moralist Posted December 17, 2016 Share Posted December 17, 2016 On 12/15/2016 at 7:55 PM, BaalChatzaf said: And some poor civilian schmucks are comfortable at home telling themselves everything is o.k. I don't need to tell myself everything's ok because it is, Bob. You're obviously speaking for yourself that everything is not ok for you... for you chose your need/hate relationship to your government and are only getting exactly the government you deserve. It's the one you hate. I'm comfortable in that I never need to worry about money for the rest of my life because I'm an independent American Capitalist entrepreneur. Inspired by the producers Ayn Rand wrote about in Atlas Shrugged, I earned my freedom. I'm still active in successful business ventures well into my retirement years... while you're cashing benefits checks. We each walk completely different paths in life... because we each chose to live by completely different sets of values... and we each are getting exactly what we each deserve. Greg Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ellen Stuttle Posted December 17, 2016 Share Posted December 17, 2016 On December 14, 2016 at 10:54 AM, moralist said: [The government is] indifferent to me because i don't need it. The quality of my life doesn't depend on what it is or what it does or who is President, because I'm the only one who is personally responsible for my own life, and no one else. Since "who is President" makes no difference to the "quality of [your] life," I have to wonder why you "thank[ed] God for the Electoral college" - see. Who's President could make a direct appreciable difference to my life, since a Hillary Clinton presidency could mean that my husband might be up on criminal charges for climate "denialism," but, hey, only a slave mentality would feel any concern about such a possible prospect. Ellen Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jts Posted December 17, 2016 Share Posted December 17, 2016 2 hours ago, moralist said: There is always a connection between hate and need, and [...] Greg . Always? Ayn Rand hated socialism; did she need socialism? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michael Stuart Kelly Posted December 17, 2016 Share Posted December 17, 2016 1 hour ago, jts said: 4 hours ago, moralist said: There is always a connection between hate and need, and [...] Greg . Always? Ayn Rand hated socialism; did she need socialism? Jerry, A story is not a good story unless there is a villain. If you want to tell a good story, or a persuasive story, you need something to hate. People don't pay much attention, otherwise. But they do bond in a group around a common hatred (or scapegoat or villain). If you want to create or reinforce a group, you need something specific to hate that everyone in the group hates. That's just Basic Human Nature 101. And there's even neuroscience to back this up, starting with the fight-flight response. Ayn Rand was a storyteller... Michael Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michael Stuart Kelly Posted December 17, 2016 Share Posted December 17, 2016 In marketing, it's common to make the problem the product solves the villain. In ideology, a conflicting ideology becomes the villain. In religion, other religions become the villain. And so on. Then folks tell great stories... Michael Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BaalChatzaf Posted December 17, 2016 Author Share Posted December 17, 2016 5 hours ago, moralist said: What companies Bob? Greg None of your fucking business. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
anthony Posted December 17, 2016 Share Posted December 17, 2016 3 hours ago, Michael Stuart Kelly said: Jerry, A story is not a good story unless there is a villain. If you want to tell a good story, or a persuasive story, you need something to hate. People don't pay much attention, otherwise. But they do bond in a group around a common hatred (or scapegoat or villain). If you want to create or reinforce a group, you need something specific to hate that everyone in the group hates. That's just Basic Human Nature 101. And there's even neuroscience to back this up, starting with the fight-flight response. Ayn Rand was a storyteller... A storyteller too, right, but one who foremost "hated" anything opposing individualism, e.g. socialism. It provided a perfect fictional foil to her individualist characters but it wasn't the main reason she invoked socialism in her novels I'm sure. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Brant Gaede Posted December 17, 2016 Share Posted December 17, 2016 3 hours ago, BaalChatzaf said: None of your fucking business. You've let Greg tar baby you. Now you're blaming him for the attachment. Greg has a core of simple beliefs he lives by he feels are good enough for him and all he has to do is keep repeating them. He will not bear not doing that, but since you won't leave him alone he won't let you alone. Intellectually he's not breathing but those who engage him--instead of taking what might be valuable and leaving the rest--are giving him continuous CPR, you most of all. It's quite boring for denying Greg affirms Greg for he never really defends his positions beyond his ad hominens. (This is me and that is you--all unverifiable.) --Brant Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wolf DeVoon Posted December 17, 2016 Share Posted December 17, 2016 4 hours ago, Michael Stuart Kelly said: Ayn Rand was a storyteller... Michael The villain in Atlas was Dr. Stadler, who reminds me a little of Bob, extremely bright, scoffed at morality, loved theoretical science. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michael Stuart Kelly Posted December 17, 2016 Share Posted December 17, 2016 2 hours ago, anthony said: A storyteller too, right, but one who foremost "hated" anything opposing individualism, e.g. socialism. It provided a perfect fictional foil to her individualist characters but it wasn't the main reason she invoked socialism in her novels I'm sure. Anthony, The point was in reference to the the hate+need relationship Greg mentioned (which I found to be a fascinating comment to think about). Try to imagine Ayn Rand writing books like The Fountainhead or Atlas Shrugged without collectivism to hate and see what happens. She actually did try it and the main result was a nasty fight between her and Barbara Branden. In the late 20's, Rand wrote a short story in the style of O. Henry called "Good Copy," but never published it. I read it years ago in The Early Ayn Rand and it reminded me a little of the writing for TV shows like Dobie Gillis or comic books like Archie, except the girls was in the all-knowing role (I've got your number but I'm not going to let on, besides, you're cute) and the guy chasing her was the lovable goofball. Rand read it to a group of students one evening, prefaced it by saying she was not going to reveal the writer (for me, that's a dead giveaway, but whatever), and wanted the students to opine. I think she was fishing for sense of life comments or something. Barbara said it sounded amateurish, needed some work, was kinda meh, and so on. Then all hell broke loose. In my opinion, it's an OK story. Not special, but not bad. Comedy really wasn't Rand's thing. She needed something to hate to bring out her real storytelling talent. Collectivism worked nicely as Satan for her. Michael Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
moralist Posted December 17, 2016 Share Posted December 17, 2016 8 hours ago, Ellen Stuttle said: Since "who is President" makes no difference to the "quality of [your] life," I have to wonder why you "thank[ed] God for the Electoral college" I'm only speaking personally for myself and no one else, Ellen... because we chose to build our "Galt's Gulch" out on the periphery of an exclusive unincorporated area and thousands of acres of open land where government can't affect the quality of our lives... ...but I'm not thiking only of myself. It's good for America when the urban public union liberal democrat government benefits parasites lose out to the rural Americans, thanks to the Founder's wisdom of desiging the electoral college. They knew human nature that the majority of urban public union leeches would eventually vote their own benefits. They do in California... and yet I'm able to live an independent productive happy life in the most liberal democrat controlled state in the union. This is possible because there are two Americas... ... and each of us has freely chosen the one in which one we are living right now. Quote Who's President could make a direct appreciable difference to my life, since a Hillary Clinton presidency could mean that my husband might be up on criminal charges for climate "denialism,"... If your husband was an independent American Capitalist producer he would have earned the right to enjoy the freedom to deny your government his sanction to make him a victim of the feminized insanity of political correctness. He needs to grow a pair. Victimhood is completely self imposed and a deserved result of a needy relationship to your government. It is impossible to deny what you chose to depend on for your own financial and emotional wellbeing. Greg Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
moralist Posted December 17, 2016 Share Posted December 17, 2016 4 hours ago, BaalChatzaf said: None of your fucking business. I rest my case, Bob... you were an employee of government contracted companies. As a complete contrast to you, I'm not ashamed of my career because I built it myself from nothing... while you have the same mindset as a public union employee. And this is why you believe the government you hate is oppressing you... when you oppressed yourself by your own parasitic dependence on it. You've only f**ked yourself. Greg Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
moralist Posted December 17, 2016 Share Posted December 17, 2016 1 hour ago, Brant Gaede said: (This is me and that is you--all unverifiable.) My own life is the verification. I enjoy freedom few people will ever taste because of their own failure to live by American values. God designed America as a duly authorized agent of moral retribution. It awards producers and punishes parasites. Greg Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Brant Gaede Posted December 17, 2016 Share Posted December 17, 2016 1 hour ago, moralist said: My own life is the verification. I enjoy freedom few people will ever taste because of their own failure to live by American values. God designed America as a duly authorized agent of moral retribution. It awards producers and punishes parasites. Greg By a third party. You and Bob can verify. You for you and him for him. All else is inference, which can be valid if it travels even if off a false base. For instance, I can make statements about myself that could lead to false generalizations about what kind of man I am. Facts: I am on SS and Medicare and work, privately, for a living. Any generalizations off these is speculative. Go ahead and speculate. I'll confirm or deny. Denial would leave your speculation as a speculation while affirmation--by me--by terms of our (honest) discourse, would make it socially factual. But I am part of the general American matrix. I acknowledge this. By your own testimony, repeated endlessly here by you, you are too but not to the same extent. As long as you and I are productive we are self-forgivable for our sins. The difference is I acknowledge my sinning while you deny yours from a faux high ground that should be a little lower down though not as low--economically speaking--as my ground. Morally speaking I've got you though only because you don't acknowledge this--that is, your actual economic and moral matrix instead of your half-assedness. People like me, historically speaking, have made the world you are productive in. In every respect. My grace is I thank them, even if they wrongly tried doing the right thing(s), while you don't. And soldiering is the least of it, until the shooting starts. Then it's women and children to the rear. Then where are you, metaphorically speaking? "God" doesn't cut it. --Brant Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
moralist Posted December 17, 2016 Share Posted December 17, 2016 Brant, we actually have very little difference in views as compared to Bob and I. I quoted your "this is me that is you" in reference to my contrast to Bob rather than to you. He tells me about the wonderfulness of his brain, while as far as I'm concerned his brain was imprinted by the government education system to be an employed monkey. Quote The difference is I acknowledge my sinning while you deny yours from a faux high ground that should be a little lower down though not as low--economically speaking--as my ground. Morally speaking I've got you though only because you don't acknowledge this--that is, your actual economic and moral matrix instead of your half-assedness. What you regard as "halfassedness" is actually the quality which is responsible for my seven figure net worth and zero debt. This is a natural consequence of living by a very specific set of American values. And as far as making the world better, I'm a genuine blessing to everyone in the community whom I serve by solving their problems they can't solve. It is impossible to run a successful business in a small town with a rotten reputation. But because I have a reputation for being ethical I always have more business than I can handle regardless of economic or political cycles. This is the essence of American freedom... ...you work to earn the right to deserve to enjoy it. So if anyone here feels they are not free... it's solely because they're living by the wrong values. Greg Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Brant Gaede Posted December 17, 2016 Share Posted December 17, 2016 5 hours ago, anthony said: A storyteller too, right, but one who foremost "hated" anything opposing individualism, e.g. socialism. It provided a perfect fictional foil to her individualist characters but it wasn't the main reason she invoked socialism in her novels I'm sure. Actually, I think she invoked jejune fascism, not socialism. Where is the welfare/warfare state in AS? Of course, boiled down you'll find socialism. --Brant Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michael Stuart Kelly Posted December 17, 2016 Share Posted December 17, 2016 2 hours ago, Brant Gaede said: Where is the welfare/warfare state in AS? Brant, LOL... I hadn't thought about that, but I've always sensed something was missing from the America of AS. The US military. Dayaamm! Where is it? Michael Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BaalChatzaf Posted December 17, 2016 Author Share Posted December 17, 2016 22 minutes ago, Michael Stuart Kelly said: Brant, LOL... I hadn't thought about that, but I've always sensed something was missing from the America of AS. The US military. Dayaamm! Where is it? Michael In the Taggart Tunnel explosion incident it was mentioned that an army train collided with the stalled steam locomotive in the tunnel. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michael Stuart Kelly Posted December 18, 2016 Share Posted December 18, 2016 5 hours ago, BaalChatzaf said: In the Taggart Tunnel explosion incident it was mentioned that an army train collided with the stalled steam locomotive in the tunnel. Bob, It sure didn't sound like the Greatest Generation army, did it? In fiction these are called walk-on characters. Except these folks didn't even get to walk on. They just got to be blown up as a collective. What I was imagining when I asked "Where is it?" was where was the military that won WWI and WWII? Where was the industrial-military complex? And the fighter bombers? And all that technology? Michael Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BaalChatzaf Posted December 18, 2016 Author Share Posted December 18, 2016 10 hours ago, Michael Stuart Kelly said: Bob, It sure didn't sound like the Greatest Generation army, did it? In fiction these are called walk-on characters. Except these folks didn't even get to walk on. They just got to be blown up as a collective. What I was imagining when I asked "Where is it?" was where was the military that won WWI and WWII? Where was the industrial-military complex? And the fighter bombers? And all that technology? Michael In the alternate time line Randverse these events never happened. Read AS as an alternate history or alternate timeline story. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Brant Gaede Posted December 18, 2016 Share Posted December 18, 2016 10 hours ago, Michael Stuart Kelly said: Bob, It sure didn't sound like the Greatest Generation army, did it? In fiction these are called walk-on characters. Except these folks didn't even get to walk on. They just got to be blown up as a collective. What I was imagining when I asked "Where is it?" was where was the military that won WWI and WWII? Where was the industrial-military complex? And the fighter bombers? And all that technology? Michael AS is a work of art. You want another million or so words? Would that have made for a better novel? Men write about (real) war, not even Rand matched up to that kind of task nor would we (men [women?]) want her to. It needs too much testosterone. The best she did was Francisco blowing off a coupla heads--as tightly described by a debriefer. Project X was her transliteration of the atomic bomb rendered worse by its larger scale. Regardless, where was the military? --Brant Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michael Stuart Kelly Posted December 18, 2016 Share Posted December 18, 2016 1 hour ago, Brant Gaede said: AS is a work of art. You want another million or so words? Would that have made for a better novel? Brant, I'm not criticizing her for it. It is fiction. I was talking about that in the context of identifying her enemy in that hate+need relationship Greg mentioned. Whether you want to split hairs over fascism or socialism or whatever, to her it all meant a collectivist ideology underpinning a dictatorship. That's what she needed to hate. There are other ways to depose a dictatorship, though, without walking off the battlefield. For instance, the military like in the rest of human history... Now there is something I can criticize. I hadn't thought of it before this discussion, but what about all those folks in our subcommunity who read Atlas Shrugged and think this turns them into military geniuses capable of calling the shots in fighting terrorists and wars? They may have gotten the attitude from Rand, but they certainly didn't get any military grounding. Not even speculations about it in her fiction. Then there's this. I think it's upside down. When you look at Rand's talk at West Point and at random other pronouncements, you get the feeling that, had she been alive today, she would have held the exact opposite military views--and foreign policy views for that matter--than our dear armchair warriors who speak in her name. (And don't get me started on what I think she would have thought of Trump... ) I just had a funny thought. Can anyone imagine what Rand would have thought of the US government borrowing money from Communist China? I, for one, think she might have broken her habit of not using profanity. Michael Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BaalChatzaf Posted December 18, 2016 Author Share Posted December 18, 2016 9 minutes ago, Michael Stuart Kelly said: I just had a funny thought. Can anyone imagine what Rand would have thought of the US government borrowing money from Communist China? I, for one, think she might have broken her habit of not using profanity. I think Rand would have had a shit-fit..... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ellen Stuttle Posted December 18, 2016 Share Posted December 18, 2016 On December 17, 2016 at 11:19 AM, moralist said: If your husband was an independent American Capitalist producer he would have earned the right to enjoy the freedom to deny your government his sanction to make him a victim of the feminized insanity of political correctness. He needs to grow a pair. Victimhood is completely self imposed and a deserved result of a needy relationship to your government. It is impossible to deny what you chose to depend on for your own financial and emotional wellbeing. Greg I guess what you mean is that he should have kept his mouth shut, like so many scientists are doing. And that likewise all the prominent "denialists" who would be at risk from a Clinton administration should have kept their mouths shut, because somehow speaking truth contra PC is self-imposing victimhood. Is that it? Ellen Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
moralist Posted December 20, 2016 Share Posted December 20, 2016 On 12/18/2016 at 3:26 PM, Ellen Stuttle said: I guess what you mean is that he should have kept his mouth shut, like so many scientists are doing. No, Ellen. That is not what I meant. It's self deception to fraudulently play the innocent helpless victim of a self inflicted situation. The instant you take employment, grants, benefits and the like from your government, you have already chosen to put yourself under its thumb and have already granted that thumb the right to press down upon you to make you behave as it wishes. Everything the government offers to give to you has strings attached to it. And anyone who takes becomes it's little puppet that can only dance to its tune. And that's by your own free choice. In my opinion you made a sucker's deal. America was designed by its Founders to reward independent private sector Capitalist producers with the freedom to operate in an ethical universe outside the fraudulent one of the public sector government parasites. Greg Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Create an account or sign in to comment
You need to be a member in order to leave a comment
Create an account
Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!
Register a new accountSign in
Already have an account? Sign in here.
Sign In Now