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Anylesca

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Posts posted by Anylesca

  1. Principles apply only within certain contexts. They always apply within those contexts and it does one no benefit to just throw them aside because you simply don't WANT them to be true in those contexts, but they do not apply outside those contexts. I mentioned in your other thread that you being a minor is an important part of the context of your life right now. Objectivism is primarily a guide for adults to go about successfully guiding their individual lives. While one is still a child, one doesn't have the same capacities as an adult to be able to go about their life the same way adults can and should, thus the existence of parents who can, should, and do place various controls on children under their charge whether the children agree with them or not, controls which very often they could not properly enact with other adults. The adults, especially as the child gets older, may or may not actually know better than the child on any given subject about what is actually right and best for the child, but so long as the child's rights as a child are not violated, it just comes with the territory that you may have to go along with many things your parents decree that you don't agree with. Doing so is not immoral though at all because, as a child, you don't have the same capacities as an adult does and therefore cannot be held to the same expectations of how you should go about existing as they do. Adults morally have to judge for themselves and make their own way in the world following those judgments. Kids though, you aren't ready yet. If you have to do things your parents decree that aren't really so good for you, go ahead and do so, but the parents are the ones guilty here as the adults, not the kid.

    I understand where you're coming from, but it is hard for me to completely agree. I will be 18 in six months. If I am not ready now to make at least most of my own decisions, what will change in these six months that will prepare me?

  2. P.S. I'm editing this because I feel a little guilty about talking to a teenager about love without further explanation. Both in my personal experience, and from what others tell me, teenagers confuse infatuation with love. You should also learn what love really is (as part of that first step), don't make the mistake of acting on your feelings for someone you don't even know very well.

    I find everything you said very helpful, and I appreciate it (that goes for everyone else too). I do believe that I know the difference between infatuation and love, because I've grown from bad experiences in the past. I'm sure I have a lot more to learn, but I know the basic difference, and I know that love is based on shared values (am I right?) as well as feeling strongly connected to the person in various ways, to sum it up very, very shortly. Infatuation doesn't feel the same. Without something more, it feels empty to me.

  3. John Galt was someone who didn't compromise his right to live, and what he thought was right. He went as far as being tortured to stand up for it, and he would have died for it as well (I assume). I'm just wondering how extreme this is? How do we apply this to reality? For example, how far should one go in doing what they think is right, and in expressing and going after what they want, when their parents say no? Or when the government is doing something wrong? I know someone who sees these things in black and white, that you should always do what you think is right no matter the consequences or hardships, and I would like to know your thoughts about it.

  4. My boyfriend and I have been dating for almost six months. In the beginning, we worked really well together. About two or three months in, he introduced me to Atlas Shrugged, which I read and loved. It seemed very right to me, and I wanted to become an Objectivist. But ever since then, we've fought off and on, because he's been pushing me to become more objectivist. It's been difficult. I've never fought my parents before. They are rather strict and not very flexible, generally nice people, but not objectivists at all. I've been pushing more and more for what I want (when I think it's right and it makes sense), like spending more time with my boyfriend. Last Monday things finally escalated. My BF was very upset with me because I had cancelled on him/not been able to hang out over the past three weeks, because I had been grounded and though I tried to fight it a few times, it was always a huge struggle, I never got to hang with him because of the fights with my parents, and they were threatening to kick me out (or try to send me to another state). So I went over to his house after school to try to make it up to him. My mom showed up about half an hour in, and then my dad came a few hours later. We argued for almost four hours outside his house. By some miracle, we came to a compromise in which I could have more freedom if I kept on top of what I needed to (I have a busy schedule). Tuesday we were going to hang out, but I forgot about an appointment I had at the same time. I had an event scheduled later that night, but it got cut down. So I would've had time to make it up to him, but I didn't think of it; I put it off to Wednesday. So he started telling me that I didn't make time for him. He cancelled something Wednesday so we could hang out on the condition that I went snowboarding with him and a friend that weekend. I shouldn't have agreed. I should've known I wouldn't have been able to convince my parents. I didn't want to lose everything I had gained... I thought I had it all, but I stopped thinking. Now he's breaking up with me, tired of not being able to see me and always taking on a paternal role of reprimanding me for my mistakes and lack of thought. I love him so much even though we've grown apart because of my grounding and all the fighting... what can you do when you face a life of grey, a life without joy and color, but you know up until now you've never been able to do enough to keep it anyway....? What can you do? How do you feel more passionately? I feel like there's something wrong with me... I can feel the deepest sadness (that I know) but I can't fulfill my potential for joy... I don't feel passionately about what's right, even when I know it is... I mean, sometimes I do. Like when I went to his house Monday... but other times I feel like I can't move... what's wrong with me? Sorry, I don't want to sound like a person who just complains and does nothing. Not objectivist of me. But I don't know what to do anymore. Don't hold back in your criticism or anything you want to say.

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