Hey kids, let's talk about Ayn Rand!
As much as I loathe to give the talentless hack anymore free publicity, you just cannot escape her crazy ideas these days. The GOP have been holding her up as their intellectual inspiration since 2009 and no matter how little money trickles down there are still suckers buying her doorstoppers. I've even heard it called a genuine revival of popularity.
Further leading me to suspect American conservatives are the dumbest hominids on the planet.
The appeal of Rand isn't based in reason. Hell, it ain't even based in greed! It's spite - good old fashioned petty malice. That dull monkey part of your brain that gets off on the pain of others. This is why you'll find so many social outcasts flocking to Rand's banner - a chance at revenge, cloaked in high-minded rhetoric about the sanctity of Reason and the Individual and all that good stuff.
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| Even internet trolls find her offensive... |
This gets to the darkest and ugliest root of modern American society - Puritans. Those dull bastards too depressing for even England who washed ashore up north and didn't have the good decency to completely die off during their first Massachusetts winter. They brought this thing most people who never read are very proud of mentioning, the "Protestant Work Ethic." Know what it means? Of course you don't, but everyone knows it's good, right?
This brainwave was a product of the predestination doctrine of 17th century Calvinism. The elect are already going to heaven but God just loves 'em so much he's going to grant them material success in this life first. The non-elect, the damned, get to be poor. This is the rarely acknowledged faith in materialism that has been a bedrock of this country since before its official founding and it's why even today, with Wall Street a flagrant criminal enterprise, people can say CEOs have earned their billions without choking on their own bile.
This further grants moral license to just flat out ignore the less fortunate. Hey, if they were good people then they would be rich too, just like Kim Kardashian! It's a mean, stupid way of thinking that Rand tapped expertly for her ponderous doorstoppers. And it's why so many have embraced her faith-based philosophy of Objectivism as it strokes their existing biases and requires no real consideration or commitment.
But Objectivism's biggest failure is its worship of money. Rand - a spoiled idiot who saw the Bolsheviks take away daddy's pharmacy - declared capitalism the One True God over and over, much as Psalmanazar flattered the Anglican church once he washed up on the shores of Dover. Today, her disciples are uniformly in favor of the gold standard and other economically backwards policies because their worldview does not allow for the reality that money is a social convention rather than a hard standard.
And this ain't a fringe theory but a recognized fact for over half a century. Currency, like the dollar or the shekel, evolved not from materials of value but rather as a standardization of existing practices of credit and debt. The original barter system you heard about in Econ 101? Never happened, it's just a convenient base for economists to spin their chronically wrong conclusions from. Real wealth isn't a direct result of possessing the most shiny things but rather a combination of material and social factors.
Which brings us to the very core of the Randroid faithful - nerds. Nerds are social failures and therefore poor - so why not embrace a mystery religion that enshrines value only in the material? This way, the asocial recluses can indeed achieve wealth and smite their more gifted foes at the same time! Just like in D&D!
So here we are at the twilight of American empire - a failing nation ruled by nerds who can't stop jacking-off to the one ugly chick to ever come out of Russia.
Hey all two of you who reading this! Check out our sister blag, Atlas Shirked!
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