Questions Of Morality

Originally posted by DINSTAAR
reply to post by Vicky32

 

Ayn Rand.... meh... she's got some great ideas and the fact that she reaches people with a libertarian message is useful, but she is a flaming hypocrit.

I don't read Ayn Rand for this reason....

She and I part ways on many issues, but this one is the dealbreaker. She is an intellectual elitist. Its not that she is elite, but that she feels entitled to her ideas as if she, herself, were the savior of mankind and all should pay their dues. Her ideas on intellectual property are gastly.

As you mentioned, she is more than willing to use the violence of government for her own use. Her idea that IDEAS themselves in published materials can be monopolized is strange and erroneous.

Objectivists miss wide on ethical and practical realities.

Randians are dogmatic, botlike (like you say), and just as delusional about the role of the state as any other statist. To think that a government of a specific kind (thier own words) can exist without going outside the preset barriers is wildly insane. Ayn Rand said it can work, so Objectivists believe it so. All the while, ignoring thier own sense perception that this type of system cannot benefit the individual.

As it is not in the nature of horses to meow and climb trees, it is not in the nature of any government to stay within its preset boundries.

Like the idea that we must end violence and corruption by giving the most violent, corrupt people the power.

Ayn Rand does a lot for the liberty movement, but her ideas are blindly taken to heart with the dogmatic fury that other religions have exhibited throughout history. Objectivists, mostly, are exclusive, elitist, and by no means as intelligent as they think they are and are, I believe, a detriment to the liberty movement.

I hope this clears up my relation to Rand and her ilk.

It does indeed clarify your views about Rand! I loathe and despise her writings and her philosophy, but I realise she will be spinning rapidly in her grave to hear you call her a statist! As far as I can see (and I have read all her books, some of them many times) - the violence of which she approved, was that committed by individuals against statists and governments!
Vicky

reply to post by Vicky32


I like much of Ayn Rand's philosophy on freedom. It is her inconsistancy on freedom that I can't agree with. \

My views more closely follow people like Murray Rothbard or Stefan Molyneux.