At least two important conservative thinkers, Ayn Rand and Leo Strauss, were unbelievers or nonbelievers and in any case contemptuous of Christianity. I have my own differences with both of these savants, but is the Republican Party really prepared to disown such modern intellectuals as it can claim, in favor of a shallow, demagogic and above all sectarian religiosity?Perhaps one could phrase the same question in two further ways. At the last election, the GOP succeeded in increasing its vote among American Jews by an estimated five percentage points. Does it propose to welcome these new adherents or sympathizers by yelling in the tones of that great Democrat bigmouth William Jennings Bryan? By insisting that evolution is 'only a theory'? By demanding biblical literalism and by proclaiming that the Messiah has already shown himself? If so, it will deserve the punishment for hubris that is already coming its way. (The punishment, in other words, that Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson believed had struck America on Sept. 11, 2001. How can it be that such grotesque characters, calling down divine revenge on the workers in the World Trade Center, are allowed a respectful hearing, or a hearing at all, among patriotic Republicans?)
politics revenge evolution christianity religion world differences characters jesus words ayn-rand divine america biblical fundamentalism jews united-states question favor party punishment calling patriotic september-11-attacks election shallow great hearing important hubris american republicans vote conservative intellectuals modern creationism deserve atheism trade grotesque william
A man's ego is the fountainhead of human progress.
inspirational ayn-rand
I do not think that tragedy is our natural fate and I do not live in chronic dread of disaster. It is no happiness, but suffering that I consider unnatural. It is not success, but calamity that I regard as the abnormal exception in Human Life.
philosophy objectivism ayn-rand galt taggart
To sum it all up, the [Ayn] Rand belief system looks like this: 1. Facts are facts: things can be absolutely right or absolutely wrong, as determined by reason.2. According to my reasoning, I am absolutely right.3. Charity is immoral.4. Pay for your own fucking schools.
philosophy cynicism objectivism ayn-rand
But, in fact, a person's sexual choice is the result and sum of their fundamental convictions. Tell me what a person finds sexually attractive and I will tell you their entire philosophy of life.
philosophy life ayn-rand sex convictions
Indifference to me, is the epitome of all evil.
evil objectivism ayn-rand psychopathology psychopaths
Ayn Rand's 'philosophy' is nearly perfect in its immorality, which makes the size of her audience all the more ominous and symptomatic as we enter a curious new phase in our society.. To justify and extol human greed and egotism is to my mind not only immoral, but evil.
greed evil objectivism ayn-rand
If everybody spent enough time worrying about their own goddamn selves, no one would have to worry about anyone else.
self ayn-rand skin noremorse
I have always found it quaint and rather touching that there is a movement [Libertarians] in the US that thinks Americans are not yet selfish enough.
individualism objectivism ayn-rand selfishness libertarianism
We are on strike against martyrdom and against the moral code that demands it. We are on strike against those who believe that one man must exist for the sake of another. We are on strike against the morality of cannibals, be it practiced in body or in spirit. We will not deal with men on any terms but ours and our terms are a moral code which holds that man is an end in himself and not the means to any end of others.
individualism objectivism ayn-rand
You must log in to post a comment.
There are no comments yet.