Ayn Rand
You probably know someone just now reading one of Ayn (rhymes with dine) Rand’s thick-as-a-brick books. Rand believed selfishness was the fundamental positive principle of human life. We are good when we tell other people to go to hell. We are at our best when we send them there.
She was wrong about history. She was wrong about psychology. She was wrong about human nature. She was wrong about economics. She was wrong about philosophy. Her mini-comeback is dangerous, so if you know some young or old person who’s only 18,000 pages or so into chapter one The Fountainhead or Atlas Shrugged, warn them off. Fox News is more uplifting — and right more often than Rand.
She made up both her names. I think Ayn is fine, but Rand is bland. But there was nothing bland about this nutball.
She was proud, grouchy, vindictive, insulting, dismissive, and rash. (One former associate called her “the Evel Knievel of leaping to conclusions.”) But she was also idealistic, yearning, candid, worshipful, precise, and improbably charming. She funneled all of these contradictory elements into Objectivism, the home-brewed philosophy that won her thousands of Cold War–era followers and that seems to be making some noise once again in our era of bailouts and tea parties. (Glenn Beck and Ron Paul are Rand fans; Alan Greenspan, once a member of her inner circle, had his faith in the market’s rationality shaken by the crash.)
I think Rand manipulated her cult followers with all-too-human tales of heroes. We all love a hero. Then she explained how we could all be heroes — mostly by making pudding pie of our fellow human beings. She not only disagrees with just about everything science now knows about empathy, human sociability and the way we’re wired for cooperation, she manages to toss out the Golden Rule and thousands of years of spiritual and philosophical teachings. Jesus would have wept to know Rand. Socrates would foregone his own heroic death and given her the hemlock. It might have been the only thing worth the sacrifice of his integrity.
Consider this post something like a philosophical Amber Alert. If someone close to you has been beguiled and kidnapped by Rand, take action now. There’s a new biography of Rand, if anyone’s interested, and I hope you’re not. Sam Anderson’s review, quoted above, can be found here.
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About Glenn W. Smith
Glenn W. Smith has spent the past 30 years in journalism and politics, where he’s made a name for himself as a writer, campaign manager, activist, think tank analyst and, as Daily Kos founder Markos Moulitsas says, a “legendary political consultant and all-around good guy.” “There’s no one like him,” says author George Lakoff. CNN commentator Paul Begala says, “He has unmatched experience, a graceful pen (or pixel nowadays) and deep insight into the best and worst of us.” Novelist Sarah Bird speaks of his “lucid and lyrical” prose. And, she says, he’s fun. Huffington Post founder Arianna Huffington says Glenn writes with “grace and abundant humor” and “uses his colorful experiences in Texas to enlighten us all.”
Smith led Ann Richards’ successful 1990 campaign for Governor of Texas. He worked for former Texas Lt. Gov. Bill Hobby and U.S. Senator Lloyd Bentsen. Earlier, Smith was a political reporter for the Houston Chronicle and the Houston Post. He’s coordinated national campaigns for groups such as MoveOn.org. In 2004, he authored the highly acclaimed book, The Politics of Deceit: Saving Freedom and Democracy from Extinction. He also wrote Unfit Commander, a book that detailed George W. Bush’s mysterious disappearance from military service.
In 2004, Smith was featured in the film, Bush’s Brain, a documentary about Karl Rove. Smith provided commentary on Rove’s role as then-President Bush’s senior advisor. He has made numerous media appearances with Chris Mathews on Hardball, Joe Scarborough, Brit Hume, and many others. He writes a regularly for top national web sites, including FireDogLake and Huffington Post.
As a senior fellow at George Lakoff’s prestigious Rockridge Institute in Berkeley he studied, wrote and taught on the power of metaphor and narrative in political communications. He also lectured on religion and politics at the Starr King School for Ministry in Berkeley. As a sponsor and organizer, he has pulled together numerous national events with progressive religious leaders. He also organized a celebration of Dr. Martin Luther King at Riverside Church in New York City as well as “Freedom and Faith” bus tours, which was a nationwide campaign for social justice and progressive values.
Smith’s play, Double Play, which explored American Western myths and legends, was held over to sold-out audiences. He’s even written and performed songs in the Americana tradition, such as his best-known song, “Helping Marty Robbins,” a tribute to his hometown, Houston.
Most recently, Smith is the creator of DogCanyon, a political and cultural web site covering state, national and global issues from a Texas perspective. DogCanyon is an exhilarating and unique site that gets the connections between politics and culture and explores both the personal side of politics and the ups, down, craziness and beauty of “life its ownself,” as humorist Dan Jenkins would say. DogCanyon offers heartfelt personal essays, hard-hitting political analysis, and, most importantly, laughs.
As Paul Begala said, Smith writes in “the finest, firmest, fearless tradition of Texas essayists like Molly Ivins.”
I’ve seen a few copies of her books around and they seem to belong to those driving pick-ups with RP stickers.
Just sayin’….
Too late. I’ve been kidnapped. Do you suspect I’m suffering from Stockholm Syndrome?
To be honest, I very much enjoyed Atlas Shrugged for the way Rand skewered the incompetence and cronyism in government. I also enjoyed the way she maligned the “too big to fail” mentality.
I don’t know much about Ayn Rand herself, but to me Atlas Shrugged was uplifting and promoted reason and pragmatism over favoritism, special interests and maddening political hogwash.
Of course there are appealing elements to her work, kidnappers use candy, after all. Her “objectivist” philosophy, however, is not pragmatic, and it’s focus on hyper-individualist heroism over our collective well-being is truly dangerous. I’m not against enjoying the candy. Just stay out of the car.
A “philosophical Amber Alert” — perfect
.
I remember having Rand preached to me, many years ago. I agreed to read Atlas Shrugged and when I raised multiple questions, was then urged to read The Fountainhead. I think I skimmed that one. Recently, another friend started the same kind of Rand sermons. I told him that I saw / heard enough of her Objectivism in the news, and disagree as much now as I did those many years ago.
I think Rand is the grandmommy of all who use “slippery slope” type arguments. If an excessive valuing of the community over the individual results in a collectivist nightmare like the Soviet Union, then any system of values not centered on the individual must be ultimately immoral. I never read either of her “Superman” novels, but was curious enough as a young man to try to read a book of hers called “For the New Intellectual.” I made it through about three or four pages, amazed at the logical contradictions as well as ignorant disregard of everything we have learned about human nature (much less ethics). As near as I could tell, the same sorts of people were attracted to her novels as were to superhuman and mutant stories in science fiction (and later comics): those who were more than usually battered by adolescence, sustained by daydreams of being secretly superior to those who tormented them. And of course recently the “greed is good” forces have been powerful movers and shakers in our culture, so it is not surprising to see Rand novels pushed in public school curricula.
I knew a lot of women during high school and college who were reading Ayn Rand. I was surprised; I had never heard of this person, and I considered myself well-read for my age at the time. At the time I was reading Dostoevksy, so I was not exactly allergic to the novel of ideas, but I opposed Rand more on aesthetic grounds. Her characters seemed flat; her stories just didn’t seem interesting to me at the time.
That said, I’m glad that some younger women found an author to look up to (and even emulate). It’s a necessary phase. Literature is marginalized these days, it’s refreshing to see people caring so much about any book.