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JASKN

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Well, all of you who approve of and enjoy this nihilistic film, despite it being unrepentently hateful of life, you will probably really go wild over this:

http://newsbusters.org/blogs/warner-todd-h...ch-out-watchmen

enjoy!

John Donohue

You tell others in this thread not to judge you poorly for disliking a movie about "Hate for hate's sake." And yet, reciprocally, you accuse every single person who disagrees with you on the artistic quality of this movie, on this Objectivist forum, of being a Nihilist and hating life.

Is it not possible that liking or disliking any art which does not fall under the genre of Romanticism is an OPTIONAL value? And being an optional value, is it valid to judge someone's character based on this optional value?

If you dislike chocolate ice-cream, is every person in the world, ever, who likes chocolate ice-cream a nihilistic, life hater?

I approve of and watch many movies which seem nihilistic, and many characters who are sociopathic, for exactly the same reason that I approve of and watch documentaries depicting images of concentration camps after the Holocaust, and for exactly the same reason I approve of and watched the movies which came out depicting the horrible events at 9-11. I believe it is necessary for man to have a very clear image of evil in his 'pocket' at all times, that he must know the details, causes, and habits of the greatest evils in the world, that when faced with such evils a man may more easily identify and destroy them.

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I am aware of that, but the movie is not the book.

There is no essential difference except the medium. This story is not the Coen brothers creation, though yes, the movie is. Are they responsible for choosing to recreate this story? Sure. Are they responsible for the creation of the story? No, not when they follow it so closely.

If they wanted to change the story, they had that option, or they could've picked a different story.

But they didn't, that's my point. They "faithfully" retold the story created by Cormac McCarthy.

I don't know for sure that the entire movie isn't just the book's content transcribed to a different medium, I can only assume it isn't based on what I know about the Coens' work

I have read the book. In every essential way, it is. I'm not asking you to believe me (if it were really important I'd assume you would read the book yourself), I'm just telling you I have read the book and seen the movie. The movie is the story (and theme) presented in the book just in a different medium.

Well, all of you who approve of and enjoy this nihilistic film, despite it being unrepentently hateful of life, you will probably really go wild over this:

Why? Or is that something else you highly informed about that you don't wish to present an argument on? A cheap dig at people who enjoyed the film?

I haven't seen it yet so I couldn't tell you whether or not I'll go wild about it.

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"You tell others in this thread not to judge you poorly for disliking a movie about "Hate for hate's sake." "

No, I did not ask to not be judged harshly.

"And yet, reciprocally, you accuse every single person who disagrees with you on the artistic quality of this movie, on this Objectivist forum, of being a Nihilist and hating life."

No I did not. That charge is emphatically rejected. I accused the FILM of being nihilistic and hateful of life.

The rest of your post is void because of these two grave errors. I request an apology.

John Donohue

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"You tell others in this thread not to judge you poorly for disliking a movie about "Hate for hate's sake." "

No, I did not ask to not be judged harshly.

"And yet, reciprocally, you accuse every single person who disagrees with you on the artistic quality of this movie, on this Objectivist forum, of being a Nihilist and hating life."

No I did not. That charge is emphatically rejected. I accused the FILM of being nihilistic and hateful of life.

The rest of your post is void because of these two grave errors. I request an apology.

John Donohue

You ignore the idea that we could enjoy movies for the skill they took to produce repeatedly. excluding skill the only other reason for appreciation is theme. So by saying that we would enjoy a nihilist themed movie you imply we enjoy the nihilist themes. You can either acknowledge that some have different tastes than you in movies or that you did try and insult us by insulting a movie and saying everyone who disagrees with you would enjoy it.

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......They "faithfully" retold the story created by Cormac McCarthy.

....The movie is the story (and theme) presented in the book just in a different medium.

the movie left out a few details that makes the story make a little more sense (but doesn't change it's bad sense of life):

cigurgh (and his crew, not shown in the movie) are on a mission to show a big gangster (also not shown in the movie) that the gangster's money and dope couriers are incompetent, lazy, and not to be trusted. while, his, cigurgh's boys, can be trusted to get a job done as planned.

this explains why cigurgh kills the 2 gangsters who show him the massacre in the desert.

cigurgh aims to be the 'best' of his profession. to show that he is a 'master', he allows himself to be captured by the highway deputy just to see if he can get out of the situation.

at the end of the book, he returns the money to the big gangster to show his competence; the ganster and he then agree to do business.

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When I see Moore's creations, I see the manifestation of the anarchist's viewpoint of the world. It is a very effective vehicle to demonstrate the consequences of those particular philosophies. Moore paints the world through bloodsoaked glasses- not as it is, but as his ideas say it is: predators at every corner and decay but a whisper away. This is not because man is evil and his course is inevitable destruction, but because it is an intrinsic part of any anarchism/socialism/nihilism/environmentalism that humanity be reviled and painted at the worst possible level, and then pretending that is the whole of humanity at its core- all of its achievements must be considered nothing but hubris causing affrontery against 'the natural order'.

Moore is fantastic because of that. In no better place can you find the tools to show someone the ultimate repercussions of these ideas, which you can then spice up with a well placed "Here is the world you want. You want to live there?"

Tragedies and dystopias are excellent for demonstrating the total outcome of philosophies that call for sacrifice, social obligation or total obedience to one power or another. Even if the writer is not rational, the outcome (his work) cannot help but reflect the premises under which it was written. When used by writers with a mind- such as Rand in "We the Living"- tragedy can become inmensely effective. Tragic Operas of the Romanticism such as Lucia Di Lammermoor share themes in common with We THe Living-- in Lucia's case, the outcome of the manipulation of people under an oppressive system (here being Feudalism) ends in the same result- death.

I don't like Moore much, and Rorschach is no Objectivist hero but rather a distortion of objectivism through an anarchist's eyes -- Rorschach is, after all, insane and psychopathic, which of course has Moore implying that only a madman would see things 'in black and white'. Here is a snippet of an interview with Moore:

Moore: I learned pretty quickly about the sources of Steve Ditko's ideas, and I realized very early on that he was very fond of the writing of Ayn Rand.

CBA: Did you explore her philosophy?

Moore: I had to look at The Fountainhead. I have to say I found Ayn Rand's philosophy laughable. It was a "white supremacist dreams of the master race," burnt in an early-20th century form. Her ideas didn't really appeal to me, but they seemed to be the kind of ideas that people would espouse, people who might secretly believe themselves to be part of the elite, and not part of the excluded majority.

I would basically disagree with all of Ditko's ideas, but he has to be given credit for expressing these political ideas. I believe some feminists regard Dave Sim in much the same light; they might disagree with everything he says, but at least there is some sort of sexual-political debate going on there. So I've got respect for Ditko.

A few years ago, I was in a local rock band called "The Emperors of Ice Cream, "and one of our numbers that always went down very well live, was a thing called, "Mr. A." The beat and the tune of it were completely stolen from "Sister Ray" by the Velvet Underground, but the lyrics were all about Steve Ditko.

CBA: "Right/wrong, black/white"? [laughter]

Moore: One of the verses was, "He takes a card and shades one-half of it in dark, so he can demonstrate to you just what he means/He says, 'There's wrong and there's right, there's black and there's white, and there is nothing, nothing in-between.' That's what Mr. A says." [laughter] And then we'd go into the chorus. Yeah, it was a Velvet Underground thrash, but with lyrics about Steve Ditko, which were very sympathetic, because at that time, I'd heard that Steve Ditko was pretty much harmless, living at the YMCA or something like that. This was, I think, during Spider-Man's anniversary year, and I thought that was criminal.

Steve Ditko is completely at the other end of the political spectrum from me. I wouldn't say that I was far left in terms of Communism, but I am an anarchist, which is 180° away from Steve Ditko's position. But I have a great deal of respect for the man, and certainly respect for his artwork, and the fact that there's something about his uncompromising attitude that I have a great deal of sympathy with. It's just that the things I wouldn't compromise about or that he wouldn't compromise about are probably very different.

Even if they have morals you don't agree with, a person with strong moral code is a person who has a big advantage in today's world.

So, yes, there is very little of Moore's work that I can actually like: He has no likable characters, as they all operate under the premise that man is incapable of doing any good, and whatever good he may do will inevitably come to destruction. Rather I look at Rorscharch and Moore's characters as an example of how, to an anarchistic mind, it is impossible to aspire for the best in the world and wish to make it so-- the primary tenement of Moore's philosophy is the clause of perversion. Logically, any good is impossible and all that we can do is merely survive in this world by any means possible until it is our time to die.

Even with some of Terry Pratchett's erroneous ideas, I would say that his character (and powerhouse) Granny Weatherwax is closer to being an Objectivist hero than any of Moore's intentional Objectivist characters (i.e. Rorschach) could ever be.

I do think that Moore's philosophy is encased in a Malignant Universe premise, and there is much of it that hates man. However, I don't think that seeing the movie is a reprehensible act any more than reading Kant and Hegel and other such incompetent philosophers is. Reading Moore's work, I learned to see through the anarchist eyes and what kind of world they wanted for themselves, just as reading Kant allowed me to understand the fallacy of his premises that came from his trying to armwrestle reality into giving him a space for God to exist (and the only way he could do that was to cripple reason so as to make it unrecognizable). In a way, it is not unlike my childhood Catholic background (and my six years of theology under the Jesuits) giving me an advantage as far as having internal knowledge of the weak points of the church's philosophical stance, and how you may undermine their arguments by knowing what curtains to look behind. When it comes to philosophy you have your allies and your opponents- and the best thing you can do is to know your opponents as well as you know yourself (where humanly possible).

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hmmm. Someone tell me why Rand loved Dostoyevsky, even though she admitted he wrote with a sense of life that was diametrically opposed to hers.

Methinks a few should check out the following: http://www.aynrandbookstore2.com/prodinfo.asp?number=LP50M

I don't know anything about the movie, but one can obtain value from philosophically flawed art. It is not the same sort of emotional value, but it can be value none the less. I am not making any sort of representations of this particular movie. It may be that it's crap, but not solely on the basis that it portrays a negative sense of art. Nor does that mean that the reasons someone has a certain psychological response to it (whether good or bad) are necessarily valid.

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Yes, one can learn from a great work of art that is also not life-affirming. But it has to be great. Have you actually LISTENED to the lecture you linked? Did you grasp "...by focusing on how art teaches man to use his consciousness" and can you show how that even remotely kicks in on this film?

This film? Total hate and vile, with no glimpse of anything life-affirming. If you actually knew Leonard, whose famous quote about films is (joking but also serious) "I denounce everything", and what film he was approving in that moment, you will very likely guess that he would stomp on this film with every bone in his body. That is my opinion.

John Donohue

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That's okay, I was giving you a chance to retract your smear. I don't care if it stands, in all it's dishonesty.

That's okay, you threw your own jab in there at a lot more people with the bit about the Watchmen movie. Feel free to retract that lest you be concerned about anyone's credibility.

I think everyone gets that you don't see how YOU can derive any value from NCFOM. It seems that other people can without it being a negative reflection on their sense of life or objectivity.

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Yes, one can learn from a great work of art that is also not life-affirming. But it has to be great. Have you actually LISTENED to the lecture you linked? Did you grasp "...by focusing on how art teaches man to use his consciousness" and can you show how that even remotely kicks in on this film?

This film? Total hate and vile, with no glimpse of anything life-affirming. If you actually knew Leonard, whose famous quote about films is (joking but also serious) "I denounce everything", and what film he was approving in that moment, you will very likely guess that he would stomp on this film with every bone in his body. That is my opinion.

As I said, I'm not analyzing the film. I'm dealing with your particular analysis of it. A "glimpse of something life afirming" is not the standard of greatness, and if you want to claim it is then provide the analysis that supports that standard. A positive sense of life does not confer greatness, nor does a negative sense of life confer rot. I haven't seen you use the principles from that lecture in your analysis yet. You've seen the movie. I've not. You may be absolutely correct that the film is vile piece of work. I'm just questioning anyone who says that solely because a work has a negative sense of life that it is vile art, as incorrect.

Peikoff indicates that Anna Karennina is his all time favorite work and that 100 pages in he wanted to throw it across the room. (or maybe that was Lisa Van Damme in her Russian short stories class this year where she referred to that lecture and the principles from it in her analysis of extremely depressing Russian literature - which I took.)

I also try not to psychologize either Peikoff, or the person with which I'm having a discussion. What you think about what Peikoff would think about the film is irrelevant, and useless speculation. And I'm sure you don't have the slightest clue what I would actually guess about anything. Should I demand an apology as well?

Edited by KendallJ
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I will not be retracting the notion that those who can, incredibly, derive pleasure from this Coen masterpiece might also go wild over other works filled with the same sense of life and character types. That is a sound conclusion, unless the incident of taste for said people is random.

If, as suggested by one person above, the Watchmen film is instead about one life-affirming character, then gee that would be astounding. I'll retract at that point; not the logic of my notion, but on the realization of this miracle.

meanwhile, "...It seems that other people can [derive any value from NCFOM] without it being a negative reflection on their sense of life or objectivity."

Outside of a repulsive but somehow necessary study of a sick entertainment, yes, that is amazing that people are claiming that. I have learned something.

John Donohue

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you are juxtaposing "great" and "vile." That takes your argument off track.

Believe me, I will not lend an ounce of my time in attempting to find the "greatness" of this thing, which then might justify wading in to 'learn' something.

John Donohue

I think the general idea among most of us is to to force you to agree with us. Yet that is what you are trying to do. Your basic argument amounts to the movie was bad and evil and there is no value because of that. We, being different people with different tastes, might differ in opinion. So why do you feel the need to berate and judge us on our opinions of one movie?

Here's a fairly relevant quote by Ayn Rand

Speaking of one’s ability to know another’s sense of life, now might be a good time to make a request: Please don’t send me records or recommend music. You have no way of knowing my sense of life, although you have a better way of knowing mine than I have of knowing yours, since you’ve read my books, and my sense of life is on every page. You would have some grasp of it-but I hate to think how little. I hate the painful embarrassment I feel when somebody sends me music they know I’d love-and my reaction is the opposite: It’s impossible music. I feel completely misunderstood, yet the person’s intentions were good. Nobody but my husband can give me works of art and know infallibly, as he does, that I’ll like them. So please don’t try it. It’s no reflection on you or on me. It’s simply that sense of life is very private.

In short please just stop trying to judge everyone else. If you want to discuss the movie do so in a more respectful and relaxed manner.

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Outside of a repulsive but somehow necessary study of a sick entertainment, yes, that is amazing that people are claiming that. I have learned something.

John Donohue

I'll take that to mean amazing to you.

I concur with fountainhead777;

In short please just stop trying to judge everyone else. If you want to discuss the movie do so in a more respectful and relaxed manner.
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:::: refraining from counter posting hundreds of pages of quotes from Miss Rand on the power and importance of art and judging it. :::::

Fine. Art is just arbitrary happenstance of sense of life. Aesthetics is a branch of philosophy, but taste for film and literature is just random and blown in the wind. Movies have no actual effect on the culture and who knows, one film you might like and the next one, not so much, but it does not mean anything.

So this thread should just be a pole. Certainly no one should comment on another person's taste. So I retract my public puking over people getting pleasure from this ....thing....and take my opinions private. I will not post on this any further. You have my vote in the pole; I did not like it.

Funny though: in this culture most of the time people don't say "I liked it" or I didn't like it", which would be appropriate since taste is random. They usually say "It was great, you have to see it." or "It sucks."

John Donohue

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