What's priming the resurgence of the Ayn Rand crap now?

[sharp_stick]

Even here in CT I've seen quite a few "I'm John Galt" / "Who is John Galt" bullshit on bumper stickers. Usually these are over old McPalin for prez stickers.

I read that ponderous tome (Atlas Shrugged) back in the old days when I was an undergraduate. I think it must have been the dope and my little antisocial streak but then I loved it. I reread it about 8 or 10 years ago and realized that it was nothing more than a bloated POS with the worst turgid prose this side of Dianetics.

What's driving this new interest? Is it the failure of gramps/bible spice to win and the righties trying to seize on something/anything to stay relevant so they naturally latch onto a 50 year old piece of junk fiction to it or is there some kind of active movement among the nuts to bring it back?

[Taverner]

1. It provides a way for the selfish to rationalize their greed

[Twillig]

10. Or rationalize their failure. n/t

edit: failure to spell 'their' correctly. LOL.

[KT2000]

34. Exactly!

Rand was a horrible writer but she managed to twist logic so that the selfish felt comfortable with their greed.
She even gave them names to call people who are concerned with the welfare of others.

[Teaser]

2. stupid comes in cycles

.

[ananda]

3. Beats me!

Rand is totally unreadable and
her ideas are utterly bankrupt
of any humanity.

[BOSSHOG]

4. In other words conservatives love her

[Hugabear]

5. I heard Neal Boortz praising Ayn Rand on his show yesterday

Rethugs think it makes them look cool, you know that hardly any of them will actually read it.

[HereSince1628]

6. Mebbe because William F. Buckley is dead and Ayn Rand can be rehabilitated?

:shrug:

I've got no answer, but I know Rand hated Buckley.

[Toucano]

7. They're looking for a leader and a dead Russian is the best they can do.

And because the works of Leo Strauss are a tougher read.

[Eric J in MN]

8. Democratic president means some conservatives wish they could withdraw...

...from society, or "Go Galt" as they call it.


=================================================
This phrase refers to a character in Ayn Rand's 1957 novel Atlas Shrugged who leads the "producers" of American society -- mostly wealthy industrialists -- in a strike to show the socialist little people, aka "parasites," who's boss. (When she wrote the book, the top U.S. tax rate was 91 percent.)

http://blogs.villagevoice.com/runninscared/archives/2009/03/rightbloggers_s_1.php
=================================================

[BurtWorm]

9. Utter lack of ideas on the right

[TreasonousBastard]

Hardly any classic fiction makes their point...

I seem to remember "Travels with Charley" has a kinda rightwing slant to it, like Steinbeck had something he wanted to get off his chest. Not much else out there for them.

Let them have that-- it's all they got, the poor things. But, if we start seeing a lot of "I'm Earl Turner" bumperstickers, be afraid. Be very afraid.

Treasonous the Literary Critic

[OHDEM]

11. Yeah and some Ayn Rand Society blowhard was on...

Glenn Beck the other day. An utter moron-fest!

[bullwinkle428]

12. "'Atlas Shrugged' should be required reading for all high-schoolers!"

This was actually posted on another board I frequent, just yestderday!

:crazy: :crazy: :crazy:

[BlooInBloo]

13. Teh stupid.

[sinkingfeeling]

14. Election 2008.

[flakey_foont]

15. same here

I read that back in the '70's.....and, probably, due in part to smoking lots of ganja, I thought there was something there. Then briefly mentioned the book to my dad and he quickly turned my thinking around....don't remember the conversation but part of it had to do with the world is a better place with co-operation and compassion, and the whole ATLAS CRAPPED thing was selfish and unrealistic

[Ikonoklast]

16. Greedy people with no empathy or sense of communtiy.

John Galt and his friends would all die of diptheria after the first toilets backed up in their little paradise, because they didn't want to have any menial laborers ("looters") around.

Like a plumber.

[Ron Green]

Most thinkers go through an Ayn Rand phase in their teenage years.

It went around my unit in the Army in 1967, stirring a lively debate between impressionable youngsters who responded to the simplicity of "objectivism" and more experienced (and educated) guys who understood there's more to life than looking out for #1.

[fascisthunter]

17. greedy upperclass idiots

through their minion tools.

[dustbunnie]

18. It's nostalgia for lost youth maybe.

Sort of like that blip of popularity for Jack Kerouac/the beat poets a couple of years ago.

The Book of the Month club is also kind of responsible for it. Maybe ten years ago they put out some ad campaign following a member survey, claiming that Ayn Rand's work came only second to the Christian bible in terms of influence. The Library of Congress was involved somehow, and It became one of those marketing schemes that spun into urban legend. People still buy into it.

Edited to add good link explaining how the Captains of Industry are promoting the rise in popularity.


http://www.africa.fnst-freiheit.org/webcom/show_page.php/_c-1531/_nr-15/i.html

Every month or so, a group of 15 or 20 Kansas City CEOs get together to share advice and corporate war stories. It's nothing like a book club, but membership requires a working knowledge of the novel.

<...>

After Enron, WorldCom, Tyco and other scandals that have created a public backlash against industry and its captains, the Kansas City group has fantasized of a modern-day strike of thinkers and creators, says Neal Patterson, a group member and CEO of Cerner, a big health care information technology company.

[Cyrano]

19. IMO, Ayn Rand was a reasonably good author and a really lousy human being

Having been born in Russia, she despised Communism. But her hatreds blinded her to the evils of what the Nazis called the ubermenschen -- the "supermen."

In Ayn Rand's world view, and in her books, if you weren't among the gifted few "superior beings," you didn't count. If you were disabled or ignorant, you could just go ahead and die. If you lacked the ability to contribution to society, you could go sleep on a subway grating. If for some reason you couldn't feed yourself or your family, you could starve.

Those who have "made it," whether through talent or connections, like to view themselves as superior to all the rest of us peasants. Who will they turn to on that day that they wake up and find themselves living in a sewer. (The saddest thing is that they never realized that they had always been living in a philosophical sewer.)

[DinahMoeHum]

20. I saw one of those "Who Is John Galt" tire covers the other day. . .

and I had to restrain myself from going over to the parked SUV and writing "Ayn Rand was a selfish whore" on it.

:evilfrown:

[sharp_stick]

27. We have one at work

parked in a handicapped reserved space. I'm thinking of leaving a note on the window telling them something like:

"Ayn Rand's bones are individually spinning in her grave at the incredible lack of self-sufficiency being showed by taking the handicapped placard. What kind of looter parasite are you!"

[YOY]

21. Are you aware of the 2008 Video Game of the Year "Bioshock"?

The game (immensely popular) takes place in a Libertarian/Randian nightmare.

The antagonist (one of them...) is even called Aaron Ryan....he constantly spouts pompous drivel that would make Ann blush.

The liberarians hate the game...their society becomes a nightmare...hell on earth...and what a game it is...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e2mhuPe3sMo

[sharp_stick]

26. I wasn't aware of that

Thanks for the youtube link, I think I may hit eBay to see what I can pick up for the PC on the cheap. That game looks fantastic, I'll just have to wait for the kids to go to bed.

[YOY]

31. It's trippy.

The art-deco style of the 40s/50s in the steam punk environment of an underwater utopia turned into to the madhouse from mans insatiable greed. It is violence and even includes possible "violence against children" of sorts...read below.

You've never heard Ella Fitzgerald's "God Bless the Child" in a video game before. They are the theme for a group of poor little girls turned into gathering mutants all from greed...and they aren't monsters...they just need someone to either save them or put them out of their misery and steal what they are collecting.

The real-life daddy in me made me save them all...and I got the happy ending (There are 3 endings)...it made me cry.

[Ignis]

45. "Would you kindly play Bioshock?"

You'll get it once you play the game. It rocks. :)

[Touchdown]

35. Can I get that for XBOX?

Do I get to shoot Randians? Sounds like fun!:evilgrin:

Also, is it ok for a 9 year old? Not too familiar with the mature ratings.

[YOY]

36. For the 360 you can.

And although I do not beleive that games affect young minds in seriously bad ways, I would not let a nine year old play. There is a major moral crossroads you must cross. That involves killing something that used to be a child. You have to play it to understand. I could not cross that bridge. (So I got the "good guy" ending...so good it made me cry.)

The "good guy" ending involves the protagonist getting a reward greater than any thing selfish old bitter Rand got at the end of her life.

[SemiCharmedQuark]

49. That game is AWESOME! They're making a movie about it.

The movie will probably be terrible.

[scrinmaster]

50. Andrew Ryan, not Aaron.

illegal codesmilie_remote(':freak:')

[Occam Bandage]

52. I'd bring up more references to Rand, but they'd be pretty big spoilers. nt

[ContinentalOp]

22. The media.

The other day somebody posted a CNN article that talked about this Rand "boom." That day two different editions of Atlas Shrugged and an edition of the Fountainhead jumped way up the Amazon bestseller list and onto the "Movers and shakers" list which tracks the books with the biggest percentage change for that 24hr period. The next day they had dropped back off the movers and shakers list.

If you do a quick google you'll see there have been a bunch of such articles written since January.

[mnhtnbb]

23. There's a guy in Panama who fancies himself a present day

John Galt. His name is Sam Taliaferro. He writes a blog which links to Atlas Shrugged on Amazon.
He is the developer of Valle Escondido, in Boquete, Panama.

http://primapanama.blogs.com/

"When Sam first created Valle Escondido, it was his goal to create a community built to first world standards, set in a beautiful environment and blessed with one of the world's finest climates. But more than that, he set out to create a community that was self sufficient, one that wouldn't need to depend on anyone or anything outside of the project to provide the basic necessities of life."

Sound like John Galt?

He links to this CNN article about the popularity of Atlas Shrugged on his blog.

http://www.cnn.com/2009/SHOWBIZ/books/04/27/ayn.rand.atlas.shrugged/index.html

[jdp349]

24. this came up at the NYU young dems meeting last night

I've noticed there seem to be 2 general types of objectivists.

High achievers who use the "philosophy" as a blinder that allows them to turn their backs on the society and rationalize sociopathic behavior, or the mediocre that somehow delude themselves into thinking that they'd be among those in Galt's Gulch. Both are ungracious little shits that seem to love preaching this crap at every opportunity.

An entire philosophy organized around worshiping yourself is pure and utter narcissism.

[sharp_stick]

25. Well put

that's the way I've found objectivists as well. It's such a simple little philosophy that it really lends itself to those that think of themselves as intellectuals but don't want to do any of the hard work that comes with really thinking.

Welcome to DU. :hi:

[MedleyMisty]

41. That must be why it shows up so much on boards for "gifted/high IQ" people

Although it's generally the males. The women on those boards are generally rich white upper middle class SAHMs who are obsessed with and live through their offspring and don't really have political views other than being nice and quiet and agreeable and not rocking the boat. The men are generally all hardcore Randian libertarians.

And yeah, I generally end up being thought of as a troll and being unliked, what with my empathy and concern for others and pointing out the problems in our system and my choice to live outside of that system as much as I can.

A lot of them weren't identified as kids, and I tend to think that's because they aren't actually gifted. I mean, come on - they're rich and white. They would have been identified in school if they were gifted.

But maybe that's just my prejudice and desire to define giftedness as creativity and empathy and mental freedom and independence.

[havocmom]

28. back in my day, we called that the 'terrible twos" and most people got over them

by four or so. I notice too many never get over that narcissus mindset. Makes me wonder if maybe Rand didn't have a point, but just missed who the real drains on society were ;)

[Ignis]

29. Sub-Rant: Get Rand out of Secular Humanism.

I subscribe to (and read) a number of atheist/agnostic/secular humanism journals, and the volume of pro-Rand crap that is appearing in them appears to be skyrocketing recently.

What gives? :shrug: Is there a memo I missed?

[Overseas]

30. Public relations campaigns prefer the public to remain divided

into rugged individuals who take care of themselves and don't care about the welfare of others who are too weak to follow their grandiose lead.

The sector of the public relations industry that serves corporate interests loves to have more rugged individuals who decry "The Nanny State"-- their clients don't like all those bothersome, costly regulations.

A great way to do PR against regulations on behalf of corporate clients is the soft way-- it is all about celebrating individual freedom, don't you know.

[DonCoquixote]

32. Here's a nasty factoid to use

When Anton Lavey tried to explain his church (The Church of Satan) to others, he would often say "Look, we are just Ayn Rand with trappings!"

[Danger Mouse]

33. Increased need for toilet paper.

[mnhtnbb]

37. Too funny. The Panama blog I referred to post # 23 picked up this thread

because it contained the guy's name.

Here's what he thinks of our discussion:

A quick read of the discussion comments shows how they perceive the producers of the world. Selfish, arrogant, narcissistic, inhumane and sociopath. They acknowledge Rand was comparing her experiences growing up in Communist Russia to the possible future of the U.S., but Communism is more attractive to them than freedom as long as they get a share of what others produce.

This is the growing culture war that is taking place in the U.S. and around the world. People with little knowledge of world history and the foundation of the U.S.A. want to take us back to a world of serfdom and enslavement. They do it on the noble ideals of equality and fairness.


:rofl:

He's a pretty quick study at identifying the way DU perceives Bush/Cheney and their supporters,
but makes his mistake (as do many Ayn Rand fans)equating support of democratic socialism with Communism.
They don't get the fact that there is an objection to the Bush/Cheney type policies of socializing
risks and privatizing profits.

I fessed up :hide: in the comments section of his blog that I posted his name on this DU thread.

[brentspeak]

38. I love the idiots who like to think they're geniuses on the order of the fictional John Galt

"Who's John Galt?"

Definitely not the idiots who worship Ayn Rand.

[Umbral]

39. Think of it as a temper tantrum, nothing more.

[Blue_Tires]

40. i saw a few months back there was some Rand-worshipping foundation

that was making a well-funded push to get a new generation talking about her works again...the foundation even gives very generous grants to universities on the condition that they offer classes on her books...

[TheMightyFavog]

42. What's even more mind bogging are fundies who are Rand fans.

People that wear thier Chirstianity on their sleeves showing their allegaince to a philosophy that can't get any more un-Christ like.

[WeDidIt]

43. "There are two novels that can change a bookish fourteen-year old's life"

"There are two novels that can change a bookish fourteen-year old's life: The Lord of the Rings and Atlas Shrugged. One is a childish fantasy that often engenders a lifelong obsession with its unbelievable heroes, leading to an emotionally stunted, socially crippled adulthood, unable to deal with the real world. The other, of course, involves orcs."

-- Kung Fu Monkey

[Orsino]

44. Because the other rationales for Republican policy have been so discredited recently.

A book no one's going to read is fairly safe for now.

[Ignis]

46. "the failure of gramps/bible spice"

Thanks for that. I lol'd.

[chatnoir]

47. 'Go Galt'

A bunch of greedy narcissists with serious delusions of grandeur.

[blindpig]

48. Obilgatory Ayn Rand image,

What a piece of shit she was.

[Spike89]

51. Rebounding from Bush

The problem for the right is that they really had two "types" of voters in their ranks, the corporate-loving anti-taxers and the religious wackos. The corporatists were always the harder sell and mostly sit in the back or try to confuse the issues with faux populism. Now, the religious right has lost its steam and republicans are trying to put the Rand lipstick on their pig of a philosophy.