RoR: Forum

You don’t like gay marriage? Then don’t marry a gay!

Ed, I know that you are smart enough to "get" the issues. These people do not want to turn a deaf ear or blind eye, they want to ban the practice. The same applies to abortion. "If you are opposed to abortion, then do not have one." ignores the real issue.

Ayn Rand was a Republican by accident, largely. For her years with Dewey or whaterver, Tricia Nixon expressed some interest. Then Alen Greenspan was appointed and Gerald Ford re-legalized gold. (It was never really illegal - see here - but that is not the point.) So, Objectivists invest their time and effort trying to get the Republicans to be rational about social issues, rather than trying to get the Democrats to be rational on economic issues.

Both strategies are equally irrational.

The people who want to ban gay marriage (also, abortions and marijuana, as well as modern art, modern music, and modern living in general), do not care what you want. They are opposed to gay marriange and they do not want anyone else to have that right. They are fascists. Face it. Realize with whom you are in bed. Conservatives are not your allies, any more than liberals are.

Again, why not wring your hands over the economic planks in the Democratic Party platform? They almost agree with you, but on other issues.

Like Dagny in the Valley you need to come to grips with the hard reality of who really benefits from your hard work. You give it up to the Republicans and conservatives. "They want to live, don't they?" Dagny asked. "Do they?" Francisco replied.

(Edited by Michael E. Marotta on 3/12, 7:09pm)

Post 1

Tuesday, March 12, 2013 - 10:43pm

Michael,

I agree with you, but only half way. I don't think any Objectivists or Libertarians are supportive of the Establishment Republicans, or the Social Conservatives. But there is a growing split in the Conservative wing of the Republican party - there are actual Libertarians who hold federal office now - prominently.

You said, "Conservatives are not your allies, any more than liberals are." That's good advice - up to a point, but it muddies the difference between the all of those conservatives that want a small government and the liberals who want a large government. That is an important difference.

If I were you, I wouldn't get all excited about the Liberals standing firm for gay rights, when in the very next breath they won't let you buy a soft drink in a container larger than 16 ounces, or keep the money you earn, or have private schools, or balance a budget. The regulations that will come from the Liberals - if they have their way and enough time - wouldn't let anyone marry anyone without government permission, or to have kids without permission, or be forced to have kids if the Elites decide that's what's best for the nation, the environment, society, the poor... the whatever.

My point is, that the non-Religious section of the Conservatives are much, much closer to individual choice, free association, personal responsibility, and getting government back to just defense. The Liberals are collectivists at heart. The Progressives are really Fabian Socialists (even if some of them don't know that).

Besides, the best approach is to keep pointing out that the Religious Right will keep the Republicans from ever succeeding, and that it is morally wrong to force religious views on others via the government, and supporting the libertarian Republicans. And nothing in that prescription stops anyone from pointing out why the Liberals are right to champion individual rights in the Gay Rights fight, and that they are wrong to oppose individual's rights to keep what they earn, to make their own decisions on soda drinks, and so forth. It isn't an either-or.

In our country's history, political parties have totally disappeared or morphed to such an extent that they got a new names. I'd like to see the Republican party be even more strongly split so that it is like two parties, and for some of the Democrats to leave the Progressives for being to Socialist, and to join the libertarian Republicans... It wouldn't be too long before a tipping point was reached and all the moderate republicans scurried over to the new Republican party (lacking solid principles lead to scurrying). This kind of evolution is natural due to the need for society to move closer and closer to addressing and settling the core issue of a free country, or centralized control by elites government. (And, sadly, the wrong side might win... for now. This might be a bit of history that takes longer than we will live to play out. Or not.)

Post 2

Tuesday, March 12, 2013 - 11:07pm

Ed,

Excellent article!

The Social Conservatives need to be marginalized, ridiculed and to have their drive to use the government to enforce their religious views on others exposed.

The majority of Americans who would say they attend church and believe in God DO NOT want to force their views on other people. It is a small percentage who are actively working the political arena - just like the Progressives - to further an agenda the rest of us don't want, to take away liberties that currently exist. And just as the Progressives would never be happy with winning the issues currently on the table, neither would the religious right. They'd go from 'freedom' to pray in school, to mandated school prayers... and so on.

As individuals, some of them want smaller government, but the real heart of the religious right lies in being willing to put small government and individual rights and fiscal conservatism and constitutional government second to religious issues - even if that means totally losing on all of the non-religious issues. They are a cancer in the Republican body and will either be cut out, or they will kill the body.

Post 3

Wednesday, March 13, 2013 - 5:06am

Steve, I have no illusions about pivoting the Democratic Party to my way of thinking. It was a strawman argument to show the futility of attempting to change the Republican Party. You are a conservative at heart. So, you feel good about them. You think that you can save them from themselves. I think that you would be wasting your time. Paul Ryan should be proof enough of that.

Post 4

Wednesday, March 13, 2013 - 5:20am

I liked your article, Ed. Stimulating remarks also from Michael and from Steve.

Steve, offhand I would think there are three big factions among Republicans. You characterized one faction as the "non-Religious section of the Conservatives [who] are much, much closer to individual choice, free association, personal responsibility, and getting government back to just defense." I think the Bushes, Graham, and McCain would fit into that wing. Would you include them in that wing? Yet what they count as "defense" is so extravagant that they are starkly different than the Rand Paul division. (All of them are on the wrong side of legal elective abortion, but let that simmer.) So I'd say three notable factions.

(Edited by Stephen Boydstun on 3/13, 7:40am)

Post 5

Wednesday, March 13, 2013 - 10:51am

Good stuff.

They can't all be that irrational, can they?

"My God/religion compels me to make this issue a matter of public political policy."

"But this isn't Iran, or any similar theocracy; this is America. We have a 1st Amendment. Your advocacy of imposing your religious views under force of law does not in any way shape or form belong in matters of government; that prohibition is by constitutional law. That is what defends your right to do so freely elsewhere, in the church of your choice. It's also what defends our peace and freedom in this nation, our ability to live as peers in freedom."

"But My God/religious beliefs are compelling me to do this, and as part of my religious beliefs, I must say 'screw your constitution' and make it so. My God, then our country, you see."

"Well, that is a time honored tradition-- be it religious conservatives or Progressives masking themselves as secularists. But it is the eater of both peace and freedom-- including, but not limited to, religious freedom. Your misdirected, if not misguided, political urges are just religion on the way to war."

Religious conservatives and Progressives come full circle and stare at each other over the divide of only two issues: abortion and gay marriage. Other than that, they are the same religious zealots.

regards,
Fred

Post 6

Wednesday, March 13, 2013 - 10:55am

Stephen,

I would agree there are a number of factions among Republicans - the split isn't just religious versus non-religious. That sentence you mention where I refer to "the non-Religious section of the Conservatives [that] are much, much closer to individual choice, free association, personal responsibility, and getting government back to just defense" isn't accurate because there are non-religious conservatives who are no friend of liberty, and not supporters of smaller government.

It depends upon how one defines "Conservative" as to whether McCain, or Graham are even in that group. They are Establishment Republicans, they are big government Republicans and they are Neo-Cons (and despite the name, I don't see Neo-Cons as actual conservatives - Being very hawklike isn't a defining characteristic of Conservatism by itself).

It is all a very muddled taxology but what else could it be since it is an attempt to sort them out by their political principles which are very muddled. I Don't think of McCain or Graham as Conservatives because they are in favor of big government and the only time they make noises to the contrary, is just as anti-Obama lip service. The Bushes are big goverment and I can't in good conscience call someone a conservative and at the same time say they are for big goverment. George W. Bush was establishment Republican, and something of a secret Social Conservative. They called him a "Compassionate Conservative" - and at the time, I saw that as just a way to package a "Conservative" for the mainstream but now it's clear that what it means is a strongly altruistic Republican who, for religious reasons, wants to engage in 'charity' with tax dollars. I don't think of Bush, Graham, and McCain as "strong on defense" because what they are doing isn't defense, it is a crusade to force democracy on the middle-east at the end of a gun - or war for the sake of war.
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I agree that they are all on the wrong side of the legal elective abortion. The question is whether or not outlawing abortion is a primary motivation for an individual in question. If it is, then do their other professed beliefs, like constitutionality, or balanced budget, or small government, etc., have any intensity for them?
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Here is how I sort out this muddled mess - Tell me what you think.

Main Categories of Conservatives:

Libertarian Conservatives/Fiscal Conservatives/Constitutional Conservatives (clumped together because they are the main advocates of a small government)
Social Conservatives (that portion of the Religious Right who might mention small government, but it isn't their primary motivator)
Establishment Conservatives (Mostly there for the power and fighting Democrats for that reason, and small government is more of a coloration than a goal)
NeoCons (May not even be Conservative, may be part of the establishment group, may be religious, but their primary drive is war)

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Here is a paragraph from Wikipedia's article on conservatism in the United States: "The history of American conservatism has been marked by tensions and competing ideologies. Fiscal conservatives and Libertarians favor small government, low taxes, limited regulation, and free enterprise. Social conservatives see traditional social values as threatened by secularism; they tend to support school prayer and capital punishment and oppose abortion and the legalization of same-sex marriage. Neoconservatives want to expand American ideals throughout the world and show a strong support for Israel. Paleoconservatives advocate restrictions on immigration, non-interventionist foreign policy, and stand in opposition to multiculturalism." That's not bad, but I wouldn't include Paleoconservatives as a major group because they are hard to find now adays (Pat Buchanan is a good example.) And they need to mention that NeoCons are expanding American Ideals via war.

Post 7

Wednesday, March 13, 2013 - 11:01am

Michael,

You are a conservative at heart. So, you feel good about them. You think that you can save them from themselves.

No, I am not a conservative at heart. I am an Objectivist at heart. You understood so little of what I wrote about factions in the Conservative portion of the Republican party that there is no reason trying to correct your misunderstandings.

(Edited by Steve Wolfer on 3/13, 11:02am)

Post 8

Wednesday, March 13, 2013 - 1:12pm

Steve, I think you have it entirely right in #6, not that I'm all that knowledgeable of the political scene, but looks right.

Post 9

Thursday, March 14, 2013 - 7:01am

SW: That's not bad, but I wouldn't include Paleoconservatives as a major group because they are hard to find now adays (Pat Buchanan is a good example.) And they need to mention that NeoCons are expanding American Ideals via war.

Steve, we talk past each other so often that it is sad. I am the oldest of three. I am more "conservative" than my siblings, though, clearly, humans make choices. Humans are not defined completely by their birth order.

Regardless of birth order, some people welcome change, while others do not. You were who you were long before you opened a book, let alone read Ayn Rand. Yes, we can change, remake ourselves with conscious inward redirection. You may well have done that at some point in your life. You are still a conservative to me. You do not like change. Maybe a Myer-Briggs/Kiersey type like Inpector-Guardian would be more accurate. You can reject this, condemn me for offering it, and claim perhaps rightlfully that I do not understand you. You might be a misunderstood bohemian, footloose and fancy free, a hard drinking don juan whispering poetry to swooning women, but I do not perceive you that way. "Would some Pow'r the giftee gie us/ To see ourselves as others see us."

All of that might be irrelevant to philosophy were we not discussing political conservatism in America. When it comes to politics, you cannot argue somebody out of their personality. Liberals, radicals, conservatives, libertarians,... people who identify with labels do so for internal reasons. The labels become a factor in their self-perception. When you tell someone that they are wrong about school prayer, you are saying that they are personally wrong inside. It takes a real poltiical scientist to accept a new idea contrary to their preferences.

Here in Texas - as across the Southwest - immigration is a polarizing issue within the Republican party. Paleoconservatives are alive and well.

NeoConservatives would deny that they want to expand American ideals via war. They would say that they want to defend ideals, using force when necessary in retaliation against those who deny freedom to others. You judge them differently than they evaluate themselves, of course... but that is the problem, is it not?

(Edited by Michael E. Marotta on 3/14, 7:03am)

Post 10

Thursday, March 14, 2013 - 9:33am

Michael,

Paleoconservatives can't be defined solely by their position on immigration. They also need to be non-interventionist. But even with that, I'm not surprised that a lot of Texans would be Paleoconservatives (I lived in Texas for a while). But there are very few national figures who match that description.
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Humans are not defined completely by their birth order. Regardless of birth order, some people welcome change, while others do not. You were who you were long before you opened a book, let alone read Ayn Rand. Yes, we can change, remake ourselves with conscious inward redirection. You may well have done that at some point in your life. You are still a conservative to me. You do not like change.

Michael, you are spouting pure drivel. You don't know me. I could easily give you facts about my life, about me that show what nonsense that is, but it would be a waste of time and just compound your insult. Too often You use facts like a strange garnish you sprinkle about on your otherwise unrelated, floating abstractions. In this case you didn't even offer a single fact about me. You just said, "You are still a conservative to me. You don't like change."

This is the kind of pissing contest you shouldn't get into with a psychologist. You opened this door, let's see if you like the fact that it swings both ways.

It is like this... I know that I'm not a conservative, and that I do enjoy, even relish change and so how do I understand your peculiar, mental delusions about me? If I'm not a conservative, not one who dislikes change, then it isn't me... it must be the lense of the viewer that is creating the distortion. I can only see it as your way of reacting to someone who is not a far-leftish flavored former-anarchist who wants to parade about naked of logic, yet never be called on it. Me, pointing out that you favor floating abstractions over fact-based truths and me, pointing out that you seem to write mostly as some kind of preening behavior or in hopes of being lauded, gets you upset and you decide I'm a hated conservative. You equate my repeated and consistent insistence on logic as being inflexible and symbolize it in your mind as not liking change. But maybe I'm just imagining who you are.
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NeoConservatives would deny that they want to expand American ideals via war. They would say that they want to defend ideals, using force when necessary in retaliation against those who deny freedom to others. You judge them differently than they evaluate themselves, of course... but that is the problem, is it not?

They might indeed make such denials, but that doesn't make their denials true. The problem isn't that I judge them differently than they judge themselves. It would be a problem if people stopped making judgments about the proper use of force and the proper criteria for engaging in war.

Post 11

Monday, March 18, 2013 - 9:32am

and so how do I understand your peculiar, mental delusions about me? ... I can only see it as your way of reacting to someone who is not a far-leftish flavored former-anarchist who wants to parade about naked of logic, yet never be called on it. ... you seem to write mostly as some kind of preening behavior or in hopes of being lauded, gets you upset and you decide I'm a hated conservative. You equate my repeated and consistent insistence on logic as being inflexible and symbolize it in your mind as not liking change. But maybe I'm just imagining who you are.

If that is the best you can do, then you are playing Inigo to my Roberts.

I do not know the "real" you, Steve, only the person you appear to be here. We both go back to before RoR was cleft from SOLO. Any disconnect between the "real" you and your public front is within you. Perhaps you should come out from your defenses and let us see the person we will like very much even if you do not yet like who you really are inside.

This actually speaks to Ed Hudgins' original post and why we Objectivists cannot hope to remake the Republican Party in our own image. As you say, the Neo-Cons claim to be acting in defense while you objectively judge them as warhawks. They are not going to thank you and change, any more that this scuffle between us will change either of us. The Republican Party is not going to abandon the Christian Right to embrace a small coterie of atheists.

The Libertarian Party is 40 years old. While they have drawn many Republicans into their organization, the GOP succeeds well enough with those who are "fiscally conservative and socially liberal." The LP's lack of success speaks volumes. America is a two-party state. Seldom has it been otherwise, and never for long, though local conditions have varied somewhat.

The Ayn Rand Institute (and Wikipedia) claim that Ayn Rand's works have sold "over 25 million copies." I talled over 36 million. I added reports from The Economist and other Internet searches, and then extrapolated based on the percentages.

Ayn Rand Institute April 7, 2008

Total sales 25 million

1- We The Living - 3 million (guess 4 million)

2- Anthem- 4 million (guess 5.5 million)

3- The Fountainhead - 6.5 million (guess 8.3 million)

4- Atlas Shrugged - 6 million (+.5 in 2009 and .445 in 2011) (guess .5 in 2010 and .5 in 2012) total guess 8 million, 33% increase over 2008

5- For the New Intellectual - 1 million (guess 1.3 million)

6- Virtue of Selfishness- 1.5 million (guess 2 million)

7- Capitalism: the Unknown Ideal - .650 million (guess .875)

8- The Romantic Manifesto - .350 million (guess .470)

9- Introduction to the Objectivist Epistemology - Unstated

Approximate subtotal- - 36 million

Stated by ARI and Wikipedia and others as - - 25 million

10- Philosophy: Who Needs It? -

11- New Left: Return of the Primitive-

12- Early Ayn Rand 1-

13- Three Plays-

- Total 10 posthumous works-

However, I could not find any numbers for Introduction to the Objectivist Epistemology. You can see that Virtue of Selfishness has sold no more than 2 million copies. I own all of the primary works from Ayn Rand, except the Three Plays. I also have other derivatives such as Ayn Rand: A Sense of Life and What is Art? The Esthetic Theory of Ayn Rand by Louis Torres and Marder Kahmi, though not the Branden kiss-and-tells or the Passion of the Passion nonsense.

So, 25 million copies might mean only 1.5 million fans, but let us guess that everyone who bought Atlas bought four more books. When VOS and ITOE sell 8 million copies and Republican politicians are giving them out, then we might speak of political change. Until that time, as Ayn Rand said so often and said so well, any change in the culture must be philosophical first.

And I do see that change. The diminuition of religion is just one trend. Let gay rights be voted down (now) because 40 years ago, it could not even have come up for a vote. The times they are a-changin' but it comes from philosophy, not politics. This is as much a consequence of the Sputnik Generation which was then the Me Generation. They wanted us to study math and science, so now we want evidence, not appeals to faith and authority.

In that, Steve, I trust that you and I are in the same boat.

(Speaking of boats... You know... I once worked with a guy who was an aviator and a yachtsman. He made boating sound exciting and I said that I would like to try it. He said, "Mike, anything that moves on deck can kill you." He meant that while I apparently could fly an airplane, I lacked the situational awareness to be safe on the water. I accepted that as fact. So, I hold you in very high esteem, Steve, for being able to do something that is complicated, difficult, and deadly.)

Post 12

Monday, March 18, 2013 - 5:54pm

The Republican Party is not going to abandon the Christian Right to embrace a small coterie of atheists.

Michael, that isn't a requirement. They can turn away from active support of the Christian Right, and not nominate their candidates (because they lose), and not give them microphone at the convention. Remember that the average voter, who is a Christian, is NOT a part of the Religious Right.

We Atheists will be the last minority to be accepted, but we don't need to be - the GOP should not be pro Atheism, or pro-Christianity - it should just ignore anything to do with or against religion. Not a proper government function.

We just need for the GOP to evolve a little more away from the Christian Right, and show a stronger and more united front against big government, deficit spending, and high taxes and a free market. That will give the GOP a platform that can be popular with a large segment of the voting public, put them more in tune with the younger voters who are mostly turned off, as are we, by the Religious overtones. It would also help to abandon the war hawks and if it was done while keeping a strong defense that wouldn't lose votes.

What I'm saying is that the GOP needs to be a in clear and significant, principled, opposition to the Democrats.

You mentioned that this is a two party nation, and that is right. Third parties can be the birth place for new political ideas, and they cause one of the major parties to shift to the left or the right and they can offer political ammunition, but they can't win a majority - the deck is stacked against them (unless one of the major parties totally dies, and the third party takes its place to keep us from being a one party nation.)
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Perhaps you should come out from your defenses and let us see the person we will like very much even if you do not yet like who you really are inside.

Please... enough with the cheap psychologizing. You wouldn't know what my psychological defenses were even if were visible in my posts and I really do like myself - inside and out.
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They [a newer generation] wanted us to study math and science, so now we want evidence, not appeals to faith and authority.

That is partly true, but not the whole story. Many of the new generation have smuggled faith and authority into science and culture so that peer pressure and political correctness become authority, along with the willingness to accept big government which comes with it's regulatory authority. And the faith becomes a blind adherence to altruism in social and political guise. It was once said that we'd not be free till the last king was strangled with the entrails of the last priest. But they didn't count on the epistemology of faith, and the ethics of sacrifice sneaking into the body of science.

Post 13

Wednesday, March 20, 2013 - 12:43pm

Steve, your analysis is cogent, but I do not see the GOP accepting your advice (or Ed Hudgins'). I do see people abandoning national politics as they abandoned state-sanctioned religion (or religion-sanctioned states), and for the same reasons.

We remain "spiritual" and "political" people, of course. I only mean that those who run to the govenrment will find themselve the only ones running there, while most everyone else ignores the government flat out, the same as we learned to ignore the Church as we accepted a more pluralistic and tolerant social structure -- no one church had the upper hand.

(Perhaps the last bastion was Massachusetts which was still collecting taxes for the Congregational Church until 1840. BTW, I think that some Swiss "communes" i.e., villages, still do this. I knew of one commune in the 1980s or 1990s that split Catholic-Protestant into two so that each could tax for their own church.)

At any rate, it is only a matter of time before something like the Gibson Guitar Raid sees people tossing the feds out, the feds calling for local LEOs as backup and not getting them. One of the arguments of the Radical Right is that the sheriff is elected, but the city police are bureaucrats. You see the outcome. Here in Austin, we have a huge city PD, but elsewhere, other departments depend on the sheriff. For one thing, in many states, constitutionally, the county sheriffs run the jails because jails are court functions and historically the elected sheriffs are officers of an elected court.

So, what happens when the jails are "too full" for the enforcement of silly laws? I see that as a likely trend over the next generation.

Whether the GOP of 2043 looks like the one today is interesting to consider. I saw a CPAC video of quips and quotes via CNN in which they declared themselves the Younger Party and the Multicultural Party while labelling the Democrats as "the party of Hillary and Biden."

MEM: Perhaps you should come out from your defenses and ...
SW: Please... enough with the cheap psychologizing You wouldn't know what my psychological defenses were even if were visible in my posts and I really do like myself - inside and out.

I still think that you are a conservative by nature but that argument is moot. Thrust and parry, I never doubted your self-esteeem, really; and I agree that we have other tasks before us, a princess (America) to rescue.

(Edited by Michael E. Marotta on 3/20, 12:45pm)

Post 14

Wednesday, March 20, 2013 - 4:24pm

Michael,

I do not see the GOP accepting your advice (or Ed Hudgins').

They will be reacting to current pressures, and stresses and they will survive and grow stronger, or they won't. They might wither away. I don't know which path they'll follow. My observations weren't unique and many others will see the same things - many already have.

The establishment Republicans are the least ideological and least principled in many ways. They are the ones that will frantically try to steer their part of the GOP ship towards the growing grass roots consensus as it changes, because they want more than anyone to be in front of the parade, no matter how much they have to run and scramble to catch up get in front again. Right now, I'd say they are still in that place where they think they can have their cake and eat it too (not move to the right, or cut out the Religious Right, but still keep the power they have). The Religious Right activists won't change and can't be convinced. The GOP is just a means to their religious ends.

This isn't just a struggle between these different GOP factions and the Progressives... it is also a generational thing. Each new generation has more Libertarians in it, but it also has way, way more Progressives, and at the same time the older, traditional conservatives are dying. Demographically, the Progressives are winning. In terms of the tipping point where the number of people receiving most of their income from the government, versus those that don't... We may have tipped.
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You talk about a chasm between the people and the government where the people start to ignore the government more and more. Well, that is only partially correct, because there are a number of other factors at work. People aren't going to become total outlaws. They will ignore some regulations and follow others - and they will become less innovative and less productive because it isn't efficient to follow absurd rules, but it is also stressful to ignore them and to not know what the outcomes will be. There is also the fact that only some of the people will follow this or that regulation, and others will. And the important factor is that some new laws will massively shift economies. For example, there is no more market place for student loans, and ObamaCare has made massive changes. Some regulations cause changes that take effect before a person can choose to ignore them.
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I still think that you are a conservative by nature...

And I still think that you come from a deeply liberal background, some of which still is evident, and that some of the anarchist that you once were remains yet. But, as you say, there are other things more worthy of discussion.

Post 15

Monday, March 25, 2013 - 8:05am