After seeing the Los Angles premiere of Atlas Shrugged, Part 2, the film that opens today based on the 1957 novel by Ayn Rand (and with an entirely new cast and higher production value, a vast improvement over Part 1), a question struck me as I was exiting the theater surrounded by Hollywood types most commonly stereotyped as liberal: Why don't liberals admire Ayn Rand and her philosophy of objectivism, so forcefully presented in this book and film?
It is not a mystery that the woman who called herself a "radical for capitalism" would be embraced by some conservatives such as Paul Ryan and Ron Paul, but why do liberals not recognize that Rand was also a champion of individual rights, was outspoken against racism, bigotry and discrimination against minorities, and most notably was ahead of her time in championing women's rights and demonstrating through her novels (and films) that women are as smart as men, as tough-minded as men, as hard-working as men, as ambitious as men, and can even run an industrial enterprise as good as if not better than men?
In the teeth of a 2010 study that revealed Hollywood still discriminates against women when it comes to roles in films, most notably the number and length of speaking parts and the continued blatant sexuality in which women show far more skin than men but speak far less, the hero of Atlas Shrugged, Dagny Taggert (played by Samantha Mathis in the new film), has the most speaking roles (and shows almost no skin), runs her own transcontinental railroad, handles with ease both seasoned male politicians and hard-nosed male titans of industry, and embodies courage and character deserving of respect and admiration from women and men, liberals and conservatives.
An answer may be found in the fact that American politics is a duopoly of those who tend toward being either fiscally and socially liberal or fiscally and socially conservative. Rand's fiscal conservatism and social liberalism fits into neither camp comfortably (and is mostly commonly associated with the Libertarian party). As well, the moral psychology behind the political duopoly leads people to either believe that moral principles are absolute and universal or that they are relative and cultural. Rand's implacable absolutism on moral issues, especially her seemingly cold-hearted fiscal conservatism, more comfortably fits into the conservative camp, but even there only barely.
Consider a few correlations from my dataset of 34,371 Americans who took "The Morality Survey" (you can take it yourself here), constructed by myself and U.C. Berkeley social scientist Frank Sulloway and analyzed by my graduate students Anondah Saide and Kevin McCaffree: (1) We found a significant correlation (r=.29) between social conservatism and the belief that moral principles are absolute and universal (and between social liberalism and the belief that moral principles are relative and cultural), so Rand's philosophy does not match that of most Americans. (2) We found a significant correlation (r=.24) between fiscal conservatism and the belief that moral principles are absolute and universal (and the reverse for social liberalism), so fiscal liberals will not embrace Rand here. We also found a correlation (r=.27) between belief in God and belief that moral principles are absolute and universal, and here again Rand is an outlier as an atheist who firmly believed in absolute and universal moral principles (discoverable through reason, she believed). So for liberals, Rand's fiscal conservatism and moral principle absolutism trumps her social liberalism, and even for many on the right her atheism and rejection of faith calls into question her conservative bona fides.
Our duopolistic political system also explains why third parties in American politics -- from libertarians and tea partyers to progressives and green partyers -- cannot get a toehold. Despite Romney's 47 percent gaffe, in point of fact both candidates know that each will automatically receive about that percentage of the vote, leaving the final 6 percent up for grabs. Why are we so politically divided? One answer comes from the 19th century political philosopher John Stuart Mill: "A party of order or stability, and a party of progress or reform, are both necessary elements of a healthy state of political life."
But why would our political life be so configured? A deep evolutionary answer may be found in the moral psychologist Jonathan Haidt's new book The Righteous Mind, in which he argues that to both liberal and conservative members of the other party are not just wrong; they are righteously wrong. Their errors are not just factual, but intentional, and their intentions are not just misguided, but dangerous. As Haidt explains, "Our righteous minds made it possible for human beings to produce large cooperative groups, tribes, and nations without the glue of kinship. But at the same time, our righteous minds guarantee that our cooperative groups will always be cursed by moralistic strife." Thus, he concludes, morality binds us together into cohesive groups but blinds us to the ideas and intentions of those in other groups.
Third parties and outliers like Rand fall into neither group and so are not even taken seriously. But why only two parties? According to Haidt, the answer is in our moral psychology and how liberals and conservatives differ in their emphasis on five moral foundations: (1) Harm/care, which underlies such moral virtues as kindness and nurturance; (2) Fairness/reciprocity, which leads to such political ideals of justice, rights, and individual autonomy; (3) Ingroup/loyalty, which creates within a tribe a "band-of-brothers" effect and underlies such virtues as patriotism; (4) Authority/respect, which lies beneath such virtues as esteem for law and order and respect for traditions; and (5) Purity/sanctity, which emphasizes the belief that the body is a temple that can be desecrated by immoral activities. Sampling hundreds of thousands of people Haidt found that liberals are higher than conservatives on 1 and 2 (Harm/care and Fairness/reciprocity), but lower than conservatives on 3, 4, and 5 (Ingroup/loyalty, Authority/respect, and Purity/sanctity), while conservatives are roughly equal on all five dimensions, although slightly higher on 3, 4, and 5 (you can take the survey here: www.yourmorals.org).
Obama's emphasis on caring for the poor and fairness across all socioeconomic classes appeals to liberals, whereas conservatives are drawn toward Romney's reinforcement of faith, family, nation, and tradition. Libertarians split the difference in being fiscally conservative and socially liberal, but their one-dimensional emphasis on individual freedom above all else (as in Rand's philosophy) leaves them devoid of political support.
So when you see the Atlas Shrugged, Part 2, remember that this is far more than a film or a story about a railroad and a mysterious motor. It is a vehicle to get us to think about which moral principles we value the most, because as Ayn Rand believed, it is ideas that move the world.
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More crucially for Gary Johnson is the question of whether everyday voters will understand that, in the forty states which are *not* swing-states, the lesser-of-two-evils rule is totally INAPPLICABLE.
Obama is gonna win the electoral college votes in California. Even if every single person residing in California that has ever *heard* of Gary Johnson votes for him. Too many people in CA have simply never heard of Gary! So no matter how many votes there are for Gary, mathematically and demographically, Obama cannot be hurt. Voting for Johnson, if you live in a heavily dem-leaning state, CANNOT possibly hurt Obama.
Similarly for Texas residents, voting for Gary Johnson will NOT hurt Mitt in the slightest -- because, just like with dem-leaning CA, even if every liberty-loving Texan votes for Gary, Mitt still wins 100% of Texas ecVotes. Mathematically, no question about it. The math is clear. But do voters understand the math?
But they understand results. Gore fans know Nader spoiled the 2000 election in FL. Bush1st fans know that Perot spoiled 1992 in Iowa. Romney is suing to keep Gary Johnson off the Ohio ballot in 2012.
Third party candidates and parties are "outliers" not because they have an unpopular message, nor because voters are 'psychologically drawn' to dempubs. Third parties are mathematically crippled, by the voting mechanism itself.
If you have a normal ballot with republican Teddy, republican Taft, and democrat Wilson, with 40% liking the dem, and 60% liking the repubs, you end up with President Wilson! He got 40%, Taft got 35%, Teddy 25%. If repub-voters had followed the thumb-rule (i.e. voted for Taft-the-nominee to prevent Wilson the dem from 'accidentally' winning) then Taft would have easily won. Cf: WWI.
The explanation of the difference between objectivism-slash-libertarianism as a mixture of socially-liberal-aka-democrat-party-line plus also fiscally-conservative-slash-republican-party-line isn't *too* bad, and serves as a simple introduction. You have to add constitutionally-governed-strictly-as-written, on top of that. Ron Paul is a libertarian-leaning republican, and certainly a constitutionalist, though he is definitely not an objectivist.
Paul Ryan is certainly not a libertarian. Nor in fact is he at *all* an actual objectivist-aka-Ayn-Rand-fan, despite constant media fanfare to the contrary. (Paul Ryan is a poser, and a liar... also known as a run-of-the-mill policitian. His claims to be a tea-party-type are belied by his votes for more bailouts and debt.)
These are pretty minor gaffes, however, compared to the major election-math versus psychology gaffe.
[To be continued … stupid character-limit … I will reply to myself ... ]
You mean when I see the DVD selling for $5 in a delete bin?
No thanks.
A very watchable interpretation of a novel that's in a style that is very difficult to bring to the screen.
Jesus said that there will always be poor. I believe that he was saying that wealth is relative.
Let's take a moment to appreciate the work of those that came before us.
http://www.alternet.org/economy/america-possible-how-we-can-reclaim-american-dream-and-just-society?paging=off
The point that I was trying to make was that capitalism and our consumption driven economy uses negative motivators of greed, fear, and today's top billing -- lying, to achieve the goal of production. Yuck!
I wish to live in a more enlightened path of connectedness and freedom from needing all this stuff.
We have been oversold this idea that selfishness is good. This egocentric point of view is killing the planet. We have resorted to a kind of duplicity where we fake competition to hide the ever growing need for central planning. We've traded authenticity for the bottom line. My selfish point of view yearns for a better outcome.
In mathematics, capitalism would be described as a local maximum in the pursuit of happiness. Each iteration brings us closer to the pinnacle of a single monarchy rule. Been there. Done that.
There is higher peak of happiness not too far away much grander than this capitalistic hill. But in order to get there, we have to climb down this mound of greed and ego. Let us begin to celebrate our shared journey. Even if we never quite get to the ultimate prosperity, its pursuit has got to better than this lonely selfish path that we are on.
Which probably explains why I'm a Rand fan.
The capitalist industry owners were all highly intelligent and altruistic, while the workers and government employees were simple-minded bumbling drones with no imagination. Only the free-market plurocrats have the foresight to save the day.
yes!
Aristocracy-based-on-inheritance: to my knowledge, Ayn Rand never set forth a position on your question, but she would probably have said something like this: first of all, as kikarok mentions, pure ideological objectivists are against *all* forms of involuntary taxation. Thus, your story would be changed to the idea that, whenever money changed hands voluntarily, betwixt individuals exercising their right to engage in commerce, no meddling government would try and take any of it.
No income tax for your boss's customers. No corporate taxes nor sales taxes nor property taxes nor payroll taxes for your boss. No income taxes, nor any other sort of taxes for you. You want cops? You want a military? Okay, pay the government for what you wish, earmarked for the purposes you approve of. Voluntarily. And, getting back to your story, no inheritance tax, no gift tax, no excise tax, no 16-ounce-cola tax.
Rand made it clear that politics is not a primary; rather it is an extension of basic philosophy, especially ethics. The central issue here is whether human beings are ends in themselves or means to the ends of others. If one supports the former, one advocates individual liberty and individual rights (including property rights), voluntary co-operation among people, banning of coercion in social/political contexts and limited government (government limited to the protection of individual rights against coercion/fraud/force by others).
This has nothing against anybody helping anybody else or against social co-operation. The only thing is it has to be voluntary and not coercion-based (as in the case of most government actions).
As for libertarianism, Rand did not consider herself 'libertarian'. While there may be libertarians who are against any government, most support limited government, entrusted with task of protection of individual rights (i.e the police, defence and justice systems).
One of the reasons the left does not warm to Rand -- in spite of many actual areas of alignment -- is that the left does not generally understand what she advocated, even more so than on the religious right. The political right at least has a general sympathy towards individualism, which affords more close alignment with her ideas. Instead, the left tends to parrot criticisms of Rand that have nothing to do with her ideas, and are actually often diametrically opposed to what she actually advocated. It would be funny if it weren't so tragic.
Yes, Rand advocated individualism and self-reliance, and unfortunately that gap will probably never be bridged when it comes to progressives. She categorically morally rejected coercion as a political means to desired ends, whereas the progressive platform uses coercion for almost every social purpose. No way to gain agreement on that very fundamental point.
I was following you all the way til there. Can you expand what you mean, please?
But try not to get bogged down in the actual physical force, which we see in the stop-n-frisk policy of NYC cops, and the raid-and-terrorize policies of the FDA, and the grope-n-terrorize policy of the TSA, and the drone strikes against our own citizens without trial.
The sort of coercion that applies to "almost every [social] purpose" that mtnrunner2 was talking about is involuntary taxation. Planned Parenthood is funded by taxdollars. Obama calls it "revenue" because he believes that the government *owns* those taxdollars, and deserves to decide what is done with them, therefore. (to be cont'd)
The IRS may not their own swat team, but if you don't pay your involuntary taxation rate, set for you by the government, you will find yourself getting calls from lawyers, and visits from cops. If you attempt to resist the government taking your property as compensation for tax delinquincy, you might well be killed. This is the sort of coercion -- involuntary taxation -- about which mtnrunner2 speaks. We don't get to say how much taxation we want, or what programs we are willing to fund. The government decides. If we don't agree, jail or death. That, my friend, is coercion.
(The other fundamental disconnect between liberal-progressive-folks and objectivists is the issue of 'group rights' such as rights specific to women, or rights specific to asians, or rights specific to scientologists, or rights specific to workers, or rights specific to the poor. To the objectivist, there are *only* individual rights, and only negative natural individual rights at that, which can be enumerated pretty briefly... and have been so enumerated, in the Constitution & Declaration. Hillary thinks there is a right to 'free' broadband and 'free' healthcare, provided for by taxing away Somebody Else's Money. Objectivists say no.)
And often she simply hid behind the word "individual" to disguise the fact that most of her fiscal policies were entirely misguided and impractical.
She believed that there were "producers" and "moochers". Those "moochers" (according to her and Mitt "Mr. 47% Romney's definition of it) actually make up the majority of the INDIVIDUALS in this country. Yet she thought that their rights as employees and consumers were standing in the way of the rights of the producers which these days actually means more often than not, CORPORATIONS, or the handful of people known as the 1%.
In the end, none of the things she said about "individual rights" had much in the way of political impact because there were others who not only championed those rights in a more honest and effective way, but those true champions of those rights put their money where their mouth in and fought for those rights with other individuals. For example, saying women should have access to reproductive rights is all well and good. Actually fighting to make those rights a reality are something different entirely.
So you think that only 1% of Americans are producers and 99% are moochers. This makes Romney look very tolerant.