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| Suppose you work at an establishment. Everyone gets along and works well together. Suppose there's a new hire who manages to score a titled position, then uses that position to impose her altruistic, religious ideology on workers who don't subscribe to it in a very subtle, almost sneaky way. I'll call it the "Lets Be Positive All the Time, Because I Can't Deal With Reality" policy. You ignore the policy because it rubs against the grain of your values and stands in direct conflict to your understanding of the Objectivist Virtues, especially Productiveness and Pride, which have served you quite well up to this point. Things at work go wrong that shouldn't go wrong. The same mistakes and errors keep getting made. You express frustration, possibly even anger that yet another error has occurred, and that translated into wasted time on your end. You're an Objectivist. You want to be Productive. You want to be Proud. But the "Office Manager" says you're just being "negative," and that's wrong. You should be "positive." Your problem is not solved. Several co-workers are angry that a series of suppliers have screwed up several important orders, again. They won't arrive on time for our customers' events, and they won't be happy. Your co-workers complain to the office manager, expecting to get a sympathetic ear, or, at least, an alternative course of action. Instead, they're told to be "positive" with the incompetent suppliers, because that "might work." The problem(s) is (are) not solved. You're approached by the owner of the company who asks a question about a problem you haven't been able to solve. You're frustrated at the lack of resolution. He complains that you're being "negative." The problem is not solved. Worse, you realize the office manager's po-mo wanking religion has infected the owner! Your job suddenly feels like the set of The Walking Dead. If you can't find a rational mind in your boss, where can you find one? What this office manager is telling everyone at this establishment is this: Dismiss the workings of your mind. Reality is subjective. Moral certainty is not only wrong, but impossible. Your moral judgment is worthless compared to mine. Having faith in magic words is better than knowing what to do and doing it. That there is something wrong with you for even having a moral judgment outside of a "positive" one, or expressing it in a way she doesn't personally approve. Being "positive" means what she thinks it means, but is never explained or explored. Your understanding of the concept be damned. For an Objectivist, telling one to reject their rational judgment of reality in favor of something outside of it pretty much feels like outright bigotry. You know you can tear her position to pieces, because you have years of practiced experience at that, but should you? She's clearly, plainly, totally ignorant of the entire scope and sphere of ethical theory, and obviously practiced only at her own frozen abstraction of it. Thoughts about this? I'm very interested. | ||||
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