Weirdest, snarkiest and... er... funny(?)

[Xray]

You also don't seem to have a clear idea regarding the terminology. That it is "consensual" does not make those acts unsadistic. For example, sadists seek masochists for consensual acts and vice versa.

So why not call spade a spade? Rearden & Co clearly had a sexually sadistic streak and found the perfect match in the heroine Dagny's sexual masochism.

My terminology is fine. You're just confusing two entirely different statements - one about sadism, and one about consent - in order to misrepresent what I said.

I'm merely trying to be as precise as possible.

So according to your logic, when a sadist and masochist perform acts with mutual consent, these acts don't qualify as sadistic/masochistic anymore just because there is consent?

Which part of "entirely different statements" are you having trouble understanding?

You haven't answered the question I asked of you in my post.

[Brant Gaede]

I've never liked clowns except rodeo clowns but I've never cared for rodeos all that much.

--Brant

[Brant Gaede]

I prefer to condemn real evil, like killing folks and stuff like that.

In the values I have chosen, granting the clown the same moral status as the tyrant is a waste of time and gets into Peikoff's thing of calling the professor of Marxism just as evil (if not more so) as Stalin, who actually murdered.

Cambodians went to France where they were taught Marxism, went home and ended up murdering millions of their countrymen so they could make a new and pure communist, agrarian society from the ground up.

A "scientist" wrote a popular book called "Silent Spring" full of drivel condemning DDT and we went from a world with little malaria to 1/2 a billion suffering from it and maybe 50,000,000 babies dead so far from it thanks to our intellectual elite and power hungry if not ignorant politicians.

The overt thugs are just at the end of the food chain.

Michael, you are denying the power of wrong ideas. While you may be impervious to infection not everybody is.

--Brant

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

I have been thinking over what reactions I give to humor I don't like.

Scoffing, but it a laughing it off kind of manner, as if to say "Who could ever take that seriously?"

Not in an aping mocking kind of manner where real hatred shines through.

As to scorching moral condemnation, I am unable to do this without feeling hatred. I just can't get my hatred chops up for Mad Magazine or Tallulah Morehead. After a little while, I don't even remember they exist. Nothing that causes me a chuckle or even to scoff (in my manner) stays in my memory for long. Oh, I'll remember it if someone reminds me, but it hardly ever comes of its own. And even when someone reminds me, if too many years have passed, I don't remember it at all.

I try to stay away from hatred since I take it seriously. I don't like what hatred does to me inside and I am not able to seethe in hatred for too long and not act. When I hate something, I go after it to destroy it.

Michael

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Michael, you are denying the power of wrong ideas. While you may be impervious to infection not everybody is.

Brant,

You are wrong. I am not denying any such thing.

I am merely placing the moral responsibility of accepting the wrong ideas right where it belongs: on the person who accepts them and acts on them. And I have learned a great deal about crowd psychology, brainwashing and public influence recently and still say that a person's individual responsibility for his own thinking is, by far, the most important standard in judging a person's thoughts and actions. There are exceptional circumstances like torture, but you either accept that man's nature includes volition or you believe otherwise.

To me, an idea is not a button for controlling automatons. A philosopher is not a puppet-master. Humanity is not a bunch of robots. And I do not belong to an elite who is immune to being this.

It's a little more complex than that.

Michael

[Brant Gaede]

Michael,

It is the "elite" that gets infected, not you or me or most people. That doesn't stop "most people" from victimization. The human race trudges through history bumping into various things and over time learning from the experiences, but sometimes important things can be forgotten and the learning/relearning might take 1000 years, which is what happened after the fall of Rome. Envy is its biggest scourge. I'm trying to understand the survival value of this curse. It's like the mosquito: What would be the unintended consequences if there suddenly were no more mosquitoes--forever?

--Brant

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Brant,

I am adamant about the following in running my own mental affairs.

The moment you accept that you are not allowed to laugh at something or someone, and you embrace the hatred that always comes with that kind of demand, that is the moment a really lethal kind of tribal power is born.

I see it as a crossing point when a person delegates his will to the crowd's leader.

If I were to preach an idea one day as a preacher-type, it would be one that I practice. It would be to never feel you cannot laugh at something if the laughter comes from inside you. I would also preach to never laugh at something just because the crowd does. And to laugh without guilt if you think something is funny. Most of all, to never apologize to anyone for your soul. Never.

In other words, be an individual in charge of your own soul for real. Not for approval by others.

It doesn't matter what others think on that level, especially what any crowd thinks.

Michael

[Michelle]

You also don't seem to have a clear idea regarding the terminology. That it is "consensual" does not make those acts unsadistic. For example, sadists seek masochists for consensual acts and vice versa.

So why not call spade a spade? Rearden & Co clearly had a sexually sadistic streak and found the perfect match in the heroine Dagny's sexual masochism.

My terminology is fine. You're just confusing two entirely different statements - one about sadism, and one about consent - in order to misrepresent what I said.

I'm merely trying to be as precise as possible.

So according to your logic, when a sadist and masochist perform acts with mutual consent, these acts don't qualify as sadistic/masochistic anymore just because there is consent?

Which part of "entirely different statements" are you having trouble understanding?

You haven't answered the question I asked of you in my post.

It isn't a legitimate question.

[kiaer.ts]

I wonder if the consistent misspelling of Roark's name as Roarke is intentional. I bet it is not, since nothing snarky came of it.

I admit I feel a bit guilty for finding some of this stuff funny, but DAYAAMM!

If you gotta let it out, might as well do it all at once...

Michael

EDIT: Incidentally, Tallulah Morehead is fictional (I think). Here is her blog: The Morehead the Merrier.

Don't feel guilty. It was a funny spoof on the motion picture -The Fountainhead-. Mad Magazines version, in a way.

Ba'al Chatzaf

I disagree, you should feel guilty. This crap is not funny (unless you find children spreading lies as rumors and children's name calling funny) and has no value worth communicating.

No, Michael, the problem is not that one can't criticize Rand, or even parody her works. The problem is that this creature's blog doesn't rise to the level of honest criticism, and it offers us no value as parody. It is purely parasitical, dung thrown on fine art.

I am reminded of a person who's banned from this forum. (I can't remember his name, Proctor Hess, or Hector Snott, or something) whose "caricatures" were lauded for some time here as art. They were pathetic, ugly scribblings, bathroom wall scrawlings that were "funnny" for one reason only, if you can call it a reason. Those pictures attacked some people who were disliked by various parties. All's fair in love and war and tribal schisms? I remember a "caricature" of Diana Hsieh. I personally disagreed with and disliked much of what Diana Hsieh stood for way back when she was Diana Mertz Brickell. But attacking her based on her appearance is not justified in any manor. The approval here of Speck's (or is it Crotch's?) hateful caricature of her, merely because she belonged to the enemy camp, isn't loyalty to the good guys. Loyalty to the good guys needs nothing more than decency and truth to support it. Any one who's read and comprehended the essay Objectivist Rage should understand the impropriety.

We have been lectured here by some parties that Barack Obama is a decent man, that we should give him the benefit of the doubt so far as it goes. There's no need to demonize him as a communist up front. Well, neither was Hsieh a killer, nor Rand a fascist, not to deserve the benefit of the doubt, and treatment on the merits. Attack Diana Hsieh on the merits. Criticize and showcase the criticism of Rand on the merits.

There's no need to rally round the flag. But neither is there the need for or the call to wallow in filth, or pass ugly notes at the back of the class. Hearing someone tell lies about someone you love is bad enough. None of us would stay silent in person if the creature who wrote this blog made the same comments at a party. To laugh as if such filth is funny simply because it is one step removed from the sphere of personal interaction is not "sophisctication." It is self-deception.

postscript

Having just thought about this post while taking my bedtime shower, I did want to add this. My purpose here was primarily to make clear my objections posted on this thread at an earlier point, which were characterized as "rally round the flagism." My point is not that, just the dignity of selectivity. I am not trying to start an argument, get the better of someone, appear superior, cause a retraction or elicit an apology. I am just as liable to bad judgement and acting out on line as anyone else. I just hope those who read this will say to themselves, Okay, I get Ted's point.

(This post was edited after Barbara Branden's reply below.)

You do realize you've written this morally infuriated post about something written by somebody who calls himself "Tallulah Morehead," right?

No. The post was not about the drag queen, but about the ugliness of yours and Mike's highlighting the ugly. It's all about your actions. You know this.

I didn't call for anyone to blast the drag queen, it isn't worth it. But neither is it worth repeating what the drag queen said. That repetition is like a little kid running and telling everybody about the dirty word he found scrawled on the wall. That sort of thing is understandable in little kids, but not mature adults. In mature adults it's embarrassing.

This thread (and perhaps this forum "Objectivism in dark places" - I won't explore it to find out) is like someone posting a picture of an open sewer. To question the propriety of posting pictures of sewers is not an attack on sewers.

As for this "refusal to feel unearned guilt"? I merely asked the reader to understand the point I have made. Remeber, when I made it before, the defensive accusation was that I could brook no criticism of Ayn Rand. Now we have outraged insistant cries that "I will accept no unearned guilt." Scream as loud as you like, someone doth protest too much.

This will be my last post on this thread.

[Michelle]

Laughter is a uniquely human way for people to deal with the unfamiliar and undesirable around them without collapsing into a bitter mush of vengeful hatred. Should every undesirable thing merely be laughed at? No. Many things are significant enough to take seriously. Tallulah Morehead is not one of those things.

And beyond that, Morehead actually hit on some legitimate issues people have with The Fountainhead.

Edited June 16, 2009 by Michelle R

[Brant Gaede]

Brant,

I am adamant about the following in running my own mental affairs.

The moment you accept that you are not allowed to laugh at something or someone, and you embrace the hatred that always comes with that kind of demand, that is the moment a really lethal kind of tribal power is born.

I see it as a crossing point when a person delegates his will to the crowd's leader.

If I were to preach an idea one day as a preacher-type, it would be one that I practice. It would be to never feel you cannot laugh at something if the laughter comes from inside you. I would also preach to never laugh at something just because the crowd does. And to laugh without guilt if you think something is funny. Most of all, to never apologize to anyone for your soul. Never.

In other words, be an individual in charge of your own soul for real. Not for approval by others.

It doesn't matter what others think on that level, especially what any crowd thinks.

Michael

I certainly hope nothing I wrote is being construed by you as my objecting to your laughter. I remember reading a 1957 review of Atlas Shrugged in The New Yorker over a decade after publication. I couldn't stop laughing. The author was trying to do a real number on the novel and with much more skill than T.M. going after The Fountainhead. I knew he or she wasn't playing fair. In my case it was the release of a tremendous amount of tension. I didn't quite realize yet that I was too wrapped up in Objectivism for my own good. That took a few more years to figure out. Those were my "tribal" years, a mind-set still sanctioned and indulged in by the Orthodoxy.

(edit:) Oh, I just read Ted Keer's "last post" on this thread. I'm with you on this "Mike." (Why are some people calling you Mike? No one ever called my Father (John) "Jack" or my step-Father (Jack) "John." For me "Mike" doesn't seem to fit you. It's funny my Mother married these two people, both lushes too boot.

(2nd edit:) After reviewing all my posts on this thread and many others plus the parody review by T.M., I would modify my post #46 slightly from "all crap" to mostly crap. But there is no need to feel any guilt in reading it and laughing at parts of it or even the whole damn thing. I laughed at a few things. It made me think about some things. We all aren't to be expected to react the same way. All in all I do think it's destructive and absolutely meant as such, but that's another subject than visceral reactions and why we have them.

--Brant

Edited June 16, 2009 by Brant Gaede

[Michelle]

I wonder if the consistent misspelling of Roark's name as Roarke is intentional. I bet it is not, since nothing snarky came of it.

I admit I feel a bit guilty for finding some of this stuff funny, but DAYAAMM!

If you gotta let it out, might as well do it all at once...

Michael

EDIT: Incidentally, Tallulah Morehead is fictional (I think). Here is her blog: The Morehead the Merrier.

Don't feel guilty. It was a funny spoof on the motion picture -The Fountainhead-. Mad Magazines version, in a way.

Ba'al Chatzaf

I disagree, you should feel guilty. This crap is not funny (unless you find children spreading lies as rumors and children's name calling funny) and has no value worth communicating.

No, Michael, the problem is not that one can't criticize Rand, or even parody her works. The problem is that this creature's blog doesn't rise to the level of honest criticism, and it offers us no value as parody. It is purely parasitical, dung thrown on fine art.

I am reminded of a person who's banned from this forum. (I can't remember his name, Proctor Hess, or Hector Snott, or something) whose "caricatures" were lauded for some time here as art. They were pathetic, ugly scribblings, bathroom wall scrawlings that were "funnny" for one reason only, if you can call it a reason. Those pictures attacked some people who were disliked by various parties. All's fair in love and war and tribal schisms? I remember a "caricature" of Diana Hsieh. I personally disagreed with and disliked much of what Diana Hsieh stood for way back when she was Diana Mertz Brickell. But attacking her based on her appearance is not justified in any manor. The approval here of Speck's (or is it Crotch's?) hateful caricature of her, merely because she belonged to the enemy camp, isn't loyalty to the good guys. Loyalty to the good guys needs nothing more than decency and truth to support it. Any one who's read and comprehended the essay Objectivist Rage should understand the impropriety.

We have been lectured here by some parties that Barack Obama is a decent man, that we should give him the benefit of the doubt so far as it goes. There's no need to demonize him as a communist up front. Well, neither was Hsieh a killer, nor Rand a fascist, not to deserve the benefit of the doubt, and treatment on the merits. Attack Diana Hsieh on the merits. Criticize and showcase the criticism of Rand on the merits.

There's no need to rally round the flag. But neither is there the need for or the call to wallow in filth, or pass ugly notes at the back of the class. Hearing someone tell lies about someone you love is bad enough. None of us would stay silent in person if the creature who wrote this blog made the same comments at a party. To laugh as if such filth is funny simply because it is one step removed from the sphere of personal interaction is not "sophisctication." It is self-deception.

postscript

Having just thought about this post while taking my bedtime shower, I did want to add this. My purpose here was primarily to make clear my objections posted on this thread at an earlier point, which were characterized as "rally round the flagism." My point is not that, just the dignity of selectivity. I am not trying to start an argument, get the better of someone, appear superior, cause a retraction or elicit an apology. I am just as liable to bad judgement and acting out on line as anyone else. I just hope those who read this will say to themselves, Okay, I get Ted's point.

(This post was edited after Barbara Branden's reply below.)

You do realize you've written this morally infuriated post about something written by somebody who calls himself "Tallulah Morehead," right?

No. The post was not about the drag queen, but about the ugliness of yours and Mike's highlighting the ugly. It's all about your actions. You know this.

I didn't call for anyone to blast the drag queen, it isn't worth it. But neither is it worth repeating what the drag queen said. That repetition is like a little kid running and telling everybody about the dirty word he found scrawled on the wall. That sort of thing is understandable in little kids, but not mature adults. In mature adults it's embarrassing.

This thread (and perhaps this forum "Objectivism in dark places" - I won't explore it to find out) is like someone posting a picture of an open sewer. To question the propriety of posting pictures of sewers is not an attack on sewers.

As for this "refusal to feel unearned guilt"? I merely asked the reader to understand the point I have made. Remeber, when I made it before, the defensive accusation was that I could brook no criticism of Ayn Rand. Now we have outraged insistant cries that "I will accept no unearned guilt." Scream as loud as you like, someone doth protest too much.

This will be my last post on this thread.

I see.

My chuckling at the semi-parodic rantings of a drag queen is "ugliness" and childish.

Your red-in-the-face righteous indignation at the fact that we would dare to find something ridiculous to be mildly amusing is noble and mature.

In reality, the review was initially a good springboard for me to better understand aspects of The Fountainhead's plot, and to discuss them with people. Attention only really started being paid to Morehead's review when you decided to play the true believer.

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Ted's remark to me.

I disagree, you should feel guilty.

My response.

I refuse to accept unearned guilt.

Ted's stumble...

As for this "refusal to feel unearned guilt"? I merely asked the reader to understand the point I have made. Remeber, when I made it before, the defensive accusation was that I could brook no criticism of Ayn Rand. Now we have outraged insistant cries that "I will accept no unearned guilt." Scream as loud as you like, someone doth protest too much.

Ted,

The only one between you and me expressing outrage or rhetoric that could be construed as "screaming" and "outraged cries" is you. Both on this point and your misstatement insinuating that you did not tell me to assume guilt, when in fact you did and did so emphatically, you have a serious consistency issue.

I suggest you avoid the "Objectivism in Dark Places" section. These topics don't appear to be good for you.

But, do as you wish, within the posting guidelines...

As for me, I have to get back to laughing and enjoying myself...

Michael

[Xray]

[Xray]:

You haven't answered the question I asked of you in my post.

It isn't a legitimate question.

It is quite obvious that you are again evading to answer the question. Edited June 16, 2009 by Xray

[Xray]

It was a funny spoof on the motion picture -The Fountainhead-. Mad Magazines version, in a way.

That's how I read it too.

(edit:) Oh, I just read Ted Keer's "last post" on this thread. I'm with you on this "Mike." (Why are some people calling you Mike? No one ever called my Father (John) "Jack" or my step-Father (Jack) "John." For me "Mike" doesn't seem to fit you. It's funny my Mother married these two people, both lushes too boot.

Now here's a question to rack our epistemologically schooled brains about: WHY do some people call someone whose name is Michael "Mike"? Or John "Jack"? Have these persons checked their premises? Does the change from Michael to Mike and John to Jack meet the stringent objectivist criteria of "objective value" or is it a mere "whim"?

Or could the audiovisual symbols "Mike" and "Jack" - could they - I hardly dare to pronounce it loudly, so psst, for this must have to do with illegal activity (theft!) what's it called - "stolen" concepts?

Edited June 17, 2009 by Xray

[ginny]

Hmmm- I was just about to heartily agree with you, Michael. While I'm typing, though, I'm watching CNN's report on Letterman's joke about Palin's teenager daughter(s) being knocked up. SOOOOOOOO not funny to joke about a teenager being knocked up. I'm amending my answer to say maybe some things just aren't funny. Now, if we could just agree what those are. That's the problem. I say Letterman had a right to make the joke, but I feel I have the right to kick his ass. Hard.

Ginny

[Brant Gaede]

It's up to the person whose name in involved, that's all. President John M. Kennedy was called frequently called "Jack." My step-Father was never "John." Jack was on his birth certificate. As John is not secondary or derivative from Jack there never was any question about calling him John. But for John, Jack is kind of a nickname--informal. It simply never fit the type of man my Dad was.

--Brant

[thomtg]

On a TV interview (perhaps an old Phil Donahue Show, first visit), a questioner asked Ayn Rand a question from a questionable source of authority. I don't remember the exact question, but it goes in paraphrase: "I used to read Atlas Shrugged and believed in capitalism, but since then my economics professors tell me otherwise. Why do you still believe in capitalism?" Rand's reply was to dismiss the question. It was asked in bad faith.

If I understand Rand's refusal correctly, I conclude that it is all right to question Rand's belief in capitalism, but it is not fine to frame it prefixed within discredit and from a mutually unrecognized authority. A question is asked in bad faith whenever the questioner has failed to pass judgment on a claim but then gone on to ask a question based on the claim. I call it the "stolen-question fallacy."

The stolen-question fallacy is a species of the complex-question fallacy, which in turn is a species of the fallacy of begging the question. The questioner in the TV show above already presumed capitalism to be false; any reply from Rand would have no effect on that as a foregone conclusion. Rand was correct and rightly so to dismiss the question. (See ARA 132-133 for more examples of such improper questions.)

I interpret Ted's argument as following this principle. There are points in Rand's writings that can be questioned (parodied, criticized, etc.), but they can be done without a layer of preachy, cynical muck whose purpose is to elevate the muckraker as some sort of authority. Repeating this critic's blog entry serves no purpose but to dignify it in civilized dialog. It properly belongs in dark places or maybe not anywhere.

I believe that if one follows this principle consistently, one may readily detect a current attempt to discredit Rand's legitimate critics. By having a book, say, PARC, written and legitimized, it becomes easy for an authority simply to point any innocent reader to it to dismiss Rand's critics. How many of us, having known its existence but prior to having read PARC, thought perhaps that we might have been mistaken in our prior assessments of the individual Brandens' writings? Now imagine the thousands of new readers every month who are introduced to Ayn Rand's writings, and imagine the sheer amount of intellectual work they need to do to integrate her ideas. It is thus not farfetched to imagine PARC standing as a convenient division of intellectual labor for the new readers. And if they have not mastered their own psycho-epistemological style for independent thinking, it is very likely that many, if not most of them, will commit the stolen-question fallacy and dismiss Rand's legitimate critics based on PARC's mere existence. The more people repeat PARC or debate Rand's story within the framework of PARC, the more legitimate PARC will appear, at the expense of discrediting legitimate dialogs about Rand's ideas, her life, and her philosophical legacy.

[Brant Gaede]

On a TV interview (perhaps an old Phil Donahue Show, first visit), a questioner asked Ayn Rand a question from a questionable source of authority. I don't remember the exact question, but it goes in paraphrase: "I used to read Atlas Shrugged and believed in capitalism, but since then my economics professors tell me otherwise. Why do you still believe in capitalism?" Rand's reply was to dismiss the question. It was asked in bad faith.

I don't have time to go into detail, but just want to note that your description of that question is too far off the mark to let it stand without my notation here. The questioner did insult Rand and she refused to sanction it but did it in a difficult way.

--Brant

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Ginny,

Tasteless jokes always happen in a context.

I found the Letterman joke tasteless. This is a case where I scoff. Talk about scraping the bottom of the barrel. But all the public ruckus over this has nothing to do with taste in joke-telling or even disrespect for Palin's daughter (which did happen). Instead the real issue is the context: partisan politics and a not-too-distant election campaign (not Palin's, but 2010).

It certainly has nothing to do with Letterman promoting pedophilia and all that stuff. And Sarah Palin is certainly not pathologically irresponsible because she put her kid in harms way by taking her to a ball game. Look at how silly the extent is that the partisans take this. It is almost as silly as Objectivst schisms.

Rather than join the clamor for Letterman's head, I prefer to change the channel until he settles down. And good for Sarah Palin in responding the way she did. She made him hurt. Since he put his foot in his mouth on national TV, he better learn how to take it out better than he has done. Otherwise he will lose his sponsors.

I grew up in the South where some of the misguided hotheads walk around with a chip on their shoulder daring anyone to knock it off. They get violent and bully others. I made a conscious decision not to live like that. When I have felt disrespected, I have learned how to insist on it firmly and effectively without being a sourpuss and without being a jerk (except to the one disrespecting me, wherein I don't mind at all being a jerk ).

At least the current situation in both the Objectivist subcommunity and in America in general, even with all the schisms and partisans, is better than former times. Not even a couple of centuries ago this stuff was resolved by dueling with pistols. They literally used to shoot each other dead over a joke.

Michael

[ginny]

You're right, Michael. At least it gave Palin the opportunity to give a dignified reply.

[Michelle]

[Xray]:

You haven't answered the question I asked of you in my post.

It isn't a legitimate question.

It is quite obvious that you are again evading to answer the question.

I explained two times that you had misunderstood what I had said.

Instead of attempting to sort out what I said, you disregarded my responses and proceeded to ask me a question that was quite clearly grounded in false premises.

It wasn't a legitimate question, and I don't play those kinds of games.

I'll explain one last time. Let's trace the course of this discussion, shall we?

You said:

"Imagine a 17 old boy reading those novels and thinking he will now have behave violently, dowright sadistically as Roark, Rearden & Co to fully qualify as "man should" be. Or young girls thinking sexual subservience (as shown in Dagny Taggart) is an essential ingredient of how "the ideal woman" should be."

I responded:

"There is nothing "sadistic "about the sex outside of the rape scene in the TF. Again, you clearly have some issue with characters having rough sex, which is silly, considering its consensual in AS."

This post was composed of two completely separate statements.

In the first, I merely stated that Rand's sex scenes, outside of the rape scene in TF, are not sadistic in nature.

In the second, I merely stated that it is silly for you to object to rough sex if it is consensual.

Nowhere in any of this did I say that the sex was not sadistic because it was consensual.

You responded:

"You also don't seem to have a clear idea regarding the terminology. That it is "consensual" does not make those acts unsadistic. For example, sadists seek masochists for consensual acts and vice versa.

So why not call spade a spade? Rearden & Co clearly had a sexually sadistic streak and found the perfect match in the heroine Dagny's sexual masochism."

Clearly, you had misunderstood what I had said, so I attempted to explain myself in the following response:

"My terminology is fine. You're just confusing two entirely different statements - one about sadism, and one about consent - in order to misrepresent what I said.

The rough sex between the characters is NOT sadistic in nature. It's merely an extension of Rand's obsession over power and moral perfection.

Sadism is a sexual perversion in which one person takes pleasure in harming the other.

...

Although bruises do result from the various sex scenes in AS, there is never an indication that the characters are taking delight in harming Dagny."

In the first paragraph, I explained that you had confused the two statements. I then proceeded to explain why Rand's sex scenes are not sadistic in nature.

You responded, QUOTING THE FIRST SECTION OF THAT LAST RESPONSE OF MINE:

"So according to your logic, when a sadist and masochist perform acts with mutual consent, these acts don't qualify as sadistic/masochistic anymore just because there is consent?"

Now, considering I had said that you were CONFUSING TWO ENTIRELY DIFFERENT STATEMENTS, I would have thought you might have stopped for a second to think: "hmmm, maybe since she was making two entirely different statements, perhaps she's not trying to form an argument out of the two." Y'know, since they are ENTIRELY DIFFERENT STATEMENTS. Of course, the really damning thing here is that, even taken together, the two statements do not join together to form the argument: 'since the sex was consensual, the sex was not sadistic.'

I responded:

"Which part of "entirely different statements" are you having trouble understanding? "

Now, any semi-rational person would have taken this to mean: 'you're not getting it. Re-read what I just said.'

Instead, you insisted upon me answering the question you posed. The problem is that the question was grounded in false premises (it presumes I said something I did not say). I said that the question was not legitimate. You then accused me of "evading" the question instead of wondering why the question might not be legitimate.

Edited June 17, 2009 by Michelle R

[Xray]

[Xray]:

You haven't answered the question I asked of you in my post.

It isn't a legitimate question.

It is quite obvious that you are again evading to answer the question.

I explained two times that you had misunderstood what I had said.

Instead of attempting to sort out what I said, you disregarded my responses and proceeded to ask me a question that was quite clearly grounded in false premises.

It wasn't a legitimate question, and I don't play those kinds of games.

I'll explain one last time. Let's trace the course of this discussion, shall we?

You said:

"Imagine a 17 old boy reading those novels and thinking he will now have behave violently, dowright sadistically as Roark, Rearden & Co to fully qualify as "man should" be. Or young girls thinking sexual subservience (as shown in Dagny Taggart) is an essential ingredient of how "the ideal woman" should be."

a I responded:

"There is nothing "sadistic "about the sex outside of the rape scene in the TF. Again, you clearly have some issue with characters having rough sex, which is silly, considering its consensual in AS."

This post was composed of two completely separate statements.

In the first, I merely stated that Rand's sex scenes, outside of the rape scene in TF, are not sadistic in nature.

In the second, I merely stated that it is silly for you to object to rough sex if it is consensual.

Nowhere in any of this did I say that the sex was not sadistic because it was consensual.

You responded:

"You also don't seem to have a clear idea regarding the terminology. That it is "consensual" does not make those acts unsadistic. For example, sadists seek masochists for consensual acts and vice versa.

So why not call spade a spade? Rearden & Co clearly had a sexually sadistic streak and found the perfect match in the heroine Dagny's sexual masochism."

Clearly, you had misunderstood what I had said, so I attempted to explain myself in the following response:

"My terminology is fine. You're just confusing two entirely different statements - one about sadism, and one about consent - in order to misrepresent what I said.

The rough sex between the characters is NOT sadistic in nature. It's merely an extension of Rand's obsession over power and moral perfection.

Sadism is a sexual perversion in which one person takes pleasure in harming the other.

...

Although bruises do result from the various sex scenes in AS, there is never an indication that the characters are taking delight in harming Dagny."

In the first paragraph, I explained that you had confused the two statements. I then proceeded to explain why Rand's sex scenes are not sadistic in nature.

You responded, QUOTING THE FIRST SECTION OF THAT LAST RESPONSE OF MINE:

"So according to your logic, when a sadist and masochist perform acts with mutual consent, these acts don't qualify as sadistic/masochistic anymore just because there is consent?"

Now, considering I had said that you were CONFUSING TWO ENTIRELY DIFFERENT STATEMENTS, I would have thought you might have stopped for a second to think: "hmmm, maybe since she was making two entirely different statements, perhaps she's not trying to form an argument out of the two." Y'know, since they are ENTIRELY DIFFERENT STATEMENTS. Of course, the really damning thing here is that, even taken together, the two statements do not join together to form the argument: 'since the sex was consensual, the sex was not sadistic.'

I responded:

"Which part of "entirely different statements" are you having trouble understanding? "

Now, any semi-rational person would have taken this to mean: 'you're not getting it. Re-read what I just said.'

Instead, you insisted upon me answering the question you posed. The problem is that the question was grounded in false premises (it presumes I said something I did not say). I said that the question was not legitimate. You then accused me of "evading" the question instead of wondering why the question might not be legitimate.

I have to smile at your preferring to write a long post instead of answering my simple question with a "yes" or "no".

All the more remarkable since you yourself were very clear on the issue a while back:

The book, and not just in the sex scenes, is filled with images of bondage and domination, which is likely due to Rand's sexual preferences. Rand's 'ideal man' stuff is mixed in with what appear to be fantasies about being dominated by powerful, almost bestial men.

I agree with this assessment of yours. Now what would you call such a relationship between man and woman? What would you call a sexually subservient character like Dagny Taggart?

Rand said that the rape in "The Fountainhead", was "rape by engraved invitation". So the heroine "invited" it?

Wouldn't you agree that such relationships are of sadomasochistic character?

"But it was consensual", you said. So what? Does consensuality make it something else than what it is?

Edited June 17, 2009 by Xray

[Michelle]

Are you even aware of the definition of sadism?

Edited June 17, 2009 by Michelle R

[Xray]

Are you even aware of the definition of sadism?

Can you seriously think of any forum member/reader not being aware of it?

Nice also of you to post where the term got its name from, but that too is common knowledge I assume.

But if for some reason, you are reluctant to use the term "sadism" - discard it and we'll use other terms fitting the quotes your own posts offer.

You wrote:

The book, and not just in the sex scenes, is filled with images of bondage and domination, which is likely due to Rand's sexual preferences. Rand's 'ideal man' stuff is mixed in with what appear to be fantasies about being dominated by powerful, almost bestial men.

I agree with this assessment of yours.

So per your own words, "bondage and domination" are likely Rand's sexual preferences, reflected in her heroes/heroines' actions. Correct?

Now what would you call such a relationship between man and woman? Would domination-subservience fit the bill?

What would you call a sexually subservient character like Dagny Taggart?

Rand said that the rape in "The Fountainhead", was "rape by engraved invitation". So per Rand, her heroine "invited" it - right?

I'll await your answers first before continuing.

Edited June 18, 2009 by Xray