Objectivism

[mediamogul]

I recently watched one of the worst movies I have seen in some time: Atlas Shrugged. It was the new version created and marketed towards the Tea Party crowd. It did get me thinking about Ayn Rand's philosophy, Objectivism, and its popularity within the right wing. I have heard her referred to as the "Karl Marx of the Tea Party."

Objectivism can be broken into few categories according to the claims it makes regarding the world and human beings. I won't bore you with the metaphysics which serves as the grounding for her claims about perception. I am mainly interested in discussing her philosophy as it relates to contemporary political and social philosophy. The important claims are roughly as follows:

Ethics: Rational Egoism. In terms of their action humans are bound ethically by rational self interest. In other words they are compelled to act in such a way that maximizes their own benefit. Egoism is a form of consequentialist ethics in that only the result matters. If an action maximized benefit to the person committing the action then it was "ethical". Rand rejected especially altruism and cites it's detrimental effects on society. In John Galt's words "I swear—by my life and my love of it—that I will never live for the sake of another man, nor ask another man to live for mine." Embodies in the "Hero" ideal are values of extreme individualism and self-determination. This ethical foundation provides the basis for her political and social philosophy.

Politics: Laissez-faire Capitalism. Rand believed that government should be extremely limited to the function of protecting the rights of self-determination for each individual. This is primarily upheld through the use of civil law and through "negative" protection by the police and military (negative in the sense that they do not compell citizens to act in a certain way but instead merely protect others from criminals and foreign threats) Economically Rand argues that laissez-faire capitalism is the only economic system that promotes individual freedom in a way that fosters a dynamic society in which the "best" among us can rationally pursue their own interests and be utterly responsible for their own success and happiness. Rand believed that as a byproduct of these pursuits society would prosper on both a personal and national level.

Now this all strikes me as inherently similar to the Libertarian view of government and it's role in protecting freedom as opposed to compelling action. Overall, the philosophy is practically a negative image of Marxism in it's rejections of collectivism and altruism. My thought is the Tea Partiers like it so much because it provides the ideological basis for unregulated pursuit of capital within the marketplace. Rand believed that the masses were parasitic upon the talents and intelligence of the few, mostly identified as captains of industry and commerce. The uber-rich and powerful who direct society by pursuing their own self-interest which then "trickles down" to the rest of society. Marx argued exactly the opposite, that the few were parasitic off of the value producing labor of the many, who were then alienated from the products of their labor, and those who owned the means of production "stole" the profit produced by the workers alienated labor.

In a nutshell, my inclination is that the right loves Ayn Rand because she provide the ideological basis for them being greedy and pursuing profit without regulation. It utterly justifies the use of business to pursue its own ends self-interestedly without regard for people, evironment, or ethics (non-egoist ethics).

Thoughts?