The Ayn Rand Love/Hate Myth - Part 4 - Rand's True Value

[C. Jordan]

I never thought I'd write anything here about Howard Roark and Harry Potter, and yes, I certainly did not plan to say any more about Bob Wallace, but here we go. What he said about Harry Potter is almost funny, in light of what he said about Ayn Rand.

Before we begin, let's recall Bob Wallace's denunciaition of Ayn Rand: according to him, the entire plot of ATLAS SHRUGGED is scapegoating and revenge, wherein Ayn Rand only projected her hatred onto scapegoats; and Objectivism is nothing more than scapegoating which leads to evil. There is nothing more to his article than that.

Now he attacks Harry Potter as follows...

Harry ... has no family; indeed what counts as "family" not only abuses him but appears to hate him. They're closer to monsters than people...in real life the emotionally repressed Harry would have lost that British stiff upper lip of his and gone postal and axe-murdered his entire "family" because of their horrendous abuse of him. Making him live under the stairs with spiders? Starving him? Yet throughout all of it he remains cheerful and unaffected? No, I don't think so.

He'd be a seething caldron of hate, rage and probably envy, and like almost all people like that, his first defense would be to blame his problems on others, specifically his adoptive parents. Then -- pow, machete time. Yet Rowling pretty much writes as if his horrendous treatment has essentially had no effect on him at all. Just how unrealistic is that? He'd be mentally and emotionally disturbed, rather than unaffected by everything, as if he was some sort of Ayn Randian superman...Let's put it this way: what would the overwhelmingly majority of parents think of some milquetoast kid like that? Would they really be surprised if the kid blew his stack someday and took a log splitter to the entire family as they slept? Probably not. I wouldn't...I was raised on Edgar Rice Burroughs and his Barsoom/Mars novels, books in which cowards and bullies were skewered with sabers and then had their carcasses kicked over cliffs (not only by the men, but by the women). Yet we get poor Harry swallowing abuse after abuse, not only from his adoptive family but from bullies and cowards like Draco Malfoy. It takes way too long for the bad guys to get their just deserts [sic].

Emphasis mine throughout. Anyone who has read the Harry Potter books knows that Harry is not unaffected by the abuse he gets throughout the books. But that is not the point.

It would be interesting to go further with the comment about Harry Potter, an 'Ayn Randian superman,' but that again is not the point.

I can't help but notice: what Bob Wallace hated Ayn Rand for doing, he also hates J.K. Rowling for not doing. If Harry Potter had "taken a log splitter to the entire family" or done some sort of black magic, would Wallace approve? Or would that be scapegoating?

For that matter, suppose Ayn Rand had not discussed what would happen to the villains of ATLAS SHRUGGED once John Galt and the last striker walked out? Suppose there was no collapse of society? Would Wallace have complained that "it takes way too long for the bad guys to get their just deserts [sic]"?

I have nothing more to add, except that it was strange to know that Bob Wallace denounces Diana Hsieh. Doesn't he realise that if he just agreed with her, they would make such good friends? They have so much in common, that they are divided only by Wallace's opinion of Ayn Rand.

For a man like Wallace, changing his opinion seems easy.

[Dragonfly]

Harry ... has no family; indeed what counts as "family" not only abuses him but appears to hate him. They're closer to monsters than people...in real life the emotionally repressed Harry would have lost that British stiff upper lip of his and gone postal and axe-murdered his entire "family" because of their horrendous abuse of him. Making him live under the stairs with spiders? Starving him? Yet throughout all of it he remains cheerful and unaffected? No, I don't think so.

He'd be a seething caldron of hate, rage and probably envy, and like almost all people like that, his first defense would be to blame his problems on others, specifically his adoptive parents. Then -- pow, machete time. Yet Rowling pretty much writes as if his horrendous treatment has essentially had no effect on him at all. Just how unrealistic is that? He'd be mentally and emotionally disturbed, rather than unaffected by everything, as if he was some sort of Ayn Randian superman...Let's put it this way: what would the overwhelmingly majority of parents think of some milquetoast kid like that? Would they really be surprised if the kid blew his stack someday and took a log splitter to the entire family as they slept? Probably not. I wouldn't...I was raised on Edgar Rice Burroughs and his Barsoom/Mars novels, books in which cowards and bullies were skewered with sabers and then had their carcasses kicked over cliffs (not only by the men, but by the women). Yet we get poor Harry swallowing abuse after abuse, not only from his adoptive family but from bullies and cowards like Draco Malfoy. It takes way too long for the bad guys to get their just deserts [sic].

Why the "sic"?

[Roger Bissell]

Harry ... has no family; indeed what counts as "family" not only abuses him but appears to hate him. They're closer to monsters than people...in real life the emotionally repressed Harry would have lost that British stiff upper lip of his and gone postal and axe-murdered his entire "family" because of their horrendous abuse of him. Making him live under the stairs with spiders? Starving him? Yet throughout all of it he remains cheerful and unaffected? No, I don't think so.

He'd be a seething caldron of hate, rage and probably envy, and like almost all people like that, his first defense would be to blame his problems on others, specifically his adoptive parents. Then -- pow, machete time. Yet Rowling pretty much writes as if his horrendous treatment has essentially had no effect on him at all. Just how unrealistic is that? He'd be mentally and emotionally disturbed, rather than unaffected by everything, as if he was some sort of Ayn Randian superman...Let's put it this way: what would the overwhelmingly majority of parents think of some milquetoast kid like that? Would they really be surprised if the kid blew his stack someday and took a log splitter to the entire family as they slept? Probably not. I wouldn't...I was raised on Edgar Rice Burroughs and his Barsoom/Mars novels, books in which cowards and bullies were skewered with sabers and then had their carcasses kicked over cliffs (not only by the men, but by the women). Yet we get poor Harry swallowing abuse after abuse, not only from his adoptive family but from bullies and cowards like Draco Malfoy. It takes way too long for the bad guys to get their just deserts [sic].

Why the "sic"?

Apparently, Dragonfly, you don't have a [sic] sense of humor, like some people on this list. :-)

REB

[Reason Man]

The Ayn Rand Love/Hate Myth—Part 4—Rand's True Value

by Michael Stuart Kelly

Greg Nyquist has written what I consider an extremely important book on Objectivism, Ayn Rand Contra Human Nature ........ He starts out by criticizing this division and asking why Human Nature and Human History do not have a place in philosophy. The more I think about it, the more I am inclined to agree that the Philosophy of Human Nature and the Philosophy of Human History are important enough to warrant separate categories.

Hi to everybody,

I am new here, and NOT internet savvy, (self-info given under Meet and Greet, unable at the moment to upload my photo son being away -- will add it later); I am not a professional philosopher, so I cannot go too deep into this topic like some others. I think history is very important from one point of view -- to learn about men’s past mistakes and to apply to today’s situation. In fact all the positive and negative aspects of all past civilizations should be studied – so as to apply to our present situation. For example, the Greeks, and then the Romans were highly advanced in political concepts and structure of governance (definitely compared to their times, and surprisingly to some extent, even compared to ours). It would be quite important to know how and why they failed – and learning the process will help us because today’s western countries are in the same transition stage towards fall due to take-over by unreason.

As we were discussing on another O’ist forum (where I have posted a substantial chunk and want to bring it here for discussion), civilizations have kept on collapsing throughout history – as some member said there, they have a limited life. But the study of their pattern should help us in taking precautions and increasing the life of civilizations – which men don’t seem to have made properly so far, most probably because, as pointed out by MSK, men tend not to give to history its due importance. Below, see a part of my writing about this and imagine the consequence of neglecting this aspect of civilizations.

4. Comments on Quotes about Democracy

Proceeding on the above lines of degeneration of rulers due to mass psychology, some reasons of erosion of American democracy are very nicely explained by the following ancient quote (though the existential situation is almost like small-town, rural India).

QUOTE

i. The characteristic of the democracy is equal freedom and open speech to all, with liberty to each man to shape his own life as he chooses.

ii. …. even horses, asses and dogs go free about, so that they run against you in the road, if you do not make way for them. ……

iii. The subversion of such a democracy arises from men who rise to be popular leaders in it: violent, ambitious, extravagant men who gain the favor of the people by distributing amongst them confiscations from the property of the rich.

iv. The rich, resisting these injustices, become enemies to the constitution.

v. The people, in order to put them down, range themselves under the banners of the most energetic popular leader, who takes advantage of such a position to render himself a despot.

vi. He begins his rule by some acceptable measures, such as abolition of debts, and assignment of lands to the poorer citizens, until he has expelled or destroyed, the parties opposed to him.

vii. He seeks pretences for foreign wars, in order that the people may stand in need of a leader, and may be kept poor by the contributions necessary to sustain war.

viii. But presently he finds, or suspects, dissatisfaction among the more liberal spirits. He kills or banishes them as enemies. UNQUOTE

This is Plato in “The Republic” (380 BC, means he is describing conditions of around 500 – 600 BC!), and the reader will be surprised how much the Republicans and the Democrats (or even the corresponding parties in India) are competing to grab power and outdo each other exactly on the above lines. (My explanation about how democracy and multi-culturlism forces them to follow the same path as Greek and Roman democracies is given ahead – I would like to add that by simply studying only this aspect of those civilizations, one could do a lot to stem today’s slide – provided men give to history its due importance. It is surprising that while man is preparing to land on moon, mankind is still rooted in 500 BC!) One may get similar quotes from Roman times.

Amongst America’s founding fathers John Adams predicted: “Remember, democracy never lasts long. It soon wastes, exhausts, and murders itself. There was never a democracy yet that did not commit suicide.”

There is a quote attributed to James Madison about majoritarian tyranny, and commentators have shown how many steps the Founding Fathers had taken against this tyranny. Following quote is attributed to Thomas Jefferson:

“The democracy will cease to exist when you take away from those who are willing to work and give to those who do not.

It is incumbent on every generation to pay its own debt as it goes. A principle which if acted on would save one-half the wars of the world.

I predict future happiness for Americans if they can prevent the Government from wasting the labors of the people under the pretense of taking care of them.

My reading of history convinces me that most bad government results from too much government.

To compel a man to subsidize with his taxes the propagation of ideas which he disbelieves and abhors is sinful and tyrannical.”

Ayn Rand herself referred at several places to fall of America, for example “For the New Intellectual” starts with America being bankrupt and following a suicidal course; The title: The New Left – the Anti-Industrial Revolution is self-explanatory and articles like “From A Symposium” describe how America is being led to collapse; or the very essence of Atlas Shrugged is the building of a new society out of the collapse of the present one (and the villains are seen in multiple copies, where are the heroes?); Anthem starts with a collapsed modern society of about 1930s (means too much more developed than Greece) – just read the April 1946 foreword she wrote for it to know what she meant by the world proceeding to collectivism, we have progressed so much towards that world; In several essays in Capitalism the Unknown Ideal, she talks about what type of dictatorship is likely to emerge in America – e.g. the title of article (of 1965): “The New Fascism: Rule by Consensus” is self-explanatory and ends with the type of dictatorship America is heading towards; the article “The Anatomy of Compromise” says, “the ultimate end of altruism will be achieved: universal immolation”; (If I am not wrong, Ominous Parallels was endorsed by her? And today, has the situation deteriorated far beyond?); in the 1971 article “Don’t Let It Go” (from the book Philosophy Who Needs It), she says “If America drags on in her current state (which is unlikely) for a few more generations, dictatorship will become possible.”

Here she was only addressing better Americans to “Don’t Let It Go”, but the unlikely has become a reality, America has dragged on and the speed of getting closer to collapse is now progressively increasing. What was a more distant possibility during her life-time (huge erosion having already happened since 1900) is now a reality – in fact in an article titled “Dismantling America” on the web-site the Atlasphere, dated Oct 27 2009, Thomas Sowell gives a horror-list of government’s atrocities that were not imaginable even one year back!

What matters now is the solution to this decay of democracy, take-over of the political machine by the so-called ‘lower classes’ released because of the efforts of heroes. (More about this aspect of “fall due to decay of democracy” is available in next posts.)

I am stopping here to keep this post limited – but I am posting another article about HISTORY of civilizations in the sub-forum “Articles” about the greatness of America during the first 150 years of her formation (Title: Anglo Saxon Protestant – Revolution (about today’s US) – see it’s connection with the Greeks, which further justifies studying collapse of Greek and Roman democracies). And for further ideas about this topic please see it by ctrl + clicking on the first link below, which will give an MS word file, therefore more recommended; or by feeding the URL in the second link (this link changes the formatting – but the ideas are in tact).

1. Download link : http://myfreefilehosting.com/f/9b7728a1ee_0.38MB

2. URL: http://wp.me/pguKM-3/ASP Revo Abstract and 3 chapters

These include discussion about moral degeneration and fall due to democracy.

I am thankfully hoping that some members will at least be interested, and make a good discussion out of it.