Contextual Virtues: A Wee Test

[Jonathan]

--The Endless Focus on Personalities: Rand's Personal Life, Movement Figures one Wants to Support or Attack--

We live in a Jerry Springer culture, a gossip and paparazzi world, a reality television and National Enquirer...and map to the homes of the stars... culture. Or psychoanalzing Richard Nixon or George Bush from a distance. Or Michael Moore questioning the motives of his opponents. Or conservative talk show hosts doing the same thing in reverse. And a food fight culture in which these issues are discussed with the vilest kind of gutter psychologizing and ad hominem. One in which if you are a Democrat, you believes every negative assertion about every Republican and vice versa. And a sensationalist culture in which these kinds of personal issues are what the "yellow journalist" what-did-Mel-Gibson-say-yesterday and how-was-Britney-dresed and was-Paris-Hilton-well-treated-by-the-sherrif press and television keep alive 24/7 instead of substantive news or explanations of causes operating in the world.

It's depressing when intellectuals get obsessed with the same issues, with bringing them up over and over, while the world is starved for a philosophy of reason.

It is tempting and easy to do it obsessively or compulsively - like downing an entire box of empty calories at one setting, because these are colorful, vivid, emotional issues. And one always will have *one more thing* to say or one more rebuttal or one more new wrinkle or tidbit of gossip from another source to read.

Okay, so I'm still not clear on whether or not Peikoff's taped courses addressed "privacy lies" and "snoopers." Apparently Phil doesn't know either, or is unable to answer with a simple, direct "yes" or "no." Does anyone else know?

And you can always come up with a rationalization for doing what you feel like doing. And why it is "important".

You don't think that it's important if Peikoff's presentation of Objectivism has been altered to include the idea that "privacy lies" told to "snoopers" are moral? If it's strictly Peikoff's idea, I think that it's worth clarifying and separating from Rand's version of Objectivism, especially if Peikoff's notion of "privacy lies" can be used to excuse Rand's lies (altering a philosophy to excuse the actions of its founder is a significant issue, and taking an interest in it has nothing to do with people having a "Jerry Springer culture" mindset).

The idea of lying to protect one's privacy -is- an intellectual issue and my view is that I or Rand or anyone else is justified in lying to protect their privacy, their personal lives from no longer being private . . . within certain limits.

So, am I correct in assuming that those "certain limits" would not include a person's making false public statements about a former lover and his ex-wife which could be very damaging to their reputations?

Obviously, protecting your 'privacy' by lying about your infidelity to a lover who has a moral right to know would not be a case of a 'privacy' you are entitled to. Your sexual history and preferece, your tax and financial status, your philosophical leanings in a hostile graduate school where it could prevent you getting your degree, your politcs if you live in Lebanon . . . etc. are (sometimes) a different context.

There is a context for this, but I'm not sufficiently interested to spend time right now in defining the 'boundary conditions' myself. If anyone else wants to do so in any systematic and thorough manner, I'd be interested in reading it however.

....

The principle is that (within an appropriate context) there is a RIGHT to privacy. And therefore a right to protect and defend it.

It's been my impression that, according to Objectivism, the only time that lying would be morally acceptable would be when there's an issue of the initiation of physical force involved. Lying to "snoopers" to protect one's privacy doesn't meet the requirements. In fact, it seems very unObjectivist even in spirit -- quite cowardly, actually -- to lie in order to avoid being traumatized by what others might think.

I think the issue boils down to this: People have the right to ask you any damn questions they wish, and to base their relationships with you on whether or not you meet their standards. If you think that their questions are too personal or an attempt to invade your "privacy," you have the option of not answering them and telling them to mind their own business. Your discomfort with their questions, or your fear of their judgments of your beliefs or lifestyle, does not make it moral to lie to them in order to receive their approval, their products, services, use of their property, etc.

J

Edited June 20, 2007 by Jonathan

[Robert Campbell]

Phil,

Either Leonard Peikoff was already saying that "privacy lies" are OK during Ayn Rand's lifetime, or he wasn't.

This is a simple question of intellectual history. It comes nowhere near the minimum threshold of luridity needed to garner an invitation from Jerry Springer.

One could take a couple of passages in Atlas Shrugged as justifying or at least excusing privacy lies. But I know of no passage in Ayn Rand's nonfiction that endorses this interpretation.

I also find it interesting that Tara Smith, whose presentation of the Objectivist ethics tracks Leonard Peikoff's in nearly every particular except the superheated rhetoric, and attaches a great many more footnotes, leaves privacy lies out of both her journal article on honesty and the chapter on honesty in her latest book.

As far as I can tell, then, the endorsement of lying to protect one's privacy from snoopers was introduced into the Objectivist ethics by Leonard Peikoff.

It's reasonable to ask whether this was a good idea, and what might have motivated Dr. Peikoff to introduce it.

(1) I don't think it's a good idea, for pretty much the same reasons that Jonathan has given. Lying to avoid other people's disapproval cannot be a good thing from an Objectivist standpoint--it is inconsistent with the virtue of pride, if not the very mark of a second-hander.

(2) It is a fact that Ayn Rand withheld information from her supposed intellectual heir about her affair with Nathaniel Branden. It is distinctly possible that she actively lied to him about the matter; it is certain that she let him go around denying that there had been an affair without taking him aside and correcting him. I agree with Michael this was a form of cruelty toward Leonard Peikoff--and I usually have trouble mustering a lot of sympathy for Leonard Peikoff.

Robert Campbell

PS. Would it be Jerry Springer-like to point out that a major application of the doctrine of the arbitrary assertion has been in writing off most of the contents of The Passion of Ayn Rand? Both Peter Schwartz and Jim Valliant have explicitly invoked the doctrine for this purpose. The difference is that Leonard Peikoff had already developed nearly the entire doctrine by 1976, when he presented it in his Principles of Objectivism lectures, so it could not have been a reaction to any revelations after Rand's death.

[Philip Coates]

> you have the option of not answering them

Sometimes a lie is the only way to keep something private. E.g., when someone asks you a question and so simply don't answer when you could and normally would have said 'no' that is same as answering yest and you are giving them information which you may have a right or legitimate interest in withholding.

Examples of things you might want to keep private (other than from a select few who have a right to know):

an investment you are about to make

an invention

your next step or a business plan or other idea someone could steal

your religious affiliations,

your sex life or peccadiloes,

if you had an abortion

magazines or pornography you read or subscribe to

who you are dating right now,

who is getting out of a relationship but hasn't broken it off yet

have you ever been bankrupt or paid bills late.

medical issues. (have asthma or diabetes or epilespsy or treated for depression.)

ever initiated force, hit someone.

affairs or relationships you've ever had,

lists of your sexual partners.

a confidence told to you, or something *someone else* isn't ready to discuss...or doesn't want gossiped about

"Is Janey Sleeping with Tom?"

[Brant Gaede]

Look, it is not a matter of whom has a right to know what, for in regard to the Rand-Branden affair the privacy demanded was to serve Ayn Rand's purposes and needs--to maintain her public persona while having an affair with Barbara's husband and the Brandens and her husband paying the price. She ripped them off--big time, for not only were they being sacrificed to some extent but because such behavior on AR's part flatly contradicted her philosophy which they were as devoted to or trying to be as devoted to as AR supposedly was. (You don't sacrifice others to yourself.) Seemingly, Nathaniel was just as responsible as AR for that mess, but considering the age difference, no. There is just so much one doesn't know in one's early 20s regardless of competence and knowledge in various areas. Barbara Branden exculpated AR to the significant extent she can be in "Passion." Now, look at this!: the Brandens are still to be sacrificed to the official persona of Ayn Rand as now maintained by the Orthodox. This is why PARC is CRAP--it always was, unfortunately. I suspect that Nathaniel made his statement in "Judgment Day" and "My Years with Ayn Rand" and that is why he feels no need to defend himself today with PARC. But Barbara isn't putting up with any of it. Good for her.

Now, consider this: Ayn Rand didn't sacrifice the Brandens and her husband to herself, but herself and the Brandens and her husband to "Atlas Shrugged." If so, she was acting heroically, but in the classical sense, not the John Galt purported sense, but in the sense that her heroes were really, under the skin, conventional heroes--that is, heroes. She too. Talk about between a rock and a hard place! Who is to say she didn't deserve Nathaniel Branden? She got him. Is the Orthodoxy complaining about that? No. I've not read one post from anywhere that says that Ayn Rand would have been better off if she had never had her way with Nathaniel Branden--if she had never met the Goddamned SOB! No. They are glad she got laid AND BY HIM!, but won't admit it. She was too! And didn't publicly admit it except she complained that she was afraid she was too much for him not that he wasn't enough for her! "Take what you want, said God, and pay for it!" The tragedy of Ayn Rand is that she refused to pay for it but paid for it anyway. Could Leonard Peikoff ever imagine himself sleeping with Ayn Rand? Can he ever accept the fact that a giant would want a giant and she got him but it wasn't him nor could it have been? And Barbara, wife to a giant. Of course, Ayn Rand was a fool taken in by a "consummate actor." Does it hurt to see where this idiocy takes us? Accept for a minute that once upon a time a giant slept with a giant and things subsequently went to hell and heck for both of them and others because of peculiar and particular circumstances. That's life! It happened before and will happen again.

--Brant

Edited June 21, 2007 by Brant Gaede

[Philip Coates]

> it is not a matter of whom has a right to know what, for in regard to the Rand-Branden affair

Brant, I wasn't talking about the Rand-Branden affair (or about when Leonard Peikoff had what viewpoint, before or after what / nor am I talking how -he- would apply principle or define a snooper..but *what my views are*). I have been posting instead about the wider and I think more important issues of:

1) privacy as a right (contextually)

2) certain situations in which it is proper to lie to prevent the loss of that privacy

3) the need to stop obessing over personalities and raking up ancient history about who did what to whom and instead spend more time on ideas (again I moved to a wider point about Oists doing this...which is not just about the R-B affair...I'm not talking about that example, but a wider issue that has many other instances).

[Brant Gaede]

> it is not a matter of whom has a right to know what, for in regard to the Rand-Branden affair

Brant, I wasn't talking about the Rand-Branden affair (or about when Leonard Peikoff had what viewpoint, before or after what / nor am I talking how -he- would apply principle or define a snooper..but *what my views are*). I have been posting instead about the wider and I think more important issues of:

1) privacy as a right (contextually)

2) certain situations in which it is proper to lie to prevent the loss of that privacy

3) the need to stop obessing over personalities and raking up ancient history about who did what to whom and instead spend more time on ideas (again I moved to a wider point about Oists doing this...which is not just about the R-B affair...I'm not talking about that example, but a wider issue that has many other instances).

Phil, no one but you thinks one can ignore the 800-pound gorilla in the room which isn't an ancient affair, but the turf war waged by the Valliant-Peikoff crowd against all and sundry who might call themselves "Objectivists" and aren't under their purview. It is so absurd that Peikoff even de facto excommunicated all "Objectivists" (as less than enough) who have demonstrated lack of DIM regarding mistakenly voting Republican. Even Valliant doesn't quite measure up. PARC is an attempt to pulverize the Brandens even at the expense of Ayn Rand herself. Amid this war you want to dust the furniture.

--Brant

[Robert Campbell]

Phil,

Lies told to protect privacy are an important issue regardless of what Leonard Peikoff happens to think about them.

I question their purported necessity, however. What's wrong with a firm policy of not disclosing certain kinds of information? If you haven't been in the habit of stating that certain matters are private and are consequently none of the questioner's business, a sudden veer into "That's none of your business" probably will serve as an implied confirmation of the answer. So, it's up to you to develop the right habits...

I also question the purported effectiveness of most privacy lies. You may not want others to know about a bankruptcy on your record, for instance, but if you lie and say there is none, you're well advised not do it in front of anyone who has access to credit bureau reports. If you tell lies to protect your privacy, and are found out, you inevitably damage your relationship with the person you lied to. You might damage the relationship without being found out, merely by giving the impression that you are slick and evasive. (I doubt that even the most ardent defenders of privacy lies are entirely OK with discovering that someone they know has been lying to them.) Rational people don't worry much about damaging their relationships with axe murderers or dictators, but they might think twice before reducing their credibility with most other human beings.

All of that said, once again I just don't buy the notion that asking when and how Leonard Peikoff adopted his stand on privacy lies is some kind of prurient inquisition into "personalities."

Dr. Peikoff has declared himself to be the foremost authority on Objectivism. By endorsing privacy lies in OPAR, he invites questions as to how they are consistent with the rest of the Objectivist ethics. On the face of it, they are not. So by providing no detailed rationale for them (either in that book, or in any other source of which I am aware), he invites questions as to what his motive for accepting them might be.

Robert Campbell

[Reidy]

Historical note: in his Basic Principles course, Branden explicitly disapproved of privacy lies and said that MYOB is the appropriate answer to intrusive questions.

[Philip Coates]

> If you haven't been in the habit of stating that certain matters are private and are consequently none of the questioner's business, a sudden veer into "That's none of your business" probably will serve as an implied confirmation of the answer. So, it's up to you to develop the right habits...

Robert, for most people it's not necessarily the right habit to say myob or the equivalent with people you know or work with or have as either acquaintance or fried. It's not until the one question you don't wish to share "Oh is Janey sleeping with Tom?" comes up that you would need to.

And then "No Comment" or "I don't like to discuss such matters" gives it all away.

So, yes, it is appropriate to lie about it when Janey for a dozen quite proper reasons wouldn't want that revealed. (No credit bureau or other source necessarily involved).

[Philip Coates]

> Amid this war you want to dust the furniture.

No, Brant. Amidst this dusting the furniture, I would like to urge people to fight the real war.

One on which civilization depends.

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

So, yes, it is appropriate to lie about it when Janey for a dozen quite proper reasons wouldn't want that revealed. (No credit bureau or other source necessarily involved).

Phil,

Like for instance if you are a woman, the leader of a philosophical movement, have the habit of harshly condemning people for lack of integrity, evading facts and not accepting reality, then get exposed for having an affair with your No. 1 disciple who is half your age?

(Sorry, I couldn't resist...)

Michael

[James Heaps-Nelson]

So, yes, it is appropriate to lie about it when Janey for a dozen quite proper reasons wouldn't want that revealed. (No credit bureau or other source necessarily involved).

Phil,

Like for instance if you are a woman, the leader of a philosophical movement, have the habit of harshly condemning people for lack of integrity, evading facts and not accepting reality, then get exposed for having an affair with your No. 1 disciple who is half your age?

(Sorry, I couldn't resist...)

Michael

Michael,

Why do you set off stink bombs like this? I happen to disagree with Phil about privacy lies, but now I'm disinclined to even discuss it or anything else for a while.

Jim

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

James,

Ever heard of evasion? That's what the phrase "stink-bomb" means here. Let's all pretend what Rand did was something other than the reality it was, and maybe we can even fool ourselves into believing it. Who knows? If we just don't ever mention it again, maybe it will all go away.

You can buy that. I can't. It ain't going nowhere, regardless.

To me, Rand's works were so respectable and magnificent that they are valid despite her contemptible conduct about the affair. In my world, both exist. I will not evade reality. Not even for Ayn Rand.

Michael

[Brant Gaede]

Phil,

Like for instance if you are a woman, the leader of a philosophical movement, have the habit of harshly condemning people for lack of integrity, evading facts and not accepting reality, then get exposed for having an affair with your No. 1 disciple who is half your age.

Michael, you are much too strong here. Nathaniel Branden once stated that Rand's heroes were projections of her ideal ego state. We cannot condemn her for that or for championing integrity, not evading facts and accepting reality regardless or in spite of the affair. Don't forget that it took two to tango and two more to go along with it. Barbara Branden in "Passion" provided the correct context and perspective. BTW, the age difference per se was not, is not, a no-no. I suspect that Rand thought it was and thus assuredly made it so. (Too simple, of course. There were the other things.) In a thousand years the affair will be thoroughly mythologized for the passionate destruction of love and lust along with other similar myths. If Ayn Rand, in toto, was not a giant, was not a hero, then we aren't going to admire her and while we can still have "Objectivist Living" you and Kat are going to have to take her photo down.

--Brant

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Brant,

Who said I don't admire Rand? OL is full of places where she is admired and studied and documented, etc., etc., etc.

I don't like her conduct about this affair. And I don't like what she did with her followers (especially the one-sided "take me on faith" command.) Do you find "To Whom It May Concern" the paragon of being a giant and a hero, to use your words? I do not. Rand lied to everyone to project a false image and, from reading the journal entries in PARC, she even lied to herself about some of the things she was judging. But believe me, she knew exactly what image she wanted the public to see. I described what she was afraid of perfectly in my "stink bomb." And it stinks to some because they know it is true.

As concerns the affair, Rand was manipulative, dishonest and acted far, far beneath her normal behavior from just about every angle I can see. I don't fault her for falling in love and trying to make it work, but that's about all I can admire in her here. The rest was simply horrible. (She wasn't alone, but she definitely had her share of immoral behavior.)

I love Wagner's music, but I would have never loaned money to him. I can admire him greatly and still hold contempt for his attitude of paying back money he borrowed.

That's my approach. I look at reality and identify what I see according to a rational standard. People don't have to like my conclusions about Rand's handling of her affair with Nathaniel Branden, but that's the way I see it. I will not bear false witness to my reason.

If you find Rand's behavior about the affair something to be admired and something you want for your loved ones and yourself to emulate, I'm listening. I have seen nothing so far. All I can see (with the one exception I mentioned) is something that needs to be pointed to while saying to them, "Don't ever do what Rand did there. That's wrong." And if they ask for something specific, give the grocery list. It's not a short one.

Michael

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Apropos, it's time to bring Mike Lee's statement up again. This is exactly what I think. And I have said so since the beginning.

On February 12, 2006, Mike Lee made two posts on Nathaniel Branden’s Yahoo forum. The views he presented are ones that are held by many, many people, but hardly ever given formal expression. They sum up a refreshingly frank and insightful historical perspective. I asked for (and received) permission from him to consolidate the two emails and present them here. I have eliminated references to posters and some other people and rearranged a couple of paragraphs.

Thank you greatly for these thoughts, Mike.

Michael

It's stunning to hear people say that the Brandens were waiting for Rand to die so they could hatchet her without her responding. That's the stupidest thing I've heard all month. And in my job, I hear a lot of stupid things that have nothing to do with Objectivism.

Rand lied, publicly, egregiously, viciously about the 1968 debacle. Both Brandens were a class act in their responses. They did everything possible to keep Ayn's dirty little secret, at great cost to themselves. What would have happened had the Brandens told the truth then?

Objectivism would have died then. It would have been the undisputed laughingstock champion of the world. All the O-O boobs who hate the Brandens owe their dreary Objectivist identities to the sacrifice of the Brandens in not exposing Ayn's lies. (By the way, you idiots, they didn't do it for you, but for the 99% of people who read Atlas Shrugged and are moved and changed by it and that you anathematize.)

Let's make no mistake: Rand LIED. Gimme an L, gimme an I, gimme an E, gimme a D, LIED. I've got a copy of her public renunciation and the Brandens' responses and all are pathetic. Rand because she was a big fat horrible chicken liar and the Brandens because they protected her. Along with pathetic, the Brandens were heroic. I can't imagine myself exercising the self-control, the renunciation of richly earned revenge, the parsing, tuning, shading, hiding, editing, pacing back and forth, and compassion that suffused their responses.

Good on you both, what an amazing thing under such pressure to separate the thinker from the thoughts and to protect the thoughts from public ridicule no matter what the thinker had done to you.

The Brandens had it in their power at that moment to destroy Objectivism, and they had every reason to, and they didn't. Say thank you, you O-O dipshits.

Talk about grace under pressure, the Branden responses to Rand's screech were archetypally graceful. Something for the rest of us to keep in the back of our minds in case we are ever so unfortunate as to come under similar pressure.

Think through this scary alternate history scenario: Rand noisily, publicly and in writing denounces NB, vaguely hinting at horrible moral defects, implying he's been embezzling or worse. Branden, instead of denying only to the ridiculous charges she made publicly, responds that the real reason she's so mad is that she and I have been having an affair for many years, conducted with the cooperation (or co-optation) of our spouses, and I've been trying to disentangle from it for several years now without provoking just this kind of explosion.

Imagine the newspaper stories, gleefully printing side by side shots of Ayn and NB's hot new girlfriend. Imagine the humiliation of their respective spouses, who I'm sure would also have been featured side-by-side in every paper.

Now imagine Rand's response to all this: does she keep lying and deny the affair? Does she admit it and thus reveal that her previous denunciation was somewhat, shall we say, less than candid?

Any way she turned, Rand's response qua Rand would have only made things worse, much worse. She would have strafed her own credibility and then bombed the rubble. Can you imagine her having to go out in public and deal with this? She was no Howard Roark when it came to ignoring public shaming (otherwise, she would have told the truth in the first place, wouldn't she?).

Imagine all the interviews with former and current members of her coterie. The reporters digging around, the "scholarly" articles hooting that Objectivism was, like we all said, just a silly fad run by amoral hedonists. Imagine this going on in an atmosphere of the mores of 1968--remember, this was pre-Joy of Sex, pre-Stonewall, pre-Harrad Experiment, pre-Open Marriage.

Without reasonable doubt, had the Brandens not bitten their tongues till the blood flowed, Rand would be known today as the kooky cult leader who got caught sleeping with her young protégé and made their spouses watch it all.

Contrast that scenario with the one that really happened: The Branden books were published after a couple of decades of cooling off. With Rand dead, there wasn't much sport in baiting and trashing her--in fact, doing so would have been in bad taste. Ortho-Objectivists were mortified at the revelations, but everyone else came away liking Rand better than before. Suddenly, it all made sense. She no longer seemed so inhuman, intolerant and inscrutable. She seemed tortured and driven by her own demons and blind spots.

Let's not forget: Rand is the one who went public with this. You can make a case that the Brandens' books were a debt owed to intellectual history to make sense of a puzzling and weird event that everyone who ever watches CSI knows didn't add up the way that Rand and the Brandens initially told it.

Let's also not forget: ever since then, both Brandens have led very respectable and productive lives. I think they've both demonstrated they can think interesting thoughts without Rand pulling their strings, and from the way Rand described them, everyone should have been expecting them to end up in jail.

I have no special insight into exactly why the Brandens zipped their lips for so long. Perhaps their motives weren't as noble as I've surmised. But probably they were. Neither Branden is short of brain cells or unable to think 3 chess moves ahead. So, yeah, I think they took one for the team.

What an ironic victory for Barbara and Nathaniel. Since it was their discretion that kept Rand on the bestseller lists.

I think Nathan rocks. His books, his work, his candor have all greatly enriched my life. I'm so glad he exists. He's publicly, obviously, admittedly, not perfect. And that hasn't stopped him from doing great work, making amazing contributions, like his mentor, God rest her sad, beautiful soul.

Michael

[Brant Gaede]

Brant,

If you find Rand's behavior about the affair something to be admired and something you want for your loved ones and yourself to emulate, I'm listening. I have seen nothing so far. All I can see (with the one exception I mentioned) is something that needs to be pointed to while saying to them, "Don't ever do what Rand did there. That's wrong." And if they ask for something specific, give the grocery list. It's not a short one.

Michael,

The short reply is no, I don't admire her for the affair as it was constituted and carried out. I will say this: Ayn Rand had too much on her plate and too little time to deal with it appropriately. As for her moral status, apparently she wasn't going to be throttled by her ostensible philosophy. She made some mistakes. They all did; we all do. She never managed to integrate simple humanity with all its complexities with the philosophy in knowledgeable and appropriate ways. And Einstein never came up with the one theory that explained it all.

--Brant

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Brant,

We are on the same page. It will be a joy sometime in the future when the true-believer faction stops peddling the lies and people can enjoy Rand's works and ideas without having to put undue emphasis on her failings to counteract such hypocrisy.

I do not hold it against Rand that she was not objective nor particularly moral about her affair with Nathaniel. I can think of a gazillion reasons why she would want it as badly as she did and how the split left a hole in soul that could not be filled and left her perplexed until the end of her life. I can even see why she would try to cover all this up, but I don't have to approve of it. This whole issue should be a footnote to her work. And it should be in proportion, just like with Wagner's money habits or antisemitism.

The present-day climate makes this impossible because of the hatred of the Brandens that is promoted. There is also airbrushing by the Orthodoxy of two items: (1) the importance of the Brandens to Rand and Objectivism, and (2) Rand's moral failings. These last were small, but they existed and they were just as ugly with her as they are with any other human being. Excommunicating and condemning more and more people will not make Rand's moral lapses go away.

Also, promoting a false sanitized version of Rand's life ultimately detracts from the acceptance of her philosophy. People grow up and one day stop believing in Santa Claus. Those who do not move on in their lives and keep to the Rand-perfect image have shown to be severely imbalanced.

My conscious intent here on OL is to appreciate Rand's works with uncompromising adherence to the truth and honest independent thinking. She should be read and appreciated just like any other thinker. That is the only way I can take her (or anyone) seriously anymore: truth above legend.

"The truth shall set you free..."

Michael

[Ellen Stuttle]

> If you haven't been in the habit of stating that certain matters are private and are consequently none of the questioner's business, a sudden veer into "That's none of your business" probably will serve as an implied confirmation of the answer. So, it's up to you to develop the right habits...

Robert, for most people it's not necessarily the right habit to say myob or the equivalent with people you know or work with or have as either acquaintance or fried. It's not until the one question you don't wish to share "Oh is Janey sleeping with Tom?" comes up that you would need to.

And then "No Comment" or "I don't like to discuss such matters" gives it all away.

So, yes, it is appropriate to lie about it when Janey for a dozen quite proper reasons wouldn't want that revealed. (No credit bureau or other source necessarily involved).

Phil,

In my experience, such a problem circumstance doesn't come up for one who exercises discretion generally. Speaking for myself, over the years I've had a large number of people confide in me, yet I have never yet encountered such a circumstance as you describe wherein there wasn't any third recourse besides revealing another person's confidences or lying.

Ellen

___

[Ellen Stuttle]

> Amid this war you want to dust the furniture.

No, Brant. Amidst this dusting the furniture, I would like to urge people to fight the real war.

One on which civilization depends.

Well, I couldn't disagree more than with your viewpoint that "civilization depends" on any wide acceptance of Objectivism, as I've said on another thread (I forget which). On the other hand, I think that there's no useful purpose whatsoever served by avoiding the reality of the psychology of any intellectual figure, very much including Ayn Rand.

Ellen

___

[Robert Campbell]

Phil,

Like Ellen, I don't think that, in 2007, the fate of civilization depends on the propagation of Objectivist ideas. Whatever the condition of movement Objectivism, Ayn Rand's books have already had such an impact that the demise of Western civilization is no longer an impending threat. This is 2007, not 1945; Rand is one of the reasons that the intellectual climate is so different now from what it was then. Along with Mises and Hayek and Paterson and a handful of others, she turned out to be right about the economic viability of the Soviet Union. The worst military threat that we face now, Islamic imperialism, is a good deal less formidable.

In my experience, it is those who insist that the propagation of Objectivism is a matter of "life and death" who find "enemies of Objectivism" under every rock, equate criticism of their leaders or their organization with Holocaust denial, and feel licensed to lie for the cause.

Jim,

Mentioning Ayn Rand herself in connection with "privacy lies" is hardly letting off a stinkbomb. It's just facing facts. I admire Victor Hugo's incredible achievement as a writer while being distressed by the way he treated his wife and his mistress. For that matter, I am moved by Charlie Parker's music despite knowing that he was grossly dysfunctional when off the bandstand.

Brant,

I'm well aware that Leonard Peikoff was the victor in a power struggle back in 1968, and that he has never forgotten how he owes his current position of authority to the excommunication of Nathaniel and Barbara Branden. Unleashing Jim Valliant is one of many ways in which he has sought to maintain his authority.

At the same time, any philosophical claim that Dr. Peikoff makes has to be assessed on its own merits. It's only after establishing that a rationale is lacking (as I believe is the case with privacy lies) or sorely deficient (as I think is going on with the doctrine of the arbitrary assertion) that hypotheses about his motives for adopting these positions should be taken seriously.

Robert Campbell

[Jonathan]

> If you haven't been in the habit of stating that certain matters are private and are consequently none of the questioner's business, a sudden veer into "That's none of your business" probably will serve as an implied confirmation of the answer. So, it's up to you to develop the right habits...

Robert, for most people it's not necessarily the right habit to say myob or the equivalent with people you know or work with or have as either acquaintance or fried. It's not until the one question you don't wish to share "Oh is Janey sleeping with Tom?" comes up that you would need to.

And then "No Comment" or "I don't like to discuss such matters" gives it all away.

So, yes, it is appropriate to lie about it when Janey for a dozen quite proper reasons wouldn't want that revealed. (No credit bureau or other source necessarily involved).

Worst Case Scenario, MYOB:

Snooper: "Hey, I know that Janey is a really good friend of yours who tells you everything. You two are like sisters. Peas in a pod. Um, do you know if she's going out with Tom, and sleeping with him?"

Non-Peikovian (who knows that Janey is going out with and sleeping with Tom, but has promised Janey not to tell anyone about it): "You're right that Janey is a very good friend of mine. She's such a good friend that I would never tell you anything about her private life. I wouldn't even think about confirming or denying any question that you would ask about her, especially one as intrusive as the one you just asked. Now, go away."

Snooper: "This must mean that she is sleeping with Tom! You wouldn't be so upset with my question if she wasn't. I struck a nerve."

Non-Peikovian: "No, it means that I don't answer inappropriate questions from creeps who are too stupid to understand that their questions are intrusive."

Snooper: "I think she's sleeping with him, and I think you just confirmed it."

Non-Peikovian: "I don't care what you think. Get lost."

Worst Case Scenario, Privacy Lie:

Snooper: "Hey, I know that Janey is a really good friend of yours who tells you everything. You two are like sisters. Peas in a pod. Um, do you know if she's going out with Tom, and sleeping with him?"

Peikovian (who knows that Janey is going out with and sleeping with Tom, but has promised Janey not to tell anyone about it): "No, I don't know."

Snooper: "I knew it! That bastard Tom is a liar! And here I thought he was one of my best friends. I was confiding in him today that I've been trying to build up the nerve to ask Janey out, and he said that he's seeing her. I asked if it was serious between them, and he said that it was. I asked if by 'serious' he meant 'intimate,' and he said, 'Enough, already! Yes, I'm sleeping with her, so she's not going to go out with you, okay?' He said to keep it all under my hat, but that you also knew about them going out and sleeping together. I just knew he was lying! I'm gonna go tell everyone else that I've talked to about this that you've confirmed that he's been telling dirty lies about Janey. See ya later."

Peikovian: "Um, hang on a second...I, uh...ummmm..."

J

Edited June 22, 2007 by Jonathan

[Reidy]

I have yet to see a convincing case in which tactfully refusing to answer a nosey question could rationally be taken as a tacit answer to such a question. In the Worst Case Scenario, MYOB above, Non-Peikovian is phrasing his answer so as to suggest that the answer is yes. He could as easily have said "Janey is my friend, and I don't want to talk about her private life. You can ask her yourself." This carries none of the insinuations. Snooper, to judge from his phrasing in turn, seems to have made up his mind as to the answer already, and probably no answer, discreet, honest, respectful or not, will change his mind.

A broader problem I see with Peikoff's argument is that you could rationalize any lie with it. Did you take the money from my purse? Did you finish the safety checks on the plane? Are you HIV-positive? And so on. In any of these instances, the motive for a false answer would be a desire to keep one's secrets to oneself.

[Chris Grieb]

Robert;

Thank you for your comment about the relative dangers of the USSR in 1945 and Islam today. Other people and I lose sight of how much better things are now then then. Thank you raising the level of the commentary.

Edited June 22, 2007 by Chris Grieb

[Judith]

If you find Rand's behavior about the affair something to be admired and something you want for your loved ones and yourself to emulate, I'm listening. I have seen nothing so far.

I do:

Having the courage to approach a man to begin an affair when she was of the position that men should be the aggressors.

Not "letting it go" when she realized what her feelings were for him and what his were for her, when "letting it go" would mean giving up what she believed to be the greatest happiness of her life and an answer to decades of frustration.

Refusing to lie about it to their respective spouses and sneak around as if they were doing something shameful. (I don't think they had to go so far as to "ask permission" from their spouses, but they did have an obligation to let them know what they were doing.)

Conducting the affair with a younger man, so much younger that she would always have in the back of her mind the question of whether he REALLY found her desirable.

Asking him if he no longer found her desirable when she sensed his disinclination to continue, and believing him when he said that that was not the problem. (Why would he lie? Put to rest doubts that have been addressed.)

Those are a few of the things for which I admire Rand in this situation. When I learned that those two had had an affair, my thought was, "Yes! There IS justice in the universe!" It would have been a cosmic tragedy had those two never slept together.

The problems came with the way both of them failed to deal with the end of the affair. There's a time to let go and move on. Former lovers can make superb friends. It's a pity she didn't figure that out.

Judith