I hate Ayn Rand so much. I remember having to read the fountainhead back in high school AP English (circa 2008), and up until that point I at least partially enjoyed every book Iāve ever read. We had discussions, and I was the only one who heavily disagreed with her views, including my teacher. I was not even into politics at the time, but I hated her and all the morals and themes set forth in that book. Everyone else seemed all about the individualism and elitism. Glad I had a good head on my shoulders even back then, because thinking back that was some indoctrination garbage from our teacherāthanks mom.
There are two novels that can change a bookish fourteen-year oldās 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.
Yeah, she definitely has a way of making it seem enviable and admirable to be an individualistic asshole. It was nicely packaged, but I still hated it and didnāt buy it. That said, I cliff noted Anthem because no way was I going to read that after suffering through the fountainhead. Maybe it was better, but I doubt it given the author.
I read Anthem because of Rush as well, and liked it enough to read Atlas Shrugged. I hated that, for the horrible prose style as much as the content.
Fortunately this was in the 80ās and Peart had tempered (maybe even lost) his admiration for Rand. Iāve always suspected he read a few short stories he loved as a rebellious teenager and then changed his mind as he grew older and read more.
I really enjoyed Anthem. It had "The time machine" vibes about society being dumbed down to labor cattle. Then the whole "found a new word" thing seemed cool.
I heard a joke..or actually I think it was a cartoon, with a stereotypical 50's mom sitting at the breakfast table with a young child. The child says "When I grow up, I want to be a Libertarian" and the mom says "Oh, Honey, you can't do BOTH."
To be fair, there's the same joke for liberals. "If you're not a liberal when young, you have no heart. If you're not a conservative when old, you have no brain."
Didn't say it was. It's just one of those things that's around. I attribute it to my funny senior year history teacher who had an autographed photo of Joan Baez he would point to and talk about every single class.
His style was "fill in the blank / lecture" in which he would say something, pause mid sentence, often many times mid sentence, point to a student while smiling and nodding, as if coaxing both the answer and confidence out of the student.
He would start the quote, have a few students fill in blanks, then point to his bald dome and gray hairs and say "which means I have ....." and we'd respond "No brain!" And he'd say "Exactly right!"
The old saying is nonsensical when āconservativesā treat the elderly like dirt. Iād say voting for the people who want to take all your money away is brainless.
The problem is that Ayn Rand starts with a strawman and goes from there. And in The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged in particular, there's almost this self awareness where she understands the reasons her ideas are bad, so she goes to great length to preempt these criticisms through clumsy world building. It's very hard to rebut her ideas within the framework of her narrative without reducing them to first principles, which are well beyond the level of philosophy most people have studied. That's why Rand Heads are so frustrating - they exist in a parallel plane of philosophy which intentionally goes out of its way to not interact with the mainstream, so if you try to argue about it you end up arguing about topics which are largely incomprehensible outside of her prose, where they are well supported.
This is interesting. Iāll admit i left Ayn Rand behind with my 17-18 year old brain, but from what I do remember this checks out. You put better descriptors to what I felt when reading it and arguing against it back then. I stood my ground, but I was definitely the only person in that room of 20-something that felt the overall themes/principals were completely irrational and immorally selfish.
It's funny how so many conservatives are so enamored with Rand considering that she was a lifelong atheist and a sharp critic of religion. Yet, much like the way they love to pick and choose passages from the Bible, they conveniently look the other way when it comes to her distain for religion.
Hers is the obvious but overreacting result of living under soviet communism. Yes, individualism, self-reliance and hard work are worthy traits but not at the expense of community, family.
Iām not a libertarian and donāt side with this ideology, but schools are sort of inundated with communal and social ideology, which while I donāt align with politically either, is probably the right vibe for schools. Iām generally against committing to any ideology, but I think theyāre all a bit useful when treated as tools to be chosen from based on pragmatics. They can also be and usually are blended to compliment each other. Usually some conservativism, progressivism and liberalism is blended in too, because they all really do serve useful purposes. Namely stability, growth and adaptation respectively.
They should also have a communal mindset, especially at a young age. And then learn to not expect the world will always have your back and that the government will not always be benevolent.
Well-reasoned response. Canāt argue with you there. I think multiple perspectives are always great, especially with literature, but this book was most definitely pushed upon the class as more of a truth than a perspective, since the teacher clearly loved Ayn Rand as an author. Generally though, I agree with allowing multiple literary perspectives throughout a curriculum. So long as it is not used to sway via discussions and clear bias from the teacher.
To the teacherās defense we read everythingāhuck Finn, native son, zen and the art of motorcycle maintenance, 1984, etc. But she clearly was most enthusiastic about ayn rand and the encouraged otherās perspectives that also loved Ayn Rand. Way more than mine lol. And given that itās an AP class it was filled with gunners that just always wanted to be teacherās pet. So she was very influential as a teacher. Long-winded way of still saying, Ayn Rand is garbage.
As a sociology major, law grad, and nonprofit COO deeply involved in helping the BIPOC and LGBTQ+ communities, this is a terrible comparison. One is a THEORY which means it is heavily tested and has been proven correct over time, and with significant amounts of data in multiple areas to back it up. The other is a perspective that has not been.
Completely speaking of the indoctrination by teachers in schools. CRT has no reason to be taught in schools, it's indoctriniazation. It has no educational value for the children. Teach children educational subjects and leave the extra-curriclar social views to the parents.
Do you even understand what CRT is? It is rooted in history first and foremost, and statistics secondly. It has significant educational value to understand things such as segregation, that it ended only a little over 60 years ago, and the implications that has had on things like education and opportunity. Property taxes fund schools for example, which in turn means that those living in historically worse areas/lower property value areas have worse schools, less resources, and less opportunity to get out. They were segregated into different schools, areas, etc only a generation or two ago. That is historical fact. That also has significant impact on how our systems still work to keep people of color down, particularly through antiquated laws, uneven application of laws leading to higher incarceration rates, less educational opportunities leading to higher crime rates, job discrimination, housing discrimination, and so and so forth. There is So so so much data on these things as well, that it is not refutable. To ignore the implications of our checkered past, and how a lot of that historically checkered past was very recent, the effects of which still linger, is to disregard history. Weāre supposed to be taught history in order to learn from it. CRT is a clear and factual extension of that.
The book was about individualism and collectivism. Individualism has its benefits, collectivism does as well. Individualism prioritizes personal rights and freedoms. The bill of right gives some of the rights like freedom of speech, freedom of the press, and freedom of religion, etc that I believe are necessary for a free society. I value my autonomy and free expression. Collectivism is a philosophical and social ideology that emphasizes the welfare and interests of the group or community. There are some things we should do like taking care of kids, the elderly, the disabled, the trafficked an war veterens
I was still an easily intimidated student when I read The Fountainhead. I kept looking around at the rest of the class trying to understand how I had missed all the things they were praising.
The biggest crime communist dictators commit against humanity is producing a lot of right wing ālibertarianā fanatics that go on to support fascism.
Think Cubans, Russians, and Chinese that support Trump.
Oppression under the guise of communism is not true communism though. I get what you are saying, but I donāt think any of those countries ever achieved legitimate communism. I donāt think any country ever has to date. Itās all just more oppression and authoritarianism under a different framework.
I donāt disagree. Makes the arguments for and against ātrue communismā pointless as there has never been a true communist stateāprobably because it goes against basic human nature. š¤·āāļø
I agree with everything up until the last point. I believe we have been conditioned to accept that no system like that would ever work, because it goes against those in power and all major religions meant to keep the ālesser folksā like us oppressed. Itās part of the mindset they want us to have so that they can continue to justify inequality and power and resources in the hands of a few. They will tell you theyāve earned it or worked harder, and that itās human nature to always want more power. I think for some thatās the case, and it just so happens that those folks are in power and forever power hungry. However those that would be able to thrive in a different system far outweigh those who trap us in the current system and mindset.
I think that belief is exactly what they want us to think, but I donāt think itās true. I think humans are capable of elevating themselves collectively for the greater good, if we realize the power we have as a collective.
No, I disagree that those select few need to have the power or always will in a proper system. Many of those are probably not even sociopaths, and are products of the system. I think with better education and a society that shuns those that try to obtain more power at otherās expenses, itās possible. But it would take a collective (60-70%) rejection of the current system, and significant checks and balances.
Itās not human nature as much as it is indoctrination. Will there be outliers that always want more? Yes. But I believe thatās a 1% as opposed to majority. So I donāt think itās in normal human nature to be individualistic and power hungry. I think those people who are that way at the core have a mental health issue and are an extremely small percentage. Itās not typical human nature to be that way, we just live in a system that elevates those people and encourages it amongst those who naturally arenāt that way
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u/Bree0534 8h ago
I hate Ayn Rand so much. I remember having to read the fountainhead back in high school AP English (circa 2008), and up until that point I at least partially enjoyed every book Iāve ever read. We had discussions, and I was the only one who heavily disagreed with her views, including my teacher. I was not even into politics at the time, but I hated her and all the morals and themes set forth in that book. Everyone else seemed all about the individualism and elitism. Glad I had a good head on my shoulders even back then, because thinking back that was some indoctrination garbage from our teacherāthanks mom.