Five Commandments of Ayn Rand Worship?

[Boojatta]

First Commandment
Put all your heart into your role in the economy. Spare nothing for family life, hobbies, social life, volunteering, philanthropy, etc. The amount of money you make measures your virtue. What you do with the money is completely irrelevant. However, money is just a tool or vehicle. It won't replace you as the driver, but it will measure all dimensions of your worth as a human being.

Second Commandment
You shall oppose any government attempt to go beyond its proper functions: using violence, making threats, and figuring out the appropriate threats or violence in a given situation. Threats and violence are the only way that governments can prevent, halt, or deter violations of your rights. One of your rights is the right to maliciously torture dogs, cats, and chimpanzees just for the fun of it, provided that you bought the animals. The reason animals have no rights whatsoever is that animals don't understand the rational language of threats. Animals only understand violence.

Third Commandment
Be a creator. The creator builds tools. The second-hander decides what the tools will be used for. Von Braun created the V2 rocket for the Nazis. Maybe you can be like Von Braun. The only other choice is to become a Nazi or other kind of second-hander.

Fourth Commandment
Tax dollars may be used to kill foreign human beings, but shall not be used to kill germs. In case of an epidemic within the jurisdiction of an Objectivist government, the Objectivist government may quarantine infected individuals, but the government may not spend any tax dollars on any of the following: research to develop a preventative vaccine, a dose of the vaccine for an individual who didn't pay for a dose, research to develop treatments for the disease, or actual treatment of victims.

Fifth Commandment
You shall revere productive achievement as the noblest kind of activity that you can engage in. For example, A isn't productive achievement, but B is productive achievement and therefore noble:

A: Spending money to buy books by Ayn Rand. Spending time reading them. Spending time trying to persuade others to accept her ideas or read her books.

B: Working as a director or producer in porn production and receiving wages and/or profit sharing and/or royalties.

[Vinnie From Indy]

1. Well done!

Cheers! K&R!

[Donnachaidh]

2. we have a neighbor who does college internet radio who is a Randian

I listened to the show once, and got very very bored. ALL the RW talking points were easily shot down. It was too easy, like poking a barrel full of stupid.

Oh yeah, he doesn't talk to us anymore :rofl:

[onehandle]

3. Being an asshole is a religion?

Ah, yes. Also worshiping an asshole does the trick.

[Jim__]

4. To an Ayn Rand worshipper, there should be no commandments.

An Ayn Rand quote:

"If I were to speak your kind of language, I would say that man's only moral commandment is: Thou shalt think. But a 'moral commandment' is a contradiction in terms. The moral is the chosen, not the forced; the understood, not the obeyed. The moral is the rational, and reason accepts no commandments."

[Tuesday Afternoon]

9. interesting.

[Boojatta]

10. Seen at your link...

"There's nothing of any importance except how well you do your work."
('Atlas Shrugged' 1957) {WMail Issue #33}

That seems to be related to what I labeled as commandment 5 in the original message of this thread.

[checks-n-balances]

14. She says "Thou shalt not think" yet thinks commandments are immoral

So "love one another" is unthinking according to her.

I didn't realize she was such a binary, black-and-white thinker. Then again, that puts her squarely in the company of right-wing thinkers. No conflict there.

[edhopper]

5. A clear

well reasoned post from Booj.
Well done!

[Silent3]

6. So...

...you do have occasional lucid moments at the keyboard? ;)

[Boojatta]

7. Kick

[Tuesday Afternoon]

8. interesting.

[Boojatta]

11. Kick

[Boojatta]

12. Kick in response to recent news and recent thread on DU ...

New 'Atlas Shrugged' Movie Booed Off Planet

[LAGC]

13. Too late to Recommend, but here's a hearty Kick.

Well done, Boojatta. You've truly out-done yourself this time.

[Deep13]

15. I don't get how religious conservatives can buy into this crap.

Whatever Jesus was or whatever he required, he sure as hell was no capitalist.

[LeftishBrit]

17. Rand herself was an atheist (except for the God of the Market). But many religious conservatives do

not only worship the Market, but believe that God commands them to do so.

Read this, if you can do so without becoming sick, by the vile Worldview organization:

http://www.biblicalworldview21.org/Economics_Business/Summary_Principles_Economics.asp

[DirkGently]

16. Nice. Rand was to philosophy what Bill O'Reilly is to journalism. Nasty, thick-witted, in love with

the sound of her own pronouncements. And reliably wrong.

[Deep13]

18. Have you ever run into a more smug, self-important group of people in your life?

The Randian point of view could just as easily have come from Anton LeVey: selfishness as a philosophy.