It’s Always Your Fault
After the release of Atlas Shrugged, Rand was greatly depressed by its many negative reviews and looked for blame outside of the book and its author, deciding that the fault lay in the readers themselves. She then resolved to reform the study of philosophy so that she could be understood. Jennifer Burns writes “She decided that her ideas about the proper approach to universals and concept formation were new and valuable. If she were to work them out systemically she could prove ‘why conceptual knowledge can be as absolute as perceptual evidence.’ She had the feeling of ‘taking on a big assignment.’ Imagining herself as an intellectual detective, chasing down the logical errors and frauds perpetrated over the ages, she became increasingly interested in meeting professional philosophers.”[1]
Her epiphany is astonishing on two counts. First, philosophers through the ages have indeed lent credence to the truth of reasoned opinion, and second, negative feedback about her ideas made her first look for errors in other people’s thinking, discounting the possibility of error on her part. At Rand’s request, acquaintance and professional philosopher John Hospers did consult with her, later reflecting, “I had to be careful that she not misinterpret or oversimplify what a philosopher was saying; she was so ‘out of the loop’ of the give-and-take of contemporary philosophers that she found even the basics to be elusive.”[2] And a professor at Columbia University said of a student follower of Rand that he was worn out and frustrated from attempting “to make this student realize that logical analysis ought to be applied when judging Ayn Rand’s statements properly.”[3]
No matter how accurate such psychological observations, we approach Rand and people attracted to objectivism with compassion and empathy, not as objects to be dissected, even as we recognize the need for social accountability within all belief systems. We also recognize the tensions inherent in Rand’s personality which would angrily condemn both the analysis and compassion.
The Psychology of Dominionism
Yet, the crux of the matter is that psychological analysis is critical to assessing the ethics of political ideologies simply because deontological ethics and mental health standards are means of achieving the highest well-being for the most people. Psychological drives that lead individuals toward selfish well-being without regard for others reveal traits established by the medical community to be personality disorders, and disorder is only exacerbated when these drives and traits are expanded to the systemic level. Dominionist ideals relate to narrow interest groups, exclude and demonize outsiders, and use physical, legal and psychological forces to implement, preserve and protect their dominant positions, and several psychological conditions may be extrapolated from these perspectives. Dominionist psychological conditions include a belief that dominionists should be granted elite status, a drive to build political systems that favor themselves and disfavor others, an inability to empathize with those of differing demographics, often including those of gender, race and economic status, and a tactical use of lies and force to achieve personal and peer group goals that are exclusive of others.
Consider also the symptoms of narcissistic personality disorder as outlined by the Mayo Clinic.
- Belief that you're special and more important than others
- Fantasies about power, success and attractiveness
- Failure to recognize others' needs and feelings
- Exaggeration of achievements or talents
- Expectation of constant praise and admiration
- Arrogance
- Unreasonable expectations of favors and advantages, often taking advantage of others
- Envy of others or belief that others envy you
This list assumes that the human species is comprised of social animals and that our personal and social well-being requires a useful degree of empathy and cooperation with others. The scope of psychological studies is the individual and does not yet reach into the social, but the American Psychological Association’s publication “Monitor on Psychology” poses this query:
Imagine a country where everyone acts like a reality show contestant — obsessed with power, status and appearance, and is comfortable manipulating others for their personal gain. “I’m here to win, not make friends,” would be the national motto.
This society would have high crime rates — white collar and violent — as people take whatever they feel entitled to, says Christopher Barry, PhD, a psychology professor at the University of Southern Mississippi and lead editor of “Narcissism and Machiavellianism in Youth” (APA, 2010). Cosmetic surgery would be routine, materialism rampant, and everyone would seek fame or notoriety, he adds. It would also be a place with high rates of anxiety and depression. That’s because narcissists — people with an inflated sense of their importance and abilities — have trouble keeping friends, even though they are good at making them, Barry’s found.”[4]
This study describes a narcissistic consumerism and it focuses on youth, but any cursory review of current events confirms that post-objectivist adults have been busy creating its supply side, exemplified by competitions from Miss America to American Idol. American capitalism peddles junk, and if my worth is defined by outside judges as objectivism purports, I’d better compete. Objectivism propagandized commercialization as heroic and exempt from traditional values, encouraging the aggressive drive to amass social power and advantage in ways that disregard other’s needs and feelings, and these behaviors are triggered by disordered mental traits.
Upcoming elections will determine whether we will be led by those whose policies promote social health or dominionism supported by our consumeristic submission. Will United States presidents, legislators and justices have sufficient gravitas to promote health within this society or will we suffer the craziness of the last days of Rome? The language of the most publicized candidate, Donald Trump, is reviewed by The New York Times editor Frank Bruni, saying “Trump is routinely — and rightly — tagged as a playground bully, but that phrase doesn’t do full justice to his arrested development, his potty mouth and the puerile nature of his vulgar bleats. He taunts people for being unpopular, for being unattractive, for physical disabilities. The altitude of his debate vocabulary is only millimeters above; I know you are but what am I,’ words that he’ll surely utter before this is all over.”[5] Current polls hint that he might utter these words as the President of the United States.
Like some others elected to government positions, former Congressman Ron Paul of Texas embraced Rand’s negative assessment of the U.S. government as the destroyer of individual creativity and productivity, and seemed eager to destroy an active government from within. Congressman Paul named his son Rand after Ayn Rand and taught him to embody her free-trade ethics, apparently without examination of any of its limitations and contradictions. The younger Paul’s voting record roughly aligns with Rand’s views, albeit from a more standardized Republican party line. He voted against the Violence Against Women Reauthorization Act of 2013 and opposes marriage equality, equal opportunity legislation, and government fiscal review and stimulus of the economy. He favors the privatization of social security, private education at all levels, gun use and is a friend of the religious right. He strongly opposes Roe v. Wade, the Affordable Care Act, holds that humans have no "rights" to clean air and water (i.e. favors privatization of natural resources). These stances, although not his pro-liberty rhetoric, reflect Rand’s condemnation of “grotesque herds or gangs— hippies, yippies, beatniks, peaceniks, Women’s Libs, Gay Libs, Jesus Freaks, Earth Children— which are not tribes, but shifting aggregates of people desperately seeking tribal ‘protection.’”[6] Marcos Rubio, Ted Cruz, Rick Santorum, and other right wing candidates share nearly identical values.
These observations indicate that ego-based worldviews make it difficult for people to see outside of their mental boxes, restricting both intellectual growth and creativity. The more subjective that mental box, the greater is the probability of ideological error. That is, the less one looks outside one’s own mind for knowledge and one’s emotions for their validation, the greater is one’s ignorance. Without a rational framework to support one’s judgment of epistemological truths or trustworthy facts, the need for mental certainty increases along with anxiety-driven anger over contradictions and rebuttals. So, when the criteria for determining truth and falsehood is subjective, confidence in one’s ability to independently discern truth diminishes and reliance on hear-say increases in proportion to one’s confidence in peer groups.
Peer group generated wishful thinking, Sarah Palin’s musings for example, that contradict apodictic or general truths thus gains social credence, and as in the Fox channel’s distribution of false “news,” many consumers believe with blind faith that ideological statements are factual and will angrily defend them without any evidence external to the group’s opinions. Right-wing groups dismiss empirical evidence as intellectual elitism, or as in the case of Creationists, apostasy. When political pundits demand equal time for truth and falseness in the name of fairness, the culture’s ability to survive is weakened. This supports Paul Weyrich’s first political strategy that “the truth of an idea is not the primary reason for its acceptance. Far more important” are the movement’s individual promoters. Thus, epistemological validity no longer determines the truth or falsity of social and political opinions. Journalistic blindness which ignores standards of truth and rationality damages our public discourse, and fairness should refer to accuracy and not tit-for-tat media exposure.
[1] (Burns, Godess of the Market: Ayn Rand and the American Right 2009) p. 186
[2] (Burns, Godess of the Market: Ayn Rand and the American Right 2009) p. 187
[3] (Burns, Godess of the Market: Ayn Rand and the American Right 2009) p. 201
[4] (Dingfelder 2011)
[5] (Bruni 2015)
[6] (Rand, Philosophy, Who Needs It? 1982) “The Missing Link”, p. 49