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Objectivist Indocrination - No Longer Just An Oxymoron
AngelHedgie
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Registered User regular
Colleges receive donations under the stipulation that they force professors to teach Objectivism.
I thought this was the sort of stuff that libertarians and Objectivists disliked. And it goes a long way in showing how weak their ideas are. And it continues to show that right-wing frames just can't survive without money - they force us to be contrary to ourselves and our interests.
I thought this was the sort of stuff that libertarians and Objectivists disliked. And it goes a long way in showing how weak their ideas are. And it continues to show that right-wing frames just can't survive without money - they force us to be contrary to ourselves and our interests.
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Only by not teaching it.
I'm not surprised because Objectivism is all about doing stuff for yourself and making yourself successful. In that respect Rand is a genius. She has a small legion of die-hard fans who promote her works endlessly.
This is pretty much as bad as harassing science teachers into teaching Creationism. (Let's call it what it is, folks.) It is indoctrination and shameless promotion of a product in a school.
Nope. It's BB&T Corp's money. They get to do what they want with it.
There is absolutely nothing in Objectivist ethics that says that spending money on propaganda is immoral or unjust.
Now, said ethics would dictate that it is immoral to tout a doctrine that you do not yourself believe. So, if a professor were to take money to teach Objectivism despite not believing in it, then that professor would be considered immoral - but the corporation that paid him to do it would not be in the wrong. (One could go a step farther and accuse the hypothetical professor in this scenario of committing a form of fraud, which puts us in the bizarre moral territory where the corporation is the poor unwitting victim.) But at no step in this transaction is the corporation doing anything wrong by Randian standards.
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
Ron Paul!
Wrong.
Your punishment is to re-read Atlas Shrugged.
You're assuming I read it.
"Wait, you mean that now I have to pay taxes too? Fuck!"
I especially like that 1 in the Dracula title since the movie had very very little to do with Bram Stoker's book.
But... Hook was my favourite movie when I was a kid! And now this guy's gone and shat Objectivism all over my childhood. Thanks a lot.
I'm sorry, but you deserve it. If your favourite film wasn't Lost Boys or Breakfast Club, then fuck you in the eye!
Seriously though, how is this even possible? How can they be allowed to take money from a bank in return for promoting the banks philosophy and therefore the bank itself? That's like McDonalds giving money on the condition that biology professor has to expound the nutritious benefits of a Big Mac. What kind of crazy country are you running over there?
Mind you, I'm a science grad - I'm used to professors who teach things that they can demonstrate and prove.
I can imagine a lot of sarcastic professors putting this on their syllabus and saying, "You may wonder why I put that book there. Simple answer: Because they're paying me."
In terms of the students, I think it'll have the same effect that Ron Paul did, only more so. You have a small group of totally dedicated people who believe that the book is totally about them and their struggles against the lesser sheeple, and you have a much larger group of people who call complete bullshit. I think that the Paultards have already generated a lot of bad blood within college campuses, and this will just give the rest of the population a chance to vent their opinions.
And honestly, does anyone have any idea what Mr. "I wrote Contact" is even talking about when he says that Ayn Rand is coming true?
This is just the next step up from the internet "scholarship" money that is available to the person who writes the best essay about Atlas Shrugged.
The issue isn't that big business would try something like this.
It's that the universities would go for it.
Like, if the KKK wants to start a "best klansman in America" scholarship, then the first amendment gives them that right. But if they actually want universities to start teaching the words of Lothrop Stoddard in order to actually promote white supremacy, then that's a whole 'nother story.
Yeah, I agree.
But I know a lot of people. I'm pretty sure that the university would rather have ongoing smaller donations from hundreds of alums than a one time million dollar donation with a nuce attached.
I have spread my dreams under your feet;
Tread softly because you tread on my dreams."
Heh, at UT I had a class with the wife of Leonard Peikoff(supposedly the heir to the objectivist philosophy?), so they've got a good headstart!
I'm not fond of making any of this required reading outside philosophy, but I don't see a problem with establishing elective Objectivism courses and whatever sort of sub-department there might be within philosophy.
She also apparently holds the "Anthem Foundation Fellowship for the Study of Objectivism", so I don't think this is Objectivism's first foray into academic funding.
At any rate I don't think this is particularly pernicious. There are so many The X Corporations Chair and Y Foundation Fellowships for every big corporation and kooky semi-popular belief system out there that I can't really begrudge these guys their own vanity Academic. I don't think a couple of Objectivist Profs are really going to take the stink off the ideas; let them pay to have a couple new papers a year to obsess over.
I almost hate to admit it, but you're right. Having and "Aryan Scholarship Fund" or a "Randian Essay Scholarship Contest" are perfectly legal. They're not pretty, but it's all right under the First Amendment and okay with me.
Bullying schools with promises of money for promoting your world-view, however, borders on blackmail. If you say no, they can deride you for "hating free speech" and "not wanting your students to succeed" and such.\
Also, pardon my ignorance but what's with the Bioshock references? Is Rapture some sort of Randian utopia or something?
The entirety of Bioshock is a critique of Objectivism, wrapped in a game. A very fun game, in fact.
I'm actually reading Atlas Shrugged at the moment, and all I can say so far is: Rand was a shitty writer. Really, not good at all.
Also, the philosophy is disgusting, but that takes second place to the writing.
How is this any different than the Economics textbooks in Germany and France that say that capitalism may cause cancer?
Or the Venezuelan textbooks that say that Simon Bolivar was a socialist?
Sorry to stomp on your endless crusade, but how is indoctrination unique to Rand?
The people who have the propensity to become objectivists are the same assholes who are likely to become Communists. They just happened to pick up a copy of Atlas Shrugged instead of Das Kapital.
Uh, evidence for your knowledge of her personal sexual preferences
and why that would be relevant
she also tied the rape in the novel into her objectivist view of sexuality, IIRC
For Ayn Rand, the purpose of a man's life was to find something he was good at, hone that skill to a razor's edge through sheer intellect and discipline, and then work hard at it until he croaked. Ideally, making a lot of money and getting a lot of respect along the way.
The purpose of a woman's life was to find such a man and stand behind him, supporting him in every way possible. She believed very firmly that feminine love was a form of hero worship. Having an individual career of her own was a virtue in Rand's eyes, but any such pursuits would ultimately be subordinate to the woman's role of supporting her lover. In Atlas Shrugged, Dagny Taggart was depicted as this ambitious, capable, high-powered executive, but she never once owned her own company. She always worked under a male authority - and when she ultimately gets together with John Galt, it is clearly not a uniting of equals, it is clearly that Taggart has finally met the man willful enough to be her master.
Dominique Francon's first sexual encounter with Howard Roark in The Fountainhead was a classic bodice ripper rape fantasy. Her voice said no but her eyes said yes. (I think Rand might have used that line verbatim, actually.) Dagny Taggart wasn't raped, but she definitely liked to be held down and taken missionary style by a good strong commanding man.
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
Feral handled the "rape fetish" part, but it really doesn't even matter. There are plenty of valid criticisms of Objectivism that don't bring up either her personal sexual preferences (which wouldn't be relevant) or her philosophical views on sexuality (which aren't surprising given the 1940-1950 time period.)
It's only significant to me because it was the rape scene in The Fountainhead that broke me out of my enthrallment with the ideology in my teenage years. Up until then I'd devoured just about all of her essays and nonfiction as well as Night of January 15th and Anthem. I was all kinds of a Rand fanboy in early high school, but after reading The Fountainhead, I felt physically ill. If Howard Roark was supposed to be the Objectivist Christ, the Word made Man, the ultimate culmination of that philosophy... well, I remember thinking something along the lines of, "Fuck this shit. I want to be absolutely nothing like that prick."
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
Ah, well, I can see that. The general consensus seems to be that The Fountainhead is a better novel than Atlas Shrugged, but I always preferred Atlas - I'm one of those people that genuinely likes Atlas Shrugged. I understand and maybe even admire Dagny and Rearden, whereas Dominique and Roark always gave me a disturbing self-loathing-tortured-artists vibe.
I am mildly offended that you would compare the writings and philosophy of Marx to fucking Ayn Rand. Marx, for all of his flaws, was an absolutely amazing philosopher and one of the best of his age. Ayn Rand is a hack, who couldn't cut it in academic philosophy so contented herself with writing bad, bad novels. Her ideas have absolutely no merit, and no serious philosopher gives them any credence. My profs. have all told me stories about the Randian contingents that always show up at national conferences, and how they get ignored and laughed out on their asses.
I see no problem with these people establishing an endowed chair for the study of Rand's ideas. I just doubt any philosopher with any credibility will ever accept the position. And I seriously doubt that any substansial scholarship will come out of this venture.
Read more from this storyline here: http://www.s-anand.net/calvinandhobbes.html#19870914
No doubt Marx was a far more influential and important philosopher - it's just people who declare themselves Communists today are hopelessly out of touch with reality, just like anyone who calls himself an objectivist.