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I was having a conversation with an Objectivist lately about the tenets of Objectivism, and I was directed toward this forum section to try to get answers. Part of Objectivist philosophy is egoism, but as far as I can see, egoism leads to socialism when it is adopted on a societal scale. Here is how I see it: Egotistical people, almost by definition, care greatly about "getting theirs". When there is a critical mass of egotistical people in any society and they aren't "getting theirs", they band together and begin using socialism to take from "the rich" who "already have theirs". And that's how they "get theirs". This is especially true when said society is an electoral democracy where the masses of people, for better or worse, have the authority to choose who governs on the basis of the greatest number of votes. In other words, they clearly turn to socialism as a mechanism to service their egoism. To use an Atlas Shrugged example: Fred Kinnan is an apt example of what most people would consider an egoist. He's a fatcat union boss who blatantly leverages socialism in the service of his egoism. The vast majority of socialists are just like Fred Kinnan. They hate it when they are called on that, but that's what they are.
