this post was submitted on 01 Mar 2024
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I understand why Ayn Rand is in this comic, but she never financed a damn thing. She was working class herself and on welfare at the end of her life.
So, on top of everything else, she was a hypocrite, but she was not a capitalist, despite her obvious longing to be one.
Usually the gist of existentialcomics (great comic btw if you haven't read it) is taking well-known philosophers from humanity's history and pitting them against each other to play with ideas and crack philosophical jokes. With that in mind Ayn Rand's and her book "Atlas Shrugged" is presented as a philosophy, which may clear up why she is here.
Yeah, I'm familiar with them myself, I'm just saying in this case Ayn Rand is doubling as both the philosopher and the person with money, and in real life she was only a wannabe.
A fair point that more people should know
I think people do not understand where Ayn Rand was coming from. She came from the Soviet Union, a highly collectivist society. Everyone is expected to conform and be all the same economically. Then she got sick of it, emigrated and formed her own Iam14butthisisdeep philosophy. Unfortunately, some rich American asshats saw that her ideas have self-serving utility to justify their ultra-capitalist beliefs and privileges and continue exploitation, and then spread her nonsensical "objectivist" ideas around. Not many people actually believe the philosophy, although we unconsciously apply this especially with middle class NIMBYISM.
"Oh, poor homeless people. I hope they could be housed. But I will elect a politician who will not build social housing because it will bring down the value of my property."
"I support mitigating climate change. But I do not want windfarms nearby. They are eye sores."
I mean, lots of people with terrible and damaging ideas came from backgrounds that explain their terrible and damaging ideas. She doesn't get a pass because the USSR was corrupt, nor does she get a pass because western capitalist society is also corrupt.
She came to the West and made it more corrupt with her half-baked ideas by amplifying the excessive use of individualist values.
No, you're being disingenuous. She formulated her philosophy moral objectivism from her experiences as a child.
This is what happened (from her wikipedia):
Where is your objection? She formed her philosophy after experiencing a collectivist dystopia. Her family's business was nationalised. That is part and parcel of such extreme collectivist socio-economics and thus enamoured by hyperindividualist extreme counterpart.
Dystopia in her experience. The peasants going to uni would have had a different perspective.
Lol! The US nationalizes stuff all the damn time - Obama essentially nationalized the auto industry after the 2008 crash (right before handing it back to the billionaire parasites after their debt had been shouldered by the US people).
Yet I don't see anybody calling the US "collectivist."
How much of US economy is nationalised compared to the Soviet Union?
That's only relevant if you insist on calling the US military "collectivist" - will you be attempting to make such an argument or not?
If you don't, your attempt to conflate nationalization with collectivization falls flat on it's face - so get on with it.
The military can be argued "collectivist". I've never been in the military but many vets say that in the bootcamp they pretty much remove the personality out of you so that you think with the team and follow chain of command. And often, teams are punished based on the mistakes of one person in the group.
And to you, define "collectivism".
So do you and your fellow Rand-cultists normally argue for "collectivist" militaries to be dismantled?
Did I say I agree with Rand?
It's because they handed it back, so everyone can see we are obviously an individualist kleptocracy. The US government should have imminent domained automakers instead of giving them billions of dollars in loans and then forgiving a good chunk of the loan.
Wealthy investors siphon as much money from the system as they can. Then, when there is the slightest economic turmoil, the government gives them billions or trillions in handouts. Why aren't they required to reinvest the windfall from their previous years into their own companies when they fail? That math doesn't add up.
It sure as hell adds up for the billionaire parasites.
The USSR wasn't a collectivist society - it was a centalized one. There's a vast difference. Nobody calls the US military "collectivist," do they now?
Centralised but everyone is expected to value the group over the individual. The property in the Soviet Union belongs to the people albeit managed by the state. Therefore, collectivist.
Centralisation does not mean either just means individualism or collectivism.
So you are now claiming that centralization isn't inherently collectivist?
So you are now claiming nothing in the Soviet Union was nationalized?
You can be centralised but not collectivist. See the theory of anarcho-capitalism.
I'm guessing you're operating from different sensibility of political philosophy. Define collectivism then we can talk.
I saw it... and just looking at it made it fall apart like an upside-down house of cards in a whirlwind. Strange... this seems to happen every time anyone looks at (so-called) "anarcho-capitalism" a bit too closely. Have you had better luck with it, perhaps?
Anarcho-capitalism doesn't work, yes. What's your point?
Have you any luck yet trying to answer me how would you define collectivism?
she was just mad that her privileges were distributed fairly for once
Also, in that reality, in panel 5 Rand's private paramilitary security team would show up and start clubbing the workers.
In the real reality, Rand would borrow the state's police and/or national guard, just as it has historically happened.
The state always has the final say. In a liberal democracy all we can do is vote, campaign & support the best (or least worst) people to make these decisions.
To be fair the owning class are even bigger welfare queens
Socialism for me, lasseiz-fare capitalism for thee.
The are the only welfare queens.
That’s every working class capitalist behaviour I’ve ever met. The average family guy with 4 kids barely able to make ends meet but god forbid if you ever make a disparaging point against Elon musk as if he’s in the same category out there fighting the good fight for the average working joe.
Blind hypocrisy seems to be a necessity in capitalism ideals.
I don't think Rand longed to be a capitalist... but it really does seem as if she longed to be owned by one.
You are just repeating what others have stated online without looking into this claim yourself.
https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/ayn-rand-social-security/
She took Social Security and Medicare benefits. She also paid into those. She also paid taxes.
It is morally defensible for those who decry publicly-funded scholarships, Social Security benefits,
and unemployment insurance to turn around and accept them, Rand argued, because the government
had taken money from them by force (via taxes). There’s only one catch: the recipient must regard the
receipt of said benefits as restitution, not a social entitlement.
If she paid into Social Security and Medicare and paid taxes then what is the issue? The paragraph above states
that she did not believe her actions to be hypocrisy because she had paid taxes.
I think everyone understands that people are dicked over and have to participate in the system as it is. However, if you’re going to be the poster child for why meat is murder or how god is fake or how public assistance is evil, it’s also not unfair for people to think you’re a hypocrite if they find you eating a turkey leg, preaching in church or taking public assistance.
She was hypocritical because she thought Medicare and Social Security shouldn't exist. And was extremely vocal about it. Yet she took them anyhow.
Also, those programs aren't some kind of retirement savings plan. The money you pay into Social Security today gets paid out to those who are receiving it today. The first people to ever receive Social Security and Medicare never paid a dime into it because it didn't exist while they were in the workforce.
We need to stop thinking about how the taxes we pay in directly benefits us. Taxes pay to keep our government and society functioning on an even keel. It isn't a pay in and get your kicks out system. And when people like Ayn Rand go about criticizing it as if it's a travesty that they had to pay taxes so that other people can live comfortable lives they are showing what kind of self serving fanatics they are.
Oh, so magic thought games change the nature of reality. Got it!