On Judgment

[kiaer.ts]

Ayn Rand famously criticized Jesus' dictum "Judge not, lest ye be judged," responding that one must always judge and be prepared to judge. This was a policy to which she strictly adhered in regard to her personal relations with others. There is no need here to describe in detail the many all-or-nothing breaks she had with people, often very close friends, from Isabel Paterson to Barabara and Nathaniel Branden and beyond. This policy of breaking with people has continued with certain of Rand's followers, such as Leonard Peikoff. The public necessity of repudiating people irrevocably, which is common in Islam, is a policy shared by some third generation Objectivists who were never part of Rand's inner circle. This tendency within Objectivism has led to innumerable splits and schisms. It is the subject of millions of words of hypertext. It is a source of scorn and ridicule of the Objectivist movement by outside observers and "ex-Objectivists." Is this policy, which seems so destructive, a necessary precaution or a tragic mistake?

Objectivism excoriates moral skepticism. Those who refuse, on principle, to make moral judgments, are refusing on principle to support the innocent or to condemn the guilty even when there is sufficient evidence to distinguish the two. But there is a deeper question, what sorts of guilt and innocence are there among people, and are we to treat all "guilty" parties the same? Suppose one person is guilty of murder, and another is guilty of lying about a love affair? Are we to treat such forms of guilt as equivalent so far as the necessity of passing judgment? The answer is no, because we must distinguish in human affairs between relationships which are purely voluntary, and relationships based upon force. To treat passing judgment as an absolute is to fail to make an essential distinction. In human relations where force is involved, which fall under the broad purview of the branch of philosophy called politics, passing moral and legal judgment under the proper circumstances is a vital necessity. But in voluntary personal relationships where no force is involved, which is dealt with under the branch of philosophy called etiquette, the propriety of passing judgment depends on a person's personal involvement in a situation, not upon some need for all to sit in judgment of all.

Objectivism holds that morality is of vital importance to the individual alone, regardless of whether the interests of other people are involved. If a man trapped on a desert island wishes to survive, it is immoral for him to evade the nature of his situation, and to expect wishes or passivity as opposed to thought and action to further his life. Objectivism also has a detailed political philosophy dealing with human rights, which can only be violated by others who use force. So, Objectivism deals theoretically with personal morality. And it deals theoretically with interpersonal morality where force is involved. But what of interpersonal morality where force is not involved? How is an Objectivist to treat others who are not politicians, criminals, or enemies during war time? What are the proper principles of an Objectivist etiquette?

When dealing with politicians, criminals, and enemies in war, the necessity of personally passing relevant judgments is unavoidable. In so far as a person poses a credible threat to your rights, you must judge him and act accordingly for the circumstances. Who poses a threat to your rights? Any politician who exercises authority over you can violate your rights. In a republic, therefore, you must exercise due diligence in evaluating and voting for any politicians whose jurisdiction includes your self. You must also oppose, in the proper manner, non-elected officials who misuse their authority over you, and officials in other jurisdictions who overstep their authority in a way that threatens your rights. Likewise, you must be aware of and judge credible threats to your rights from foreign powers, and exercise your influence with your representatives to take proper action. Your life and livelihood are physically involved in these cases. Further, you must form opinions of political policies, and at the minimum raise your voice against those of influence who advocate policies which involve the initiation of force not in self defense.

But what about people who are not politicians, who are not criminals, who are not enemies at war, who are not acting politically to establish a policy of the forcible violation of rights? What duty do you have to pass judgment upon the the foolish, the mistaken, the rude, the annoying, the disgusting, the vain, the gossipy? And further, what right do you have to demand that others pass judgments upon such people?

We have all had the misfortune of dealing with people whose behavior, while not criminal, is not ethical either. We have all dealt with the two-faced, with the liar, with the gossip, with the friend who backstabs and betrays. And I think it is also valid to say that we have in some ways seen such behavior in our own selves. In so far as a person's actions directly affect our own values, (by which I mean not our expressed moral values, but our actual physical and spiritual property,) we must pass judgment upon them. If a friend or a business colleague or a lover is apparently lying to us, then their actions fall within the direct circumstances of our happiness.

But what about the case where we observe such matters as third parties? Each of us has had a falling out with someone, and therefore wished not only to sever our own relations with the offender, but have also wished that our friends and acquaintances would do so also. Is it fair to demand that a third party pass judgment and take sides? If they do not do so, are they craven tolerationists?

The proper policy to hold towards a third party observer of a personal falling out between yourself and another person who is not threatening you with violence is to expect that person to understand that there is a conflict, and expect that person to take into account any relevant evidence based on current or future actions, and to act on that evidence when it becomes conclusive, but not to demand summary judgment, nor the taking of sides based on "loyalty," nor the acceptance of your accusations based upon faith. The proper application of Ayn Rand's dictum that there are no rational conflicts of interest between men requires that when there is a conflict, we allow men to use their own reason.

The third party has his own life. He has a full enough plate as it is without needing to interrupt his own pursuits to investigate another person's alleged non-violent wrongs against you. As frustrating as it may be to you, it is proper only to expect others to acknowledge a conflict, and to expect them to take into account the evidence as it emerges. Passing judgment requires knowledge, and possessing knowledge requires an effort. You have no right to demand that others go out of their way to take sides in an issue for which they have insufficient evidence to make a contextual judgment. And it is improper for you to attempt to manipulate the third party to do so.

In most such cases, if the conflict is serious, and the third party is sufficiently close to the situation, the truth will out. It may be frustrating to personally know the bad character of an enemy, yet see others treating him with the benefit of the doubt, if not respect. If your enemy continues actively lying, point it out, but otherwise show restraint. You earn respect and the benefit of the doubt for yourself when you respect a third party enough to let him make his mind up upon the evidence. And it is not your place to make the case against your enemy unbidden, and out of proportion to the third party's own real personal involvement. The inordinate need to convince somone that someone is evil is evil.

If a third party finds that making the effort to pass an informed judgment is worth his effort, he will ask us for the evidence. He will see the public vicious actions of the other without our help. And we should provide that evidence to him when he requests it as fairly and dispassionately as possible. We should recognize and be cautious of the strength of our own feelings. We need not overmake our case. We need not poison the well. We need not engage in rumor and insinuation to strengthen our case or a case we feel we might need to make in the future. Name calling and heckling and Schadenfreude on our part weakens our case. The proper stance on our side is proportion, and decency, and restraint. Our enemy, if he does not threaten us with force, has no hold over us beyond that which we grant him.

While all is fair in war, it only feels that way in love. As animals, personal conflicts with former friends strike us as just as compelling as conflicts with mortal enemies. But we are not animals. We can judge when the threat of violence is or is not involved in a conflict. Out of respect for ourselves we should not allow our feelings for our enemies to overwhelm us. Out of respect for our friends, we should let them form their own conclusions. Eventually, they will. And when they do, their judgment will be all the more strong in our favor, if we allow the facts, and not our accusations, to speak for themselves.

[Chris Grieb]

Ted; I want to commend you for taking up this topic. After I study your comments I may have more to say.

[James Heaps-Nelson]

Ted,

Terrific exploration of this topic. I have noticed an overweening attempt by many Objectivists to try to put an almost religious stigma on association and an attempt to try to whip up borrowed anger. It is, as you've said an imposition for people to make unreasonable conditions for friendship and association. When people do this, they show insecurity and a lack of respect for your individual judgment.

Life is continually an optimization problem and people have to make their own choices about it. We will have a better movement if people are given the breathing room to make these choices on their own. My own suggestion to Objectivists is to construct a social life that leaves you free of group pressure. This practice is the support edifice for individual judgment.

Jim

[Guyau]

Ted,

Thank you.

At my childhood Lutheran church, baptism was in infancy and confirmation was near end of eighth grade. As we did not have a parochial school, we went to Saturday School at church for two or three years prior to confirmation. On the Friday evening before confirmation, the catechumens sat on the first few pews, the interested members of the congregation sat farther back. The pastor asked the students various questions about doctrines of the faith. He asked them to recite various Bible versus and old Creeds they had been required to learn. Among the things from Luther’s Small Catechism they had been required to learn by rote were the ten commandments, accompanied by Luther’s “What Does this Mean?” I think I can still do it for the eighth commandment, “Thou shalt not bear false witness.”

I think I still remember Luther’s Meaning for this one because I always found it to be a good rule of thumb as a social strategy and policy for personal happiness. I share it for anyone who might like to give this way of living a try. Here goes, best to my memory:

8. Thou shalt not bear false witness.

What does this mean?

That we should fear and love God such that we may not belie, betray, slander, nor defame our neighbor, but defend him, speak well of him, and put the best construction on everything.

My friends who know how it is with me (simply under life and value, not under the supernatural deity of value) about people, say teasingly to me: “You’re so Lutheran” or “That’s putting the best construction on it.”

Best,

Stephen

[thomtg]

[...]

The proper policy to hold towards a third party observer of a personal falling out between yourself and another person who is not threatening you with violence is to expect that person to understand that there is a conflict, and expect that person to take into account any relevant evidence based on current or future actions, and to act on that evidence when it becomes conclusive, but not to demand summary judgment, nor the taking of sides based on "loyalty," nor the acceptance of your accusations based upon faith. The proper application of Ayn Rand's dictum that there are no rational conflicts of interest between men requires that when there is a conflict, we allow men to use their own reason.

The third party has his own life. He has a full enough plate as it is without needing to interrupt his own pursuits to investigate another person's alleged non-violent wrongs against you. As frustrating as it may be to you, it is proper only to expect others to acknowledge a conflict, and to expect them to take into account the evidence as it emerges. Passing judgment requires knowledge, and possessing knowledge requires an effort. You have no right to demand that others go out of their way to take sides in an issue for which they have insufficient evidence to make a contextual judgment. And it is improper for you to attempt to manipulate the third party to do so.

[...]

I agree with this aspect of justice in the social, private and noneconomic realm. Often you are friends with a couple who then split up. The one who befriends you first or longer usually claim seniority over you and want you to stick to his/her side and to shun the other person. And yet, if you are objective in your judgments, you might side with the other person, or you might like both and want to continue separate relationships with them. (Or sometimes the breakup is too nasty that you want to avoid both of them.) In any case, it is in your interest to judge independently, and neither of the two parties can or should pressure you. Therefore, you as a third party is your own person, and your relationship with each party is separate and stands on mutual knowledge of each other, and is none of the other's concern.

The difficulty I think is if you are friends with them as couples. When they break up, what happens? Each of you might like to remain friends with the opposite party! Then you bring into your internal relationship their problems. So, you as a third-party individual has to make an additional stance as a third-party couple. And as a third-party couple, you have the problem of the internal veto. If a veto is invoked toward a party, you in your capacity as a couple cannot be friends with that party. It's a messy multi-layered problem.

Edited June 22, 2009 by Thom T G

[Brant Gaede]

Ted,

Apart from the general value of your essay, this is an oblique way of criticizing Michael about a matter you have given no evidence of having researched. That's fair enough as far as it goes because of the brevity of his reply to your complaint on the Valliant thread, but you've still come up short in that regard--that is, you weren't more direct. Too much does get overdone, overvalued and unnecessarily disparaged on the Internet. It all goes back to the NBI/Ayn Rand years of the 1960s when there wasn't any Internet and Branden and Rand controlled the microphone and print communications and could ignore if not avoid most public feedback. The basic principle of Internet manners is to address everyone as if you were in the same room with them and most unnecessary antagonism might then be avoided.

--Brant

[kiaer.ts]

Thanks, gentlemen. I have edited the essay somewhat since your posts, so I hope your judgments still apply.

The policy I have spelled out is based largely upon my own experiences, largely in middle school, and on my Father's Jesuit-educated advice; do not gossip, turn the other cheek, always put the best interpretation on even your own enemies behavior.

When I and my classmates transferred from elementary school to junior high in seventh grade our circle of friends grew. I was the unspoken leader of the group, the one who suggested and arranged activities and who made sure all were involved. I found out after a year that one of our new friends had been arranging activities where I was not invited, and was told everyone had other obligations. These friends were getting together, telling stories about me, plotting things to do to me later in school, all very much after the behavior of those girls in that Lindsay Lohan movie. After I was ostracized, they moved on to ostracizing others in the group. All very much a thirteen year old thing to do. I was devastated, I had always tried to include as many as possible, had never done anything to attack the person who betrayed me. I could not understand this behavior.

When I came out as bisexual two years later, I went through the same thing all over again with a whole new bunch of friends. It was easier to handle due to practice, if no less personally disappointing.

I moved on. When others in school asked me what was going on, I simply said that they were attacking me unfairly and I did not know why. I did not demand that others take my side. Indeed, I told them just to be fair to everyone, and to judge for themselves. Within months, the neutral parties, students, friends and even teachers did take my side. My former friends all eventually came to me at some point and apologized. My former seventh grade enemy himself came to my parents' house years later while I was away at college and apologized to them, and then later to me in person. I even got a call from someone years after college asking if I was the Ted Keer who went to such and such school, and apologizing. My response to all these people was that my only regret was the lost years of potential friendship.

I encountered Objectivism only a few months after I dealt with these things in my personal life. I am glad of that order of occurrence.

To see Rand engage in such behavior, whether as an instigator or as a victim, is painful. How could she not have dealt with this in childhood? I can sympathize to some extent I believe she probably never had a childhood. But to see this sort of behavior continue in men who are in their forties and older and who speak today in the name of Objectivism is embarrassing in the extreme. The current Wikipedia fiasco doesn't just make the bad guys in the PARC parade look bad. This tar baby makes everyone who touches it with warm hands look bad. When silence is not possible, calm neutral factual statements, such as Barbara Branden's simple denial that she was involved in the IP 160 affair are the best. "The worst are full of passionate intensity," and blunders like Peikoff's ill-advised open letter to Jimmy Wales should not amuse anyone. That single statement has probably done more to "prove" that Scientology and Objectivism are in the same category than anything since the birth of the World Wide Web.

[James Heaps-Nelson]

The ostracism stuff is amusing. How can the reaction to it be anything other than: their loss. Ted's right that most people deal with that particular problem in childhood.

Jim

[James Heaps-Nelson]

I will add to my previous comment that high school was terrific for me. I'm headed back for my 20th reunion this week. Lots of wonderful people to reconnect with. I'm glad I made it back to my 10th. One of my best friends didn't live long enough for our 20th. Party 'til you drop :-).

Jim

[kiaer.ts]

Ted,

Apart from the general value of your essay, this is an oblique way of criticizing Michael about a matter you have given no evidence of having researched. That's fair enough as far as it goes because of the brevity of his reply to your complaint on the Valliant thread, but you've still come up short in that regard--that is, you weren't more direct. Too much does get overdone, overvalued and unnecessarily disparaged on the Internet. It all goes back to the NBI/Ayn Rand years of the 1960s when there wasn't any Internet and Branden and Rand controlled the microphone and print communications and could ignore if not avoid most public feedback. The basic principle of Internet manners is to address everyone as if you were in the same room with them and most unnecessary antagonism might then be avoided.

--Brant

No, Michael is not the intended victim here, even if his crticism of Ellen on the other thread was the last straw. I'd rather we drop that subject on this thread right now. That's why this is a new thread. This fiasco has been annoying me since day one, and I have been considering posting on it for the last month. If you look at the wikipedia history I (Kjaer) was the first one to make a policy of reverting IP 160's posts. I didn't know who IP 160 was. See the archived Ayn Rand talk page from Dec 2008. This behavior makes everyone who engages in it look bad, and the specifically Objectivist problem is this idea that personal disputes are to be couched in philosophical terms and treated as if they were physical threats.

[kiaer.ts]

I will add to my previous comment that high school was terrific for me. I'm headed back for my 20th reunion this week. Lots of wonderful people to reconnect with. I'm glad I made it back to my 10th. One of my best friends didn't live long enough for our 20th. Party 'til you drop :-).

Jim

Oh, I have to agree. I don't even remember the details of those conflicts I mentioned. I consider myself friends with all those people. I never met anyone smarter or more fun in college, believe me.