| | Mme. Zhang-
I believe you speak in honesty, and I am sure you have reason to believe as you do. However, I do in truth speak from a very deep conviction and not an irrational one.
That said, one reason I came to this site was to understand my spiritual concurrence and difference with Objectivism. While I came close for a time to believing that my differences with Objectivism were primarily those of names, temperament, unique experiences, and a thousand technicalities, I think I am here finally understanding why I feel estranged from the philosophy on some basic level. Essentially, Objectivism believes in adult 'responsible' freedom in the context of self-expression bent as necessary for the sake of happiness flowing from right reason in orderly pursuits in an orderly world, whereas I believe both adulthood and reason are justified because they can grant strength and perfection to one's uniquely individual song of passion that begins pure in childhood- and that society should be moved aside and shattered for this rare unbroken beauty's sake.
There are things I needed to resolve, and my past is part of this. But Rand too, never ceased to remember vividly and never divorced from her own life the horrors of Soviet Russia- instead, she learned from those horrors and never forgot not forgave those evils; the lesson she drew was eternal emnity against altruism. I have seen other evils- of which I've even now said but a fraction- which crystallize in my eyes broad social evils throughout the world; the lesson I draw is eternal emnity against patriarchy.
The point is, ultimatley, that Objectivism is a patriarchy, deriving its concept of human nature from self-interest defined by necessity and accepting and even glorifying the bending of will and passion to that end, as well as accepting a form of self-interest which assumed the social structure and constraints of a society geared to necessity. I've long wondered about Objectivist deference to the police and military, to the social and economic heirarchy, to "honest work/just reward" instead of simply pursuing happiness. It simply makes sense now- Objectivism assumed the repressed "armored" psychology of a Western socialized man deprived of the ability to experience immediate pleasure of existence and instead invested in the sublimated pleasures of achievement, performance, and ego-maintenance.
There are many conclusions from this, which will take me some time to work out; but ultimately what I believe it means is that Audre Lorde was right: "the master's tools will never dismantle the master's house."
Adam Reed has here said a beautiful, noble thing. He spoke up a terrible wound inflicted upon him and worse injustice to ruin the life of a young woman, in the innocence that a philosophy of self-interest would support him. But the truth is threat other voices rose up here to say: by Objectivist rationality, you should have accepted your parents right to snuff out your dreams and soul, and hers as well, and that your parents were likely right to check your irresponsible little sexuality.
And the truth is that while Adam was right, beautifully right, his critics could not be answered on Objectivist grounds. Objectivism- and a lot more than Objectivism- honestly applied lined up on what I would call, by both my premises and passions, the side of evil.
I am glad to see this: I've wanted to understand why my emotions said there was something deeply wrong with Objectivism even though my mind said the differences weren't all that great. I've had at least one very wise person who shares other of my convictions state that I was just not getting what was wrong with this philosophy. I think I finally am.
That's it, let me just say to Adam Reed: stop supporting your own destroyers.
Jeanine
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