Michelle

That is not true and it is a very damaging notion to put into the minds of young people. People young and old are capable of having an urge to have sex with people of the same or opposite sex. But to state, effectively, that one must honor one's urges is to sell that person short. A person should examine his urges in the light of his value hierarchy and decide whether it makes sense to follow those urges or not. If a person has an authentic urge to kill someone, should he honor that urge? Darrell I said orientation, not urge. The two words have entirely different meanings. Don't tell me I said something I didn't say in order to lend legitimacy to your own mistaken views. In fact, your "sexuality is entirely a choice" argument is the one that is dangerous. Did there ever come a point where you said: "I'm going to choose to be sexually oriented toward women!"? No. It developed without your consent as a part of your individual nature. Furthermore, I have never said a homosexual MUST engage in sexual relations with people of his own gender, just as I wouldn't say a heterosexual MUST engage in sexual relations with people of the opposite gender. Many homosexuals refuse to sleep with others of their own gender for health/religious reasons. If they value their religion or the minimization of certain health risks over finding a person to spend their life with, this is their choice to make, and I won't give them grief about it. But this does not make them non-homosexuals. You seem to be subscribing to the Sartrean notion that humans create their own natures from the ground up, which is nonsense in the light of psychology and genetics. Humans work with what they're given to create their identities.

I think people who see some degree of truth in it (like me) are going to find it funnier than people who think she's off the mark. Now, this is a bit unfair, isn't it? I think Rand's characterizations in The Fountainhead are magnificent, by-and-large. And even in AS, which is a "social novel," according to Rand's notes, several figures (Francisco, Rearden, Dagny, Cheryl, Stadler, etc.) have very strong characterizations. Although Galt and a majority of the strikers, yes, are 'blunt narrative devices.' Richard Prior is irritating. George Carlin swore up a storm and thought that made him funny. Dane Cook's humor is mediocre and uninspiring. I certainly wouldn't want them advising me! As much as I disagreed with him on just about everything, I wouldn't have minded the advice of the brilliant comedian Bill Hicks.

Would you laugh at yourself for how deeply you care about your husband/wife? Would you laugh at yourself if you remember back to earlier years when you made stupid decisions/believed untrue things? Laughing at oneself, like everything else, happens in context. As to Jews telling Jew jokes and the such, I always took it to mean that they are asserting their superiority over insecurity. By this, I mean that they have gotten to the point where their identity is solid, and they use a destructive medium (humor) to highlight this. If a Jew tells a joke about Jews, or a gay a joke about gays, they are in effect saying: "You can't hurt me anymore. I'm sure of who and what I am now."

The question of whether homosexuality is a "choice" or not misrepresents the issue. Homosexuals have no more control over which gender they are attracted to than heterosexuals do. Homosexuality, in and of itself, is a psycho-sexual orientation toward one's own gender. An orientation one does not "choose," but develops. The only choice involved is whether to honor or to betray one's authentic orientation. Either way, it does not change reality: as it is said, A is A.

The question of whether homosexuality is a "choice" or not misrepresents the issue. Homosexuals have no more control over which gender they are attracted to than heterosexuals are. Homosexuality, in and of itself, is a psycho-sexual orientation toward one's own gender. An orientation one does not "choose," but develops. The only choice involved is whether to honor or to betray one's authentic orientation. Either way, it does not change reality: as it is said, A is A.

Queef is an obscure word? Yes, it's relatively obscure and unknown in many areas of the South and West. It does come from Old English. It is cognate with quaver. But you will not find it in many dictionaries, and it mostly survives dialectally, being passed on from child to child as a dirty word. Not all dialects use this word. It is native to my own American East Coast Midlands dialect. It's also native to the NYC dialect area. See Eat, Pray, Queef at South Park. Weird. My whole family grew up in the west and we've always known the meaning of the word. Depends on ancestry, chance and local variation. An earlier epsiode of South Park has the kids meet kids from New York who know the word. The boys from Colorado have no idea what it is. I asked around at that time. All the people I knew who grew up in the NE knew the word. People from California and Florida did not. I haven't been able to find anything scientific about it on the web. I'm sure it's just like whether you call it soda or pop, a faucet or a spigot, a hoagie or a hero or a sub or a grinder. The Pop vs Soda Map Haha. I lived in Colorado from age six until... well, a few months ago, really. Not technically native, but native enough. Scientific information? There's not much to explain. If the expelled air has a nasty odor to it, it might be a sign of rectovaginal fistula, but otherwise... No, no. Scientific data (as oppsed to anecdotal) on the dialectal spread of the word. I am quite aware of the physiology from personal experience, and I do not thank you for that last bit of imagery, although I suppose I deserved it. Oh, and notice my deft use of the split infinitive "to really test it" in the original post.

Queef is an obscure word? Yes, it's relatively obscure and unknown in many areas of the South and West. It does come from Old English. It is cognate with quaver. But you will not find it in many dictionaries, and it mostly survives dialectally, being passed on from child to child as a dirty word. Not all dialects use this word. It is native to my own American East Coast Midlands dialect. It's also native to the NYC dialect area. See Eat, Pray, Queef at South Park. Weird. My whole family grew up in the west and we've always known the meaning of the word. Depends on ancestry, chance and local variation. An earlier epsiode of South Park has the kids meet kids from New York who know the word. The boys from Colorado have no idea what it is. I asked around at that time. All the people I knew who grew up in the NE knew the word. People from California and Florida did not. I haven't been able to find anything scientific about it on the web. I'm sure it's just like whether you call it soda or pop, a faucet or a spigot, a hoagie or a hero or a sub or a grinder. The Pop vs Soda Map Haha. I lived in Colorado from age six until... well, a few months ago, really. Not technically native, but native enough. Scientific information? There's not much to explain. If the expelled air has a nasty odor to it, it might be a sign of rectovaginal fistula, but otherwise...

Queef is an obscure word? Yes, it's relatively obscure and unknown in many areas of the South and West. It does come from Old English. It is cognate with quaver. But you will not find it in many dictionaries, and it mostly survives dialectally, being passed on from child to child as a dirty word. Not all dialects use this word. It is native to my own American East Coast Midlands dialect. It's also native to the NYC dialect area. See Eat, Pray, Queef at South Park. Weird. My whole family grew up in the west and we've always known the meaning of the word. EDIT: HAHA, you're right. It isn't in my dictionary.

Queef is an obscure word?

I don't recall Obama doing anything to Beck/O'Reilly/Limbaugh/etc. What have I missed?

I could make a good case for why all of my favorite books are quality pieces of literature which should be read by everyone if I wanted to. This does not mean, however, that they would appeal to everyone. This might come with odd writing styles, heady dialogue, complex or slowly-paced plots, etc. The Brothers Karamazov is one of my favorite novels. I think it is a fantastic piece of fiction which uses colorful characters, a mysterious plot, and penetrating dialogue to explore a variety of fascinating religious ideas. It is a superb integration of character, theme, and plot into one seamless whole. It is also a roughly thousand page novel with a relatively slow plot development, complex character developments which might be seen as baffling to the reader who is not well-acquainted with Dostoevsky, and an excess of long 'talking heads' dialogues. Not to mention the overtly ponderous nature of some of these dialogues (the 'Grand Inquisitor and Rebellion' dialogue in the cafe between Alyosha and Ivan comes to mind). I would recommend this novel highly to almost anyone, but not without some slight reservations based on who I am recommending it to. You mention a club-footed busboy, but what about people who don't want to have to wade through extensive amounts of history lessons to get to the story's main plot? It isn't merely a matter of 'not getting it.' Yes, most educated adults will 'get' The Name of the Rose. But what sense does it make to recommend a book to them if you know they probably won't like it? Take my tastes, for example. I don't mind novels which contain extensive explanatory passages on historical developments so long as these passages are well-integrated into the plot and are necessary in order to understand the contextual action of the characters. Much as I dislike it, I remember the first LOTR book being good in this regard. Most of Hugo's work, and the work of other decent historical novelists, are also good in this regard. Les Miserables showcases both good and bad examples of how to integrate history into a novel. Most of the novel weaves historical overviews into the fabric of the plot with skill and ease. You might be treated to a description of a certain French town in earlier years before the action taking place in that town started. Often times Hugo uses Valjean's flight through France as a way to describe the changing geography of certain places. Now, the bad example should be obvious: the account of the battle of Waterloo. This nearly 50 page segment, almost completely unrelated to the plot (until the end, when we see how it connects to Thernardier), is crammed in-between two sections of the book which would have otherwise gone naturally side-by-side. Ignoring the skill involved in its creation, this account is not at all integrated into the fabric of the plot, but is like food stuck in the gap between two teeth. When one hits that segment one feels, not the desire to taste more of Hugo's literary banquet, but to grab a toothpick and dislodge the trapped food.

You'd have to ask someone willing to pretend to such nonsense, Like Rich Engle. Anyone who tells you his favorite meal is broken glass is up to something. I've already stated my judgment of Ulysses (disciplined style; worthless content). Perhaps there are people out there who legitimately enjoy a book like Ulysses because of the skill involved in its construction. I'm not one of them. It's painful to even think about Joyce wasting his talent and energy on rubbish. Nevertheless, as far as there is no objective criterion on which to base the value of fiction, I'd be cautious of condemning people for their preferred literature. You're not seeing the point, however. How about The Brothers Karamazov, or War and Peace? Not all novels should be unreservedly recommended. If a person wants an engaging read that won't make them think very hard (most people I've met, sadly), you probably wouldn't recommend Notes From Underground to them.

I've wanted to read the Bond novels for a long time, but I have this creeping feeling that they're probably nothing more than second-rate spy mysteries without the charm of the cinematic Bond. Is this a notion I should be disabused of, or is it correct? Michelle, I read many of them when I was young before I ever read Ayn Rand. They used to set my mind on fire. I would not trade my memories of reading James Bond in my youth for anything. It has been years since I have read one of these books and I have become much more jaded than back then, but I have no doubt if I ever pick one back up, I will let it all go, jump back into that world with both feet and will be just as enchanted as before. Don't let any cynic tell you what Fleming's writing is "really about" without reading it for yourself. It's marvelous. You cut off a most charming addition to your inner wealth if you take any cynic's view of Fleming's writing over Fleming's writing. Michael Oh, I don't know what others think about the books. But I have wasted plenty of time on bad popular fiction. It isn't a mistake I enjoy making. It's one of the reasons I've retreated to 19th century literature - with few exceptions (Flaubert and Henry James, for example, can go to hell for all I care), I tend to enjoy what I read from that large pool of literature.

I, Claudius is a book you'd recommend? Highly. Very. Does that surprise you? Or was I just unclear that that was a recommendation. One's favorite novels are not always books one would recommend to others unreservedly. Okay, well, I'd go so far as to make I, Claudius required reading for any 14 year old. The BBC adaptation is excellent, a hint as how to do Atlas Shrugged. As for King Jesus, I doubt most Objectivists would like it. It is all about levantine mysticism. But I have read it twice. Favorite books as secret vices? I suppose only Piers Anthony's work would fall under that category. I read everything he published until I was 16. (He has published lots since then that I have never read.) He is a hack juvenile writer. His plots are akll about contrived moral dilemmas usually set up because people make silly assumptions about what others are thinking, and they refuse to communicate, getting everyone in trouble - the typical sit com plot device. But I did recently reread Battle Circle, one of my former favorites of his 30 years ago. It was okay. I see why I liked it. But I wouldn't recommend it now except to a 12 year old boy. No, not as secret vices. I don't believe in secret vices. I think it's a clever way to make one feel disdain for perfectly legitimate fiction. For instance, I like JD Robbs' In Death series. I don't regard the series as a 'secret vice.' I think it's an excellent series with an imaginative setting, decent writing, intriguing characters, puzzling mysteries, and hot romance. What I mean is that a fiction one likes might not be something most people would like. If a person's favorite novel was Ulysses, would he be wise to recommend it unreservedly to others?

Are you even aware of the definition of sadism?

I, Claudius is a book you'd recommend? Highly. Very. Does that surprise you? Or was I just unclear that that was a recommendation. One's favorite novels are not always books one would recommend to others unreservedly.

I, Claudius is a book you'd recommend?

I've wanted to read the Bond novels for a long time, but I have this creeping feeling that they're probably nothing more than second-rate spy mysteries without the charm of the cinematic Bond. Is this a notion I should be disabused of, or is it correct?

Being inarticulate isn't a sign of being stupid, either. Yes, he drank heavily and used drugs, like many college students who straightened out in later years. This might imply youthful foolishness, but not a lack of intelligence. He never applied himself to anything? The man graduated from Yale and Harvard Business School, for goodness' sake! He was the governor of Texas. This isn't a man who stumbled out of a bar and into the oval office. I never said he was an intellectual, only that he probably wasn't the idiot the mass media makes him out to be.

I'm pretty sure George W. Bush is much sharper than the mass media made him out to be. Being inarticulate does not make one stupid.

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.

Watch as people who criticized Bush for doing something defend Obama for doing the exact same thing. Heeee-larious.

Invoking the tribal gods, are we? May his grandchildren wither and die! May Rand strike all his kin with a thousand plagues! May Peikoff rob his soil of all fertility, that he may never have another harvest! May all his kin never again receive the blessings of Rand. Curse Rand and die! Nothing to do with Rand. Everything to do with Jimmah being a Jew hating son of a bitch bastard. Is this clear to you? Jimmah has smoked himself out as a primal anti-Semite. I intuit a gut hatred of Jews in the man. Hence the malediction. Ba'al Chatzaf Is it clear to you that cursing his grandchildren for something he did is about as reasonable as slaughtering goats on an altar in order to please YHWH?

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.

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.