For the longest time I put off reading the self-indulgent fantasies of Ayn Rand. A big part of that had to do with reading Terry Goodkind’s “Sword of Truth” series that started as an interesting fantasy adventure; then devolved into stream-of-consciousness prostelyzing of the virtues of selfishness.
In modern nomeclature, the series “jumped the shark” pretty quickly and never recovered. Feeling I had enough of Randian philosophy (“objectivism”), I had no interest in looking at the source material.
It wasn’t until the last decade that her work has come forward again and preached by advocates all over the social spectrum (teenage self-interest to senators in the highest levels of government), that I took a serious look at it. Perhaps it’s my attachment to the wonders of community and seeing how it benefits all of us that gave me difficulty with believing anybody could take this seriously. I mean, the basic summary is that selfishness is a virtue, we should all act in our own rational self-interest, altruism is for suckers and the only role of government should be to protect private interests.
In Rand’s dream world, private industry is the reason for innovation and would produce wonders for society while also extolling the achievements of humans. Ideas like romanticism, abstraction and subjectivism are tossed aside because they are not grounded in an objective world. It’s at this point that I could perhaps forgive Rand for what I assmume to be purposefully tone-deaf to the world around her and the very basics of human history that showcases how easily we are corrupted by power. She also didn’t have the foresight to know that she would eventually draw upon government assistance for her health issues late in life.
Rational self-interest depends on people acting… well… rationally.
I mean, if everyone acted rationally, we could just about make any system work just fine.
Unfortunately, this leaves us in a situation in a world where we celebrate the individual and denigrate the collective for our own personal gain. It also resulted in a system where people take advantage of the collective while also harshly judging it. I believe we call this talking out of both sides of your mouth.
“The government is inefficient and gets in the way of my progress…” while also begging government for subsidies to get this “private pursuit” going and providing a safety cushion in case it fails. This is why I roll my eyes when the financial industry tells us that we need to teach people financial literacy because they are the worst example of it. Wouldn’t we all love to just go YOLO on investments and then get a bailout in case it doesn’t work out?
All this to say, well done Rand. In your wild swing away from communism as a corrupt and wicked form of government, you’ve persuaded us to move towards a corrupt and wicked form of individualism.
How’s that working out for most of us?
It’s time for a new icon. We no longer need another Howard Roark or John Galt sounding the alarm of the downfall of society because we decided to help each other out, and we certainly no longer need the narcissism this type of behaviour brings.
What we need, is each other.