Objectivism all around us

[Kat]

Kevin posted an interesting comment over on another thread and I think it might be a good discussion topic in the living room.

I think Objectivists would be served much better seeking to discover the Objectivist meaning in as many works of art as possible. Just look at how far Marx and his minions have gotten interpreting all art as class struggle, until all of academia believes it; can't Oists do the same for the struggle of the individual? Which of Shakespeare's plays have the strongest Objectivist overtones, for instance? Is there a discernable "Objectivist spirit" running through western art? What are it's strongest examples?

Where can you find examples of Objectivism around you? Think about art, music, movies, plays, books, entertainment, news and current events, and on down to just everyday life. Where are the strong individualists, the heroes, the capitalists, the role models for our children?

Kat

[tqk]

Kevin posted an interesting comment over on another thread and I think it might be a good discussion topic in the living room.

I think Objectivists would be served much better seeking to discover the Objectivist meaning in as many works of art as possible. [snip] Is there a discernable "Objectivist spirit" running through western art? What are it's strongest examples?

Where can you find examples of Objectivism around you? Think about art, music, movies, plays, books, entertainment, news and current events, and on down to just everyday life. Where are the strong individualists, the heroes, the capitalists, the role models for our children?

Kat

Well, that's depressing. The above was posted more than three months ago, and since then there have been no replies. That's downright shocking, don't you think?

In an attempt to rectify this, here's my suggestions:

* "Gladiator" the movie. "The general who became a slave, the slave who became a gladiator, the gladiator who defied an emperor." I confess I'm fully and irreparably addicted to this movie. In daily life, when something brings me down, I find myself reciting Maximus' speech to myself ("My name is Maximus Decimus Meridius, Commander of the armies of the North, General of the Felix Legions, loyal servant of the true emperor, Marcus Aurelius, father to a murdered son, husband to a murdered wife, and I will have my vengeance, in this life or the next.").

* "Free Software". While much of the industrialized world is addicted to "bad software" based around that toy operating system produced by the Redmond, WA based conglomerate ("Bill's a Capitalist, so it must be good!"), others are happily and proudly avoiding it by using the cooperatively produced, far more robust and secure, and essentially costless alternatives produced by the Free Software community. Included in this article are multitudinous examples of applications which have been under constant development and support for decades, updated with new features and secured against even the latest discovered threats to system security.

* Somalia. Even the CIA Fact Book remarks on how well this country manages with no government in sight.

* "Buena Vista Social Club". Who'd have thought that such brilliance could come from the occupants of Fidel Castro's failed revolution? It only goes to show that no matter how malevolent communism is, it's a toothless tiger.

There, that should offer a good start. I've tried to pick some potentially controversial items, hoping to elicit discussion. Fire away.

[Aaron]

You succeeded. Gladiator was kind of disappointing.

Seriously though - Somalia? I've defended Somalia before to a limited extent, against some ignorant Objectivists who were trying to use it as a strawman for anarchocapitalism. It's really no worse (maybe better) than comparable nearby countries with governments such as Eritrea, Djibouti, or Ethiopia, for example. That said - it's still certainly not a place to hold up as a shining success story of individualism or laissez-faire!

I disagree with your assessment of Microsoft, but don't care to get into that type of religious discussion. Free software is a mixed bag. In and of itself, it is good and compatible with capitalism, when people do (willingly) produce/test/modify/improve each others' freely available source. The free software 'movement' however, is unfortunately represented primarily by more socialist views such as Richard Stallman and the GNU Manifesto.

[tqk]

You succeeded.  Gladiator was kind of disappointing.    

Seriously though - Somalia?  I've defended Somalia before to a limited extent, against some ignorant Objectivists who were trying to use it as a strawman for anarchocapitalism.[snip]

I disagree with your assessment of Microsoft, but don't care to get into that type of religious discussion.  Free software is a mixed bag.  In and of itself, it is good and compatible with capitalism, when people do (willingly) produce/test/modify/improve each others' freely available source.  The free software 'movement' however, is unfortunately represented primarily by more socialist views such as Richard Stallman and the GNU Manifesto.

Gladiator: Really? I love it. Quality production, excellent acting, brilliant script, a seriously evil antagonist, and they even avoided a typical Hollywood style fairytale ending.

Somalia: I tend to agree with your assessment. All is not sweetness and light there. However, it's also not the Hellhole that we're traditionally taught to expect from anarchy. See <http://www.lewrockwell.com/orig7/stateless-somalia.html>:

"... As for Somalia being lawless, Van Notten, a Dutch lawyer who married into the Samaron Clan and lived the last dozen years of his life with them, specifically challenges that portrayal. He explains that Somalia is a country based on customary law. The traditional Somali system of law and politics, he contends, is capable of maintaining a peaceful society and guiding the Somalis to prosperity. Moreover, efforts to re-establish a central government or impose democracy on the people are incompatible with the customary law ..."

Free Software: Certainly, Stallman is a traditional Bostonian "pinko, hippie creep", but Free Software is more than Richard Stallman. It also includes Eric Raymond, who's about as far from Stallman philosophically as you can get. As for Microsoft, I'm all for Capitalism, but bad software is bad software, whether produced by capitalists or fascists. They've had years to fix the most egregious flaws and they've failed miserably. "XP", I thought, would be the version which *finally* fixed the problem of software piracy (enforcing their "End User Licence Agreement"). Days after release, that too was shown to be pathetically flawed. Add in the problems of viruses/malware, ActiveX, Passport, etc., etc., and I can't imagine why any sane individual would choose to use it. Add in all the junk about "Trusted Computing" (aka "Palladium") and anyone can see Microsoft is not on the side of its customers; it's on the side of content producers (RIAA, MPAA, et al).

By the way, not even Stallman's all bad. He's right about software patents.

The Usenet Newsgroup "comp.risks" had an interesting piece in it the other day(Risks Digest 24.20):

--------------------------------------------------

Date: Mon, 13 Mar 2006 19:13:31 -0500

From: Steve Summit

Subject: When trusted systems fail

On Friday, March 10, McAfee's antivirus program gave users a nice lesson on the meaning of the term "trusted system". Due to a faulty virus definition file, the software began deleting or "quarantining" hundreds or thousands of legitimate system files (including, among others, Microsoft's excel.exe).

<http://www.realtechnews.com/posts/2802>

<http://blog.washingtonpost.com/securityfix/2006/03/mcafee_update_flags_hundreds_o.html>

--------------------------------------------------

Not all bad software comes from Microsoft. When software you purchased to protect your system begins to attack it instead, I'd say it's time for a re-think. 8-[

Tooduls. :-)

[Aaron]

Gladiator comment was just silliness because it was the only thing you'd mentioned before that wasn't seriously controversial.

MS is in the enviable position of being #1 OS and app provider, which puts them in the unenviable position of being the #1 target for security related attacks. Agreed on the Palladium business though. Thanks for the info about Raymond and sw patents.

[JennaW]

Where can you find examples of Objectivism around you?  Think about art, music, movies, plays, books, entertainment, news and current events, and on down to just everyday life.  Where are the strong individualists, the heroes, the capitalists, the role models for our children?

Well, looking back, I found elements of Objectivism in China in Tiananmen Square when an individual stood up for freedom.

Edmond Rostand is wonderful, as well as romantic; he was a playwright.

Books: The Power of One, by Bryce Courtenay. The Count of Monte Cristo, Alexandre Dumas. Anything by Charles Darwin.

Movie: Dangerous Beauty, Pride & Prejudice

[tqk]

Gladiator comment was just silliness because it was the only thing you'd mentioned before that wasn't seriously controversial.

Well, Gladiator could be seen to support Imperial Rome, and there was lots of religion in it (which Objectivists might find offensive). Me, I just see the "One man vs. an inhuman system bent on grinding him to dust" sort of stuff, and Maximus fits my definition of heroic.

MS is in the enviable position of being #1 OS and app provider, which puts them in the unenviable position of being the #1 target for security related attacks.  

Sorry, but I've been through that one before too. Apache is the #1 httpd on the internet, hence (by your theory) there ought to be many more Apache related exploits than there are IIS exploits. Not true, because Apache is good code, and IIS is bad code, hence IIS has far more extant problems than does Apache.

MS' code is vulnerable to exploits because of their *choices* in system design. Lots of people run video games on Windows, so Microsoft ties game performance directly into kernel space to provide that performance. Mistake, for the security-wise.

MS chooses to minimize distinctions about "What type of file is that?" It chooses to make it the default that the OS auto-loads incoming files to make it easier on the user. Oops, autoloading many MS file formats leads to files which can corrupt the entire system, due to the close ties user space apps have to OS internals.

Agreed on the Palladium business though.  Thanks for the info about Raymond and sw patents.

NP.

[tqk]

Where can you find examples of Objectivism around you?  Think about art, music, movies, plays, books, entertainment, news and current events, and on down to just everyday life.  Where are the strong individualists, the heroes, the capitalists, the role models for our children?

Well, looking back, I found elements of Objectivism in China in Tiananmen Square when an individual stood up for freedom.

Uhmmm, :-) one of my most heroic ... dunno what you would call them, ... but that lone individual refusing to yield right of way to a PRC tank, ... I would love to hug the guy, assuming he survived.

Thanks. :-|

[Kat]

This photo was taken from the sixth floor of the Beijing Hotel, about half a mile away through a 400mm lens by Jeff Widener (The Associated Press)

Jenna, Tankman from Tiananmen Square is a wonderful example. Thank you so much for that reminder. I was actually just thinking about how Rand often gave examples from her own fiction and rarely from real life. That bothers me a bit, especially knowing that she had studied history. I personally prefer to see real heroes, as I find them far more inspirational than fictional characters.

Kat

[tqk]

This photo was taken from the sixth floor of the Beijing Hotel, about half a mile away through a 400mm lens by Jeff Widener (The Associated Press)

Jenna, Tankman from Tiananmen Square is a wonderful example.

That's the one. :-)

Kat, have you noticed that under your avatar, you're listed as having joined in 1969? Where did you find a computer back then?