I wonder how much better off we'd be if Ayn Rand never lived

[Roland99]

Although, actually, it probably wouldn't have mattered much. Some other prophet of selfish greed would have come forward and become the beacon of light for those who think only about themselves while wrapping themselves up in pages of red, white, and blue Bible.

Is it genetic? Is it a product of their environment?

What causes a human being to turn into a Republican? And, not only a Republican, but a genuinely selfish, greedy, willfully ignorant pseudo-Christian?



*sigh*



What disgusts me is what I've run into lately that I posted here:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x7992153

It continued downward this morning to the point I just bowed out before my head exploded.

[Cassandra]

1. This will explain all.

http://home.cc.umanitoba.ca/~altemey/
And it's a fun read, too.

It's psychological, not ideological.

[tabatha]

2. Thanks for that.

I wonder how it compares with Dean's book.

[Cassandra]

6. Dean used Altemeyer's research for his book...

and encouraged him to write his own for laypeople. It's quite a bit wittier and easier to read than Dean's (which was very good).

[Roland99]

7. Thanks for that!

Looks quite interesting.

I agree in that I think it is mostly psychological but what plants that seed and fertilizes and nurtures it?

There have been people to rise up from a home life of strict, fundamentalist Christian teaching and turn out to be the exact opposite (and people growing up in liberal homes turning into evangelicals). But yet it's not everyone rebelling against their upbringing, most embrace it, perhaps as it's all they've known and are afraid to question it? But then what causes those few *to* question things and break away?

[Cassandra]

13. It's a reaction to one's childhood...

and the decisions we make about ourselves and the world in response to events. It's part genetic (personality), part events, part nurture. These people don't feel safe in some way. They don't trust others to treat them well (lots of projection). It seems to be about 23-29% of the population, any population. The bad news is that some of them will always be with us. The good news is that they don't respond to reasoned argument, so you needn't waste your time. They do sometimes learn from personal experience.

[Roland99]

14. I'm a rare breed, I think. I used to pretty much be one of them.

I wasn't a Bible-thumper but I was a dyed-in-the-wool lover of O'Reilly and Hannity and was in favor of invading Iraq in 2003. Still sickens me to think of the things I used to say back then.

But yet I wasn't entirely insensitive to liberal thought. I was no fan of "Trickle-down" economics, right-wing death squads, and certainly not the religious right.

In late 2003, I started questioning why Bush was continually defending the war. I started doing more research and reading. I came across a link someone sent me to DU mentioning the PNAC and then on my own found Hersh's and Lt. Col. Karen Kwiatkowski's articles.

I had a huge revelation and a sea change of ideology. My pendulum swung far back to the left and will hopefully stay there. :)

So, I know a little about where these people are in their heads but I just find willful ignorance so damned frustrating.

And, yeah, you're right. Debating with them is impossible. Arguing with them is an exercise in :banghead:

[hlthe2b]

9. John Dean's book covered all this some time ago....

including a summary of the research that is out there. Conservatives Without Conscience by John Dean...

[Cassandra]

12. It really is worth reading this from the original researcher.

It's free and written in a witty style. What's not to love?

I read it after I read Dean's book and still learned something.

[hlthe2b]

16. Fine... but I think Dean's unique qualifications in interpeting

this issue, given his own experience with the worst of Rethug politics, makes his book a "must read" regardless.

[Cassandra]

17. Wasn't really disagreeing with you about Dean's book.

Altemeyer's research is part of an ongoing study started after WWII to understand the "good Germans". Although he talks about contemporary politics, he also goes beyond that.

[hlthe2b]

19. Gottcha

;)

[happyslug]

25. That books brought up three things in my mind

First was Demenjuk's trial in Germany. At best he was a Right wing authoritarian (RWA) who did what most people would do in the circumstances he was in (And noted by the author citing the Milgram Experiments), yet today Germany has put him on trial after leaving the people who ORDERED him to do what he did to die of old age. Is this trial one of Revenge (The Israeli Supreme Court Freed Demenjuk once it became clear he had NOT been "Ivan the Terrible" for any other trial would be one of revenge not Justice) or someone trying to show that Germany (And the US who extradited Demenjuk to Germany for the Trial) no longer supports such actions (But in a way that NO one who actually had a hand in passing the orders on could be tried)? It almost smacks of Right Wing Dominator's sacrificing a Right wing authoritarian (RWA) to show that today's Right Wing Dominators no longer support what they did in the 1940s (And remember Right wing Dominators have no problem in such a sacrifice if it provides them Power).

Second is maybe we need the Draft, just to get such Right wing authoritarian (RWA) to have to work with others. In his research such Right wing authoritarian (RWA) almost always deal with others of their own makeup. When such Right wing authoritarians (RWA) meet and have to deal with other NON-Right wing authoritarian (Non-RWA) the Right wing authoritarians (RWA) become less Right wing authoritarian (RWA). The drafted ended in 1972 and since that time the Military has gone to all-volunteer. More whites volunteered for combat roles then did Blacks (Blacks were recruited to "Get an education" while whites were recruited to serve their nation, please note this is NOT true of all whites and Blacks, just tendency AND the whites who volunteer for Combat roles tended to be RWA more then anything else). Since the Draft ended, the military, was a whole, has become more Right Wing, and has gone further to the right then the nation did as a whole from 1970-2000 (A Military officer did a paper on this a few years ago, I can NOT find the cite at the present time but it was on the net). Why? simply because you had less non-right wingers being drafted into the Military. When I was in Boot Camp in 1981 the Sergeant in overall command of my Battalion had been drafted in the 1960s and decided afterward he liked it and stayed in. The Younger Sergeants in command of my company tended to also have been subject to the draft (By 1981 the draft was only dead nine years) but compared to my fellow enlistees all of these long serving Sergeants were more left wing (No Flaming liberals, but to the left of most of the men, I was in a all male combat arm, who were in ROTC at that time (The other enlistee ranks, the non-ROTC, were more "normal" in political outlook, but since my was a summer company we had a lot of ROTC in the ranks between Collage terms. Research has tended to support my observation, that as the 1980s and 1990s went on and the Military left the draft further and further behind, it became more and more right wing. This has increased since the wars on Iraq and Afghanistan as inner-city blacks just refused to enlist and the Military became more and more dependent on Rural enlistees. We may have to go back to the draft just to bring into the Military people of a less right wing background AND to expose those people who do enlist that most Americans are NOT Right wing authoritarians (RWA).

Third is that the people to fear is NOT the Right wing authoritarians (RWA) but the Right Wing Dominators. The environmental experiments cited by the Author seems to show that Right wing authoritarian (RWA), while maybe not the worse people to be in charge of things will NOT destroy the earth. Right wing Dominators, on the other hand, can lead such Right wing authoritarians (RWA) to such a future (And lost money for the Right Wing Dominators are more concern with Power then Money). While Right wing authoritarians (RWA) can be a pain in the neck, they are people others can work with, not so with the Right Wing Dominators. The Right Wing Dominators will do anything to get control and hold onto control even if that means total failure (Reminds me of Hitler in the last year of WWII, ordering the Destruction of Germany so the Allies, both the Western Allies and Russia, could NOT recover anything AND that the German People would suffer from NOT winning the War for him).

More on the Miligram experiments:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milgram_experiment
http://www.psychologytoday.com/articles/200203/the-man-who-shocked-the-world

[el_bryanto]

3. I can live with Ayn Rand

and her followers - while their philosophy is abhorrent, at least they are open about what they are trying to do, and they seem to genuinely believe what they are doing is right.

What gets me is just the low grade corruption masked by religious fervor that makes up so many mid-card republicans.

Bryant

[ashling]

4. Libertarian theory was around long before Ayny

She just put it in words that the simpletons could grasp ... dull, uninspired, boring, superciliously stagnant words masquerading as intellectualism.

[Loge23]

5. You give them too much credit...

...most of them have never read anything that long.
They subsist on sound bites, on slogans, on the mis-used and mis-applied failed slogans of the past.
They have no substance (not that Rand did either), and their objective - if we find one - is counter to the goals of democracy.
Let's be clear, many of the right and far-right would be much, much, more comfortable in a fascist society.

[Roland99]

8. "many of the right and far-right would be much, much, more comfortable in a fascist society."

That is so tragically true.

[wial]

10. I'd have loved to be a fly on the wall

in the green room or whatever passed for it of the HUAC hearings. Rand and Reagan turned in their friends to McCarthy on the same day. Can you imagine their conversation?

[HughBeaumont]

11. The U.S. was imperialistic before Ayn Rand. After her, it's now HYPER-Empirical.

Mere boring profit is no longer good enough - it has to be amazing profit, ever better, never stopping, ALL the time.

What's even more amazing is that we now run the U.S. with an economic theory that boils down to faith, gut-level thinking, fortune-telling, devil-may-care planning and short-term quick fixes to complex and long-standing problems. It also depends on a world that has infinite capital and resources, when in reality, no such place exists.

[blindpig]

15. If not her, someone else.

The ruling class will always find willing tools.

[Orsino]

18. Right. It wouldn't matter much.

Without the pseudo-legitimization of Rand for right-wing selfishness and greed, they'd just hit the flag 'n' Jaysus that much harder.

[femrap]

20. Will this

willful ignorance ever stop?

Please, no repugnants read her books. And I'm sick of 'dems' pointing their finger at a woman who grew up under Soviet Totalitarianism and saying she is responsible for our current mess.

You embarrass yourself.

[Roland99]

21. You obviously didn't read past the the thread title. Who's embarrassed now?

[femrap]

23. I'm not...

Why do you look at Rand and mumble about the current greed?

Why don't you look at who is DIRECTLY responsible? Why not name the CEOs of the top 100 CORPORATIONS of the US as well as the top Bankers of the World? These are the rich white dudes responsible for what is going on NOW. The Globalisation. The lack of human rights. Human Slavery. The murder of The Middle Class.

Stop sniffling about Ayn Rand who has been dead for decades now and place blame where the blame is due.

Discussing Ayn Rand is a waste of time if you really want to make CHANGE happen.

She was a product of her times and life experiences. Maybe you should try making even one-hundredth of an effect that she did.

I agreed with her on one thing: Bureaucracy kills creativity and productivity.

[Roland99]

24. Wow, you really should be embarrassed now!

You *still* haven't read the OP, much less the entire thread.

[izzybeans]

22. Like Rand, they would have found another source for their

ego-maniacal power seeking activities via cherrypicking sources and misreading Aristotle. They've been doing it with Adam Smith for some time.

Rand just took their ideology and turned it into a fantasy where all of the sudden emotional tirades for not getting one's way were the new rational (e.g. an architect blowing up buildings b/c he was incapable of understanding structural engineering -oh but it's the bureaucrats fault, right?), perhaps that's what made her more dangerous to liberty than most other thinkers since Mussolini. If you debate an Objectivist they have a hard time getting out of this fantasy world and dealing with facts. I once had a debate on why architects often see their plans changed with an Objectivist. All his arguments cycled back to Rand's works of fiction (e.g. "But Rand said in The Fountainhead x,y,z." When I forwarded him copies of three studies outlining the social process of how buildings get made, he refused to read them and called me a collectivist (e.g. architectural creativity x structural capacity x geological necessity x political externalities x capital expense, etc). He reminded me of my young son when he talks about Megatron looking for the All Spark, lost in a world of fiction. At least my son understood it that it was a realm of play. "But in free markets Transformers will great us like liberators!"

She was neither an original nor interesting for that matter. Ayn Rand was just another tool in the authoritarian workbench who twisted the meaning of words to scare the young to her cause.

She was the original Ann Coulter. One difference may have been, if Rand never lived, that Ann Coulter would be in a state hospital somewhere if Rand hadn't cleared the path for her.