Singing SOLO, Three Years On
by Lindsay Perigo
Around this time three years ago, SOLO was born—a modest adjunct to my Free Radical website, with some modest aspirations and a few sense-of-life articles to go with them. It included an open forum that was quickly invaded by Nazi nutters from the UK.
In May of 2001, the SOLO Yahoo forum was launched, in lieu of the open forum. Within weeks it had drawn in over 200 members, and although there was the odd nutter (loose change from the other Objectivist groups), none of them was a Nazi nutter.
In February, 2002, SOLO held its first conference in Waitomo, New Zealand, attracting 75 people from 5 countries. Several attendees described it as the most uplifting experience of their lives. Since then, gatherings have been held in New York City, Auckland and Philadelphia.
On May Day, 2002, SOLOHQ.com was born, superseding the original "modest adjunct" as SOLO's face on the worldwide web. It was originally intended as "ObjectivistHQ.com" by its creators, Joe Rowlands and Jeff Landauer, but so impressed by SOLO was Joe that he asked if I'd agree to amalgamate my enterprise with his and Jeff's. I readily agreed. At the same time, at Joe's urging, I rewrote the Credo to make SOLO's goals a little more challenging—like world domination by 2008.
Shortly after we appointed "staff"—a misnomer, since these were/are unpaid volunteers with day jobs ... and a surpassing enthusiasm for SOLO's ideals. They included Barry Kayton of South Africa, who became Sales and Marketing Manager. In that capacity he quickly produced a brochure gloriously capturing SOLO's vision. He also conceived and oversaw the production of the Michael Newberry Calendar, 2003.
More recently he has overseen the design, production and marketing of SOLO's first monograph: Chris Matthew Sciabarra's Ayn Rand, Homosexuality and Human Liberation. This has already created such a stir that one indignant Objectivist has virtually completed his own monograph in answer to Chris's.
On SOLOHQ, Joe and Jeff have succeeded in their goal of posting a fresh article each week day. There's a raft of regular and less regular writers, and periodically, new contributors appear, seemingly out of nowhere—such as Henry Emrich and Neil Parille, who have articles on display currently. The open forums ebb and flow, as does the original Yahoo forum. I like to think of the open forums as places where one can engage the evil and the stupid directly, if one is of a mind to, as well as the honestly searching and the like-minded—who do, miraculously, preponderate. The closed Yahoo forum, moderated by the warm, inviting presence of the redoubtable Ashley Frazier (she's been slightly AWOL lately for the most objectively correct of reasons) remains a sanctuary to which one can repair for reassurance!
2004 will be another bumper year for SOLO. A relaunch of SOLOHQ is imminent. We're calling it SOLOHQ2. It will be state-of-the-art.
More monographs will be published.
An announcement will be made shortly that will herald a burying of the hatchet between me personally and TOC. I shall speak again from their platform. SOLO and TOC will, of course, continue as separate identities. We are different—but we can work together.
Of the many accolades SOLO has received since its inception, I especially enjoy a recent one that was sent to me privately. It says:
I've been an Objectivist since high school, standing firmly in the ARI camp. When the Kelley-Peikoff schism blew up it starkly revealed a sense-of-life conflict that had been bothering me. I grudgingly sided with Peikoff but I strongly empathized with Kelley. I deplored Peikoff's lack of tact towards a man of integrity with a genuine concern for Objectivism's fate.
Standard dress for a romp through the sun-lit garden of Objectivism should not be inquisitor's robes. The negative, pronouncement-oriented tone of most Objectivist writings began to wear me down. What about changing the world through positive ideas? When I ran across your website and your manifesto for homeless Objectivists, I cheered!
Ladies and gentlemen, as we look back on our first three years, we are all entitled to cheer. We have provided that sunlit garden. Ayn Rand deserves nothing less.
We've done good; but as Al Jolson—himself a soloist of no mean repute—would have put it, "Y'ain't seen nuttin' yet."
2008, here we come!
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