it would have been you.

You were meant to be born."

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If Ayn Rand and Frank O'Connor had chosen to have children, it is quite possible that the financial pressures would have severely curtailed her writing career, with disastrous consequences not only for her but for the millions of people whose lives have been infinitely enriched by her words and ideas. Many of the recent studies of Rand's life have highlighted some of the suffering she endured, especially in her later years. It is pure speculative nonsense and the worst kind of baseless psychologizing to assume that she was, therefore, an unhappy person throughout most of her life, or that she did not experience extraordinary levels of joy and satisfaction.

Nevertheless Dennis, I maintain my position, and furthermore I think that the "speculative nonsense and the worst kind of baseless psychologizing" is the assumption that unwanted fetuses kill all possible future happiness or career achievement for all their parents,and the presentation of kids or achievement is, or even was in 1965 or 1983, the either/or situation Rand said it was. Susannah Moodie anybody? Mary Wollstonecraft and her daughter Mary Shelley? Fay Weldon, who produced several excellent novels, journalism and screenplays along with four sons and is still producing? Er, J.K. Rowling? I leave out my personal heroine, L.M. Montgomery, whose career was well established long before she married. But the "lady novelists" of yesteryear did not produce their novels instead of children, but often along with them. It is true that children risked the physical lives of the mothers, and I along with many am glad that Jane Austen never managed to catch a husband as she could have died in childbirth before she ever published. But productive, ambitious, talented people will manage to be productive despite the hindrances of everyday life, even a hindrance that yells for food every four hours.

I repeat, Rand's statement was wacky.

To say that Rand’s statement was wacky is to imply that women face no genuine conflict between devotion to family and devotion to a career in today’s world. You cannot seriously believe that. There are always exceptions, and I really don’t care about the details of why this or that novelist was able to write books despite the duties of motherhood. It’s all a matter of individual context. Perhaps some had husbands who assumed the major parental role. Perhaps others had enough money to hire full time help. Perhaps others lived utterly miserable lives but somehow managed to turn out half-decent fiction by starving themselves or going without sleep for months at a time. Perhaps others took a cavalier approach to raising children that yielded the likes of Chaz Bono. It doesn’t really matter about the details. The fact is that none of the women you mentioned developed a philosophy that stood in radical opposition to thousands of years of cultural tradition, and none of them wrote Atlas Shrugged.

Different people have different needs. Ayn Rand was a genius, and wanted to devote her time and energy to using her mind to maximum capacity. Changing diapers and teaching table manners did not appeal to her as intellectual pursuits. The point is not that that “unwanted fetuses kill all possible future happiness or career achievement for all their parents.” Rand didn’t say that. She did say that children can represent a huge burden on a couple just starting out in life, and obviously there is plenty of evidence to substantiate such a view. Your whole position seems to imply that there’s no way women can be perfectly happy and fulfilled without motherhood. A century ago, most everyone would have agreed with you. Today, such a viewpoint has to be classified as not only wacky but rather narrow minded. I frankly expected better from you.

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If Ayn Rand and Frank O'Connor had chosen to have children, it is quite possible that the financial pressures would have severely curtailed her writing career, with disastrous consequences not only for her but for the millions of people whose lives have been infinitely enriched by her words and ideas. Many of the recent studies of Rand's life have highlighted some of the suffering she endured, especially in her later years. It is pure speculative nonsense and the worst kind of baseless psychologizing to assume that she was, therefore, an unhappy person throughout most of her life, or that she did not experience extraordinary levels of joy and satisfaction.

Nevertheless Dennis, I maintain my position, and furthermore I think that the "speculative nonsense and the worst kind of baseless psychologizing" is the assumption that unwanted fetuses kill all possible future happiness or career achievement for all their parents,and the presentation of kids or achievement is, or even was in 1965 or 1983, the either/or situation Rand said it was. Susannah Moodie anybody? Mary Wollstonecraft and her daughter Mary Shelley? Fay Weldon, who produced several excellent novels, journalism and screenplays along with four sons and is still producing? Er, J.K. Rowling? I leave out my personal heroine, L.M. Montgomery, whose career was well established long before she married. But the "lady novelists" of yesteryear did not produce their novels instead of children, but often along with them. It is true that children risked the physical lives of the mothers, and I along with many am glad that Jane Austen never managed to catch a husband as she could have died in childbirth before she ever published. But productive, ambitious, talented people will manage to be productive despite the hindrances of everyday life, even a hindrance that yells for food every four hours.

I repeat, Rand's statement was wacky.

To say that Rand’s statement was wacky is to imply that women face no genuine conflict between devotion to family and devotion to a career in today’s world. You cannot seriously believe that. There are always exceptions, and I really don’t care about the details of why this or that novelist was able to write books despite the duties of motherhood. It’s all a matter of individual context. Perhaps some had husbands who assumed the major parental role. Perhaps others had enough money to hire full time help. Perhaps others lived utterly miserable lives but somehow managed to turn out half-decent fiction by starving themselves or going without sleep for months at a time. Perhaps others took a cavalier approach to raising children that yielded the likes of Chaz Bono. It doesn’t really matter about the details. The fact is that none of the women you mentioned developed a philosophy that stood in radical opposition to thousands of years of cultural tradition, and none of them wrote Atlas Shrugged.

Different people have different needs. Ayn Rand was a genius, and wanted to devote her time and energy to using her mind to maximum capacity. Changing diapers and teaching table manners did not appeal to her as intellectual pursuits. The point is not that that “unwanted fetuses kill all possible future happiness or career achievement for all their parents.” Rand didn’t say that. She did say that children can represent a huge burden on a couple just starting out in life, and obviously there is plenty of evidence to substantiate such a view. Your whole position seems to imply that there’s no way women can be perfectly happy and fulfilled without motherhood. A century ago, most everyone would have agreed with you. Today, such a viewpoint has to be classified as not only wacky but rather narrow minded. I frankly expected better from you.

Well, I expected better from you, too. Rand did not say "unwanted fetuses kill ...etc"). That is of course my paraphrase, but it is the black-white import of her statement. It is that baby's life, or yours. If you have it, you will sacrifice your own life to it.

My whole position may seem to you, to imply that a woman's life cannot be happy and fulfilled without children, and your inference is dead wrong. My role models, women I believed to be the happiest and most fulfilled, were all childless, unmarried women, throughout my childhood and later. I have always known that a happy and fulfilled life is about the happiness and fulfillment of the individual. Being without children on its own, does not make anyone happier, than being the mother of many does, to the individual. It is not the defining aspect of happiness or fulfillment in life, for women or men. I still believe this, which I believed for a certainty when I was 18 and never intended to get married at least until I was 35, and did not epecially like children but thought I might have one, if it was convenient.

There is no one overriding defining requirement for happiness in life, as you well know professionally and personally. Rand said there was only one, productive achievement, and she was wrong to be so blackwhite there, too.

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I was going to go further on my last, but on reflection I will cool it a little. Dennis is psychologizing me, and stereotyping me to boot, and categorising me in his own ways. Which is fine, and his right. I do the same to others.

Instead I will say I am sure that rand said many sensible things about parenting. I believe she wrote a letter to Barbara Branden's mother, congratulating her on the way she had raised Barbara. I guess she did not think much of the parenting of her own mother, but I'm sure she approved the methods of others. Does anybody have any input on this?

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Carol:

Have you read the Heller book on Rand - Ayn Rand and the World She Made?

Adam

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Carol:

Have you read the Heller book on Rand - Ayn Rand and the World She Made?

Adam

No, Adam. On Rand bio I have only read the excellent and affecting Passion of Ayn Rand. i am aware that it is part memoir on the part of the author , and it is the richer for it. Have you read Heller's book? Do you recommend it?

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Carol:

Have you read the Heller book on Rand - Ayn Rand and the World She Made?

Adam

No, Adam. On Rand bio I have only read the excellent and affecting Passion of Ayn Rand. i am aware that it is part memoir on the part of the author , and it is the richer for it. Have you read Heller's book? Do you recommend it?

Yes I have read it and the Burns book.

The Heller book would address lots of issues about her childhood. Rand's "mommy dearest" and her did not get along at all. Very nasty situation.

It is the better of the two for your purposes.

Adam

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If Ayn Rand and Frank O'Connor had chosen to have children, it is quite possible that the financial pressures would have severely curtailed her writing career, with disastrous consequences not only for her but for the millions of people whose lives have been infinitely enriched by her words and ideas. Many of the recent studies of Rand's life have highlighted some of the suffering she endured, especially in her later years. It is pure speculative nonsense and the worst kind of baseless psychologizing to assume that she was, therefore, an unhappy person throughout most of her life, or that she did not experience extraordinary levels of joy and satisfaction.

Nevertheless Dennis, I maintain my position, and furthermore I think that the "speculative nonsense and the worst kind of baseless psychologizing" is the assumption that unwanted fetuses kill all possible future happiness or career achievement for all their parents,and the presentation of kids or achievement is, or even was in 1965 or 1983, the either/or situation Rand said it was. Susannah Moodie anybody? Mary Wollstonecraft and her daughter Mary Shelley? Fay Weldon, who produced several excellent novels, journalism and screenplays along with four sons and is still producing? Er, J.K. Rowling? I leave out my personal heroine, L.M. Montgomery, whose career was well established long before she married. But the "lady novelists" of yesteryear did not produce their novels instead of children, but often along with them. It is true that children risked the physical lives of the mothers, and I along with many am glad that Jane Austen never managed to catch a husband as she could have died in childbirth before she ever published. But productive, ambitious, talented people will manage to be productive despite the hindrances of everyday life, even a hindrance that yells for food every four hours.

I repeat, Rand's statement was wacky.

The fact is that none of the women you mentioned developed a philosophy that stood in radical opposition to thousands of years of cultural tradition, and none of them wrote Atlas Shrugged.

Different people have different needs. Ayn Rand was a genius, and wanted to devote her time and energy to using her mind to maximum capacity.

First, true, none of them developed overt philosophies. None of them wrote Atlas Shrugged. But some of them wrote novels that qua novels were better.

Shakespeare was a genius, and wanted to devote his time and energy to maximum writing capacity, so he lit out for London, but he found the time and energy to provide for the wife and children he had been trapped into at age 18, and to spend early quality time with them, at the age when his genius was most ripe to be murdered by such life conditions. Perhaps there are several plays he did not get to write while he was changing napkins, and we are all the poorer for it.

Mozart was a genius, and he spent a lot of his young life fretting and fussing over his wife and kids, writing silly jealous letters when he should have been writing more symphonies, didn't he realize he could die at any time? The man was just not rational.

Ayn Rand's precious, precious time which she used exactly as she wished, was perfectly apportioned according to her own needs.Only the genius can turn the tap of genius on and off, and only the genius knows the conditions which much exist, for the tap to flow at all.

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Carol,

For some reason, you sometimes quote a post, then quote the same one again before making your response. I just cleaned one up (No. 46) so the post is quoted only once.

There's no problem for me with this, but it does make people scroll more. Also, Google downgrades entries like that in search results for being duplicate content. (Spammers used to do that kind of thing for keyword stuffing.)

In all, it would be far better if you didn't do this, at least when quoting long posts.

I think you have it figured out by now, but if you need a pointer or two to be sure, give me a holler.

Michael

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Carol,

For some reason, you sometimes quote a post, then quote the same one again before making your response. I just cleaned one up (No. 46) so the post is quoted only once.

There's no problem for me with this, but it does make people scroll more. Also, Google downgrades entries like that in search results for being duplicate content. (Spammers used to do that kind of thing for keyword stuffing.)

In all, it would be far better if you didn't do this, at least when quoting long posts.

I think you have it figured out by now, but if you need a pointer or two to be sure, give me a holler.

Michael

Michael, I know, and I'm sorry. What happens is, i hit Post and it doesn't "take", and the green things just go back and forth, and again so, and then finally it appears as a post, and half the time I have quoted what I am replying to twice or more, without meaning to.

It could just be my old keyboard which needs to be pounded like a Neolithic anvil to produce any print. I will try to be more careful.

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I was going to go further on my last, but on reflection I will cool it a little. Dennis is psychologizing me, and stereotyping me to boot, and categorising me in his own ways. Which is fine, and his right. I do the same to others.

I didn’t psychologize or stereotype you, Carol. I simply disagreed with you.

You expressed the view that most couples do not regret parenthood, and that, based on your observation, they “enjoyed their non-lives more than Rand ever did hers, most of the time.”

You seemed to be portraying parenthood as inherently preferable to childlessness. In addition, you were presuming knowledge of Ayn Rand’s inner emotional state throughout her life. I do regard that as a form of psychologizing—i.e., of claiming to know another human being’s inner experience. On the contrary, there is plenty of evidence to support the view that, for most of her life, she was supremely happy most of the time.

Ayn Rand never claimed that either parenthood or childlessness were inherently preferable. Take another look at her statement::

The question of abortion involves much more than the termination of a pregnancy: it is a question of the entire life of the parents. As I have said before, parenthood is an enormous responsibility; it is an impossible responsibility for young people who are ambitious and struggling, but poor; particularly if they are intelligent and conscientious enough not to abandon their child on a doorstep nor to surrender it to adoption. For such young people, pregnancy is a death sentence: parenthood would force them to give up their future, and condemn them to a life of hopeless drudgery, of slavery to a child’s physical and financial needs. The situation of an unwed mother, abandoned by her lover, is even worse.

Rand is simply stating that parenthood is an overwhelming burden on young couples who are poor and struggling to create productive careers. For such people, parenthood is a terrible burden which makes it inestimably more difficult for them to create the future they want for themselves. That is an indisputable fact. There are many, many conscientious young people who have had to give up their dreams when they assume the responsibility for a child before they are in a financial position to do so.

It seemed to me that point was getting lost amidst the various posts extolling the glory of parenthood, and I felt the need to present a different point of view. I’m very sorry if it seemed to you that I was attacking you personally. When I said that I expected more from you, I was simply expressing disappointment, and that disappointment derives from my strong admiration for the exceptional intelligence and independence your delightful posts typically display.

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How about my grandmother?

Don't worry, everybody. if our mothers had not had us, there would be no us, which is logically impossible and quite unthinkable but here we are. Somebody else would have had us and we would still be us.

I think I have told this story here before. My mother was talking about the mixup that led to her not receiving the letter that would have summoned her to Ottawa in 1947, to work in the Civil Service. All her friends got their letters and went, but hers sat in her Aunt Ruby's farmhouse kitchen under an almanac until it was discovered when she died ten years later. Greataunt Rube was not much of a reader and thought it was from the Income Tax so she did not do anything about it.

"Just think, Carol Jane," Ma said. "If I had got that letter I would have gone to Ottawa and never met your father. I would have married somebody else and your father might have been a rich banker or a politician like Jeanette married."

"But Ma, if my father wasn't Dad, I wouldn't be me. Your daughter would be a different person."

"Oh no, Carol Jane, it would have been you.

You were meant to be born."

I agree with your Mom, only your name would have been Fred.

--Brant

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I was going to go further on my last, but on reflection I will cool it a little. Dennis is psychologizing me, and stereotyping me to boot, and categorising me in his own ways. Which is fine, and his right. I do the same to others.

I didn’t psychologize or stereotype you, Carol. I simply disagreed with you.

You expressed the view that most couples do not regret parenthood, and that, based on your observation, they “enjoyed their non-lives more than Rand ever did hers, most of the time.”

You seemed to be portraying parenthood as inherently preferable to childlessness. In addition, you were presuming knowledge of Ayn Rand’s inner emotional state throughout her life. I do regard that as a form of psychologizing—i.e., of claiming to know another human being’s inner experience. On the contrary, there is plenty of evidence to support the view that, for most of her life, she was supremely happy most of the time.

Ayn Rand never claimed that either parenthood or childlessness were inherently preferable. Take another look at her statement::

The question of abortion involves much more than the termination of a pregnancy: it is a question of the entire life of the parents. As I have said before, parenthood is an enormous responsibility; it is an impossible responsibility for young people who are ambitious and struggling, but poor; particularly if they are intelligent and conscientious enough not to abandon their child on a doorstep nor to surrender it to adoption. For such young people, pregnancy is a death sentence: parenthood would force them to give up their future, and condemn them to a life of hopeless drudgery, of slavery to a child’s physical and financial needs. The situation of an unwed mother, abandoned by her lover, is even worse.

Rand is simply stating that parenthood is an overwhelming burden on young couples who are poor and struggling to create productive careers. For such people, parenthood is a terrible burden which makes it inestimably more difficult for them to create the future they want for themselves. That is an indisputable fact. There are many, many conscientious young people who have had to give up their dreams when they assume the responsibility for a child before they are in a financial position to do so.

It seemed to me that point was getting lost amidst the various posts extolling the glory of parenthood, and I felt the need to present a different point of view. I’m very sorry if it seemed to you that I was attacking you personally. When I said that I expected more from you, I was simply expressing disappointment, and that disappointment derives from my strong admiration for the exceptional intelligence and independence your delightful posts typically display.

Dennis, I did not feel personally attacked , and I am greatly touched by your compliment. I was attacking Rand's sweeping statement, and you , in defending it, inferred that I was a pronatalist , and I got a little polemical about that, is all that happened.

There are so many points that get lost in the vast complexity of this whole issue. I can see why Rand, a philosopher, needed to make it simple, but I think she was wrong to do so, just as pro-lifers are wrong to simplify it by picketing abortion clinics. Never mind bombing them.

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Daunce wrote:

Instead I will say I am sure that rand said many sensible things about parenting. I believe she wrote a letter to Barbara Branden's mother, congratulating her on the way she had raised Barbara. I guess she did not think much of the parenting of her own mother, but I'm sure she approved the methods of others. Does anybody have any input on this?

end quote

I will not attribute any ulterior motives to people who did not want to have children. Having children is the norm but so what? I grew up in a family that loved children and there were songs that extolled the virtues of having a family of your own.

The Beach Boys wrote:

Wouldn't it be nice if we were older

Then we wouldn't have to wait so long?

And wouldn't it be nice to live together

In the kind of world where we belong?

You know its gonna make it that much better

When we can say goodnight and stay together

Wouldn't it be nice if we could wake up

In the morning when the day is new

And after having spent the day together

Hold each other close the whole night through?

Baby then there wouldn't be a single thing we couldn't do

We could be married

And then we'd be happy

Wouldn't it be nice?

end quote

I have quoted "Goddess" before but it is worth looking at from a fresh perspective. I looked for any quotes from “Goddess” that might relate to emotions similar to that found in a parent. Who were Ayn’s children? Her fans? I suppose a psychologizing case could be made for that thesis. Who’s the boss? Mommy is the boss. You do as I say. Lordy, I have so many children I don’t know what to do!

From “The Goddess of the Market, Ayn Rand and the American Right,” by Jennifer Burns, pages 217 and 218:

Far from welcoming the swelling in Objectivist ranks, Rand was increasingly suspicious of those who claimed to speak in her name, even the Ayn Rand campus clubs, which germinated spontaneously at many of the nation’s top colleges and universities, including Boston University, Dartmouth, MIT, Stanford, and Columbia, began to bother her, for they used her name without her supervision. In May 1965 Nathan issued a rebuke and a warning to the campus clubs in The Objectivist Newsletter. He and Rand were particularly concerned about the names those organizations might choose. Nathan explained that names such as Ayn Rand Study Club were appropriate, whereas names such as The John Galt Society were not. “As a fiction character, John Galt is Miss Rand’s property; he is not in the public domain,” Nathan argued.

He also spelled out the proper nomenclature for those who admired Rand’s ideas. The term Objectivist was “intimately and exclusively associated with Miss Rand and me,” he wrote. “A person who is in agreement with our philosophy should describe himself, not as an Objectivist, but as a student or a supporter of Objectivism.” At a later date, when the philosophy had spread further, it might be possible for there to be more than two Objectivists. Further, any campus club that wished to issue a newsletter should indicate their agreement with Objectivism but make clear that they were not official representatives of the philosophy. Nathan closed with a strong attack against another group of Rand readers, the “craven parasites” who sought to use Objectivism for non-Objectivist ends. Into this category fell anyone who advocated political anarchism and anyone who tried to recruit NBI students into schemes for a new free market nation or territory.

end quote

Back to me, Peter. How did she view her sisters? The author, Jennifer Burns, also makes Ayn (Alisa) seem a bit like a sufferer of Asperser’s Syndrome, though she and her younger sister Nora got along well, and her middle sister Natasha was a pianist, but not as great a confidante. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s “Lost World,” was one of their favorite books.

From page twelve of “The Goddess of the Market, Ayn Rand and the American Right:”

“Alisa’s most enthusiastic audience for these early stories were her two sisters. Nora the youngest, shared her introversion and artistic inclinations. Her specialty was witty caricatures of her family that blended man and beast. Alisa and Nora were inseparable, calling themselves Dact 1, and Dact 2, after the winged dinosaurs of Arthur Conan Doyle’s fantastic adventure story, “The Lost World.” The middle sister Natasha, a skilled pianist, was outgoing and social. Both Nora and Natasha shared a keen appreciation for the elder sister’s creativity, and at bedtime Alisa regaled them with her latest tales.”

end quote

Me again. If the Czars were bad, what horrors awaited them after The Communist Revolution! A closet for an apartment, a young Ayn teaching red soldiers to read, carrying water up to their apartment in buckets and no electricity. “Rusty nails on the walls, showed the places, where old paintings had hung. So little food, she was a hungry adolescent girl. Ayn remembers begging her Mom for (literally) their last dried chick pea to stave off hunger.

From Page 14:

“At parties hostesses could offer their guests only dubious delicacies, such as potato skin cookies and tea with saccharine tablets instead of sugar.”

end quote

Is her obsession with an actor a crush or a wish for a son?

From “Goddess of the Market, Ayn Rand and the American Right,” by Jennifer Burns page 277:

In the aftermath of Frank’s death, Rand had few projects and almost no energy. She became obsessed with Hans Gudagast, a German born movie actor who resembled Frank. While writing the Atlas script she had envisioned him playing the role of Francisco D’Anconia. Then Gudagast, now using the name Eric Braeden, grew a mustache, ruining his resemblance to Frank. Ayn pined for a photo of him without facial hair. When she discovered one in a magazine she had the idea to derive a full sized photo from the small thumbnail. Ignoring the pleas of her solicitous house keeper, Eloise, Rand plunged out into the rain to a photo studio in Times Square. Without a coat or umbrella she was caught in a downpour on her way back home. She fell ill with a cold, a dangerous malady for a woman of seventy-six with a history of lung cancer.

end quote

Eric Braeden, as you undoubtedly know, later became Victor on “The Young and the Restless. “

Mother Ayn Rand wrote to her unappreciative children as John Galt speaking on page 989 of “Atlas Shrugged”:

The man at the top of the intellectual pyramid contributes the most to all those below him, but gets nothing except his material payment, receiving no intellectual bonus from others to add to the value of his time. The man at the bottom who, left to himself, would starve in his hopeless ineptitude, contributes nothing to those above him, but receives the bonus of all of their brains. Such is the nature of the “competition” between the strong and weak of the intellect. Such is the pattern of “exploitation” for which you have damned the strong.

end quote

Jennifer Burns in, ”Goddess of the Market,” responded to the above passage:

In these passages Rand entirely drops the populism, and egalitarianism that characterized her earlier work, reverting to the language used by earlier defenders of capitalism. Although she did not use explicit biological metaphors, her arguments were like a parody of social Darwinism. “Atlas Shrugged” was an angry departure from the previous emphasis on the competence, natural intelligence, and ability of the common man that marked the Fountainhead.”

From “Goddess of the Market, Ayn Rand and the American Right,” page 173-174:

Why such a dramatic shift in thirteen years? Partly Rand was simply tending back to the natural dynamics of pro-capitalist thought, which emphasized (even celebrated) innate differences in talent. These tendencies were exaggerated in Rand’s work by her absolutist, black-and-white thinking. Her views on the “incompetent” were particularly harsh because she was so quick to divide humanity into world-shaking creators and helpless idiots unable to fend for themselves. This binarism, coupled with her penchant for judgment, gave the book much of its negative tone. Because she meant to demonstrate on both a personal and a social level, the result of faulty ideals, Rand was often merciless, with her characters, depicting their sufferings, and failings with relish. In one scene she describes in careful detail the characteristics of passengers, doomed to perish in a violent railroad crash, making it clear that their deaths are warranted, by their ideological errors. (566-568). Such spleen partially explains the many negative reviews that Rand received. After all, by renouncing charity as a moral obligation she had voluntarily opted out of any tradition of politeness or courtesy. “Atlas Shrugged” demanded to be taken on its own merits, and most book reviewers found little to like.

end quote

Of course we later know she had a split with her living sister who would not leave The Soviet Union. I forget if it was Dact 1 or Dact 2. I know I should not but I feel sadness for people who do not have children.

Peter Taylor

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{quote name='Dennis Hardin'

-You expressed the view that most couples do not regret parenthood, and that, based on your observation, they “enjoyed their non-lives more than Rand ever did hers, most of the time.”

-You seemed to be portraying parenthood as inherently preferable to childlessness.}

On the first point, I expressed the view that most couples get some enjoyment out of their lives, even lives adjusted to accommodate unwanted children. That is a far cry from saying most couples do not regret parenthood. I know more than one couple who regret it very much, and no couples who do not regret it sometimes, even couples who eagerly wanted children. Children are a huge factor in the life of couples, obviously, but they are not the only factor, or the only source of happiness or misery in the relationship, Yes, I was flippant about Rand and implied she was something of a sourpuss, but I don't think motherhood would have altered her character or made her happier. I believe it would have made her miserable, just as she said.

- On the second, parenthood and childlessness cannot be inherently preferable, only contextually preferable, in individual circumstances.

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Carol,

I understand your reaction.

For me, of course pro-choice, there will always be a disturbing element about abortion's pragmatism.

It is a triage of whose life comes first, I feel.

When Rand says "It is a question of the entire life of the parents" I have to admit she is right -on balance.

(There is the lurking question of what about the entire life of a nascent human being, which she doesn't mention,

but I do not believe she lightly dismissed.)

.

It is such a fraught decision, the best rational answer I can come up with is not to have an unwanted pregnancy - ever.

Glibly self-evident, I know.

Rand, "a philosopher who had to make it simple" as you say, came from the premise of value of life - - now.

What is, is. Primacy of existence. We, the living. Existence supersedes potential existence.

The 'sacrifice factor' of a parent's yet unlived life, for the life of an unborn - which may be distasteful at first,

is a lot less so than them actually making that sacrifice (irrationally), having the child, then forever resenting him or her -

imagine the effect on the child.

It does happen, I'm certain. (In fact I know of it.)

Alternatively, to consciously choose to have a newly created life, is to want it to the utmost.

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Tony, et. al:

I am not trying to be specious in this discussion, but Ayn had parents. Had they decided as she did, we would all not be here on OL having this discussion.

How can anyone determine the potential of a human life? You can't, You roll the dice.

Adam

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Carol,

I understand your reaction.

For me, of course pro-choice, there will always be a disturbing element about abortion's pragmatism.

It is a triage of whose life comes first, I feel.

When Rand says "It is a question of the entire life of the parents" I have to admit she is right -on balance.

(There is the lurking question of what about the entire life of a nascent human being, which she doesn't mention,

but I do not believe she lightly dismissed.)

.

It is such a fraught decision, the best rational answer I can come up with is not to have an unwanted pregnancy - ever.

Glibly self-evident, I know.

Rand, "a philosopher who had to make it simple" as you say, came from the premise of value of life - - now.

What is, is. Primacy of existence. We, the living. Existence supersedes potential existence.

The 'sacrifice factor' of a parent's yet unlived life, for the life of an unborn - which may be distasteful at first,

is a lot less so than them actually making that sacrifice (irrationally), having the child, then forever resenting him or her -

imagine the effect on the child.

It does happen, I'm certain. (In fact I know of it.)

Alternatively, to consciously choose to have a newly created life, is to want it to the utmost.

Tony, I am thinking perhaps you have not read my post #67 above, where I agree with many of your points.

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Tony, et. al: I am not trying to be specious in this discussion, but Ayn had parents. Had they decided as she did, we would all not be here on OL having this discussion. How can anyone determine the potential of a human life? You can't, You roll the dice. Adam

Yes Adam,

The dice- rolling is precisely it.

But the 'what ifs' lead to infinite regress - if not this, perhaps that, if not me, who?

Only the axiom of primacy of existence settles it satisfactorily.

I suppose all those who ever found themselves conscious - alive - have had to do exactly

what we are doing - take what they find, and run with it.

Of course there were always reality and reason, and I'm sure,always inspirational figures to draw from.

As Kris Kristofferson - fine American philosopher, lyricist and singer - sang (in his fashion):

"There's still a lot of wine and lonely girls

In this best of all possible Worlds".

:cool:

(Carol: quite right - I missed your post.)

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