Ayn Rand's crush on a famous serial killer:

[annabanana]

http://www.alternet.org/books/145819/ayn_rand%2C_hugely_popular_author_and_inspiration_to_right-wing_leaders%2C_was_a_big_admirer_of_serial_killer_

~snip~

One reason why most countries don't find the time to embrace her thinking is that Ayn Rand is a textbook sociopath. Literally a sociopath: Ayn Rand, in her notebooks, worshiped a notorious serial murderer-dismemberer, and used this killer as an early model for the type of "ideal man" that Rand promoted in her more famous books -- ideas which were later picked up on and put into play by major right-wing figures of the past half decade, including the key architects of America's most recent economic catastrophe -- former Fed Chair Alan Greenspan and SEC Commissioner Chris Cox -- along with other notable right-wing Republicans such as Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, Rush Limbaugh, and South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford.

So what, and who, was Ayn Rand for and against? The best way to get to the bottom of it is to take a look at how she developed the superhero of her novel, Atlas Shrugged, John Galt. Back in the late 1920s, as Ayn Rand was working out her philosophy, she became enthralled by a real-life American serial killer, William Edward Hickman, whose gruesome, sadistic dismemberment of 12-year-old girl named Marion Parker in 1927 shocked the nation. Rand filled her early notebooks with worshipful praise of Hickman. According to biographer Jennifer Burns, author of Goddess of the Market, Rand was so smitten by Hickman that she modeled her first literary creation -- Danny Renahan, the protagonist of her unfinished first novel, The Little Street -- on him.

What did Rand admire so much about Hickman? His sociopathic qualities: "Other people do not exist for him, and he does not see why they should," she wrote, gushing that Hickman had "no regard whatsoever for all that society holds sacred, and with a consciousness all his own. He has the true, innate psychology of a Superman. He can never realize and feel 'other people.'"

Remember this when her disciples and recent converts corner you with their "I'm going Galt" crap.

[annabanana]

1. Worship at her alter has caused America some great harm. . n/t

[ProfessorGAC]

2. Faux Philosophy

And boring, pedantic prose.

Not only has she done great harm to society, she was seminal in the dumbing down of America. When a two dimensional dullard like this becomes considered a "thinker", we began a downhill run
GAC

[Enthusiast]

7. It's been a long downhill run.

Can't we stop now?

[MattBaggins]

87. You do a disservice by calling it a philosophy

I had to cringe when I went to college and her name would always pop up as one of the "spotlight" biography's for women's history activities.

[timtom]

3. But...but...

she was an atheist. Doesn't that count for something?

[spiritual_gunfighter]

6. At least she got something right n/t

[Name removed]

8. Deleted sub-thread

Sub-thread removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[eppur_se_muova]

46. Broken clock, right twice a day. She didn't come close to that standard. nt

[GoneOffShore]

53. Set up of straw man.

[lolly]

84. Standard bearer for Republican party

Which also, according to many of its members, is the "real Christian" party.

[timtom]

86. And therein lies THE irony.

Right-wing Christians embracing a right-wing atheist.

[Name removed]

97. Deleted message

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[Name removed]

96. Deleted message

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[formercia]

4. I have a hardcover first printing of Atlas Shrugged

I plan to turn it into confetti with a high-powered rifle and tape it for others to enjoy.

Going Galt on Galt.

[onehandle]

51. I fully endorse this act of gun violence. nt

[Hannah Bell]

5. she was sicker than i imagined. post-traumatic stress from the rev, i imagine.

rich people react strongly when they lose property & status.

they don't mind inflicting that trauma on others, however.

[mitchum]

9. I love telling Randoids about Crazy Alice and Killer Ed

"But...but...but!"

[Bosso 63]

10. I knew she was crazy, but damn. . .

[Odin2005]

11. Yuck, I need to take a shower after reading that.

:puke:

[UTUSN]

12. K&R #18, so that visiting wingnuts will see themselves!1 n/t

[devilgrrl]

13. Personally, I think all average citizens should "go Galt"

Everyone who bags groceries, pumps gas, garbage men, auto repairmen, nurses, etc...

Watch the country grind to a halt!

Galt this Ayn Rand!

:nuke:

[The_Commonist]

31. I never get tired of this one...

[eppur_se_muova]

47. Understandably so. ;^)

:thumbsup:

[daleo]

74. Best BTAF ever. n/t

[Frank Cannon]

75. Ha ha ha. That's awesome.

Pretty much sums the whole thing up right there. :thumbsup:

[nxylas]

37. Most of the people threatening to "go Galt" *are* grocery baggers, garbagemen et al

The people waving copies of Atlas Shrugged at Tea Parties are, by and large, the ordinary working stiffs that Rand the royalist regarded as parasites upon the great and the good. If you ever see someone holding a sign reading "Who is John Galt?", the answer 99% of the time is "Not you".

[Name removed]

99. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[devilgrrl]

101. "Its sort of like socialism..." Cute quote.

[Name removed]

102. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Name removed]

105. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[devilgrrl]

106. hmmm, can't seem to locate it on google. Could you have been paraphrasing?

:popcorn:

[JackRiddler]

140. People running business empires would tend to notice the collective nature of production...

even if they supported an ideology like Rand's as one convenient for the lower orders to believe.

[Z_I_Peevey]

14. K&R

Some fascinating comments with the full article too.

[suede1]

15. I knew she was bad, but I didn't know she was that twisted.

[redqueen]

16. K&R

Sickening that such disdain for other people is so popular with so many.

[BrklynLiberal]

67. That sort of disdain is a basic tenet for repukes.

[redqueen]

80. That would explain a lot about their world view, yes.

Still sickening though. Can't help wonder what is wrong with them, to make them think that way.

[hunter]

17. Ughhhhhhhh. Ought to be a warning on that article... it's the stuff of nightmares.

Ayn Rand was a vile creature. The stench of her inhumanity seeps from all her writings. I'm always extremely suspicious of anyone who embraces her philosophies, although to be fair, many of her readers seem to be incapable of extracting the themes or objective of any story and never see beneath the surface of anything.

Rand herself didn't realize she was spewing toxic shit. Hers is a bloody stinking cholera of a philosophy that still infects or society and makes us less than animals; makes us a toxic blight upon the earth. Her heroes are not the "producers" she claims they are, they are in fact the ultimate consumers, the ultimate parasites upon human society, upon our very humanity.

[maryf]

18. The "me" generation...

has to be a spawn of hers at least indirectly...sociopath for sure. K&R

[wolfgangmo]

38. The me generation is a media creation

Just like the slacker generation.

Every generation has the few who we can point to and ridicule, but most people of most generations just want a good life and are willing to work for it IF GIVEN THE CHANCE.

Don't buy the media meme.

[maryf]

82. There is some reason for the names...

The selfishness that was evidenced in the 80's earned the title, "me generation". It is no misnomer regardless the source...

[Last_Stand]

19. Fortunately...

the REAL Superman is a stand-up guy who protects the Earth daily from asteroid impacts and mad-genius attacks.

Plus he's got two soup-bones to throw around at injustice.

:)

[Umbral]

20. I say go Galt! The Randians leaving will reduce unemployment...

and generally improve the quality of work environments, everywhere.

[Overseas]

21. K&R to highlight right wing pathology. //nt

[REP]

22. Another insight: Alan Greenspan - associating with Rand humanized me

I'm not making that up. It's from his recent book, and that plus his admission that he didn't understand Keynes (not disagreed with; didn't understand) told me all I needed to know about why the economy tanked.

[redqueen]

23. Geez... he must be waaaaaay the hell out there.

Rand humanized him? :scared:

[ocd liberal]

122. That's it there.

I have made this exact point with many family members, coworkers, etc. ever since I found out that Greenspan tidbit from Frontline's "The Warning."
You summed it up just perfectly.

[Hong Kong Cavalier]

24. That explains a lot about her #1 fan; Terry Goodkind.

His protagonist slaughters people full-out through his Sword of "Truth" series (quotes added by me) and feels little remorse over his actions.

It looks like being a sociopath is required to be a Randian.

[MattBaggins]

88. Not to mention his morbid fascination with rape

Women should just take gang rape and use it to strengthen themselves and become better for it. Rape builds character don'tcha know?

Terry Goodkind is an idiot.

[Hong Kong Cavalier]

124. Oh yes. How could I forget that.

In the entire series, doesn't the female protagonist almost get raped a dozen times?

[LisaM]

25. Thank you so much for posting this

I'll add it to my fodder of anti-Ayn materials. What a wicked woman she was.

[onestepforward]

26. K&R.

[Flatulo]

27. I've read 'The Fountainhead' and 'Atlas Shrugged' ...

I saw her works as romantic novels praising individualism and achievement, although they were both very pedantic and predictable. Her characters are very 2-dimensional.

I think the article cited in the OP is a bit dramatic. Equating libertarian principles with sociapathy is a bit of a reach. There is absolutely nothing wrong with working hard and making lots of money, as long as one pays their fair share back to the society that allowed them to reach their full potential.

Obviously, many many people today have achieved wealth not by the sweat of their brow, but by 'legalized' gambling with other peoples' money (think bankers or hedge fund managers). These are not people to be admired.

I think the ideal man of her novels would be more like a Steve Jobs - someone who changes the world for the better with the force of their will and their unstoppable drive to create excellence.

Flame away.

[Umbral]

30. "...pays their fair share back to the society..."

Romantic? Indeed.

[liberation]

43. .... except that none of the "heroes" in Rand's novels are really that succesful

they are simply flawed individuals with some serious personality disorders who spend most of their time and effort in blaming others for their very own flaws and imperfections.


Rand wanted to give more gravitas to her trite, so she insisted in portraying her books as philosophical manifestos, not works of fiction. As such, it means her novels are a clear projection of her psyche and thought processes. Any person, who while projecting, can write about a love story centered around the concept of rape is a truly degenerate piece of work. Or a seriously troubled individual.


Basically, Rand must have picked on Nietzche's "superman" theories during the boat ride from imperial Russia to the US, but only manage to read through the first 20 or 30 pages, since she missed the point Nietzche was referring at the need for societies to be based around the exaltation of those gifted individuals... who bring value added to the whole of society. That boor Nietzche thought those people were the artists, the thinkers, etc. But that point seemed to be completely lost on Rand who probably as a sociopath could not comprehend what a society is for.

Rand basically managed to make a very good living out of a perennial temper tantrum because the evil commie proles didn't feel like playing servants no more and too her toys away.

[Flatulo]

57. Respectfully disagree with your first point...

Her heroes were actually the only competent people in the world. They were extremely successful. Everyone else in the world was an idiot. The idiots were incapable of comprehending the brilliance of the heroes, but the heroes didn't care what the idiots thought. They achieved what they did for their own gratification, and for money.

[liberation]

72. And there is were I disagree, I don't tend to equate "frustrated" with "sucessful"

Yes, a lot of people suck, a lot of people are idiots. But if Ms. Rand was trying to build a case exalting the leaders of society and why they deserve to be treated with such reverence, she should not have picked her heroes to be people who happen to really suck at "leading."

Rand equates their supposed "potential for greatness" with actual "production of greatness." None, and I mean not a single damn one of the supposed achievements Rand tries to assign to her "heroes" is deserved as a personal accolade, since those productions required large amounts of labor capital. Also in her books, her heroes do not achieve much, they simply spend the whole book "fighting" the system and complaining. Basically, because Rand at a personal level had no first hand experience on having produced anything remarkable at all, and thus could not articulate the process in her books.

That is why I said Ms. Rand did not get Nietzche at all, he could get away with the exaltation of individual achievement because he was focused on art and philosophy, which indeed can be thought of in some cases as an individual undertaking. Some paintings are indeed the creation of a single great painter, or a symphony may be the production of a musical genius, etc. But not everything can be thought of that way: a conductor needs good musicians in the orchestra to shine, a choreographer needs great dancers to carry his vision, and architect needs great engineers and contractors to
materialize his ideas, etc.

[nashville_brook]

93. great point...that potential doesn't equal genius or success...

i'm just going to provide this as one example: it's a trap that gifted/talented kids fall into. if you're good at nearly everything your elem/middle school throws at you; and you score well on the special tests they give you, then congratulations...you're a genius. then, you're sent back to your normal classes where, as a genius, nothing challenges you, and you start to equate being smart with *not being challenged,* and you never learn to try stuff and fail. this way they can always be the *potential genius* -- and you might learn some of these noxious behaviors that lead to becoming a character in an Ayn Randian narrative.

Ayn Rand's characters are exactly these kinds of kids all grown up living in the fantasy where you get to be a genius without ever actually producing anything...or, being challenged.

these "great" people only exist in fiction, b/c in real life they're called underachievers and they have shitty jobs doing meaningless/boring work, and bitch about having to play by rules that rest of the world has to play by.

i'm speaking from personal experience...not casting aspersions on all gifties. if it weren't for some amazing profs in college who taught me that it's okay to be challenged...in fact, that's the POINT...then i might have become one of these awful people. i was very lucky.

[Flatulo]

112. I don't understand this comment...

> Ayn Rand's characters are exactly these kinds of kids all grown up living in the fantasy where you get to be a genius without
> ever actually producing anything...or, being challenged

The characters I remember from Atlas were productive geniuses. Dagny Taggart resurrected a rail system that had fallen into disrepair and was a public hazard. Hank Reardon invented a new steel that was 3X stronger than conventional structural steel. Remember he designed a bridge that everyone predicted would fail? Of course, the bridge was an utter success.

The conflict for Reardon came when the government wanted to expropriate his steel formula for the 'greater good' of society. Reardon destroyed the formula rather than give up ownership if it.

The essence of Rand's characters is their rigid belief that they were the sole owners of their intellectual achievements. They would rather destroy their creations than give them over for the good of all. This is exactly the path that John Galt chose.

Where her philosophy departs from reality is in the assumption that her heroes brainstormed their creations in a vacuum. Nearly all technical achievements rely heavily on the the work of others who came before, and that most inventions rely in some part on research that was publically funded in some way.

[liberation]

119. I am getting the impression, you are being obfuscated on purpose in order to protect your narrative.

Rand's characters and their "achievements" are dubious and arbitrary, and always follow a "convenient" reality in order to completely fit Rand's intended narrative. She made every character from her heroes to the villains utterly one-dimensional. That is why I mean their achievements are meaningless, because Rand's prose is childish to the extreme. Rand was a remarkably mediocre person trying to write authoritatively regarding genius and achievement. That is why her characters fail miserably at being taken seriously as "heroes."

The whole point is that Rand always tries to make society's real victims as the villains, while trying to convince us the power brokers and the people behind inequality are the real "victims." That is why none of her books and characters are believable, and that is why her prose comes off as childish and shortsighted to the extreme. Her literary production is nothing but a decade-long temper tantrum by a spoiled unremarkable little girl.

[nashville_brook]

133. "a remarkably mediocre person trying to write authoritatively regarding genius and achievement" --

eggsactly.

[verges]

114. As I recall....

Howard Roarke was a terrible failure because of his unwillingness to conform; until he resorted to terrorism!!! Though I can respect his artistic integrity, his use of rape to romance the woman he wanted and the wanton destruction of other people's property to assert his artistic independence is detestible at best!

[Flatulo]

115. If you think that Roarke's failure was his unwillingness to conform, then

I think you may have missed the whole point of the book.

Her heroes were all non-conformists.

[verges]

117. His failure wasn't his unwillingness to conform.

Just the opposite. His unwillingness to conform was the cause of his failure. He was broke and couldn't hold on to a job. His genius wasn't recognized (yes, I know that was the point.) My point is that the SOB was broke. He sucked at capitalism.

Now, it's been twenty years at least since I've read the silly book (I HAVE seen the movie more recently) and I have absolutely no desire to read it again.


I will confess that I actually enjoyed the movie. A cast I generally like: Gary Cooper, Raymond Massey, Patricia Neal (who is stunning as a blond in this flick) and even Ray Collins. I laughed a lot. The comic book style of the film (the art direction and sets) The waaaay over the top sexual imagery (riding crops, drills!) where an absolute hoot!

[Flatulo]

118. Yeah, Patricia Neal was pretty hot with those riding crops! nt

[WinkyDink]

45. Some readers might be over-dramatic; some might be naive.

[hunter]

48. Steve Jobs?????

No, I don't even want to know where that observation came from...

But it is perversely close to the mark, I think.

Steve Jobs makes that Capitalist Shark Bill Gates look like a squishy humanist.

If Jobs has the qualities of an Ayn Rand hero this probably explains how every PC got owned by Bill Gates, even those computers Apple sells as Macs. Ordinary people tend to shy away from fascists, even fascists who always dress as if it's casual Friday. Single minded capitalists like Gates are a bit more pleasant to do business with.

Me and my Linux penguin are going to walk away now.

[Flatulo]

68. The issue isn't whether you personally like or dislike Jobs.

Actually, my sister worked for Apple for many years. He was an absolute fuck of a prick of a despot of a meglomaniac tyrant. He would fire people if he didn't like their tie. He would drive engineering teams to near death to meet schedules. If you disagreed with him in any way, you were history.

But he has kept Apple alive, against all odds, and has brought major innovations to way we listen to music and use our cell phones. This happened largely based on the force of his will. And he has made billions of dollars. These traits would make him a Rand hero.

[zeemike]

52. It may well be that every libertarian is not a sociopath

But every sociopath is a libertarian because they like the ideas of no restraint....but they are not limited to one idea like libertarianism because there are other things that allow them to "reach their full potential" like fascism and the KKK.....my guess is that they would embrace anything that allows them to rise to the top including religon.

[krabigirl]

60. what about left libertarians?

[zeemike]

77. Well that would be me.

Because i am very much interested in liberty but with justice. And there can be no true liberty until there is justice.

[liberation]

120. You mean, liberals?

[anonymous171]

121. You mean anarchists? nt

[femrap]

54. I won't flame at you...

I've read lots of Rand...long ago in the academic days of poli sci. And I've read bios on her as well. This is the first I've heard of this fascination she had with a murderer. She had a long affair with a very much younger man when she was married.

She seemed to hate bureaucracy....be it government or corporate.

I'd bet lots of money that 95% of the people who are responding on this thread haven't read any of her books, be it novels or theory. Hell, it would take most of them a lifetime to read 'Atlas Shrugged.'

I just don't understand the hatred of her...unless these little 'lefties' simply hate Russian women.

She was not a sociopath. Saying that reveals ignorance.

[nightgaunt]

55. She just loved to be like him thats all

Sure I'm not a psychopath/sociopath I just love who they are and what they can do without empathy or sympathy. Yes in a way they are "superior to us" they have no moral restraint so they can do anything no matter how heinous or evil. Yes such a being is a form of "superman" but more like the evil version.I wonder what she thought of the Nazis? Maybe they were too "socialist" because of their title, that and too religious.

[Flatulo]

59. Have you read her books? nt

[Flatulo]

58. I can't speak to her sanity, but at the time I read her works, her writings certainly

struck a chord with me. This was 35 years ago when I was pretty much working myself to death in engineering school. It certainly seemed to me to be a reasonable expectation that I would be able to make and keep a lot of money.

I see no problem with society placing a higher value on some people's efforts than others. Engineering is hard. Surgery is hard. Law is hard.

Absolutely anyone can be a waitress or convenience store clerk. Almost no one can be a brain surgeon or a nuclear physicist.

[femrap]

83. It's funny how everyone takes such

a different message from Rand. I understood her to praise ability...I believe she would see a waitress/waiter as needed in society and that person is either doing a good job or a bad one.

Believe me, not everyone can be a waitress/waiter. Obviously you haven't done this work or if you did, you never had nasty customers to serve. I found it physically demanding on the feet and back. I found it emotionally draining in that one had to be nice to assholes. I was an 'eat it or wear it' person.

People are born with certain talents and either their environment encourages that talent or it doesn't.

I, too, went through Engineering School. Does that make me a better person than a waitress? No.

I believe Rand HATED bureaucracy....and those that got positions of power because their brother-in-law got them the job.

She lived in a very different time than we do today...plus she lived through the Russian Revolution. This must have effected her deeply.

I believe good teachers should make as much money as a good engineer. It's all about the money, huh? Happiness? Health? Peace? Kindness? Love?

WASF.

[Flatulo]

111. To your points...

> I understood her to praise ability...I believe she would see a waitress/waiter as needed in society and that person is either doing a good
> job or a bad one.

This is true. She admired a character who could make a good cheeseburger as long as they did so to the best of their ability.

> I, too, went through Engineering School. Does that make me a better person than a waitress? No.

Obviously not, but certainly one who's talents and contributions are worth more in a semi-free market economy such as ours, where salaries are largely determined by the laws of supply and demand (except in the corporate boardroom, where the game is rigged and incompetence is rewarded).

> I believe Rand HATED bureaucracy....and those that got positions of power because their brother-in-law got them the job.

I think Ms. Rand would be revolted by the culture of entitlement that exists today in corporater America. Boards of Directors appoint their pals as CEOs, and the CEOs in turn put their pals in the Board. They then proceed to loot the company to enrich theirselves and screw the public and the shareholders. The system of corporate governance we have today is no different than the system that she fled, where pull mattered more than ability.

[brownp51]

131. To Flatulo

I agree with you. I liked The Fountainhead. I like many books written by people I probably would not like as personal friends. I could relate to many of her characters and found her descriptive prose interesting. Your comment about her "hating bureaucracy" really strikes a chord with me having just retired from an environment exactly as you described in your last paragraph. She was personally a nut, and people who made a working philosophy out of her work I find a little suspect as well, as I do anyone who idolizes celebrities. She has her groupies, and they happen to be very powerful folks. That's a shame. It's a book. It's fiction. It's a story. She was a personal mess...what's new?

[Flatulo]

146. Pete Townsend was a pedophile, yet the Who produced some of the

finest rock ever created. 'Tommy' and 'Quadrophenia' were absolute masterpieces.

[Threedifferentones]

141. There is the other side of the coin as well, however.

Just as it is reasonable to believe that more people can make and serve a good meal than perform surgery, it is also reasonable to believe that more people could grow a fortune of many millions into even more than can perform surgery.

I mean, how hard is it to buy things that people will want later, and then sell them once the price goes up? When you need never worry about paying for daily life, because you have so much saved up? But, the lowly waiter will get no respect, and maybe not even health insurance, while the rich heir will get praised for his "hard work," which consisted of nothing other than deciding when to buy or sell and telling other people how to serve him.

So, while I will readily admit that an engineer deserves to drive a nicer car, live in a bigger house, watch a bigger television, and travel more than a janitor, I do not believe, as Raynd did, that greed is always good, and that we all ought to just hoard as much wealth as possible so as to control the lives of other people.

Please don't take this as me implying you agree with Rand's philosophy, Flatulo, I am just trying to add to an interesting conversation.

[Flatulo]

145. Thanks for the comment - I think most reasonable people

would agree that the horrific economic conditions we are seeing today, with record amounts of wealth being concentrated in ever fewer hands, is ample evidence that unrestrained greed is not an economic system.

[MattBaggins]

92. That's nice and all

but actually how difficult something is is not the main indicator of it's value.

I'm understand that she may have "struck a chord" with you; but the woman was disturbed. She took the rantings of a mad man who slaughtered a 12 year old girl and praised it. She took his claim that "what is good for me is right" and parroted it as her own so-called philosophy.

Ayn Rand was a spoiled brat who couldn't succeed on her own merits and it was every one else's fault.

[Flatulo]

116. You're right about this...

> but actually how difficult something is is not the main indicator of it's value.

This is true, and if I claimed otherwise, then I mis-stated my thoughts. Some things that are extremely hard for some people come very easily to others; it's largely determined by how our brains are wired, which is pretty much dumb luck. For example, math always came easy to me, so I entered engineering, but I absolutely cannot master any kind of musical instrument, and I struggle with any foreign language.

What I was trying to say is that in a semi-free market such as ours, higher value is placed on things that fewer people are naturally good at. Since so few people are good at brain surgery (whether from lack of ability or lack of access to training), we pay brain surgeons lots of money.

> Ayn Rand was a spoiled brat who couldn't succeed on her own merits and it was every one else's fault.

That's a rather bizarre statement about an author who is as widely read as her ... She may have been a spoiled brat, but she certainly succeded in the commercial sense. Whether or not she was miserable for most of her life, I do not know - but I suspect so. Who could possibly live up to her standards?

There was a movie about her a few years back starring Helen Mirren and Eric Stolz. I had lost interest in her, so I never watched it.

[nashville_brook]

135. i offer myself as a counter-example to "anyone can be a waitress" -- it's a gift to be able

to be a GOOD waitress, and it's a gift that I don't have, and that many people I know don't have. i also can't do retail, i just don't have the personality for it, and i am completely appreciative and in awe of people who can do it, and really like doing it. waiting tables and doing retail were the two most difficult jobs i've ever had.

for me, it's much easier to do the specialized work that i went to college for.

[Flatulo]

150. OK, let's further differentiate between 'ability' and 'temperment'.

Any physically able person should have the needed ability to perform the duties of a waiter/waitress, but they might be tempermentally unsuited to be any good at.

By contrast, having the hand-eye coordination plus massive medical knowledge to be a surgeon is simply not an ability that many people have.

FWIW, I never implied that waiting was an easy job. I think it's a very hard job that pays poorly, so I always tip 20% at a minimum, and will go to 30-40% for really good service.

[lolly]

85. Hmm---idolizing a child murderer is romantic?

How can a description of a man who murders a 12 year old girl, dismembers her body, and taunts her father with it be OVER dramatized?

Equating sociopathology with admiration of such a man is hardly a reach. It is a reach NOT to note the sociopathology here.

How can anybody think that a woman who admires such a murderer is interested in people who change the world for the better?

[MattBaggins]

91. Flame away?

You can make up attributes for her characters and claim what you want about "what she really meant" but there are facts that contradict your desires to have her be more human in her world veiw. She wrote plenty of notes and "essays" on what her "superman" would be like and it was not Steve Jobs. She herself describes the perfect rational being as a psychopath.

[Flatulo]

113. I'd like to see the citation for that so that I can examine the context.

Never mind - I just found it.

[heliarc]

94. Weber calls it the zweckrational

And it's brand of libertarian rationalization coincides nicely within a fascist aesthetic that will justify all manner of horrors because the individual of strong will requires it.

Ayn Rand is fascism marketed to Americans. Its the wolf in sheep's clothing.... She's Fascist scum ... and that's generous.

[fascisthunter]

144. yikes

[Echo In Light]

28. Creepy. How does a woman fantasize/exalt a man who dismembered a little girl?

[redqueen]

29. Someone posted a "how to be a hero in an Ayn Rand novel" flowchart...

can't find it now. If you posted it and you see this please link me up, cause I'd like to save that.

[onestepforward]

32. Is this it?

Found it here: http://www.cracked.com/funny-304-ayn-rand/

[semillama]

34. Cracked FTW!

those guys are geniuses.

[redqueen]

40. Yes that's it... thanks!

:hi:

[onestepforward]

44. Glad I could find it!

It was very interesting!
:hi:

[XemaSab]

71. Perfect

:D

[704wipes]

35. here it is

http://www.cracked.com/funny-304-ayn-rand/

Google is your friend, sometimes.

[redqueen]

39. I did Google... I remembered it as "hero" and not "character"

ugh... some people. :eyes:

[upi402]

33. Ayn Rand's Greenspan's hero. Andrea Mitchell is married to him

What is she doing on MSNBC? I've always contended that conservatives are missing the capacity to empathize. They are not completely human. And this tells me all I need to know about Andrea Mitchell's heartless spin against average Americans.

[BillyBob99]

36. ATLAS SHRUGGED: THE ABRIDGED VERSION (with spoilers)

ATLAS SHRUGGED: THE ABRIDGED VERSION (with spoilers)

AYN RAND:
Hello, I'm Ayn Rand. I wrote a novel based on my Objectivist philosophy called The Fountainhead, but I don't think 700 pages was quite enough to get my point across, so I will write the exact same novel, only it will take 1100 pages this time.

READERS:
Hey, great.

HEROINE:
I'm Dagny Taggart. I am a railroad tycoon, woman-in-a-man's-world, stunningly beautiful heroine. I am the only person capable of running this railroad. I am the only woman in the universe worth a damn. I am also the only woman in the universe with a real job. I am basically the only woman in this novel.

LOVE INTEREST #1:
I have worshiped you, the only woman in the universe worth a damn, from afar for my whole life.

HEROINE:
That's nice.

LOVE INTEREST #2:
I have worshiped you, the only woman in the universe worth a damn, naked on the forest floor. Yet I will nobly step aside in the name of noble idealism, despite the fact that I love you and want you, the only woman in the universe worth a damn, desperately.

HEROINE:
Okay.

LOVE INTEREST #3:
I worship you, the only woman in the universe worth a damn. Let us have creepy rape fantasy sex now. I will not ask permission to do all these kinky things to you, but luckily you want to be forced into all the kinky things, you dirty bitch.

HEROINE:
This is clearly true love! Stick it in me.

ALL:
Who is John Galt?

AYN RAND:
I am not telling. Instead, please listen to someone pontificate about my Objectivist philosophy for a while.

SOMEONE:


VILLAINS:
There are many of us, but we are all exactly the same. We are caricatures of evil socialists and embodiments of pure evil. Let us create a perfect socialist world order ruled by the inept! We all suck! Socialism sucks! Ha ha!

HEROES:
We are all exactly the same. We are noble and perfect and have very angular and insolent faces. We can read each other's minds and the minds of everyone else in this novel, leaving less room for misunderstanding and more room for pontificating. And we are all in love with Dagny Taggart, the only woman in the universe worth a damn.

ALL:
Who is John Galt?

VILLAIN:


HERO:

If it's heads, I will gaze apathetically. If it's tails, I will laugh heartily.

VILLAIN:
Although these are the only two things any of you heroes have done for the past 800 pages, I am shocked at this response! How could you! How dare you!?!

HERO:
I will now pontificate about Ayn Rand's philosophy. It has been at least 50 pages since you've heard it.

AYN RAND:
It is so convenient that all of my heroes are in perfect agreement about my philosophy so that their pontificating is so interchangeable.

ALL:
Who is John Galt?

JOHN GALT:
Hello. In this, the culmination of all the pontificating, I will explain Ayn Rand's philosophy for a full 57 pages. No, I am not kidding. This one monologue will last for 57 pages. Oh and also, I love Dagny.

DAGNY:
I love you too. Man, this is really going to suck for Love Interest #3.

LOVE INTEREST #3:
Despite my passionate love for you and enjoyment of our rape sex, and the fact that there is no other woman on earth worth a damn, and the fact that I sacrificed my life's passion on your behalf, and that I spent my entire fortune to get a divorce to be with you, I will now nobly step aside in the name of noble idealism.

DAGNY:
Great! I will miss our creepy rape sex. Farewell.

LOVE INTEREST #3:
Bye.

READER:
Wait, what?

ATLAS:


THE END

[redqueen]

41. LOL

I'm sure that's much better than the original.

[wolfgangmo]

42. Brilliant

But I hope you didn't have to read that drivel to come up with this synopsis.

[20score]

61. That's great! You should post this as an orginal.

[VOX]

127. Damn! You got tombstoned for this? It's ART!!!!! n/t

[nashville_brook]

138. i was wondering the same thing...might not be b/c of the post, since it wasn't deleted.

/shrugs/

[Prof Lester]

148. OFF TOPIC: Love your cat, dude.. Can I steal him?

[JVS]

49. Good old Mark Ames.

[onehandle]

50. Ayn Rand sucks.

Whatever circle of Hell she's in, she's sucking something.

[Arkana]

56. They made a video game based on Ayn Rand's brainchild.

It's called Bioshock, and it's about an underwater city that has been torn apart and is populated by genetically enhanced freaks called "splicers".

Yeah.

[arcadian]

64. I think I played that.

Is it all Art Deco?

[Arkana]

73. Pretty much. The city, Rapture, was founded in the late 50s.

Since the game takes place in the 60s, the city is mostly retro design with future elements (like the genetic modifications, plasmids, etc.)

[Occulus]

90. "Is a man not entitled to the sweat of his brow?

No, says the man in Washington; it belongs to the poor.
No, says the man in the Vatican; it belongs to God.
No, says the man in Moscow; it belongs to everyone.

I rejected those answers. Instead, I chose something different. I chose the impossible.
I chose... Rapture.

A city where the artist would not fear the censor, where the scientist would not be bound by petty morality, where the great would not be constrained by the small.

And, with the sweat of your brow, Rapture can become your city as well..."

-Andrew Ryan, introduction, Bioshock

In Bioshock, players take the role of Jack, sole survivor of an airplane crash in the middle of the Atlantic in 1960. Jack finds himself floating amid the debris of the crash, and discovers a large lighthouse nearby. On investigation, he finds the lighthouse contains a bathysphere, which takes him to a city the size of Manhattan on the ocean floor.

Welcome to Rapture.

The city is the brainchild of free-market Randian capitalist Andrew Ryan (yes, the name is deliberate), who wanted to build a place where the best and brightest of humanity could go and "do their thing" apart from the rest of society. Sound familiar? Yet, as usual, something goes terribly wrong.

While working in Neptune's Bounty (one of the playable areas of this game), one of the dockworkers discovers an odd, previously unknown species of sea slug. As it happens, one of the dockworker's hands is badly deformed. The slug bites him, and the next day, his hand is good as new. On investigation, Rapture scientists discover that the slug injects stem cells into its victim as it bites, and these stem cells become the basis for what are known as plasmids- injectable genetic material that is capable of instantly rewriting the genetic code of anyone who uses it to give them fantastic abilities. Such abilities include lighting a fire with a snap of the finger, shooting bolts of electricity from the palm of one's hand, and even hatching killer bees from one's arm.

You can imagine what happened next. Fueled by the increasingly weaponized nature of the plasmids, civil war broke out in Rapture on New Year's Eve, 1959. The end result was the fall of Rapture as a city and its rise as a vast chamber of horrors, in which little girls (known as Little Sisters) wander about the place, using a syringe with an attached sippy-cup to suck blood from fallen corpses, so they can drink it and allow a slug embedded in their stomachs to reprocess the ADAM (carried in the blood of those who overused the plasmids, known as "splicers") and keep the wheels of Rapture turning.

Bioshock is an almost-perfect dystopic deconstruction of Randian free-market capitalism writ large on the stage of this fallen city. Decorated with an art deco theme throughout, yet leaking and falling apart almost everywhere, Bioshock is at once a study of contrasts, a grand vision, and a warning rolled into one.

[Arkana]

100. Would you kindly go get stomped by a Big Daddy?

[Occulus]

104. It was such a nice moment, wasn't it?

And what a twist. That phrase was in the game literally from the very first ten seconds of the opening sequence.

Marvelous game, and the sequel isn't bad either.

[Arkana]

108. "A MAN CHOOSES...A SLAVE OBEYS!"

Did you think the sequel was better or worse than the first? Personally, I thought it was slightly worse in quality...there are a lot of technical issues with the PC version, not to mention that the story is basically a rehash of the first with Lamb retconned in as the villain.

[Occulus]

109. I'm still working through it. I'm in Siren's Alley right now...

I'm loving the map design. It's nothing short of fantastic. I'm still trying to let myself be drawn into the story, though. There seems to be something missing. What that is, I probably won't know until the end of the game.

I have to agree, the first game was better in the sense that everything was "new". Rapture sure has fallen apart in the ten years since the events of the first game, though. It's way more run-down than it was.

I'm also finding that the characterization of the bosses isn't quite as good as in the first game. The people "in charge" seem more sane, somehow. For example, there's nothing like Steinman or Cohen to be seen thus far. The Big Sisters, though.... brr. I hate the Big Sisters. Hate them hate them hate them, but in a "good" way. Nimble little minx, isn't she? :D

What I'd like to see- and it's supposedly in pre-production- is a Bioshock movie. All the elements are there except for a speaking role for the protagonist (kinda important detail there, wot?). Done properly, a Bioshock feature film could be amazing.

[Arkana]

110. Oh God...if you think the people in charge are saner, wait. Just wait.

And you're right about the Big Sisters. Hearing that awful SHRIEKING as you rescue the last of the Little Sisters, and knowing that one of them is coming...oh god, it's terrifying.

Still, the Big Daddy's drill KICKS ASS.

[Occulus]

126. What is this "rescue" of which you speak?

:P

[Arkana]

132. You MONSTER.

[johnaries]

62. Can this be independently verified?

If so, this would be devastating. But, if it is open to speculation then the Randians would rally to "Liberals are trying to destroy us!"

Personally, I think it is better to just point out the errors in the theory itself - or the positions of Randians.

For instance, Ron Paul wants to repeal the income tax. As evidence that it is "unnecessary" he points to the time pre-income tax. However, the US was raking in huge revenues from a highly protective tariff - which, btw, was rampant with corruption. But, Ron Paul is against a protective tariff such as we had during the period pre-income tax. His argument contradicts itself, when viewed through the lens of history.

edit to add: however, most people's eyes just glaze over when you argue history. So, if it is provable that Ayn Rand was a verifiable sociopath - that sells much better in today's market of public opinion.

[nashville_brook]

137. it's in her notebooks, Rand biographer Anne Heller also wrote her infatuation with Hickman.

only, in Heller's book, the girl who was murdered was 8 years old, and not 12.

[timtom]

63. The responses to my initial little jape

and its sequel were so, so predictable. I'm sorry for the hurt feelings I've caused. Truly. And, I won't do it again. I do wish you guys could take it as well as you dish it.

[kestrel91316]

65. O.M.G. This explains so much about her twisted anti-human philosophy.

We need to scream this from the rooftops ANY TIME ANYONE starts spewing Randist crap.

[applegrove]

66. No surprise she is a sociopath. She wrote about life as if their was never anything

to consider but simple nakid ambition.

[bvar22]

69. Ayn who?

Oh, Ayn Rand.....
Didn't she write FICTION?
I prefer reality based literature.

She did have a lot of sympathy for Serial Killer Wild Bill Hickman.
Apparently, she felt he was never able to achieve his true potential because he was heavily burdened by the restraints imposed upon him by the limiting Social Pressures of the times.

Ayn felt that as a result of this social and legal bondage, he was only able to achieve an embarrassingly low body count. He had the inherent potential for a much higher number, but The World blocked him from achieving the greatness he deserved.

The WORLD just isn't fair to geniuses, or posters on Free Republic.

[annabanana]

78. heh heh heh

(love the pic)

[bkohatlanta]

70. Ayn Rand and the Russian Revolution

We all have culprits who we blame for the bad things that happen. I remember that Nicholas II's statue stands in the Hague because he was of the main proponents of the Geneva and Hague Conventions. He was also the man who pleaded with the world to submit the Assassination of Franz Ferdinand and Sophie and Serbian involvement to the Hague for arbitration. 20,000,000 people died because Kaiser Wilhelm II, President Raymond Poincaré and King George V wouldn't listen to him. The real tragedy is that the real evil in Russia were Russian Industrialists like Ayn Rand's Father(and her Mother's Family), who were vicious to their employees, employed children as young as 8 to work in their factories, who had to work 16 hour days.
I read that Ayn always lamented the loss of her birthright in Russia.
To tell you the truth, that makes two things I hate about Ayn Rand. And that doesn't include the things I don't like about her.

[RedCloud]

76. Rivers of fascism flowed through her like a fountainhead.

[rpannier]

79. I always knew that woman was crazy

Just never realized she was a prison-groupie

Not surprising that conservatives have are followers of a philosophy with it's roots in the dewy-eyed fawnings of a sociopath

[gtar100]

81. She is so wrong about the concept of a Superman or Overman from Nietzsche.

It doesn't take a great consciousness to shut out compassion and empathy; it takes anger, self-pity and a mind that is obsessed with the self. That's not rising above our frailties, it's sinking into them. For me, the superman Nietzsche wrote about was unhindered by human weaknesses but also held on to the higher faculties of both heart and mind. Nietzsche wasn't perfect in his descriptions and seemed a little bitter about the current state of humanity but he was at least thoughtful and insightful. Ayn Rand seems only to have been looking to justify her own selfishness and greed. The more I learn about Ayn Rand, the more contempt I feel for her. She has been a horrible, horrible influence on this world.

[nashville_brook]

136. [phone] -- Nietzsche hated the meanness that came with "received morality"

an ethics that comes from anywhere but from an authentic self (sans the invisible authority of "god") is worthless to him. the emphasis is on BOTH being a good person AND doing it without the threat of hell, etc.

[nightgaunt]

142. Very true on that

An example he identified as a living ubermensch wasn't Napoleon but Goethe! Nietzsche despised the "nobles" and their actions. He criticized Germans most of all and only had praise for Jews. He liked the kind of mentality of groups for mutual support within the Slaves but wanted that to be in place of what the selfish ones of the Master Mentality exhibited. It is amazing how many people miss that. The "Blond Beast" he refers to is the African lion, not any racial characteristic.

Reading Nietzsche is easy but understanding him is hard. He doesn't write in clear unambiguous prose either.

Ayn Rand's ethos was one of selfishness, worship of self, greed, atomism of society into distinct islands with little group dynamic. (One can have both without sacrificing either.) That and without empathy of any kind coupled with money, a sharp mind and ambition one can go very high in societies like ours. We see it all the time. It is one of the successful psychopath. Not a place we would or should want to live and be like.

[WillYourVoteBCounted]

89. Voting Machine Monopoly ES&S located at 11208 John Galt Blvd

Ironic isn't it, the voting machine company that has now purchased Diebold
and counts most of the votes in the US:

ES&S Corporate Headquarters

Election Systems & Software
11208 John Galt Blvd
Omaha, NE 68137
www.essvote.com

http://www.essvote.com/HTML/contact/contact.html

[Name removed]

95. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[mitchum]

98. She would have gushed over Leopold and Loeb a few years before, but she didn't like Jews

Unlike Hickman, that pair really did subscribe to a misreading of the superman theory

[invictus]

103. Ayn Rand was Jewish (born Alisa Rosenabaum). So was her boyfriend Alan Greenspan.

[mitchum]

107. Yes she was, but look for Florence King's essay about Alice's issues with that fact

it is very insightful

[earth mom]

123. Sounds like Rand was a sociopath herself-one of many rethugs no doubt. nt

[Richard Steele]

125. Clearly, some seriousy FUCKED UP shit occurred in her childhood.

Has anyone ever investigated her childhood?

I'm guessing that her dad must have been much more twisted
than most of today's ordinary daughter-raping pedophiles,
for her to have been so impresed by a murderer at such an age.

Did she have sisters that her daddy killed in her presence?
Inquiring minds want to know.

[nashville_brook]

134. I've read a couple of biographies, and there's nothing about that. she idolized her father

and hated her mother. the father was largely absent from the family, running his business.


completely recommend "Ayn Rand and the World She Made" by Anne C. Heller.
http://www.amazon.com/Ayn-Rand-World-She-Made/dp/0385513992/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1267374695&sr=8-1

[redqueen]

151. Sweet Jesus...

not every person who is victimized in that way turns into a person like Ayn... and not every person like Ayn has such an excuse.

Jesus.

[nikto]

128. Where is her grave?

Let's all go and piss on it.
:P

[nikto]

129. Drink a lot of beer 1st

A couple quarts of Blue Moon Ale will do.




Aiming RIGHT is so apropos.
;)

[Orrex]

130. Horrifying as all of this is, I have to say that the article itself is rather poorly written

A minor quibble, perhaps, but 145 posts into the thread, I didn't want simply to echo the (absolutely true) charge that Rand was a monster.

[bridgit]

139. Like Mitt Romney's sons; Rand had early on made the career decision to disengage...

As do Libertarians today, her squawking progeny, see themselves doing in these forms of want and desire for all proceeds for themselves by having been legislated out from under Democracy: no taxation, liaise fare, wind fall, no-bid capitalism and in that process *from* any responsibilities to a host nation - specifically their shared national goals, which such people rather too often consider unworthy of their time, their energies, their careers, their children again ala Mitt Romney's sons, every other Bush family member you'll never see cinching into a Kevlar vest on the battlefield, etc; and least of all their money and their reasons why they consider themselves so apart from the rest of the world

Miss Rand is a wordy mock-revolutionary hiding behind her Jewish intellectualism an incidence of cultured pamper quite different from the Russian girls she was also afforded the opportunity to have "witnessed" walking past everyday in their dress from home which she may have thought a form peasant wear

By embracing the freedoms of sociopathic thinkers & serial killers she obfuscates her own understanding - perhaps as an antidote *to* her own thinking that explained to her, like a little bird on your shoulder, that, as an agreed matter round a family supper table different from many in Russia - that she was far too special, far too unable to participate in the world around her due to familial thoughts of elitism and so much less likely to crawl through any bloody trench anyway least of *all* the one right in front of her parlor window enter John Galt

A Brief Biography of Ayn Rand

Ayn Rand was born in St. Petersburg, Russia, on February 2, 1905. At age six she taught herself to read and two years later discovered her first fictional hero in a French magazine for children, thus capturing the heroic vision which sustained her throughout her life. At the age of nine, she decided to make fiction writing her career. Thoroughly opposed to the mysticism and collectivism of Russian culture, she thought of herself as a European writer, especially after encountering Victor Hugo, the writer she most admired.

During her high school years, she was eyewitness to both the Kerensky Revolution, which she supported, and—in 1917—the Bolshevik Revolution, which she denounced from the outset. In order to escape the fighting, her family went to the Crimea, where she finished high school. The final Communist victory brought the confiscation of her father's pharmacy and periods of near-starvation. When introduced to American history in her last year of high school, she immediately took America as her model of what a nation of free men could be.

When her family returned from the Crimea, she entered the University of Petrograd to study philosophy and history. Graduating in 1924, she experienced the disintegration of free inquiry and the takeover of the university by communist thugs. Amidst the increasingly gray life, her greatest pleasures were Viennese operettas and Western films and plays. Long an admirer of cinema, she entered the State Institute for Cinema Arts in 1924 to study screenwriting. It was at this time that she was first published: a booklet on actress Pola Negri (1925) and a booklet titled “Hollywood: American Movie City” (1926), both reprinted in 1999 in Russian Writings on Hollywood.

http://www.aynrand.org/site/PageServer?pagename=about_ayn_rand_aynrand_biography

An assessment of Rand's reputation a decade and a half after her death must account for several contradictory factors. Few professional philosophers take her work at all seriously, yet many groups of readers and fans still debate and write about her theories. Her work continues to appeal to those who search for non-religious answers about human progress and agency. Certainly her declaration that selfishness is a virtue and altruism a vice is contrary to traditional Jewish values—yet her exaltation of personal ambition is not so different from that of many Russian Jewish immigrants of her generation who savored the relative freedom of America. Despite their dismissal by the critical establishment, her books continue to sell. Together, her novels have sold approximately twenty-five million copies, a figure that still grows by about 250,000 every year. Rand might not have succeeded in achieving the immediate influence of a crusading novelist like Harriet Beecher Stowe, as she had hoped, but her popularity today testifies to an enduring appeal.

http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/biography/Rand.html

It always seems to come down to 'isms'. Slap an 'ism' on it and it nearly becomes a topic. Grow a go-tee and you can peddle reams of isms in the coffee houses of the world. But Miss Rand was far too special for that...she went straight to Hollywood where she peddled it not by the whisker, but via ink & paper by the ton lending yet new facet to "aloof, high riding (fill in the blank)". But its the shear tonnage that makes her disciples conclude behind glazed eyes, certainly some of them...

"Ayn Rand has to know what she is talking about. Look at all these words!"

[fascisthunter]

143. yet, she's an idol to many well off Americans

figures... sociopathy seems to be a trend with the well-off.

[99 Percent Sure]

147. She was a nut. n/t

[DirkGently]

149. Rand reminds me of Scientology

... with her clueless, pedestrian appropriation of and infatuation with the idea of "competence." "The Fountainhead," suggested to me by a college girlfriend, was, skinny as it is, the first book in my life I remember throwing down in disgust and refusing to finish. Preachy AND dumb? No thanks.

Rand's a mass of contradiction. An immigrant who hated immigrants. A woman who conceptualized sex as consensual rape. A fierce defender of personal autonomy and the power of genius who depended on family for support (and reneged on promises to repay them) then quickly re-wrote her personal history to falsify her educational achievements and paper over her failure as a screenwriter. Of course she had no problem envisioning a supremely "competent" designer of buildings to be built by other people, for the use of other people ... but with no regard for -- whouda thunk -- other people.

It's not just a mangled rationalization for selfishness, either. It's a mangled rationalization for selfishness AND a weirdo personal arrogance and active contempt for others, which is what I'm getting out of the "Ayn (hearts)Sociopaths" article. An active hatred of a vast cloud of "those other people" out there somewhere.`If you pull that thread of the "producers vs. parasites" thinking a little, and assume that Rand and her acolytes think they'd come out better off in a non-cooperative world, it's got a distinctly fascist / racist tang to it. Which is what a lot of people seem to think is going on behind Dr. Ron Paul's pleasant-sounding-at-first-but-oddly-smug brand of libertarianism. I think maybe they're not wrong about that.

Rand seems to me like the philosophy for people looking to feel superior about themselves and their own intellect despite significant evidence to the contrary, in order to feel good about taking advantage of everything society and "collectivism" offer, while pointedly giving nothing back.

(As an aside, I played through the original "Bioshock" people have mentioned here recently -- the stylized, Howard Hawk rantings of the Randian "Andrew Ryan" character about "men vs. the parasites" and all the fascist statuary depicting the "The great chain of industry" in the ruins of a sunken streamline/ deco distopia made for a great backdrop to a paranoid storyline). Creepy.

The article is a great find. Thanks for posting it.